San Juan Boundary Dispute

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When President James Buchanan learned on September 3, 1859, of the confrontation with the British through newspapers in the American capital, he was shocked. After receiving General Harney’s July 19 report on that same day, the president took swift action. He directed the acting secretary of war, W. R. Drinkard, to send an urgent message to General Harney stating that ‘the President was not prepared to learn that you had ordered military possession to be taken of the Island of San Juan or Bellevue. Although he believes the Straits of Haro to be the true boundary between Great Britain and the United States, under the Treaty of June 15, 1846, . . . he had not anticipated that so decided a step would have been resorted to without instructions.’ Secretary of State Lewis Cass assured the British ambassador, Lord Lyons, that General Harney was not acting on the instructions of his government, and Buchanan dispatched the general in chief of the army, 73-year-old Winfield Scott, to the Pacific Northwest to order Harney to desist.

In spite of his poor health, Scott left New York City on September 20 on the steamer Star of the West for the long sea voyage to the west coast, arriving in San Francisco on October 17. Scott immediately continued on to Fort Vancouver, where he met with General Harney on October 21 and with Captain Pickett the following day. Scott concluded from these meetings that both men were quite proud of their actions, and he set about at once to defuse the situation they had created.

In negotiating with Governor Douglas, Scott resurrected the offer of joint military occupation of San Juan Island, which Britain’s Captain Hornby had made to Captain Pickett at their meeting in August. Scott also unilaterally reduced the American garrison stationed there to a single company under the command of Captain Lewis C. Hunt. Governor Douglas accepted the arrangement, on the condition that Pickett not be reinstated at that post. This being agreed to, General Scott thought the matter resolved and began to plan his return to the District of Columbia. Before leaving, however, he attempted to persuade General Harney to relinquish his command in Oregon and transfer to the Department of the West, whose headquarters was in St. Louis, but the troublesome general flatly refused.

Returning to the nation’s capital, General Scott reported on the matter to Secretary of War John B. Floyd and expressed grave doubts about the wisdom of leaving Harney in command. ‘The highest obligation of my station,’ Scott stated, ‘compels me to suggest a doubt whether it be safe in respect to our foreign relations, or just to the gallant officers and men of the Oregon Department, to leave them longer, at so great a distance, subject to the ignorance, passion, and caprice, of the present headquarters of that Department.’

Even after the joint-occupation agreement was reached, the British naval personnel on the scene continued to act with remarkable restraint. When Governor Douglas told Admiral Baynes that he had received word from the British government that such an occupation should now take place, he demanded that marines be landed on the island immediately. But Baynes resisted, preferring to wait until clear instructions had been received from the Admiralty. Those orders arrived in March of the following year, and shortly afterward, a Royal Marine detachment of 84 men, under the command of Captain George Bazalgette, landed and set up camp on the opposite end of the island from the American troops.

On April 10, 1860, General Harney–furious that he had not been advised about the joint-occupation agreement and that his man, Pickett, had been replaced as commander on the island–committed a final act of insubordination. In spite of the agreement reached by General Scott and the British, and in violation of Scott’s direct orders, Harney sent Company D under Captain Pickett back to San Juan Island to relieve Captain Hunt’s Fourth Infantry company.

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Tags: 19th Century, American History, Foreign Affairs, Historical Conflicts, Politics

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