File No. 812.00/14368.
Confidential Agent Llorente to the Secretary of State.85
Washington, December 26, 1914
memorandum.
Mr. Enrique C. Llorente, Confidential Agent of the Provisional Government of Mexico, presents his compliments to the Honorable William Jennings Bryan, Secretary of State of the United States, and has the honor to inform Mr. Bryan that General Villa, Commander-in-Chief of the Army, on behalf of the Provisional Government of Mexico, has deemed it desirable to act in harmony with certain suggestions of General Hugh L. Scott, Chief of Staff, United States Army, in declaring the frontier port of Naco neutral, during the present armed conflict between the forces of Carranza and those of the Provisional Government, leaving the town of Agua Prieta in the hands of the former and Nogales in the possession of the latter, hoping that by means of such an arrangement a definite solution of difficulties heretofore existing can be happily reached.
Mr. Llorente desires to add that in accepting General Scott’s suggestions the Provisional Government has availed itself of this opportunity to make a practical demonstration of its sincere desire to maintain the most friendly and cordial relations with its northern neighbor and at the same time to show how keenly interested it is in preventing danger to American life and property resulting from missiles said to have been fired across the frontier into territory of the United States, during the siege of Naco.
- Appointed by Provisional President Gutiérrez on November 7, 1914, with the consent of the Convention at Aguascalientes.↩