File No. 195.1/160
The Secretary of State to the German Ambassador (Bernstorff)
Washington, December 10, 1914.
NO. 1155]
Excellency: Referring to the Department’s note No. 1123, of November 12, 1914,1 I have now the honor to inform you that the Department is in receipt of a further communication from the Secretary of the Navy enclosing the full report of the Commandant of the twelfth naval district with reference to the placing of a guard on board the S. S. Alexandria , while she was lying in the harbor of San Francisco.
It appears from this report and from other documents now in the possession of the Department that the Alexandria arrived in the port of San Francisco on August 7 last and was, on account of the European war, laid up in Richardson Bay, off Sausalito; that during the month of September negotiations were entered into between the owners of the Alexandria, the Hamburg-American Packet Company, and the Northern and Southern Steamship Company, an American corporation, for the transfer of this vessel to the latter company, and that these negotiations were concluded and the sale consummated, the bill of sale from the Hamburg-American Packet Company having been executed and filed with the collector of customs at San Francisco on September 21. On September 22, 1914, the Northern and Southern Steamship Company made application to the Department of Commerce for the registration of this ship under the name of the [Page 644] S. S. Sacramento , as an American merchant vessel under the provisions of the act of Congress approved August 18, 1914. Some ten days after this application was made by the Northern and Southern Steamship Company, and pending Ole decision of this Government as to the registration of the S. S. Sacramento as an American vessel, the officers of the American corporation which had purchased the ship, applied to the collector of customs at San Francisco on October 3 for the immediate clearance of the vessel. This fact, together with certain other circumstances and evidence at that time known to the officials of the Government of the United States, made it seem advisable to take such steps as might be necessary to render it impossible for the vessel to leave port without proper clearance papers, and with this object in view a small guard, consisting of eight men, including a petty officer and a wireless operator, were on the night of Saturday, October 3, placed on board the vessel which was then lying in Mission Bay. On subsequent nights this guard was reduced to four men and a wireless operator. It appears that no protest against the placing of the guard on board the vessel was at any time made by any one connected therewith, nor that any protest has at any time been made concerning the using by this guard of the wireless outfit of the ship. It further appears that the action of the officials of this Government in placing the guard on board the vessel was known to the Imperial German acting Consul at San Francisco on Monday, October 5, at which time he called at the office of the Commandant of the twelfth naval division in regard to the matter, without making objection thereto, and that the acting Consul subsequently addressed two communications on the subject, dated, respectively, October 6 and October 7, to the Commandant, in neither of which appears any protest with regard to the action of the officers of this Government. The S. S. Sacramento was formally registered as an American merchant vessel on October 8.
By note of October 14, 1914,1 your excellency requested this Department to institute an investigation into the matter referred to above with a view to determining whether the procedure of the authorities at San Francisco was in accordance with the provisions of paragraph two of Article 12 of the consular convention concluded between the United States and the German Empire on December 11, 1871. The treaty provision referred to is as follows:
The judicial authorities and customhouse officials shall in no case proceed to the examination or search of merchant vessels without having given previous notice to the consular officers of the nation to Which the said vessels belong, in order to enable the said consular officers to be present.
As the action of the United States naval officers in placing a guard on board the S. S. Alexandria was neither for the purpose of examining or of searching the vessel, but was merely a precautionary step calculated to insure the strict observance of the neutrality laws of them United States, the Department feels confident that your excellency will concur in its opinion that no violation of the treaty provision referred to was either contemplated or committed.
Accept [etc.]