Editing Berwick-upon-Tweed (section)

=== Relations with Russia ===

There is an apocryphal story that Berwick is (or recently has been) officially at war with [[Russia]].<ref name="QI">{{cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhtiGIuR1M4 |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211107/YhtiGIuR1M4 |archive-date=2021-11-07 |url-status=live |title=Who was the only survivor of the Crimean War? |author=QI: Quite Interesting |work=YouTube |date=9 December 2016 |access-date=28 May 2020}}{{cbignore}}</ref> According to a story by George Hawthorne in ''[[The Guardian]]'' of 28 December 1966, the London correspondent of ''[[Pravda]]'' visited the Mayor of Berwick, Councillor Robert Knox, and the two made a mutual declaration of peace. Knox said, "Please tell the Russian people through your newspaper that they can sleep peacefully in their beds." The same story, cited to the [[Associated Press]], appeared in ''[[The Baltimore Sun]]'' of 17 December 1966; ''[[The Washington Post]]'' of 18 December 1966; and ''[[The Christian Science Monitor]]'' of 22 December 1966. At some point, the real events seem to have been turned into a story of a "Soviet official" having signed a "peace treaty" with Mayor Knox; Knox's remark to the ''Pravda'' correspondent was preserved in this version.<ref name="QI"/><ref name=Culture>{{cite web |last=Spicer |first=Graham |title=Myth Or Reality? Berwick Revisits Its 'War With Russia' |work=Culture 24 |date=24 July 2006 |url=http://www.culture24.org.uk/history+%2526+heritage/time/georgian+and+victorian/art38768 |access-date=1 December 2009 |archive-date=22 October 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101022030506/http://www.culture24.org.uk/history+%26+heritage/time/georgian+and+victorian/art38768 |url-status=live }}</ref>

The basis for such status was the claim that Berwick had changed hands several times, was traditionally regarded as a special, separate entity, and some proclamations referred to "England, Scotland and the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed". One such was the declaration of the [[Crimean War]] against Russia in 1853, which [[Queen Victoria]] supposedly signed as "Victoria, Queen of Great Britain, Ireland, Berwick-upon-Tweed and all British Dominions". When the [[Treaty of Paris (1856)|Treaty of Paris]] was signed to conclude the war, "Berwick-upon-Tweed" was left out. This meant that, supposedly, one of Britain's smallest towns was officially at war with one of the world's largest powers – and the conflict [[List of wars extended by diplomatic irregularity|extended by the lack of a peace treaty]] for over a century.<ref name=Culture/> In reality, Berwick-upon-Tweed was not mentioned in either the declaration of war or the final peace treaty and was legally part of the United Kingdom for both.