Mr. Washburn to Mr. Stewart.
Sir: When I left Paraguay on the 12th instant, I regret to inform your excellency that nearly all the foreigners in that country, including [Page 830] several of your countrymen, were in prison, and as I am the only person beyond the reach of President Lopez’s power who has any personal knowledge of their situation, it seems to be my duty to give any information I possess to the representatives of the different foreign governments, that, knowing the condition of their unfortunate countrymen, they may take such action as may seem most proper in order to extricate them from their terrible situation. Unless speedy action is taken there may be none left to tell the tale of their annihilation.
To give an idea, therefore, of the situation there, and of the dangers and horrors to which all foreigners in that country are subjected or exposed, I propose to give a brief narrative of the events that have transpired since the 21st of February last. On the evening of that day, on returning from a duck-shooting “paseo,” I learned that several Brazilian ironclads had passed Humaita, and were on the way to the capital, On reaching my house, I was informed that the minister of foreign affairs, José Berges, had sent an urgent request for me to visit him at his office. I immediately complied, when the minister told me that the Brazilian squadron having passed Humaita, and being already half way to Asuncion, the government had ordered an evacuation of the city, and had declared it a military point. He also said the capital was to be removed to Luque, a little village some ten miles from Asuncion, and that he had invited me to visit him in order that I might have such accommodations provided for me at or near Luque as I might select. I replied that whoever else might obey the order of evacuation, I certainly should not. My legation was, for the time, the territory of the United States, and I should remain in it, giving such protection as my house and flag could afford to all who chose to resort to it. I told Señor Berges, also, that the government had no right to compel the foreigners to abandon their houses and property; that if they chose to remain and defend it, taking the risk of exposure to a bombardment of the town, they had a right to do so. He dissented entirely from this view, and on returning to my house I found it full of people, who were anxiously waiting to learn if I would remain in the capital or not. I told them that I should stay, and many more than my house could accommodate asked permission to remain within the legation. I told them that I could not give them all shelter, but if they chose to deposit their valuables in my house I would receive them, but always subject to their own risk; I should give no receipts for anything.
The same evening and the next day people came rushing in in large numbers, bringing their trunks and boxes and several iron safes, all of which were deposited in the different rooms of the legation. The next day people were hurrying terror-stricken from the town, not from fear of the Brazilians, but of a worse enemy, and towards evening several Englishmen came to my house and asked me to permit them with their families to occupy certain vacant rooms in the rear of my legation. As they were all in the government employ, I suggested that it would be more prudent for them to get permission to do so from the authorities. They accordingly asked and obtained the permission, and on the following morning they came with their families, twenty-one persons in all, and took shelter in the legation. The following morning Dr. Antonio de las Carreras, who was the former head of the Oriental government and a most bitter enemy of the Brazilians, fearing lest, if he fell into the hands of the allies, he would be treated as was Leandro Gomez after the fall of Paysandu, came to my house and asked for shelter. He was accompanied by Francisco Bodriguez Larreta, who went to Paraguay as secretary of legation with Dr. Vasquez Sagastume, the Oriental minister [Page 831] resident in 1864, and I gave them a cordial welcome, and they remained with me till July 13. At the time we all thought that the war was virtually over, and that within a few days Asuncion would be in the hands of the Brazilians. Such was the universal wish of everybody, Paraguayans and foreigners alike. On the 24th the iron-clads approached Asuncion, which was defended by a little fort having but one gun of sufficient caliber to do any harm to monitors or iron-clads, and this one so badly mounted, as I was informed afterwards, that it could not be depressed so as to be of any service. As the Brazilians approached this fort they began firing at it, but without injuring it. The fort replied with some half a dozen shots to some thirty-five or forty from the ironclads, when the latter, for some reason inexplicable to me, turned back and went away. No harm was done to the fort, and very little to the town. One shot struck the new palace of the President, but the damage done to it was very trifling. We then supposed that the iron-clads would soon return reinforced, but week passed after week, and month after month, and we could learn nothing of what was going on at the seat of war. Supposing that Lopez was shut up within his intrenchments around Humaita, and that it would be impossible for him to escape with any considerable portion of his army, we thought the duration of the war was only a question of time, a few days more or less. Thus things remained with us, till on the 1st of April we learned, for the first time, that Lopez had abandoned Paso Pucu, and had reached and passed the Tebicuari with the larger part of his army. Thus the end of the war seemed to be indefinitely postponed. Our situation in Asuncion was extremely disagreeable, as it was impossible to obtain many things elsewhere regarded as necessaries of life.
The town was completety deserted, save only that more or less people were permitted to come in occasionally to carry away things that, in their first fright and hurry, they were unable to do. Some incidents occurred which showed that the government, or rather Lopez, for Lopez is the government, did not approve of my keeping so many people in my legation, and therefore all of them who had not been recognized as belonging to it thought it prudent not to venture into the streets. But considering the circumstances, we passed the time more pleasantly than could have been expected. Carreras and Rodriguez were most agreeable and intelligent gentlemen, and Mr. Bliss was an encyclopedia of knowledge on almost every subject. Our Paraguay servant was able to obtain for us all the beef, mandioca, maize, chickens, and eggs required, and sometimes a duck or a turkey; the caña of the country could also be obtained at double the prices of Martell’s best brandy. But the gloom seemed to be darkening every day over the country; scarcely ever did a person come to my house to carry away anything deposited there, but he had to tell of other foreigners recently arrested and taken in fetters to the President’s headquarters at San Fernando. What it all meant no one of us could divine; there was a terrible mystery about it. At length, however, about the 1st of May, I received notice that the United States steamer Wasp had come up as far as Curupayti to take me away, and was there detained by the allied squadron. I knew that Lopez did not wish me to leave Paraguay; that he, like everybody else, was very anxious for me to remain. The foreigners of all nations were especially anxious that I should wait to the end of the war; and many of the better class of Paraguayans, those having most to lose, were exceedingly importunate that I should stay to give them the protection of my flag at the last extremity. Of these the mother of the President was one of the most solicitous. I told them all that I would not abandon them; that I [Page 832] would endure privations and loss to give them any protection in my power, and that if a successor did not come to take my place, or imperative orders from my government to return home, I would stand by them to the last. I knew also, or at least had no doubt, that if I had proposed to go away and had asked Lopez for means of conveyance to pass through the allied lines to embark on the Wasp, he would not have granted my request. I therefore wrote to the commander of the Wasp that if he did not come above the squadron my family could not get aboard of his steamer, and I therefore urged him very strongly to force the blockade. My great object was to get my wife and child out of the country, and if the Wasp was once above the military lines I could go or not, with or without the permission or favor of his Excellency Marshal Lopez, if, on the arrival of the steamer, it should appear to be my duty to do so. I was disposed, however, to remain, as I knew that if I left I should carry with me the last hope of hundreds or thousands. They all seemed to think that in any contingency my house and person would be inviolate. I did not fully share this opinion, but I nevertheless thought if I could get my family away so much would be gained, and then it would be my duty to remain. With this view I went down to San Fer nando to see President Lopez and confer with him in regard to the passage of the Wasp above the Brazilian squadron. I found him reserved and glum, though evidently desirous that the Wasp should come through; and before leaving to return to Asuncion he promised to forward my letter to Captain Kirkland by flag of truce, and gave me letters to inclose to his commanders at Humaita and Curupayti to allow the Wasp to pass without molestation. In my conversations with Lopez he expressed great dissatisfaction that I had admitted so many persons into my house. My communication to Captain Kirkland being dispatched, I returned to Asuncion. The Wasp, however, did not at that time go above the squadron, and we were then all left in uncertainty whether or not anything would come to our rescue ere it was too late. The arrests of foreigners continued, but for what object or for what offense no one could imagine. The few people I saw were more frightened and shy than ever. Nothing, however, of importance occurred till, on the 16th of June, we were surprised by the appearance of the acting Portuguese consul, José Maria Leite Pereira, and his wife, who came to ask the protection of my house and flag. Of the events that followed this I refer you for information to the correspondence I had in regard to it, published in the Sema-nario. First, the government desired to know if the said Leite Pereira was in my house. I replied in the affirmative, but denied the right of the government to question me as to the persons in my legation, and that if it knew or suspected any obnoxious person to be within it, a specific allegation of his offense must be made before I should be under obligations to send him away. Some two weeks passed after the first call for him was made before it was repeated, and in the mean while we all began to cherish the hope that he would not be molested. His whole offense, so far as I knew then or know now, was the crime which, among civilized men, would be considered venial, if not meritorious, of spending all his own money and all he could borrow to relieve the prisoners who fell into the hands of Lopez, relying on them or their respective governments to repay him after the war. On the morning of his coming to my house, however, he had received notice that his consular character would no longer be respected, and as he had previously been cautioned that Lopez was badly affected towards him, he considered the withdrawal of his exequatur as but a prelude to imprisonment, irons, and starvation; he therefore fled, with his wife, to the United States legation, hoping to [Page 833] find shelter and protection. It was accorded him without hesitation, though regarded by me as an unwise and imprudent step on his part. On the 11th of July, however, the dream of security was dispelled by the receipt of the letter from the acting minister of foreign relations, Gumesindo Benitez, published in the Semanario of July, in which the government demanded the dismissal, on the following day, not only of Leite Pereira, but of everybody else in my house that did not belong to the legation. Pereira and the English left accordingly, though “I told them all that I did not send them away, and that if they chose to remain they might do so, and I would never deliver up one of them until some specific crime was alleged against them.” They all thought, however, it was best for them to go, and the English requested me to go and see Colonel Fernandez, the military commander at Asuncion, the men offering to resume work in the arsenal, and requesting to be advised of the points to which the women and children would be sent. The house was surrounded by as many as forty policemen, and they were all afraid of being taken immediately to prison. Fernandez, however, pledged me his word of honor that they should not be molested by the police, but should be well treated, and said the men would be again taken into the service on condition of making new contracts. The men had made the offer only because they thought it better to go to work than go to prison. They accordingly left the legation in the afternoon, and were directed to the railway station, where they were most miserably provided for, notwithstanding that Fernandez had pledged his word of honor that they should be well treated. They remained in that situation for about a week, when they disappeared, and I know not what has become of them. I have heard that the women and children were sent to a village about four leagues from Asuncion, called San Lorenzo, and that the men had, like most of the other foreigners in Paraguay, been taken in irons to the army headquarters. Leite Pereira left about five p. m. of the same day, and was arrested as soon as he got into the street. Of his subsequent fate I know nothing. On the same day I wrote a letter to Benitez, advising him that the Portuguese consul and the English had left voluntarily, but that as no charge had been made against Carreras or Rod-riguez, and they preferred to stay in the legation, and as such was also my wish, I presumed no objection would be made to it. By sunrise, however, the next morning, I received another letter still more urgent, demanding that they should leave my house by one o’clock of that day. Still no specific charge was made against them, and I told them that they might go or stay as they thought best, but that they would have the protection of my house and flag until they were taken by force, or till some direct crime was laid to their charge. They both said that if I would promise to remain till the end of the war they would not deliver themselves up, as it was impossible for any specific charge to be brought against them, and they did not believe that Lopez would venture to take them out of the legation by force; but I could not promise to remain to the end of the war, and they therefore said it was better that they should go at once than to enrage Lopez by remaining, when at last they would probably fall into his hands. They accordingly left at twelve m. of the 13th of July, but not till I had shown them my letter of the same date to Benitez, in which I gave my reasons for believing that the government could have nothing serious against them, and that in regard to Rod-riguez, even if it had, they had no right to touch him, as he was entitled to diplomatic immunities.
This letter I sent the same afternoon to Benitez, and as all were then gone who did not belong to the legation, I thought that I should be left [Page 834] to a dismal peace. Before night, however, came another letter demanding that I should likewise send away two members of my legation, P. C. Bliss and G. F. Masterman, whose names as such had long before been given in to the ministry for foreign affairs.
At this point I made a stand, as you will see by the published correspondence, and, by fencing and fighting to the best of my ability, saying some flattering things about Lopez, I kept them with me till my final departure. I admit that I purposely prolonged the correspondence, in hope of saving these two men. They were arrested, however, as they started to accompany me to the steamer, at the moment of leaving the legation, taken by force from my side, and their subsequent fate may be guessed at from what I shall hereafter relate.
May none ever know the dreary uncertainty of the last two months and a half of my life in Paraguay. To see men with whom you have had the most friendly relations for months, with whom you have discussed questions of history and politics every day, varying the monotony of the days with billiards and of the evenings with whist, and yet to feel that of these very men with whom you were talking over the situation one or more might be in irons in one hour, and shot within twenty-four. Certainly you will allow that this was enough to render even the sleep of a brave man fitful and uneasy, and of a man like me, without such pretensions, utterly inadequate to “knit up the raveled sleeve of care.” And up to this time we had not the least idea of what it was all about. No such word as treason or conspiracy had, to my knowledge, ever been heard in my house. What could Lopez want? Was it his plan to kill off all foreigners, that no one may be left to tell the story of his enormities? Did he seek to blot out the record of his crimes? If so, the minister was no safer than the other members of the legation. But as Bliss and Masterman were not taken for several weeks after the departure of Garreras and Rodriguez, we gradually got into a more normal state. The conduct of persons accused in the time of the French revolution, whose levity in the prospect of death seems incredible, appeared to us, as we often remarked, no longer strange; but to the credit of Bliss and Masterman, though not to myself, as I did not consider my danger as great as theirs, I will say we scoffed at the dangers before us, and talked, joked, and laughed as freely as though we had nothing to fear. At this point I may remark that, from the time that Leite Pereira came to my house, it was always surrounded by at least a dozen policemen, and that frequently, on looking out in front, I have counted more than that number on one side. Probably fifty men, who might otherwise have been in the army, were kept night and day to watch me and the members of my legation. In the mean while we could hear scarcely anything of what was going on. With the exception of the consuls, who occasionally came in from Luque, no one ever came to my house, and my Paraguayan servants, if they learned anything, feared to tell it. I did learn, however, that about the time that the great sweep was made from my house, the brother of the President, Venancio Lopez, was carried off in irons to the army headquarters. His other brother, Benigno, had been called below long before, and when I visited his excellency at San Fernando, in the early part of May, Don Benigno and the minister of foreign affairs, Berges, were both close prisoners, as was the President’s brother-in-law, Saturnino Bedoya. The old Vice-President, Sanchez, who had previously been a prisoner, was then allowed to leave his house, but neither he nor any Paraguayan dared approach me or be seen with me.
For a time we feared it was the intention of Lopez to cut the throats [Page 835] of all the foreigners, as we knew but little of any arrests at that time of Paraguayans. If they were arrested, they were taken off so quietly that we might or might not hear anything of it for weeks or months. But while the English who had been in the legation were detained in the railway station, the train came in one night at midnight full of prisoners. The English could see nothing, as no light was allowed in the station, but the clanking of the chains and the sighs and groans of the prisoners as they were forced from the cars and driven forward towards the bank of the river were distinctly audible. They were all embarked in a steamer for San Fernando before daylight. A few days after I learned that this crowd of prisoners was almost entirely composed of Paraguayans; that nearly every man in the new capital, the judges, clerks, accountants, and all, save the chief of police, Sanabria, a man eminently distinguished for his brutality, Benitez, and the vice-president, were the only ones left there, besides policemen and soldiers; that there was a gloom over the place so deep and funeral-like that the women and children scarcely ventured out of their houses, and if they did, it was with fear, as if they had just felt the shock of an earthquake and were in dread of another.
For more than fifty years the country has been a Dionysius gallery. It was always the policy of Francia, and of Carlos Antonio Lopez, that everything said should reach the ear of “El Supremo.” But in the worst days of Francia the government was mild and paternal compared with what it has been under this younger Lopez. People have been thrown into prison not only for saying things perfectly innocent, and for not reporting what they have heard, but also for the crime of not reporting what they have not heard. It is made the duty of everybody to be a spy on everybody else, and woe to him whose ears are not open to every word spoken in his presence.
The arrest of all the civil magistrates indicated that it was not the foreigners alone that had made themselves obnoxious to Lopez. But what it was all for no one in my house, as I yet firmly believe, had the least idea. The published correspondence, however, will show that about the 18th or 20th of July the government suspected, or affected to suspect, a conspiracy, alleging that ex-Minister Berges was a traitor, and was in collusion with the enemy, and that under my official seal I had transmitted the correspondence to and fro between the conspirators. I must refer you to the published correspondence to show how they undertook to connect me with the conspiracy, or, at least, as knowing that a revolution was in contemplation. At first it would seem that they were so confident of implicating me that they began to publish the correspondence; but after receiving my letter of the 11th of August, in which I showed so many contradictions in the declarations that had been made by the accused, probably under torture, that they suspended further publications. But it was not in the nature of Lopez to show any magnanimity, or even justice, by acknowledging he had been lead into error by false depositions. Men who know him would as soon accuse him of ordinary courage as of magnanimity, and he never was accused of that, except in his own “Semanario,” of which he is virtually the editor. During all this war Lopez has never exposed himself to any personal danger; he has never on asingle occasion risked himself in any battle, and while he was at Paso Pucu he had an immense cave, or rather house, with walls of earth over twenty feet thick, from which he never ventured for weeks together; and at the same time that his organ was filled ad nauseum with accounts of the great Lopez leading with dauntless valor his legions to victory, he was sitting quaking and quivering in his cave, [Page 836] afraid to venture out lest a ball might reach him. On one occasion, some two years ago, when he was out with his bishop and his staff, a shell struck at a distance of half a mile or more from his excellency. Instantly the brave Lopez turned and ran like a scared sheep, with his staff, including the bishop, after him, the latter losing his hat as he fled affrighted after his chief. This is the only instance known of his ever having been in personal danger; he has not even the vulgar merit of personal courage, nor has he any other. His firmness, carried to obstinacy, is the result of personal fear. Many persons, his own people, who have escaped from his power, and whose families have been tortured and otherwise persecuted to death, have sent messages to him threatening to kill him at sight should they ever meet him; he therefore dares not treat with the enemy, for so many have sworn to pursue him, the world will not afford him a refuge if he once has no army between him and his enemies. He knows the country to be lost and ruined; he has no navy, and in my opinion not more than one-fifth of the land forces of the enemy. Why the latter do not attack him and put an end to the war I do not know; but they do not do so, and the war may not end for a long time. Lopez has recently said he expected to be compelled soon to fall back from the river, and then he would retire into the mountains, driving everybody, foreigners and Paraguayans alike, before him. In that case, at the rate the allies have been going on for the last two years, it will be long before he will be unable to present as strong a front to his enemies as he did when they landed above the Tebicuari, viz, one man to watch the telegraph.
It was not, however, till August that I heard, besides the conspiracy against the government, that there had been a great robbery of the public treasury. Of the particulars of this robbery I could never learn anything; neither did I ever have any knowledge of the details of the plan of the conspiracy. It was said in one of Benitez’s letters that Mr. Bliss, a member of my legation, had signed a paper, with others, in which they had engaged to assassinate President Lopez. I knew that was false, or, at least, had no doubt that it was so, and defied them to produce any such paper; but they never showed it. They never gave me any clue as to the manner of the conspiracy, or how the revolution was to be effected, and I do not believe to this day that anything of the kind was ever attempted. The declarations of prisoners prove nothing except the merciless cruelties of Lopez, for it is known that he freely employs the torture. He loads his prisoners with heavy fetters, sometimes two, three, or four pairs, and besides flogs them, if they do not give the testimony he requires, till they die.
The only explanation I can give in regard to the robbery of the treasury is this: since Lopez came into power he has never had a competent bookkeeper in his employ, and very probably has never known till recently how much money had been left by his predecessor. He has been spending largely ever since, and probably no accurate account has ever been kept of the amount paid out according to his order. After the city was evacuated, however, in February, he probably had occasion to count his money, and found a large hole in the bottom of his treasury. This discovery was not probably made till some months after the removal to Luque, as about the month of June we found that all those foreigners who had made any money during the past years, and were most likely to have any in their houses, were arrested and sent below. Among them were English, French, Italians, Spanish, Germans, and Portuguese. The plan of Lopez appears to be to get this money into his hands, and then by torture or threats to extort confessions of being either conspirators [Page 837] or plunderers of the treasury. On these confessions they will probably be executed, on the precautionary principle of footpads and other murderers, that “dead men tell no tales.” How Lopez expects to escape with the money thus obtained I do not know. Perhaps he thinks that some neutral gunboat will take him and his plunder away at the last moment. But I here give notice that the money thus taken does not belong to Lopez. It is the property of citizens of those powers that are able to pursue it and return it to its rightful owners.
Your excellency, as all the world, probably wonders how it is, if Lopez be the character I have described him, that he is served so faithfully and bravely. It is entirely through fear, for, save and except a few of the most willing instruments of his cruelties, like his favorite mistress, his bishop, Luis Caminos, Sanabria, and a few others, who have evinced most alacrity in doing his bloody work, there is not a man, woman, or child (I do not except either his mother, sister, or brothers) who would not thank God if he would take him to another world where his deserts could be more adequately rewarded.
Why then do the Paraguayans fight so bravely? It is not because of their superior courage, nor of their devotion to Lopez. That they are a brave and enduring people cannot be denied. But the reason why they fight so desperately is this, that, according to Lopez’s system of discipline, there is always more danger in giving way than in going on. He has no confidence in his troops, and always seems to act under the belief that they would desert if they could get a chance. He, therefore, in going into battle, advances his first lines, with orders to fight to the death. A little in the rear is a smaller body, with orders to shoot down the first man who gives way or attempts to desert. Behind these are still others, with orders to shoot any one who fails to bring down any one in front who does not fight to the death; and behind those again are others with like instructions, until at last the threads are all gathered in the hands of Lopez. If, in spite of all these precautions, a point is carried by the enemy, his unhappy officers who survive are shot and the men decimated. Under this system he has lost at least one hundred thousand men, probably more than the Brazilians, and yet this system, though it has not left six thousand able-bodied men in the country, has kept from three to six times as many of the allied forces at bay.
The country is entirely denuded of its male population. All the ploughing, planting, and sowing is done by women; women must yoke the oxen, do the butchering, and all the other work usually done by men. There are many women also with the army, to do the labor of men, and thus relieve the troops, but none, I believe, are forced to bear arms.
The next news that we shall probably hear from Lopez is that he has retired with his whole army to the mountains, and that he has driven every man, woman, and child before him. Had not the Wasp arrived till a month later, I have no doubt that I should have been forced to do the same. To the last moment Lopez hesitated whether to keep me a prisoner or not; he wants no one to survive him capable of telling the world of his enormities; and of all those whose declarations have been given in the correspondence lately published, not one will be allowed to escape, nor will any of those persons before whom they were made. For, once beyond the reach of Lopez, they would declare that they had never made them, or had made them under torture.
Since arriving in this city I have seen a letter that was brought by the Wasp, evidently written at the dictation of Lopez, in which some details are given of the nature of the plot or conspiracy. This is the first information I had of the kind of plot that had been discovered, and [Page 838] the absurdity of the whole thing convinces me more strongly than ever that there never has been any plot or conspiracy at all.
How long is this war to last? For more than a year and a half I have believed that Lopez would not hold out for two months longer; but I had no idea how slowly some people could move, if they resolutely set themselves not to fight.
With the hope that the war would end shortly, I remained a year longer than I intended, very much against my interest, and suffering great discomfort. I believe that at the final catastrophe I could be of great service, especially to the foreigners; and had Asuncion been taken in February, when the iron-clads went up there, as we then expected it would be, I should doubtless have been able to save the lives of many who now will never see their native land again. But when all of them had been killed or made prisoners, and nobody, native or foreigner, dared come near my house, and I was utterly powerless to do any service for anybody, I thought it time to obey the orders of my government and return to the United States.
Your obedient servant,
His Excellency Hon. William Stuart, Her Britannic Majesty’s Minister Plenipotentiary, Buenos Ayres.