Today -100: January 25, 1919: Of Russian legions, prejudiced claims, prisoners, and extra meat

The War Dept says soldiers can stay in the army until they find jobs.

Former Tsarist Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Sazonov, in Paris (and in exile), asks for the Whites to be allowed to recruit volunteers from European countries to fight the Bolsheviks.

The council of the Allies warns that any country taking territory by force (this means you, Italy) would “seriously prejudice the claims of those who used such means and set up sovereignty by coercion.”

Rumor of the Day -100: Trotsky has been taken prisoner by the Estonians.

Bavarian Prime Minister Kurt Eisner orders that the extra ration of meat Duke Ludwig Wilhelm has been getting be stopped. What Eisner has against the 87-year-old unimportant member of the Wittelsbach family, who gave up his ducal rights long ago in order to marry the first of two actresses, is unclear.

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Today -100: January 24, 1919: Of sitting with assassins, evacuations, elections, and early recognitions

Former Tsarist Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Sazonov rejects the Peace Conference’s idea of a meeting between the contending (well, warring) Russian factions. He says he “will not sit with assassins” (that quote is in the banner headline but appears nowhere in the article).

The NYT reports that Minister of War Leon Trotsky and his forces are evacuating Petrograd and Trotsky has ordered the city surrendered without a fight.

The German federal election results are in. The Social Democrats have 163 out of the 421 seats, followed by the Zentrum (Catholic Center) Party, with 91 and the Democratic Party (DDP). The NYT’s headline focuses on the election of 34 women (women voted for the first time in this election), 15 of them SPD, the rest scattered among the other parties (except the dying National Liberals).

Headline of the Day -100:

Yup, that’s Poland alright, they’ll say.

Portuguese warships bombard the country’s second city, Porto. There are rumors (which the NYT reported as fact a day or two ago) that the deposed and exiled king Manuel is about to land.

There’s an uptick of anti-Semitism in Argentina and other South American countries.

And the Broomielaw Race Riot in Glasgow.

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Today -100: January 23, 1919: Leave Poles alone

The German government announces that the National Convention to draw up a new constitution will be held in Weimar instead of turbulent Berlin.

Headline of the Day -100: 

Germany responds to Britain’s complaint by saying that the British government is ill-informed about events in the East and anyway the Poles started it.

The Peace Conference adopts Woodrow Wilson’s proposal that all factions in Russia be invited to meet representatives of the Allies next month to sort Russia out. And there should be a cease-fire first. The communique assures the Russians that the Allies are not trying for a counter-revolution.

The Allies are totally trying for a counter-revolution. 

The smaller countries at the Peace Conference are beginning to realize that the Big Five intend to shut them out of significant decision-making.

The meeting of the Irish Dáil Éireann comes off without a hitch (or a police raid), and chooses an Irish Cabinet. Censors prevent the Dublin newspapers from publishing the declaration of independence.

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Today -100: January 22, 1919: Why should we not be masters in our own house?

Headline of the Day -100:

Good luck with that, guys. Prince Faisal of the Kingdom of Hejaz says the Arabs have an even greater right to independence than the new states in Europe “since we are the oldest democracy in the world.” That’s Prince Faisal saying that. “Why should we not be masters in our own house?” he asks.

Also looking for independence, 25 of the people elected to the British Parliament from Ireland (the rest being in prison or exile) constitute themselves as an Irish Parliament (Dáil Éireann), declare Irish independence, adopt a provisional constitution, and appoint a delegation to present Irish claims to the Peace Conference. 2/3 of that delegation are currently in prison, leaving only Count Plunkett, a name I will never stop finding amusing. The TDs (that’s the term in 2019, I’m not sure what this group called themselves) have some difficulties trying to conduct the meeting in Gaelic.

Ex-king Manuel of Portugal changes his mind and says he’d be willing to take back the throne after all, now that the war is over and with the assassination of President Sidónio Pais last month and everything.

In the US Senate, Sen. Warren G. Harding says things are “drifting into chaos” in terms of reconstruction in the US and Wilson and his administration should “give up their idealism.” Evidently the first step in his campaign to become president is taking a firm anti-idealism stand. He thinks Wilson should have formalized a peace deal first thing, before he went around Europe being adored by the masses. Also, because Wilson kept talking about making the world safe for democracy, Harding thinks he’s personally responsible for Bolshevism, because logic. He says that in Europe, “If we must have anarchy on the one hand or hateful autocracy on the other, I choose autocracy.”

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Today -100: January 21, 1919: Of monarchists, trustworthy nations, resentful kings, and IQ

The Austrian government tells former Emperor Charles that unless the monarchist movements at home and abroad cease to agitate for his return, he will be banished from Vienna.

Lord Robert Cecil, the British foreign secretary until earlier this month and now in charge of League of Nation policy for Britain, says only “trustworthy” nations should be admitted to the League. Germany, Austria, Turkey and Bulgaria will be deemed trustworthy when their governments are not dominated by the military and no doubt a whole bunch of other criteria, and in Germany’s case when the present disorder is resolved.

Headline of the Day -100: 

Former Portuguese King Manuel II, deposed in 1910 when a republic was proclaimed, objects to the movement of soldiers who just occupied Porto and proclaimed the Monarchy of the North in his name without even asking him, which is just bad manners.

Columbia University will replace entrance exams with IQ tests.

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Today -100: January 20, 1919: Of radio aliens, bells, epilepsy, and roofs

In an interview, radio dude Guglielmo Marconi says he hopes to communicate with life on other planets. Indeed, he’s often received odd signals which just might be....

German National Assembly elections are held amidst riots and the occasional general strike. Spartacists, none too pleased about the murder of their leaders, seize bourgeois newspapers and disrupt voting.

Erich Ludendorff (who fled Germany at the end of the war) says he’s writing a completely impartial book that will totally exonerate him.

Italians in the regions of Italy which were occupied during the war ask to be given Austrian cannons to melt and make new church bells to replace the ones that were taken away by the Austrians to be made into cannons.

Prince John of England, King George V’s 6th kid, dies of epilepsy at 13. The official notice of his death is the first time his medical condition is revealed to the public.

Headline of the Day -100:

Jules Védrine wins a 25,000 franc prize for landing on a roof (offered before the war), which seems oddly specific. He lands on a department store roof in Paris. His plane is 36 feet wide, the roof 52 feet wide & 75 feet long. Védrine, who has the first pilot to beat 100 mph and hopes to fly around the world, will die in a crash in 3 months.

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Today -100: January 19, 1919: Good luck with that, guys.

The Peace Conference opens. The Germans, whenever they arrive, will oppose any terms that go beyond Wilson’s 14 Points.

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Today -100: January 18, 1919: Summary, if irregular, justice

The armistice is extended for another month.

Karl Liebknicht is reportedly shot dead while “attempting to escape.” And Rosa Luxemburg is reportedly beaten by a mob and shot dead by some rando and thrown in the canal. Both stories are, of course, bullshit (except for the canal part; it will be months before her body, um, surfaces): the two were tortured and then executed by the soldiers who held them, under orders from their commanding officer. Pre-meditated, in other words. The German press mostly blames her for her supposed mob lynching, for having aroused “the basest passions.” And so does the NYT, which calls their murders “a summary, if irregular, justice to the fomenters of robbery, murder, and anarchy.” It blames the thriving of the Spartacists on the hesitance of the Socialist government “to make the final test.” “These two leaders, the man violent but weak, the woman a termagant of the familiar revolutionary type, have perished miserably by the sword they drew.”

The press protest their exclusion from the peace negotiations, demanding the admittance of 5 journalists from each major country. The French newspapermen don’t join the protest, they’re not fussed. The Supreme War Council backs down and will allow in 3 reporters from each country, except when they don’t.

Another rumor of a counter-revolution breaking out in Petrograd. Lenin is evidently now in exile in... Barcelona.

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Today -100: January 17, 1919: They would drag us all down to the level of the lowest man

Nebraska is the 36th state to ratify the prohibition amendment, which means it is now the 18th Amendment to the Constitution. It will come into effect in a year. It will require Congress to pass enacting legislation, defining “intoxicating liquors” and setting up enforcement (the states also have enforcement powers).

Rosa Luxemburg has been “murdered,” according to a correct but sparse report. And Karl Liebknecht is reported captured by troops.

Some Montenegrins don’t want to be folded into Yugoslavia and are resisting Serb troops.

The Senate votes 50-21 to exonerate Robert La Follette of disloyalty for a 1917 speech in which he said that the sinking of the Lusitania was not a sufficient reason to go to war.

The Ebert government issues a draft constitution for Germany. Provisions include a 10-year term for an elected president and the partition of the country – and more importantly, Prussia – into entirely new states.

Spartacists are declaring separatist republics in Bremen and Brunswick.

46 members of the IWW are convicted of conspiracy to violate the Conscription Act. Federal prosecutor Robert Duncan told the jury, “They would drag us all down to the level of the lowest man. They do not recognize difference of ability in man, but would give the unworthy the same privileges for which the worthy have to strive so hard.” 43 of the Wobblies refused to speak or put on any defense. They will be sentenced to terms ranging from 1 to 10 years.

Headline of the Day -100: 

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Today -100: January 16, 1919: Of molasses. Sweet, murderous molasses.

Headline of the Day -100: 

This is the Great Molasses Flood, in which 21 Bostonians come to a sticky end as 2 million gallons of molasses run through the streets at 35 miles per hour, drowning people and horses, destroying buildings and crumpling elevated train tracks. There’s a book about this.

After all the talk about “open covenants of peace, openly arrived at,” the five Powers decide (supposedly over US and British objections) to keep the Versailles deliberations secret.

The NYT prints another story about how the Romanovs are totally still alive, at a monastery in the Urals.

You know who’s (also) not alive? Karl Liebknicht and Rosa Luxemburg. I think it’ll take a few days for their bodies to be discovered.

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Today -100: January 15, 1919: Where is the enemy?

Sen. William Borah (R-Idaho) attacks the idea of a League of Nations as requiring the maintenance of large militaries, including peace-time conscription in the US (actually the Peace Conference is talking about banning conscription. Oh, or maybe that hasn’t come up yet). Borah is also not fond of Navy Secretary Josephus Daniels’ plan for a huge navy, asking “Where is the enemy?”

The peace talkers have almost decided on whether the talks will be conducted wholly in French. They have allocated representation: 5 delegates for France, Britain, the US, Italy and Japan, 3 for Brazil for some reason, 2 for Belgium, Serbia (just Serbia, not the United Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes) no decision yet about the Croats and Slovenes), Greece, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, China, Canada, Australia, South Africa and India. 1 for New Zealand and Newfoundland. States which broke off diplomatic relations with Germany but didn’t declare war, like Portugal, get 1.  Decisions will have to be unanimous.

The Senate votes for a $5,000 pension (and franking privileges) for Theodore Roosevelt’s widow Edith.

The remnants of the Spartacists, having lost their revolution, are turning to looting and holding up casinos frequented by war profiteers, the NYT reports.

Former Kaiser Wilhelm now has a beard. It’s grey.

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Today -100: January 14, 1919: We have no policy in Russia

Sen. Hiram Johnson (R-CA) is frustrated that the Foreign Relations Committee is delaying action on his resolution asking the government for its rationale for keeping troops in Russia and he is frustrated at the White House for not responding. He says this shows “that we have no policy in Russia.” Troops yes, policy no.

Britain has tentatively suggested that the Bolshevik government be invited to the peace talks, along with the various competing White governments. No one else seems too keen.

The Japanese delegation arrives. The only non-whites at the conference presently, I believe. It’s still being worked out which countries will be represented and by how many delegates each, but China will be there and won’t be represented by Japan, which I can’t believe was ever seriously proposed but I guess it was.

That the peace talks seem to have accomplished so little is in part due to the powers spending more time talking about out how to remove the Bolsheviks from power in Russia.

Using heavy artillery, the German government defeats the Spartacists in Berlin. Prisoners are being executed, which is a first since the Revolution began in November. It won’t be the last time. Rosa Luxemburg writes, in what will be her last article, “the government’s rampaging troops massacred the mediators who had tried to negotiate the surrender of the Vorwärts building, using their rifle butts to beat them beyond recognition. Prisoners were lined up against the wall and butchered so violently that skull and brain tissue splattered everywhere.”

California is the 24th state to ratify the prohibition amendment. In so voting, the Legislature chooses to defy the results of the prohibition referenda held last November.

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Today -100: January 13, 1919: I would rather die than be forced to admit that civil war is prevailing

In the midst of trying to form a coalition government for Poland, Ignacy Jan Paderewski is shot, but not seriously injured.

Uruguayan police supposedly foil a Bolshevik plot for simultaneous revolutions there and in Argentina.

Grand Duchess Marie-Adélaïde announces her abdication; Luxembourg is now a republic, says the NYT, a bit prematurely.

Headline of the Day -100: 

Willing to shoot down their fellow countrymen, you know, “dependable.” Troops recapture the Vorwärts building (well, set it on fire after bombarding it. Not sure how useful it will be for putting out a newspaper now). This is followed by a parade of soldiers through Berlin to show who’s in charge. The Spartacist uprising spreads to Düsseldorf and...

“Infection.” Bavaria’s socialist Prime Minister Kurt Eisner says “I would rather die than be forced to admit that civil war is prevailing in Munich.”

The French General Staff is reportedly going to propose exiling ex-kaiser Wilhelm and all the male members of the Hohenzollern family to (French) Algeria.

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Today -100: January 12, 1919: Did you win the war in order to knit Ireland’s chains?

The NYT is pretty sure Karl Liebknecht has been machine-gunned to death. Nope.

I’ve been wondering: when did the NYT first have a corrections section? Does anyone know?

Headline of the Day -100: 

Not really a significant headline, just worth noting that Germany still has POWs, presumably darned pissed-off POWs, it hasn’t released 2 months after the armistice.

Sinn Féin hq in Dublin is raided. The police find pamphlets addressed to US soldiers asking “Did you win the war in order to knit Ireland’s chains?” and “We helped to win your independence. Will you help us to win ours?”

Knit?

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Today -100: January 11, 1919: When you have the entire bourgeoisie and three-fourths of the Berlin workmen with you, what can’t you do?

The NYT says Gen. Luis Dellepiane is now dictator of Argentina. He isn’t, but in his role as head of the police he is crushing a communist/anarchist strike/uprising in what became known as the Semana Trágica (tragic week).

In Berlin, the army tries to machine gun a plane dropping Spartacist leaflets. Where did they think it would crash if they succeeded in shooting it down?

The Ebert government, which is about to order soldiers to use military force against the Spartacists in Berlin, says “This whole Bolshevist uprising will be put down within the next three days. We are absolutely sure of our position. The entire bourgeoisie and three-fourths of the Berlin workmen are with us.” Also, possibly, Field Marshal Hindenburg, who it is rumored will be asked to lead the army against Berlin?

An ad placed by the Association Opposed to National Prohibition asks the question

Evidently “National Prohibition will compel a spy system similar to that of the overthrown Czar and the Kaiser.” Prohibition “will be the best excuse that can be offered to stir up strife among the people.”

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Today -100: January 10, 1919: On immigration, fighting in Berlin, and the secretary of the air

Congress is considering legislation to ban immigration by Bolsheviks, or just blocking almost all immigration for 2 or 4 years because you never know who might be a Bolshevik.

German troops beat back Spartacists in Berlin. Lots of shooting. Bavarian Interior Minister Erhard Auer threatens to send... I don’t know, the Bavarian Army?... into Berlin.

Italy is happily reconquering Libya.

Bolsheviks retake Vilna.

Lloyd George announces his new Cabinet: Austen Chamberlain will be chancellor of the Exchequer, Winston Churchill (still a Liberal) will be secretary for war and secretary of the air (yes, “secretary of the air” is a thing). Arthur Balfour will continue as foreign secretary. Sir Satyendra Prasanna Sinha, the former president of the Indian National Congress, will be under-secretary for India, the first Indian in the British government. It will be a largely Tory cabinet and will quietly sabotage LG’s election promises about housing and land for returning soldiers.

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Today -100: January 9, 1919: No one can tell what the Germans will do

The Spartacists, described by the NYT correspondent as “typical proletarians, some of whom affect even a more dilapidated appearance than is naturally their own,” are still out on the streets in Berlin. Fortunately, the Ebert government is prepared to engage them with reason and patience and...

Ebert and Philipp Scheidemann address crowds in front of the Chancellor’s palace.  Scheidemann says “This dirty mess has to be brought to an end” and  “If you men who have had military training will join us, you will get arms.” (Those quotes may be from 2 different such speeches). Increasingly, he will find what the kaiser was unable to find in November: German soldiers willing to use lethal violence against fellow Germans. A government proclamation says “Force can only be fought with force... The hour of revenge draws near.”

Which is the best false rumor about Russia published by the NYT today -100: 

1) another report that Czar Nicholas is still alive, according to a Morning Post correspondent who heard it from Grand Duke Cyril, who heard it from Prince M____, who heard it in a letter from the totally-not-dead Grand Duchess Tatiana, who said that the Bolshevik officer in charge of the execution didn’t care who he killed, as long as he had a body with its head blown off to show his bosses, so Count T____ insisted on taking the czar’s place.

or 2) Trotsky arrests Lenin and declares himself dictator?

The US has 12,941 soldiers in Russia.

Victor Berger, Socialist member of Congress for Wisconsin, is convicted along with 4 other Socialist Party leaders (Adolph Germer, William Kruse, J. Louis Engdahl and Irwin St. John Tucker) for disloyalty and sedition under the Espionage Act. The NYT says the conviction bars him from Congress. The House will debate this before expelling him. He will then win the special election and be barred again, then his conviction will be overturned by the Supreme Court and he’ll defeat the man they declared elected in his place.

US delegates to the Peace Conference have been suggesting that the blockade of Germany be lifted to prevent mass starvation, uphold the Ebert government, and prevent the spread of Bolshevism. France is ok with mass starvation in Germany.

British Prime Minister David Lloyd George asks soldiers, who have been demonstrating for demobilization to be sped up, for patience, saying it’s necessary to maintain a large army during peace negotiations. “Although the fighting has stopped, the war is not over. The German armies have not yet been demobilized and are still very powerful. No one can tell what the Germans will do, nor whether they will agree to the terms of the peace and reparation which we seek to impose upon them.” The soldiers are especially worried that they’re being retained so they can be sent to Russia, but the War Office denies this.

The British Labour Party accepts the position of Official Opposition for the first time, which means they get the good seats in Parliament.

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Today -100: January 8, 1919: The German menace is still there

While German political parties are reshaping themselves in preparation for Reichstag elections (which are being fought without much in the way of rallies and speeches), the Spartacists are seizing telegraph and newspaper offices. Radical Berlin Police Chief Emil Eichhorn was fired by the central government but refuses to go, saying “I received my position from the revolution, and I will only give it back to the revolution” (actually during the revolution in November he just walked into hq and said he was chief now, which isn’t quite the same thing). The government bans street gatherings (and secretly orders Freikorps, non-governmental organizations of former soldiers, to suppress the Spartacist rising).

Sen. Robert LaFollette objects to US troops being kept in Archangel to fight the Bolsheviks, especially with no war having been declared. Claude Swanson (D-Virginia) replies that they’re needed to protect Allied ammunition stores there, because we’re technically still at war with Germany, which wanted to keep Archangel as a u-boat base. “The German menace is still there, for Germany has shown that she is trying to influence the Bolsheviki. It is the Bolsheviki who are making the trouble, and it is to keep the trouble down that our men are being kept there, but back of it all is the German menace.” LaFollette replies that the Bolsheviks are not in fact friends with Germany but the evidence of this has been stifled by the censors. William Kenyon (R-Iowa) points out the the US soldiers don’t have the proper clothes for a Russian winter.

The US military is admitting to 132 deaths in the Northern Russia campaign (half from disease).

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Today -100: January 7, 1919: TR out

Former president Theodore Roosevelt is dead. Embolism, brought about by his history of tropical diseases and the bullet he still had in him from the 1912 assassination attempt and whatnot. Age 60, a reminder of how early he became president (43) and how young he was when his important public work was over.

Headline of the Day -100: 

Yeah, death’ll do that. Republicans, who had become grumpily reconciled to TR returning to the party as their 1920 presidential candidate, now have to find someone else. Speculation is focusing on Sen. Philander Knox, Gen. Leonard Wood, and Sen. Warren G. Harding. I really don’t know what Harding has ever accomplished to so distinguish himself.

We could have had a president named Philander. Imagine that.

US oil companies deny that they have come to an agreement with the Mexican government to pay royalties on oil extracted from their Mexican properties, insisting that their absolute “right” to their oil be respected. Mexico says they can drink all the oil they like. OK it doesn’t say that.

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Today -100: January 6, 1919: Of uprisings, kingdoms, mutilated soldiers, justice to peasants and Jews, united cigars, and fake Archies

The “January Uprising,” a hasty workers’ rebellion in Berlin, begins.

The Kingdom of Serbia is now the United Serbian-Croatian-Slovene Kingdom. Good luck fitting that on the stamps.

Headline of the Day -100: 

Romania grants citizenship to Jews born in Romania. And expropriates the lands of large landowners. “It is thus,” the Romanian ambassador to France writes to one of the Rothschilds, “that at one and the same moment the Government grants justice to our peasants and to our Jews”.

The United Cigar Stones Company will ask its customers to contribute to a fund to distribute (through the Red Cross) cigars, cigarettes and tobacco to wounded soldiers in hospitals in New York.

Someone claiming to be Archie Roosevelt, the former president’s son, has been sending telegrams to his acquaintances asking for money. And someone (the same person?) is impersonating him in hotels in Albuquerque. The real AR is recovering from war injuries in New York.

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