365D.1163/138
The Financial Secretary and Treasurer of the Board of Foreign Missions of the United Presbyterian Church of North America ( R. W. Caldwell ) to the Secretary of State
Dear Sir: We wish to thank you for your communication of March 31st8 enclosing copy of cablegram from Ambassador Phillips9 at Rome relating to our mission property at Sayo (Dembi Dollo) and Gore.
In regard to the appraisal of this property in Western Ethiopia, we are not informed by our representatives at Addis Ababa of any definite invitation on the part of the Italian authorities to assist in an appraisal of this property. We have repeatedly instructed our representatives at Addis Ababa, Mr. Henry and Doctor Cremer, to keep us informed of any approach on the part of the Italian authorities, reminding them that any final negotiations should be conducted with us here. The only information which has reached us is contained in a letter from Mr. Henry in October, 1938, in which he states: “The Ufficio Politico called me in once and asked if any of us had made a trip out to the west to list and evaluate the property. We told them that we had not, and nothing more has been said.”
It has not been our intention in these negotiations to commit to our representatives at Addis Ababa any responsibility for appraising the value of the property in Western Ethiopia, but rather we have been quite content to carry on negotiations through your good offices. In preferring to negotiate through your Department directly with the authorities at Rome, we have been influenced by the following considerations:
- 1.
- The properties in question are in Western Ethiopia, quite remote from the capital, and our missionaries who are familiar with the property at Sayo and Gore, Messrs. Kenneweg, Dougherty, West and Buchanan, were all unable to secure permission to return to their stations. Hence it has seemed desirable that we should assume responsibility here for any decision made concerning the disposal of these properties.
- 2.
- Of our two remaining representatives in Addis Ababa, only one has any knowledge at all of the property values in western Ethiopia, and his knowledge is inadequate for the purposes of appraisal. Our access to Western Ethiopia was for many years by way of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, through which building materials were imported, accounts being handled in America and complete records of building costs being kept here and not in Addis Ababa. If there has been any hesitancy on the part of our missionaries in Addis Ababa to participate [Page 514] in the appraisal of properties in Western Ethiopia, it is due not to any unwillingness to cooperate with the Italian authorities, but to lack of complete information on their part.
- 3.
- The absence of American diplomatic representation at Addis Ababa has made it especially desirable that we should communicate with the Italian authorities directly through your Department.
We note from the cable message, of which you have kindly given us a copy, the willingness of the Italian authorities to consider a claim for this property, and we suggest that you might find the present time favorable for presenting to the Italian authorities a statement in regard to the valuation of the properties in question. We are informed from our records here that we have invested in these properties at Sayo and Gore at least $50,000, and this sum might be accepted as a basis for negotiations, since the Italian authorities have had possession of the buildings now for more than two years and they are reported to have been adapted to the military and civil uses of the Italian Government.
We trust these statements have provided you with information which makes it possible for you to communicate further with the Italian authorities through the United States Ambassador at Rome, presenting our claim for compensation on the basis of an estimate of $50,000, and also suggesting that settlement should be made with us here in view of the considerations which have been mentioned above.
Thanking you for your consideration, I am
Sincerely yours,