The New York Herald, New York, NY, January 5, 1920

To the Editor of the Herald : —

There is considerable confusion concerning the term “Carpatho-Russians,” and the facts are often still more beclouded by newspaper articles which put the Ukrainians and Carpatho-Russians together. Such an article appeared in the Herald on December 29, under the caption “Ukraine Congress Here to Protest Polish Mandate.”

In the first place, there is no such nation, race, language, country or religion known as Carpatho-Russian. The Carpatho-Russians are an insignificant political party — nothing more. Ever since East Galicia, peopled by Ukrainians formerly unwilling subjects of the Russian Empire, became a part of the Austrian Empire, the Russian Tsar sought to win the territory back to his domain. He sent into East Galicia many agents, some political, some of them Russian Orthodox priests, to try to convert the people into Russophiles. These Russian Tsarist agents, together with the few converts they made, were the Carpatho-Russians. In race and language they are Ukrainians; in religion and politics they are Russian. Out of a total Ukrainian population of more than four million in East Galicia the Carpatho-Russian party numbers less than fifty thousand.