author

Helen Davenport Gibbons

1882–1960

An American journalist, lecturer, and author, she is best remembered for writing from direct experience after witnessing the 1909 Armenian massacres in Tarsus. Her work brings together eyewitness reporting, travel writing, and a strong humanitarian voice.

2 Audiobooks

Paris Vistas

Paris Vistas

by Helen Davenport Gibbons

The Red Rugs of Tarsus: A Woman's Record of the Armenian Massacre of 1909

The Red Rugs of Tarsus: A Woman's Record of the Armenian Massacre of 1909

by Helen Davenport Gibbons

About the author

Born in 1882, Helen Davenport Gibbons was an American writer who studied at Bryn Mawr and Simmons colleges. After marrying the journalist and historian Herbert Adams Gibbons in 1908, she traveled with him to the Ottoman Empire, where the couple spent time in Tarsus.

She became known for her firsthand account of the 1909 massacres of Armenians in and around Tarsus and Adana, later published as The Red Rugs of Tarsus in 1917. She also wrote A Little Grey Home in France, Paris Vistas, and Four Little Pilgrims, and contributed to magazines including The Century, Harper’s, and Pictorial Review.

During World War I, she lived in France for a time, where she helped found the relief group Sauvons les Bébés, said to have saved thousands of war orphans. She also worked as a lecturer with the YMCA and served as a correspondent for The Century Magazine at the 1919 Peace Conference. She died in Princeton, New Jersey, on September 1, 1960.