Sám Khán [the colonel of the Armenian regiment ordered to
carry out the execution] accordingly set out to discharge his duty. A spike was
driven into a pillar which separated two rooms of the barracks facing the
square. Two ropes were fastened to it from which the Báb and one of his
disciples, the youthful and devout Mírzá Muhammad-‘Alí-i-Zunúzí, surnamed Anís,
who had previously flung himself at the feet of his Master and implored that
under no circumstances he be sent away from Him, were separately suspended. The
firing squad ranged itself in three files, each of two hundred and fifty men.
Each file in turn opened fire until the whole detachment had discharged its
bullets. So dense was the smoke from the seven hundred and fifty rifles that
the sky was darkened. As soon as the smoke had cleared away the astounded
multitude of about ten thousand souls, who had crowded onto the roof of the
barracks, as well as the tops of the adjoining houses, beheld a scene which
their eyes could scarcely believe. The Báb had vanished from their sight! Only
his companion remained, alive and unscathed, standing beside the wall on which
they had been suspended. The ropes by which they had been hung alone were
severed.
- Shoghi Effenid (‘God Passes By’)
