File No. 367.116/488
The Chargé in Turkey ( Philip ) to the Secretary of State
[Received May 26, 8.15 a. m.]
1825. My 1815, May 17, 4 p. m. On the 9th instant I received a telegram from Doctor White and from consular agent at Samsun to the effect that all the Americans had left Marsivan on the 15th instant for Constantinople via Angora. I saw Minister for Foreign Affairs by appointment 20th instant and informed him that I believed our people had been obliged to quit the place by the authorities and to leave their Armenian charges and certain Russian students of the college without protection. I further stated that this news together with that of departure Sivas missionaries might be construed as a desire on the part of the Government to expel Americans from the interior, as well as to annex their properties, and if true, this could not fail to cause a strong feeling of resentment in the United States. I had previously sent the Minister a memorandum of instructions for governors in the interior, drawn up in conjunction with Peet, which made plain that it did not prejudice any action which might be taken by the Government of the United States in the protection of American interests yet provided for the extension to all American missionaries whose institutions may be temporarily [Page 835] taken over of facilities to find other quarters, etc., or to travel to Constantinople or elsewhere as they should—and which I requested should be sent immediately. I also requested that special instructions be sent to the Governor of Angora permitting the return to Marsivan of Doctor White or another of his party from there, if he desired, as well as permission to bring their Armenian and other charges to Constantinople.
Minister for Foreign Affairs promised to see Minister of the Interior at once and to arrange for the sending of the desired instructions with the possible exception of the permission to bring to Constantinople the Armenians and others at Marsivan who number over 100 and which he thought would hardly be allowed at present. He regretted that if the authorities at Sivas and Marsivan have obliged Americans to leave those places, such a step can only have been taken before the receipt of Talaat Bey’s instructions mentioned in my 1814, and said that in the name of the Government he gave me absolute assurance that no intention existed either to oblige Americans to leave the interior and abandon their charges or to take over American institutions which are not judged by the military to be absolutely essential for the carrying out of active operations. Minister for Foreign Affairs called attention to the massing of troops behind the extensive front of the campaign against the Russians, which extends in an easterly semicircle from Samsun via Sivas and Diarbekr to Aleppo, and the consequent importance of all large buildings near this front, of which the American colleges and hospitals are the principal ones. He also stated that the military authorities had taken over German institutions within the same zone of operations.
I am inclined to believe that considerable value may be attached to assurances of Minister for Foreign Affairs and that no determined anti-American policy need be apprehended at present. Foreign Office stated on the 21st instant that the instructions desired by me had been sent by the Minister of the Interior.