No. 668.
Mr. Cox to Mr.
Bayard.
[Extract.]
Legation of
the United States,
Constantinople, October 10, 1885.
(Received October 26.)
No. 25.]
Sir: Upon April 9, 1885, General Wallace, in his
No. 491, reported the adverse decision of the Government of Turkey to the
claims for indemnity for the assault upon Rev. Drs. Knapp and Reynolds, and
Maurice Pflaum, M. D.
On the 17th August ultimo, in instruction No. 10, you advised me to pursue
the claims for pecuniary indemnity. Your letter was quite imperative. It was
what it ought to have been. The reply of the minister of foreign affairs you
summarized. You declined to accept his reply as either final or
satisfactory. Thereupon I made a study of the
[Page 869]
cases, reading up and noting all the points in each
from our imperfect records; and I wrote to the minister ad
interim the inclosed dispatch.
You observe that I have made your non-acceptance of the minister’s reply the
basis of the renewed application, copying proper parts of your instruction
for the reopening of the cases; only as yet the reopening.* * * I am now
awaiting the appearance and action of a new minister, Said Pasha, minister
at Berlin. He will come to the foreign affairs office here with a reputation
for sense and liberality, and for special knowledge and judgment in affairs
of this very nature. Therefore I do not press the matter overmuch as yet. In
this I have the concurrence of the Bible-house people and missionaries.
* * * * * * *
I have, &c.,
[Inclosure in No. 25.]
Mr. Cox to the
minister of foreign affairs ad
interim.
Legation of the United States,
Constantinople, September 28,
1885.
Excellency: The inclosure is an extract from
the letter of the Hon. T. F. Bayard, Secretary of State. It pertains to
a question which has been unduly vexed. A new administration has
supervened in my country; a new President has been elected; a new
cabinet have been installed; a new condition also obtains here; so that
we may reopen these matters without prejudice.
The tenets of religious freedom of our new order are not unlike those of
the great men of your race who have tolerated differences of faith.
It was one of the sentiments which led me here, viz, that this land, so
often impugned, had been gracious toward religions of differing ceremony
and thought. I had read its history and believed in its ultimate and
liberal justice.
When, therefore, such a stringent letter came as this I inclose, which
looked to the embarrassment if not unhappiness of my service here, I had
either to blame my predecessor (which would have been discourteous) for
his lack of suavity, or to blame the Turkish Government for its
insensibility to an unredressed crime. There is no real remedy on the
proposition allowing us to sue your magistrates, because they have
prejudiced by their irregularity the cases referred to.
The Secretary of State advises me that he will not accept this reply as
final or satisfactory.
The question, then, is, before we discuss the merits of the case will you
review the cases? If not, my duty is plain. It is only to report that
fact to my Government. I have avoided making this question for almost a
month, for I knew you were preoccupied with other troubles, in which you
have the sympathy of a great people, quite aloof from you in every way,
except in sympathy.
The answer to this dispatch will be simply regarding the reopening of the
cases referred to, with a view to pecuniary remedy.
I avail, &c.
P. S.—For full particulars of the above cases I refer to dispatch of
my predecessor No. 198, January 24, 1884, and other dispatches in
your archives. May I add the letter of Mr. Cole, which is a painful
commentary on this delay and denial of justice and reward of the
guilty by promotion in office? I earnestly entreat your attention to
this extraordinary state of affairs. Evidenced by the inclosures:
Extract and translation from instruction No. 10 of Hon. T. F.
Bayard, Secretary of State, Washington, in reference to the Knapp,
Reynolds, and Pflaum assault cases; and letter of R. M. Cole, and
translation.
