Mr. Olney to Mr. Dupuy de Lôme.
Washington, July 18, 1896.
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your note of the 24th ultimo, communicating the instructions received by you from the minister of foreign affairs in relation to a complaint presented in my note of the 11th of April last touching the boarding and search on the high seas of the American schooner William Todd on the 16th of March last by two Spanish gunboats,
From a comparison of dates and the stated latitudes and longitudes it is obvious that the note of the Duke of Tetuan has reference to some other incident than that of which this Government complained. The inclosure to my note distinctly stated that the William Todd was boarded and searched on the 16th day of March about 6 or 7 miles from the island of Pinos, in latitude 21° 12ʹ, longitude 82° 42ʹ (west from Greenwich being of course understood). Your reply quotes the position given by me as “21° 12ʹ north latitude and 76° 30ʹ west longitude”—the Greenwich longitude being apparently reduced to approximate to the Spanish scale—and then proceeds to describe a certain search of April 6th last as having taken place in 21° 23ʹ north latitude and 73° 56ʹ west longitude, which, if the Spanish scale be followed, would be somewhere south of Trinidad. It is now ascertained that on the 6th of April the William Todd was in Jamaican waters, near Kingston.
As it seems evident that the Spanish reply has relation to some entirely different occurrence from that presented in my note, it seems unnecessary to advert to the complete discrepancy of details upon which the minister of foreign affairs dwells.
At the time of writing my note to you of April 11 the Department had not received the later report of the United States consul at Kingston, Jamaica, communicating the sworn affidavit of the master and mate of the William Todd. I have the honor to inclose a copy of that affidavit herewith and to repeat the representations and requests contained in my aforesaid note of April 11.
Accept, etc.,