The Friend: Harris Treaty and Embassy Announced, March 1859

The following news story was featured in the January, 1859 edition of Rev. Samuel C. Damon's monthly newspaper The Friend. News reached Honolulu via a "correspondent of the Boston Herald" that a treaty between the the U.S. and Japan had finally been successfully negotiated by Townsend Harris, U.S. Consul to Japan at that time.

Honolulu residents also learned: "The Japanese Government has decided to send an Ambassador to Washington in March next, on the condition that our government will convey him and his suite to Panama in a government ship en route for the United States." This was more than a year before the Japanese arrived in Honolulu in March, 1860.

The Friend: January 1859, Page 5, col. 3.

NEW TREATY WITH JAPAN. –A correspondent of the Boston Herald, writing from the steam frigate Mississippi, at Hakodadi, says:

I presume that before this reaches you, you will have received the intelligence that our Consul, Mr. Harris, has succeeded in completing his new treaty with the Japan Government, and that it has been signed by the Emperor and sent to our Government by Commodore Tatnall. Mr. Harris has labored hard to bring about this grand result, and is deserving the congratulations of the whole American people.

By this new treaty the port of Simoda, of no account to us, will be closed and the beautiful harbor of Lanagua, only twelve miles from the city of Jeddo, is to be opened to us for commerce, &c. After the treaty is ratified, that portion will be the residence of Mr. Harris. It is a beautiful harbor, easy of access at all times of the year, well protected from all storms, and is not like that of Simoda, surrounded at its extremes by sunken rocks. It is also capable of containing a large number of ships, while that of Simoda is not large enough to allow more than three or four ships to ride at anchor at the same time. Its proximity to the Court at Jeddo will also make it convenient for Mr. Harris.

The Japanese Government has decided to send an Ambassador to Washington in March next, on the condition that our government will convey him and his suite to Panama in a government ship en route for the United States. I learn that Mr. Harris and Commodore Tatnall assured the authorities of Jeddo that it would be gratifying to the United States Government and its people to comply with this request, and that the return mail would no doubt bring orders to that effect.

Sunday, August 1^st, was an interesting one at Simoda. At 10 o’clock, A.M., all the boats of the Powhatan and of this ship were seen pulling to the landing near the Consul’s residence, one miles from Simoda proper, filled with officers and men, among whom were Commodore Tatnall, Capt. Nicholson, and the Rev. Mr. Wood, Chaplain of the Powhatan. This large party, numbering four hundred, proceeded to the Consul’s residence for the purpose of attending divine worship of Almighty God on Japanese soil. Here, on the very soil from which the decree has gone forth for centuries to the world, that if the Almighty God himself, or man, or the devil should dare to step foot on Japanese soil to preach the religion of the Most High, they should pay the forfeit of their lives; here it was that, on the 1^st day of August 1858, four hundred American officers and seamen worshipped the true God without being molested. Rev. Mr. Wood gave his text from 1^st Thessalonians, chapter 1, versus 9 and 10, and hymns 107 and 118 from the Epsicopal Common Prayer-book were sung with much effect by the choir of the Powhatan. The discourse was listened to for an hour with the utmost silence by the American hearers, while a vast crowd of Japanese gathered around the building to watch our movements.