Bassett to Mr. Etheart, April 29, 1872

Mr. Bassett to Mr. Etheart.

Sir: Your dispatch of the 27th instant has this moment reached me, and I hasten to acknowledge its receipt.

In that dispatch you state, on the information which your government had received from Cape Haytien, that on the morning of the 19th instant, at 11½ o’clock, a boat filled with men, and carrying a howitzer, was launched from the United States war-steamer Nantasket, then anchored in the bay of the Cape, and that the said boat, coming to the Careenage, landed the howitzer, but that the men, on the approach of the commander of the port, quickly re-embarked the gun and hurried back to the Nantasket. You favor me with the further statement that the occurrence became a subject of correspondence between the Haytian authorities and the United States consul at the Cape. In this correspondence the consul explained that the movement was simply a customary naval exercise; that our naval commander not only did not intend by it he slightest disrespect to the authorities of Hayti, but that he expressed through the consul his very great regret that the circumstance should have been regarded in the least as unfriendly or disrespectful. You also inform me that your government has favorably received this explanation, and express the hope that I will take such measures as will prevent in the future a recurrence of a similar event. I thank you, Mr. Minister, for the information which you are pleased thus to convey to me.

I send herewith the dispatch (see inclosure A) which the United States consul addressed to General Nord Alexis. This dispatch gives an explanation of the affair substantially as you have stated it to me, and in it the consul expresses the regret of the naval commander at the occurrence.

I assure you, Mr. Minister, that I myself join in this expression of regret, and I will use my best endeavors to the end that a similar occurrence may not again arise.

I am, &c,