ETHÉART, Secretary of State of Foreign Affairs to Bassett, March 27, 1872

Mr. Ethéart to Mr. Bassett.

Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your dispatch of the 25th instant.

If the investigation, for which you have just been to Saint Marc, has revealed to you some facts of a nature to put in evidence the improper proceedings employed by the agents of my Government against Mr. Jastram, when General Batraville, aîné, was arrested, it is my duty to say to you that the circumstances which accompanied this arrest, and upon which I furnish you by this dispatch all the necessary information, supported by authentic documents, prove, without a doubt, that the Haytian authorities conducted themselves on that occasion conformably to all the usages and according to all the forms prescribed by the laws of nations.

Indeed, General Batraville was not taken from the United States consulate at Saint Marc. I had the honor to relate to you, at our first interview, the circumstances of his arrest, and it is easy to prove by the documents that I hold that it was at the house of Mr. Edmond Martelly, a Haytian citizen, who voluntarily opened his doors to the Haytian authorities, where the said general was arrested. The minutes of the justice of the peace at Saint Marc, of which I send you a copy under this cover, (inclosures A and B,) prove this fact superabundantly.

I regret, as you do, that, in the absence of the President of the republic from Saint Marc, you did not have all the facilities of prosecuting a serious inquiry into the facts of this arrest, upon which, evidently, you would have been enlightened in a manner more satisfactory. But since you do not dwell thereupon, and waive this question, you will permit me, Mr. Minister, to do as you have done, in analyzing the principal point which forms the base of your reclamations.

You establish: 1st, that in consequence of the arrest of General Batraville some improper means were employed against your consul, Mr. Jastram, who received some violence on the part of persons in the service of my government; 2d, that the British vice-consul, the French vice-consul, and some other persons, eye-witnesses of these facts, agreed in saying that Mr. Jastram had been attacked, seized without any legal form by a band of armed men, under the command of a Haytian officer, who ordered them to conduct him to prison; 3d, that Mr. Jastram was dragged through the streets, in the midst of violent menaces and injurious epithets uttered against him and his colleagues, while his house was surrounded and threatened by this same band of armed men.

You do not in any manner doubt the veracity of these facts, Mr. Minister, which have been confirmed to you by the British and French vice-consuls, by eye-witnesses; facts, without doubt, you would have been able to better verify, if the authorities of Saint Marc had furnished to you the means of doing it. You have expressed to me your regret that this was not done, and I have not failed to partake this regret with you.

The information that I have upon these facts which accompanied the arrest of General Batraville are in all points in disaccord with yours. Permit me, Mr. Minister, to place them under your eyes in citing to you the names and the documents in support of my assertion.

I must inform you that when the Haytian authorities went to General Batraville, to arrest him, he had declared himself to be in open rebellion. This fact drew to his house a good number of persons, among others Mr. Jastram and the English vice-consul of Saint Marc.

Does it not seem to you, Mr. Minister, that that was not the place for persons who seemed to be invested with an official character? Should they not have avoided going to General Batraville’s at the moment of his arrest? And when, some moments afterward, General Batraville rushed into Mr. Jastram’s to seek shelter, ought not the Haytian authorities to have been a little moved at this proceeding?

Yet they remained calm, as it became them to be. The commander of the department, General Acoune Jean, addressed a first dispatch to Mr. Jastram (inclosure C) to invite him in the name of public order, gravely menaced in the country, to surrender to him the said Batraville. And immediately that he learned that Batraville had taken refuge in Mr. Martelly’s, a Haytian citizen, was it not with all the forms of politeness used in similar circumstances (inclosure D) that ho prayed Mr. Jastram to send to him the first dispatch?

Convinced, then, of the place where the said Batraville had taken refuge, the authorities took the necessary measures, and it was then that the justice of the peace at Saint-Marc, upon the demand of the secretary of state for justice, who was previously informed by the commander of the place, ordered a search of the house of Mr. Martelly, (inclosures E and F.) I have already stated, Mr. Minister, what was the result, is there anything therein, I ask, of improper proceedings, of violence, of an attack, of an illegal seizure, of an order to conduct Mr. Jastram to prison, or an argument to prove that he had been dragged through the streets, in the midst of violent threats and of injurious epithets? And the letter of General Saint Elia Cauvin, (inclosure E,) addressed to the secretary of state of justice, does it not say that General Luc, wishing to enter into Mr. Jastram’s to seize his escaped prisoner, was violently prohibited by this latter person?

But this is not all, Mr. Minister. Mr. Jastram, who complains so bitterly to-day that the Haytian authorities did not have any regard, any proper respect, for him: that the said authorities had caused him to be dragged through the streets to be incarcerated in prison, in exposing him to the insults of the populace—Mr. Jastram did not say a single word of all this in his protest sent to the commander of the arrondissement of Saint Marc. He only protested against the insult which was made to the American flag in taking by armed force General Batraville, who had voluntarily taken refuge under the protection of the said flag, (inclosure G.)

This method of procedure must appear strange to you as it does to me, and you know the human heart too well—the just susceptibilities of a foreign agent—to suppose that Mr. Jastram would have hesitated a single instant to complain with energy in the exasperation that conduct so reproachable, on the part of the authorities which owe to him a certain regard and consideration, would have dictated to him.

And yet, I repeat it, Mr. Jastram is silent in his protest upon all the deeds now laid to the charge of the Haytian authorities.

No, Mr. Minister; you have said yourself that there is not any instance where any officer of the republic of Hayti has ever conducted himself in such a reprehensible manner toward a foreign agent, and I do not see any motive that one of a friendly power, of a great republic, our elder sister, which gives to us each day incontestable proofs of sympathy, should not be surrounded with every regard and every consideration.

You will doubtlessly acknowledge, by the sincere recital that I make to you, by the perusal of the documents that I submit to you, that some evil-disposed persons have taken pleasure in distorting the facts which it has been my duty to expose to you in detail, in order to place you in a position to take a fair and impartial view of the same.

You are too much the friend of truth not to recognize the fact that it is on the side of my government.

Be pleased, Mr. Minister, I pray, to accept the renewed assurance of my very high consideration.