GENEVA CONVENTION, an international agreement for the purpose of improving the condition of wounded soldiers of armies in the field, originally adopted at an international con ference held at Geneva, Switzerland, in 5864, and afterwards re placed by the convention of July 6, 1906, also adopted at Geneva. This later agreement is the one now known as the Geneva Con vention. The conference of 1864 was the result of a movement which sprang from the publication in 1862 of a book entitled Un Souvenir de Sol f erino by Henri Dunant, a Genevese philanthro pist, in which he described the sufferings of the wounded at the battle of Solferino with such vivid effect that the subject became forthwith one of public interest. It was energetically taken up by M. Gustave Moynier, whose agitation led to an unofficial congress being held at Geneva in Oct. 1863. The convention after wards received the adherence of every civilized power.
At a second conference on the same subject, held at Geneva in 1868, a supplementary convention was drawn up, consisting of 14 additional articles which never became operative. The Brus sels International Conference (1874) for the codification of the law and customs of war occupied itself with the Geneva Con vention, but in this relation led to no result.
At The Hague Peace Conference of 1899 Great Britain with drew her objections to the application of the convention to mari time warfare, and agreed to the adoption of a special convention "adapting to Maritime warfare the principles of the Geneva Con vention." After some unsuccessful efforts an invitation by the Swiss Government was accepted in March 1906 by 35 States, only Turkey, Salvador, Bolivia, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Colombia abstaining, and the conference was held at Geneva in July 1906, when a full revised convention was adopted, which replaced that of 1864. This was again revived at The Hague Peace Conference of 1907 and adopted as Convention X.