Fifty years in Wall Street

by Henry Clews

The Grand-Duke Alexis when he came to New York, with another Russian squadron, under another Admiral, in 1871, practically verified, in reply to my inquiries in conversation while I was acting as one of the Russian Reception Committee, what Secretary Seward had previously intimated to me—namely, that there was no foundation for the story that the Russian squadron of 1863 had come here to help us in warfare, if needed. Mr. Seward told me this very definitely on one occasion when I met him at Washington. But that its officers enjoyed themselves here very much socially was evident from their profuse expression of thanks, and acknowledgment of obligations for the favors received, before they took their departure, and also from the fact that when they got back to Russia, they called in a body, with the Emperor’s approval, on Mr. Cassius M. Clay, the American Minister at St. Petersburg, to return thanks more formally for the courtesies and kindness of which they had been the recipients here.

Now, it is clearly to be inferred that, if they had come here to serve us at a grave crisis, by offering to take part in our war, they would not have felt themselves under such obligations to us; on the contrary, we should have been under very great obligations to them, which would have called for public acknowledgment. Moreover, if the Russians had come on any such mission as naval co-operation in actual war, if needed, it would not only have been a matter of official record in both countries, but it would have immediately become known, not alone to the public here, but to the world. It would have been simply impossible to keep the news from the press; and the Government at Washington would have had no object; no good purpose to serve, in concealing such an alliance, for alliance it would have been of great international importance, and one which would have tended, still more than the activity of our own navy, to show Europe and the South the hopelessness of the South’s struggle with the North. Russia was friendly to the United States, of course; but this friendship between the two countries was very different from an offer, or a willingness, to help us by armed intervention in our favor. Russia has never intimated that she had any such intention; and, indeed, such intervention on her part would have been folly, as her navy was then very small after the destruction of the Crimean War, and would have been powerless against England or France.

The conclusion is, therefore, that the sympathy with Russia in its present war with Japan, which many in the United States are endeavoring to stimulate on the strength of this Munchausen story of proffered war-ships, is based on a mere assumption. Just as in the case of one of Dickens’s characters, “Mrs. Harris,” there was “no such person,” so in the case of this visit of Russian cruisers, there was no such offer of these by Russia to the United States, nor any evidence of any intention to offer them by Russia. On the contrary, Prince Gortchakoff, the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, repeatedly said to our Minister at St. Petersburg and in despatches to the Russian Minister at Washington, that Russia greatly favored peace, and wished for its speedy return; but would never take sides in the controversy between North and South.

Finally, as to England, we have the word of William Ewart Gladstone that the British Government was not unfriendly to us throughout our Civil War, inasmuch as it was absolutely and entirely opposed to the recognition of the Southern Confederacy, and instantly and effectually checkmated the French Emperor when he tried to make it swerve from its consistent course of neutrality. Had the British Government been unfriendly, it would have jumped at this chance to join France in recognition and intervention. “By their fruits ye shall know them.”

There is no reason in what I have said, however, for an anti-Russian and pro-Japanese feeling in the United States, or an anti-American feeling in Russia; and it is much to be desired that friendly feeling towards each other should prevail in both countries, but not at the expense of truth. Even Japan, while fighting Russia, is showing good-will and generosity towards Russian officers and men, and treating them with uncommon courtesy and consideration.

My only object in thus writing is to present the matters referred to, involving the relations of the United States with England, France and Russia during our Civil War, in a true and proper light, and so to correct prevailing misapprehensions. Russia’s course in Manchuria, however, by which she tightened, instead of releasing, her grip upon it, as she promised to do, sufficiently accounts for our lack of sympathy with her in her war with Japan.

While professing friendship for the United States, she has acted in bad faith, and by her restrictions ruined our growing trade there; and all the specious arguments put forward by Russia through the Russian Ambassador at Washington will not make the American people believe that Russian success in this war would be an advantage to the United States.

Hence, American sympathies are not generally on the side of autocratic and grasping Russia, with its closed door, but with liberal Japan, and its open door. Moreover, it is to be hoped that Russia will find her so-called “special position” of exclusiveness and monopoly in Manchuria untenable, and be compelled to abandon it, to evacuate that country, and leave its trade open to all the world. Then the now idle and ruined factories, built there by Americans, could be turned to profitable account again.