De Long to Hamilton Fish, January 22, 1870

Mr. Be Long to Mr. Fish.

Sir: On the 18th instant a reply was received from the Japanese minister of foreign affairs to the joint note of the foreign representatives of the 17th instant, appointing the following day, the 19th instant, for an interview at Yeddo with the highest officers of state on the Christian question.

I accordingly proceeded thither in company with my colleagues, and I now have the honor to submit herewith (inclosure No. 1) copy of a memorandum of the interesting conference held on that occasion.

From this memorandum (your perusal of which I beg especially to invite) you will perceive that the high officers of this empire engaged themselves to reconsider this question, and that pending the reconsideration the deportation of the native Christians from Urakami should be suspended, and that no further persecutions of any kind against them would in the mean time be entered into.

The apparent frankness with which this matter had been treated at the conference by these high officers, and this apparent desire to conciliate the good-will of the civilized world, was very encouraging and reassuring to all of us foreign representatives, and we returned that evening to Yokohama pleasantly impressed with the idea that through coöperation and energy we had succeeded in this highly delicate and difficult matter, in averting some evil, and in laying a broad foundation for future success by continued coöperation and remonstrances.

You may judge, then, of our surprise and chagrin when, on the day before yesterday, the Pacific Mail Steamship Company’s steamer New York arrived at this port bearing the unwelcome intelligence that the governor of Nagasaki, acting under peremptory orders from the Mikado’s government, had forestalled the reconsideration of this question by deporting three thousand one hundred and seventy of these unfortunate people—in fact all, or nearly all, of the native Christians at Urakami.

From some cause unexplained and most annoying, no report of this subsequent action was forwarded to me by this mail by our consul at Nagasaki, but I am enabled, through the kindness of my colleague, Mr. de Brandt, to send you the report received by him from his consul at that port, a copy of which he most kindly furnished me, and which I herewith transmit, marked inclosure No. 2.

I have further learned, both from the minister of France and the German charge d’affaires, that some fears are entertained for the safety of the Christian missionaries at Nagasaki, and the danger is considered so urgent that the French minister has seen proper to immediately send to that port the French gunboat Flamme.

From evidence received by me from unofficial sources and deemed reliable, I am led to believe that in this deportation families were separated with perfect ruthlessness, the men being sent to different provinces as convicts to literally fulfill the original decree of the Mikado against them, to wit, “that they should labor in the mines and live in forests;” that the women, whether married or single, were sent to houses of public resort, and the children so distributed as to secure their being strictly educated in the Sintoo faith; and the most unpardonable feature of the affair, that these high officers of the Mikado government must have known that this was already done, or being done, when they accepted our proposition for a conference, and while at that conference they were engaged in allaying oar anxieties by promises that further proceedings should be stayed.

I must also state that I consider the evasion of the Mikado’s high officers at the conference to inform us as to where these unfortunates were to be sent as deliberate dissimulation upon their parts, and I now do not doubt but that their argument for holding the conference at a time when they knew that this deportation was taking place was, instead of being, as we most fondly hoped, for the honest purpose of trying to arrive with us at some understanding for a satisfactory settlement of this matter, merely a device to gain time to have these orders fully executed before any resistance to their execution could be offered.

It may also be safely assumed that their assertions at the conference that houses and lands are provided for these exiles is as baseless as their assertions, made to us in that conference, to the effect that the families of these Christians were not to be separated.

That these people have not been guilty of any other or further offense against the government than that of becoming Christians is doubtless true, and the statements of the Mikado’s officers at the conference so often repeated, to the effect that these men were not being punished on account of being Christians, but solely on account of their seditious and rebellious practices, is proved to be unfounded by the admissions made in the conference, that those of them who had been formerly deported and who had recanted had been returned, and also by the decree of the Mikado himself, which is directed against Christians as such in express terms. The difficulties of obtaining authentic information on all of these points, when dealing with such authorities and in a country where we have no means of obtaining any information from the interior where those people are sent, will be apparent to you.

One advantage, however, as I consider it, has arisen from the holdings of that conference.

We there obtained from these high officers the distinct and positive avowal that the Mikado’s government is based upon the Sin too creed, and for its perpetuity depends upon the maintenance of that faith at all hazards. That they foresee in the propagation of Christianity the overthrow of this faith and the consequent fall of the Mikado’s dynasty, which pro confesso has no other hold upon the people or the princess than that engendered by the idolatrous belief in the divinity of his origin; that they fear the advance of Christianity more than they do the consequences of wounding the sensibilities of the Christian powers, and, entrenching themselves behind the legal shield of an abstract right on their part to manage their own internal affairs without foreign interposition, they intend by such practices as these to maintain this faith and the government based upon it until forced to abandon them.

That remonstrances on the part of the treaty powers’ representatives will cause them to change this policy I do not for a moment believe.

That it was the liberal foreign policy of the Tycoon’s government that led to the rebellion and his overthrow is a well-established fact. That the rebellion against his authority was incited by an appeal to the antiforeign sentiments of the daimios and others is certain, and that the Mikado’s party succeeded by this appeal in seizing upon this government is an undoubted fact.

Hence, we have in this government one impliedly and expressly pledged to hostility to foreigners and the Christian faith; and from such a government, so intended and so committed, I can see no hopes of effecting aught for important or general good relative to this subject by simple remonstrances. Thus, then, the issue stands framed; and thus simplified, the Christian powers may now know the exact spirit and disposition of this government relative to this question.

What further is to be done in the premises by me is a question I now beg leave to submit to your superior judgment for determination.

In dealing with this question so far I have carefully governed myself by the instructions given to my predecessor on this subject, and which I was instructed by you to consider as applicable and binding upon myself; but I feel that those instructions now stand exhausted, and I most earnestly solicit other and further instructions upon this matter, so full and complete that I may know the full extent to which I may proceed should exigences of a very grave nature arise, which is not improbable, as I fear that these authorities will become much emboldened by the success of this movement, if they find that for any considerable length of time it is allowed to pass unmet by aught else than remonstrances and vague warnings.

I deeply regret this occurrence, which I am sure will shock the civilized world.

I do not urge or recommend further action than already taken; but that the struggle will continue between the attempted advances of Christianity and idolatrous resistance is plainly to be foreseen, and what serious results may soon follow again none can tell.

It is in the light of this apprehension that I ask for full and explicit instructions.

In the mean time I shall content myself with following the course which I have already pursued in concert with my colleagues, although keenly conscious of its perfect inefficiency, as proved by the circumstances now related.

For a more full understanding of the bearing of this question upon the political affairs of Japan, so far as understood by me, I beg leave to refer you to my dispatch No. 14, which is a political summary.