Anglo-Ukrainian Committee [Англо-український комітет] – an organisation which existed from 1931 to about 1934 for the purpose of promoting, in the United Kingdom, the hetmanite movement led by Pavlo Skoropadskyi.
The Committee was established on the initiative of Arthur Maundy Gregory (known for his involvement in the sale of peerages and other honours on behalf of British Prime Minister David Lloyd George). Gregory was the owner of a periodical, the Whitehall Gazette, a contributor to which was Vladimir Korostovetz, Skoropadskyi’s London representative. Korostovetz had approached Gregory with a request to provide introductions to potential supporters of the hetmanite movement. Gregory proposed the creation of a committee for the purpose, and as a result the Anglo-Ukrainian Committee was formally constituted on 3 November 1931. Its Council comprised Skoropadskyi (president), Gregory (chairman), Lords Southborough, Strathspey and Ffrench, Brigadier-General Horwood and Korostovetz. The honorary secretary and treasurer was Louis Tufnell, who assisted Gregory in publishing the Whitehall Gazette. The Committee’s address was 38 Parliament Street, London SW1, where the Whitehall Gazette was based. Tufnell and Korostovetz soon began to suspect that Gregory had little commitment to the hetmanite cause and was using the Committee to further his own interests. Consequently, on the instructions of Skoropadskyi the Committee was formally dissolved on 25 February 1932, and a new committee with the same name was formed in its place.
Among the members of the reconstituted Committee were Skoropadskyi (president), Tufnell (secretary), Brigadier-General Bruce, Sir Michael O’Dwyer, Captain Guy McCaw and Korostovetz. A major supporter of the Committee was Sir Henri Deterding, chairman of the Royal Dutch Shell Petroleum Company. From November 1932 to February 1934 the Committee published a periodical entitled The Investigator. The office of The Investigator was at St Stephen’s House, London SW1, which probably also served as the address of the new Committee. Towards the end of 1933 the British Security Service came to the view that Skoropadskyi should be advised to close down The Investigator and to replace the existing Committee with one with a different membership. In March 1934 Tufnell was dismissed from his position and within a short time the Committee effectively ceased to exist. It would appear that no new committee was formed in its place.
Bibliography
Syrota, R., 'Z istorii odnoho sudovoho protsesu abo hetmanska sprava u mizhvoiennii Velykii Brytanii', Ukraina moderna (Kyiv-Lviv), 4-5 (2000)
Cook, A., Cash for honours: the story of Maundy Gregory (Stroud, 2008)
Syrota, R., 'Pid pylnym sposterezhenniam: Brytanski spetssluzhby i ukrainska politychna emihratsiia v 1920-40-ykh rr.', Ukrainska Dumka (London), 15 March 2008, p. 4
(In 1935 a separate Anglo-Ukrainian Committee, unconnected with the hetmanite movement, was established.)