German Diplomatic Documents 1871–1914 Volume 3 by Ets Dugdale

German Diplomatic Documents 1871–1914 Volume 3 by Ets Dugdale

Originally published in 1930, this volume opens with some selections dealing with the situation created by the victory of Japan over China in 1904 which opened a new epoch in the history of the Far East. It includes two momentous conflicts profoundly affecting international relations – the Boer War and the Russo-Japanese War. It also touches at many points on the long discussions aiming at a naval agreement, with or without some form of general understanding, between England and Germany. Through the Alliance with Japan and the Entente with France it leads up to the separation of Europe into two rival camps, in the course of an evolution in which crisis followed crisis with increasing and often alarming intensity.

Original Review of German Diplomatic Documents 1871–1914 Volume 3:

'The third volume of Mr Dugdale’s translation..covers the period when Europe crystallised into two opposing groups of powers... The Kaiser and his advisers were unpleasantly disillusioned by the rapidity with which the Entente Cordiale was conceived and born...Chagrined that the lover [Great Britain] whose advances [for an alliance] Germany had spurned had dared to woo another, the Kaiser’s mischief-making now redoubled. [The Kaiser and his advisers] feared to be thought unworthy custodians of the national dignity. As the volume closes they are slipping fast towards the abyss that is soon to engulf them.The Daily Telegraph April 1 1930

'...the documents are vastly entertaining and offer the means of checking up the justness of public opinion. It is inevitable that Germany will demand a reconsideration of the guilt of the Kaiser and nation in bringing about the World War as charged in the Treaty of Versailles...Of the documents which the Republican Reich decreed should see the tardy light of day, Mr Dugdale makes judicious and unprejudiced use...the comments of the alert, indefatigable Kaiser lend periodic emphasis and piquancy to the diplomatic correspondence.New York Times November 9 1930

'The selection has been very judiciously made, the documents chosen are all of real importance, they are linked together by admirable brief editorial notes, and, taken together, present a very fair picture of the evolution of the European states system.' New York Herald Tribune January 1931

'The third volume of the series covers a wide field in which the chief interest for South Africa lies..in the acquisition of Damaraland by the German Empire..' Cape Times

E. T. S. Dugdale (1876–1964) chose and translated these four volumes of selections from the stupendously large collection of diplomatic documents held in Berlin after the First World War. Dugdale was a keen shot, an academic, a pipe-smoking stamp-collector, and an ardent admirer of Dickens, who for a time made the translation of German texts his métier. On leaving Balliol, he had hoped to join the British Foreign Office; and to that end in the late 1890s spent two years in Germany perfecting his grasp of German – an experience which admirably qualified him for the more literary occupation. In the event, having married in 1902, he instead became an underwriter at Lloyds, and ended the War, wounded, as a captain in the Leicester Yeomanry. The four volumes of Diplomatic Documents were Dugdale’s chefs d’œuvre. The very many and generous contemporary reviews of these are as uniformly struck by their historical importance as by the skill of their presentation and choice.