Finally: Peace came, at least to Eastern Europe, as the new Soviet government signed a peace treaty with Germany. The Diviners exiled to the east looked toward home:
{
49} The year 1918 came. We refugees from the West continue to live in the central governances and the Asian provinces past the Ural [Mountains], in the former Russian Empire, which is already in the rule of the Soviets.
According to the Brest Peace Treaty [the
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk] of the 3
rd of March, 1918, entered into by Soviet Russia and Germany, we received permission to return to our homeland and the town of Divin.
However this was not a return to a sweet life personally for me, as well as for other refugees arriving from Soviet Russia. The Germans were still the masters here. They malevolently looked at and treated all of those returning, considering them all already infected with Bolshevism.
The second hardship for us was that we did not, in our homeland, find our dwellings, but instead conflagration and thick grass in place of the homes that we left. It turned out that the majority of us were homeless refugees. The Fall [season] was on its way out, and following it was the winter. Every family was trying to find itself some comforts for the winter; in one hut there could be living two, three families, and new Divin refugees would arrive almost monthly.
(The people of Divin – refugees, returned to their native land from Russia, starting in August 1918 – 1923 annually, for a span of six years).
A revolution in Germany in late 1918 led the way to the full end of World War I:
On November 9th, 1918, in Berlin, a revolution was sparked. The German emperor Kaiser-Wilhelm and his family fled to Holland by automobile. Rule of the country fell into the hands of the socialists, led by Ebert. The German General von Hindenburg turned to the allies for a request for peace. This is why the German front began to disintegrate everywhere. All of the soldiers tried to quickly return to German territory.
The Germans in Divin paused to sell their possessions and supplies, then fled.
This is why the German commandant’s office stationed in our Divin began to quickly sell off all of the material possessions they had amassed: various inventory and food. They did so in two days; the 11th-12th of November, 1918. Representatives of our population were chosen, whom our refugees authorized to purchase all that they could. After that, all of the Germans fled away from us in one night, as if the wind had blown them away.
Control passed from the Germans...
After the Germans left, rule of Divin was passed to the hands of the army chieftain
Petlyura for a brief time.
.
The people of our regions always strived towards Soviet rule. Many of our Diviner young men and women began to return again to Soviet Russia, as defectors. All of our people {
50} of the Western provinces hoped each day that our lands would be merged into the Soviet Republic of Belarus.
But fate did not allow the dreams of our people to come true. In early 1919, the army of
General Pilsudsky attacked the young Belarusian Republic. This was an army that consisted of Polish immigrants living abroad, or the so-called
Belapoles [белополяков:
White Poles]. The French army of
General Haller came to the aid of the invaders. This was an army that was created through the resources of Antanta. At this time, the Poles captured Bileika, Molodechno, and Luninetz.
This way, Belapoles, with the help of Antanta, divided Belarusian and Ukrainian lands into two parts again.
For our Belarusian and Ukranians, the Belapoles prepared their colonizers – their humiliaters, so that they can rob, materially and spiritually, our people on captured lands. Their chief goal was Divide et impera – Divide and Conquer.
The Poles felt they had a free hand in Belarus.
The Polish masters reasoned that they could do anything with the dark rural people of our Divin. For the motherland, beloved Poland, nothing was spared.
The Polish opposed and oppressed those loyal to the new regime:
To create a powerful Poland, “from sea to sea.” these Chubareks (this was the way the Poles called our settlers), overfed with Bolshevism, needed to be tightly gripped in our hands.”
A line was drawn to divide the region:
On December 8
th of 1919, Antanta determined
the Curzon Line, as the Eastern border.
The line passes through: Grodno – Yaluvka – Nemirov – Brest-Litovsk – Dopogusk – Ystilug, East Grobeshov, through Krilov, and the farther Rava-Russia, and farther east Peremyshol.
George Nathaniel Curzon, English Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 1919 – 1923, conservative leader, was one of the organizers of the intervention against Soviet Russia.
