No. 1056.
Mr. Bayard to Mr. Straus.
Department
of State,
Washington, December 7,
1887.
No. 58.]
Sir: I inclose for your information a copy of a
letter from Mr. John H. Flagg, representing certain exporting interests in
the United States, dated the 1st instant, concerning a report that the
Russian Government is endeavoring to obtain an exclusive concession at Cairo
and other Egyptian ports for the erection of tankage for Russian
petroleum.
I will thank you to make such investigation of the report as possible, and in
case Mr. Flagg’s representations shall be well founded, to take such action
as you properly can for the protection of American interests.
An instruction in this sense has also been addressed to Mr. John Cardwell,
the agent and consul-general of the United States at Cairo.
I am, etc.,
[Inclosure in No. 58.]
Mr. Flagg to Mr.
Bayard.
Welles
Building,
18 Broadway, New
York, December 1,
1887.
Sir: Information has recently come to the
exporters here of American petroleum to the effect that the consul
general of Russia at Cairo, Egypt, has received orders from his
Government to secure if possible an exclusive concession at Cairo and
other Egyptian ports for the erection of tankage for petroleum to
parties in the interest of Russian oil.
If such concession should be granted it would prove a disastrous blow to
American petroleum in Egypt, and it is doubtless intended to have
precisely that effect. It is very much desired that you may instruct our
consular officers at Cairo and Alexandria to be especially vigilant in
regard to this coup d’affaire prompted by the
Russian Government, and it is also extremely desirable that the United
States shall make a prompt and earnest protest against the granting by
the Turkish Government of exclusive commercial privileges, to the
detriment of these American interests. The exports of American refined
oil to Egypt for ten months ending November 1, 1887, were 3,743,950
gallons. It is the manifest purpose of persons manipulating Russian
petroleum to place every obstacle in the way of our maintaining these
exports and to grab a franchise which will virtually exclude us from the
Egyptian markets.
Respectfully, yours,
Jno. H. Flagg,
Attorney for Standard Oil Company,
American
Petroleum Export Association, and other
exporters.
