No. 233.] Mr. Seward to Mr. Bigelow. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washingion, August 25, 1865. SIR: I have received your despatch of the 5th instant, No. 153. In accordance with the request of the honorable Garnier Pagès, a translation of his letter which accompanied your despatch has been submitted to the President, who recognizes Mr. Pagés' great political virtues, and eminent labors in the cause of humanity. Be pleased to convey to Mr. Pagés my sincere appreciation of the sentiments which he has expressed towards me personally. I am, sir, your obedient servant, JOHN BIGELOW, Esq., &c., &c., &c. No. 168.] WILLIAM H. SEWARD. Mr. Bigelow to Mr. Seward. [With three enclosures.] LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, SIR: I am in receipt of your despatch No. 204, relating to the replies to be made to the expressions of condolence and sympathy called forth in France by the assassination of our late President. In pursuance of your request that I would convey to the proper party in each case in which the communication had been addressed to or intended for the President, our government, the State Department, or the people at large, the grateful acknowledgments of the government and people of the United States for the neighborly and fraternal spirit, in such terms as my judgment might suggest, I have addressed the communication, of which enclosure No. 1 is a copy, and enclosure No. 2 a translation, to the following persons, mutatis mutandis: Mr. Viennet, of the French Academy, grand master of Scotch masonry in France; M. Neno, master of the Lodge La Ligne Droite; M. Perrot, master of the Lodge La Bonne Foi; M. Gary, master of the Lodge Orion; Reverend Descombaz, president of the Evangelical Alliance of Lyons; Henri Carle, president of the Alliance Religieuse Universelle; L. Pelatte, vice-consul of the United States at Nice, representing the American residents at that city; M. Viollier, vice-consul of the United States at Lyons, who transmitted the address of the democrats of Lyons; M. C. Davisson, United States consul at Bordeaux, who transmitted the address of the citizens of Pau; M. P. Leconte, delegate of La Jeunesse Francaise. Of the whole list of letters these were the only ones which were not, as I supposed, sufficiently acknowledged by me immediately upon their receipt. I did not send these replies to you when the letters were forwarded, for the want of force in my office at that time to prepare them, but I now have the honor to transmit to you copies of all these replies in the annexed enclosure No. 3. I am, sir, with great respect, your obedient servant, Hon. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State. JOHN BIGELOW. [For the addresses, &c., above referred to, see Appendix, separate volume.] [Enclosure No. 2.-Translation of No. 1.] LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, SIR: I am instructed by his excellency the President of the United States to acknowledge the receipt of the touching note you were pleased to address to him on the occasion of our late national bereavement. The President has been deeply affected by the fraternal and sympathetic spirit which this distressing event has awakened in every quarter of the globe. He accepts it as one of the precious results contemplated by Providence in permitting our national capital to become the theatre of a crime in many respects of unparalleled atrocity. If the world needed some new and signal illustration of the folly of assassination as a political agency, it would be difficult to select an event from all history better calculated for such a purpose than that which raised President Lincoln to the dignity of a martyr, and filled the whole civilized world with grief and dismay. I pray you to accept the assurance of my most distinguished consideration. To JOHN BIGELOW. [Enclosure No. 3, 30 papers.-Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Rev. Mr. Descombaz. (3d category, No. 3.) PARIS, May 1, 1865. MR. PRESIDENT: I have received your touching and sympathetic address to the President of the United States, and shall experience a sad satisfaction in transmitting it to him. The horrible crime which has called him to succeed to the first martyr in the list of our Presidents will make him especially thankful for your sympathies and your prayers. The deep emotion which our national mourning has everywhere excited, and particularly in France, proves that the assassin who has deprived us of the precious counsels of President Lincoln has given to him the immortality of the martyr, and forever placed before us this rare example of Christian courage and patriotism. I beg you, sir, to accept for yourself and your reverend colleagues the assurances of my deep veneration. The Pastor Mr. S. DESCOMBAZ, JOHN BIGELOW. President of the Evangelical Alliance of Lyons. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Prince Napoleon. (3d category, No. 14.) PARIS, May 1, 1865. MONSEIGNEUR: I am sensibly touched by the expressions of sympathy which your Highness has had the goodness to address to me. If anything could allay our great national grief it would certainly be the abundant proofs which reach me from all parts of France that the loss we have just suffered is deplored by all those who know how to appreciate that which is great, which is noble, which is pure. I shall hasten to transmit this kind expression of the sympathy of your Highness to the afflicted widow and other members of the family of our deceased President, who have the first right to the consolations which such a testimonial can give. I have the honor to be, with most profound respect, your Highness's most humble and most obedient servant, Monseigneur the PRINCE NAPOLEON. JOHN BIGELOW. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Mr. Isoard. (3d category, No. 52.) PARIS, May 4, 1865. SIR: I thank you heartily for the sympathy you have pleased to show towards my country and its government on the occasion of the calamity which has just stricken them so cruelly. Accept, I pray you, sir, the assurance of my distinguished respects. JOHN BIGELOW. Mr. E. ISOARD. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Mr. Delbetz. (3d category, No. 51.) PARIS, May 4, 1865. SIR: I am sensibly affected by the very cordial letter which you have pleased to address to me on the occasion of the horrible crime which has struck down our President, Mr. Lincoln. Nothing, in my view of it, can more contribute to strengthen the very cordial relations which unite our two nations than the evidences of sympathy emanating from such men as you. Please accept, sir, the assurance of my most distinguished and cordial respect. M. DELBETZ. JOHN BIGELOW. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Mr. Marais. PARIS, May 4, 1865. SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter dated April 16, and to thank you for the sympathy for my country and its government, of which you are pleased to send me the expression on the occasion of the horrible crime which has so cruelly wounded us in the person of President Lincoln. Accept, sir, the assurance of my most distinguished sentiments. To Mr. MARAIS. JOHN BIGELOW. Similar letters were addressed to Messrs. Guggernot, ainé, (3d category, No. 46;) Dalibelle, (3d category, No. 12;) Simille, (3d category, No. 50;) Dugit, (3d category, No. 49;) Rey, (3d category, No. 19;) Delestre, (3d category, No. 48;) Leborgne, (3d category, No. 39;) Dr. Bonifas, (3d category, No. 45:) Lemassou, fils, (3d category, No. 16;) Hếnat, (3d category, No. 15;) Mexal, (3d category, No. 54;) S. M. Remale, (3d category, No. 40;) Lanaux, (3d category, No. 36;) P. Ionain, (3d category, No. 20;) P. Leconte, (3d category, No. 22;) P. Griel, (3d category, No. 60;) A. Rivière, (3d category, No. 43;) G. Descottes, (1st category, No. 7;) A. Schiegars, (3d category, No. 22;) I. B. Thurges, (1st category, No. 13;) H. Carle, (1st category, No. 1;) Campadelli, (1st category, No. 61;) Chaube, (1st category, No. 57;) Cherrier, (1st category, No. 66;) Banet Rivet, (3d category, No. 35;) Imbert, (3d category, No. 33;) Comte de Douchet, (3d category, No. 34.) [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Mr. Niquet. (3d category, No. 13.) PARIS, May 4, 1865. I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter dated May 1, second anniversary of the National Union of Commerce and Industry, of which you are president. I thank you sincerely for the very sympathizing resolution of which you send me the text, and will be greatly obliged to you to express to your colleagues how much I have been touched by this cordial manifestation of the sentiments of the traders of Paris toward my country and its government, so grievously tried by the loss of President Lincoln. Please receive, Mr. President, the assurance of my most distinguished and most cordial sentiments. JOHN BIGELOW. Mr. ALLAIN NIQUET, President of the National Union of Commerce and Industry. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Mr. Cuicedo. (3d category, No. 35.) PARIS, May 6, 1865. DEAR SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter dated April 26, and to express to you all my thanks for the sympathy of which you have sent me the evidence on the occasion of our great national mourning. In the midst of all these marks of kind regard which are given us at this moment, we are particularly sensitive about those which emanate from men belonging, like you, to the American continent, and who are devoted to our institutions. Please accept, sir, the assurance of my distinguished regards. Mr. I. M. TORRES CUICEDO. JOHN BIGELOW. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to M. de Félice. (3d category, No. 21.) PARIS, May 6, 1865. SIR: I have been extremely touched by the very sympathizing letter which you were pleased to address me in your name, personally, and for several of your friends, members of the Protestant church of France, and correspondents of the society for the abolition of slavery. Permit me to say to you that I attach especial value to seeing the efforts of my country and its government in the interest of the holy cause of humanity appreciated with so much loftiness by men such as you. I beg you to accept my best thanks, and to transmit them to your friends, among whom I find M. M. Courtois, with whom I had the happiness to make acquaintance at Toulouse. Please receive the assurance of my sentiments of high consideration. JOHN BIGELOW. Mr. G. DE FÉLICE. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to M. de Lafayette. PARIS, May 6, 1865. SIR: In the midst of all the testimonials of sympathy which I receive on the occasion of our great national mourning, none could bring me more real consolation than yours. The name which you so worthily bear recalls the services which my country will always keep in remembrance, and will remain united in the gratitude of my countrymen with those of Washington and Lincoln. Please, sir, to accept, with all my thanks, the assurance of my highest consideration. JOHN BIGELOW. Mr. OSCAR LAFAYETTE. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Rev. M. Barthe. (3d category, No. 7.) PARIS, May 6, 1865. SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter, dated May 2, through which you were pleased to send to me your adhesion to the well-considered address from your colleagues, present at this time in Paris. I thank you cordially for the part you take in our great national mourning, for the sympathy with which you appreciate our efforts in the interest of the sacred cause of humanity, and for the prayers you address to God in behalf of my country. Please accept, sir, the assurance of my sentiments of high consideration. Rev. M. BARTHE. JOHN BIGELOW. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to General Faubert. (3d category, No. 4.) PARIS, May 6, 1865. GENERAL: I have the honor to acknowledge the reception of the address which you were pleased to transmit to me, as well in your own name as in that of your son, on the occasion of the crime of which Messrs. Lincoln and Seward have been victims, and I beg you to accept all my thanks for the sympathy with which you partake in our national mourning. Receive, sir and general, the assurance of my most distinguished and most cordial senti DEAR SIR: I thank you earnestly for the sympathy, the expression of which you were pleased to send me on the occasion of our great national mourning, and for the delicate attention with which you have brought to my knowledge those touching words by which the pious pastor William Monod announced our misfortune to the Evangelical Society. Mr. Monod had taken the trouble to write to me one of the kindest of letters, before his departure for America; but that letter only reached my legation after my departure for Brest, and when I got back to Paris, precipitately recalled by the terrible news of the death of Mr. Lincoln, it was impossible for me, in the midst of my occupations which assailed me, to send to Mr. Monod the information he sought of me. I will therefore be greatly obliged to you shall write to him to make all excuses for me. Accept, sir, the assurance of my most distinguished respects. M. ADOLPHE MONOD. JOHN BIGELOW. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Messrs. L. & C. Didé. (3d category, No. 18.) PARIS, May 9, 1865. GENTLEMEN: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the address you were pleased to send me, as well in your own name as in that of the working-men of your house. In the midst of the deep grief which has fallen on Mrs. Lincoln, there cannot be more effective consolation than the marks of sympathy by which she is surrounded, and I shall make it my duty to send her your address. I request you to accept yourselves, and cause your worthy operatives to receive, the expression of my thanks. Receive, gentlemen, the assurances of my most distinguished regards. JOHN BIGELOW. [Translation.] Mr. Bigelow to Mr. Molard. (2d category, first subdivision, No. 10.) PARIS, May 10, 1865. SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the letter which you have been pleased to address to me in the name of the "Masonic Lodge of Triumphant Friends." I beg you to accept personally and to transmit to the lodge all my thanks for the marks of sympathy which it has pleased to give to my country and its government on the occasion of our great national mourning. Accept, sir, the assurance of my distinguished sentiments. Mr. MOLARD. JOHN BIGELOW. |