Papers Relating to Foreign Affairs, Accompanying the Annual Message of the President to the First Session Thirty-ninth Congress

[Extracts,]

Mr. Williams to Mr. Seward

No. 4.]

Legation of the United States, Peking, July 11, 1865.

Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of several despatches addressed to Mr. Burlingame, among them Kos. 123, 126, and 128, enclosing military circulars to the United States ministers in London and Paris; of No. 121, acknowledging receipt of rules for consular courts in China; of No/125, referring to Mr. Walsh’s notes upon steam communication between China and California; and of No. 127, being Mr. F. W. Seward’s circular of April 10 respecting the sad accident which happened to you a few days previous, and from which I am happy to learn that you are likely to recover. * * *

Since my last the mail has brought full accounts of the lamentable assassination of our beloved President, and I have taken the telegraphic despatch of the Secretary of War, of April 16, to Mr. C. F. Adams, at London, which appeared in the English papers, as containing the principal facts, and have notified the Chinese government of this sad event. Prince Kung responded in a friendly spirit, (enclosures A and B.) Previous to this I had informed the Chinese officials of all the details then known respecting the occurrence.

The telegraph brought the first notice to Peking via Russia in forty days, but nearly a fortnight elapsed before further news arrived to induce us to believe that such a horrid deed could have been committed in the United States.

The contentment and joy caused by the previous news of the fall of Richmond and the surrender of Lee’s army, foretokening the cessation of arms and final suppression of the rebellion and restoration of the Union, were turned into grief and indignation at learning that the President had been thus removed. All the Americans in Peking alike mourned his death, and all we could do was to pray that God, who had brought the nation to see the triumph of its arms against treason, would strengthen the national cause by leading to the adoption of those plans which would best uphold justice and best promote union.

The limits of a despatch will hardly allow me more than to add my tribute of admiration to the character of Mr. Lincoln. His firm and consistent maintenance of the national cause, his clear understanding of the great questions at issue, and his unwearied efforts while enforcing the laws to deprive the conflict of all bitterness, were all so happily blended with a reliance on Divine guidance as to elevate him to a high rank among successful statesmen. His name is hereafter identified with the cause of emancipation, while his patriotism, integrity, and other virtues, and his untimely death, render him not unworthy of mention with William of Orange and Washington.

I have the honor to be sir, your obedient servant,

S. WELLS WILLIAMS.

Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State,. Washington.

A.

Mr. Williams to Prince Kung

Legation of the United States, Peking, July 7, 1865.

During the present month I have received despatches from the government of the United States informing me that, “on the evening of the 14th of April, a man approached one of the attendants upon the President, pretending that he had important despatches to deliver from the army, which he wished to do personally. He was accordingly admitted, and going directly up to the President, fired a pistol at him, whose shot struck him in the brain; he never spoke after, and died early the next morning. On that day the Vice-President quietly succeeded to the vacant office. The assassin was arrested a few days after.”

This startling intelligence has filled me with amazement and profound grief, and the sorrow it causes is the greater from the contrast with the gratifying tidings received only a few days before of the capitulation of the so-called capital of the southern confederacy, and the surrender of its principal general with over twenty thousand men to the victorious arms of the government.

Mindful of the amicable relations subsisting between the governments of the United States and China, which cause all events, whether they be sad or joyful, to possess a common in terest, I have the melancholy duty to state these circumstances of the death of the President to your Imperial Highness for the information of his Majesty the Emperor in such a manner as may be suitable.

I have the honor to be, sir, your Highness’s obedient servant,

S. WELLS WILLIAMS.

His Imperial Highness Prince Kung, &c.,&c.,&c.,

B.

[Translation.]

JULY 8, 1865,(Tungchi, 4th year intercalary, 5th moon, 17th day.

Prince Kung, chief secretary of state for foreign affairs, herewith sends, in reply:

I had the honor yesterday to receive your excellency’s communication informing me that the President of the United States had been removed by death, an announcement that inexpressibly shocked and startled me. But, as you add that on the same day the Vice-President succeeded to the position without any disturbance, and the assassin had been arrested, so that the affairs of government were going on quietly as usual, I hope that these considerations will alleviate your grief at the event, and you will be able to attend to public business.

I shall be pleased to embody the particulars connected with this event in a memorial to his Majesty, and thereby evince the cordial relations which now exist between our countries, which is the purpose of sending the present reply.

His Excellency S. W. Williams, Charge d’Affairs of United States, in China.