Both blue–yellow and yellow–blue flags were widely used during the Ukrainian struggle for independence in 1917. For the first time in the Russian Empire the blue-yellow flag was flown on 25 March 1917 in Petrograd during a 20,000-strong mass demonstration. On the territory of the Russian Ukraine (Little Russia) the national flag of Ukraine was flown for the first time in Kyiv on 29 March 1917 by soldiers. On 1 April 1917 Kyiv saw a 100,000-strong demonstration that carried over 320 national flags. After that similar demonstration with Ukrainian flags took place across the whole Russian Empire even beyond the Ukrainian ethnic lands. Numerous famous Ukrainian politician wrote their recollection about the April 1 demonstration such as Mykhailo Hrushevsky and Serhiy Yefremov stating that there were blue-and-yellow flags, while Dmytro Doroshenko claimed that there were yellow-and-blue. The blue-yellow flag was flown at the First Ukrainian Military Congress on 18 May 1917.