No. 221.
Mr. Foster to Mr. Evarts.

No. 528.]

Sir: On the 21st instant I received your dispatch, No. 379, of the 31st ultimo, with which you transmit a copy of a communication and its accompaniments from the Secretary of War, embracing a report from Colonel Shafter concerning recent incursions of Indians from Mexico into Texas.

In accordance with the indication contained in your dispatch, I called upon Mr. Vallarta, at the foreign office, on yesterday, gave him the facts contained in Colonel Shafter’s report, and represented to him the manner in which Colonel Shafter’s recommendation for authority to cross the border in pursuit of the raiders had been received by our government. Whereupon a lengthy conversation followed on the general subject of the Texas-border troubles.

I recalled to Mr. Vallarta’s attention the fact that, in one of the first interviews which I had with him after the establishment of General [Page 402] Diaz’s government in this capital, I represented to him in very strong terms the urgent necessity there was to give early attention to the peace and order of that frontier, and in my first audience with General Diaz I made the same representations to him, assuring him that it was essential to the maintenance of cordial relations between the two countries. I stated that the recent occurrences on that frontier had fully confirmed me in the suggestion which I first made to him, that a military officer of high rank, character, and prudence should be sent to the Rio Grande with a sufficient force of regular federal troops to repress the marauding bands, and compel the local authorities to co-operate in enforcing order and punishing the murderers and robbers.

I expressed regret that my suggestion had apparently had so little effect, as the only person sent to that frontier was General Blanco, who went to Matamoras simply on a political mission, unaccompanied by any federal force, and that his mission, if I had not been incorrectly informed, had proven the truth of the position frequently assumed by me, that the State and local authorities in that region pay very little regard to the orders or wishes of the federal government, as Governor Canales, of Tamaulipas, refused to recognize General Blanco’s authority or to be governed by his orders, and that he found it necessary to return to this capital, and I feared it was the same with the other authorities on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande; so that Mr. Vallarta’s government ought not to consider it strange that the military officials of Texas should deem it necessary to have authority to pursue the marauders into Mexican territory and punish them for their murders and robberies. This was no new declaration for me to make, as he would see by an examination of my correspondence and interviews with his predecessors in the foreign office.

I referred to the fact that notwithstanding my repeated remonstrances with the past administration for a series of raids into Texas from Mexico, resulting in murders, arson, plundering of government post-offices and custom-houses, robberies, and other outlawry, up to the present time not a single punishment had resulted on the part of the Mexican authorities. The only action taken by the federal authorities during my residence which indicated any vigor or decision was the arrest of General Cortina by order of Mr. Lerdo, and that simply resulted in bringing him to the capital to release him on parole. And it appeared that the government of General Diaz had in his recent arrest even treated him with greater consideration, as it had rescued him from the death-penalty which Canales had caused to be pronounced against him in Matamoras, and, according to the public press, had brought him to this city to be acquitted of all blame.

Mr. Vallarta replied that General Diaz was fully impressed with the importance of preserving the peace of the Rio Grande border, as he had so freely expressed to me, and was desirous of doing all in his power to that end; but that up to the present he had not been able to adopt such measures as he desired, owing to the difficulties necessarily incident to the readjustment of public affairs after the triumph of the revolution. He said that his government agreed with me that it was desirable to send to that frontier an able and prudent general, with a sufficient federal force, to co-operate with the American military authorities; but in order to make this co-operation fully effective it was highly desirable, first, to have the official relations between the two governments restored.

I answered, that the peace of that region ought not to be endangered by a delay in sending a federal force awaiting the recognition of General Diaz’s government. Mr. Vallarta acquiesced in this, but said that [Page 403] it appeared important that an understanding be arrived at whereby the American and Mexican military authorities might be able to co-operate in their movements against the Indians and other raiders and outlaws, and that such an agreement should be made by or have the approval of both governments, and that the non-existence of official relations stood in the way of such an understanding. He referred to the reported crossing of Colonel Shafter at Piedras Negras early in this month as a violation of Mexican territory, which did not appear to have the justification alleged in his (Colonel Shatter’s) recommendation to our government, as the crossing of the river was not in pursuit of either Indians or other raiders, but to demand the surrender of persons arrested in Mexico by its authorities. To which I responded, that I was not authorized to discuss that occurrence, as I had as yet received no information or instructions concerning it; but, from my acquaintance with the treatment which the Rio Grande troubles had received from the Mexican federal and local authorities in the past four years, I was not surprised to be informed that events had occurred which, in the judgment of our military officers, had made a crossing of the border necessary.

Referring to the visit of General Blanco to Matamoras, Mr. Vallarta said that his mission was purely of a political character, growing out of the difficulties existing between Revueltas, Cortina, and Canales; but he did not deny my allegation of the insubordination of Canales, now in command at Matamoras. He stated that this visit had resulted in the removal from that region of General Cortina, who was regarded as one of the chief causes of the border troubles, and that his government considered that as an important step in the direction of pacification, and that whatever might be the treatment he would receive here he would not be permitted to return to the Rio Grande.

Mr. Vallarta was quite earnest in impressing upon me the desirability in this connection of restoring the official relations between the two countries, upon which event, he said, depended the adjustment also of other questions, to which he alluded in passing, but which need not be referred to in this dispatch.

* * * * * * *

In this connection, it may be proper to refer to the fact that early last year I obtained an assurance from the Mexican Government that it would remove the small bands of Indians in Mexico, near the Texas frontier, to distant points in the interior of the country, and place them under such surveillance as to prevent their raids into Texas.

But the administration of Mr. Lerdo was so occupied with the revolution that it never carried out this resolution. I hope with the establishment of official relations to have this measure, so important for our frontier protection, carried into execution.

I am, &c.,

JOHN W. FOSTER.