Red Cross

The Committee was founded in Geneva in 1863, and by 1914 there were about 45 national societies. In the autumn of 1914 the ICRC opened the International Prisoners-of-War Agency in Geneva's Musée Rath, where about 1,200 people, mostly women, were working by the end of the year. By 1923 its card index held about 7 million cards and had helped establish the fate of 2 to 2.5 million prisoners (estimates vary). Its delegates visited more than 500 camps, and the Committee helped arrange exchanges and internment in Switzerland of wounded prisoners. In 1917 it received the Nobel Peace Prize.

The national societies ran hospitals, hospital trains and hospital ships, and the red cross emblem was meant to protect them, which did not always work. The Poles had no society of their own: the Russian and Austrian Red Cross worked in their lands, and in 1915 the ICRC set up a temporary Polish section for the duration of the war. The Polish Red Cross was founded on 18 January 1919 and recognised by the ICRC that July.