Greece refuses overland passage to the Serbian army

The British chronology of the war records under 3 April 1916 that the Greek government refused consent to the transport of the Serbian army from Corfu to Salonika by land. The British official history of the operations in Macedonia gives the same date: on 3 April France and Britain met with an “indignant refusal” from Athens. In Greece, which used the Julian calendar, it was 21 March. The British writer George F. Abbott, sympathetic to King Constantine, describes the conversation in which the refusal was given under 5 April. All the sources agree that by the first days of April the matter had been settled.

Rail instead of sea

The Serbian army, rebuilt on Corfu, was almost ready to set off for the front. The sea route from the island to Salonika was, however, long. Ships had to sail round the whole Peloponnese, with Cape Matapan, and then pass between the Cyclades, where according to the British official history they were particularly exposed to German submarines. The French and British governments therefore wanted to ship the Serbs a short way to Patras and from there take them north by rail through Athens and Larissa. The plan was not simple technically either. The Greek railway network was only just being joined to the line to Salonika, and the missing section from the old Greek–Turkish border to Plati station was not officially opened until May 1916.

According to Abbott, the French and British ministers, Jean Guillemin and Sir Francis Elliot, called on the prime minister and foreign minister Stefanos Skouloudis and told him that their governments intended to transport the rested Serbian army through Greece and did not doubt that Athens would agree. Skouloudis replied that moving more than 100,000 men would paralyse the railway and the whole economic life of the country for at least two months, would expose the population to the infectious diseases that had decimated the Serbs, and above all would be regarded by the Central Powers as a breach of neutrality, which could drag Greece into the war against its will. When Guillemin retorted that his government had instructed him not to ask for consent but to announce a decision, the old prime minister is said to have threatened to have the railway blown up if the passage were attempted. Elliot smoothed things over by asking whether Greece would also object to ships carrying Serbs passing through the Corinth Canal. To this the government agreed.

Greek reasons and French anger

Athens had a long list of such grievances behind it. The Entente had landed at Salonika, occupied Corfu despite protests and installed the Serbian government there. The Greek press, including the pro-German papers, argued that the railways and rolling stock would not suffice and that moving so many troops along a single track would take too long. The London weekly The Near East considered these arguments an excuse, and quoted a newspaper of the supporters of Eleftherios Venizelos. It wrote that there could be no question of a breach of neutrality, since Greece had already accepted the presence of the Allies at Salonika and was still Serbia’s ally. A refusal would be justified only if the Serbs were still carrying typhus or cholera with them or were to pitch camps along the way.

In Paris the refusal was very badly received. On 10 April the Greek minister Athos Romanos informed Skouloudis that the prime minister, Aristide Briand, no longer wished to hear of the advance of 150 million francs Greece had asked for, and the Paris press had for several days been threatening Greece with a blockade. Romanos added that Briand would have preferred to send the Serbs by sea round Matapan, but the minister of marine considered that route too dangerous, and if a ship carrying Serbs were sunk, public opinion would blame Greece. Skouloudis replied that Athens had not asked for money in return for breaking its neutrality, and remarked in passing that on Sunday evening a French transport with a Serbian unit had passed through the Corinth Canal almost unnoticed.

The Allies did not yet give way. On 20 April the Serbian minister in Athens asked in a note for passage through Patras, and a few days later he was backed by the ministers of all four Entente powers. Skouloudis refused every time. Meanwhile, on 11 April, the transport of the Serbs by sea began. The Corinth Canal could not take ships drawing more than 20 feet, so most of the transports sailed round the Peloponnese. A shortage of ships meant that the transport lasted until the end of May, but according to the British official history, thanks to secrecy and careful escort, not a single soldier was lost on the way.