WHEN GOVERNMENTS TRANSFER

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVIII, Issue 58, 5 September 1914, Page 8

WHEN GOVERNMENTS TRANSFER

. FROM CAPITALS TO OTHER CITIES. Thrice during the present war the seat of Government has been transferred from the capital of the country to another city. Karly in the prelude to the great struggle the Servian Government shifted out of Belgrade, which was dominated by Austrian guns, and removed to Kraginevatz, in the heart of the hills. Then, when the onrush of the German invasion of devoted Belgium could no longer be stayed, the Government left beautiful Brussels, the capital, for Antwerp. And now as the advancing wave nears Paris, the French authorities are moving out to a safer spot in Boideaux. There have been a few examples of similar transfers of Government from the capital to subordinate cities in. past wars. In 1870, when Paris was invested by the Prussians, Leon Gambetta escaped from Paris in a balloon and established the headquarters of the defence at Tours, where already the "Delegation" of the central government — which had decided to remain in Paris — had concentrated the machinery of government. From there a resistance was made with varying fortunes for several months. During the Civil War in England, Charles 1., when London went" over to the Roundheads, transferred his Court to Oxford. In the war between Great Britain and the United States (1812-1814) the British defeated an American force at Bladensburg, Maryland, and occupied Washington, the enemy's capital, burning the White House, the Capitol, and some of the public buildings. There were many proposals to shift the Atnerican capital subsequently, yet in the American Civil War, though the rival capitals, Richmond and Washington, were not much more than one hundred miles apart, neither city was actually occupied by the enemy during a four years' war. When Napoleon invaded Russia in 1812 he struck at the heart of the country, Moscow, not the head, St." Petersburg. But he failed in the long ran and the Government was not in danger. It may be said as a rule that a nation successful in land warfare prefers to have its capi-, tal as far inland as possible from the reach of a hostile navy, while, on the other hand, a nation which is being beaten on land, but still holds the sea, will naturally transfer the Government when the capital is in danger of being invested to a sea port,/ where it may be protected by the guns of the fleet. Hence the movement of the French Government to-day.