Léon Blum | Manuscript memorandum on the Munich Agreement, 1938

Léon Blum

Manuscript memorandum on the Munich Agreement

setting out his opinions of the Munich Agreement whereby Britain and France allowed Germany to annex the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia, 7 pages, 4to, [September 1938], signed "Leon Blum" at end, ink smudges

Léon Blum (1872-1950) was Prime Minister of France in the late 1930s; he was the first Socialist Prime Minister in France and, as he was Jewish, was also subjected to anti-Semitism and was later sent to Buchenwald by the Vichy Government.

The conference held in Munich on 29-30 September 1938 to discuss Nazi claims on Czechoslovakia resulted in the annexation of the Sudetenland (and soon after the dissolution of the state of Czechoslovakia), and the agreement was signed by Hitler, Neville Chamberlain, Mussolini and the current French Prime Minister, Édouard Daladier. Both Britain and France were keen to avoid a repeat of the First World War and saw this agreement as the only way to achieve that.

Blum's notes on the conference, called a war of nerves ("la guerre des nerfs") which only began the previous Tuesday, show that Hitler dominated proceedings from the start. He talks of France and England's desire for a peaceable solution ("une solution pacifique"), despite the effect this would have on Poland, with whom Hitler refused to talk directly. Roosevelt's proposition to Germany and Poland for mediation through a third party and for a general conference involving all the relevant states was rejected by Hitler.

"I know that my readers are waiting for something more from me than my effort at clarification. They would like an impression which at the same time would be a prophecy. Are we this evening closer or further from war? My pen hesitates while I write these words. In my soul and my conscience, I continue to hope."