File No. 812.6363/29a.
The Secretary of State to Special Agent Carothers.
Washington , April 28, 1914 .
You will please present to those in authority, even if it be necessary for you to go to Chihuahua to do so, the following arguments, and endeavor, after full explanation has been made, to secure in writing the agreement of the Constitutionalist authorities to the neutralization of the great oil producing section or zone between Tampico and the Tuxpam River, and also at Ebano and vicinity to [Page 691] the west of Tampico. Within this zone many Mexican, American, British, and other foreign producers have been conducting operations. One of the principal American interests owns and operates wells at Ebano, thirty-five miles west of Tampico on the railway line connecting that city with San Luis Potosi, and has at Casiano, a place about sixty miles south of Tampico an enormous well capable of producing great quantities of oil which is connected with Tampico by pipe line. The principal British interest controls near the Tuxpam River, at a place called Potrero del Llano, another great well from which the oil is conducted by a pipe line to a loading station situated near Tuxpam. Both 01 these properties have been operated by American and other foreign managers and employes, and since the Tampico and Vera Cruz incidents these foreigners have been driven from the country by force necessitating their leaving these wells and all other oil properties in the foregoing zone in charge of subordinate and inexperienced Mexican employees. The nature of the properties is such that these wells can not be shut in, but need the most constant and careful attention by men of the greatest experience, and as a result of the expulsion of these experienced foreigners the wells are running wild, which means that there is not only great loss of valuable oil but great danger of fires which will devastate the entire region,’ but more important than all is the danger that these oil producing tracts may be exhausted, which will be not only a loss to the owners but a great national calamity to the Republic of Mexico, involving as it does the destruction of one of the great natural resources of the country from which much revenue has been obtained in the past and would be derived in the future. It would also throw out of employment thousands of Mexicans who have been receiving higher wages than those paid in other parts of the Republic, and will expose the natives of this region to great danger of personal injury from fires and the escaping of poisonous gases which formerly have caused many deaths. This Government considers it vitally important, not merely in the interest of the owners but of the Republic of Mexico, and, in fact, the world at large, that measures should immediately be taken to prevent this wholly unnecessary and appalling danger. The only means of accomplishing this result is by mutual agreement of all contending parties in Mexico permitting the employees to return to their posts, operations to be resumed and continued under protection of guards selected from among the employees of the companies. This proposition relates only to the territory in which the wells and pipe-lines are located and is not intended to apply to the cities of Tampico or Tuxpam through which this oil reaches the market. Urgent representations will be made in Mexico City of the same nature as the foregoing, and we desire a written agreement with the Constitutionalist Party to the above neutrality plan, accompanied by immediate instructions to all field commanders. Instant action is imperative if the foregoing dangers are to be avoided.