The capture of the governor of Warsaw. The Germans entered Warsaw on August 5, 1915 as the Russians continued to retreat before the joint German-Austro-Hungarian Gorlice-Tarnow Offensive launched on May 2, 1915.

Gefangennahme des Gouverneurs von Warschau

Feldskizze.



Arrest of the governor of Warsaw

Field sketch.



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Logo: W&N AGL No. 151

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Territory that would become Poland at the end of the war lay, in 1914, in Polish Russia, northeastern Austria-Hungary, and eastern Germany. Through much of the war, the Eastern Front lay or moved back and forth across Poland.

The Battles of Ivangorod and Lodz in October 1914, the Gorlice-Tarnow Offensive in 1915, that of Brusilov in 1916, and Kerensky's in 1917 were fought across this land.

As the Russian, Austro-Hungarian, and German empires fell, Poland rose on territory from each.

United States President Woodrow Wilson presented his Fourteen Points for a peace settlement to Congress on January 8, 1918. Number 13 called for an independent Polish state with access to the Baltic Sea.

While Austria-Hungary celebrated peace with Ukraine in February 1918, Poles mourned the loss of a hoped-for Poland. A general strike was declared in Warsaw, Cracow, and Lemberg and the Polish Council of Ministers resigned.

In October, 1918, Poles demanded an independent nation unifying ethnic Poles, based in Russian Poland but incorporating ethnic Poles in the lands of the swiftly-disintegrating Austro-Hungarian Empire. Warsaw, Russia's third largest city, would be the capital. Ignoring the struggling and seemingly failing Bolshevik regime in Russia, the Poles contended with Ukraine for its boundaries in Galicia.

On October 28, Galicia announced it would become part of a Polish state.

Poland defeated Ukraine in the Polish-Ukranian War (November 1, 1918 to July 18, 1919).

Poland defeated the new Soviet Russia and Ukraine in the Polish-Soviet War (February 14, 1919 to October 18, 1920).

Poland is a country in Europe.