October 9th, 1921.
Dear Miss Addams,
I enclose a copy of a letter from the Comité International de Secours à la Russie, in which they ask us to nominate a representative to serve on the Committee which is being formed as a result of the International Conference held in Geneva on August 15th and 16th. I hope you will be willing to let your name go on to the Committee, and I suggest that they should have mine as your acting deputy. You will see that it is not proposed to call the committee together, but merely to use it as a signal of the international and representative character of the relief [organization] and to effect [coordination] in and between the various countries. There will, however, doubtless be many things (as there have been every week so far) that a person on the spot here in Geneva can do to accelerate or affect in other ways the action that is taken by the Commission Mixte. [Realizing] this, the International Labour Office and the Russian (Soviet) Red Cross are both appointing acting deputies (in the former case Dr. Pardo, and in the latter Dr. Bagotsky -- both our firm friends and allies) as well as their official chief as nominal representative, whose name [will] be used in all official publications. The opinion of all these people, and also of Mr. De Salis, who is now acting as secretary to the Commission Mixte, is that the ideal arrangement for the W.I.L.P.F. would be that which I have proposed. Will you please cable "yes" if you agree.
My reason for delay in sending on the letter has been that I have waited to see the chief people concerned and most of them have in turn been out of Geneva.
I have just decided, for a mixture of family and other reasons, to go to London [tonight] for a week. This will enable me to attend the International Conference of the Fight the Famine Council, which I will do officially on behalf of our International Headquarters. I shall see my parents, my doctor, and my dentist, and collect some winter clothes, and return here to help Mlle. Gobat until Velma Glücklich or some one else can come and join her. She obviously cannot be left with the whole work of the office on her shoulders. She went to Berne last Sunday for the Swiss National Women’s Congress, knocked up and had to stay away till Friday. I got [page 2] out the Disarmament Manifesto ↑& circular for her↓ as best I could under the circumstances, ↑without having my office [illegible]↓ but I too have been desperately busy and not too well. I am going to rest as much as I can during the days in London. I will write full reports when I get back here.
You will be interested to know in the meantime that we had a very interesting evening here on October 1st to discuss [Interracial] Relations. I enclose a copy of the invitation and a list of our speakers, and the report which appeared in the Journal de Genève. We had another useful gathering last Thursday, when Mr. Lodi, the President of the Buenos [Aires] League of Nations Union, gave us an informal lecture on South American politics ↑and we delayed him with questions↓. Mlle. Gobat, Miss Thornton and I entertained Miss Forchhammer, Mme. Wicksell and Dr. Bonnevie to dinner one night and had a reception here afterwards -- a small one this time, about 30 people only, so that everyone had a chance of a real talk with the people they particularly wanted to meet.
You may remember that in a letter which was sent to you by the Comité International de Secours à la Russie just before you left Geneva, they asked us what share the W.I.L.P.F. would be prepared to take in the administration expenses of Dr. Nansen’s work resulting from the decisions of the Conference in which we took part. They suggested £10 a month. You will be glad to know that we have already covered five months of this as a result of a collection taken among the members and friends of the League in Geneva. We have sent it in immediately. No doubt al our National Sections will respond to a similar appeal. My idea is to try and raise the necessary ↑amount↓ for one year as quickly as possible. I enclose a copy of Dr. Nansen’s reply to my letter sending the first instalment. The work of creating an authentic information bureau is not progressing as quickly as I could wish, but Dr. Pardo, who is extremely keen about this, is going to London with me, and we hope to get some fresh initiative taken by the Fight the Famine Conference.
I must not write more, as I am in the middle of packing to get away [tonight].
How we wish you were here [still] -- and all the time.
With affectionate greetings to you, and to Miss Smith if she is with you,
Yours ever,
Catherine E. Marshall [signed]
↑[We are] asking Gertrude Baer to be our Fraternal Delegate to the Int. Working Women's Congress which opens here on the 15th↓
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