The Turkish Gazetekarinca news website covers stories of Armenian Genocide survivors, and this time it has covered the story of the family of famous Armenian American rock musician Derek Sherinian.

Sherinian managed to find his relatives in Armenia through a photo portraying two Haiduk women, one of which was Sherinian’s maternal great-grandmother, Elizabeth Yazijian.

Elizabeth was born into a family of a wealthy Armenian diamond cutter and grew up in Arabkir. During the Hamidian massacres in the 1890s, some members of the Yazijian family were forcefully Islamized and saved from being killed, while others refused to convert and were later hung.

However, the greatest hardship that the family faced was in 1915 when the nationalist groups come to their home and kill Elizabeth’s relatives. The woman is saved by a miracle. Elizabeth faints when she sees how her brother is executed, and the bandits think she is dead when they see her on the floor.

After losing her family, Elizabeth joins the Armenian self-defense groups. To save her daughter, Mariam (Derek Sherinian’s grandmother), who was 2 years old at the time, Elizabeth sends her to the United States of America for safety purposes.

According to an agreement, Elizabeth’s friends were supposed to take care of Mariam until the end of the war, but as soon as they arrive in the United States, they hand Mariam over to a wealthy American couple who had no children.

After the war, Elizabeth travels to the United States of America in search of her daughter, but Mariam, who didn’t know that she was adopted, doesn’t believe Elizabeth. Elizabeth doesn’t have any evidence and can’t prove it to her daughter or the court. In despair, she returns to Greece where she starts a new family, but doesn’t forget Mariam and continues to send her letters that remain unanswered. She also sends the famous photo along with one of the letters.

When she matures, Mariam tries to find her mother, but in vain. In 1946, Elizabeth and her family repatriate to Armenia. The Soviet authorities accuse her husband of spying for England and exile him to Siberia. Elizabeth dies in Yerevan in 1972.

Elizabeth’s generations reunited in 2015 when the famous American musician shared his grandmother’s story during an interview and showed the photo that is very famous in Armenia. Elizabeth’s Armenia-based grandchild Marina Yazijian recognizes the grandmother’s photo, after which she contacts Sherinian. The family meets for the first time in April 2015 when Derek comes to Armenia to participate in the events dedicated to the Centennial of the Armenian Genocide.

When talking about his feelings during those days, the famous musician said: “My recent visit to Yerevan was very important for me. It was hard to be there on the Centennial of the Armenian Genocide in terms of emotions, but my cousins, whom I hadn’t known until then, were by my side. They took me to see the tomb of Elizabeth. It truly seemed to be a scene from a film,” writes ermenihaber.am.