The constant intervention in Dominica was supplemented by that other
intervention in Hayti, when an American admiral threatened war to the
Black Republic. Shame and indignation rise as we read the record.
Already we know it from the State Department. Rear-Admiral Poor,
under date of February 12, 1870, reports to the Navy Department his
achievement. After announcing that the Severn, with an armament of
fourteen 9-inch guns and one 60-pounder rifle, and the Dictator, with
an armament of two 15-inch guns, arrived at Port-au-Prince the 9th
instant, he narrates his call on the Provisional President of Hayti,
and how, after communicating the pendency of negotiations and the
determination of the Government of the United States “with its whole
power” to prevent any interference on the part of the Haytian or any
other Government with that of the Dominicans, (meaning the usurper
Baez,) he launched this declaration:--
“Therefore, if any attack should be made upon the Dominicans
[meaning the usurper Baez] during the said negotiations, under
the Haytian or any other flag, it would be regarded as an act
of hostility to the United States flag, and would provoke
hostility in return.”
Such was his language in the Executive Mansion of the President. The
Rear-Admiral reports the dignified reply of the President and Secretary
of State, who said:--
“That, ‘while they were aware of their weakness, they knew
their rights, and would maintain them and their dignity as far
as they were able, and that they must be allowed to be the
judges of their own policy,’--or words to that effect.”[66]
Such words ought to have been to the Rear-Admiral more than a
broadside. How poor were his great guns against this simple reproof!
The Black Republic spoke well. The Rear-Admiral adds, that he learned
afterward, unofficially, “that the authorities were displeased with
what they considered a menace on the part of the United States,
accompanied with force.” And was it not natural that they should be
displeased?
All this is bad enough from the official record; but I am enabled from
another source, semi-official in character, to show yet more precisely
what occurred. I have a minute account drawn up by the gentleman
who acted as interpreter on the occasion. The Rear-Admiral could
not speak French; the President could not speak English. Instead of
waiting upon the Secretary of State and making his communication to
this functionary, he went at once to the Executive Mansion, with the
officers of his vessel and other persons, when, after announcing to the
President that he came to pay a friendly visit, he said, that, “as a
sailor, he would take the same opportunity to communicate instructions
received from his Government.”
The President, justly surprised, said that he was not aware that
the Rear-Admiral had any official communication to make, otherwise
the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs would have been present,
being the proper party to receive it. The Secretary of State and
other members of the Provisional Government were sent for, when the
Rear-Admiral proceeded to make the communication already reported, and
at the same time pointing to his great war-ships in the outside harbor,
plainly visible from the Executive Mansion, remarked, that it could be
seen he had power enough to enforce his communication, and that besides
he was expecting other forces (and in fact two other war-ships soon
arrived, one of them a monitor); and then he announced, that, “if any
vessels under Haytian or other flags were found in Dominican waters,
_he would sink or capture them_.” Brave Rear-Admiral! The interpreter,
from whose account I am drawing, says that the President felt very
sorry and humiliated by this language, especially when the Rear-Admiral
referred to the strong forces under his command, and he proceeded to
reply:--
“That Hayti, having the knowledge of her feebleness and of
her dignity, had taken note of the communication made in the
name of the United States; that, under present circumstances,
the Government of Hayti would not interfere in the internal
affairs of San Domingo, but the Government could not prevent
the sympathies of the Haytian people to be with the Dominican
patriots fighting against annexation.”
Who will not say that in this transaction the Black Republic appears
better than the Rear-Admiral?