The President of Nicaragua to President Taft
I beg Your Excellency’s leave to refer to certain facts connected with our civil war.
On the 27th of May last the forces of this Government stormed the Bluff stronghold, which defends Bluefields.
The commanding officer of that force was under orders to proceed immediately and capture the city, which was without a garrison; that would have insured the ending of the campaign. This was frustrated by the attitude of the commander of the American cruiser Paducah, who notified the commanding officer of our troops that he would oppose with his forces the capture of the city, and to that effect landed American seamen to occupy it, and thus the revolution, sure of its base of operations, was enabled to take all of its forces out of the city and bring them against one of our columns, and so was a carefully planned combination, the success of which was certain, defeated.
This Government purchased in New Orleans a British vessel, Venus, now named Maximo Jerez, which sailed for San Juan del Norte by permission of the American authorities after exhibiting in good faith all the ammunition of war she had on board as articles of free commerce. At San Juan del Norte she was made a Nicaraguan vessel, fitted out as a war ship, and destined to blockade the port of Bluefields. The blockade was intended to prevent the revolution from continuing to receive, as before, arms, supplies, and funds from New Orleans. Your Excellency’s Government denied our vessel the right to blockade as far as American vessels were concerned and the New Orleans source of supplies remained open to the revolution.
The capture of the Bluff put this Government in possession of the Bluefields customs, whereby it hoped to deprive the revolution of its customs receipts. Your Excellency’s Government declared that customs duties must be paid to the revolution, and thus in a large measure frustrated the victory of our arms at the Bluff. Your Excellency’s Government has denied us the right to prevent the passage off the Bluff of the American vessels bound for a revolutionary customhouse that has just been established on Schooner Key, in Escondido River, in spite of this Government’s decree which closes the port and prohibits that traffic as a necessary measure of defense and pacification. The commanding officer of the Paducah one day threatened the captain of the Maximo Jerez to fire at and sink her if our troops attempted to attack Bluefields. The chief of our forces at the Bluff, having noticed that boats in the service of the revolution were using the American flag in order to pass in front of the fort without being stopped, notified the commander of the Paducah that he had resolved to prevent the free passage of those boats in front of [Page 752] his positions; the commanding officers of the Paducah and Dubuque replied that they would enforce respect of American commerce with the firing of their guns, even though such commerce should consist of arms and ammunition for the revolution, and that one shot fired at the said boats would mean a declaration of war to the United States.
Lastly, I know that there is being prepared at Bluefields, still guarded by American seamen, an attack on our position at the Bluff and Laguna de Perlas. The warning of the commander of the Paducah prevents us from forestalling that action of the enemy as we, in self-defense, have the right to do.
It is my duty to say frankly to your Excellency that I can see no way in which the above-stated facts can be reconciled with the principles of neutrality proclaimed by the law of nations, and relying on the high rectitude of the Government of the United States I have no hesitation in applying to your Excellency with the respectful request that the orders given to your naval authorities at Bluefields be rectified. That will enable this Government easily to bring to an end a bloody and destructive revolution which has no life of its own and is working Nicaragua’s ruin.