Foreign Relations of the United States, Conferences at Washington and Quebec, 1943

Department of the Army Files: Telegram

The British Deputy Prime Minister (Attlee) to the Commander in Chief, Allied Force Headquarters (Eisenhower)¹

most secret
priority

[London, August 19, 1943.]

For General Eisenhower’s Eyes Only from the Deputy Prime Minister.

To avoid inference which might be drawn from paragraph 3 of armistice terms,² now in the hands of your staff officers travelling Lisbon, that we are “negotiating” with Badoglio Government, President and Prime Minister have agreed that after words “Commander-in-Chief” paragraph 3 should be amended to read “and none of these may now or at any time be evacuated to Germany.”

His Majesty’s Ambassador, Lisbon, has been informed.

1. No copy of this instruction originating at Quebec has been found, although the second paragraph was presumably telegraphed by Churchill to Attlee with Roosevelt’s approval. The source text, from the files of Allied Force Headquarters, represents the message as received at that Headquarters from United States Forces Headquarters in London.
2. Ante, p. 519.