Mr. Bayard to Mr.
Curry.
Department
of State,
Washington, October 29,
1887.
No. 231.]
Sir: I transmit for your information, in connection
with former correspondence, a copy of a letter from the American Board of
Commissioners for Foreign Missions, at Boston in reference to affairs in the
Caroline Islands.
As suggested in the letter, instructions have issued looking to the
establishment of a consular agency at Ponape, if thought expedient. Our
consul at Manila will consider the matter.
I also inclose a copy of a letter from Mr. H. A. Stimson, and of minutes
which accompany the same, adopted at the annual meeting of that board on the
4th instant, relative to the arrest of the Rev. Mr. Doane by the authorities
at Ponape, and a copy of my reply.
I am, etc.,
[Inclosure 1 in No. 231.]
Mr. Smith to Mr.
Bayard.
American Board of Commissioners for Foreign
Missions,
Congregational House, 1
Somerset Street, Boston, October
15, 1887. (Received October
15.)
Dear Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the
reception on this day of your favor of the 13th instant. I desire at
once to express my very hearty satisfaction in view of the promptness
and energy which our Government has taken in regard to affairs in the
Caroline Islands. I am also specially grateful to you for the
information contained in this communication. Word was received by me on
Monday last by cablegram from Japan to the effect that the Ponapeans had
killed fifty Spaniards, and also that the ship Essex had been sent from Yokohama to Ponape to look after
American interests there. I am very glad to receive confirmation of this
last fact from your communication. I trust that the report of the number
of Spaniards who have been slain by the natives is exaggerated. I am led
to expect this the more from the fact that a communication has just met
my eye that was published in the Spanish press not long since to the
effect that the natives on Ponape rose against the Spanish authorities
on the 5th of July last, and, having slain the governor and wounded
three of the soldiers, the remainder of the Spanish force took refuge
upon the boats in the harbor. As I have intimated in a former letter to
you, we are fully assured that our missionaries on Ponape have not only
had nothing whatever to do in the way of inciting the natives to this
result, but we are fully assured that they have done everything in their
power to dissuade the natives from such sanguinary measures. We can only
explain the rising of the natives upon the supposition, which is
recognized as probable in the Spanish press, and, as I suppose, also at
the Spanish court, namely, that religious persecution in some form has
goaded the natives to this extreme measure. It is greatly to be
regretted that such an outbreak should have occurred; it will make more
difficult all measures looking to the settlement of relations in the
islands. I am greatly relieved that a United States man-of-war has been
sent to the scene; it will have an excellent moral effect in every way,
and I trust will prevent bloodshed and violence.
I note the suggestion in your communication bearing upon the difficulty
of receiving information from the islands, resulting from the fact that
there is no consul
[Page 408]
or other
representative of the United States stationed near the Caroline Islands.
Allow me to raise the inquiry whether the events of these past months do
not make a call upon our Government to establish a representative at
Ponape. The advantages of such an arrangment would be many and
important, and I do not think that great expense need be involved in the
arrangement. It would seem to me wiser for many reasons that such
official representative should not be one of the missionaries employed
by our board. Mr. Voigt, the United States consul at Manila, in a
communication which met my eye, suggested a Mr. Bowker, now resident on
Ponape, a citizen of this country, who would creditably represent the
Government there, and who would be acceptable in such position to the
Americans—missionary and other—who are resident on that island.
Considering the large interests which Americans have in these islands,
resulting from the thirty-five years of successful missionary work
carried on there, and the remarkable state of advancement to which these
labors have brought so many of the inhabitants, it would seem not an
extravagant or unreasonable thing for our Government, in view of present
dangers and complications, to establish an official representative near
the seat of the Spanish Government in these islands. I believe that I
have in former letters sufficiently stated to to you the losses and
special expenses created by the arbitrary proceedings of the Spanish
authorities on Ponape. I am informed in a recent dispatch received from
Madrid that the Spanish Government is said to have given pledges that it
will fully meet the demand of our Government for indemnity. If this is
indeed the case, and if adequate security for the future can also be
afforded, we shall feel that justice is done and a great end gained.
You will learn by an official communication sent from the officers of
this board, and adopted at the annual meeting of the board at
Springfield, Mass., last week, with what sentiments the gentlemen who
compose this corporation view the action of Spain in this case, and with
what hope and confidence they look to our Government for protection and
redress. It gives me great pleasure to add to such an official
expression my own personal sense of the energy and wisdom with which the
reasonable demands of our Government have been brought to the attention
of Spain and the correspondence with reference to settlement carried
forward. I shall await further information, which you promised to send
me, with very lively interest and confident hope.
I am, etc.,
[Inclosure 2 in No. 231.]
Mr. Stimson to the
President.
3811 Delmar Avenue, St. Louis, Mo.,
October
21, 1887. (Received October
24.)
Dear Sir: The American Board of Commissioners
for Foreign Missions, at its annual meeting in Springfield, Mass.,
October 4–7, 1887, adopted the inclosed minute and instructed me to lay
it before you, asking for your kind attention.
I am, etc.,.
Henry A. Stimson,
Recording Secretary.
The American board has learned with surprise and indignation of the
unjust arrest and imprisonment of Mr. Doane in April last, and of
the interruption of work in the Micronesian mission which has
followed upon the establishment of Spanish authority on Ponape.
It recalls with devout thanksgiving the wonderful results of
thirty-five years of Christian work in those islands; the gathering
of nearly fifty churches, with 5,300 members—a greater number of
communicants than are found in any other mission under its care; the
establishment of six high schools for the training of native
preachers and teachers, and of forty common schools, with more than
2,800 pupils, and the transformation of the people from naked and
warlike savages to orderly, peaceful, and industrious communities.
In view of the interference of the local Spanish authorities with
all this work, and of the violent treatment of Rev. Edward T. Doane,
against all reason and national right, it calls on the Government
for the most prompt and energetic action to obtain reparation for
wrongs already endured, and especially to secure ample protection
for the missionaries and the prosecution of their beneficent work
for the future; and it assures to the Government in these measures
the indorsement of the nation and of the Christian world.
Eliphalet W.
Blatchford.
Presiding
Officer.
[Page 409]
[Inclosure 3 in No. 231.]
Mr. Bayard to Mr.
Stimson.
Department of State,
Washington, October 26,
1887.
Sir: I have to acknowledge the receipt of your
letter of 21st instant, and of the “accompanying minute” adopted at the
annual meeting of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign
Missions at Springfield, Mass., on the 4th instant, relative to the
arrest of Rev. Mr. Doane, the American citizen and missionary, by the
Spanish authorities at Ponape, and to say in reply that the Department
has done and is doing everything practicable to secure protection to Mr.
Doane and his associates in labor.
I am, etc.