102 That solemn engagement Philip G. Thompson notes (Portsmouth Conference) (HKB). The date of this visit was 27 July. The New York Times, 28 July 1905.
103 a space both deep and high The following description is based on David H. Wallace, Historic Furnishings Report: Sagamore Hill National Historic Site (Harpers Ferry, W. Va., 1989), vol. 1, 51–52, 246–52 (photographs taken in July 1905). See also Hermann Hagedorn, The Roosevelt Family of Sagamore Hill (New York, 1954), 232–35. Komura was the first VIP received by TR in the North Room.
104 heavy Philippine hardwoods The Roosevelts took pride in the fact that “every bit of wood or stone [in the North Room] came from the United States or her possessions.” Roosevelt, All in the Family, 7–9.
105 “Framed” thus in Japan’s terms are reproduced in Dennett, Roosevelt, 231–32. See also Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 95–96.
106 Arrogant though these Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 96.
107 As for the indemnity TR, Letters, vol. 4, 1293.
108 hard numbers of yen A member of the Japanese delegation hinted that the indemnity request might run as high as three million yen. J. J. Korostovetz, Pre-War Diplomacy: The Russo-Japanese Problem: Diary of J. J. Korostovetz (London, 1920), 28 (hereafter Korostovetz, Diary).
109 After Komura and Takahira TR, Letters, vol. 4, 1293. Philippe Bunau-Varilla to Francis B. Loomis, 27 July 1905 (FBL); Loomis to TR, 28 July 1905 (TRP).
110 Roosevelt was worried TR, Letters, vol. 4, 1293. TR here displayed acute intuition. According to Baron Rosen, Witte “would not have hesitated to consent to the payment of a war indemnity provided it could be accomplished under some plausible disguise.” Roman Rosen, Forty Years of Diplomacy (London, 1922), vol. 1, 263–64.
111 his friend Kentaro See above, Interlude, p. 368.
112 The Russian plenipotentiaries Korostovetz, Diary, 31.
113 His guests arrived Ibid.
114 Still less could Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 112, quotes some of the Tsar’s adamant instructions, which formed the basis of Witte’s negotiating brief.
115 Their country Rosen, Forty Years, vol. 1, 263–64. Sakhalin was to remain a Russian strategic trigger-spot for most of the rest of the century: vide the downing of Korean Airlines Flight 007 in 1983.
116 Paradoxically, the Ibid., 264.
117 Baron Rosen’s suspicion Ibid.
118 Witte was enormous Smalley, Anglo-American Memories, 386–87; TR, Letters, vol. 5, 61. TR’s impression of Witte was not altogether pleasant, and turned to outright dislike as the peace conference progressed. TR, Letters, vol. 5, 22–23.
119 “We are not” Korostovetz, Diary, 31, qu. Witte’s own repetition, later that day, of his words to TR.
120 However, Witte Ibid., 32.
121 Witte watched Witte, Memoirs, vol. 2, 442. It is probable that Witte told TR, for example, that Japan had just as many imperialistic designs in Manchuria as Russia did, and considerably more in Korea. And by her very nature, she was likely to close the Open Doors in both those countries with louder slams than any yet heard. After Portsmouth, Japan did indeed immediately close the door on Korea, and by the time TR left office she had begun to shut it in Manchuria, too. By 1938, Japan had used her military power to close off all of China to the West, and her subsequent moves upon the Philippines, not to mention Pearl Harbor, made wastepaper of the Taft-Katsura Memorandum. It is moot, of course, whether China and Korea would have fared any better under Russian domination. See Dennett, Roosevelt, 238–39, for the role of public relations in formulating American attitudes in 1905.
122 Roosevelt said Korostovetz, Diary, 32.
123 The plenipotentiaries Dennett, Roosevelt, 240 “I have brought them to a cool spring,” TR said later that afternoon. “It remains to be seen whether they will drink of it or not.” Smalley, Anglo-American Memories, 362.
124 Tweedledum and Tweedledee See above, p. 168.
125 from next Wednesday When the delegations got to Portsmouth, they found that TR had made no arrangements for meetings, leaving them to construct their own schedule. Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 127.
126 He sent two Korostovetz, Diary, 35. Except where otherwise indicated, the following is taken from this source, plus New York Sun, 6 Aug. 1905, and Henry J. Forman’s excellent oral history of his coverage of the Mayflower reception for the Sun syndicate. Forman was one of the bright young reporters TR liked to cultivate with exclusive favors. He was given a presidential pass to remain on board during the ceremonies, and permission to dispatch bulletins ashore by rowboat shuttle (dropping them out through a porthole). A transcript of Forman’s memoir, “So Brief a Time” (1959–1960), conducted by Doyce B. Nunis, is in the Department of Special Collections, Young Research Library, UCLA.
127 glittered like a ballroom The simile is Forman’s.
128 From then on It is not likely that a peace conference ever began more noisily. The Mayflower’s logbook records twenty-one guns for TR, nineteen each for the plenipotentiaries, then respective honors for every Cabinet officer, admiral, and general who came aboard. O.H.M. McPherson, “The U.S.S. Mayflower, a Presidential Prerogative,” Yachting, July 1992.
129 the Stars and Stripes This flag now hangs at in the North Room at Sagamore Hill.
130 Since Komura and Rosen, Forty Years, vol. 1, 265.
131 The door to Witte, Memoirs, vol. 2, 434, 439.
132 As the President handled The simile of a hostess is again that of Forman, who was stationed in the room with a notebook. It was the first decisive moment of the peace conference, a pas de deux or pas de quatre, a symbolic crossing of the threshold between formality and conviviality. The subsequent relaxation of tension was not to last.
133 Asia and Russia “Two and two they came, arm in arm.” Forman’s original eyewitness account makes plain that TR and his senior guests did not, as often stated, enter all in a row. He led the way, as President of the United States, and the plenipotentiaries followed, “Baron Komura’s shoulder touching Mr. Witte’s elbow.” Witte managed, by means of his longer stride, to get a foot over the threshold first.
134 Those set aside Not even the punctilious Rosen recalled his orientation. “We were seated all in a group surrounding our genial host” (Forty Years, vol. 1, 265). Hagedorn, Roosevelt Family, 222, says without attribution that the principals shared a long wall seat, while TR took “the only chair in the room, facing them.”
135 To Komura, he Rosen tried to interpret, but was ignored.
Historical Note: TR read French easily, as indicated by his consumption of all of La Corce and Cahun’s Turcs et Mongols in 1905 (“with such thoroughness … that at the end it was dangling out of the covers”). He spoke the language with equal ease (“Je le parle comme une langue touranienne”), although John Hay noticed that his grammar was “entirely lawless,” and Jules Jusserand was amused by his occasional, entirely unself-conscious pauses before settling on le mot juste (TR, Letters, vol. 4, 1268; André Zardieu, “Trois Visites à M. Roosevelt,” Le Temps, 15 Apr. 1908; Thayer, John Hay, vol. 2, 356; Jusserand, What Me Befell, 338).
According to Ethel Roosevelt Derby (interview, 1962 [TRB]), her father read German “equally well”—works of literature, history, and science, as well as poetry. In youth, he could recite stretches of the Nibelungenlied by heart. As President, TR often conversed in German with Germans (Dunn, From Harrison to Harding, vol. 1, 373; Butt, Letters, 116). He was less versed in Italian, although, as noted above, he read E. de Michelis’s L’Origine degli Indo-Europei from cover to cover in 1904. For more on TR’s “not inconsiderable” linguistic achievements, see Wagenknecht, Seven Worlds, 34–35.
134 Other guests Review of Reviews, Sept. 1905.
135 Roosevelt went on See TR, Works, vol. 18, 409.
136 When lunch was Rosen’s position right next to the President, opposite Komura, was not accidental. As Russian Ambassador to the United States, “I was the ranking person of both delegations.” Rosen, Forty Years, vol. 1, 265.
137 AT TWENTY MINUTES New York
Sun, 6 Aug. 1905, precisely gives departure times. In what is possibly a jingoistic slip of the pen, Korostovetz has the Dolphin wallowing in the Mayflower’s wake. Diary, 37.
138 “I think we” Hagedorn, Roosevelt Family, 223, qu. Joseph Bucklin Bishop.
139 The self-important New York Sun, 19 Aug. 1905; Forman, “So Brief a Time,” 34–35. For the negotiations up to this point, see Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 128–38. Trani’s overall account of the conference is the only one based on Japanese and Russian, as well as American, primary sources.
140 His news today Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 137–39.
141 Later that evening George Meyer to TR, 18 Aug. 1905 (TRP); Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 139.
142 Roosevelt detected See, e.g., TR, Letters, vol. 4, 1222–23.
143 A fantasy began Lee, Good Innings, vol. 1, 306.
144 He told Kaneko Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 140.
145 That night, Roosevelt Beale, Theodore Roosevelt, 296–97.
146 It was galvanizing The telegram, addressed to Witte, read: “I earnestly request that you send either Baron Rosen or some other gentleman who is in your confidence to see me immediately, so that I may through him send you a strictly confidential message.” Dennett, Roosevelt, 251–52.
147 Roosevelt was playing Korostovetz, Diary, 92.
148 He said that three Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 141.
149 “We Americans” Qu. in ibid., 142.
150 Roosevelt seemed to know TR was receiving regular briefs from the reporter John Callan O’Laughlin, a member of his secret du roi with good connections in Portsmouth. See Dennett, Roosevelt, 252n.
151 He asked Rosen Korostovetz, Diary, 91–92; Dennett, Roosevelt, 252. TR was unaware, as he talked, that Nicholas II had that day summoned the Duma (national assembly)—the first truly democratic step taken by any Russian monarch.
152 Rosen, politely masking The ambassador kept his anger for later (Rosen, Forty Years, vol. 1, 104; Korostovetz, Diary, 99).
153 “If it is our” Qu. in Beale, Theodore Roosevelt, 299. TR’s proposal was rejected outright by Nicholas II (Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 142). Throughout the conference, the Russians felt they were being leaned on by TR, because the Japanese were rigidly silent about his equal pressure on them. He compared his own attitude as being that of “a very polite but also very insistent Dutch uncle.” TR, Letters, vol. 5, 1.
154 On Monday, the President Dennett, Roosevelt, 253.
155 “I earnestly ask” TR, Letters, vol. 4, 1307–8.
156 “not an inch” Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 138.
157 The cable went TR, Letters, vol. 4, 1306–8.
158 “I think I ought” Ibid., 1308–9.
159 Then, putting TR to Jules Jusserand, 21 Aug. 1905 (JJ). In a handwritten postscript, TR adds: “I have received a couple of brand-new pipe dreams from my constant correpondent [Wilhelm II].”
160 “I cannot” Adams, Letters, vol. 5, 707.
161 THE SIGHT OF Sergei Trani, Treaty of Portsmouth, 145.
162 “Russia is not” George Meyer to TR, 23 Aug. 1905, qu. in TR, Letters, vol. 5, 5–6. See ibid., 6–9, for more cables to and from TR during the crisis period.
163 On the same day For an indication of TR’s frenzied activity in this period (“I am having my hair turned gray”), see Beale, Theodore Roosevelt, 298–302.
164 Another year of war TR, Letters, vol. 5, 1312–13.
165 The letter was wired Beale, Theodore Roosevelt, 301–2.
166 ON FRIDAY, 25 August For more on TR’s famous dive, see Douglas, The Many-Sided Roosevelt, 104–5; Hagedorn, Roosevelt Family, 226–29.
167 cigarette after cigarette Smalley, Anglo-American Memories, 399. This dramatic story was told by Witte after the conference. Witte wrote later that he had spent the previous night “sobbing and praying.” Witte, Memoirs, vol. 2, 440.
168 Rumors spread over the weekend Korostovetz, Diary, 102; Dennett, Roosevelt, 260.
169 On Tuesday, 29 August Korostovetz, Diary, 107–8.
170 Komura sat Dennett, Roosevelt, 261.
171 HENRY J. FORMAN This incident occurred on 10 Aug. 1905. Forman, “So Brief a Time,” 29–31.
172 Then Roosevelt was Ibid., 30.
173 “the best herder” Adams, Letters, vol. 5, 719.
174 “It’s a mighty” Harold Phelps Stokes, “Yale, the Portsmouth Treaty, and Japan,” privately printed memoir, 1948 (TRC).
CHAPTER 25: MERE FORCE OF EVENTS
1 Ye see, th’ fact Dunne, Mr. Dooley’s Observations, 97.
2 “Accept my congratulations” Qu. by TR in Letters, vol. 5, 9. For the plaudits of other foreign government officials, see Benson J. Lossing, Our Country (New York, 1908), vol. 8, 2084–87.
Chronological Note: On 13 Sept. 1905, in a development that greatly amused TR, Nicholas II called for a second Hague Peace Conference. TR asked the Russian Ambassador if this meant that His Majesty wished to have it appear that he (not TR in 1904) had conceived of calling a second conference. When Baron Rosen answered yes, TR told him that he was delighted to have the Tsar take the initiative in the matter, and that he would heartily back him up. While relieved that it would not fall to him, once again, to “appear as a professional peace advocate,” the President did find a “rather grim irony” in the fact that the man who had so prolonged the Russo-Japanese War was now taking the lead in a “proposition toward world peace” (TR, Letters, vol. 5, 25–26, 30–31). The Second Hague Conference met on 15 June 1907.
3 The Mikado’s enigmatic TR, Letters, vol. 5, 8–9. After the Portsmouth Peace Treaty was signed, TR sent Mutsuhito the largest of his Colorado bearskins. According to Kaneko, “His Majesty was greatly pleased with the skin, because of the emblematic nature of the gift.” Street, “Japanese Statesman’s Recollections.”
4 “It is enough” TR, Letters, vol. 5, 1–2. Taft had, meanwhile, returned home with most of his official party.
5 Alice had returned Longworth, Crowded Hours, 106–7; TR, Letters, vol. 5, 15; Review of Reviews, Oct. 1904.
6 This did not “I confess that we came out from [the] Navy Yard in Portsmouth with all the booties as we could carry and cast a discreet smile on our ‘wily Oriental faces.’ ” Kentaro Kaneko to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., 7 Sept. 1905, in Kanda and Gifford, “Kaneko Correspondence,” 2.
7 After Tsu Shima TR qu. in Wood, Roosevelt As We Knew Him, 168; Ferguson, “John Barrett” (JB); Grenville and Young, Politics, Strategy, and American Diplomacy, 313ff. Many years later, when Philip C. Jessup asked about TR’s conduct of Far Eastern affairs from 1905 to 1909, Root replied dryly, “He kept them in his hands.” Interview, 13 Sept. 1932 (ER).
8 a new recruit See James Brown Scott, Robert Bacon: Life and Letters (New York, 1923), 105; Jessup, Elihu Root, vol. 2, 455–56.
9 Socialism was spreading British Documents on Foreign Affairs, vol. 1A, 3, 162–63; Jusserand, What Me Befell, 322.
10 The “odd year” Gould, Presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, 26–27, points out that, by statute, the second and fourth congressional sessions of the four-year cycle had to end on 4 March. That made each a mere three months long.
11 One issue above Ibid.; Mowry, Era of Theodore Roosevelt, 198. It is not known if TR saw Baker’s earlier conspiracistic articles about J. P. Morgan and “The Great Northern Pacific Deal” in Collier’s, Oct.-Nov. 1901. If so, he would have been able to trace the progressivist neurosis to the first weeks of his own presidency.
12 “law-abidingness” S. S. McClure to TR, 18 July 1905 (TRP). See also Philip Loring Allen, America’s Awakening: The Triumph of Righteousness in High Places (New York, 1906), chap. 1.
13 Doubtless somebody “Somebody” by the name of Herbert Croly had indeed just begun work on what was to become the basic text of Progressivism: The Promise of American Life (New York, 1909). See Croly, “Why I Wrote My Latest Book,” World’s Work, May 1910, and “The Memoirs of Herbert Croly: An Unpublished Document,” ed. Charles Hirschfeld, New York History 58.3 (19
77).
14 What particularly S. S. McClure to TR, 18 July 1905 (TRP). The first five chapters of Mowry, Era of Theodore Roosevelt, remain the best survey of the rise of Progressivism in early twentieth-century America.
15 Now here, in the Ray Stannard Baker to TR, 9 Sept. 1905 (TRP). The page proofs are wrongly identified in TR, Letters, vol. 5, 25, as coming from Baker’s first (Nov. 1905) article in the series. See text, below.
16 Let Baker, Steffens See Eugene L. Huddleston, “The Generals up in Wall Street,” Railroad History 145 (1981), for an alternative look at Ray Stannard Baker and his work. While history has viewed Baker as one of its greatest muckrakers and a wholly impartial analyst of runaway corporate power, Huddleston maintains that Baker was neither as objective nor as well-informed as Progressives then and since have made him out to be. He claims that Baker oversimplified complex issues, fell short in command of technical data governing railroad rates, operations, and regulation, and used as his most trusted background source an outdated, fifteen-year-old book, A. B. Stickney’s The Railway Problem. Huddleston also feels that Baker often relied on moralistic rhetoric designed to stir up emotion in an effort to disguise the fact that he had little solid evidence of wrongdoing. In Huddleston’s judgment, Baker’s solid reputation today is based partly on the esteem accorded him by TR, who consulted with the journalist in drafting railroad-reform legislation, even including a paragraph almost exactly in Baker’s words in his Message to Congress seeking such legislation. Time would demonstrate that TR used Baker to help accomplish his goal of rallying popular support for the new legislation—Baker’s six-part series appeared at just the right time, November 1905–June 1906, to help the Hepburn Act through Congress—only to dismiss his brand of journalism as less than honorable. Baker’s disillusionment with TR led him to ardent support of Woodrow Wilson, and he later became Wilson’s official biographer.
17 “I haven’t” TR, Letters, vol. 5, 25.
18 Just how “far” Pringle, Theodore Roosevelt, 359–65, shows that TR gave advance notice of his legislative intentions to the “short” Congress of 1904–1905, both in his Fourth Annual Message and in a remarkable speech to the Union Club of Philadelphia on 30 January 1905. Neither utterance had any lasting effect, due to the distraction of the Inauguration and the quick death of the Fifty-eighth Congress.
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