[Extracts.]
Mr. Koerner to Mr. Seward
No. 35.]
Legation of the United States,
Madrid,
April 11, 1863.
Sir: On the 7th instant I had an extended
interview with the Marquis of Miraflores. He requested me, at the end of
it, to reduce my remarks on the main subject of our conversation to
writing; which I did in a note, of which I have the honor to enclose you
a copy.
The minister, who is of an advanced age, and a gentleman of the most
bland and polished manners, was full of assurances of kind and friendly
feelings towards us, expresses his entire conviction that the matters
about which we had complained would be very satisfactorily settled as
soon as the facts were once fully ascertained. He made great professions
of the strict neutrality which Spain would observe in our contest, as
though this was a very great boon to our government.
I told him, in return, that neutrality was really the very least we had a
right to expect under the circumstances, and that even that neutrality
was not closely regarded, as it appeared to me, by the Cuban
authorities, which had certainly shown, on almost every occasion, a
somewhat unfriendly spirit to the United States government.
Judging, from some remarks made in the course of our discussion, that the
minister (who has been for several years out of office) was not very
well informed with the recent history of our country, and the causes of
the present rebellion, I made him a short exposé
of the nature of the questions which had agitated the Union before the
southern insurrection, and gave him a history of the political movement
in connexion with the Cuban question, as being one of the causes of
southern discontent. To my surprise he did not seem to have been aware
of the participation of Jeff. Davis, Pierre Soulé, Mr. Slidell, and
other leaders of the south, in the scheme of General Pierce and Mr.
Buchanan, of wresting Cuba by force, if persuasion failed, from
Spain.
He had not even known that Mr. Preston had considered the acquisition of
Cuba as almost the sole object of his mission, and that he had been most
anxious to have Mr. Slidell’s thirty million bill passed, the money to
be used by him to bribe parties here into a cession of Cuba. He appeared
to be very much interested in my account, and expressed great
satisfaction when I remarked that the statesmen who now controlled the
destinies of the United States, and the loyal people, generally, north
and south, had ever resisted this aggressive policy, and had in no small
degree incurred thereby the displeasure of the south and of the party
favorable to the expansion of slave power.
These views, I know, have been heretofore ably pressed upon the
consideration of the Spanish government by my immediate predecessors,
but the late changes in the cabinet here necessitate, and may again
compel, very shortly, a repetition.
Señor Miraflores, in the two last interviews, not having said word in
regard to my question, put to him when I saw him the first time, whether
her Majesty’s government would object to our mediation in the supposed
difficulties between Spain and Peru, I have not mentioned the subject
again, thinking that a proper regard to the dignity of our country
demanded my silence.
The trouble, if there be any between the two countries, is entirely
ignored here by the press; and I have seen notices in the papers that
the Spanish squadron has withdrawn from the Pacific.
On day before yesterday the Cortes, suspended in January last, have
re-assembled. The president of counsel (Miraflores) has delivered an
address in which he announces, on the part of the new cabinet, a policy
which, while it shall not [Page 976] be
reactionary, will be conservative. All parties are invited to support
the new administration, while it in return will not demand party tests
in its appointments, &c., &c. * * * * * * *
I have the honor to be your most obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, Washington,
D. C.
[Untitled]
Legation of the United
States, &c.,
&c.,
April 10, 1863.
Sir: In the interview which took place on
the 7th instant, and in which I had the honor to address to your
excellency some observations on the note which you directed to me,
under the date of 1st of April instant, in reply to my note of the
23d of February, to the Duke de la Torre, you expressed a wish that
I should give to my remarks a more permanent form, by imbodying them
in a note.
In compliance with your desire, I beg to state now, what I remarked
to you verbally, that I do not think that my government will be
satisfied with the views which the government of her Majesty has
taken of the various complaints which were presented in my
communication of the 23d of February, and in the despatch of Mr.
Seward of the 30th of January, which I had likewise transmitted to
your excellency.
Your note of the 1st of April instant, insisting that the admission
of the Florida into the port of Havana, although she had destroyed
in the open sea a vessel of her enemy, was justified by the strict
neutrality observed by Spain between the belligerents, seems to be
based in that part of it, on the supposition that my government had
preferred a complaint on account of such admission. This, however,
was not the case. While the President and the people of the United
States have always deplored the hasty and unfortunate, not to say
very unjust, step taken by the maritime powers of Europe, in
recognizing, at the very outset of our complications, the southern
vessels as belligerents, and to a certain degree as equals to a
long-established, friendly and powerful government; and while we
have ever believed that, without this encouragement, the rebellion
would have been of short duration, and would have saved to the
United States the lives of hundreds of thousands and of millions of
treasure, and to the European states the very serious industrial
distress and suffering of operatives, resulting from the protraction
of the struggle; and while my government has strongly protested
against the measure in question, it had nevertheless acquiesced in
it, and has, since such protest, not further complained of such
neutrality.
The burden of the grievance in the present instance is the admission
of said Florida under circumstances which were deemed sufficient by
the local authorities of Cuba to deny such admission to a war
steamer of the government of the United States. Upon this latter
point, however, I do not now offer any remarks, as both your
excellency and your predecessor have admitted on principle the
impropriety of the course pursued by the Spanish authorities, and
have only refrained from giving the desired reparation, for the
reason that you wished first to be informed of the facts of the case
from your own agents, so as to establish a proper basis for
action.
In the interview first alluded to, you remarked that you were also
waiting for information from Cuba, to ascertain the truth of the
allegation that the Florida was permitted, in spite of the express
notification of our consul general, to leave the port of Havana
within nineteen hours of the departure of the United States aviso W. B. Reaney.
[Page 977]
Your excellency has, nevertheless, in your note to me, apparently
justified this violation of the usual rule of international law,
which prescribes twenty-four hours as the time within which
belligerent vessels are not to leave neutral ports, by remarking
that as the Reaney sailed for Cayo Hueso, (Key West,) she had ample
time to reach her place of destination, nay, even to return, the
shortening of the usual time could have done her no injury.
Your predecessor, the Duke de la Torre, has absolutely denounced this
deviation (if it should have taken place) from the usual rule as
highly improper in the conversation I held with him on the subject,
and I am, therefore, somewhat surprised that your excellency should
have taken such a view of it as is indicated in your note, and to
which I cannot by any means assent.
Upon more elaborate reflection, I cannot but believe that your
excellency must be convinced that it would be a very dangerous
innovation to allow subordinate or any authority to add to or to
subtract, according to their discretion, from the time which has
been fixed as the proper one by the consent of nations. The vessel
which leaves first has a right to count on the time so fixed, and
her commander takes his measures accordingly. He will consult his
convenience as to the course he may take; he may deviate from it in
order to communicate with other vessels; he may delay for any
purpose. And it will surely not do to let the port authorities
substitute their calculations to his own, and therefore expose him
to an unanticipated danger.
It was the very business of the Reaney, as part of her service, to
communicate with the naval forces of the United States, at the West
India station, and she was entitled to use for that purpose all the
time which the law of nations gave her, and she was under no
obligation whatever to make the voyage to Key West in such a manner
and within such a time as might conform to the suppositions of the
port authorities of Havana.
Concerning the firing into and visiting the Reaney by her Majesty’s
war steamer Princesa de Asturias, your note proceeds upon the
supposition that the Reaney was within the jurisdictional waters of
Cuba.
The information in the possession of my government is, that the event
took place from six to eight English miles from Havana, which would
certainly fix the locality beyond the jurisdiction accorded by the
law of nations to the power owning the litoral territory. Not being
able, however, at this time, for want of more complete information,
to allege with any degree of certainty that the Reaney was beyond
the jurisdiction of her Majesty’s government, I will leave the
subject for the present. I may remark, however, that if the
detention took place for the purpose of giving warning to the
captain of the Reaney not to communicate with another vessel so near
the harbor, a detention of a vessel in the service of the government
of the United States for such a purpose was wholly unjustifiable, an
act of very great assumption on the part of the commandant of the
Princesa de Asturias, and cannot and will not be tolerated for a
moment by any government which has the slightest regard for its own
dignity and power.
I shall soon receive more complete information and further
instructions concerning these disagreeable events from my
government, and until then I shall forbear to discuss them any
further, trusting that the observations now submitted will receive
due consideration from your excellency, and that they may, to some
extent, modify the views which you have expressed in reply to my
informal note.
I take this occasion to assure your excellency of my most
distinguished consideration.
His Excellency the Marquis of
Miraflores, First Secretary of State
of her Catholic Majesty.
