No. 46.
Mr. Williamson to Mr. Fish.
Guatemala , March 5, 1877. (Received April 13.)
Sir: I have the honor to lay before you the following report upon the present and prospective lines of communication of the Central American states with the United States and Europe.
To one not familiar with the difficulties of communication with Central America in former times, it would be surprising to note in the dispatches of the first ministers who were accredited to the Central American confederation, as well as of those who were subsequently accredited to the several states, how long a period of time seemed to be required by them to reach their posts of duty, and how difficult it was to receive and to transmit mails. I propose to state in this connection a few facts exhibited by the records of the legation. They relate to the difficulty and danger attending a journey to this city in past times.
The first minister, Hon. John Williams, appears to have journeyed by the way of Havana and Belize. He was several months on the way. So slow was mail communication that, although he arrived in this city on the 2d of May, 1826, his first opportunity of sending a dispatch was the 3d August of that year.
[Page 54]The first minister who came by the Panama route was the Hon. Elijah Hise, in 1848, and he reports a fearfully dangerous trip by sea and land to his post of duty in this city.
The Hon. Mr. Marling, in 1855, came via San Juan del Norte, and arrived at his post in about two months, as he states, by a rare chance availed of, and made successful with resolute pluck.
One of our ministers, Hon. Mr. Shannon, lost his life at Izabal, when coming to this city via Belize route; and another, Hon. Mr. Clark, died of injuries received in the surf when he was engaged in landing at San Jose de Guatemala.
Up to 1860, it appears that the average time taken by ministers to reach their posts in Central America was two months. Even as late as 1870, a minister reported that he was obliged to pass by the port of San José and make a voyage to Panama and back before he was able to land at San José de Guatemala. At that time there was no pier at San Jose. Now there is a strong iron one at that port, at Acajutla, at La Libertad, and at Punta Arenas. A finer one than all the other piers mentioned is now under construction at Champerico. It is to be completed in May.
In endeavoring to inform myself fully for the purposes of this dispatch how the mails were formerly sent to the legation or legations, I find that one minister in 1833 recommended the route via Mexico and Vera Cruz, and another the route by Havana to Belize. Several recommended the route via Omoa; some via San Juan del Norte. Before the establishment of the Panama Railroad (now Pacific Mail) Company’s line of steamers in 1856, the mails from the United States to ministers seem to have come by occasional vessels from New York or Boston, bound for Belize, Omoa, or Truxillo, and generally were many months on the way.
In those days there was no regular mail communication in these states interiorly and exteriorly. In fact they seem to have had no post-office department. There has been a great change, I am glad to say, effected by the enterprise of an American company, the Panama Railroad Company, to whose steamship lines the Pacific Mail has succeeded.
Capt. J. M. Dow, I believe, first called the attention of the Panama Railroad Company to the importance of developing the Central American trade, and he commanded the first steamship, the Columbus, which ran specially to Central American ports on the Pacific. The contract was signed in the city of Guatemala on the 5th February, 1856. The first trip to Guatemala was made in December of that year. Now there are many ships of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company engaged in the Central American trade. I shall not pretend to name them while treating of this part of my subject, and propose to refer only to those lines that have trade relations with these states.
The lines on the Pacific are first mentioned, partly because, in my judgment, they have done more, and are likely to continue to do more, to direct this valuable trade to the United States than any other lines on the Atlantic side, but principally because all the American and European lines which terminate at Aspinwall make their Central American connections by means of the Panama Railway and the Pacific lines of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company. There are perhaps some other fact that entitle the Pacific, lines to special prominence. They are very important to be noted and continually borne in mind in connection with efforts to promote trade between the Central American states and the United States. I shall attempt to give a brief résumé of these facts.
The mass of the population is nearest the Pacific. The productive state of Salvador lies entirely upon the Pacific side. It has no front upon the Caribbean. Five-sixths of the population of Nicaragua live south and west of the lakes.
[Page 55]Honduras, in my judgment the poorest of all the states, has a scattered population, the majority of which may be on the Caribbean side. Neither Costa Rica nor Guatemala has a city on her northern and eastern front.
The face, then, of Central America may be said to be to the Pacific. Her back is toward the United States and Europe. The most fertile and healthy agricultural localities in these states are upon the slopes and plateaus on the Pacific or southern side of the great and high range of the Cordilleras that runs through Central America. It is true the highest peaks of the Cordilleras are nearest the Pacific coast, and that the longest and largest rivers empty into the Caribbean and its adjacent waters. The most rugged and continuous ranges are nearer the Caribbean. Geologists consider the former as representing the Sierra Madre, because they are probably older; but admitting that these high peaks represent the oldest range, (as they doubtless do,) it is clear to one familiar with these countries that the general surface of the Pacific slopes and plateaus of Central America is nothing like so rugged, and the ranges of high mountains are not nearly so continuous, as those nearer the Caribbean front.
The northern or Caribbean slope of these ranges of mountains is not so fertile (except in localities) as the southern or Pacific. The rain-fall there is also far greater, and the dry and wet seasons not so distinctly marked. Assuming that coffee will continue to be the staple article of export of these countries, because of the profitableness of its production, it should not be overlooked that the coffee-tree grows best, and produces the most highly aromatic fruit, in a volcanic soil, and where it is not exposed in the season of flowering to either very heavy rains or strong winds. These conditions are found on the Pacific slopes and plateaus. The best coffee-estate I have seen on the Atlantic side is estimated to produce an average of two pounds per tree. The best I have seen on the Pacific side (Las Nubes, the property of an American gentleman, Mr. William Nelson) has averaged up to the present time five pounds or more to the tree. This, however, is an exceptionally good estate.
In respect to harbors, the two shores of Central America are sadly deficient. On the Caribbean, Guatemala has one that is unsurpassed in size and security, the bay of Santo Tomás. Honduras has the little inlet at Omoa, and the too-open port to northeast winds, Puerto Cabal-los. Nicaragua has none since the port of Greytown lost its usefulness, unless Bluefields maybe so considered. Costa Rica has Port Limon, which can scarcely be called a harbor. On the Pacific, Guatemala has no harbor, only open roadsteads. Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua all touch upon the splendid harbor of the Gulf of Fonseca. The first two named have these, respectively: the ports La Union and Amapala. Nicaragua has the narrow estuary at Corinto, the open roadstead of Brito, and the bight of San Juan del Sur. Costa Rica has the fine harbors of the Gulf of Nicoya and of the Gulf of Dulce.
The Caribbean side of Central America is also considered more unhealthy than the southern, and (according to my experience) is infested with a greater number and variety of insects annoying to man. It does not seem inappropriate to mention, I have been repeatedly informed by American physicians residing in these countries that the yellow fever has never made its appearance on the Pacific side of Central America.
In addition to this, the Caribbean Sea and Mexican Gulf, through which the northern and eastern coasts of Central America have to be approached, have a deservedly bad reputation among sailors for the terrible hurricanes that prevail upon them. The grand Pacific continues [Page 56] to deserve its gentle name. It is also worthy of note that quite a number of wealthy, energetic Central Americans have established themselves in business in San Francisco, and that the many attractions of that thriving city, coupled with its semi-tropical climate, are likely to beget influences favorable to the cultivation of trade relations with these States.
This digression seemed to be desirable in order to afford you clear information. To guard against misapprehensions that may arise from this contrast of the Caribbean and Pacific sides of Central America, I beg leave to say, on the former are rich lands and superb woods and extended pasturages for cattle.
The object of the contrast has been neither to depreciate nor super-praise, but to point out the fact that the Pacific section of these countries is more developed than the other, and to indicate some of the causes that have produced, and that are likely to maintain, its superiority in that respect.
The following are the Pacific Mail Steamship Company’s lines on the Pacific. The names used to designate them are those employed by the company in its latest schedule: The Panama and San Francisco line. Two of the steamers of this line, in making trips to and from Panama and San Francisco, touch twice a month at the ports of Punta Arenas, in Costa Rica, and San Jose, in Guatemala. One steamer touches once a month on the trip from San Francisco to Panama and the other touches on the trip from Panama to San Francisco. By a late contract with the government of Salvador the same service is to be performed for that State by touching at the port of La Libertad. These are called through steamers.
When close connection is made with the steamer from New York to Aspinwall, it is possible to arrive at the capital of Costa Rica in thirteen days from New York, and at the capital of Guatemala in fifteen days. It is also possible, by means of this line of steamers, for one to arrive from San Francisco in the capital of Guatemala in twelve days, and in the capital of Costa Rica in fourteen days. Both of the capitals referred to are two days’ journey from their respective ports. The Panama and Acapulco line consists of several steamers, that touch at all the Central American ports on the Pacific twice a month in going from Panama to Acapulco, and twice on the return voyage.
The Panama and Champerico line only extends to Champerico, the most northerly port of Guatemala. It also touches twice a month at all the Central American ports on the Pacific. The last named lines carry most of the cargo from Central America. They leave Panama three times a month, 9th, 22d, and 29th. The ships of the last named lines are of about 1,200 tons burden. Those of the Panama and San Francisco line are of about 3,000 tons.
The governments of Central America have contracted to pay the following subsidies to the Pacific Mail Steamship Company for carrying their mails: Guatemala, $25,000 per annum; Salvador, $12,000 per annum; Honduras, $8,000 per annum; Nicaragua, $6,000 per annum; Costa Rica, $12,000 per annum. The subsidy of Salvador has been increased to $25,000 per annum, to be paid in installments, as soon as the new contract, under which the through steamers are to touch twice a month at La Libertad, goes into effect. These vessels also carry the United States mails, but I am not aware that they receive a subsidy for doing so.
At Panama, the foregoing lines of steamers connect with the following foreign and American lines directly, and by means of the Panama Railroad: With the Pacific Steam-Navigation Company’s line (British) [Page 57] to Callao, which leaves Panama four times a month, and touches at all the way ports of any importance in Ecuador and Peru. By means of the Panama Railroad Company, these lines also make connection at Aspinwall with their own New York and Aspinwall line. With the Atlas Steamship Company’s line (American) to New York; with the Royal Mail Steam-Packet line (British) to Southampton and Cherbourg) the West India and Pacific Steamship Company’s line (British) to Liverpool; the Harrison line (British) to Liverpool, occasionally making voyages by the way of New Orleans for cargo; the General Transatlantic Company’s line (French) to St. Nazaire and Havre, and the Hamburg and American line (German) to Hamburg. All of these lines of steamers steam from Aspinwall twice a month, except the General Transatlantic Company’s line and the Harrison line, which only leave once a month. Panama and Aspinwall may be considered the distributing-points of the eastern bound trade from the west coast of South America north of Callao, and from the west coast of the Central American States and Mexico. The American ships engaged in this distribution are believed to be nearly, if not quite, equal in carrying capacity to the foreign ones. Assuming* they all carry about the same cargoes it is easy to see that the share which Europe receives of this valuable and large trade, almost right at our doors, is two-thirds. This does not represent all that foreign ships take from Central America. The Royal Mail Steamship Company’s steamers make monthly trips to Port Simon in Costa Rica, and Greytown in Nicaragua, carrying passengers and cargo; and a monthly steamer of the West India and Pacific Steamship Company sails from Kingston to and from Belize, carrying thence, indirectly, the products of the northern parts of Guatemala and Honduras and Nicaragua that are concentrated at that place. In addition to these steam lines carrying the trade of these and other contiguous countries to Europe, there is a line of British clipper-ships that make annual voyages to Punta Arenas in Costa Rica, and there are many German ships that come to Guatemala and these states via Cape Horn annually with cargoes of merchandise, and return with cargoes of wood, hides, &c. There are also American sailing-vessels that frequently, but not quite regularly, ply between ports of the United States and Central America. None of them, I think, can be called lines. (Belize is meant to be included in Central America, for, geographically speaking, it is a part of it.) The most regular of these in believed to be the Jex or Jelks sailing-ships from New York to Belize. I am informed there are three of them, of about five hundred tons burden. There are also several small schooners that carry passengers and freight between New Orleans and Belize. In the winter, there are a number of small sailing-vessels plying between New Orleans and the Bay Islands of Honduras, engaged in the fruit trade. There are also occasional sailing-vessels from Boston and New York that make voyages to Greytown and the Mosquito Coast for india-rubber, &c., but, I am told, nothing like so many now as formerly. On the Pacific side there are occasional sailing-vessels that bring and Carry cargoes between San Francisco and the Central American ports.
It is also worthy of mention that an enterprising New York firm, Pomares & Cushman, sent a vessel last year, via Cape Horn, to the Pacific ports of Central America with cargo, and were sufficiently satisfied with the results to send her again the present year. To one looking at the map of North America, without a knowledge of the fact that these states really front, in population and commercially, to the south and west, instead of to the north and east, New Orleans would be pointed [Page 58] out as the American city that ought to command a large part of their trade. Being a Louisianian, and having come here with preconceived and incorrect views upon that subject, I have reluctantly abandoned that idea being realized for a long time, (if ever,) even if the merchants of New Orleans were to divert their minds and capital from local and temporary troubles to practical commercial enterprises. The fact is, as heretofore stated in this dispatch, the products and population are not on her side of Central America.
By establishing a steam line to Aspinwall, touching at Belize, Santo Tomas of Guatemala, the Bay Islands, and north coast of Honduras, Grey town, and Port Limon, and returning via Havana, she would probably get a fair share of the trade that now goes to Europe and New York and Boston from that coast. She may never compete successfully for the Pacific coast trade, in my opinion. Its natural market at present is San Francisco. To that port alone in the United States can cargoes be carried without breaking bulk. This fact will be undisturbed until the interoceanic canal is constructed. Central America, geographically, comprises all that semi-continent lying between the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and the Isthmus of Darien.
Politically, it embraces about two-thirds of that semi-continent; commercially, at present, it is a narrow strip on the Pacific, lying between the Gulf of Nicoya, in Costa Rica, and Champerico, in Guatemala. The width of this strip is about eighty miles, and its length about six hundred miles. The trade that passes through Greytown on the Caribbean is carried on with the population that dwells southwest of the lakes of Nicaragua. Under existing conditions New York is commercially nearer Central America than New Orleans. A few facts in connection with this remark are here presented.
From Punta Arenas, the most southerly Pacific port of Central America, to New York via Panama, the steaming distance is about 2,489 miles, to which is to be added forty miles of transit by the Panama Railroad. From Punta Arenas to San Francisco the steaming distance is nearly 2,720 miles. From Champerico, the most northerly and westerly point of Central America, the steaming distance to New York via Panama is about 3,089 miles. To this also must be added the Panama Railroad transit. From Champerico to San Francisco, the steaming-distance is about 2,120 miles. From New Orleans to Aspinwall the distance is given on a chart before me at 1,400 miles. Her distance from the northern ports of Guatemala cannot, therefore, exceed 700 miles, and from the eastern terminus of the Nicaragua Interoceanic Canal on the Caribbean side, cannot exceed 1,000 miles. The length of the interoceanic canal route, as measured by Commander Lull, from Greytown to Brito, on the Pacific, is 180.76 miles. From Punta Arenas to Brito, the distance is about 200 miles, and from Champerico to Brito about 400 miles. By this canal route, then, New Orleans would be only about 1,400 miles from Punta Arenas, and about l,600 miles from Champerico by water communication. She would, then, be much nearer the Pacific Coast of Central America than either New York or San Francisco. The great cities of Saint Louis, Louisville, Cincinnati, and Chicago would then become greatly interested in securing to that city (as an entrepôt at least) a large part of the trade of Central America. Then New Orleans might become a formidable competitor of San Franciso.
Experience, however, teaches that mere proximity, although an advantageous element in influencing the course of trade, is by no means, in these days, to be relied upon as certain to produce changes or satisfactory results. San Franciscan energy and enterprise may reach [Page 59] through the canal, and, overcoming distance by superior skill and superior commercial facilities, may take the trade of the Caribbean coast of Central America away from New Orleans, as British traders are now doing at Belize, Greytown, and Port Limon. As New Orleans has no steam-line to that coast, it may be said that London and Liverpool are commercially nearer the Caribbean coast of Central America than the metropolis of Louisiana.
In my No. 430 of September 17, 1875, I had the honor to advise you of efforts then being made by the several governments of these States (except Salvador) to obtain facilities of communication through Caribbean ports. You were good enough to say in reply (instruction No. 205) that a copy of the dispatch had been communicated to the Secretary of the Treasury. I now propose to allude to the lines of communication with the United States and Europe, to which these efforts appear to address themselves. It seems best to begin with Costa Rica. Her government is still struggling on under great financial embarrassments to complete the railway from Port Limon to San José. Nearly fifty miles of that part of the railroad is reported to be sometimes in running order. That extraordinary enterprise, so bold in its conception by a little State of scarcely a hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants, so reckless in its management, so difficult in engineering obstacles, and so hurtful in its effects up to the present time, on the hitherto untarnished financial reputation of the State, is too familiar to the Department to need any further comments from me at present. Should the road ever be completed and maintained in running order, it will take a large portion of the trade of Costa Rica to the Caribbean; for her cultivated coffee-lands do not, as in Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Salvador, lie so near the Pacific as to cause the shortness of distance to compete successfully with the greater dispatch of a good railway in the direction of the great markets of the world.
In Nicaragua the outlet of Greytown is by the San Juan River, which is navigated by steamers. The navigation is becoming more difficult each year. A considerable part of the trade of Nicaragua seeks that outlet. When the interoceanic canal is completed the facilities for carriage afforded by the lakes of Nicaragua may control a large part of the trade of that State toward the Caribbean mouth of the canal. In respect to the possible influence of that great enterprise on the channels of trade, I cannot do better than quote the simple yet eloquent words of Commbdore Ammen, in a letter published by the American Geographical Society in October, 1876. He says:
The Suez Canal is the opened gate for the inland sea-route of Europe and North Africa with Southern Asia and its Archipelago; the American Isthmus Canal invites Europe with our own commerce to the whole west coast of the Americas, to Northern China and Japan, and southwardly to the Australian continent. Nor can commerce longer forget that not only the drainage of the rivers emptying into the American Mediterranean is of an area greater than that of all the rivers emptying from Europe into the Atlantic, and of all those emptying into the Mediterranean and into the Indian Ocean, but that the valleys of these American rivers are those of different productive zones. The back country essential to commerce exists here, therefore, (as Maury showed twenty-five years ago,) around the Mexican Gulf and the Carribbean Sea, larger than that around any other sea.
The contract for the construction of the canal having been made, and the new treaty for guaranteeing its neutrality being under negotiation, it is not unlikely the present generation may witness the increased activity its completion is expected to produce.
Every American should not only be full of hope, but full of energy and of resources, else we may continue to witness the mortifying spectacle [Page 60] of our neighbors preferring to sell and buy in distant European markets; a spectacle, it may be remarked, not calculated either to please our national pride, or to vindicate our claims to the superior energy of our merchants and manufacturers, or to sustain our pretensions to practical statesmanship.
The interoceanic railway of Honduras is not progressing. It is with difficulty kept in running order to San Pedro, thirty-seven miles in the interior from Puerto Caballos. If the new executive chief of Honduras can assure peace to that unhappy country, and develop her resources in the face of what may well be considered by the most daring financier or statesman insurmountable financial obstacles, the road may in time be pushed farther into the interior. At present the principal use of the road is to transport valuable woods for shipment to Europe.
In Guatemala the main project for communication with the Caribbean is by a cart-road, called here “El Camino del Norte,” from this city to Izabal or Santo Tomás. Such a road would not be very difficult or very expensive. Sometimes it is proposed to attempt to use the Motagua River to a point near the Bay of Santo Tomás, and from that point to dig a canal into the bay. Having had occasion to observe the river closely on several trips to and from Izabal, I question the navigability of the Motagua, because of the excessive shoaliness in the dry season and the velocity of its current in the wet. There is a very dangerous bar at the mouth of the river. The most practicable project, according to my view, is to build a cart-road to Santo Tomás direct.
Another project is to build a cart-road from Coban, in Alta Vera Paz, to Panzos, near the junction of the Cahaban and the Polochic. The latter river* empties into the Gulf of Dulce. I have traveled down the river in a steam-launch, and believe from observation it will be navigated by steam whenever there is sufficient trade to support one or more steamers. Many years ago there was a steamer lost on that river. I have thus mentioned, as briefly as practicable, all the existing and proposed lines of communication between these countries and the United States and Europe that are known to me. After considering the statements of this dispatch one cannot fail to feel the force of the fact that under existing conditions San Francisco enjoys advantages over any other city of the United States as a base from which trade relations with these States may be best promoted.
With the rapid growth of California, and the steady development of our other Western States and Territories, there cannot be much doubt all the coffee produced in Central America will find (until the interoceanic canal is completed) its best market in San Francisco. And as the inhabitants of these countries progress in artificial wants, it ought not to be questionable that the skill and energy of our agriculturists, manufacturers, and merchants will enable us to supply them at a cheaper rate and in a more convenient way than European nations. As it seems to be apposite to the subject I take the liberty, in closing this dispatch, to repeat a paragraph of my No. 371, dated June 7, 1875:
As the exported products of Central America are all tropical and such articles as are consumed in the United States, and as all the imports into Central America are such articles as are produced in the United States, it seems obvious that our proximity ought, in time, and with proper energy and skill, to give us the control of this valuable trade. Might it not be promoted by reciprocity treaties?
I am, &c.,