Mr. Porter to Mr.
Hay.
Embassy
of the United States,
Paris, March 10,
1900.
No. 638.]
Sir: In compliance with your instruction No.
722, of February 2, concerning Mr. Thompson’s mission to the President
of the French Republic, I took pleasure in introducing that gentleman to
the minister of foreign affairs and afterwards to M. Loubet, who gave
him a special audience and treated him with exceptional courtesy. Mr.
Thompson’s report, which I inclose herewith, will show how much the
French President was pleased with the testimonial and how gracefully he
expressed his appreciation of the kind thought of President McKinley,
which was so agreeable to him personally and so well calculated to
render still stronger the ties of friendship which have so long existed
between the two nations.
All the papers gave flattering accounts of the ceremony.
I have, etc.,
[Inclosure.]
Mr. Thompson to
the President.
Paris, France, March 8, 1900.
To the President: Pursuant to the
performance of the commission kindly intrusted to me by you, of
presenting to the President of the French Republic the first
Lafayette dollar, I have the honor to report to you as follows:
On the 3d instant, in company with the ambassador of the United
States to France,
[Page 469]
Gen.
Horace Porter, to whom the successful execution of my mission must
in large measure be credited, I was received by the President of the
French Republic in special audience at the Elysee Palais. The
presentation was made on this occasion in the presence of the
official household of the President and the minister of foreign
affairs for France, M. Delcassé.
I was highly gratified at the pleasure evidenced by the President in
receiving the souvenir and the casket, and profoundly impressed by
the numerous official courtesies, of a most sympathetic character,
shown your special commissioner.
The President begged me to convey to you his warmest thanks for your
kind thought in sending to him the first Lafayette coin, and to
express his sincere sentiments of sympathy for Your Excellency and
the American nation.
I have the honor, Mr. President, to inclose herewith as an addenda to
this report copies of the remarks addressed by your special
commissioner to the President, and his response thereto.
With great respect, I have the honor to be, very faithfully, your
obedient servant,
[Subinclosure 1.]
Remarks made by Mr. Thompson.
Mr. President: In the name and on behalf of
His Excellency the President of the United States, I have the
distinguished honor of extending to you, the high representative of
the people of France, salutations and greetings of friendship.
On the 19th day of October, 1898, the anniversary of the victory of
Yorktown of the French and American arms in the cause of liberty,
the American school youths were invited by the President and
governors of the several States of the United States to contribute
their pennies toward the erection, in Paris, of a monument to a son
of France, our great and venerable ally General Lafayette. The
response of the children was universal, the monument a splendid
success. In further aid and in honor of the work an issue of 50,000
souvenir dollars was appropriated and ordered struck by
Congress.
Of these 50,000 dollars the first to issue from the Mint was
especially preserved for Your Excellency by the President of the
United States, and I have now the honor, Mr. President, of
presenting to you this coin, a simple and sympathetic token in his
name and for the people of the United States.
I voice the sentiments of my country, Mr. President, when I express
the hope that this memorial dollar, stamped with the likeness of
Washington and Lafayette, may remain always as it is to-day an
emblem of the amity and the unity of purpose of the two great
republics of the world.
[Subinclosure 2.]
Translation of Mr. Loubet’s remarks.
The President of the Republic replied that he was very much touched
at the kind thought of Mr. McKinley and of the American people, as
well as the gracious and courteous manner in which the coin had been
presented to him by Mr. Thompson. He begged the special commissioner
to convey to the President of the United States his warmest thanks,
and to express the sentiments of sincere sympathy which animate the
President and Government of the Republic for President McKinley and
the American nation. He looked on the souvenir as a new pledge of
the ties of reciprocal esteem and friendship which had united France
and the United States for so long, and he hoped that these ties
would become closer and stronger than ever. The President added that
he was particularly pleased that the mission had been confided to
Mr. Thompson, who was the initiator of the subscription opened in
the American schools to erect the monument to General Lafayette.
