Romanian Campaign of 1918 .Resurrection.

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All during the War and of austrian occupation ,Bucovina has lived under the regime of the most absolutist dictature,military.The conception of the political leaders and military ones was that austria hase a great enemy outside -Russia and another one inside -the nationalities.The War has been started with the aim to defeat the external one;it was especially the wellcomed occassion to escape by the intern one,surpressing the iredentist movements .The orthodox population of Bucovina ,no matter if it was Rutean or Romanian ,was considered as Russophil one ,so dangerous for austria .The military commanders ,send here ,were trained that they would figth on two Fronts :with the Russian army in front and with the Russophil peasants in the back.Any Rutean and any Romanian was a suspect .in fact there was no Romanian ,intelectual or peasant ,to have taken part in the Russophil movement .Such that,the crime of austria against Bucovina ,is more the greater,as the Romanians were not guilty at all by the things imputed to them.

In this way ,the country has been filled by the geandarmery of Fischer ,comprised in a big net of espionaj.All suspects of Russophily were arrested ,accuzed of espionaj ,by brotherhooding with the enemy and treason of patria.Martial courts ,forr speeding the things ,were moving from one locality to another ,and in the intervals of the Russian occupation ,they functioned in the localities neighbour from Galitia ,Maramures or Transilvania .And because the juridic action did not seem expeditive enaugh ,it went down to sumar accuzations.Orders emanated either from general koves ,the commander of the Bucovinean Front ,or from his subalterns ,either from colonel Fischer ,were making appeal to the geandarms to not waste time with the sending of the "guilties" in front of the martial court ,but"to make them and the witnesses a short interogatory ,a short paper work and to be shot on the spot ,giving in this way an example ,perhorescent to the civilian population".

And at an order of count Meran ,the governor of Bucovina ,news the population that "the military commanders have strict order to shoot on spot anyone which would make himself even suspicious of treason or of any other enemy like conduct to the state"*

It may be understood easy the terror which unleashed in Bucovina .For four years the population moaned under the most terrorist regime .Arrestations based on a simple suspicion or a dennaunce ,unprobed,incarcerations in the camp of Thalerhof ,in Stiria ,nest of desintery ad exantematc typhus ,in which died up to 30 men a day ,hangings by the simple order of an officer or even geandarm ,degenerated monsters which made a sadistic pleasure to see hanging dead bodies by the trees from the forests ,by street lights or by the telegraph poles ,these are the effects of the fibrilations which created to colone Fischer a sad celebrity ,giving him the supername of "Father of the hanged ones" and has dirty with blood and mud the last years of the austrian regime .

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Ucrainean pretentions

When the blows received by austro-hungary from outside ,as from inside ,have made unavoidable the end of the Dualist Monarchy,Bucovina was finding herself in a dangerous situation .The presence of a Ruten population ,which after the tendentious statistics ,offical,would have wanted to surpass numericaly the Romanian autohtone population ,was giving the occassion to political combinations bad for the Romanians. The reality was though that the North of Bucovina was lived partly by Rutens which have come from Galitia .The South of Bucovina has remained though clean Romanian.The Rutean population awakened at the Rusian national conscience and her tendency was attaching to Russia.To counterballance this move ,austria created the Ucrainian ideea promissing to Rutens the entering in the political arena as special nation and the attachment of the territory lived by Rutens in Galitia and Bucovina to this pprojected Ucraine .In both cases ,Bucovina would have been lost for Romania .But the fate of the War wanted other way:austria and Russia collapsed ,and Ucraine has been pass in the register of birth certificates of the history at column born dead.

But the effects of the sneaky combinations of the austro-hungar politic would turmoil the normal unfolding of the solution of Bucovinean matter....During the tratatives at Brest-Litovsk ,pushed by the needs of austria alimentation,which was in hunger ,Czernin sold formaly Bucovina to Ucraine .By a secret dispozition of the treaty "the austrian government engages to make until 15th of July 1918 a plan of law by which to separate the Galitian territories by East of which population is in majority Ucrainean ,from Galitia of until now and to make them one together with Bucovina in a country of the crown.The austrian government obliges to give to this project the value of law.Until then she will take care to work with all powers to realize this goal".

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When however the principles of Wilson's evangely conquered the populations and gave the death blow to the secret diplomacy and of occulte combinations ,made on the back of the nations ,the Rutens seen themselves forced to give up to some of their pretentions .Not being able to deny the Romanian character of Bucovina ,they edged themselves to revendicate for the future Ucrainian state the Northern half ,until Siret River ,which tey reclaimed as Ucrainian.In the third case ,the worse one,they reclamed imediately the part between Nistru River and Prut River together with Cernauti ,remaining that over the middle region ,between Prut and Siret ,to be decided last.

The Romanians could not receive any compromise on this matter .The historic rights of Romania over Bucovina ,the Romanian character of the country ,which could not be altered by the presence of an intruding elements ,where beyond any doubt .Bucovina hase ben ripped by fraud and viollence from the bosom of mother country.Now ,when the fatal judgement of the history was hitting the culprit ,the stolen object had to return to the legitime owner .Just as for Alsacia -Lorena ,the dezannexation of Bucovina was requested by the historic justice and by the spirit of times.The hour of the events was imposing it as the only solution possible.Ucraine ,the artificial making of Czernin and Kuhlman ,were evaporating together with the retreat of the occupation troops austro-germans.austria desagregating,Galitia attaching to Poland ,Bucovina -too small to form a state -followed withot a doubt to attache to one of the neighbour states .This attachment could not be done but only in the way requested by the free will of her people.

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The manifest of Emperor Carol ,this funest voice of bell of the Dualist Monarchy ,did not comprised nothing related to Bucovina.Hussarek thought himself obliged to give some sort of explanations :"The matter of Bosnia and Hertegovina and the Romanian matter ,remain open ,given their connection with hungary...Bucovina would be ,as Trieste ,dependant directly by the central government ,Galitia would be shared ,remaining that the Polish parts to together with Poland ,and Galitia of East to form a state by herself...".The intentions of a solution philo-Ucrainean could be spotted from the evasive declarations of the austrian minister.

The Romanian deputies from Reichsrat of Vien protested against any veleity Ucrainian over Bucovina and proclaimed the necessity that the Romanians matter from Bucovina to be resolved together with the one of Romanians from hungary ,with which to form a state national unitar.According to the manifest of the Emperor and of the opportunity ,the Bucovinean deputies were seeing this state in the frame of a federalized austria,for the time being.The made a National Council and addressed to the Committe of the national Party from Transilvania for a commune action .The next day ,this was making ,by the voice of Vaida ,the memorable declaration ,by which the Romanian nation reclaimed for her the right to decide alone by her fate.The connections with austro-hungary were breaking .Now,the initiative of great events was not at Vien ,but at Cernauti.

*Balan T.,Suprimarea miscarilor nationale din Bucovina,Cernauti ,1923

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Free Bucovina

The Romanian intelectuals which remained in Bucovina are organizing,make to appear the newspaper "Glasul Bucovinei"(Voive of Bucovina) and start the campaign for solving the matter of Bucovina in the frame of Romanianaism.It wasn't too numerous at the beginning the groupation :a great deal of Bucovina intelectuals were in the Kingdom and in Basrabia .Soon though , all that felt and thought Romanian in Bucovina gathered around the tribune from where it sounded "glasul" of Romanian Bucovina.

The representatives of all political parties Romanian in Bucovina meet and summon for the day of 27th of October a gathering at Cernauti ,at which they call the Romanian deputies from parliament ,the former deputies of the diet of the province ,the Romanian mayors from all Bucovina and a number of intelectuals .The gathering is held in a solemn atmosphere and celebrating one.It proclaimes itself ,the Constituant Gathering ,in the power of national sovereignity and declares that"decides the unification of Bucovina with the three Romanian countries in a national state ,independent and will proceed in this aim in full solidarity with the Romanians from Transilvania and hungary".A National Council of 50 members is instituted by the Constituant Gathering to lead the Romanian nation from Bucovina ,to defend her rights and establish a tight connection between all Romanians ,being the only one in right to decide or negociate over the Romanian nation in Bucovina .The Constituant rejects with decissivness any trial which would have brought to the fate of Bucovina ;declares though that;wishes to understand with the nations around her".

The decissive step has been made .After almost a century and a half of slavery ,Bucovina has throwed the chains and,free on her faith ,was stretching now the arms towards brothers.The crowd manifesting on to the streets enters the hall of National Palace where constitutes the Council and hangs to the windows the Romanian tricolor(flag).Overwhelmed by emotion which was filling with tears everyone's eyes ,the octogenar priest Bejan ,which has opened the meeting of the Gathering ,salutes the youth and speaks the words of faithful Simeon:"Now release ,God,your slave ,because my eyes have seen the salvation of the hood!"

The National Council has delegate from within an Executive Committe ,ahead with Iancu Flondor ,which has to take over him the Bucovinean government .The governor of the country,Count Etzdorf ,continues though to keep in hands the administration of the province.

During this time ,the public order starts to be turmoiled .Bands of soldiers ,former prisoners freed and by ucrainian agitators ,givethemselves to unjust deeds.The Ucrainians devastate the military deposits and take the equipments ,arms and munitions .Antysemit excesses statr to produce through the villages .Count Etzdorf brings to the knowledge of Flondor that the ucraineans reclaim for them the right to govern the Northen part of the contry to Prut River ,leaving to the Romanians the Southern Part ,until Siret River ;the middle land ,between Siret and Prut ,to be considered ,until the final delimitation ,as a kind of condominium.At this solution agreed also the romanian deputy Aurel Onciu ,very known by his anty national activity ,manifested by all kinds of trials to break the Romanians from Bucovina ,insult the ones in the Kingdom ,mock the country and figth against interests and ideals of ROmanians.Flondor refuzes the proposition of the governor and communicates this one in the same time that,to defend the rigths of Romanians against any trial of country breaking and to ensure the quiet and order in the country ,he has intervened next to the Romanian Government in Iasi ,asking for Romania 's armed intervention in Bucovina.

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The Romanian Army in Bucovina

Flondor was right to take measures of precaution.At 6th of November ,the ucrainean representatives ,accompanied by an armed band ,make their apparition in the palace of the governor ,which they away and istall themselvs as government.Aurel Onciu is the accomplices of the Ucraineans ,ruining the quality of representative of Romanians ,which noone gave it to him.The Ucraineans pretend from the clerks the oath of faith -which the Romanian clerks refuse to give -and cover the walls of the city with proclamations.As delegate of this government of usurpers ,Onciu leaves to Iasi to protest against the sending of the Romanian Army .He finds however in Iasi all over closed doors,and the students make him a contondent manifestation.

The real missionary of Bucovina is Bodnarescu ,the delegate of the National Council ,which implores the fast sending of the Romanian Armies in the sister country ,which has throwed away her chains .H.M. the King and the Government haste to fulfil the request of the brothers.It is,after Basarabia ,the second Romanian province which needs the shield of the Romanian soldier ,to be able to afirm in all freedom the will to live a national life and to organize in quiet.The 8th Romanian Infantry Division ,under the Command of General Zadik ,receives the order to enter in Bucovina .

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In two days the Division has been set on foot of War with the men which could be gathered in haste.With big efforts could be made 3 Detachments :"Dragos","Alexandru cel Bun" and "Suceava" of 600 men each ,composed of soldiers of the Infantry Regiments 16th,29th and 37th ,to which have added also the frontier troops "Granicerii" and the geandarms ,which were making the watch on the frontier of Bucovina.Each detachment was completed with very few cavalry ,with two batteries of artillery ech and a group of machineguns,each.All over the effective of the Division was not more than 3000 men,thin dressed ,weakly provisioned ,but with high moral by the historic mission given to them.

At 8th of September ,the Romanian Army was crossing the old frontier -the unfast "cordon"strengthened by the unlaw made at 1775 and steped on brother land of Bucovina .The Romanian soldiers are received with a moving enthusiasm ,such that brothers long time waited are.No one has any doubts over the real character of this Expedition .It cannot be talk of a simple action of police.But mother country sends messengers to rebring to the bosom the kidnapped daughter .Bucovina,the oldest corner of the Moldavian Country ,which had the holly place of the Voevodal Chair and the graves of the voevods,was attaching again to the body of the mother country.Moldavia of Stefan cel Mare was rewholing.From the heights of old edifices of Musatinilor and Movilestilor (old Moldavian families) ,the bells ,which for centuries have sounded the danger and ravage,sounds now joyful of celebration .And the wind takes their echo further ,along the valleys which dive in the thick of the forests ,until the news arrives at the monastery where rests the old Voevod(Putna Monastery) ."under the rock in Putna ,the Saint ,after one hundred and thirty years of heavy sleep ,turmoiled by bad dreams ,has refound again his rest".

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At 9th of November ,an Romanian aeroplane announces ,by proclamations thrown from above ,the arriving of the liberating Army and in the same day ,the Ucrainian legoneers from Galitia ,which have mastered for a few days Cernauti city ,were running in horses gallop over Prut River.The day of 11th of November is the great day of the Capital of Bucovina.Ahead of the soldiers of Dragos Detachment ,General Zadik was entering in Cernauti ,as Alexandru cel Bun Detachment was traversing the city to cross to the North of Prut River.In the meetings room of Cutural Society of the National Palace ,Iancu Flondor ,surrounded by the members of the National Council ,salutes and embraces the Romanian General "as do all loving brothers which ,after a long and painful separation ,are reunited for to never be separated again ,ever". After this,the Commander of the Romanian troops is covered with flowers and carried on shoulders to his automobile .It has been the day of rebirth and triumph of the liberated Cernauti.

Under the presidency of Iancu Flondor was constituted a government of Bucovina ,under the form of a "Council of the state secretaries" which begin to take measures of organization of public services ,as the Army continues her march of peaceful occupation of the entire territory of Bucovina.

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Unconditioned unification

The act of 27th of October did not brought a solution in a decissive way to the fate of Bucovina .First,it was missing to the document the precissness of exprimation.It was more a formulation of the wish to proceed to the constitution of a national independent state together with the Romanians from Transilvania and hungaria.The states of facts of that time were not so advanced ,such that the unification with mother country to be clearly proclaimed .next to this,the decission seemed taken some way unilaterally ,only by the Romanian population ,without the participation of other ethnic groups.It was as such most needed that the unification of Bucovina with the other countries sister and with mother country ,finished now and in fact by occupying her territory ,to be proclaimed under a form which constitutes a title of uncontestable right.

For this act ,solemn,have arrived now in Cernauti also the intelectuality of Bucovina , refugeed in the country and in Basarabia ,having in front the member of Romanian Academy Stefanelli and Romanian History profesor from Cernauti University ,Ioan Nistor.A delegation of Basarabians arrived also to bring to the Bucovinens the brother salute of Romanian Basarabia.The national Council complets by the cooperation of 12 more members from the former refugees in the country and invites also the other nationalities to send their representatives to the Congress which will be held in the day of 28th of November and in which would be established the rapports ,political, between country of Bucovina and the Romanian state.The adopted formulae by the National Council was the one of "unconditioned unification with Romania". Halippa ,the vicepresident of the Council Advice from Chisinau ,has explained to Bucovineans for what the Basarabians set conditions to the Unification.They were not guarantees taken against Romania ,but against the government of that time ,which was governing with german bayonet at the back.Today however,when the enemy has ruined ,when the King Himself decreets the sharing of the land to the peasants and when we are only amongst brothers any fear would be in vain ,any reserve ,a weakening element .In fact ,Basarabia herself will review the act of Unification and will proclaime it without conditions.

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In a celebration atmosphere has been held the Congress in the great sinodal hall of Mitropolitan Palace,under the presidency of Iancu Flondor ,which salutes with outstanding satisfaction the representatives of foreign elements from Bucovina which participate at this great historic act.Then he gives reading to the act of unification.He evokes the glorious past of this province ,which has been the seed around which has constituted the Principat of Moldavia where can be found all over the traces of her great past and the graves of the voievods (Kings ) ;exposes the martyr of the country kidnapped and choked ,condemned to send her sons to dye on all fields of battle of Europe,under foreign flag ,to maintain,the glory and increasing of the oppressor ;brings omages to this nation which have not lost hope for salvation ,awaiting the fulfilling of the great dream of the unification of all Romanians in a single national state unitar.Notices that this great hour has come!"Today when after efforts,sacrifices and huge martyrs from Romania and of her strong noble Allies ,have throned in the world the principles of right and humanity for all nations and when,under the crushing blow ,the austro-hungar Monarchy has collapsed shaken from its fundations ,and when all nations enslaved in its making earned the right to free decission ,the first thought of Bucovina unslaved ,aims towards the Romanian Kingdom ,to which always we connected the hope of our unslaving.

So ,We ,the general Congress of Bucovina ,embodying the supreme power of the country and being invested alone with leguitor power ,in the name of National Sovereignity,

Decide :

The unconditioned Unification and for eternity of Bucovina in her old frontiers until Cermus ,Cloacin and Nistru ,with the Romanian Kingdom".

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In the name of the national Council of Pollish from Bucovina their delegate ,Stanislas Kwiatowski reads in Polish language a declaration in which evokes in his turn the past of the Polish nation on this land ,cordiality and feelings of warm friendship shown all the time by Romanian people ,whith which tey suffered together ,under the same yoke."We Poles from Bucovina ,avanguard towards Orient of the Polish nation which ,in this moment ,gathers on her shoulders ,hit for one hundred and fifty years ,the purple,torn in three pieces ,of the political unity of all Polish territories from Baltic until Nistru ,salute with warmth the holly day of rebirthing of Romania united.We recognize ,entirely ,the rights imprescribtible of the Romanian nation over the territories South of Nistru in general,and especially over Bucovina".

Aclamations ,enthusiast ,have covered the words of the delegate of the noble nation ,martyr and friend.

In the name of the National Council of the germans from Bucovina ,which till now have been the dominant element in Bucovina ,their delegate Alois Lebouton reads in german the following declaration :"For the attachment of Transilvania and Bucovina to Romania and with full trust in the program of the government ,evolved by the provisory government of the country in meeting of the National Council Romanian of 13th of November 1918 and aproved by this one with almost unanimity of voices ,and from where results that it will be taken into acount about the cultural needs of the unRomanian people living in the country and that alone the principle of right and justice will decide in all circumstances ,the german National Council ,in the name of the germans in Bucovina ,pronounces for the unification of Bucovina with Romanian Kingdom".

The german delegate ends with the shout :"Long live Great Romania !Long live H.M. King Ferdinand !"

In the midst of greatest emotion and of an enthusiasm without borders ,the motion of unification is voted with unanimity by the members of the Congress.

The great historical act has been made.The unjustice of 1775 has been repaired.The Crown of Stefan cel Mare ,stained by the blood of mucenic(one of Forty Martyrs) of Grigore Voda Ghica ,was placing shining on the forehead of Ferdinand the Ist ,King of all Romanians.

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Inscription from the 2nd century belonging to I-st Cohort Aelia Dacorum from Britannia Province ;in the rigth side is the figthing sword "SICA",specific to Dacia(Romania) soldiers;Dac(Romanian ;as Dacia has been conquered by the Romans)

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Chapter VI

THE UNIFICATION OF TRANSILVANIA WITH ROMANIA

The hungarians after the destruction of Transilvania

Amongst the countries of Europe ,hungaria /hungary was one of the four to which the War was most wellcomed;it was the occassion to cut with the sword the hombilical cord of the matter of nationalities.The vigorous elements of the nationalities were send on to the figthing Fronts and put in to the first line of fire to be sacrifyed*.

From the mountain passes of Carpathians of Galitia up until under the forts of Iwangorod Fortress[1] ,and from the rocky plateaus of Cars of Italy until Trenitin Alps ,the thousands of Romanian graves are the evidence of the shed blood in an inutile way by Ardeal sons and of the criminal intentions of the hungarians.On the celebre Mountain San Gabriele ,the 50th austro-hungarian regiment from Alba Iulia ,composed exclusively of Romanians ,has been completelly destroyed ,during the memorable figths in the summer of 1917 .The 43rd Caran -Sebes regiment and 61st Timisoara regiment left more than half of their soldiers ,Romanians,in the ground forming "zona de guerra "[2] Italian.

On the Romanian figthing Fronts ,the austro-hungarians have been very careful,not to send Romanian soldiers.Their untrust was ofcourse right.A moving episode prooves the power of the national sentiment of the men from Ardeal ,which defeated even the military duty one.

Among the rare Romanians ,escaped ,of unprecautionary measures ,amongst the units send on the Romanian Front from Ghimes ,was the reserve Lieutenant Emil Rebreanu ,of the artillery regiment "Maria Luisa".It was an officer of great merit ,decorated on the Italian Front with the greatest War decoration :"The golden medal for bravery".At the closing of the Romanian ground ,Rebreanu has heard the secret calling of brothers souls ,whispering to him from beyond the trenches .Between the unnatural soldier duty and the holly spirit duty of Romanian ,Rebreanu listened to the latter one.One nigth ,he tries to cross the Front ,in the Romanian lines,carrying with him also the plans of the austro-hungarian troops movements in the sector.He has been caught and arrested .Although adviced by his commander -which estimed him and loved him -to declare that he lost his way around ,to escape the punishment ,he refuses with pride ,confessing his intentions and the wish to be shot ,than to be forced to figth against his brothers.He has been condemned to death .He has been refused the request to be shot.At 14th of May 1917 ,he has been hanged near a stream ,which was making before the frontier between Moldavia and Ardeal,in a place where the scene could be seen by Romanian soldiers from the Romanian Army ,within the trenches .In the minute when the executioneer put the rope by the neck ,Rebreanu has shouted:"Long live Great Romania!"

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As on to the figthing fronts were exterminated the sons ,in the same time,for the ones left at home ,was operating the arsenal of exceptional laws ,of the police measures and of corruption.They will complete the masterpiece of the cannon.Especially after the enter of Romania in to the War ,any reserve has disappeared .The drastic measures aimed against Romanians ,were motivated frontal by the intention to anihilate the "traitor" nationalities.The law XVIII establishes "the material responsibility of the traitors of patria".The Romanians blamed of treason will be punished with requisitioning and confiscation of their wealth.An ordonance of Wekerle forbids to the owners from Transilvania to sell or give for work ,the lands ,for more than ten years.The state has priority in the case of selling ;the right of Romanians to buy land is subjected to the pre-aprobation of the administration.The authority may refuse for example the selling of the property towards a Romanian ,reserving the right to buy it for the state or for a person agreed by it.It is decided to be made a new repartition of the land;the frontier counties ,lived by compact majority Romanian ,will be colonized with hungarian frontier troops and with Ceangai(Csangos) population brought from Moldavia.

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The " Democrat" Vaszonyi makes the project for electoral reform which introduces an universal vote sui-generis :the procent of the voters unmaghiar(un-hungarian) decreases from 45,5% to 38,3% and the une of the maghiars(hungarians) increases from 54,4% to 61,7%.Apponyi ,the executioner of the Romanian learning system ,surpresses the autonome learning system of the normal Romanian confessional schools ,institutes comissaries of the government with discretionary powers and creates along the Romanian frontier a cultural zone ,in which he statifies all elementary Romanian schools.Another two projects of laws are prepared to give the death blow to Romanian Church.To systematize the action of terrorising of Transilvania ,he is given a governor in the person of Ugron Gabor ,a political partizan of Apponyi.

In the same time ,the cities and villages of Ardeal were emptied by all intelectuals and leaders which have kept clean their belief and did not prosternated in the mud in front of the tyrans .Entire convoys of Romanians were headed towards the deportation places of hungar dessert,or were filling the hungarian prissons.Only in Cluj prisson went for two years some 26 000 Romanians .One hundred and thirty two priests have been ripped from their altars and from the midst of their believers ;from these ,eleven did not come back ,but have thicken the raw of the forty martyrs of the nation,dead from starvation,maltratations ,tortures endured in the prissons.Who could record the names or at least the number of all those sacificed behind the Fronts of figth ,in the gutters of the camps or at the gallows behind the barracks of geandarmery?

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The corruption masterpiece could not touch but only the surface foam of the nation,the wishers of getting situations by slavery and sole selling of the hood.The prototype of these ones has been the renegated monk Mangra ,the accomplice of Tisza ,to which has been given that not even dead to not rest in the ground of his people ,in the ancestral land ,but has been buried in Kerepes Cemetery in Budapesta.From the other Romanian leaders ,the hungar government could not take out but only some signatures on a declaration of repudiation of the Entente and of Romania and of "loyality" towards the "Throne and Patria"."We Romanians from hungaria ,want very much to remain under hungarian crown mastering",ends the document .The most part of the signatures has been given by the heads and clerks of the curch ,which thought that it is in the interest of the flock which they sheperd and of the institutions they administrated to not adopt an intransigent attitude ;amongst the leaders of politic,the most important have refused to do it and have been rewarded with years of prisson.

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Romanians rejoyn the figth

In the middle of this unleash of chauvine rage have fallen the evangelic words of Wilson .They were not speaking in the beginning but only about the wish to guarantee to the austro-hungarian nations the power of economical evolution.But the central powers thought themselves sure on triumph and, hungary was the one wanting to profit of the occassion to liquidate once and for all the matter of nationalities .Their answer sounds hyronically ,and Wilson gives the reply ,putting it this time at the base of reglementations of international autodetermination principle."It must-completes Wilson-to be accorded the largest satisfaction to all national aspirations well founded;it will be avoided to be introduced new elements of quarrel and antagonism or to perpetuate the ones have existet and which would only compromise the European peace and,as such ,of the world".

The antagonism between the two tendencies was ireductible.In october 1918 ,together with the collapse of the Central Powers,Wilsons'victory was acomplished.Prosternated at the feet of the new evangelist from Washington ,the former tyrans from Berlin,Vien and Pesta(BudaPesta) were imploring for the peace ."All conditions set by Wilson are received anticipative",moans Andrassy.It is the bankruptcy of the chauvine politics ,the end of hungary's integrity.

With the heart filled more and more with joy were watching the Romanians from Ardeal the evolution of the events.The salvation aurora was shining more and more lively to the horizon.The peace offer of Burian ,from 7th of October ,has been the signal of catastrophe.The triumph of the national ideea was now sure.The Romanian nation had to appear ,at her turn, on the front of the nations revendicating the right to their free choosing of their own fate.More than two years ,the leaders of the Romanian nation had to adopt a reserved attitude ,in front of the unleash of hungarian terror.Teodor Mihail ,the president of the committee ,gave his adhesion conditioned to the signing of the manifest.Vaida-Voevod ,the figther full of temperament, which many times have risen storms in the hungarian parliament by the courage of the attacks or his replies,has exiled himself in switzerland,Iuliu Maniu had to dress the military uniform and was on the Italian Front.Vasile Goldis has remained all the time in Arad ,maintaining an intransigent attitude and continued with the publication of "Romanului" until he has been surpressed by the authorities.Aurel Popovici died before his eyes to see the great day .Stefan Pop has stayed all the time guard in the hungarian parliament ,raising his voice in the defending of the mocked nation and sentenced,helding cest with courage to her executioneers.

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When the nations from hungaria have been called by the events to constitute their national governments ,the National Romanian Party took the task to represent the Romanian nation from Transilvania ,Banat and the hungarian parts.By its organization ,based on a large democratic fundation ,by the fact that at 1848 ,when has been decreed the political program of the Romanian nation ,he has represented with consecvence this program ,recognized by the whole Romanian nation from over the mountains ,the National Romanian Party was ,without power of contestation ,the legitim organ of this nation.At 12th of October ,the members of the executive committe of the P.N.R. gathered at Oradea to discuss the situation ;there were present T.Mihail,Stefan Pop ,Vaida-Voevod ,V.Goldis ,A.Vlad ,A.Lazar ,I.Suciu and dr Ciordas .The Comitte has fixed the attitude of the Romanian nation towards hungary and tasked V.Voevod to read in the hungarian parliament the celebre resolution ,which text has been written by Goldis :"The Executive Committe of the National Romanian Party from Ardeal and hungary ,as political organ of the Romanian nation from Ardeal and hungary ,notices that the aftermaths of the War make right the pretentions ,of centuries ,of the Romanian nation to full national freedom.

On the base of the natural right that every nation may decide freely by her fate ..., a right which is now recognized by the hungarian nation by the truce proposition of the Monarchy ,the Romanian nation from hungary and Ardeal wishes now to make use of this right and reclaims for herself the right that,free by any foreign influence ,to decide alone the place amongst the free nations ,as well as the establisment of connections of coordonation of her with the other nations ,free.

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The national organ of the Romanian nation in Ardeal and hungary does not recognize the right of this parliament and of this government ,to consider themselves as representants of the Romanian nation ,to be able to represent at the general peace congress the interests of the Romanian nation from hungary and Ardeal ,because the defending of her interests ,the Romanian nation may give it only to some assigned by their own national gathering,factors.

Outside the delegated organs by the national gathering or elected from her inside,so outside the Executive Committe of the National Romanian Party ,noone may have the right to treat and decide in matters which rapports to the political situation of the Romanian nation .All decissions and agreements which would be made and would be as such without the approval of these organs ,we declare as null and without value ,which link by nothing the Romanian nation.The Romanian nation ,living inside the austro-hungar Monarchy ,expects and requests ,after many sufferings of centuries ,the afirmation and valorification of unmoved rights and unalienable ,to full national life".

The resolution was in fact the proclamation of independence of the Romanian nation from Ardeal and has also been the answer of this nation to the manifest of Emperor Carol .A delegation of the Committe ,composed of six members ,with the ressidence at Arad ,has been tasked to work in permanence according with the unfolding of the events.

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Councils and national guards

Karolyi government rippeed the power by viollence of the revolution and was making illusions that he will be able to retain the opressed nations yoked to the hungarian Republic waggon .The principal instrument by which Karolyi proposed himself to acomplish this hope was the presence in his minister of the democrat Oskar Iaszi ,to which he gave the newly created portfolio of the Nationalities .Sociolog and publicist of value ,Iaszi have studied the problem of nationalities without hungarian patterns ,and especially ,treated with great warmth the Romanian problem ,which has atracted the Romanian's sympaties.He was ,as such,indicated to be the white pigeon of peace between hungarians and nationalities.The great defect of Iaszi system was his theoryticianism .Penetrated by the owerpowerfulness of social revendications ,neglecting the national feeling ,he thought in the possibility of solving the matter of nationalities in the frame of the hungarian state.It was too late though for compromises.The Jugoslavs have constituted the national state at 29th of October ;they were not making part of hungary.The Slovaks attached to the Czech state .There were left the Romanians.

At Arad ,the delegation of the Executive Committee ,under the presidency of Stefan Pop ,having as members Mihail,Vaida ,Goldis and Lascar ;the Council has been completed also with four delegates of the Central Committe social Democrat ,amongst which Jumanca and Flures .The central government of Karolyi recognizes the National Council Romanian as the only one in right to talk in the name of Romanians in hungary.

At Vien ,Iuliu Maniu ,which has returned from the Italian Front as sub-Lieutenant of artillery ,organizes the "Advice of the Romanian Soldiers from Vien" with the help of the 100 officers Romanians from the regiments there.The 64th infantry regiment at Orastie ,formed exclusivelly by Romanians ,set itself to the dispozition of the State .The messengers of the Advice go to Prague ,where there were two Romanian regiments ,which afiliates to the State and put themselves to the dispozition of the Czech revolution ,being her principal armed support .In the critical days of the Vien revoluton ,the Romanian regiment from Vien has been the only organized and disciplined element ,which has obstacled the propagation of the anarchy and maintained order.Havin to its dispozition barracks now,the military camp of Wiener -Neustadt and the necessary trains for transport ,all Romanian units returning from the Italian Front were giving their oath under Romanian flag and were directed as rule towards Ardeal ,to thick the ranks of Romanian guards organising there.The War ministry from Vien has been separated in to different nationalities of the former Monarchy;the Romanian commander had here also his bureaus and could correspond by telegraphic installation without wire with Ardeal ,organising systematiacally sending of Romanian troops.

During this time ,hungary was in full revolutionary anarchy.At 16th of November ,hungary detached by austria and has proclaimed herself "The independent hungarian republic".But the government with colorful composition ,led by Karolyi was not capable to dam the anarchy wave unleashed by himself on the whole of the country.All those who had revendications to ask ,old scores to set,soldiers returning from the Front ,the oppressed nationalities which felt the time of liberation has arrived.

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The uprising propagated with the speed of ligthning , sighted from the flats of hungary over Tisa ,and spread in all Transilvania ,to Carpathians.She had a double character :social from the part of hungarians ,deeply national from Romanians part.The soldiers ,which have left the Front,were adding the special character against the extension of the War ,asking the peace.The masses overwhwlmed by the drunkness of revenge ,throwed themselves over those they seen as enslavers ,of their rights and as exploiters of their work;the principal objective were the manssions of great owners ,which were robbed and arsoned.The Romanian peasants were seeing in hungarian groffs the exploatators of their work and the oppressor of the nation.In Banat ,the uprising dressed a political form :the workers organized under the the leadership of the social democrat party ,allied with the maghiar burgessy and the german one ,have declared general strike ,put their hands over authorities buildings and have proclaimed "the authonome Banat republic",have instituted "workers councils" in the frame of hungary ,the military garrisons have disbanded.

As a reaction against the turmoils ,an administrative action and a military organization start to take shape in hungary ;it is made in Transilvania on national bases.There are created "national councils" :Romanian,hungarian ,sas.Each of these councils creates ,in its turn ,national guards ,formed in majority by officers and soldiers demobilised ,by soldiers who have left the Front ,by former prisoners freed and by local elements.In this way ,appear in Transilvania maghiar guards ,Romanians ,sas ones etc.,in some localities appear also by the leaders social- democrats initiative "workers councils" and worker's guards ,international ,with the aim to deep and propagate the revolution in hungary,directing it on socialist way.

The Romanian national guards ,constituted under the impulse of the National Council ,have the mission to maintain the public order and to defend the wealth and the person of the inhabitants.In the bigger centers have been organized "national committe advices",in direct connection with the National Council from Arad ,and in every village were made small national advices ,composed by the priest ,the teacher and a leader of the village.By the fact that they were constituted by all that had the Romanian hood of value ,they gained imediatelly a big ascendent over the population and all other authorities set to their dispozition.At Cluj has constituted an independent organ with the name of Romanian National Senate of Transilvania from Cluj,under the presidency of Amos Francu ,having the intention to lead the entire civil organization and military one from Ardeal itself,independent by the National Council from Arad.The role of this organization has been though edged to Cojocnei Comitat ,becoming an organ afiliated to the Central Committee of Arad.

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A great enthusiasm is among Romanians all over Ardeal.There are held popular gatherings of organization ,are receiving the church blessing national flags ,oath is given to National Council.Imense corteges of peasants ,entire villages ,with priests and teacher ahead ,rove in the sound of village music and with the unfolded flags the streets of the cities ,especially of Ardeal,where is the center of Romanian movement .It is finally freedom and national independence ,after which was thirsty for centuries this nation.

All around gathers dark clouds .Conflict begin to produce among guards of different nationalities .At Cluj ,general Ziegler ,the commander of the hungarian guards tries to ask the Romanian officers to give oath in hungarian government belief ,in Budapesta ;the officers refuse and declare that they can only give their oath to the Romanian National Council.At 3rd of November ,the Romanian officers have carried on Cluj streets in the sounds of the Romanian anthem"Awaken Romanian" an old Romanian flag ,held hidden since 1848(Romania 's Nicolae Balcescu 1848 Revolution) in the Romanian church bell house of Cluj;on it is sworn the solemn oath for the Romanian National Council.The maghiars look in silence the so unusual spectacle .Something has changed since the epoch of Momorandului process!The National Senate from Cluj agrees with the hungarians to colaborate together to maintain the order and safety in Ardeal ,being in commune interest to have silence within the country.General Ziegler is ellected commander supreme of the Romanian national guards and hungarians from Transilvania ,having by him another Romanian attache.Only the orders countersigned by this attache are valid for the Romanian Guards.The National Council from Arad dissagree though the procedure of the Senate ,to which it narrows the competence and lifts to general Zeigler the command of the guards ,which is assumed by the National Council.

At 13th of November ,the hungarian war minister himself ,Bartha communicates to the ROmanian militars ,officers ,sub-officers ,soldiers and guards ,that they will swar oath of trust only to the Romanian National Council.At 10th of November the episcopal synod of the orthodox mitropolly decided that"from all principal services and prayers ,singings and readings of the liturgy ,it is omitted the person of the sovereign".And after a few days ,the ierarchs of the two confessions ,Romanians,were recognising in an official way the national Council as the representative and political leader of the Romanian nation in hungary .one after the other,old connections were ruining.

The authorities and guards give all their best to maintain order .It is hard though to put an end to excesses and turmoils.From many localities ,solgabiraii and the other tyrants of the Romanian population run away.in other localities are arsoned to the archives of authorities ,in the middle of the village ;the folks stay around the fire and warms at the "masters rights".The trains with Romanian flag pass through train stations of villages in which the population makes the sign of the cross ,rises their hands towards the sky and cries out long.

The hungarians are completelly demoralized and,in the first days ,make no agrressions.Outside ,local incidents ,tey maintain expectative.Their all eforts concentrate now to persuade the Romanians to a colaboration politic ,to save the hungar state from complete shipwreck.The appeal to brotherhooding occupies entire columns of the hungarian press .From under the contorsined eye brows ,the eyes try to give calm glances ,and the harsh voices and demanding from other times seek to become more honney like.The intelligent leaders of the hungarian culture ,men of letters ,university professors ,artists,launch towards the hungarian inelectuals a manifest ,full of the most clear feelings towards the neighbouring nations.Karolyi makes a kind appeal to the nationalities :"Before breaking from your old patria ,make the trial to live in harmony and to work together with the new government.If you will see then that we do not keep our word ,you will have enaugh time to detach from us!"

And towards Arad runs Oskar Iaszi with the branch of olives in one hand and the bag of promisses in to the other.

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The supreme trial

One of the first political manifestations of the Romanian National Council has been to apreciate her rightful rapports with the hungarian government and to affirm her situation de "guerre legitim of the Romanian territories from the liquidating Monarchy".

By a memorandum telegraphied to Budapesta ,in the day of 10th of November ,the National Council shows that"in the meaning of the right of free dispozition of the hood ,and also for to maintain the public order,the safety of wealth and life" ,he has to take over the "full power of governing" over the territories lived by Romanians in Ardeal and the hungarian country,and namely over 23 comitates and of the Romanian parts from three more others.The government in Budapesta is invited to address to the nations in hungary and Ardeal a manifest ,asking to subordinate itself to the authority of the National Council ,Romanian, all institutions and administrations of state finding on this territory ,suspending any other authority .Face to the other nations finding themselves o this territory ,it will be respected Wilson's principle .It was given a term until 12th of November ,6 in the evening for the answer.

It couldn't be found even a more precise language.It was,in fact ,the ultimatum by which the Romanian nation was asking to Hungary the recognizing of smashing of the millenary yoke.

Oskar Iaszi is delegated by the hungar government to find the term for the understanding with the Romanian National Council .At Arad begin the tratatives ,laborious , at which are wellcomed to participate also other delegates ,representing circles interested at the new political arangement which will result from these tratatives.In this way,assists Bokany ,one of the social -democrats leaders of Budapesta ,Apathy ,the rector of the Cluj university and the president of the National Maghiar(hungarian) Council from Transilvania ,deputy Neugeboren ,the presodent of the National Council of Sasi(ethnic german population.).

Iaszi tries very hard to keep in one place the bits and pieces which do not glue one another anymore.He makes use of all is personal credit and all his cleverness ,dialectic.From the start,he wants to be known that the representative of a government ,revolutionary,of a republic in the making and repudiates the old hungarian traditions ,feudal and oligarhic.The new mastering wishes that the hungarian people to be able to live in complete good understanding with all the nations of the country in the spirit of equality and rightfulness.The hungarian government point of view is this one:it is talk to make for the time being only an arrangement for short time ,for the well being of the order.He will not bound none of the parts ,because the decissive solution will be taken only by the peace conference.The hungarian government admits fully the Wilsonian principle ;but they pretend it for all nations living on the revendicated territory by Romanians ,meaning also for maghiars(hungarians) ,sasi or secui.The delimitation made by Romanians would not correspond to the reality ;in this territory are zones and eclaves lived by other nations.For applying of the Wilsonian principle ,Iaszi proposes that ,abandoning the administrative delimitations of the comitates ,to be formed national blocks as compact as possible and homogeneous ,which to federalize between them after the swiss model.The hungarian government disposed then ,to invest the Romanian National Council with the administration in fact af the cantoons of language majoritary Romanian.Iaszi thinks opportine to end with a threat,attracting the Romanian's attention to think wise and with reserve the international situation .The closing of the peace ,thinks he further,is not in Foch's hand ,but in the hands of the european soviets of the workers.

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In the name of the National Romanian Council,Goldis answers that the Romanian nation pretends the independence ,fully,of state and does not admit this right to be overshadowed by provisory solutions."The Romanian nation recognizes the competence of the peace Congress to fix the definitive limits reclaimed by this nation for its own stae ,and takes the obligation that,face to the other nations living on this territory ,to respect Wilsonian's principles ...,but in the proposition of the hungarian government she sees the negation of her independence of state ,and on the other hand thinks that that solution makes impossible the hope of this nation for maintaining of the public order until the fulfilling of the definitive peace".That is why ,the Romanian National Council cannot receive the propositions of the hungarian government ,to which he leaves the plenitude of the responsibility for the events which might occur.

Follows long discussions in which,from Romanian part it is contested the sincerity of the statistical data hungarian over the population repartition ,and from hungarian part is contested to Romanians the right over the revendictad territories and the legitimacy of the Romanian leaders to present pretentions as just aspirations of the Romanian nation.

Maniu intervines in discussion and makes categoric declarations ,which show the abyss between the two conceptions.The Romanians do not admit but the radical solution .The Romanian nation whishes to have her own state and soverign.The Romanian nation wishes to fulfil the sovereignity ,national and of state ,on the whole of the territory lived by Romanians ,of Ardeal and hungary.

The situation of Romanians is defavorable influenced by the news arriving by the closing of the truce in Belgrade between General Franchet d'Esperey ,Commander of the Allied Armies and Karolyi.Not knowing the rapports in Transilvania ,the Convention of Truce decides that"the civil administration will remain in the hands of the actual government",meaning the hungarian one.

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