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1941 AGREEMENT FREEING POLAND OF SOVIET CONTROL
63
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CHURCHILL, WINSTON S. Group Photograph Signed, as Prime Minister,
showing the dignitaries present during the signing of the Sikorski-Mayski Agreement in
1941 (seated from the left): Poland’s Prime Minister in Exile Wladyslaw Sikorski, Foreign
Secretary Anthony Eden, Churchill, and Soviet Ambassador Ivan Mayski. Additionally
dated and signed by Eden. Inscribed in blank lower margin. 4
3
/
4
x6
1
/
2
inches (image), 7
1
/
2
x9
inches overall; some fading to Eden signature and date; matted and framed.
[London], 30 July 1941
[4,000/6,000]
The Nazi–Soviet Pact, signed in 1939, arranged for the division of Poland and other territo-
ries into areas to be controlled by the signatories, followed by the Nazi, and then Soviet,
invasions of Poland in September. After the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in June of
1941, the Soviets sought alliances against the Nazis, prompting the Sikorski-Mayski
Agreement in July and liberating those areas in Poland annexed by the Soviet Union.