763.72119/2864

The Ambassador in France ( Sharp ) to the Secretary of State

No. 6794

Sir: I have the honor to enclose copy, with translation, of a note dated November 14, 1918, from the Royal Ministry for Foreign Affairs, which is an appeal that Montenegro be represented at the Peace preliminaries.

I have [etc.]

Wm. G. Sharp
[Enclosure—Translation]

The Montenegrin Minister for Foreign Affairs ( Popovitch ) to the Ambassador in France ( Sharp )

No. 2456

Mr. Ambassador: The negotiations between the heads of the Governments and the Ministers for Foreign Affairs of the Allied States being about to begin in Paris in order to prepare the peace preliminaries, the undersigned has the honor to address himself to Your Excellency in the hope that the Government of Montenegro will be represented thereat.

It is within the knowledge of Your Excellency that the right of Montenegro to take part in the Inter-Allied Conferences has been acknowledged by all the Allied Governments.

However, at the last Versailles conference the Montenegrin delegates were not mentioned, although our Government had requested in [Page 255] good time to be represented. It was attempted to justify this omission on account of the military character of the decisions to be taken at Versailles, Montenegro having no army at the front. Our Government regretted this exclusion, Montenegro being since many centuries essentially a military state and nearly always at war with Turkey and Austria. There is no need to add that Montenegro in these last wars, although small, has dared to stand up against the forces of Austria and beat them in several combats, and that it was only after four years of struggle heroically supported that it succumbed for the cause of the Allies, standing alone against three enemies. In spite of all its sacrifices Montenegro, in the most glorious period of the war and in the days of the armistice, had on the Eastern front and on the Franco-Belgian front, some thousands of soldiers in the service of the Allies in the Anglo-Canadian armies, in the French army (Foreign Legion and Army of Macedonia) and in the aviation. These soldiers, under the flags of the Allies, have shown themselves heroes and have won the highest military decorations.

The Montenegrin Government had declared at the second Inter-Allied Conference, which took place at Paris in December, 1917, (meeting of the commissions), that it was ready, if its organization in France were facilitated, to get together in a very short time, under the French high command, a legion of soldiers for whose qualities it offered every guarantee. Such a request had been presented at the beginning of 1916 after the fall of Montenegro. Thousands of Montenegrins in North and South America and in the other Allied and neutral countries impatiently awaited the call to put themselves at the sides of their brothers and Allies on the European fronts.

Furthermore, history has shown the importance of the Montenegrin rock in the central Adriatic region and in its relation to the other interior regions. Montenegro therefore had every right to take a place even at the military conference. Montenegro has been and will continue always to be a devoted and faithful Ally of the Allied Powers. The Royal Government therefore has the honor to address itself to the Government of the United States with the assurance that in the negotiations about to begin at Paris to prepare the peace preliminaries the place which is its by right shall be kept for it.

With assurances [etc.]

Eugene Popovitch