File No. 763.72119/4
The Ambassador in Great Britain (Page) to the Secretary of State
London, July 31, 1914, 5 p.m.
[Received 5:54 p.m.]
[Telegram]
My July 29, 1 p.m.1 I am just come from a talk with Sir Edward Grey. He again expressed his great gratitude for the suggestion of offering the good offices of the United States in case they could be used. After the failure of his proposal of an ambassadorial conference to prevent Austria from going to war with Servia, he [Page 25] made proposals looking to the localization of hostilities and he has yet received no responses. Grey asked me if the United States has offered its good offices at Vienna or Saint Petersburg or Berlin, about which, of course, I have no information. Perhaps you will inform me of proposals or other actions of our Government if it does anything.
There is great gloom here this afternoon. As Grey expressed it, “It looks as if Europe were in the clutch of blind forces.”