Shinagawa to William H. Seward, August 18, 1874

Mr. Shinagawa to Mr. Seward.

Sir: You have doubtless been informed that General Charles W. Le Gendre, a citizen of the United States and late United States consul at Amoy, who was engaged by the Japanese government through the United States minister in Japan, in December 1872, in conformity with the terms of Article X of the treaty of 1858 between Japan and the United States, to serve in the department of foreign affairs at Tokei as an officer of the second rank, who lately came to China as His Imperial Japanese Majesty’s special commissioner, was on the 6th day of August, 1874, forcibly taken before the United States consular court at Amoy by United States marines landed for that purpose from the United States steamship Yantic, upon unknown charges, and in virtue of a warrant issued by the United States consul at Amoy, while he was in Amoy on his way to Foochow and Shanghai on business connected with his mission; that on the day following the Hon. Charles W. Le Gendre was, against his will, again brought before the United States consular court at Amoy, when for the first time he was verbally made acquainted with the charges made against him; that from that date until the 13th instant he was forcibly detained at Amoy by the United States consul, and was thereby rendered unable to discharge the duties intrusted to him by His Imperial Japanese Majesty; that on both occasions he notified the United States consul that he yielded only to force, which he was unable to resist, in suffering the violence and detention to which he was subjected; that he strongly protested against these proceedings with the United States consul at Amoy; that Mr. Gosheki, His Imperial Japanese Majesty’s acting consul at Amoy, found it his duty to himself protest in the most formal and solemn manner against these acts of violence toward His Imperial’ Japanese Majesty’s special commissioner, as being a manifest infraction of the rights of nations, and contrary to the privileges and immunities which commissioners enjoy in civilized countries, although such officers may not always be vested with the character of public ministers; that on the 13th day of August, 1874, the United States consul informed Mr. Gosheki that Mr. Le Gendre was arrested by him in the United States consulate upon a charge of advising, aiding, and abetting an expedition in hostility to the government of China in violation of the laws of the United States and their treaty with China; and that he had informed Mr. Le Gendre that in so doing he was acting under instructions from the United States legation at Peking.

In the afternoon of the 13th instant the Hon. Charles W. Le Gendre was sent to Shanghai in charge of the acting clerk of the United States consular court of Amoy, and upon his arrival at this port, a paper purporting to come from you was read to him by the marshal of the United States consulate-general, from which he was given to understand that he had been released from arrest by order of the minister, and that there would be no occasion to hold him for trial on the charge preferred against him by the consul at Amoy.

The circumstances of the arrest and detention of General Le Gendre being now the subject of correspondence between the governments interested in the affair, I beg that you will have the goodness to furnish me, for the information of His Imperial Japanese Majesty’s government, with a copy of the paper read to him by your order on his arrival at Shanghai, as stated above, if possible before the departure of the mail for Japan.

I take, &c.,