CZECHOSLOVAKS IN AMERICA
only knows what kind of eagles, but because they could be Austrian eagles, the posters were torn from the walls and torn into shreds. The Austrian consul had his informers at the meeting and these brought to him aa list of people most prominent at the meeting and the respective names later appeared in the so called black book of the Austrian police in Prague.
The meeting had its positive results. It appealed for the founding of an organization of all American Czechoslovaks for the purpose of aiding the poor, suffering from the consequences of the war and on behalf of widows and orphans of Czech soldiers who were forced to fight contrary to their will against brother Slavs.
A rather simple picture, but it speaks volumes as to the attitude of the Czech mind immediately upon the outbreak of the war.
The meeting described by Mr. Sindelár had its origin in a conference of a group of patriotic Czechs and Slovaks held on Saturday, July 25, 1914. This gathering and the subsequent conferences have been described by a leading participant, J. V. Nigrin, who, according to a contemporaneous newspaper report of July 27, 1914, made this statement during one of the discussions:
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