The New York Herald Newspaper, October 23, 1872, Page 3

senna Herald Special Report from Berlin by Way of London. England’s Pretensions to Terri- tory in the Northwest. Highly Important Proceedings in the Prussian Capital. The German Jurists’ Report Awaiting Emperor William's Signature for International Force and Binding Effect. His Majesty’s Pronouncement in Favor of the United States. pease British Intrigue Against a Formal Imperialist Judgment. Diplomatic Design and Royalist Family In- fluence Moved from Downing Street. Prevention of Justice to America or Neu- tralization of Its Consequences. Fe | | 18 BISMARCK INTERESTED ? The Sanctity of the Treaty of Washington in Danger of Violation. Queen Victoria’s Agents and the Im- pelling Motives of Their Action. Buchanan’s Compromise---The NEW YORK HERALD, WEDNESDAY, OUTOBER 23, 1872—TRIPLE SHEKT. “THE NORTHWEST BOUNDARY. Ashburton Treaty of 1846. San Juan Island—Its Fer- tility and Size. The Arbitrator Under the Wash- ington Treaty. ‘TELEGRAM TO THE NEW YORK HERALD. The following special despatch to the Hizrnatp has been received from our corre- spondent in Berlin by way of London:— Lonpon, Oct. 22, 1872. Special despatches addressed to the Huraup from the ‘North German capital report the highly important fact that the written judg- ment in the San Juan boundary arbitration, between the governments and peoples of the United States and Great Britain, by the Prus- Bian jurisconsults to whom the case was sub- mitted by Emperor William, awaits only the signature of His Majesty in order to give it effect and force. HOW HIS MAJESTY WILL PRONOUNCE. Emperor William decides, according to the Tegal and topographical information afforded to him, in favor of the United States by fixing the line of boundary demarcation by the route of the Canal de Haro, the point which Great Britain disputed, even to the verge of war, during the periods of previous attempts at adjustment of the subject by diplomacy. ENGLISH INTRIGUE AGAINST THE FORMAL PROC- LAMATION. The cause of the delay which has taken place in communicating the judgment for- amally to the nations is to be found in the active exercise of a British diplomatic intrigue in Berlin: This intrigue is conducted with the intent and object to so modify the Em- peror’s judgment as to cause the arbitation to vesalt in a failure. His Excellency Odo Russell, English Am- Dassador at the Court of Germany, therefore, endeavors to prevent His Majesty Emperor William from acting on the solemn written judgment which has been rendered by the jurists. In this course Minister Russell en- deavors, also, to raise a false issue in the premises. ENGLISH CABINET FORECAST OF THE MINISTERIAL STRATEGY, An editorial article which was published in the columns of the London Times om the 18th of October, and which was inspired from the Foreign Office, in Downing street, presents the view which the government of Her Majesty Victoria urges at the Court of Berlin. The London press sets forth by saying that “Em- peror William may decide upon any one of the three channels." This falsifies the words of the Treaty of ‘Washington, which are inserted in article 34 of the instrument, saying that judgment is required on two specified points, and the text of which is as follows :— 3 THE TREATY OF WASHINGTON—ARTICLE XXXIV. ARTICLE 34.—Whereas it was stipulated by arti- le 1 of the treaty concluded at Washington on the ‘15th of June, 1846, between Her Britannic Majesty and the United States, that the line of boundary between the territories of the United States and ‘those of Her Britannic Majesty, from the point on the forty-ninth parallel of north latitude, ap to which it had already been ascertained, should be continued westwara along the said paral- Tel of north latitude “to the middle of the channd which separates the Continent from Van- eouver's Island, and thence southerly, through the middie of the said channel and of Fuca Straits, to the Pavific Oeean;” and whereas the Commission- + ers appointed by the two high contracting parties to determine that portion of the boundary which Fens suutberly through the middie of the chaguel SPRING ( Shirch Bay 3 7 hi 1—The black line running from the forty-ninth parallel through the Canal de Haro into Juan de Fuca Strait is the boundary claimed by the United States under the Treaty of 1846, and said to have been awarded by the claim. Emperor of Germany in conformity with that 2—The black line from the forty-ninth parallel through Rosario Strait is the boundary claimed by Great Britain. 8—The black line between San Juan Island and Lopez Island is a compromise line offered by | Map Showing the Territory in Dispute and the Boundary Lines Claimed by the Contending Parties. F\.Rellingham Bo ir Wy andl Whatcom Great Britain, but rejected by the United States. 4—The line — ---—--- between Vancouver's Island and Salt Spring Island is the boundary according to the letter of the Treaty of 1846. N. B,—The stipulations of Article 34 of the Treaty of Washington limit the award to a choice between the first two lines. aforesaid were unable to agree upon the same ; and whereas the government of Her Britannic Majesty claims that such boundary line should, under the terms of the treaty above recited, be run through the Rosario Straits, and the government of the United States claims that it shouid be run through the Canal de Haro, it is agrecd that the respective claims of the government of Her Britannic Majesty and of the government of the United States shall be submitted to the arbitration and award of His Majesty the Emperor of Germany, who, having re- gard to the above-mentioned article of the said treaty, shall decide thereupon, finally and without appeal, which of those claims is most in accordance with the true interpretation of the Treaty of June 15, 1846, ENGLAND'S ALTERNATIVE OF LAST RESORT. Should the Queen’s Minister in Ber- lin, Mr. Russell, fail in his effort to obtain an imperial German declaration favoring the line of an _ intermediate channel he is then to labor for the attainment of a negative judgment, to the effect that neither De Haro nor the Rosario Channel is the channel which is described in the treaty between England and the United States, CONSEQUENCES OF BRITISH SUCCESS. Thus, should Mr. Odo Russell’s ministerial strategy prevail in Berlin, the German arbi- tration by Emperor William in the San Juan boundary case will fail, like as did that which was submitted some years since on the same subject to His Majesty the King of the Nether- lands, who, instead of delivering a definite decision, recommended a compromise of the whole matter. LOCAL AIDS TO THE ROYAL DISPUTANT CROWN. Minister Odo Russell's intrigue exertion against the interests of the United States in the case involyes efforts which are made by the Crown Princess of Prussia—Victoria’s daughter—in support of the British govern- ment, and also those of M. Bleichroder, an. Israelite banker and intimate associate of the German Premier, Prince Bismarck. This gentleman, Mr. Bleichroder, is exceed- ingly useful to the English Minister, Mr, Russell, and has just been appointed British Congul Geneyal at Berlin, . HISTORY OF THE DIFFICULTY. How San “Joan Island Became a Bone of Contention. THE “64 40 OR FIGHT” EXCITEMENT. Whitman's Ride—Organization of Oregon Ter- ritory—The Hudson Bay Company. A Boundary Treaty Without a Map. OPENING OF THE GREAT PIG CONTROVERSY Landing of American Troops on San Juan Island. British Warlike Preparations to Oompel Evacuation. The English Admiral Pre- vents a Fight. A JOINT MILITARY OCCUPATION. ‘The terms of the Treaty of Washington involved, among other things, the settlement of the question ofthe Northwest boundary, better known as the San Juan Istand difficulty, that being the most im- portant of the group of islands lying between the Canal de Haro and Rosario Straits, the channels in dispute between the United Staves and Great Britain. The Joint High Commission, by agree- ment, which was affirmed by treaty stipulation be- tween the two countries, constituted the Emperor of Germany the arbitrator in the case. The British and American Ministers at Berlin, about the Ist of last December, presented to Emperor William their respective statements as to the question in dispute. A copy of the case thus Presented §= wag interchanged betweep the parties, and six months afterwards— which was the limit of the time allowed for that purpose—the re- joinders and final papers in the matter were sub- mitted. The whole question in dispute had, there- fore, been before the arbitrator for many months before the delivery of the award. The dispute con- cerning the Northwest boundary years ago brought the two countries to the verge of war. The well- remembered democratic slogan in the Polk and Dallas campaign, “54 40 OR FIGHT,” was evidence of the feeling existing throughout the country with regard to our claim to the whole of Oregon, which embraced the Northwest territory as far north as the Russian Possessions, The ad- ministration came into powér on the tidal wave of that enthusiasm, and it is a well-known fact that a declaration of war was actually drafted against Great Britain should she not concede to us what we deemed our just territorial boundaries. This very draft was shortly afterwards—with the slight variations necessary—made use of as the declara- tion of war against Mexico, BRITISH DIPLOMACY. The American claim was from the Mexican line to 6440. The English claimed all the territory north and west of the Columbia River, and at the outstart even as far south as the California boun- dary, which would have deprived us at that time of a foothold on the Pacific coast—California being then @ part of Mexico, The claim south of the Columbia was absurd, and was evidently for the purpose of enabling them the better to secure the line of that river as the boundary. RUCHANAN’S TIMIDITY. In the Polk administration James Buchanan was Secretary of State, On him devolved the conduct- ing of the negotiations with the British Minister, Mr. Pakenham. It was soon apparent that the British would not give up the whole of Oregon— that 54 40 was a line to which they would not agree. It was equally plain that we could not concede that of the Columbia River. The question was settled that longer delay would not be brooked—some solution had to be arrived = at, Mr. Buchanan, with the timidity natural to his disposition, shrunk back at the idea of bringing on a war, and so agreed, in the Ashburton Treaty of 1846, as a compromise, to the line of forty-nine, It was found that this line, if carried out to the Pacific Ocean, would divide the Jurisaiction of Vancouver's Island, and this would have included withia our limits the principal settlement, the important town of Victoria, which is om its extreme southern portion. As three- fourths of the island are above forty-nine degrees, the boundary hne, on striking the Guif of Georgia, which separates the mainiand from the island, was 80 deflected as to include all of Vancouver's Island within the British jurisdiction, By this compromise Mr. Buchanan avoided what he deemed, at the time, a great danger; but left, as he always did, to those who came after him in the administration of pubke adairs the settiement of | | rights of trade, diMculties, which, had it not been for his wavering | timidity, would have had no existence. THE HUDSON BAY COMPANY. Aside from the mistake that was made of not | attaching a@ map to the treaty and making it a part of it, with the boundary line distinctly traced, the great mistake was made of allowing an im- mense foreign corporation, claiming not only but of government, within our territory. By articles 3 and 4 the Hua- son Bay Company and its branch organization, the Puget Sound Agricultural Company, retained their trading posts and the farms, lands and other prop- erty of every description belonging to them. is true that there was also a clause that when the United States government should deem it of public and political importance and should signify a desire to obtain possession of the lands thus occupied the property so required should be transferred to the United States at a valuation to be agreed upon between the parties, But as this required a to be appointed by the two governments, it virtually necessitated, whenever it was to occur, another tedious diplomatic negotiation, and resulted, as was to be seen, in over twenty years’ occupation of our sot] by a foreign corpora- tion, who had not only no interests in common with our citizens and the developments of the resources of the country, but were absolutely inimical to them. The Hudson Bay Company, which, next to the Fast Indian Company, was the most extensive | monopoly in the British Empire, was a fur-trading | company, which RECEIVED ITS CHARTER FROM CHARLES 1. in 1670, It had trading posts throughout the whole of the British North American possessions. There was extended to it outside of the Canadas and other organized provinces the absolute sovereignty over a territory larger than the United | States, The Hudson Bay Company possessions ex- tended trom ocean to ocean. Its numerous trading posts Were a continuous chain across the Conti- nent, and its head men were the judges of life and property throughout this Dominion. To belong to it was considered @ protession for life, just asin the East India Company or in the army and navy. It required influence to obtain an appointment; but after having secured a clerkship a young man had only to look forward to his own exertions and fitness for promotion. He went up regularly uatil he at last Srrived at the dignity of what was termed CHIRF FACTOR, the pay of which might fairly be considered ® handsome fortune, It is true it had ite drawbacks. in the remoteness from civilization an@d the long and in many instances perpetual absences from home, but the life to the young and adventurous man was attrae- tive, and as years came the added dignity of pro- motion and importance rendered him contented, Thig company, thus go complete in its organization to remain | tt | commission | 3 and discipline, had planted its posts west of the Rocky Mountains early in the présent century. The Northwest Fur Company of Montreal was the | first British company on the Columbia River. It was to this company the agents of Astor, who had established @ trading post at the mouth of the river | now known as Astoria, transferred all his vaiuable property in 1815, The exense was given that al- | thoagh they sold it for less than one-six Value, yet they acted for his best interests, a8 1b was understood an English war vessel was on its way for the purpose of capturing the pest and | property, As the erts, however, were Canadians, and were immediately given luc } Positions in the ec | thought it was thet Astor's they were the most anxious about. In after some contentions and bioodshed between their adherents, the Northwest Company was | j united and merged in the Hudsou Bay Com. | pany. They date ineir claims in Oregon ty | those of the Canadian Company. Fort Vain on the Columbja River, a@ short distance above the | mouth of the Willamette, was established as the head trading post, The Senior Chiel Pactor re- sided at Fort Vancouver, and was the governor of aii the country whieh the Hndson Bay Company claimed west of Lhe Koeky Mo ains, COMMENCEMENT OF AMERICAN EMIGH A . When the Americans be to emiyrate to Oregon the agents of the fur company ut once per- ceived that they mist make ktrenuous © retin possession of the country, or at te portion which was to them tle most valuable discovered that it would be impossible to preve the settlement of the tich Willamett they might succeed tu keepmg the ters south of the Columbia. Every obstacie was thrown in tie Ww nd ven violence resorted to, ¢ ny Americans taking up farms on the north si; Their nis to thas profit lay in the fur trade, and milks beaver dams could not very well exist offthe same siveams, and opening up farms and settling up a country would be very certain to drive away or materially decrease the fur- ring animals, Right here com- menced the struggle for the possession of Oregon. It was civilization against barbarism—the Ameri- can settlers against the English company. PUGET SOUND AND ITS COMMERCIAL IMI PANCE. Int he post at Victorta, Vancouver's Isiand, was established by Chief Factor James Dongias, and who, on the grant of the isiand to the Hudson Bay Company, became its first Governor, munication between the post at Visqu toria wis very frequent, and the great commercial advantages of that grand inland sea so impressed itseif on the agents of the Hudson Bay Company that it was determined to make every effort to secure it. It was Puget Sound and its harbors that was the cause of the tenacity with which the British clung tothe claim of the line of the Co- lumbia River. The only safe harbor north of the port of San Francisco, they saw thatin the future it would command the trade of China and the Kast Indies, By fair means or foul, by assertion or force, it must be gamed; and how near they came to succeeding is to this day but little known. ‘That we own Oregon to-day, that the North Pacifié Railroad will be one of the greatest successes of this century, is due to the courage, energy and perseverance of one man—a plain, unpretending missionary of the Methodist Episcopal Chureh, DR. MARCUS WHITMAN, who, under the auspices of the Missionary Board, went out to Oregon in 1836, and ministered to the Indians. In 1842, learning tnat an attempt was about to be made to steal Oregon from America vy aseries of misrepresentations alleging the worth- lessness of the soil and by planting a few bogua English colonists, with a single companion he re- turned over the wildernesses to civilization, and hastened to Washington just as Mr. Webster was about to trade Oregon to the British for a eod- fishery oif the Banks of Newfoundland on the strength of the Canadian Governor Simpson’s mis- representations. He demonstrated the practica- bility of colonizing Oregon by conducting thither a train of 200 wagons. He was afterwards murdered, in 1847, with his family, by the Cayuse Indians, at the instigation of a Canadian, OREGON CLAIMING ITS BOUNDARIES. With a strange want of statesmanship, Oregon was jor years neglected by the home government. Tt was not untdl August, 1848, Congress organized it asa Territory. Its first Legislative Assembly was convened in 1849, In due course of time the Terri- tory was divided into counties, the Itnes of which were defined in the various enactments. From the very start Oregon claimed jurisdiction over all the islands in Puget Sound northward to the bound- ary line of Canal de Haro. In 1863 the northern part of Oregon was organs ized as Washington Territory. At the first session the county of Whatcom was created. It is tha county which comprises within its limits the dis- puted islands of San Juan, Orcas, Lopez, Blageiy, Decatur and Shaw, which group is between the Canal de Haro and Rosario Straits. ‘THE BRITISH LAY CLAIM TO SAN JUAN. ‘The first permanent occupation of the island by the Hudson say Company was effected on the 13th of December, 1855, by the landing of a flock of some thirteen hundred sheep, under charge of Mr. Charles J. Griffin, then aclerk, now a@ chief trader, in the company’s service, and who remained for several years on the island in charge of their prop- erty and interests. ‘The place had been frequented the three previous years as @ fishing station, the parties coming over from Victoria for that purpose, | being in charge of clerks in the company’s service. ‘They occupied the island simply the few weeks of | the salmon season, abandoning it as soon as that was over. No English settler or colonist had ever been on the island and no occupation | or claim was attempted to be set up previous to the year 1853. Frustrated in the attempts to make the Columbia River the hound- ary, the company determined to grasp at every foot of land south of the forty-ninth paraiiet about which there could be a possible quibble of sovereignty. Searching the treaty for an excuse, they founda in THE BUNGLING MANNER IN WHICH IT WAS DRAWN that the channel separating Vanconver’s Island | from the main land was not specially designated. Flimsy as it was, this afforded the opportunity. ‘There were several channels, but, of course, they insisted that nearest to the main land must be taken instead of the one nearest to the island. Im the Summer of 1853 the chief factors of the Hudson- Bay Company at Victoria, after consultation, deter- mined to establish 4 sheep farmon San Juan and then claim the whole archipelago as British soil. It was @ cool piece of assurance, the audacity of which has almost made it successful, On learning of this invasion I. N. Ebery, the Collec- tor of Customs for the Puget Sound district, at once notified Governor Douglas that the sheep ani other property were liable to seizure for being brought | within the jurisdiction of his Custom House with- out payment of duties, Whereupon Governor | Douglas, in accordance with the plan agreed upon, claimed it as British soll and appointed Mr. Grifin @ magistrate for the island of San Juan as, A DEPENDENCY OF VANCOUVER'S ISLAND, thus extending the British law over the island. The United States Coilector had no means of en- forcing the collection of the customs; there was aG that time no revenue cutter in the district or other available force, and he had to content himself with protesting against the action of Gov- ernor Douglas, notifying him that eventually this unjustifiable intrusion would have to be accounted for. He also appointed a Unit States Inspector of Custdms to remain the teland, directing him to keep w count of all goods and dutiable effec’ might be landed. At the first assessmen‘ | erty in Whatcom county, in 1854, that or was included with the other parts of but the enforcement of the tax + until the Spring of 1865, when the suance of the requirements of * cases, SEIZED THIRTY 07 on the Hudson Bay ¢ sold them to. the big’ ment of the taxes been refused by Mr. ¢ much ado about the British Minis’ claim for damag CONTI”