Mr. Tower to Mr. Sherman.

No. 42.]

Sir: In reply to your dispatch (No. 63) of the 10th of January, 1898, and to your supplemental dispatch of the 22d of January, by which I was instructed to make inquiry in the proper quarter in regard to the detention by the Austro-Hungarian authorities, for military service, of Peter Hornik, a naturalized American citizen of Hungarian birth, who went to his native country in November of last year for the purpose of taking his family to the United States, I have the honor to report that immediately upon the receipt of your instructions I addressed a letter to Peter Hornik at Nagy Tarkany, in Hungary, the temporary residence of said Hornik as given in the letter of Messrs. Mallory & Sons, of Danbury, Conn., a copy of which accompanied your dispatch No. 63, and asked him to inform me whether he had been arrested or detained in Hungary contrary to his rights as an American citizen. I wrote at the same time to Mr. F. D. Chester, United States consul at Budapest, asking him whether he knew anything of this man, and requesting him to make such inquiries as he might be able, to discover [Page 16] whether he was in any difficulty from which his American citizenship ought to protect him. I have not received a reply to the letter which I addressed to Mr. Hornik at Nagy Tarkany; but the consul at Budapest reports that—

The said Hornik was registered at this consulate on December 10 last; that he sent in to me from Nagy Tarkany on the 18th of the same his military pass, from which it appeared that he had served the usual time in the Austro-Hungarian army and was enrolled in the second reserve (militia) of Szabolcs-Zemplin district at the time of his emigration to America, which was in his twenty-eighth year. He begged me, at the time of sending his pass, to ask the proper authorities to excuse him from answering a summons which he had received immediately on his return to Nagy Tarkany.

In compliance with my representations the district commandery of Szabolcs-Zemplin district informed me on December 24, 1897, that Hornik’s name had been struck off the list, as being a citizen of the United States. On the 30th of the same Hornik informed me that he would leave for the United States by a steamer sailing the 11th of January, together with his wife and family, whom he came over expressly to lake back with him to America.

It would seem that Mr. Hornik was in no way detained or molested contrary to his rights as an American citizen, but that the summons sent to him was merely the usual demand made in this country of all returning emigrants to prove their freedom from liability to perform military service. This demand was met satisfactorily in the case of Mr. Hornik by the exhibition of his naturalization certificate, which established his American citizenship.

The consul at Budapest informs me, under date of the 9th of February, that he has received information from Nagy Tarkany that Peter Hornik, with his entire family, left for America on the 6th of January.

I have, etc.,

Charlemagne Tower.