File No. 341.115St2/18

The Acting Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Great Britain (Page)

[Telegram]

379. Department informed American steamer Platuria with cargo illuminating oil was seized on her voyage to Aarhus, Denmark, and taken into port at Stornoway by a British vessel. The Platuria, like the steamer Brindilla, recently taken into port at Halifax by British cruiser, is owned by the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey and was formerly owned by the Deutsch-Amerikanische Petroleum Gesellschaft, a subsidiary of the Standard Oil Company controlled by American capital. Bring these facts to attention of the British Government and say that this Government does not perceive that there could be any justification for the seizure [Page 326] and detention of this American vessel, bound, according to this Government’s information, for a neutral port, with a neutral cargo of petroleum, and therefore requests that vessel and cargo be immediately released.

Lansing

[For telegram from the Ambassador in Great Britain, October 24, 1914, dealing in part with the question of detention of ships and cargoes, see ante, page 259.