| Primary Source |
| International
| East Europe | Poland | [P|S|M] |
Declaration of Russia respecting Poland |
August 15, 1914
(The Times, August 17, 1914)
Poles. - The hour has sounded when the sacred dream of your fathers and your grandfathers may be realized. A century and a half has passed since the living body of Poland was torn in pieces, but the soul of the country is not dead. It continues to live, inspired by the hope that there will come for the Polish people an hour of resurrection, and of fraternal reconciliation with Great Russia. The Russian Army brings you the (p.66) solemn news of this reconciliation which obliterates the frontiers dividing the Polish peoples, which it unites conjointly under the sceptre of the Russian Tsar.
Under this sceptre Poland will be born again, free in her religion and her language. Russian autonomy only expects from you the same respect for the
rights of those nationalities to which history has bound you. With open heart and brotherly hand Great Russia advances to meet you. She believes
that the sword, with which she struck down her enemies at Gruenwald, is not yet rusted. From the shores of the Pacific to the North Sea the Russian armies are marching. The dawn of a new life is beginning for you, and in this glorious dawn is seen the sign of the Cross, the symbol of suffering and of the resurrection of peoples.
| | R.B. Mowat, Select Treaties and Documents 1815-1916, Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1916,
pp.65-66 |
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