Mr. Washburne to Mr. Fish
Sir: In my dispatch numbered 376, I had the honor to state that my efforts to secure protection for American apartments and property, during the occupation of Paris, would be made the subject of a further communication. You will recall to mind that, on the 29th of August last, looking to possibilities, I telegraphed and wrote to you, suggesting whether you would not ask the German government to protect American property in Paris, in the event its army reached here. In your dispatch numbered 158, dated August 30, 1870, you state that “instructions will be forwarded by this day’s post to Mr. Bancroft, to ask that in the event of the occupation of Paris by the German force, American property may [Page 307] be respected.” In your dispatch numbered 190, dated October 18, 1870, you state that Mr. Bancroft was “instructed to ask that proper measures be taken by the government of North Germany for the protection of American property in Paris, in the event of the occupation of that city by the German forces.” In reply Mr. Bancroft states, in his dispatch No. 143, dated September 29, 1870, that he had addressed to the secretary of foreign affairs a request that measures might be taken for the protection of the large amount of American property in Paris, upon its occupation by the German troops, and concludes as follows: “I append a translation of the reply of Mr. Von Thile conveying the desired assurances.”
Notwithstanding the somewhat non-committal character of Mr. Von Thile’s letter to Mr. Bancroft, Mr. Bancroft understood it, as I presume you did, and as I certainly did, that American property in Paris would be respected by the German troops in the event of their occupation of the city. As soon as it was officially announced that a certain number of German soldiers were to enter Paris, and as they were to occupy that portion of the city where the greatest number of Americans resided, I lost no time in addressing Count de Bismarck on the subject. A copy of my letter to him I send you herewith. In view of Mr. Vou Thile’s letter, and of the fact that French soldiers had not been billeted on Americans, I felt entirely confident that the German soldiers would not be quartered in American apartments. Although I sent my letter to Count Bismarck by a special messenger on the day on which it was written, I received no answer from him until eight o’clock on the evening of the 3d of March, nine hours after the last German soldier had left the city. A copy of that answer I inclose herewith for your information. On the day of the entry of the Germans into Paris the legation was filled by people who had charge of American apartments, and who had come to claim my protection for them, stating that the German soldiers had been billeted on them by direction of the mayor of Paris. I must confess I was somewhat surprised that the mayor of Paris had given such an order, as none had ever been enforced billeting French soldiers upon Americans.
It now appears that the mayor, or his subordinates, had undertaken to quarter as many German soldiers as possible on foreigners, particularly Americans, and spare their own people. I immediately made an appeal to German officers, in view of what I considered the meaning of Mr. Von Thile’s letter to Mr. Bancroft, that American property should be respected, not to quarter their soldiers in the apartments of my countrymen. As they had no order on the subject they did not consider themselves bound to conform to the suggestion of Mr. Vou Thile’s letter, but in many instances, upon a statement of the case, they did not insist upon going into American apartments, but found lodgings elsewhere. In other instances they went in under threats of using force unless the apartments were opened to them, although the American flag was in all cases displayed, and the persons in charge had papers from me certifying that the property belonged to Americans, and was entitled to be respected as such. Occupying the apartments for so short a time, and upon full explanation of the ownership of the property, and upon an earnest request that it should not be damaged, I am happy to say that scarcely any injury has been inflicted upon a single apartment. I made it a matter of complaint to Mr. Jules Favre that the mayor of Paris had billeted so many of the German soldiers in the American apartments while so large a number of the French apartments had been spared. He expressed great regret at such being the case, and send the condition of [Page 308] things had come upon them so suddenly that every thing had been done in great confusion, and that if any damage whatever happened to American property by the German troops, all such damage should be scrupulously paid for. But no claim for damages has yet been put in, and you can well imagine my relief in finding, at the end of the war, and after all the danger and tribulations through which we have passed in Paris, that out of American property estimated from seven to ten millions of dollars, the damages by the casualties resulting from the state of war does not amount to $500, excepting always the horses which were taken by requisition for food, at a stated price per pound, and not according to values. I have, in this dispatch, gone over the matter somewhat at length. While fortunately, as I have stated, no particular damage was done to American property by the German troops during their stay in Paris, you will be able to judge how far the Count de Bismarck was disposed to carry out what you must have understood to be the views expressed by Mr. Von Thile to Mr. Bancroft. The occupation of the American apartments by the German troops was but for two days, and not followed by any material damage, but, had such occupation been, as it might have been, for six months, excluding the proprietors from their apartments, and attended by the destruction of furniture belonging thereto, I take it a grave question must have arisen as to reclamation for damages sustained by the subjects of a friendly neutral power. Count de Bismarck having observed in his letter to me that the military authorities, obliged to provide quarters, could not be expected to enter into researches about proprietorship of houses, or relations between landlord, tenant, and occupant, it is evident that he had overlooked that portion of my letter in which it was stated that the proprietors of nearly all the American property in Paris had been provided by me with protection papers, and authorized to display the American flag. Every American apartment, therefore, that was entered by German troops, was known to be American property by the German officers.
I have, &c.,