File No. 2956/1.]

Minister Bryan to the Secretary of State.

No. 291.]

Sir: In obedience to the department’s instruction No. 108, of December 18, 1906 (file No. 2956), in reference to the case of Francisco Freitas, arrested for military service in Madeira, I have the honor to report that I took up the matter with the minister for foreign affairs in a note dated January 18 last, and am now in receipt of a reply stating that as the said Freitas had been drafted before his alleged naturalization, he must, nevertheless, under the Portuguese law, be held liable to military duty. I inclose copies of the correspondence.

From the facts now in my possession I am unable to contest the position of this Government that Mr. Freitas was drafted before naturalization in the United States and while still a subject of Portugal, and as the date, if not, indeed, the fact, of his naturalization is a matter of some doubt from his apparent failure to produce with his application the certificate of naturalization, which he claims was issued by the “municipal” court of Brookline, Mass., I have thought it best to await the department’s further directions.

I have, etc.,

Charles Page Bryan.
[Inclosure 1.]

Minister Bryan to the Minister for Foreign Affairs.

Excellency: Herewith I have the honor to transmit a brief statement gathered from the report of the American consul at Funchal, Madeira, concerning the arrest and detention of an American citizen named Francisco F. Freitas, and I earnestly solict your excellency’s kind attention in this matter and such treatment for this citizen of my country as he is entitled to.

I avail, etc.,

Charles Page Bryan.
[Page 960]
[Inclosure 2.—Translation.]

The Minister for Foreign Affairs to Minister Bryan.

I have your excellency’s note of January 18 last, accompanied by a statement relative to the detention of Francisco Freitas in Madeira. The matter was at once submitted to the minister of war, and he has requested me to inform your excellency that the facts of the case are as follows:

Francisco Freitas, born in Madeira of Portuguese parents, was drafted in 1904, and in the same year was marked as refractory for not having appeared in answer to the call. In 1906, in Funchal, he was arrested as a young man who should perform his military duty, the said Freitas declaring that he had emigrated to North America at 16 years of age, and that he had been naturalized as an American citizen after arriving at the age of 21. In view of the fact that he was drafted for military service in his native country the law requires that he should be deemed a deserter, notwithstanding the allegation that he had been naturalized in a foreign country, for already at that time he had been drafted, and had not previously fulfilled his respective obligations.

On communicating to your excellency this information, I take occasion to reiterate, etc.,

Luis de Magalhaes.