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that part of the world under the guarantee of treaties." The visit of the ships bore a friendly character." Admiral Kirkland reported that no information could be obtained of any outrages on American citizens, and that his reception was everywhere most courteous.

"The number of citizens of the United States. resident in the Turkish Empire is not accurately known. According to latest advices, there are 172 American missionaries, dependents of various mission boards in the United States, scattered over Asia Minor. There are also numbers of our citizens engaged in business or practicing professions in different parts of the Empire. Besides these, more or less persons, originally subjects of Turkey and since naturalized in the United States, have returned to the country of their birth and are temporarily residing there. The whole number of persons comprising these several classes can not be accurately estimated, but, the families of such citizens being considered, can hardly be less than five or six hundred, and may possibly exceed that total. "Outside of the capital and a few commercial seaport towns, the bulk of this large American element is found in the interior of Asia Minor and Syria, remote from the few consular establishments maintained by this government in that quarter, inaccessible except by difficult journeys, and isolated from each other by the broken character of the mountain country and the absence of roads. Under these circumstances and in the midst of the alarming agitation which for more than a year past has existed in Asia Minor, it has been no slight task for the representative of the United States to follow the interests of those whose defense necessarily falls to his care, to demand and obtain the measures indispensable to their safety, and to act instantly upon every appeal for help in view of real or apprehended peril. It is, however, gratifying to bear testimony to the energy and promptness of the minister in dealing with every grievance brought to his notice, and his foresight in anticipating complaints and securing timely protection in advance of actual need. The efforts of the minister have had the moral support of the presence of naval vessels of the United States on the Syrian and Adanan coasts from time to time as occasion required, and at the present time the San Francisco and Marblehead are about to be joined by the Minneapolis, which has lately been ordered to the eastern waters of the Mediterranean, the squadron being under the command of Rear-Admiral Selfridge, an officer whose record indicates the necessary discretion in dealing with whatever emergencies may arise.”

Mr. Olney, Sec. of State, report to the President, Dec. 19, 1895, S. Doc. 33, 54 Cong. 1 sess.; For. Rel. 1895, II. 1256, 1321 et seq.

a For. Rel. 1895, II. 1237, 1238, 1239, 1240, 1241, 1243, 1247, 1250.
For. Rel. 1895, II. 1242, 1248, 1250.

c For. Rel. 1895, II. 1245-1247.

See, also, Mr. Olney, Sec. of State, to Mr. Terrell, min. to Turkey, Nov. 22, 1895, For. Rel. 1895, II. 1345.

The following instructions were telegraphed, Dec. 18, 1895, to Admiral Selfridge: "The Minneapolis ordered to Alexandretta, Syria, Marash, Turkey, center of danger. Suggest the concentration of vessels United States Navy, and taking missionaries and other Americans on board, if necessary. Act promptly if in your judgment advisable to land force. Keep Department fully informed. Acknowledge." (For. Rel. 1895, II. 1422.)

It has not been "the policy of this government to make the protection of American missionaries in Turkey dependent upon their withdrawal from their posts of duty. It has been made clear to Dr. Smith [foreign secretary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions] that there has been no change of policy whatever in this regard. As in China during the recent war with Japan, when mob violence and anti-Christian spirit ran high in the remote interior provinces, this government stands ready to use its influence and its agencies to assert its rights by every permissible means to insure the safety of resident American citizens in Turkey, aiding them to reach places of safety should they voluntarily desire to do so, and exerting diplomatic pressure for their protection should they remain at their posts. If it aids those devoted men or their families to reach a place of temporary shelter, that in no way implies a condition of abandonment of their employment. Like yourself, this Department sympathizes very keenly with the perilous situation of the nonworkers, the helpless women and children, who are not reasonably to be regarded as tied to their posts by obligations of duty, and would be glad to see them shielded from harm which may possibly befall them. It understands that your advice as regards removal has been confined to those nonworkers, and that you have been unremitting in your efforts to protect the effective personnel of the missions at their posts under any and all circumstances. The Department would be glad to learn that you have made this clear to Mr. Dwight also.

The communication of Mr. Dwight is interesting in that it brings pre minently forward the commercial aspects of the American missionary enterprises in Turkey, a point of view of much importance in dealing with the problems presented; but not, according to his exposition of the matter, disassociated from the obligations of duty which in his view constrain his agents to personally remain among the communities where those interests of trade have been built up in order to afford moral protection to the native classes with whom they have been associated in their enterprises. The latter consideration is a matter of conscience as to which the representatives of American enterprises must follow their own judgment or the judgments of the boards which employ them. This Government can not and should

not assume to influence them in this regard. Whether as traders in vendible merchandise, according to Mr. Dwight, or as teachers in legitimate fields of instruction, they are entitled to the same protection as other American merchants or professional men, pursuing their trades or avocations peaceably under the guaranty of law, of existing capitulations, and of that usage which in Turkey has grown to have the force of conventional law.

"No problem of modern intercourse has more forcibly presented itself to this Government or more earnestly engaged its attention than that of the situation of our citizens in Turkey at the present time, and its determination to act without hesitancy and effectively as occasion may demand is as fixed as your own endeavor to aid the Government in the accomplishment of its purposes has been zealous and unflagging.".

Mr. Olney, Sec. of State, to Mr. Terrell, Jan. 16, 1896, For. Rel. 1895, II. 1461-1462.

The communication of Mr. Dwight above referred to, bearing date Con-
stantinople, Dec. 26, 1895, and addressed to Mr. Terrell, is printed,
with Mr. Terrell's reply, in For. Rel. 1895, II. 1427-1434.

See, also, Mr. Goodell to Mr. Olney, Sec. of State, Jan. 4, 1896, and Mr.
Olney, Sec. of State, to Mr. Goodell, Jan. 8, 1896, For. Rel 1895, II.
1449-1452; and Mr. Terrell, min. to Turkey, to Mr. Olney, Sec. of
State, Jan. 25, 1896, id. 1467-1468.

See, as to charges and denials of encouragement by American missionaries
of sedition, For. Rel. 1895, II. 1413-1416, 1463, 1469.

In acknowledging the receipt from the Spanish minister at Washington of the procotol concluded between Germany and Spain through the mediation of Pope Leo XIII. relative to the sovereignty of Spain over the Caroline and Pelew islands, Mr. Bayard called attention to the fact that citizens of the United States had been actively engaged in disseminating information among the inhabitants of that quarter, with a view to their prosperity, and he observed that it was not presumed that their treatment under the rule of Spain, which the protocol recognized and affirmed as between Germany and Spain and which had never been contested by the United States, would be any less favorable than that of Germans and other foreigners commorant therein. The Spanish minister subsequently communicated to Mr. Bayard a note from his government, in which it was declared that nothing was further from the intention of that government than to seek to hamper or embarrass in the slightest degree the work of Christianizing and teaching of the American missionaries, but that it was, on the contrary, the determination of the government to favor and promote such beneficent enterprises to the extent of its ability. Subsequently, however, the Spanish authorities, when they assumed the government of the islands, closed

all the American schools but one. One of the missionaries was forbidden to preach; services at some of the churches were suppressed, and lands granted to the missions many years before by native chiefs were encroached upon and seized. These proceedings culminated in the arrest of Mr. E. T. Doane, the oldest of the American missionaries in the islands, because of a letter addressed by him to the governor protesting against the seizure of certain lands belonging to the mission. He was subsequently deported to Manila, where he was released. The government of the United States protested against these acts, and the Spanish government endeavored in a measure to repair the wrong that it had done by restoring Mr. Doane to the scene of his labors and by repeating its assurances with reference to the protection of the missionaries and their property. It made, however, an unsatisfactory response on the question of pecuniary indemnity. Subsequently, hostilities took place between the Spaniards and the natives, and all the buildings belonging to the American mission were burned by the Spanish troops; and the missionaries were forbidden to hold any meetings and were practically obliged to leave the islands. Complaints and claims were presented by the United States to the Spanish government, and early in 1893 the matter was pressed for a settlement, with a view (1) to secure the restoration of the missionaries to the scene of their labors, and (2) to obtain compensation for the property destroyed or taken from them by the Spanish authorities. In April, 1893, it was reported by the legation at Madrid that the question had been settled by Spain's agreeing to permit the return of the missionaries and to pay $17,500 on account of their losses of property. The Spanish government, however, qualified the concession of the first point by reserving "the right of fixing the moment" when the missionaries might return to Ponapé, and disclaiming all responsibility for their safety, should they return sooner.

Mr. Bayard, Sec. of State, to Mr. Strobel, chargé at Madrid, No. 394, Sept. 7, 1885, MS. Inst. Spain, XX. 100; Mr. Bayard, Sec. of State, to Mr. Valera, Spanish min., March 2, 1886, For. Rel. 1886, 831; Mr. Valera to Mr. Bayard, March 12, 1886, id. 832; Mr. Wharton, Act. Sec. of State, to Mr. Newberry, chargé at Madrid, No. 135, Oct. 6. 1891, For. Rel. 1892, 442.

66

See, also, For. Rel. 1892, 485, 512, 513; For. Rel. 1893, 559 et seq., and
especially, at page 565, a chronological statement of events occur-
ring in the island of Ponapé
from its first occupation by

November, 1890,"

the American missionaries in 1852 until
by Mr. Snowden, min. to Spain; For. Rel. 1893, 574, 575, 584–588.

There being nothing in the treaties between the United States and France stipulating or regulating liberty of doctrinal teaching by

American citizens in the French dependencies, the intervention of the United States in behalf of certain American missionaries in the Society Islands "was necessarily confined to equitable representations that citizens of the United States in the French dependencies, who tranquilly obey the laws and regulations there in force, should enjoy all privileges and immunities permitted to any other foreigners."

Mr. Rockhill, Acting Sec. of State, to Mr. Burton, Aug. 6, 1896, 211 MS.
Dom. Let. 669.

With reference to a letter of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the United States relative to their mission at Benito, West Africa, the American minister at Madrid was instructed that he might, by way of good offices, bring the matter to the attention of the Spanish government and ask for American missionaries in the territories ceded by France to Spain on the west coast of Africa a continuance of the favorable treatment which had been accorded them in the past by the French authorities.

Mr. Hay, Sec. of State, to Mr. Storer, min. to Spain, No. 336, June 1, 1901, MS. Inst. Spain, XXIII. 150.

As to correspondence between Mr. Jay, United States minister at Vienna, and the Austrian foreign office, touching the admission of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows into the Austrian Empire, see Mr. Fish, Sec. of State, to Mr. Durham, M. C., Feb. 13, 1875, 106 MS. Dom. Let. 483, referring to a dispatch of Mr. Jay of Aug. 21, 1874, and the instructions previously sent him.

9. INTERCESSION FOR PERSECUTED JEWS.

(1) MOHAMMEDAN COUNTRIES.

§ 923.

In 1840 Mr. Forsyth, referring to a resolution adopted at a meeting of Israelites in the city of New York in relation to the persecution of their brethren in Damascus, stated that the heart-rending scenes which took place had previously been brought to the notice of the President by the American consul there, and that in consequence an instruction was immediately written to the American consul at Alexandria, and that at the same time the diplomatic representative of the United States at Constantinople "was instructed to interpose his good offices in behalf of the oppressed and persecuted race of the Jews in the Ottoman dominions, among whose kindred are found some of the most worthy and patriotic of our own citizens, and the whole subject, which appeals so strongly to the universal sentiments of justice and humanity, was earnestly recommended to his zeal and discretion."

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