European Small States and the Role of Consuls in the Age of Empire [1 ed.] 9789004414389, 9789004414372

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European Small States and the Role of Consuls in the Age of Empire

European Small States and the Role of Consuls in the Age of Empire By

Aryo Makko

LEIDEN | BOSTON

Cover illustration: A picture of the Berlin Conference of 1884–​1885 in which the European powers decided on the so-​called scramble for Africa. Includes Swedish-​Norwegian minister to Berlin and later Swedish prime minister Gillis Bildt (third from right). Adalbert von Rößler, Zeichnung der Teilnehmer der Kongokonferenz 1884, Über Land und Meer: Allgemeine Illustrirte Zeitung, 1884, p. 308. The Library of Congress Cataloging-​in-​Publication Data is available online at http://​catalog.loc.gov LC record available at http://​lccn.loc.gov/2019953517​

Typeface for the Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic scripts: “Brill”. See and download: brill.com/​brill-​typeface. isbn 978-​9 0-​0 4-​4 1437-​2 (hardback) isbn 978-​9 0-​0 4-​4 1438-​9 (e-​book) Copyright 2020 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Hes & De Graaf, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Rodopi, Brill Sense, Hotei Publishing, mentis Verlag, Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh and Wilhelm Fink Verlag. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-​free paper and produced in a sustainable manner.

Contents Acknowledgements vii List of Tables ix List of Abbreviations x

Introduction 1 1 Focus of This Book 3 2 Sources 5 3 Structure 6 4 Prior Research 7

1

Power in the Age of Empire 22 1 Sweden-​Norway during the Age of Empire: Shipping, Trade and Globalization 23 2 Trade, Diplomacy and Security? Consuls and Foreign Policy 35

2

Years of Ambition, 1875–​1884 40 1 The Consular Committee of 1875 and the Backlog of Reforms 43 2 Africa: Economic Stagnation and Mixed Courts 54 3 Eastern and Southern Asia: the “Opening” of a Continent 68 4 West Indies: Old Ambitions, New Realities 85 5 Conclusions 98

3

Disillusionment and Years of Conflict, 1884–​1905 100 1 The Consular Regulation of 1886 and Renewed Failures 103 2 After Berlin: the Scramble for Africa 110 3 Eastern and Southern Asia: Growth, Tension and Hesitation 139 4 West Indies: Colonial Periphery and Merchant Consuls 173 5 Conclusions 187

4

From Informal Empire to Small State Realism, 1905–​1914 190 1 Zero Hour: Reorganizing the Foreign Service 193 2 Africa: Maintaining the Status Quo 201 3 Eastern and Southern Asia: Concentrating Efforts 209 4 West Indies: Falling into Oblivion 216 5 Conclusions 219



Conclusion 221

vi Contents Appendix 225 Bibliography 235 Index 252

Acknowledgements Many scholars claim that the second book is the hardest to write. Whether or not this is true, in writing it I soon encountered significant challenges that were liberating and frightening in equal measure: independence as a postdoctoral scholar, the teaching and supervision of students, the struggle for tenure and, not least, family responsibilities. In my attempt to rise to the occasion, I have accumulated a list of debts. This book would never have seen the light of day without the continuous support and encouragement of Leos Müller. Leos is not only an authoritative scholar in the fields of consular affairs, maritime history and global history but more importantly the kindest person you could meet in a history department –​I profited immensely from all his qualities as I was trying to navigate the labyrinth that is post-​doctoral academia. Leos also read the manuscript at various stages and provided important remarks throughout. Thank you, Leos! The book started as a two-​year project about the history of the Swedish consular service supported by the Centre for Maritime Studies (cemas) at Stockholm University. cemas, the Museum Board of the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs (Utrikesdepartementet, UD) and the Swedish National Maritime Museums (smm), and the Friends of the Swedish Maritime Museum (Föreningen Sveriges Sjöfartsmuseum i Stockholm, fsss) provided a project reference group comprising Manne Dunge (smm), Marika Hedin (smm), Stefan Lundblad (smm), Hans-​Lennart Ohlsson (smm), Ambassador Greger Widgren (UD) and fsss chairman Hans Christner. The fsss also generously supported the project. I would like to thank all of them. The president of Stockholm University, Astrid Söderbergh Widding, nominated me for a stipend from the Henrik Granholms Foundation, which allowed me to write the first draft of the book. The project also received generous support from the Magnus Bergvalls Foundation and the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities (Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien). The final touches were put to the book during my year as a Pro Futura Scientia Fellow at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study (scas) in Uppsala. I owe thanks not only to scas Principals Björn Wittrock and Christina Garsten for providing unique working conditions but also to my co-​fellows Pia Campeggiani, David Cannadine, Linda Colley, Rebecca Earle, Nikolay Grintser, Jürgen Kocka, Francisco Ramirez, Joëlle Rollo-​Koster, Jan Stenger, Keith Tribe and Meir Zadok for their good company and intellectual stimulus during our many lunches, seminars and other activities at scas. I would also like to thank

viii Acknowledgements the wonderful staff at the Collegium: Constanze Ackermann-​Boström, Ulrika Andersson, Bjarne Graff, Pia Hultgren, Maria Odengrund, Sandra Rekanovic and Anna Svensson. Thank you also to Emma Rosengren and Thomas Jonter for your helpful cooperation in establishing the Hans Blix Centre for the History of International Relations at Stockholm University, which I hope will become the Swedish platform for international history. The Centre was established under the patronage of Sweden’s former foreign minister and top diplomat Hans Blix. Hans and his wife Eva Kettis invited me to their home on various occasions, where Hans not only shared his wisdom about international affairs and life in general but also served coffee together with home-​baked cakes. Thank you, Hans, for being a true inspiration. I would also like to thank Jeremy Lowe for his patience and meticulous work in editing the final draft of the book. Thank you, Jeremy –​I know that I have been a challenge! Anipa Baitakova and Irene van Rossum at Brill provided smooth communication and excellent support relating to the publication process. I would also like to thank the anonymous reviewers for Brill. Last but not least, many thanks to my family: my parents Elias and Hasare, my sister Shamiram and my brothers Ninos and Nuhro. Without a doubt, I also owe the deepest gratitude to my wife Rimrama: for her love, and for tolerating the more time-​consuming parts of academic life. Our sons Leonardo and Alexander continuously remind me of the most important things in life –​family, laughter and sufficient sleep. I dedicate this book to the memory of my late beloved grandfather Israel Makko (1935–​2018), with whom I shared a passion for history and reading and who always encouraged me to pursue an academic career.

Tables 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

Number of Swedish-​Norwegian consular officials 1875–​1904 20 Merchant fleets in shipping tonnage 27 Representative countries’ naval tonnage 1880–​1914 29 Letters received by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs 1875–​1905 38 Letters sent out by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs 1875–​1905 38 Development of Swedish-​Norwegian shipping in Japan from 1870–​1895 150 Budget for the consular service in East Asia proposed in the Gude Report (1898) 153 Budget for the consular service in East Asia approved in 1899 156 Swedish and Norwegian shipping in Singapore, 1895–​1900 163 Norwegian shipping in Jamaica, 1901–​1902 177 Swedish trade with Africa in the early 1900s in kronor 202 Foreign service and consular service budgets of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway, 1875–​1906 233 Budgets of the Swedish Foreign Service, 1907–​1914 234

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Abbreviations aic atc BoT DfI dti mccs mfn nms obe sea UD U.S.

Association internationale du Congo African Trading Company Swedish Board of Trade (Kommerskollegium) Norwegian Department of the Interior (Departementet for det Indre) Norwegian Department of Trade and Industry Mission Covenant Church of Sweden (Svenska Missionsförbundet) Most Favoured Nation Norwegian Missionary Society (Det Norske Misjonsselskap) Order of the British Empire Swedish Export Association (Sveriges Allmänna Exportförening) Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs (Utrikesdepartementet) United States (of America)

Introduction It would be difficult to exaggerate the significance of merchant shipping in the evolution of international relations. Historically, questions of merchant shipping have preoccupied government officials; maritime policies have been at the centre of mercantilism, imperialism, and war. Since the time of Grotius, the legal foundations of international order had been closely related to the needs of international shipping. The study of shipping reveals that the distinction between trade policy and foreign policy is an artificial one.1 alan weston cafruny

∵ Between the 1870s and World War I, an era the eminent British historian Eric Hobsbawm famously described as the ‘Age of Empire’, a number of smaller and declining Western states responded to the great –​or growing –​military might of their neighbours Great Britain, France and Germany by employing varying policies of imperialism and colonialism. Five of these smaller states –​ the Netherlands, Portugal, Belgium, Denmark and Sweden-​Norway  –​were among the fourteen signatories of the General Act of the Berlin Conference of 1884–​1885 to regularize the so-​called ‘Scramble for Africa’ and spur on the New Imperialism of that era.2 Together with Austria-​Hungary, France, Germany, Italy, the Ottoman Empire, Russia, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States, they agreed on the future of Africa as a continent of colonies to Western powers.3 The smaller states stood in the shadow of the latter in this new

1 Alan Weston Cafruny, Ruling the Waves. The Political Economy of International Shipping (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1987), 13. 2 The 1884–​1885 Conference (also known as Congo Conference) must not be confused with the 1878 Congress of Berlin, in which Sweden-​Norway did not participate. 3 A good overview of the Western conquest of Africa is presented in Muriel Evelyn Chamberlain, The Scramble for Africa. 3rd ed. (Harlow: Longman, 2010). For a broader background, see Stig Förster, Wolfgang J. Mommsen and Ronald Robinson (eds.), Bismarck, Europe and Africa: The Berlin Africa Conference and the Onset of Partition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988) and the classic Sybil Eyre Crowe, The Berlin West African Conference, 1884–​1885 (London: Longmans, Greene and Co., 1942).

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020 | DOI:10.1163/9789004414389_002

2 Introduction race for resources and prestige but shared much in terms of worldview and policy goals, and therefore employed their own strategies of imperialism and ­colonialism. The Netherlands had declared neutrality in 1839 and responded to the rise of modern imperialism by consolidating its crumbling colonial system in Southeast Asia, which was threatened by the abolition of slavery in Surinam. With this, the Netherlands succeeded in remaining a first-​rank colonial power, even though it was considered only a second-​rank power in Europe, as one historian has put it.4 In similar fashion, the Portuguese Empire declined in the nineteenth century, losing its colonial authority over large territories in South America to Brazilian independence. At the same time, in Africa, Portugal extended the size of its colonies to include present-​day Angola and Mozambique, although the British ultimatum of 1890 restricted its initially even greater ambitions to establish control over the territories in between, as laid down in the famous ‘Rose-​Coloured Map’.5 Belgium, another neutral European small state, adopted the imperialist attitude of its neighbours and established ruthless colonial rule over Congo following the Berlin Conference. For 23 years, Congo was ruled as the personal property of King Leopold ii before the Belgian government took control of the colony in 1908.6 Denmark’s imperial legacy comprised colonies in the Atlantic –​including Greenland, Iceland and the Faroe Islands –​and the Caribbean, as well as minor trading posts in India and modern-​day Ghana. The Danish maintained a thriving slave trade between Africa and the Virgin Islands until 1848. During the second half of the nineteenth century, the tiny Scandinavian country started ceding and selling its colonies, acknowledging its incapability to maintain its place in the concert of the imperialists.7 Denmark’s northern neighbours, Sweden and Norway, formed a union between 1814 and 1905. The past and present of the two Scandinavian nations differed from those of the above-​mentioned countries. Like Denmark, Sweden 4 Maarten Kuitenbrouwer, The Netherlands and the Rise of Modern Imperialism (Oxford: Berg, 1992). 5 Malyn Newitt, A History of Mozambique (London: Hurst, 1995), 342–​348. For the broader history of Portugal’s failed attempt to establish formal control over vast territories from coast to coast, see Charles E. Nowell, The Rose-​Colored Map: Portugal’s Attempt to Build an African Empire from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean (Lisbon: Junta de investigações científicas do Ultramar, 1982). 6 Matthew G. Stanard, Selling the Congo: A History of European Pro-​Empire Propaganda and the Making of Belgian Imperialism (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2011). 7 David M. Carletta, ‘Danish West Indies’, in Carl Cavanagh Hodge (ed.), Encyclopedia of the Age of Imperialism 1800–​1914. Vol. 1. (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2008), 178–​180.

Introduction

3

had developed colonial ambitions in the early seventeenth century but had abandoned them almost completely by 1663. The only exception (in addition to a year-​long rule over Guadeloupe between 1813 and 1814) was the island of Saint Barthélemy in the north-​eastern Caribbean, which came under Swedish control between 1784 and 1878 before being sold to France. The slave trade flourished there as well, but on a much smaller scale than in the Danish case. Due to this earlier failure of their colonial ambitions, it came naturally to the Swedes and Norwegians to respond differently when the imperialist competition of the great powers gained momentum in the 1870s. The foreign policy decision-​makers in Stockholm did not consider adopting classic imperialist strategies aimed at acquiring new colonies. Instead, they turned to focus on the opportunities offered by the great imperialist powers’ explorations by attempting to take part in the exploitation of new colonial markets and resources.8 Global historian Christof Dejung has described comparable Swiss attitudes as Sekundärimperialismus.9 At the advent of the new imperialist age, Sweden-​Norway was among Europe’s poorer and militarily weaker powers, but it commanded one of the world’s largest merchant fleets. Shipping-​related commercial interests allowed the Swedes and Norwegians to join the big players, and these interests were therefore soon at the core of their foreign policy. In this, consuls played a central role. 1

Focus of This Book

This book started as a research project about the history of the Swedish consular service. As a result of initial archival studies, the focus then shifted towards the era of the New Imperialism, throughout which period Sweden was in a personal union with Norway. The foreign policy of the two separate kingdoms was conducted through the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs under the authority of a king mainly residing in Stockholm.

8 Dag Avango, Per Högselius & David Nilsson, ‘Swedish Explorers, In-​Situ Knowledge, and Resource-​Based Business in the Age of Empire’, Scandinavian Journal of History 43(3), 2018, 324–​347. 9 Linus Schöpfer, ‘Die Schweizer betrieben sozusagen einen Sekundärimperialismus.’, Tagesanzeiger, 10 December 2012. Available at https://​www.tagesanzeiger.ch/​kultur/​diverses/​Die-​ Schweizer-​betrieben-​sozusagen-​einen-​Sekundaerimperialismus/​story/​28808087 (accessed 25 June 2019).

4 Introduction Therefore, the book deals with the role of the consular service in the foreign policy of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway, and of Sweden after the dissolution of the Union in 1905, during the Age of Empire. It focuses on three regions: Africa, Eastern and Southern Asia and the West Indies. The book argues that the growing importance of consuls and their services during this era can be understood as the small-​states’ response to the imperialist policies of the great powers. The book therefore has two overarching aims. Firstly, it attempts to demonstrate how decision-​makers in the seats of governmental power, Stockholm and Kristiania (present-​day Oslo), acknowledged the growing political significance of shipping and foreign trade in a globalizing world and used the consular service to meet the challenges these developments posed. Secondly, it aims to map the main tasks and daily routines of Swedish-​ Norwegian consuls, in particular with regard to the other actors relevant to Swedish and Norwegian commercial and political interests, such as Swedish and local businesses, missionaries, local authorities, sea folk and others.10 As we will see in the review of the existing literature, most studies about the consular service of the United Kingdoms have focused on its role in Swedish-​ Norwegian political and economic relations and in Norwegian nation and state building. The book presents the first in-​depth analysis of Swedish-​Norwegian consular activities in various colonial territories on the basis of (ultimately Swedish) foreign policy decision-​making. It is not –​ nor does it pretend to be –​ a complete or general history of the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service, but it does attempt to offer a fresh take on established narratives about Sweden and Norway in international affairs during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The consular service played an important enough role at the heart of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway that our view of its vital role needs to be challenged and updated, so that we can get a renewed understanding of the period. On a more general level, the book reconsiders the history of Swedish neutrality by applying maritime and economic perspectives widely ignored in earlier research. It does so by bringing together hitherto overlooked perspectives from the fields of diplomatic history, global history and imperial and colonial history, i.e. of consular affairs and theories of informal imperialism. The concept of informal imperialism used here has been defined in one study,

10

Some of these ideas were presented in an article published in 2014. See Aryo Makko, ‘I Imperialismens kölvatten? Ett maritimt perspektiv på stormaktsspel, kolonialism utan kolonier och den svensk-​norska konsulsstaten, 1875–​1905’, Historisk tidskrift 134(3), 2014, 499–​523.

Introduction

5

to describe a willing and successful attempt by commercial and political elites to control a foreign region, resource, or people. The means of control included the enforcement of extra-​territorial privileges and the threat of economic and political sanctions, often coupled with the attempt to keep other would-​be imperial powers at bay. For the term informal empire to be applicable, we argue, historians have to show that one nation’s elite or government exerted extraterritorial legal control, de facto economic domination, and was able to strongly influence policies in a foreign country critical to the more powerful country’s interests.11 This approach allows an examination of Dutch economic historian Ferry de Goey’s argument that in the so-​called long nineteenth century, ‘Western states were convinced that consuls made an important contribution to their foreign policy’.12 Specifically, the questions raised are: How did Sweden-​Norway react to the New Imperialism? What was the role of shipping, foreign trade and the consular service in Swedish-​Norwegian foreign policy and how did it change over time? How were consular appointments to consular posts made, and who were the consuls that represented Sweden-​Norway abroad? What were the main tasks of Swedish-​Norwegian consuls, and what did their daily routines look like? 2

Sources

The study is based on a variety of Swedish and Norwegian sources. The Swedish National Archives (Riksarkivet) store an immense amount of documentation left behind by Swedish-​Norwegian consulates from all over the world in a separate division called Konsulatarkivet (‘The Consular Archive’), as well as in the main archive of the Swedish Board of Trade (Kommerskollegium, BoT). In addition to the minutes of government meetings (series A3A, Statsrådsprotokoll i utrikesdepartementsärenden), the inquiry into the Stockholm archives includes consular correspondence from both the archives of the Ministry

11

This definition has been offered in Gregory A.  Barton & Brett M.  Bennett, ‘Forestry as Foreign Policy. Anglo-​Siamese Relations and the Origins of Britain’s Informal Empire in the Teak Forests of Northern Siam, 1883–​1925’, Itinerario 34(2), 2010, 67. For a theoretical discussion of the concept see Mathieu Gotteland, ‘What Is Informal Imperialism?’, The Middle Ground Journal 15(Fall), 2017, 1–​14. 12 Ferry de Goey, Consuls and the Institutions of Global Capitalism, 1783–​ 1914 (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2014), 2.

6 Introduction for Foreign Affairs (E2F, Skrivelser från konsuler) and from the archive of the BoT (series E vi aa, Skrivelser från svenska (svensk-​norska) konsuler). Official publications from the period, such as Berättelser om handel och sjöfart från de förenade rikenas konsuler (‘Reports about Trade and Shipping from the Consuls of the United Kingdoms’), and various publications from Norges offisielle statistikk (‘Norway’s Official Statistics’) and Bidrag till Sveriges officiella statistik: Utrikeshandel och sjöfart (‘Contributions to Sweden’s Official Statistics: Foreign Trade and Shipping’), complement the archival sources. A  particularly valuable source is the former Royal Archivist Johan Axel Almquist’s detailed account of the BoT, the Office of Manufacturing (Riksens ständers manufakturkontor) and the consular service, published in three volumes between 1912 and 1915.13 3

Structure

The book comprises six chapters: along with the introduction and conclusion there are four empirical and chronologically organized chapters. The introduction sets out the aims of the study and the research questions and provides information on primary sources and previous research. It also outlines the book’s analytical framework and methodology. It is followed by a chapter establishing the historical background of the foreign policy and consular service of Sweden and Norway from the foundation of the Union in 1814 up to the 1870s. It draws mainly but not exclusively on secondary literature. The three empirical chapters form the book’s main body. They discuss the role of the consular service in the foreign policy of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway during three distinct periods. Chapter  2 deals with the role of consuls, starting from Sweden-​Norway’s initial response to the Long Depression that started in 1873 and the emergence of a new balance of power in Europe after Germany’s victory over France and concluding on the eve of the so-​called 1884–​1885 Berlin Conference. Chapter 3 discusses the consular service as an integral part of Sweden-​Norway’s informal and economic imperialism in the wake of the New Imperialism, from the so-​called ‘Scramble for Africa’ to the dissolution of the Union in 1905. Chapter 4 then finishes by analysing how the reorganized Swedish consular service met the political and

13

Johan Axel Almquist, Kommerskollegium och Riksens Ständers Manufakturkontor samt konsulsstaten 1651–​1910: administrativa och biografiska anteckningar (Stockholm: Norstedt, 1912–​1915).

Introduction

7

economic challenges posed by the dissolution of the union with Norway and increasing international political tensions from 1905 until the First World War. 4

Prior Research

In the 1970s, Marxist historians such as Per Nyström and Jan Larsson initiated a debate about whether Sweden had been an imperialist state at the turn of the twentieth century. The origin of the debate was Nyström’s description of Sweden as such in the earliest version of his essay Sveriges historia (Sweden’s history), published originally in 1933 and republished in 1974.14 The exchange drew inspiration from similar discussions between leading West German historians, but nevertheless met with little interest from contemporary scholars. Similar to questions about Sweden’s colonial past, the debate quickly fell into oblivion.15 A few doctoral dissertations on the Foreign Service and foreign trade in East Asia published between the second half of the 1970s and the late 1990s suggested that the expansion of the Swedish consular service could be viewed as Swedish imperialism, but this argument again failed to generate any real interest. Most historians mainly remember the consular service for its role in the dissolution of the union in 1905. Published on the centennial anniversary of this event in 2005, Bo Stråth’s extensive account of the history of the union confirmed the widespread view that the consular service was a problem, rather than a subject worth studying in detail from various perspectives.16 Norwegian scholars Iver Neumann and Halvard Leira have focused on the consular service as part of the Norwegian struggle for international recognition and the desire to influence the foreign policy of the United Kingdoms.17 Neumann and Leira also point out that Norwegian ship owners and merchants requested

14 15 16 17

Sverker Sörlin, ‘Förtjust i kunskap. Per Nyström död.’, Dagens Nyheter, 5 October 1993. Available at http://​www.dn.se/​arkiv/​kultur/​fortjust-​i-​kunskap-​per-​nystrom-​dod/​ (accessed 8 February 2018). Jan Larsson, Diplomati och industriellt genombrott:  svenska exportsträvanden på Kina 1906–​1916 (Uppsala: Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, 1977), 29. Bo Stråth, Union och demokrati: De förenade rikena Sverige och Norge (Nora: Nya Doxa, 2005), 321–​341; see also Stefan Håkansson, Konsulerna och exporten 1905–​1921:  Ett ‘Government failure’? (Lund: Lund University Press, 1989). Iver B.  Neumann and Halvard Leira, Aktiv og avventende. Utenrikstjenestens liv 1905–​ 2005 (Oslo:  Pax, 2005), 22–​50 and Halvard Leira, ‘The formative years. Norway as an obsessive status-​seeker’, in Benjamin de Carvalho and Iver B.  Neumann (eds.), Small States and Status Seeking:  Norway’s Quest for International Standing (Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2015), 22–​39.

8 Introduction that the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service expand in order to accommodate the global expansion of Norwegian shipping, but they do not identify this as a response to the New Imperialism.18 Much of the Swedish and Swedish-​ Norwegian consular service’s economic, socio-​political and diplomatic relevance has thus been overlooked to this day.19 This situation is not unique to Swedish and Norwegian historiographies. Some scholars, including the Dutch business historian Ferry de Goey and the British economic historian Theo Barker, have lamented the general lack of research on consuls for decades.20 In 1981, Barker described consular reports as ‘a rich but neglected historical source’.21 Scholars have only addressed this criticism in recent years, which has been expressed in renewed interest in the role of consuls in national, transnational and global history.22 Jan Melissen wrote in the introduction to a volume on consular affairs and diplomacy, published by Brill in 2011, that ‘the academic literature on consular affairs is rather thinly scattered, particularly in the field of diplomatic studies’.23 Melissen describes consular affairs as a ‘much-​neglected’ area, with the potential to improve our understanding of diplomacy, explaining that,

18 19

20

21 22

23

See also Torbjørn L. Knutsen, Halvard Leira and Iver B. Neumann, Norsk utenrikspolitisk idéhistorie: 1890–​1940 (Oslo: Universitetsforlaget, 2016), in particular ­chapters 4–​6. Aryo Makko and Leos Müller, ‘Svenska konsuler 1600–​1985. I sjöfartens och statens tjänst’, in Aryo Makko and Leos Müller (eds.), I främmande hamn. Den svenska och svensk-​norska konsulstjänsten 1700–​1985 (Malmö: Universus Academic Press, 2015), 21–​36. See also Ingrid Myrstad, ‘Generalkonsulatet i Kina. En studie av en svensk-​norsk utenriksstasjon 1842–​1905’, unpublished master’s thesis (University of Bergen, 2009), 6. General surveys of Norway’s diplomatic history also pay little attention to consular affairs. See for example Alf Kaartvedt, ‘Unionen med Sverige’, in Narve Bjørgo, Øystein Rian & Alf Kaartvedt (eds.) Norsk utenrikspolitikks historie: Bd 1, Selvstendighet og union: fra middelalderen til 1905 (Oslo: Universitetsforlaget, 1995), 231–​360 and Roald Berg, Norsk utanrikspolitikk etter 1814 (Oslo: Samlaget, c2016). Ferry de Goey, ‘The Business of Consuls; Consuls and Businessmen’, unpublished conference paper (14th Annual Conference of the ebha, University of Glasgow, 2010), 1; Desmond Ch. M.  Platt, The Cinderella Service:  British Consuls since 1825 (London: Longman, 1971). Theo Barker, ‘Consular Reports: A Rich but Neglected Historical Source’, Business History 23(3), 1981, 265–​266. The growing interest is nicely reflected in a more recent volume on the global history of consuls in the nineteenth century comprising a total of 36 chapters. See Jörg Ulbert and Lukian Prijac (eds.), Consuls et services consulaires au XIXe siècle–​Consulship in the 19th Century–​Die Welt der Konsulate im 19. Jahrhundert (Hamburg: dobu, 2010). Jan Melissen, ‘The Consular Dimension of Diplomacy’, in Jan Melissen and Ana Mar Fernández (eds.), Consular Affairs and Diplomacy (Leiden & Boston:  Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2011), 1.

Introduction

9

a great deal more has been written about diplomacy and diplomats than about consular affairs and consuls. At any point in the history of diplomacy and consular affairs, however, more people will have been in touch with either honorary consuls, career consular officers or, after the amalgamation of the diplomatic and consular services, with regular diplomats on a consular posting. Most citizens are also likely to have fewer lasting memories of bumping into diplomats than personal encounters with consular staff, whose work, after all, consisted of acting on their behalf by helping them out. To make the former type of personal meeting possible, diplomats first had to make a point of moving out of their own circle; while throughout history ordinary people have been part and parcel of the consul’s operational sphere.24 In a recent wide-​ranging study, Ferry de Goey delivers a compelling analysis of how the significance of consuls expanded greatly throughout the nineteenth century and became an important institution of global capitalism. Their duties usually related to three parties: their own government, fellow countrymen and foreign governments. Reports to their governments at home were composed of business-​related information, such as market prices or information on the arrival, departure and operation of ships, the collection of fees, and communication with other governments. Duties relating to fellow citizens included issuing of documents and notary services, including marriage. More importantly, consuls worked to safeguard business-​related provisions laid out in commercial treaties, such as the use of warehouses and ports or the right to purchase land. Thus, consuls not only worked with Swedish and Norwegian traders and seamen but also with a homogenous group including tourists, missionaries, expatriates and artists. Working with foreign governments, consuls held important political and judicial powers –​naturally some more than others.25 In most places, the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway’s highest formal representative was a consul, not an ambassador or a minister. According to Maaike Okano-​Heijmans, we must not ignore the contributions of consuls in the areas of commercial and economic diplomacy or in political and public diplomacy, although foreign ministries have often regarded consular services as a matter of necessity.26 Okano-​Heijmans describes the 24 25 26

Melissen, ‘The Consular Dimension of Diplomacy’, 3. de Goey, Consuls and the Institutions of Global Capitalism, 9–​11. Maaike Okano-​Heijmans, ‘Consular Affairs’, in Andrew F. Cooper, Jorge Heine and Ramesh Thakur (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Modern Diplomacy (Oxford:  Oxford University Press, 2013), 483.

10 Introduction period between 1800 and 1914 as the heyday of the consular institution, with the number of consular posts and the powers of consuls reaching a peak.27 This was the result of intensified international trade, spurred on by increasing industrialization and the breakthrough of progressive liberal ideas.28 Not every consul had the interests of his state as a top priority, of course. Many sought to make their fortunes, or wanted the increased prestige that the position offered.29 The services of consuls were instrumental to Swedish shipping at this time, but in contrast to the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the significance of maritime contexts to Sweden and its policy of neutrality during the nineteenth century remain rather unexplored.30 Swedish historians of this era were trained in the Rankean tradition of Curt and Lauritz Weibull (Weibullska riktningen), focusing on political decision-​makers of the highest ranks while assigning economic aspects and trade policies a peripheral role.31 Therefore, they rarely considered consuls as interesting or influential actors. Leos Müller has pointed to this as the main reason why the consular institution has generally received very limited attention in Swedish and Swedish-​Norwegian diplomatic history.32 Following a turn towards cultural studies in the discipline, interest in the study of diplomacy, foreign relations and international history has decreased even further in recent decades.33 In Sweden, political scientists have therefore been able to monopolize the area of the history of diplomacy and international relations

27 28 29 30

31 32 33

See also Jörg Ulbert, ‘Introduction: La fonction consulaire au XIXe siècle’, in Ulbert and Prijac (eds.), Consuls et services consulaires au XIXe siècle, 9–​18. Okano-​Heijmans, ‘Consular Affairs’, 475. de Goey, Consuls and the Institutions of Global Capitalism, 9. Leos Müller, ‘The Swedish-​Norwegian Consular Services in the 19th Century (1814–​ 1905)’, in Ulbert and Prijac (eds.), Consuls et services consulaires au XIXe siècle, 261–​ 270. See also Jan Glete, Swedish Naval Administration, 1521–​1721: Resource Flows and Organisational Capabilities (Leiden:  Brill, 2010), Navies and Nations:  Warships, Navies and State Building in Europe and America, 1500–​1860 (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 1993). Rolf Torstendahl and Birgitta Odén, ‘Den weibullska riktningen’, in Gunnar Artéus and Klas Åmark (eds.), Historieskrivningen i Sverige (Lund: Studentlitteratur, 2012), 109–​118. Leos Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce:  The Swedish Consular Service and Long-​ Distance Shipping, 1720–​1815 (Uppsala: Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, 2004), 17. For a broader overview on this development, see Stefan Eklöf Amirell, ‘Den internationella historiens uppgång och fall. Trender inom svensk internationell historieforskning 1950–​2005’, Historisk tidskrift 126(2), 2006, 257–​278.

Introduction

11

despite their lack of interest in longer historical perspectives and archival research.34 De Goey’s description of how the consular institution functioned in various continents is generally applicable to all Western states, even the smaller ones, but in his study he makes only three references to Sweden or Swedish consuls and none whatsoever to Norway and Norwegian consuls, mainly drawing on examples from the United States, Great Britain, the Netherlands and Germany. The present book therefore attempts to complement the historiography of the consular institution with empirical evidence from the history of the Swedish-​ Norwegian consular service during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It also contributes to the historiography on Swedish foreign policy, which often excludes both the role of the consuls and of Norway in the nineteenth century. In his study on Swedish perceptions of Russia as a menace during the era examined here, Gunnar Åselius observes that there was no clear line between the makers and the executors of security policy among the Swedish (and Swedish-​Norwegian) security elite. The operational rights of the king as the formal commander-​in-​chief had been restricted when the cabinet refused to support Charles xv’s intention to grant Denmark military assistance against Prussia and Austria in 1863. Formally, authority on foreign policy matters was transferred to the foreign minister, but in practice such tasks were carried out more and more by the newly established General Staff and Naval Staff, created in 1873 and 1894 respectively. Thus, the Swedish-​Norwegian security elite was made up of high-​ranking Swedish and Norwegian diplomats, such as the foreign minister, the minister of war and the minister of the navy, but also of lower ranking officials. Åselius mentions that Norwegians had access to the foreign service and were part of the security elite, but pays limited attention to the particular role of consuls, despite bringing up various examples of Swedes and Norwegians who occupied both military and diplomatic or consular posts.35 There are many such individuals. David Bergström was a journalist and politician who served as consul general in Helsinki from 1907–​1911, and later as envoy in Beijing and

34 35

Stefan Ekecrantz, Hemlig utrikespolitik:  Kalla kriget, utrikesnämnden och regeringen 1946–​1959 (Stockholm:  Santérus, 2003), 13–​14 and Aryo Makko, Ambassadors of Realpolitik: Sweden, the CSCE and the Cold War (New York: Berghahn Books, 2016), 9–​14. Åselius sometimes seems to refer to consuls as diplomats but elsewhere distinguishes between the two categories: see his The ‘Russian Menace’ to Sweden: The Belief System of a Small Power Security Élite in the Age of Imperialism (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wicksell International, 1994), 62 and 447–​455.

12 Introduction Tokyo (1918–​1922).36 Count Kristian Carl Magnus Gustaf Björnstjerna served as consul general in London (pro tempore, 1884–​1886) and Helsinki (1886–​1903) after almost two decades in various positions of the diplomatic service, such as attaché in St. Petersburg, legation clerk in Washington D.C. and head of the Swedish Foreign Ministry’s bureau for trade and consular affairs.37 Harald August Waldemar Eckell served as vice consul in Cardiff, London and Helsinki between 1889 and 1905 and, after the dissolution of the Union, as Norwegian diplomat in Paris, Mexico City and Havana.38 Like Eckell, Carl Martin Fallenius worked many years in the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service, first as clerk in London from 1887 until 1897 and then as vice consul in Cardiff until 1900, before he was appointed to a position at the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm.39 The Norwegian Conrad Falsen and his son Henrik served as consuls in Archangel. The elder Falsen was also a captain in the Norwegian army, and both he and his son were important informants about the Russian attitude in the Arctic Sea to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm.40 Carl Juhlin-​Dannfelt, who was consul general in Helsinki (and later in London) in the 1880s, and Karl William Hagelin, who worked for the Nobel Brothers in Baku and later became consul general in St. Petersburg, both used their consular appointments in a similarly political fashion.41 Therefore, any history of Swedish neutrality must include the consular service and Norwegian consuls and diplomats. Over the course of the past decade, a growing number of historians in both Sweden and Norway have pointed to the striking unreadiness of Sweden-​ Norway’s responses to the rise of the New Imperialism, and to Swedish and Norwegian attitudes towards colonialism in the nineteenth century, as historiographical blind spots.42 36 G. Jacobson, ‘David Kristian Bergström’, in Johan Axel Almquist, Bertil Boëthius & Bengt Hildebrand (eds.), Svenskt biografiskt lexikon. Band 3, Beck-​ Friis–​ Berndes (Stockholm: Bonnier, 1922), 728. 37 Albin Hildebrand & Edvard Bergenstråhle (eds.), Svenskt porträttgalleri.  3, Konungens statsråd, Konungens högsta domstol, Kungl. Maj:ts kansli, Kungl. Maj:ts beskickningar till främmande makter samt svenska och norska aflönade generalkonsuler, konsuler och vice konsuler (Stockholm: Tullberg, 1899), 81. 38 Hjalmar Steenstrup (ed.), Hvem er hvem (Oslo: Aschehoug & Co., 1930), 105. Available at http://​runeberg.org/​hvemerhvem/​1930/​0105.html (accessed 10 December 2018). 39 Albin Hildebrand, Svenskt porträttgalleri. Generalregister (Stockholm:  Tullberg, 1913), 211. 40 Gunnar Åselius, The ‘Russian Menace’ to Sweden, 60, 133 and 154. 41 Gunnar Åselius, The ‘Russian Menace’ to Sweden, 41–​63. 42 David Nilsson, Sweden-​Norway at the Berlin Conference 1884–​85:  History, National Identity-​Making and Sweden’s Relations with Africa (Uppsala:  Nordiska Afrikainstitutet,

Introduction

13

In Sweden, historians turned to the subject of colonialism in the early 2010s. Several research projects received major grants and have generated new results. Nikolas Glover has studied Swedish economic diplomacy in Africa and Asia during decolonization and points out that Swedes had actively contributed to European empire-​building in those regions much earlier.43 Pia Lundqvist, a historian at the University of Gothenburg, recently published a book about how men and women of the Mission Covenant Church of Sweden operated against colonial authorities in the Congo Free State from the gender, global history and postcolonial perspectives.44 Fredrik Thomasson of Uppsala University is exploring how the legal system of the Swedish colony of Saint Barthélemy dealt with slavery at the turn of the 1800s, while Ale Pålsson of the Centre for Maritime Studies at Stockholm University recently completed his dissertation on its political culture.45 Thomasson’s and Pålsson’s research about Saint Barthélemy has also received considerable public interest.46 More recently, Thomasson also took up new projects on the unmaking of Sweden’s colonial past during the first half of the nineteenth century.47 Holger Weiss, a

43

44 45

46

47

2013), 5; Svein Ivar Angell, ‘Konsulatspörsmålet og kolonialismen’, in Kjerland and Rio (eds.), Kolonitid, 111–​128. Nikolas Glover, ‘Framtidsmarknader:  Svensk ekonomisk diplomati i Afrika och Asien under avkoloniseringens era’, Historisk tidskrift 138(4), 2018, 649–​677. For a longer history of Swedish attitudes towards remote areas, see Åke Holmberg, Världen bortom västerlandet. Svensk syn på fjärran länder och folk från 1700-​talet till första världskriget (Göteborg: Kungl. Vetenskaps –​ och vitterhets-​samhället, 1988). Pia Lundqvist, Ett motsägelsefullt möte. Svenska missionärer och bakongo i Fristaten Kongo (Lund: Nordic Academic Press, 2018). Fredrik Thomasson, ‘Thirty-​Two Lashes at Quatre Piquets: Slave Laws and Justice in the Swedish Colony of St. Barthélemy ca. 1800’, in Holger Weiss (ed.), Ports of Globalisation, Places of Creolisation. Nordic Possessions in the Atlantic World during the Era of the Slave Trade (Boston: Brill, c2016), 280–​305; Ale Pålsson, ‘Our Side of the Water: Political Culture in the Swedish Colony of St. Barthélemy, 1800–​1825’, PhD dissertation (Stockholm University, 2016). See for example Ale Pålsson, ‘Våga prata om vårt lands mörka historia’, Svt Opinion, 31 October 2013. Available at http://​www.svt.se/​opinion/​vaga-​prata-​om-​vart-​lands-​ morka-​historia; ‘Över 5000 slavar transporterades på svenska skepp’, Sveriges Radio, 23 augusti 2014. Available at http://​sverigesradio.se/​sida/​artikel.aspx?programid=2151&artikel=5945467 (both accessed 27 February 2018). Thomasson’s project is entitled ‘Debate, Silence, Oblivion, and Denial. Slavery and Colonialism in Newspapers, Literature, and Theatre 1750–​1847 and How Swedish Colonial Experiences Vanished from History’; for information see also the website of the Swedish Foundation for Humanities and Social Sciences Research. Available at http://​ anslag.rj.se/​en/​fund/​49942 (accessed 1 March 2018). He has also received a major grant for the digitization of Swedish colonial archives, see https://​www.vr.se/​utlysningar-​och-​ beslut/​beslut-​om-​bidrag/​beslut/​2018-​09-​06-​humaniora-​och-​samhallsvetenskap.html (accessed 9 December 2018).

14 Introduction professor of global history at Åbo Akademi University in Turku, has recently published a monograph about slavery under the Swedish flag in Africa and the Caribbean, demonstrating that only a few thousand of the eleven to thirteen million African slaves were transported on Swedish vessels.48 Victor Wilson’s doctoral dissertation provides a thorough examination of Saint Barthélemy’s overall commercial importance to Sweden and international trade.49 Weiss’s book, like the work of Thomasson, Pålsson and Wilson and much of the existing Swedish literature, deals with the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Therefore, David Nilsson’s observation about Swedish unawareness of its own colonial past remains valid: However, what few Swedes know –​and probably even fewer people in today’s Democratic Republic of Congo –​is that Sweden participated in the conference and fully embraced the agreements made there. While King Leopold may have led a colonial enterprise of unmatched brutishness, all the Scandinavian countries gave him their blessing back in 1885. Of the Europeans participating in Leopold’s exploitative machinery in the Congo, Swedes were the third most numerous. The many Swedish missionaries in the Congo depended on Leopold’s harsh administration. Some even bought slaves to keep at the mission stations.50 Nilsson and Carl Yngfalk have also written about Sweden-​Norway’s involvement in the Scramble for Africa. Their essays broke new ground and pointed to economic objectives as the primary interest of Sweden-​Norway, but they remain unclear on their nature and extent. In this book we take a closer look at how Sweden-​Norway actually attempted to attain these objectives.51 The situation regarding the scholarship is very similar in Norway, where several historians have revisited the country’s colonialist endeavours and imperialist policies in recent years. Just under a decade ago, Africanist Kirsten Alsaker Kjerland gave an interview to the Norwegian University magazine Samfunnsviter’n in which she drew a picture of Norway’s suppressed colonial

48 Holger Weiss, Koloniala drömmar och verklighet i Afrika och Karibien 1770–​ 1847 (Stockholm: Atlantis, 2016). 49 Victor Wilson, ‘Commerce in Disguise:  War and Trade in the Caribbean Free Port of Gustavia, 1793–​1815, PhD dissertation (Åbo akademi, 2016). 50 Nilsson, Sweden-​Norway at the Berlin Conference, 5. 51 Carl Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika: En studie av utrikesministeriets och opinionens bemötande av Berlinkonferensen 1884–​85 och Kongofrågan 1903’, unpublished master’s thesis (Stockholm University, 2005).

Introduction

15

memory in a fashion similar to how Sweden was (and still is) described. Kjerland maintained that the construction of a mythical modern narrative of colonial non-​participation had portrayed Norway as particularly suitable for an international role in peacekeeping and development aid, allowing it to establish itself as a humanitarian superpower.52 Kjerland herself has since led a major research project entitled ‘In the Wake of Imperialism’, which has generated several substantial publications about Norwegian and Swedish activities in Africa and Oceania.53 The project’s overall findings were recently published in English in an important collection of essays that will certainly become a standard reference for those interested in learning about Scandinavian colonialism.54 Historian Camilla Brautaset, also based at the University of Bergen, has looked deeper into Norwegian encounters with China from the 1890s to the late 1930s in her research project entitled ‘Merchants and Missionaries’.55 Using migration theory to study the networks established by Norwegians in China, she demonstrates how merchants and missionaries used the Norwegian merchant fleet and adapted to local conditions in order to contribute to successful business operations and Protestant missions.56 Whereas historians like Brautaset, Kjerland, Thomasson or Weiss are in the process of raising awareness about a colonial past, the issue of empire, as we have seen above, remains more of an unexamined subject in the Nordic countries. It is only recently that scholars like Iver Neumann have argued in favour of ‘imperializing Norden’ in order to better understand the past and the present state of Northern Europe.57 Political scientists Rebecca Adler-​Nissen and Ulrik Gad point to the need to correct the myth of a Nordic exceptionalism based on the absence of a colonial and imperial past: 52

Torbjørn Nilsen, ‘Norges fortrengte kolonihistorie’, Sammfunnsviter’n, 4 October 2009. Available at http://​samfunnsvitern.com/​norges-​fortrengte-​kolonihistorie/​ (accessed 7 February 2018). 53 Kirsten Alsaker Kjerland, Nordmenn i det koloniale Kenya (Oslo: Scandinavian Academic Press, 2010); Kirsten Alsaker Kjerland and Knut Mikjel Rio (eds.), Kolonitid: Nordmenn på eventyr og big business i Afrika og Stillehavet (Oslo: sap, Scandinavian Academic Press, c2009); Anne Katrine Bang, Zanzibar-​Olsen: norsk trelasthandel i Øst-​Afrika 1895–​1925 (Bergen: Fagbokforlaget, 2008). 54 The most recent book is Kirsten Alsaker Kjerland and Bjørn Enge Bertelsen (eds.), Navigating Colonial Orders:  Norwegian Entrepreneurship in Africa and Oceania (New York: Berghahn Books, 2015). 55 See http://​merchantsandmissionaries.squarespace.com (accessed 7 February 2018). 56 Camilla Brautaset, ‘Merchants and Missionaries. Connecting China, Norway and Beyond’, in Camilla Brautaset and Christopher M. Dent (eds.), The Great Diversity: Trajectories of Asian Development (Wageningen: Wageningen Academic Publishers, 2014), 21–​44. 57 Iver B. Neumann, ‘Imperializing Norden’, Cooperation and Conflict 49(1), 2014, 119–​129.

16 Introduction But what makes the Nordic countries different? Firstly, it is commonly argued, the Nordic region does not have a lengthy and painful history of colonialism like the rest of Europe does. Unlike the United Kingdom and France, the Nordic states rejected a policy of imperialism. Or at least, so the story goes, in the Nordic region, empire is something of the past. The Danish and Swedish colonies were lost or sold (although the Danish colonies in the West Indies were only sold to the U.S. in 1917). Arguably, the Nordic countries closed the chapter on imperialism when Norway, Finland and Iceland gained independence in the first half of the last century. Having turned its back on colonial and imperial adventures, Norden instead developed into a security community and the world’s largest donor of development aid and contributed disproportionately to United Nations (UN) peacekeeping. Thus, “the Nordic nations provided public goods to the world community … [and] fancied themselves as mediators and healers”.58 Overall, then, the nineteenth century remains a somewhat obscure period in Swedish historiography. Relatively few scholars have dealt with this period in recent decades, and this is certainly true of diplomatic history. Nor has any scholar integrated the consular dimension into the study of Swedish-​Norwegian diplomacy. It is also correct to state that there are two national historiographies of the Union rather than one. The first deals with the organizational aspects of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs more generally, and addresses questions about how it worked, how it was financed, what its relationship with the Swedish and Norwegian governments was like, and how this relationship developed over time. The other type has looked at foreign policy itself, but, as mentioned earlier, it overlooks economic factors and the Union and instead focuses predominantly on security and high-​ranking foreign policy decision-​makers, such as the kings, the various Swedish foreign ministers and their small circles of advisors.59 Standard historiography also usually portrays nineteenth-​century Swedish neutrality from a Eurocentric standpoint. It focuses heavily on the Western hemisphere and traditional factors such as war, peace, and military

58 59

Rebecca Adler-​Nissen and Ulrik P. Gad, ‘Introduction: Postimperial Sovereignty Games in the Nordic Region’, Cooperation and Conflict 49(1), 2014, 3–​32. See for example the classic work Folke Lindberg, Kunglig utrikespolitik. Studier och essayer från Oskar II:s tid (Stockholm: Bonnier, 1950); see also Mikael af Malmborg, Neutrality and State-​Building in Sweden (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2001), ­chapter 3; or recent studies like Stefan Gammelien, Wilhelm II. und Schweden-​Norwegen 1888–​1905. Spielräume und Grenzen eines persönlichen Regiments (Berlin: Berliner Wissenschafts-​Verlag, 2012).

Introduction

17

defence on land. It is thus characterized by traditional methodology, which the eminent British historian G.M. Young once dismissed as ‘the record of what one clerk said to another’.60 The emerging field of global history, on the other hand, has successfully shifted focus from individual actors to structures, highlighting the relevance of the sea, and of economic aspects relating to the growing interdependence between different regions, and between actors and markets in colonial peripheries.61 This turn in international research has also left its mark on Swedish historical scholarship. Tellingly, the first major history textbook for university undergraduates in the Swedish language, published in 2014, explicitly takes the sea as a geographical point of departure.62 Torsten Gihl, a historian and lawyer who headed the archives of the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs, and for two years even those of the Secretariat of the League of Nations (1924–​1926), produced the first modern ‘official history’ of the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs in 1935. He offered a useful overview of the organization of the Ministry rather than a comprehensive analysis of the Union’s foreign policy, but does mention that from the 1830s onwards, consuls in various regions carried out a combination of traditional and diplomatic tasks as a result of the fact that economic matters surpassed in importance those of a purely political nature.63 Technological advancements and deepening international cooperation in related areas such as communications and law created a growing interdependence between countries and economies around the world. It became obvious, as Gihl writes, ‘just how dependent on foreign conditions the Swedish people were in their daily lives’ by the late nineteenth century.64 Gihl, like Kjell Emanuelson in his administrative history of the Swedish-​Norwegian Foreign Service, 60

G.M. Young, Portrait of an Age:  Victorian England (London:  Oxford University Press, 1953), 101. 61 C.A. Bayly, The Birth of the Modern World, 1780–​1914: Global Connections and Comparisons (Oxford:  Blackwell, 2004); Jürgen Osterhammel, Die Verwandlung der Welt:  eine Geschichte des 19. Jahrhunderts (München: C. H. Beck, 2010), republished in English as The Transformation of the World: A Global History of the Nineteenth Century (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014); and Emily S. Rosenberg, A World Connecting, 1870–​ 1945 (Cambridge, MA: Belknapp Press of Harvard University Press, 2012). 62 Maria Sjöberg (ed.), En samtidig världshistoria (Lund: Studentlitteratur, 2014). 63 In some cases, the merger occurred in order to cut costs:  see Torsten Gihl, ‘Utrikesförvaltningen under unionen med Norge. 1814–​1905’, in Sven Tunberg et al., Den svenska utrikesförvaltningens historia (Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1935), 378–​379. 64 Gihl, ‘Utrikesförvaltningen under unionen med Norge. 1814–​1905’, 428–​430; Kjell Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905: dess organisations –​och verksamhetsförändring (Lund: LiberLäromedel/​Gleerup, 1980).

18 Introduction describes the political and economic developments of the nineteenth century at a glance, mainly turning his attention to explaining what their consequences were for the relationship between Sweden and Norway –​in particular to the inner conditions of the Foreign Service. Organizational, budget –​or personnel-​ related questions are described in detail, whereas little information is given on foreign policy itself. In this book I therefore attempt to provide detailed analyses of the consequences the above-​mentioned developments had for Swedish-​ Norwegian foreign policy in general, and the role of the consular service in particular, during the years 1875 to 1914. However, none of the above means that this book is the first to attempt to understand Swedish neutrality during that era as a matter of informal imperialism. In his study of Swedish business endeavours in China during the decade following the dissolution of the Union, historian Jan Larsson uses the theory of free trade to explain Sweden’s attempts to enter the Chinese market. Larsson departs from extended definitions of imperialism offered by eminent historians like Hans-​Ulrich Wehler, Wolfgang Mommsen, Hobsbawm and others. These definitions include non-​violent exercise of power, such as semi-​formal and informal imperialism. According to Larsson, Sweden’s industrial and economic development required expansion into foreign markets. This affected the development of the state apparatus, particularly from the 1890s onwards, and would ultimately result in ideas about transforming the Foreign Service into a commercialized agency where the main goal of diplomats with technical and mercantile skills would be to support the Swedish industry.65 Larsson describes the Swedish business endeavours in China prior to 1906 as ‘parasitic’, since they exploited the opportunities created by the imperialist major powers during the late nineteenth century.66 The departmental reforms allowed for a more concerted and conscious Swedish effort to break into the Chinese market, even though the organizational ground remained fragile for several years. Under the leadership of the new envoy, Gustaf Wallenberg, new specialized positions were filled after close consultations between the head of the Swedish legation and the businesses at home, in particular Stockholms Handelsbanken. Wallenberg himself adopted a toned-​down but nevertheless opportunistic stance towards imperial aggression when dealing with the Chinese, believing that there was no alternative to the then influential ‘dollar diplomacy’.67 This 65 Larsson, Diplomati och industriellt genombrott, 16–​21. 66 Larsson, Diplomati och industriellt genombrott, 54–​56. 67 Larsson, Diplomati och industriellt genombrott, 82–​ 83 and 106–​ 108. ‘Dollar diplomacy’ was the name for U.S. President William Taft’s strategy to further Washington’s aims in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and Latin America through guaranteed loans to countries in those regions. See Stacy Warner Maddern, ‘Dollar Diplomacy:  Roosevelt

Introduction

19

attitude allowed him to maintain privileges similar to those of the major powers gained in the 1847 Treaty of Canton (officially the ‘Treaty of Peace, Amity, and Commerce between the King of Sweden and Norway and the Empire of China’), without making real concessions when he negotiated a new treaty that was ratified in 1909.68 Larsson ultimately describes the Chinese venture as a series of ‘failures and disappointed expectations’, and concludes his study by claiming that ‘the Swedish Government apparatus was requisitioned to serve particular interests of finance capitalism for ends which bore pronounced features of informal imperialism’.69 Earlier studies have suggested that Sweden-​Norway’s beneficial trade treaties with countries like China or Japan were not the result of a peaceful policy, with Pär Cassel arguing that it constituted a ‘Swedish free trade imperialism, which at least in theory was not reluctant to Anglo-​American style gunboat diplomacy’.70 According to Gunnar Åselius, some sort of Swedish-​ Norwegian imperialist attitude would also often surface during budget struggles between the Army and the Navy.71 We will see in the following chapters how Swedish-​Norwegian consuls played a central part in exploiting the gunboat diplomacy of the great powers by negotiating similarly unequal treaties in the aftermath of the forced opening of ports and markets. The significance of consuls in making connections between states and industry has also been explored –​but only for the period immediately after the dissolution of the Union. The Swedish government used the separation from Norway as an opportunity for substantial reforms, and entrusted the 1905 Diplomatic and Consular Committee (1905 års diplomat-​och konsulatkommitté) with the task of reforming the Foreign Service in mercantilist fashion and exploring its potential to function as an export-​promoting institution. Harald Runblom has demonstrated that the expansion of the consular service in Latin America during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was a

to Taft 1890–​1913’, in Immanuel Ness & Zak Cope (eds.), The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Imperialism and Anti-​Imperialism (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), 608–​615. 68 Larsson, Diplomati och industriellt genombrott, 179–​180; Pär Cassel, ‘Traktaten som aldrig var och fördraget som nästan inte blev. De svensk-​norsk-​kinesiska förbindelserna 1847–​ 1909’, Historisk tidskrift 130(3), 2010, 456–​466. 69 Larsson, Diplomati och industriellt genombrott, 176 and 191 (emphasis in the original). 70 Cassel, ‘Traktaten som aldrig var’, 438; Ingemar Ottosson, ‘Kanonbåtsdiplomati med förhinder:  Sverige, Danmark och Japans öppnande’, Orientaliska studier 100–​1, 1999, 51–​79 and ‘Svensk frihandelsimperialism: det ojämlika fördraget med Japan 1868–​1896’, Historisk tidskrift 117(2), 1997, 199–​223. 71 Åselius, The ‘Russian Menace’ to Sweden, 220.

20 Introduction table 1

Number of Swedish-​Norwegian consular officials 1875–​1904a

Year

Vice consuls

Others

Total

1875 1880 1885 1890 1895 1900 1904

547 537 585 622 572 540 455

135 137 165 171 166 169 167

682 674 750 793 738 709 622

a  Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 140.

result of commercial rather than political interests.72 Small and medium-​sized export-​oriented businesses were mainly interested in cooperating with the consular service, whereas larger corporations showed little interest. Business executives criticized the consular service for its slowness and lack of economic training and skills. The scepticism was mutual, even among the staff of the Foreign Service itself. The majority of the staff of the Foreign Service were lawyers, who viewed the growing economic significance of consuls as a threat while believing they lacked the economic knowledge such tasks required.73 The reforms of 1906 and 1913, both initiated by the liberal administrations headed by Karl Staaff and the conservative government under Arvid Lindman, led to very little progress. Recruitment analyses illustrate that six out of ten consuls were lawyers, whereas only one out of ten had a background in business or science. Officials at the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs had used their freedom of action to advance their own interests rather than to fulfil the mercantilist goals of Staaff.74 The (re-​)development of the Swedish consular service after the dissolution of the Union was in line with that of other countries such as Denmark, Germany, Great Britain and the United States. With the exception of Great Britain, where state intervention was ruled out for

72

Harald Runblom, Svenska företag i Latinamerika: etableringsmönster och förhandlingstaktik 1900–​1940 (Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksells, 1971), 1–​8. 73 Håkansson, Konsulerna och exporten 1905–​1921, ­chapter 2. 74 Håkansson, Konsulerna och exporten 1905–​1921, ­chapter 3.

Introduction

21

ideological reasons, all those countries attempted to turn consuls into export-​ promoting actors, and all eventually failed. The British Foreign Office basically operated three regional consular services rather than one: the Levant Service for Asia Minor, the Far East Service for China, Japan, Korea and Siam (present-​day Thailand), and the General Consular Service for the remaining areas. The majority of consuls were honorary consuls who lacked proper mercantilist training, as paid consuls were considered too expensive. In the Swedish case, this contributed to export companies rejecting the support from consuls in favour of hiring professional agents of their own.75 As we will see in the forthcoming chapters, the history of the consular service is the key to understanding the history of Sweden-​Norway in the context of the New Imperialism. 75 Håkansson, Konsulerna och exporten 1905–​1921, ­chapter 5.

­c hapter 1

Power in the Age of Empire As a result of their chase for resources and new markets, many of the major powers, including Great Britain, France, Tsarist Russia and Imperial Germany, expanded on a global scale during the Age of Empire.1 Unable to keep up with the military might of the larger powers, smaller European states like Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, Portugal and Sweden-​Norway  –​some of which had earlier carried out imperialist policies themselves –​were therefore forced to seek alternative ways of securing their political and economic interests. Ferry de Goey points out that the growing significance of the consular service in Western countries resulted from the rise of the nation-​state, the European expansion into Asia and Africa, and the growing rivalry between industrializing Western countries during the nineteenth century. States with maritime interests were the first to develop consular institutions because they were more dependent upon it than others.2 These states commanded large commercial fleets, made up of thousands of seafarers, which created the need for a strong administration and well-​orchestrated economic and social support. In the late nineteenth century, the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway maintained a global network of about 100 consulates and 800 consular officials.3 Swedish-​Norwegian consuls not only operated in metropolises like London, Hamburg, New York and Shanghai but also in smaller cities and outposts like Guayaquil in Ecuador, Honolulu, and Port Louis in Mauritius. Norway’s merchant fleet was one of the world’s largest commercial fleets during that era, and therefore it came naturally to decision-​makers to incorporate shipping and trade into their policy considerations and to attempt to profit from the imperialist expansion of other Western powers.4

1 Andrew Porter, European Imperialism, 1860–​1914 (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1994). On Russia, see Nicholas Papastratigakis, Russian Imperialism and Naval Power: Military Strategy and the Build-​Up to the Russo-​Japanese War (London: I.B. Tauris, 2011). 2 de Goey, ‘The Business of Consuls’, 1. 3 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 138–​140. 4 Nilsson, Sweden-​Norway at the Berlin Conference, 35.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020 | DOI:10.1163/9789004414389_003

Power in the Age of Empire

1

23

Sweden-​Norway during the Age of Empire: Shipping, Trade and Globalization

The 1815 Vienna Congress restored peace and stability after more than two decades of revolution and the Napoleonic wars. The Congress has often been described as the restoration of a conservative order which ignored the strong winds of liberalism and nationalism connected to the French Revolution. According to this narrative, this would eventually lead to renewed domestic unrest in several European countries, not least in France and Germany. But Vienna has also been praised for the stabilization of relations between nations. The restored international order achieved by leaders including Charles Maurice de Talleyrand, Klemens von Metternich, Robert Stewart (Viscount Castlereagh), Tsar Alexander I and Karl August von Hardenberg, created the political conditions for the following processes of industrialization. Europe was spared major conflict until the Crimean War of 1853 to 1856. Even wars that did break out between larger powers, like the Austro-​Prussian War or the Franco-​German War, were rather short-​lived. Historians such as Paul W. Schroeder and the former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger therefore consider 1815 as the starting point for a century of genuine political, social and economic development on the European continent.5 These representatives of what can be called the traditional school focus on Europe, diplomacy, and the balance of power between major nations.6 Yet critics have accused the traditional school for ignoring the minor conflicts and domestic unrest across Europe, culminating in the revolutions of 1848/​1849. More recent research has thus taken a different approach, turning the focus from the centre to the periphery and arguing for the need to include colonized territories and peoples in the analysis. Global historians like Christopher Bayly and the Polish-​British historian Adam Zamoyski point to the domestic conditions after 1815 as important drivers of inter-​state conflict, highlighting the interplay between home affairs and foreign policy. Zamoyski is particularly critical of Kissinger’s and Schroeder’s portrayal of the nineteenth century as a peaceful era. He acknowledges that the Congress of Vienna accomplished its foremost goal –​to end a belligerent quarter of a century –​ but also links the 5 Paul W.  Schroeder, The Transformation of European Politics 1763–​1848 (Oxford:  Clarendon Press, 1994), 575–​576. A more recent account reaching similar conclusions can be found in Mark Jarrett, The Congress of Vienna and Its Legacy: War and Great Power Diplomacy after Napoleon (London: I.B. Tauris, 2013), 149–​157. 6 Henry Kissinger, A World Restored: Metternich, Castlereagh and the Problems of Peace 1812–​ 1822 (Brattleboro, VT: Echo Point Books & Media, 2013[1957]).

24 CHAPTER 1 uprisings in the mid-​nineteenth century, the Franco-​German War of 1870–​1871 and the First World War to the unfavourable international climate that came in the aftermath of the Congress. It is true that that the number of possible alliances diminished as a result of the Congress of Vienna, increasing the possibility of conflict between the large powers in the long run. The outcome of the Congress had created a more fragile international system, and the great powers, particularly Great Britain and Tsarist Russia, emerged strengthened from the Congress and developed attitudes that in the long term resulted in revanchism and imperialist ambitions.7 In such a world, a small state like Sweden-​ Norway needed to find new strategies to realize its strategic goals and safeguard its commercial interests. The eminent British historian Richard Evans points out that although its wars were relatively few, limited and local, this was a century characterized by European states’ pursuit of power: over themselves, each other, the world, and nature. As part of this, governments were striving to strengthen their imperial and diplomatic spheres of influence.8 Bayly describes the post-​Vienna era as a time in which a new world order was established, with the result that ‘a large part of humanity had been converted into long-​term losers in the scramble for resources and dignity’.9 Growing international trade helped in avoiding major European wars but created a growing dependency among people living outside of the centre of development in North West Europe. Bayly identifies maritime capacity as a major factor in the West’s edge in this global competition: This, then, was the critical period, when industrial production was repatriated to Europe and North America. Already in the eighteenth century, European and North American naval power had allowed the merchants of these regions to capture a disproportionate percentage of the value added to world trade by industrious revolutions. In the early nineteenth century, these disparities in power became wider, as European military power became unassailable and industrialization began gradually to gather pace. In the longer term, these developments reinforced the great disparity in income per head at the international level between what we would now call the rich ‘north’ and the poor ‘south’.10 7

Adam Zamoyski, Rites of Peace:  The Fall of Napoleon & The Congress of Vienna (New York: HarperCollins, 2007), 550–​569. 8 Richard J. Evans, The Pursuit of Power: Europe 1815–​1914 (London: Allen Lane, 2016). 9 C.A. Bayly, The Birth of the Modern World, 119. 10 Bayly, The Birth of the Modern World, 138. Jan de Vries explains that ‘industrious revolutions’ were part of a growing commercial culture of consumption that preceded and pushed the industrial revolution; see Jan de Vries, The Industrious Revolution: Consumer

Power in the Age of Empire

25

Bayly’s global historical perspective allows him to conclude that growing European and American dominance created increasingly similar societies. European and American trade blossomed as a result of the exploitation of cheap raw materials and labour in the colonies.11 Like Zamoyski, Bayly views the post-​Napoleonic order as fragile, adding that its failures had effects on a global scale. The goal of conservative elites and intellectuals was to return to the political, economic and ideological realities of the time before 1789: to the so-​ called Ancien Régime. But the sudden uprisings in Europe and similar events in Asia in the mid-​nineteenth century, such as the Taiping Rebellion in China 1850–​1864 and the Indian Rebellion of 1857, were clear signs that ongoing change was irreversible.12 The world also witnessed the establishment of global networks for exchanging information, capital, commodities and services –​of ‘processes of globalisations’, as German historian Jürgen Osterhammel describes it.13 In his classic Age of Empire, Hobsbawm points out that shipping played an important role in this development: Now the major fact about the nineteenth century is the creation of a single global economy, progressively reaching into the most remote corners of the world, an increasingly dense web of economic transactions, communications and movements of goods, money and people linking the developed countries with each other and with the undeveloped world. […] Without this there was no particular reason why European states should have taken more than the most fleeting interest in the affairs of, say, the Congo basin or engaged in diplomatic disputes about some Pacific atoll. This globalization of the economy was not new, though it had accelerated considerably in the middle decades of the century. It continued to grow –​less strikingly in relative terms, but more massively in terms of volume and numbers –​ between 1875 and 1914. European exports had indeed grown more than fourfold between 1848 and 1875, while they only doubled from then until 1914. But the world’s merchant shipping had

Behaviour and the Household Economy, 1650 to the Present (Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 2008). 11 Bayly, The Birth of the Modern World, 89 and 134–​139. 12 For the broader argument, see Bayly, The Birth of the Modern World, ­chapter 4. On Europe, see also Jonathan Sperber, The European Revolutions, 1848–​1851 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005)  and for a broader account Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution: Europe 1789–​1848 (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1962). 13 Osterhammel, The Transformation of the World.

26 CHAPTER 1 only risen, between 1840 and 1870, from 10 to 16 million tons, whereas it doubled in the next forty years, as the world’s railway network expanded from a little over 200,000 kilometres (1870) to over 1 million kilometres just before the First World War. This tightening web of transport drew even the backward and previously marginal regions into the world economy and created a new interest among the old centres of wealth and development in these remote areas.14 Economic historians Kevin O’Rourke and Jeffrey Williamson have supported Hobsbawm’s claims by offering empirical data on how falling transport costs in the nineteenth century accelerated the rise of an integrated transatlantic economy.15 Ultimately, it was the strength of their navies that allowed Great Britain and other large powers to establish and exert control over remote territories.16 Great Britain’s rise to global strength and its demise were both intimately linked to sea power.17 The importance of shipping as part of a new infrastructure is also detailed in Robert Millward’s more recent work on the economic organization of energy and telecommunications in Europe during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Millward reminds us of the fact that Sweden and Norway were among the strongest competitors of Great Britain, the most powerfully dominant shipping nation of the era. The reasons for this, according to Millward, were Scandinavia’s access to the sea, Sweden’s tradition in shipbuilding, and Norway’s traditional strength in tramp shipping.18 In their theory of free-​trade imperialism, British historians John Gallagher and Ronald Robinson maintain that imperialist powers did not necessarily exert control over a territory through military or judicial means. There were less violent but equally exploitative alternatives to the traditional imperialist policies adopted by the great powers. Gallagher and Robinson argue that

14 15 16 17 18

Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Empire: 1875–​1914 (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1987). Kevin H. O’Rourke and Jeffrey G. Williamson, Globalization and History: The Evolution of a Nineteenth-​Century Atlantic Economy (Cambridge, MA: mit Press, 1999), c­ hapter 3. Ronald J. Johnston (ed.), The Dictionary of Human Geography. 4th ed. (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), 375. Paul M. Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery (London & New York: Vintage Books, 1989[1976]), 177–​237. Robert Millward, Private and Public Enterprise in Europe:  Energy, Telecommunications and Transport, 1830–​1990 (Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 2005), 6, 23–​25. Millward also points to the fact that shipping remains one of the understudied issues, see page 11.

27

Power in the Age of Empire table 2

Merchant fleets in shipping tonnagea

1860

1875

1890

Great Britain 2768 6 153 7 979 USA 5 354 3 754 3 968 Germany 777 939 1 275 Sweden-​Norway 813 1 859 2 217     Sweden 281 507 511     Norway 532 1 352 1 706 France 996 1028 944 Italy 654 (1861) 1 044 826 (1891) Russia 173 (1859) 376 (1876) 529 (1896) Austria-​ 342 (1861) 325 (1876) 248 (1891) Hungary Netherlands 496 468 255

1907

1914

11 167 6 093 2 765 2 342 772 1570 1 403 996 701 472

12 120 6 861 3 320 (1913) 2 685 901 1 784 1 629 1 282 974 (1913) 610

448

767

a  B.R. Mitchell, International Historical Statistics: Europe, 1750–​2000 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), 710–​720; International Historical Statistics: The Americas, 1750–​2000 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), 571–​573.

the historian who is seeking to find the deepest meaning of the expansion at the end of the nineteenth century should look not at the mere pegging out of claims in African jungles and bush, but at the successful exploitation of the empire, both formal and informal, which was coming to fruition in India, in Latin America, in Canada and elsewhere. The main work of imperialism in the so-​called expansionist era was in the more intensive development of areas already linked with the world economy, rather than in the extensive annexations of the remaining marginal regions of Africa. The best finds and prizes had already been made; in tropical Africa the imperialists were merely scraping the bottom of the barrel.19

19

John Gallagher and Ronald Robinson, ‘The Imperialism of Free Trade’, The Economic History Review 6(1), 1953, 15. See also Bernard Semmel, The Rise of Free Trade Imperialism: Classical Political Economy, the Empire of Free Trade and Imperialism, 1750–​ 1850 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970).

28 CHAPTER 1 Hobsbawm also writes that a small number of Western states partitioned most of the world outside of Europe and America into territories either under their direct formal rule or governed by informal political domination.20 The trade and industries of the imperial powers depended on foreign markets, but it was not always necessary to establish formal control over the territories themselves. The main objective of the economic imperialist was to integrate the resources of a territory within its own economic sphere. This could be done peacefully, as in the case of British expansion into Latin America: the British would use military force and employ their famous ‘gunboat diplomacy’ only when they deemed it unavoidable. Swedish economic historian Lars Magnusson lauds Gallagher and Robinson’s theory for bringing the economic and strategic causes of imperialism closer to each other. Magnusson explains that the Manchester liberals borrowed their arguments from economists like Adam Smith, David Ricardo and Robert Torres, showing that most often informal methods were enough to establish British economic dominance. Accordingly, a world without formal colonialism was directly favourable to a country that could produce its products much more cheaply than its competitors. The goal of British foreign policy would be to open up new territories for trade and other economic activities, using force only where necessary to maintain formal control, as, without the need to exert control, use of force was wasteful. Agitating in favour of free trade was first and foremost a means of preserving an industrial advantage.21 Hence, great powers could establish their influence in various ways –​informally if possible, formally if necessary. This theory of the imperialism of free trade has not been applied to European small states, although they were no different to their mighty neighbours in most respects. They shared similar values, virtues and belief systems. Some of these small states, like the Netherlands, Portugal and Sweden, still held vivid memories of their own past as great powers. Decision-​makers in Stockholm or The Hague viewed war, trade, indigenous peoples and potential markets very much like their counterparts in Berlin, London and Paris did. The one fundamental difference was the limited military means at their disposal necessary to establish either formal control or informal dominance over foreign territories. European small states could not compete militarily, as they had done in earlier centuries. This fact elevated the importance of the role of trade in their foreign policies. Great Britain, France or Germany aspired to achieve military and 20 Hobsbawm, Age of Empire, xx. 21 See the chapter ‘Kolonialism utan kolonier’ in Lars Magnusson, Teorier om imperialism och globalisering (Stockholm: Prisma, 2002), 122–​143.

29

Power in the Age of Empire table 3

Representative countries’ naval tonnage 1880–​1914a

1880 Great Britain France Russia USA Italy Germany Austria-​ Hungary Japan Sweden-​Norway     Sweden     Norway

1890

650 000 679 000 271 000 319 000 200 000 180 000 169 000 240 000 100 000 242 000 88 000 190 000 60 000 66 000 15 000 41 197 23 779 17 418

41 000 46 606 28 050 18 556

1900

1910

1914

1 065 000 499 000 383 000 333 000 245 000 285 000 87 000

2 174 000 725 000 401 000 824 000 327 000 964 000 210 000

2 714 000 900 000 679 000 985 000 498 000 1 305 000 372 000

187 000 92 253 53 391 38 862

496 000 125 003 83 289 41 714

700 000 146 757 93 475

a  Quincy Wright, A Study of War. Vol. 1. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1942), 670–​671. For Sweden-​Norway, see Robert Gardiner (ed.), Conway’s all the World’s Fighting Ships 1860–​1905 (London: Conway Maritime Press, 1979), 360–​363 and 369–​371; Conway’s all the World’s Fighting Ships 1906–​1921 (London: Conway Maritime Press, 1985), 355–​363 and 348–​350.

economic control, whereas smaller states like Sweden-​Norway had to content themselves with securing only economic influence. This was a cheap strategy, offering many of the benefits of colonialism without the military spending. The consular services and their trade-​related activities were vital to helping Sweden and Norway integrate into global and colonial affairs. Various Swedish and Norwegian scholars have described these consuls as entrepreneurs who were dragged behind in the wake of imperialism, capable of exploiting the opportunities imperialism offered despite being like ‘small brothers who did not have to make the first move’.22 Studies on the Swedish-​Norwegian general consulate in Shanghai outline how Swedish-​Norwegian consuls operated in a climate created and characterized by the imperialist politics of the major Western powers. For instance, consuls were important actors within the strategy employed against China set out in the 1847 Treaty of Canton following

22 Nilsson, Sweden-​Norway at the Berlin Conference, 9; Kjerland and Rio (eds.), Kolonitid, 8. See also Angell, ‘Konsulatspörsmålet og kolonialismen’, 111–​127.

30 CHAPTER 1 Great Britain’s victory in the First Opium War in 1842.23 This treaty regulated customs, granted the Swedish-​Norwegian consulate both extraterritorial jurisdiction over its citizens and commercial access to the five treaty ports of Amoy, Canton, Fuzhou, Ningbo and Shanghai, and conferred on Sweden-​Norway the status of a Most Favoured Nation.24 This allowed Sweden-​Norway to take part in what political scientist Turan Kayaoğlu terms ‘legal imperialism’.25 China has often been described as a primary example of an informal empire, and it is certainly an interesting case where we can observe how a small European state like Sweden-​Norway profited from the imperialist policy of a major power. Sweden underwent a significant reorientation in its foreign policy during the early nineteenth century. The loss in the Finnish War in 1809, the declaration of war against Great Britain, which France dictated the following year, and finally the so-​called ‘Campaign against Norway’ (Fälttåget mot Norge) in July and August 1814, forced their Scandinavian ‘brethren’ –​the brödrafolket –​ into a personal union. The Union was formalized through the Convention of Moss, a peace treaty between the Swedish king, Charles xiii, and the Norwegian Stortinget.26 This was a time of intense nation-​and state-​building in the Nordic countries, as it was in the rest of Europe. In Sweden and Norway, these processes were conducted between the poles of nationalism and Scandinavianism, the ideology that supported deepened integration or even unification of the various Scandinavian nations. During the reign of Charles xiv John (1818–​1844), the Swedish Crown attempted to forge deeper integration between the two countries through various economic, military, political, symbolic and judicial incentives.27 These efforts were often viewed critically in Norway. The Union, established under the House of Bernadotte, brought Norway substantial independence, including its own constitution and a parliament of its own based in Kristiania. This personal union tied Sweden and Norway together formally, but in reality it was only common foreign policy that tied the two countries together. At the time, Sweden and Norway had rather divergent 23 24

Myrstad, ‘Generalkonsulatet i Kina’, 9. Erling von Mende, ‘Die wirtschaftlichen und konsulären Beziehungen Norwegens zu China von der Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts bis zum 1. Weltkrieg’, PhD dissertation (University of Cologne, 1971[1968]); Pär Kristoffer Cassel, Grounds of Judgement: Extraterritoriality and Imperial Power in Nineteenth-​Century China and Japan (Oxford:  Oxford University Press, 2012). 25 Turan Kayaoğlu, Legal Imperialism:  Sovereignty and Extraterritoriality in Japan, the Ottoman Empire, and China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010). 26 Martin Hårdstedt, Omvälvningarnas tid:  Norden och Europa under revolutions  –​och Napoleonkrigen (Stockholm: Norstedt, 2010). 27 Stråth, Union och demokrati, ­chapter 3.

Power in the Age of Empire

31

economic interests. Both countries maintained separate structures, including separate parliaments and separate boards of trade –​as there were no ministries of trade until 1916 (Norway) and 1920 (Sweden). Sweden was going through a process of industrialization, focusing on the export of timber, iron, and paper and the mass-​production of goods, while its maritime interests declined. Norway’s economy, on the other hand, was still essentially of a maritime character, and shipping was at its core. These varying trade interests and different economic orientations would eventually add to the persistent Norwegian criticisms of the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service.28 The Norwegian constitution authorized the king to make decisions in matters of foreign policy. The problem was that the king, on his part, usually used the Swedish state apparatus, which, unlike that of Norway, comprised a foreign ministry, a foreign minister, and diplomatic and consular representation abroad. The 1815 Union Act contained no regulations on how to deal with foreign affairs, and nothing on the organization of a foreign ministry, embassies or consulates. Therefore, these matters were not discussed in the joint cabinet (sammansatt statsråd) either, creating a Swedish monopoly.29 This only changed in 1835, when the Norwegian prime minister in Stockholm (Norges statsminister i Stockholm), who until 1873 was second to his counterpart in Kristiania (Norges statsminister i Kristiania), was allowed to participate in ministerial meetings dealing with foreign affairs.30 By the early 1870s, and in response to recent political and economic developments, in particular the French-​German War and the turn towards protectionism following the Panic of 1857, the Swedish parliament abandoned its hopes for taking a greater role in European politics which it had announced at the 1856–​1858 Riksdag. Instead, Sweden-​Norway now focused on staying out of international conflicts and concentrating its foreign policy efforts on economic matters. This also meant severe cuts to the Foreign Ministry’s budget from 1868 onwards, which

28

Müller, ‘The Swedish-​Norwegian Consular Services’, 261–​270. For the broader background, see Lennart Schön, An Economic History of Modern Sweden (London: Routledge, 2012), ­chapters  3 and 4 on Sweden, and Fritz Hodne, An Economic History of Norway: 1815–​ 1970 (Trondheim:  Tapir, 1975)  on Norway. See also Lewis R.  Fischer and Even Lange, New Directions in Norwegian Maritime History (St. John’s, Nfld.:  International Maritime Economic History Association, 2011). 29 Gihl, ‘Utrikesförvaltningen under unionen med Norge. 1814–​ 1905’, 362–​ 365, 452; and Folke Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia. 3.  4, 1872–​ 1914 (Stockholm: Norstedt, 1958). 30 Håkan Berggren, Första försvar:  diplomati från ursprung till UD (Stockholm:  Atlantis, 2008), 248.

32 CHAPTER 1 were only alleviated by the considerable rise in consular fees that the shipping boom of the 1870s generated.31 The proponents of Scandinavianism claimed that the cultural and linguistic proximity between the two countries was so extensive that there was no alternative to unity. The idea of a Scandinavian nation was rooted in Neo-​ Gothicism, where the origin of the Nordic peoples was located in a prehistoric past. During the early years of the Union, intellectual circles in Lund and Copenhagen spread the idea of a peaceful Scandinavian nation with a common past, common enemies in Russia and Prussia (prior to 1870), and common future goals. In one way, the Scandinavian option was the result of a political reality in which both Sweden and Denmark had been relegated to small state roles after the Congress of Vienna. The shift from a belligerent past to peaceful future resulted from realism rather than pacifism. The Pan-​Scandinavian movement was originally mainly of cultural character, and spread to Uppsala, Stockholm and Kristiania in the 1830s and 1840s. Leading Norwegian intellectuals and politicians nevertheless rarely viewed it as more than a complement to Norwegian nationalism. The main goal of these circles remained to avoid a ‘Swedishization’ of Norway.32 The enthusiasm of their opponents was put to the test when Scandinavianism was politicized in the context of the First Schleswig War 1848–​1851 and the Crimean War 1853–​1856. It quickly became clear that Scandinavianism had obvious limitations. The Union’s policy of giving military support to Denmark and thus compromising its neutrality met with criticism in both Sweden and Norway. Oscar I (1844–​ 1859) and Charles xv (1859–​1872) conducted an active foreign policy employing strong Scandinavian rhetoric. This strategy eventually boomeranged because it strengthened two opposite poles that were both essentially anti-​unionist, i.e. the dreams of a greater Sweden among Swedish nationalists and Norwegian fears of being swallowed by the Scandinavian project. Stockholm’s active foreign policy also heightened the Norwegian discontent over being treated unfairly by the Swedes in the Union’s cabinet and Foreign Service.33 This scepticism also included economic issues. The competition between the economies of the two countries overshadowed the advantages of an increased trade exchange. The Norwegian side maintained its demand for protective tariffs against Swedish goods even though the expansion of shipping had contributed to a breakthrough for free trade more generally. Attempts 31 Gihl, ‘Utrikesförvaltningen under unionen med Norge. 1814–​ 1905’, 428–​ 430 and 438–​440. 32 Stråth, Union och demokrati, ­chapter 4. 33 Stråth, Union och demokrati, 193–​209.

Power in the Age of Empire

33

to develop the mellanrikslag of 1825 into a real customs union, to establish a Union parliament and to deepen military cooperation therefore all failed in the 1850s and 1860s. The Norwegians increasingly viewed Scandinavianism as the ideology of the Swedish Crown; the Swedes, on their part, veered increasingly towards protectionism from the second half of the 1870s onwards.34 Divergent economic interests and Norwegian discontent thus complicated the chances for a consistent foreign and trade policy from the inside. In such a climate, appointments to important consular posts became as much subject for discussion as those to the most senior diplomatic posts in Berlin, London, Paris and St. Petersburg.35 There were fewer and fewer proponents of Scandinavianism. This was aggravated by Sweden’s turn away from France and Great Britain and towards a Germanophile profile after 1871.36 Gunnar Åselius has described how Sweden only reluctantly accepted its decline to lesser status.37 German historian Stefan Gammelien aptly portrays the Swedes in the nineteenth century as a ‘humiliated great power’.38 The Swedish self-​perception as a power seeking ways to restore its earlier greatness is illustrated in a statement by diplomat Carl Georgsson Fleetwood on the eve of the Berlin Congo Conference in November 1884. Fleetwood was an attaché at the Swedish-​Norwegian embassy in Paris at the time, and viewed as one of the greatest talents within the diplomatic corps. Five years later, at the age of 30, he would be appointed head of the Swedish Foreign Ministry’s political section. In light of the upcoming conference, Fleetwood believed that, it is a fact, worth explaining, that all of European politics hardly are European anymore but rather Asian or African –​ and that it is in those remote parts of the world where the fate of Europe is decided. Are we returning to a new age of colonial politics? Should we then, powers of second or third rank, become even more insignificant than before –​ or could economic 34 Stråth, Union och demokrati, 119–​129 and c­ hapter 7. 35 Stråth, Union och demokrati, 321–​341. 36 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 81; Stråth, Union och demokrati, ­chapters 6–​8, in particular 279–​288. 37 Gunnar Åselius, ‘Sverige:  Motvillig småstat i imperialismens tidsålder’, in Sven G.  Holtsmark, Rolf Hobson and Tom Kristiansen (eds.), Stormaktene Sverige og Norge 1905–​1907:  Fra konsulatsak til integritetstraktat (Oslo:  Cappelen akademisk forlag, c2006), 22–​48. 38 Stefan Gammelien, ‘The Humiliated Great Power:  Sweden under the Influence of the “Russian Menace” and in Discord with “Little Brother” Norway 1814–​1905’, in Jan Hecker-​Stampehl (ed.), Perceptions of Loss, Decline and Doom in the Baltic Sea Region (Berlin: Berliner Wissenschafts-​Verlag, 2004), 131–​143.

34 CHAPTER 1 interests possibly give us a growing influence –​or could we maybe appear as colonizing, although on a lesser scale, in order to have some benefit from the bleeding caused by growing emigration?39 Diplomat Carl Bildt shared Fleetwood’s assessment of the significance of the new imperialist policies’ economic aspects. When he bade farewell to his diplomatic post in Washington D.C. in December 1883, Bildt explained in a speech that the political and economic developments had taken the diplomat ‘from the helm of the ship and placed him in the bow to be a looker-​out for rocks and shifting bars, to warn the merchants and the manufactures of his country against threatened danger to their interest, and to give them timely notice of what might turn to their profit’.40 In 1880 and 1884, Foreign Minister Carl Fredrik Hochschild suggested expanding the Swedish-​Norwegian legation in Madrid ‘because trade and shipping demand it’.41 In January 1886, Hochschild’s successor Albert Ehrensvärd (the elder) stated that ‘colonial politics, which several powers conduct with remarkable force, should first and foremost be seen as a grand attempt to meet the needs of the industry’.42 Twelve European powers negotiated the colonization of the African continent in Berlin. Gillis Bildt, the father of the above-​mentioned Carl Bildt, was envoy to Berlin at the time and represented Sweden-​Norway at the conference. He would serve as prime minister in 1888–​1889. Unlike Belgium, another small European state, which seized this opportunity to take control over Congo, Sweden-​Norway acquired no colonies at Berlin.43 At the same time, the Swedish government had no objections to the decisions made by the European imperialist powers over Africa.44 When the violent Belgian rule in Congo drew considerable criticism in the 1890s, the Swedish government remained silent.45 Similar to other aspects of imperialist expansion, such as the question of extraterritoriality in East Asia, Sweden-​Norway was following in the wake of imperialism, trying to position itself in the best possible way and profit from international developments. Oscar ii and the diplomats of his Foreign Service 39

Gwendolyn Fleetwood and Wilhelm Odelberg (eds.), Carl Georgsson Fleetwood:  Från studieår och diplomattjänst. Dagböcker, brev och skrifter 1879–​1892 Vol. I, 1879–​1887 (Stockholm: Norstedt, 1968), 560. 40 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 91. 41 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 91. 42 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 54. 43 On Belgium’s endeavours in Congo, see Adam Hochschild, King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, c1998). 44 Nilsson, Sweden-​Norway at the Berlin Conference, 5. 45 Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika’, 36–​45.

Power in the Age of Empire

35

tried to use the conference to secure their economic interests while strengthening their bonds with the new major power, Germany.46 The imperialist order itself and the colonial activities it provoked were not questioned outside the corridors of power in Stockholm, either. The majority of the Swedish press covering the negotiations in Berlin portrayed them as a commendable ‘brotherly’ collaboration between European nations. This collaboration would help avoid war and thus actually serve peace.47 Alfred Lagerheim, a long-​term envoy to Berlin (1886–​1899) who served as foreign minister between 1899 and 1904, agreed with Fleetwood’s assessment from 1884 in a letter he sent to Oscar ii in 1893. Similar to Fleetwood, Lagerheim argued that colonial policies were ‘about to put their mark on all European politics’. Some high-​ranking diplomats and decision-​makers in Stockholm viewed the political developments and the globalizing economy as potential threats to their countries’ independence, and even against peace more generally.48 Most of them agreed that adaptation and participation were the only means of countering such threats. 2

Trade, Diplomacy and Security? Consuls and Foreign Policy

Through the union between Sweden and Norway, the fleets of two of the world’s leading maritime nations were brought together under the administrative aegis of the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. Early on, the Swedish dominance was obvious, despite the reforms that the Swedish ministries had undertaken five years earlier in order to satisfy Norwegian demands. The consular service underwent a process of professionalization during the nineteenth century through a number of commissions of inquiry, which produced reports that served as the basis of a new consular instruction (konsulstadga). The goal of this professionalization was to rationalize the organizational structure of the consular service and make it more effective, as well as to meet the growing Norwegian criticism of Swedish dominance. In the beginning, the Norwegians had been forced into accepting the Swedish recruitment procedures for consuls defined in 1809. This meant that the Swedish Board of Trade, the merchant associations from Swedish cities with staple rights, and the largest Swedish shipping companies, all had exclusive rights to propose new consuls to the Crown. After these initial nominations, the BoT and the 46 47 48

Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika’, 25–​26. Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika’, 26–​35. Åselius, ‘Sverige: Motvillig småstat’, 23.

36 CHAPTER 1 Government Office (kanslistyrelsen) issued official proposals that the Ministry for Trade and Finance (Handels –​och finansexpeditionen) finally presented to the king. The Office of the Court Chancellor (Hovkanslärexpeditionen) then awarded royal diplomas to the newly appointed consuls. Since the seventeenth century, Swedish consuls had been appointed by the BoT in order to serve export interests.49 After the establishment of the Union, consuls reported political and economic information concerning trade and shipping to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, the Swedish Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior (DfI).50 The consuls’ main tasks were to support the export industry and merchants and to conduct the administration of Swedish-​ Norwegian shipping, as well as to organize the social and economic support of seafarers. Thus, the Norwegians were initially left out of the process. This changed in 1830, when a new consular instruction was adopted to show special consideration for Norwegian interests and create greater equality between the two countries. Consuls now had to report to both Swedish and Norwegian authorities.51 Reports and nominations from the Norwegian government and Norwegian trade associations (through the Ministry for Finance, Trade and Customs) were included in the procedures for the recruitment and dismissal of consuls. One effect of this development was that it diminished the role of the BoT. Consuls started sending their political reports to the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs from 1831 onwards. In 1840, authorization of consular recruitments was transferred from the BoT to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. The reforms carried out throughout the 1830s addressed many issues, including the adjustment of consular fees, but also more peripheral questions such as consular uniforms. Only Swedish-​Norwegian citizens or well-​established local businessmen were elected to consular posts. These positions gained prestige as a result of the conflation of the consular service with the Foreign Ministry and the diplomatic corps. The consular regulation of 1858 finally determined that only exclusively Swedish economic matters were to be dealt with by the BoT. This regulation was the starting point for the establishment of the Konsulsfonden. The fund replaced the old Konvojkassan and was the first step towards the introduction of fixed salaries within the consular service.

49 Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce, 79–​82. 50 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, vi. Konsulsstaten.; Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 110. 51 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 195–​197.

Power in the Age of Empire

37

A consular committee comprising three representatives from each country carried out another major inquiry in 1875.52 The three Swedish representatives were Per Axel Bergström, who was minister for public administration and president of the Board of Trade, the aforementioned Lagerheim, who was head of the Foreign Ministry’s political department at the time, and Commander Emil Ekman. The committee obtained the input of all relevant parties  –​consuls, diplomats, ship owners and merchant houses –​and ended up recommending that the consular service be tied even more closely to the Foreign Ministry; that it should maintain its system of paid (consules missi, exclusively Swedish and Norwegian citizens) and unpaid (consules electi, including citizens of other states) consuls; that the Foreign Ministry should be responsible for the recruitment of paid vice consuls; and, finally, that the salary scheme should be regulated with greater clarity. It would take more than a decade for these recommendations to be adopted into the new consular regulation of 1886. Despite the continuing efforts to meet Norwegian criticisms and demands, the consular issue prevailed throughout the 1890s, and eventually ended up being at the centre of the controversy contributing to the dissolution of the Union in 1905.53 There were three categories of consuls:  general consuls, consuls and vice consuls. General consuls and consuls were appointed by royal decree, and vice consuls by the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. Decisions about the establishment and closing down of consulates were formally made by the Crown, but in practice issues were handled by the Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior.54 The following numbers illustrate nicely how the consular service came to play an increasingly important role within the Ministry for Foreign Affairs over the course of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: Hence, the consular institution demanded more resources at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. The following chapters will substantiate these numbers with empirical data from the period. These will be complemented by studies about different aspects of the Swedish consulship in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.55 Foreign trade and shipping consequently gained in importance while military ambitions declined during the second half of the century. By the 1860s, 52 Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce, 45–​48. 53 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 112–​137. 54 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 110. 55 Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce; Joachim Östlund, Saltets Pris: svenska slavar i Nordafrika och handeln i Medelhavet 1650–​1770 (Lund: Nordic Academic Press, 2014).

38 CHAPTER 1 table 4

Letters received by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs 1875–​1905a

Year

From embassies

From consulates

Total

1875 1880 1885 1890 1895 1900 1905

1 308 1 674 2 623 2 647 2 740 3 217 4 256

750 769 1 507 1 942 2 300 2 810 4 437

3 620 4 478 6 957 7 243 8 055 10 046 13 612

a  Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 84.

table 5

Letters sent out by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs 1875–​1905a

Year

To embassies

To consulates

Total

1875 1880 1885 1890 1895 1900 1905

740 910 1 243 1 401 1 560 2 637 2 633

235 345 712 674 1 063 1 285 1 607

2 618 3 559 5 366 5 519 6 555 9 680 10 513

a  Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 85.

the merchant fleet of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway was one of the five largest in the world.56 Sweden’s foreign trade developed successfully and resulted in what has been described as an industrial breakthrough.57 The consular institution played an important role in the Swedish government’s decision to found the Sveriges Allmänna Exportförening, the forerunner of the

56 See Figure 1. 57 Schön, An Economic History of Modern Sweden.

Power in the Age of Empire

39

modern Swedish Trade Council (the Exportrådet), in January 1887.58 Yet we know little about the interaction between consuls and the Swedish export industry during that period. The shift towards neutrality had allowed trade and economic aspects to gain further importance in the eyes of Swedish decision-​makers, as war was no longer an option. Against this background, and due to the union between Sweden and Norway, the maritime dimension became essential. The key to success in shipping and foreign trade was that belligerent powers would come to respect Swedish-​Norwegian neutrality and recognize the United Kingdoms as a valuable member of the international community. Norwegian and, to a lesser extent, Swedish shipping expanded on a global scale and required the commercial assistance provided by consuls. The Swedish-​Norwegian consular network grew steadily, and consuls were assigned tasks of growing economic and diplomatic significance that shaped Swedish-​Norwegian foreign policy to an extent largely overlooked in earlier research. 58 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 91–​94. The Swedish Trade Council is called ‘Business Sweden’ today after merging with the government agency ‘Invest Sweden’ in 2013.

­c hapter 2

Years of Ambition, 1875–​1884 The formal powers of the Swedish king over the foreign policy of Sweden-​ Norway were extensive during the first decade of the era treated in this book. According to Swedish law, the king had the formal right to declare war, enter peace, form alliances and conclude treaties. But in the second half of the 1860s an increasing number of Swedish members of parliament viewed the sheer extent of royal power in these matters as a problem. Early democratization and the parliamentary reform of 1866 had replaced the old Ståndsriksdag (the Riksdag of the four Estates) with a political assembly of two chambers, whose members were chosen in national elections. The new Riksdag empowered various groups, most notably the rural population, and was a more correct representation of Swedish society. However, one rather unexpected effect of this reform was that parliament’s influence over foreign policy decreased, especially because many of the new members were concerned with other issues. The Norwegian Storting, in contrast, enjoyed constitutional rights, including the screening of negotiations on alliances and treaties (except for secret matters). The new democratization did not prevent the king and his diplomats at the Foreign Ministry in Stockholm from entering into secret defensive alliances.1 In reality, however, the king’s room for manoeuvre was now as limited as his formal rights were extensive. The continuous Norwegian attempts to gain independence clearly indicated that the Union was unlikely to survive any deviations from neutrality, let alone any participation in controversial wars. In the 1870s, neutrality was considered a natural choice for Sweden-​Norway both because of the absence of conflicts in its vicinity and because of its military incapability.2 The early death of 46-​year-​old King Charles xv on his return from a cure-​stay in Aachen on 18 September 1872 still had implications for the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway. The beloved but politically little-​respected monarch, whose ideas on foreign policy and defence had fallen on deaf ears, gave way to his energetic younger (by three years) brother Oscar ii, who would implement a change of course that would shape Sweden-​Norway for decades to come. One consequence was felt immediately. The ascent of Charles’s and Oscar’s

1 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 9–​22. 2 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 26.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020 | DOI:10.1163/9789004414389_004

Years of Ambition, 1875–1884

41

grandfather Jean Bernadotte to the joint Swedish and Norwegian throne in 1818 had been a manifestation of friendship with France. But this changed drastically under Oscar ii, who looked to Germany, Europe’s new leading power after its victory over France, for friendship and protection from Russia. To Oscar, the German victory attested to the superiority of the conservative order and highlighted the danger that the destructive revolutionary elements that had appeared in France posed to all of Europe. He also believed that abandoning his sympathies with Scandinavianism and France in favour of the Prussian social order would strengthen his position as monarch. Oscar thus adopted a conservative stance –​which he maintained for the rest of his life –​and appointed the like-​minded diplomat Oscar Björnstjerna as foreign minister in order to complete the policy change. Björnstjerna had served as Sweden’s ambassador to St. Petersburg since 1865 and was not fond of his appointment. He was an astute politician, and aware of the fact that this manoeuvre was little more than a declaration of intent on Oscar’s part: Oscar was capable and ambitious enough to more-​or-​less serve as his own foreign minister.3 Indeed, Oscar soon completed Sweden-​Norway’s turn to Germany during a series of visits to Berlin, St. Petersburg and Copenhagen in 1875, in which he laid out his priorities for everyone to see. The Court also considered claiming that the Swedish-​Norwegian king chose not to visit London.4 During a meeting with the German state secretary, Bernhard Ernst von Bülow, in Berlin, Oscar emphasized his sympathy with Chancellor Otto von Bismarck’s anti-​Catholic policies.5 In light of Oscar’s decisions, by 1875 Charles’s reign looked to have been even more of a failure than it had at the time of his death. His futile attempts to re-​ establish Sweden-​Norway as a relevant power in European politics, his willingness to abandon neutrality in order to support Denmark against Prussia during the Second Schleswig War, and his inability to embrace Germany as the new leading European power, were all viewed as mistakes, and important lessons to be learned by his younger brother. During the reign of Charles, the Crown had enjoyed popular support, but had lost prestige and been weakened politically both domestically and internationally. Oscar was therefore determined to use whatever means at his disposal to regain domestic strength.6 Chancellor von Bismarck was well-​aware of Oscar’s inclinations towards Germany and welcomed them  –​mostly for geostrategic reasons. Bismarck 3 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 28–​29. 4 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 37–​41. 5 Lindberg, Kunglig utrikespolitik, 7–​8. 6 Lindberg, Kunglig utrikespolitik, 12–​13.

42 CHAPTER 2 therefore embraced and encouraged the friendship between the German crown prince, Frederick Wilhelm, and Oscar, and advised Frederick to visit the Nordic kingdom in 1873. When Oscar asked for a German squadron at his coronation as king of Norway in Trondheim in July that year, Bismarck granted the request without hesitation. And when Frederick Wilhelm was on his deathbed fifteen years later, having reigned for only three months as Frederick iii, Oscar was among his last visitors.7 The Swedish-​Norwegian king then established equally intimate ties with Frederick’s son and heir, Wilhelm ii. Oscar and the young Kaiser shared a monarchist, anti-​republican, anti-​democratic and anti-​socialist worldview. They shared a disregard for the Slavic people and for France, the country of Oscar’s forefathers.8 After Oscar had settled Sweden-​Norway’s relations with the major European powers, and the Congress of Berlin had avoided the immediate risk of a great war in 1878, the United Kingdoms entered a decade of ease. There was general optimism about the future; in Sweden, the focus shifted from an outward perspective, with focus on security and military issues, to an inward one focused on economic issues –​most notably, the conflict between the proponents of free trade and those of protectionism –​and on Norwegian criticisms of the Union. Defence reforms were continuously discussed in the Riskdag, but ultimately postponed six times between 1875 and 1883. In 1880, Carl Fredrik Hochschild replaced Björnstjerna as foreign minister. In contrast to Björnstjerna, Hochschild was critical of Oscar’s leanings towards Bismarck and Germany, but this did not bring about a change in foreign policy. The relationship between Hochschild and Oscar deteriorated from 1883 onwards, and two years later he was replaced by Albert Ehrensvärd (the elder).9 Throughout the decade between the mid-​1870s and the mid-​1880s the joint cabinet, composed of the king, the foreign minister, and the Swedish and Norwegian members of government, increasingly dealt with consular issues that concerned both Swedish and Norwegian interests. Among these matters were the appointment of new consuls, closures of consulates, and general issues relating to Swedish and Norwegian trade and shipping. In 1875, the Foreign Ministry sent 235 letters to consulates and 740 to missions. Ten years later, the numbers were 712 and 1243 respectively.10 The share of consular correspondence had thus risen by 50%, from 24% to 36% of the total outgoing correspondence. The Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs  –​the foreign minister, 7 Gammelien, Wilhelm ii. und Schweden-​Norwegen, 32. 8 Gammelien, Wilhelm ii. und Schweden-​Norwegen, 99–​108. 9 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 55–​56 and 80. 10 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 85.

Years of Ambition, 1875–1884

43

the state secretary (kabinettssekretare) and a handful of desk officers and secretaries –​thus became increasingly closely involved with consular issues. Exclusively national issues, such as the social or legal interests of Swedish and Norwegian seamen, were mainly dealt with by the Swedish Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior.11 This new emphasis on the consular service and administration was part of the general direction away from war and towards economic and trade-​based expansion. Oscar ii was instrumental in this by supporting the diplomats, who attempted to establish the assistance of Swedish and Norwegian business as a foreign policy priority. When Oscar ii succeeded to the throne in 1872, the world was on the verge of entering a new era, one in which the European colonial powers were beginning to establish a form of economic imperialism that dictated terms not only for colonized territories but also for second-​rank powers like Sweden-​ Norway. This chapter specifically deals with the development of the Swedish-​ Norwegian consular service during those years, demonstrating how Sweden-​ Norway adapted to the new imperialism and attempted to profit from it through an extensive network of consuls. But it also illustrates how a combination of inability and unwillingness to execute necessary reforms hampered the globalizing consular service from becoming an effective tool for Swedish-​ Norwegian trade, shipping and foreign policy. The chapter will show that, due to these failures, Sweden-​Norway often depended on well-​established and successful foreign businessmen who ultimately lacked both knowledge about and interest in the demands of Sweden’s and Norway’s industries and shipping and had no competence to act on their behalf, rather than on properly trained diplomats and consuls, with the result that the strategy of the United Kingdoms strategy slipped into haphazardness and incoherence. 1

The Consular Committee of 1875 and the Backlog of Reforms

As tools for securing and strengthening Sweden-​Norway’s interests, Oscar was well-​aware of the significance of consuls, and appointed a committee of six members on 12 February 1875 in order to address the (mainly Norwegian) criticisms of the consular service. This step was long overdue. Ten years earlier, in 1865, the then Foreign Minister Ludvig Manderström had raised the question 11

Vol. 15, A  3 A  (Huvudserie 1840–​1952), A  3 (Statsrådsprotokoll i utrikesdepartementsärenden), A (Protokoll), UD/​KfubH [Utrikesdepartementet/​Kabinettet för utrikes brevväxlingen Huvudarkivet 1681–​1952], UD [Utrikesdepartementet med föregångare], RA [Riksarkivet].

44 CHAPTER 2 of increasing the budget of the consular service so that it could finally ‘meet the legitimate needs’ of the two countries’ industrial and shipping concerns. Manderström had argued, with support from the Norwegian side, that first and foremost it was necessary to employ paid consuls at the places of most importance to Swedish-​Norwegian trade and shipping. His initiative met with resistance from the Board of Trade, which was in favour of unpaid consuls being recruited from locals.12 The issue resurfaced due to the surplus in the consular fund resulting from the steady expansion of Swedish-​Norwegian shipping in the early 1870s. This prompted Foreign Minister Björnstjerna to suggest three alternatives of what to do with the profits from the consular service: create new paid consulates in China, Australia, France, Italy and other countries; repay the Swedish and Norwegian states; or reduce tariffs (lästavgift). The BoT opted for the second alternative, which, it suggested, could allow for salary raises for state officials. The Board criticized Björnstjerna’s analysis of the profitable economic situation as short-​sighted, and warned that consuls in places like China or Australia would be expensive. Björnstjerna would not budge, even though the Norwegian government seconded the board’s opinion. Therefore, a decision was made to appoint a committee in order to study the issue thoroughly.13 This was a time when many of the leading industrialized countries were attempting to reform their consular service and make it more effective. It thus came naturally to the committee to collect information from countries such as Denmark, Germany and the United Kingdom.14 In the Netherlands, the foreign minister took formal control of the consular corps in 1862, and two consular regulations were issued, in 1864 and 1874 respectively.15 In 1872, the British Foreign Office asserted authority over overseas commerce from the Board of Trade and divided its consular corps into paid and unpaid consuls, following a report on the consular service published by a committee appointed by the House of Commons.16 And in the newly formed German Empire, high-​ranking officials of the Auswärtiges Amt considered it a priority to review 12

Underdånigt betänkande angående svenska och norska konsulatväsendet jemte förslag till förordning m.m./​afgifvet den 4 november 1876 af den enligt nådigt beslut den 12 februari 1875 förordnade svensk-​norska komité (Stockholm: Häggströms, 1876), 94–​96. See also Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 117–​118. 13 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 117–​118. 14 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 5. 15 de Goey, Consuls and the Institutions of Global Capitalism, 21; See also Albert E. Kersten & Bert van der Zwan, ‘The Dutch Consular Service in the 19th Century’, in Ulbert and Prijac (eds.), Consuls et services consulaires au XIXe siècle, 413–​421. 16 de Goey, Consuls and the Institutions of Global Capitalism, 19.

Years of Ambition, 1875–1884

45

the new consular service made up of consulates who had earlier belonged to the Norddeutscher Bund, the three Hansa towns and the southern German states. Only two months after the foundation of the empire, a new consular instruction (Allgemeine Dienst-​Instruktion für die Konsuln des Deutschen Reiches) was published.17 These examples reflected a more general trend. In the 1860s, most Western powers realized the need to reform their consular services in order to put them in a position that would allow them to support shipping and trade more effectively. Over the course of the following decade, appointed committees drafted new regulations and instructions which formalized and professionalized the consular post. In most cases, the most important changes were the transfer of powers from other authorities to the ministries of foreign affairs and the creation of salaried consul positions. The discussions in Sweden and Norway and the decisions that resulted from them were thus in line with this more general development. It was decided that the committee would be made up of three Norwegian and three Swedish members; they were then ordered to develop proposals for the necessary reforms and, ultimately, a new consular charter. The Swedish and Norwegian governments did not take the task of finding the right people lightly, and it took about four months before the committee members were appointed. On 6 July, the Swedish cabinet finally appointed Per Axel Bergström, Alfred Lagerheim and Emil Ekman. The Norwegians followed suit some three weeks later and decided on 31 July that their representatives would be Herman Severin Bernhoft, Jacob Andreas Michelsen and Christian Christiansen.18 The composition of the committee was testament to the importance the governments assigned to it, and it brought together members with a variety of backgrounds and skills. Assessing it also reveals the differences between the Swedish and the Norwegian camps. Lagerheim was a diplomat, Michelsen was both a merchant and a politician, Bergström and Bernhoft were trained lawyers, and Ekman and Christiansen were among their respective countries’ most prominent businessmen. Notably, none of the Swedish members of the committee had served as consuls, while all three Norwegian members had done so. The Norwegians showed greater interest in the committee’s task, as Bergström noted to Björnstjerna in a letter in August 1876, adding that this was 17

18

de Goey, Consuls and the Institutions of Global Capitalism, 28. See also Eva Susanne Fiebig, ‘The Consular Service of the Hansa Towns Lübeck, Bremen and Hamburg in the 19th Century’, in Ulbert and Prijac (eds.), Consuls et services consulaires au XIXe siècle, 248–​260. Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 2.

46 CHAPTER 2 because ‘the consular service undeniably is of greater significance to its sister state [Brödrariket]’.19 Oscar’s choice of committee chairman is particularly interesting. Axel Bergström was a native of Örebro and a lawyer by training who had prepared for a career as a judge before moving into politics in 1863 at age 40. He had entered parliament as an independent member of the lower house in 1867, and quickly established a reputation as a fiery speaker, a conservative and royalist. He became part of the Swedish cabinet as minister for public administration three years later. With his ascent from working as an assessor to obtaining one of the most powerful political posts in the country he had managed a career shift that was very unusual for the time. He made intensive use of his new position, and played an important role in the development of Sweden’s railroad system and industry. This earned him the nickname “King Bergström”. He left government in May 1875, as a result of harsh budgetary debates, to take up the post of president of the Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency and governor of Örebro County, but made a comeback to the cabinet as minister of justice in 1888. With Bergström’s appointment as committee chairman, Oscar made sure that the committee would not hurt Swedish interests or raise questions about the union between Sweden and Norway.20 Alfred Lagerheim was only 31 years of age at the time of his appointment, but in spite of this he was perhaps the up and coming diplomat. He had entered Uppsala University in 1859 at age 15, received his first appointment as attaché to the mission in Paris upon graduation only two years later, and quickly rose through the ranks of the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs in the following years. Lagerheim was acknowledged as an exceptional administrator and organizational talent. He had acquired intimate knowledge of Swedish trade, commerce and exports and would later serve on the committee for the Foundation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry. At the Ministry for Foreign Affairs he came to specialize in unionist issues and relations with Germany, became one of the most important Swedish figures in the struggle to maintain the Union, and later served as one of the youngest state secretaries for foreign affairs in the history of the Union as the head of the Board of Trade and as foreign minister. Lagerheim’s appointment secured

19 20

As cited in Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 118. The term means literally ‘brother folk’ in the original, but the best approximation in English is ‘sister state’. G. Jacobson, ‘P Axel Bergström’, in Almquist, Boëthius & Hildebrand (eds.), Svenskt biografiskt lexikon. Band 3, 739.

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the consular committee access to King Oscar ii, with whom he maintained excellent relations.21 Herman Bernhoft was a 51-​year-​old lawyer and civil servant. He was a native of the Norwegian capital, Kristiana, and graduated with honours from both the highly regarded cathedral school and the university’s law school. The Norwegian Department of the Interior employed him in 1847 and appointed him as head of the Bureau for Trade and Consular Affairs (Kontor for Handels-​og Konsulatsager) twelve years later. He went on to serve for eighteen months as Norwegian commissar to the unionist delegation that negotiated the Trade and Shipping Act of 1865, and was appointed consul to Barcelona in 1869 and consul-​general to Havre seven years later.22 Bergström, Lagerheim and Bernhoft lent the consular committee political weight. Ekman, Christiansen and Michelsen complemented this with their skills and experience in commerce, trade and shipping. Jacob Emil Ekman was 60 years old at the time and the oldest member of the committee. He had enjoyed a long career as a naval officer and commander, serving not only on merchant ships but also in the Swedish, Danish and British navies; he became a partner at his brother’s firm D. Carnegie & Co. after retiring from active service in 1860. Ekman documented the impressions he got from his early travels in his diary.23 The biographer Bengt Hildebrand describes Ekman as a ‘capable, sharp and humorous observer with an open nature … eager to be of use and to learn, pleasant and cheerful, at the same time a conscientious gentleman’. Obviously, Ekman’s personality ought to have balanced that of the more conflict-​prone conservative hardliner Bergström within the committee, but he was also related to members of Sweden’s aristocracy and political elite: both his cousin Baltzar von Platen and his wife’s stepbrother, Albert Ehrensvärd (the elder), served as foreign ministers of the Union.24 Jacob Michelsen’s background was different. He was neither a diplomat nor a lawyer and had no family ties to the aristocracy. His ascent, and that of his family, would come to play an important role in the history of Sweden-​Norway. 21

Kent Zetterberg, ‘C H T Alfred Lagerheim’, in Erik Grill & Birgitta Lager-​Kromnow (eds.), Svenskt biografiskt lexikon. Band 22, Königsmarck–​Lilja (Stockholm:  Svenskt biografiskt lexikon, 1977–​1979), 121. 22 Jens Braage Halvorsen (ed.), Norsk Forfatter-​Lexikon 1814–​1880 (Kristiania: Norske forlagsforening, 1885–​1908). Available online at http://​runeberg.org/​halvforf/​1/​0255.html (accessed 3 October 2018). 23 Emil Ekman, Emil Ekmans dagboksanteckningar (Göteborg: Wennerholm & Béwe, 1916). 24 Bengt Hildebrand, ‘Jacob Emil Ekman’, in Johan Axel Almquist, Bertil Boëthius & Bengt Hildebrand (eds.), Svenskt biografiskt lexikon. Band 13, Ekman–​ Ekwall (Stockholm: Samfundet för Svenskt biografiskt lexikons utgivande, 1950), 87.

48 CHAPTER 2 Born into a merchant family in Bergen, he established himself as a highly respected merchant and politician both locally and on a national level. He served as commissioner at the Bergen Stock Exchange, was appointed as administrative director of Bergens Sparebank, and represented Bergen at the Storting. This earned him an appointment as consul of the Grand Duchy of Oldenburg. His son Christian followed in his footsteps and played a decisive role in the dissolution of the Union as prime minister of Norway in 1905. Michelsen established close cooperation with British merchant houses and pioneered the corn trade from Black Sea ports, mainly Odessa. He had wide interests and was very active in the cultural life of his hometown. He was considered liberal, but would join the conservative party Høyre upon the introduction of parliamentarianism in Norway in 1883.25 Christian Christiansen, like Michelsen, was a politically active merchant who had earned respect for his ‘enormous’ contributions to the development of his hometown, Larvik. Christiansen had studied economics, and had gained working experience in Germany, France and England before returning to Norway, where he took over and successfully expanded his father’s brewery and wholesale business. He was an adherent of the Manchester School, and was appointed vice consul of Denmark in Larvik in 1870, a position he would hold for 18 years.26 The committee came together for the first time in Stockholm upon its convocation by the minister for foreign affairs, Oscar Björnstjerna, on 15 September 1875. Björnstjerna explained that the committee would be given a free hand, rather than detailed instruction, to identify issues and implement necessary reforms. The committee members remained in Stockholm for a month, working on laying out their modus operandi, and agreed to assign Bergström, Lagerheim and Bernhoft the task of drafting the new consular regulation, including a separate instruction and assignment to review a number of issues such as the consular districts and consuls’ salaries. During the fall of 1875 they developed a set of questions to identify the demands and expectations made of the consular service and met with some of Stockholm’s foremost ship owners and exporters to collect their statements. A questionnaire was also sent out to other representatives of trade, commerce and shipping all over Norway and Sweden. The collected data served as the basis of the first draft for a new regulation that was circulated to the remaining three members of the committee 25 26

Egil Ertresvaag, ‘Jacob Michelsen’, i Norsk biografisk leksikon. Available online at https://​ nbl.snl.no/​Jacob_​Michelsen (accessed 5 October 2018). ‘Christian Christiansen (1825–​1894)’, i Larviksguiden. Available online at http://​larviksguiden.no/​christian-​christiansen-​1825–​1894/​ (accessed 5 October 2018).

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for further discussion in early March 1876. Over the course of the following six months, current and former diplomats and consuls were consulted, before a final draft was discussed at the committee’s final meeting in Kristiania on 29 September, just five weeks before the publication of the commission’s report.27 The results of the committee’s work were impressive. The report was arranged in three parts. Firstly, there was a detailed, 383-​page account of the Swedish-​ Norwegian consular service’s history and organization; secondly, there was a 56-​page proposal for a new consular regulation of 134 paragraphs (Förslag till Förordning angående konsulatväsendet); and thirdly, there was a proposal for consular instruction (Förslag till Allmän Instruktion för ­konsulernas embetsutöfning) that amounted to another 100 pages, plus ­various appendices. The committee acknowledged the ineffective steering of the consular service that, it stated, had been a result of the threefold division between the Board of Trade, the Norwegian Department of the Interior and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. It agreed that reducing the number of involved authorities from three to two would probably simplify the organization of the consular service and make it more effective. Yet the committee decided to refrain from making a recommendation for such a reorganization.28 It offered no explanation for this position in the report, other than several rather incomprehensible insinuations about the members’ ‘views and reasons’ about maintaining the role of the BoT. However, several of these reasons can be identified. Self-​ evidently, the Board of Trade was continuing its fight for survival, as it had done for several years, and consequently it resisted reforms and changes in general.29 Furthermore, the Swedish side feared losing control over the Foreign Service, and wished to avoid a scenario where consular issues would be dealt with by them and the Norwegians on equal footing. Unsurprisingly, the Swedes believed that the existing authority that the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm exercised over all foreign policy matters served their interests and stabilized the Union regardless of whether it was complicating the actual daily routines of the consular service. Therefore, the committee focused on proposals aimed at improving existing conditions rather than reforming them. This precautionary attitude was indicative of the delicateness of the issue and anxiety about possible unexpected

27

Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 2–​3; Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 117–​132. 28 Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 105–​106. 29 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 118.

50 CHAPTER 2 consequences of far-​ranging reforms. The committee instead focused on central issues that were dealt with in twelve separate chapters of the report: i . the steering of the consular service, i i. personnel, including appointment and dismissal procedures, i ii. establishment and filling of consulates and vice consulates, i v. leave of absence for consuls and vice consuls, v. separation and suspension of consuls and vice consuls, v i. assumption of office of consuls and vice consuls, v ii. general provisions on the exercise of office of consuls and vice consuls, v iii. salary related to and other perks for consuls and vice consuls, i x. regulation of salaries during leave of absence and remuneration for substitutes as well as pensions, x . compensation for expenses of consuls and vice consuls in duty, x i. inspection of consulates and vice consulates, x ii. assets, expenses and administration of the consular fund. As pointed out by Emanuelson, the reason for these far-​ranging considerations –​and, ultimately, the changes that would occur as a result –​was to address not only the expansion of Swedish and Norwegian shipping but also the economic imperialism created by the major powers.30 The consular committee justified its comprehensive approach by problematizing the fact that Swedish-​Norwegian consuls had to consult a variety of Swedish and Norwegian statutes, royal decrees and letters, as well as circulars and other documents from the minister for foreign affairs, the Swedish Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior, which had never been collected in one place.31 This, the committee pointed out, put Swedish-​ Norwegian consuls in a unique spot: Most countries with considerable seafaring have published not only the laws or regulations [lagar eller förordningar] that regulate the tasks of consuls but also regulations [reglementen] or instructions comprising more detailed provisions, references to specific laws to be applied, advice and directives for the treatment of specific matters as well as forms for various purposes. Such are conditions in Great Britain, Germany, the United States of America, the Netherlands, France and other countries. It appears to the committee of utmost importance that the consuls of the United Kingdoms may not lack such a tool considering the fact

30 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 148–​150. 31 Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 107.

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that they are virtually the only ones among the consuls of all countries to have to apply different rules for completely similar cases on a daily basis, depending on whether they deal with Swedish or Norwegian vessels, seamen or goods.32 Very little in the report suggested that the committee believed that the regions that were about to be colonized as a result of the New Imperialism were of particular importance to Sweden’s and Norway’s trade and industries –​and thus the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service. The committee considered Africa particularly irrelevant. It proposed the closure of the consulate-​general in Alexandria, which it did not believe to be of ‘peculiar interest’ to Swedish and Norwegian shipping and trade, and instead suggested assigning the Union’s interests to another power’s local consul.33 The committee was equally sceptical about the usefulness of the old consulates in the Barbary States. It argued that the consulate in Tripoli could be closed without inconvenience, and that the consulate in Tunis ‘without doubt’ should be closed ‘at the first opportunity’.34 The committee suggested maintaining Algiers and Tangier at minimum cost, despite the fact that neither city, including their affiliated vice consulates, had seen much traffic from Swedish and Norwegian vessels since 1870.35 There were four additional African ports where Swedish-​Norwegian consular presence existed:  two on the western and southern shores of the continent (Monrovia and Cape Town respectively) and two in Mauritius and Madagascar respectively (Port Louis and Tamatave/​Toamasina), none of which was considered particularly important either.36 It is quite obvious that the committee did not foresee a future where the African continent would be particularly relevant to Sweden-​Norway. The same can be said about the West Indies. In 1875, Sweden-​Norway maintained a consular presence in twelve ports in the region, ten of which were located in colonies of the United States, Britain, France and Denmark. In previous years, suggestions to expand the consular presence of the Union had come from various directions, such as the consulate general in New York, the commander of the Norwegian corvette Örnen, the American consul in Kingston and the Danish consul in the Port of Spain. For all this attention, the region remained of limited relevance to Swedish-​Norwegian trade and shipping; even 32 33 34 35 36

Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 107–​108. Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 277. Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 281. Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 281–​284. Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 284–​288.

52 CHAPTER 2 so, in contrast to Africa, the committee did suggest a modest investment in the form of an allowance of 4,000 kronor to the consulate general in Havana.37 The Far East, and China and Japan in particular, was considered more positively. Sweden-​Norway had taken immediate advantage of the British so-​called opening up of China and established its first consulate in 1851.38 But the committee concluded that reality had fallen short of expectations. Not only had Swedish and Norwegian shipping been decreasing for the fourth year in a row, but there was also little belief that the situation could be turned around in the short term by Sweden-​Norway itself by employing measures such as establishing a consulate general in Shanghai. Instead, the committee suggested that the existing post of unpaid consulate general should be renewed, and criticized the fact that a paid vice consul was being employed. The committee added, however, that China was of such importance that the question of establishing a paid consulate general should still be reviewed, as it believed that there was some prospect for the future, particularly if additional Chinese ports were to be opened up to foreign nations.39 There was less interest in the other East Asian ports, including Calcutta, which the committee itself discussed under the label Ostindien (East India).40 In its conclusions, the committee stated that the proposed reform would result in increased costs amounting to 70,000 kronor, to be covered by the Swedish and Norwegian governments (40,000 and 30,000 kronor respectively). Although this would exceed the current budget of the consular service by more than 25%, the committee argued that the increase could not be considered significant, and could easily be covered by the government, with the intention of creating a satisfactory level of order in the Union’s consular service.41 It would nevertheless take another decade before a decision was made to adopt the proposed regulations and instructions that the committee had worked so hard to draft. The main reason for the delay was the unclear future of the Swedish Board of Trade. The Board had been facing consistent criticism over its ineffectiveness and high cost since the mid-​1840s. In 1847, King Oscar I proposed its abolishment. The proposal was rejected by parliament in 1853, but criticisms and calls for the Board to be dismantled persisted for decades. A reorganization of the BoT in 1858, including the integration of the Board of Mines (Bergskollegium) under one roof, was expected to meet this criticism, but 37 38 39 40 41

Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 349–​358. Cassel, ‘Traktaten som aldrig var’, 445; Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 401. Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 288–​308. Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 308–​314. Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 381–​382.

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instead a committee seconded Oscar’s proposal to abolish the BoT in 1859.42 Parliament rejected the idea for the second time in 1867 but failed to close the matter. Oscar’s son Charles xv did not maintain his father’s position; instead, new enemies of the BoT emerged among members of parliament and the civil service. Parliament again rejected new motions of the same kind in 1868 and 1869, but once more things went from bad to worse. The state auditors (statsrevisorerna) presented a new case against the maintenance of the Board. They had conducted a detailed analysis of the Board’s activities and finances and came to the conclusion that the authorities of the Board could be transferred to other existing departments, thus allowing the Swedish state to save money. This argument was presented in a new parliamentary motion in 1871, which was only discussed in 1874 when the newly appointed king Oscar reiterated his grandfather’s original position that setting up a new department could be proposed as a justification for abolishing the BoT. At this point, the issue caused heated controversy, as it was considered a matter of principle that parliament had the right to intervene in the organization of the state. The Board survived these continuous attacks but saw itself weakened and stripped of parts of its budget. Another committee was appointed that year, and on 30 January 1875 there was another proposal to abolish the Board in favour of a new department entitled ‘The Royal Committee for Trade and Industry’ (Kongl. Styrelsen för handeln och näringarne).43 The delay was a continuation of the struggle over the role of the Swedish BoT, and, as an additional consequence, that of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm. The question had been controversial before the committee took up its task, which was why the committee had never taken a definitive position on eventual reorganization in the first place. Foreign Minister Björnstjerna agreed with the committee that moving all purely Swedish matters from the BoT to the Foreign Ministry would have resulted in more effective handling and organization, but also pointed out that the Ministry could never administrate these matters with the same expertise as the Board.44 As mentioned earlier, abolishing the BoT potentially risked downgrading the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs to becoming the Swedish counterpart of the Norwegian Department of the Interior. Therefore, it was more desirable for the Swedish government to follow the committee’s factual recommendations and move

42 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 208–​219. 43 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 225–​228. 44 Emanuelson, Den svensk-​norska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1905, 132–​133; Müller, ‘The Swedish-​Norwegian Consular Services’, 266.

54 CHAPTER 2 additional authority from the Board to the Foreign Ministry without making substantial changes to the organization of the consular service as such. The fact that it took a decade to reach agreement on a new consular regulation does not mean that there was a standstill. In October 1884, Oscar appointed a legal committee made up of two Swedes and two Norwegians, with the remit to draw up a new law on consular jurisdiction. Two of them were already involved in similar tasks at home and abroad. These were Herman Bernhoft, who was also a member of the 1875 Consular Committee, and Magnus Armfelt, who was a member of the international commission that had developed the system of the Mixed Courts in Egypt and drafted its charter. The other two members were Reinhold Skarin and Thomas Jacob Aall. They were ordered to develop a specific law on consular jurisdiction and a regulation on these legal powers of consuls in ‘certain non-​Christian countries’. They submitted their bill two years later, on 1 November 1886, just three days before the new consular regulation was finally adopted.45 2

Africa: Economic Stagnation and Mixed Courts

The Swedish-​Norwegian interest in Africa accelerated as a result of the ascent of the New Imperialism. It had been limited to the Barbary States on the North African coast previously, but the Western expansion into the African continent as a whole was immediately considered an opportunity from both economic and political perspectives. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm developed its approach to the African continent based on political and economic ambitions, and highlighted social issues and ‘responsibilities’, such as spreading civilization, to legitimize these ambitions. Oscar ii and the diplomats of the UD had high hopes that participating in trade with African colonies would benefit the Swedish economy and allow for further strengthening of Sweden-​ Norway’s friendly ties with Germany. Therefore, Stockholm adopted Berlin’s policy towards Africa almost wholesale, and took no steps without consulting the Germans first.46 In 1875, eight out of Sweden-​Norway’s 110 consulates were located in Africa. Four of them were installed on the continent’s northern coast: Alexandria, Algiers, Tangier and Tunis. The latter three had been established in the early and 45 46

Förslag till författningar om svensk och norsk konsularjurisdiktion jemte förklaringar och motiv/​Afgifna af dertill i nåder utsedde komiterade den 1 november 1886 (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet. P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1886). Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika’, 54.

Years of Ambition, 1875–1884

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mid-​eighteenth century in order to maintain good relations with the Barbary States and secure Swedish trade and shipping in the Mediterranean. They were thus all among the oldest consulates.47 Two of the African consulates were located on adjacent islands: Jamestown in St. Helena and Port Louis in Mauritius. In addition to this, there was one consulate on the western coast and one on the southern coast: Monrovia and Cape Town respectively.48 Five of these eight consulates were located in areas that were colonized by the British and the French during this era. Sweden-​Norway’s consular presence in Africa had thus mainly been established in order to secure trade with or establish routes to other regions, rather than to promote trade between the two Nordic countries and African countries. Africa itself had never been of great importance to the economies of Sweden and Norway. In 1875 Sweden did not import anything at all from Africa. Its exports amounted to 1,278,000 kronor, or 0,61% of its total exports. Egypt, Algiers and the Cape Colony all accounted for almost a third of these volumes, while Tripoli, Tunis and Morocco played an almost completely insignificant role.49 Nine years later, when the imperial powers were called to Berlin for the conference, little had changed. Exports to Africa had grown by 29%, to a total amount of 1,653,000 kronor, but in absolute terms that still only accounted for 0,69% of Sweden’s total exports.50 Norway’s trade with Africa looked quite similar. There were no imports from Africa at all and only 90,400 kronor in exports in 1875.51 A decade later, Norwegian imports –​ mostly corn –​ still only amounted to 176,500 kronor and exports –​almost exclusively timber –​to 294,900 kronor. With this, the African trade amounted to roughly 0,17% of Norway’s total foreign trade.52 Colonial goods like rice, coffee or sugar were instead imported indirectly via European countries, mostly from Germany and Great Britain, the Netherlands and Belgium.53 All in all, Norway’s foreign trade more or less stagnated at around 280 million kronor.54 47 Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce, 40–​44. 48 Almquist, Kommerskollegium. 49 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Commerce collegii underdåniga berättelse för år (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet, Norstedt & Söner, 1877), 103. 50 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Commerce collegii underdåniga berättelse för år (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet, Norstedt & Söner, 1885), 88–​89. 51 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Tabeller vedkommende Norges handel i aaret (Christiania: Steenske bogtrykkeri, 1877), xii. 52 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Tabeller vedkommende Norges handel i aaret (Christiania: i kommission hos H. Aschehoug, 1885), xiv, 50–​55 and 144. 53 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges handel i aaret 1884, 61–​62. 54 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges handel i aaret 1884, inledning.

1875 1884 1875 1884

56 CHAPTER 2 Over the course of this decade an additional two consulates were established, in Tamatave in 1876 and Lourenco-​Marques (present-​day Maputo) in 1883. Tamatave, today more commonly known as Taomasina in English, was Madagascar’s second largest city after Antananarivo at the time. The Norwegian Department of the Interior had first proposed the appointment of the British consul Thomas Conolly Pakenham as Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Madagascar on 9 September 1875. It had done so at the request of the boards of the Norwegian Missionary Society (Det Norske Misjonsselskap, nms for short) and the missionary ship Elieser from Bergen, which visited Madagascar once a year. The missionaries feared a coup d’état on the island that might threaten its existence, and therefore argued that a consul would be able to protect it while also securing the Swedish-​Norwegian trade and shipping-​related interests.55 The nms was a Lutheran mission founded by a group of 180 people in Stavanger in 1842. Its aim was to spread Christianity, and colonialism indeed proved to be a door opener. Initially, it focused on South Africa, where hundreds of Norwegians had settled in Durban in the Colony of Natal. By 1911, the colony had grown to 1600 people. Alsaker Kjerland reminds us that the activities of this group are a good example of the limited extent to which Western, and indeed Swedish-​Norwegian, expansion was motivated by missionary work rather than economic and political goals. Contrary to widespread myths, only a handful of the settlers engaged in missionary activities: Who created the notion that Africa was ‘full’ of Norwegian missionaries prior to the days of good intentions and merciful development gifts? A slight rubbing of the surface suggested that this was at best nothing but a well-​established myth. The total number of Norwegians working directly with missionary-​associated work at any time in Natal, South Africa –​ the stronghold of Norwegians wishing to convert Africa’s heathens between the 1840s and 1950 –​never exceeded more than a few handfuls of persons. On the contrary, the majority of the Norwegians in Natal worked in every other business than the missions –​primarily mining, joinery and in various kinds of trade.56

55

56

‘ang. upprättande af ett Konsulat på ön Madagascar m.m.’, Ministerial protocol No. 7, 24 March 1876, Vol. 19, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. On the background and history of the ship itself, see ‘Bark Eliezer’, Sjøhistorie, 4 October 2009. Available at https://​www.sjohistorie. no/​no/​skip/​8193/​ (accessed 13 October 2018). Kirsten Alsaker Kjerland, ‘Preface’, in Kjerland and Bertelsen (eds.), Navigating Colonial Orders, xiv–​xvii and.

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Yet their influence was more significant than their size, and they used the one to inflate the importance of the other. In their letters to the authorities in Norway they claimed that no other European emigrant community was as large as the Norwegian one, pointing out reasons why a local Swedish-​Norwegian consul was sorely needed. Accordingly, the local authorities required consular presence for the Norwegian nationals to maintain their right of residence or for Swedish-​Norwegian vessels to be repaired. After the Board of Trade had given its consent, Stockholm asked its minister in London, Carl Fredrik Hochschild, to ask the British government for permission to offer Pakenham the post and grant him the right to protect Norwegian missionaries, similar to the British ones. London responded that they gladly gave permission for Pakenham to become Swedish-​Norwegian consul but added that he had no specific instruction to offer British missionaries protection beyond that enjoyed by any British citizen in Madagascar. Pakenham accepted the offer without hesitation and was immediately ordered to negotiate a treaty on trade and navigation with the Kingdom of Madagascar. For this, he was granted a budget of up to 4,000 kronor to cover diplomatic expenses.57 When Pakenham died in June 1883, the foreign minister, Hochschild, proposed renewing the arrangement with Britain and offering the post to Pakenham’s successor, G.F.N. Beresford Annesley. The fact that the Board of Trade supported Hochschild with reference to its statement from 1875 confirms the above-​mentioned numbers with regard to Africa’s role in Sweden-​Norway’s trade and shipping. Not much had changed by 1883, and thus the post in Tamatave had not been under much scrutiny. Not everybody, however, seems to have been satisfied with the situation or agreed to the assessment made in Stockholm. The nms instead proposed a candidate of its own, Alfred Anker from Antananarivo, who was a civil engineer and member of the emigrant community. Meanwhile, the Swedish-​Norwegian legation in London sent word that Annesley had already been moved to another position and would be replaced with John Hicks Graves. But the nms failed to gain the support of the authorities in its homeland. Instead, Kristiania supported the continuation of prevailing circumstances on the basis of statements issued by the Norwegian ministries of the interior and for church affairs, which both agreed with

57

‘ang. upprättande af ett Konsulat på ön Madagascar m.m.’, Ministerial protocol No. 7, 24 March 1876, Vol. 18, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. See also Pakenham’s letter of appointment, Vol. 3 (1877–​1879 Madagaskar: Tamatave), 1 (Afrika), E 2 FA (Skrivelser från konsuler 1809–​ 1880), E 2 (Inkomna handlingar 1809–​1901), E (Inkomna handlingar), UD/​KfubH, RA.

58 CHAPTER 2 Foreign Minister Hochschild that the position would not generate sufficient income and that representation through the British consul was the best option.58 Despite the stagnation in trade and shipping with Africa, another Swedish-​ Norwegian consul was appointed to Lourenco-​Marques in the old Portuguese colony of Mozambique in 1883. Johannes Bang, who was general agent for a Marseille-​based firm, wrote a letter to Foreign Minister Hochschild in which he argued that the Swahili coast was important to Swedish-​Norwegian trade and shipping and therefore required consular presence. Bang, who was not of Swedish or Norwegian background but spoke the Scandinavian languages, also offered his nomination in case the post was established. Before moving on with the matter, Hochschild requested the opinion of Consul Claes Peyron of Marseille, who was a member of a prominent aristocratic family in Stockholm. One of Peyron’s ancestors, Barthelemi, a silk manufacturer from Lyon, had moved to Sweden in 1740, where the family had established itself in business, politics and military circles. Peyron’s father, Gustaf (the younger), was a prominent military man who sat in the Riksdag and was appointed Swedish minister for war in 1887. Peyron attested to Bang’s reputation and that of his firm in Marseille, as well as spoke to the firm’s business activities in Mozambique and Bang’s status as the most important contractor of Swedish and Norwegian ships, which thereby justified his appointment as consul. He also pointed out the potential of the considerable cargo shipping trade between France and Mozambique. Hochschild therefore proceeded to request the opinions of the Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior. The BoT noted that there was no direct trade between Sweden-​Norway and Mozambique, but still assented to the proposal, referring to Peyron’s opinion about the cargo shipping and adding that there was not a single Swedish-​Norwegian consul on all of Africa’s east coast. The DfI added that the illustrious Danish financier and industrialist Carl Fredrik Tietgen had issued ‘the warmest recommendation’ in favour of Bang. This naturally sealed the deal, and Bang was appointed without a formal announcement of the position.59 Peyron’s positive assessment proved correct, since Bang would go on to hold the position for 18 years.60 Deviating from usual consular regulations, as in Bang’s case, or appointing consuls of other nations, as in Tamatave, was indicative of the insignificance of 58

‘Angående återbesättande af konsulatet i Tamatave’, Ministerial protocol No. 29, 21 December 1883, Vol. 26, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 59 ‘ang. upprättandet af ett svenskt och norskt Konsulat för portugisiska besittningen Mozambique’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 13 January 1883, Vol. 26, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 60 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 411.

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a consular post. Tellingly, this was often the case when consuls were appointed to positions in Africa. The joint cabinet noted in July 1884 that it had to proceed ‘similar to what has often occurred in relation to consular appointments to remote places’ when it decided to fill the post in Monrovia with the local vice consul of the United States of America after it had remained vacant for two years following the death of consul Charles Anthony Snetter.61 In contrast to earlier centuries, the northern African consulates had become of equally limited significance by the mid-​1870s.62 This decline is reflected in the recurring requests for salary raises from the region’s most important consulate, the consulate general in Alexandria. Early on, the salary for the post had steadily risen from 8,000 to 12,000 kronor between 1858 and 1875; at this, the salary of the general consul of Alexandria was among the highest, exceeded only by London, Washington and Le Havre.63 To the incumbent, Berndt Anker Bödtker, a native of Bergen who had served in the consular service for almost half a century, this was perfectly acceptable. Bödtker had worked as clerk and chancelier at the general consulate in Constantinople from 1857 to 1871 before he was appointed to the post in Alexandria, a position he would hold until 1883. He was later moved to Leith (1883–​1896) and finally Hamburg (1891–​ 1905).64 However, in December 1875 Bödtker requested a 70% raise to 20,000 kronor, in addition to the usual consular fees. Bödtker complained about the economic losses he had suffered during his 18 years of service in the Orient and identified both the cost of living in the Egyptian metropole and the higher salaries of consuls of other nations. But the request was unanimously rejected by the Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior.65 The following year, he once again pleaded for ‘an improvement of his position, either through a raise […] or by any other means’. His renewed request was based on the same arguments, and was thus refused once more; but this time the DfI opened up the possibility for some kind of compensation in order to settle Bödtker’s earlier expenses, and also acknowledged that his income from consular fees had been more than halved, from 1,000 to 400 or 500 kronor, more recently. Therefore, Oscar agreed to a gratification of 2,000 kronor, suggested 61 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Monrovia’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 18 July 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 62 Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce. 63 ‘Sveriges och Norges gemensamma Utrikes-​Budget för år 1877’, Ministerial protocol No. 1, 10 January 1876, Vol. 19, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 64 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 358, 429, 432, 439; Hildebrand & Bergenstråhle (eds.), Svenskt porträttgalleri. 3, 82. 65 ‘angående General Konsul i Alexandria a. Bödtker ansökning om förhöjd traktamente.’, Ministerial protocol No. 2, 28 January 1876, Vol. 19, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

60 CHAPTER 2 by Foreign Minister Hochschild.66 But the writing was on the wall. The decline continued, and in 1886 the consulate general in Alexandria was replaced with an unsalaried consulate and the budget cut from 18,000 kronor to 3,500.67 Despite its palpable significance to Swedish-​Norwegian trade and shipping, the consulship in Alexandria remained interesting from an imperialist perspective due to reforms to Egypt’s legal system. These reforms had been in the making since 1867 and were intended to address two problems. On the one hand, Egyptian authorities were frustrated over the fact that many Europeans had established quasi-​legal immunity as a result of their growing political and economic influence over Egypt. And on the other, these Europeans increasingly feared for their investments, as they realized that there was no legal system in place to enforce potential claims. The architect of the new legal system was Nubar Pasha, an ethnic Armenian from Smyrna who had been raised and educated in France, and who came to serve three times as prime minister of Egypt. Nubar failed to abolish the extraterritorial powers of the consuls through the establishment of a unified judicial system, as he had to make considerable concessions to the Western powers, particularly France. Egypt ultimately adopted much of the Code Napoléon and accepted a majority of foreigners on the bench.68 In October 1875, the Viceroy (Khedive) of Egypt and Sudan, Ismail Pasha, founded the Mixed Courts as part of a series of reforms intended to modernize his country. Ismail famously stated that: ‘My country is no longer in Africa; we are now part of Europe. It is therefore natural for us to abandon our former ways and to adopt a new system adapted to our social conditions.’69 The Mixed Courts were thus intended to curb the legal imperialism of the older consular courts that Western powers had established in previous centuries, but ended up creating what the historian Elizabeth Shlala describes as a ‘colonial hybrid’.70 Swedes and Norwegians were an integral part of this hybrid, and would remain so until 1949.71

66

‘ang. General Konsuln i Alexandria A. Bödtkers ansökning om löneförhöjning’, Ministerial protocol No. 9, 18 May 1877, Vol. 20, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 67 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 432. 68 Nathan J.  Brown, The Rule of Law in the Arab World:  Courts in Egypt and the Gulf (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 26–​40. 69 Brown, The Rule of Law in the Arab World, 26–​40. 70 Elizabeth H.  Shlala, The Late Ottoman Empire and Egypt:  Hybridity, Law and Gender (Abingdon, Oxon; New York, NY: Routledge, c2018). 71 Emil Sandström, ‘Upphörandet av de blandade domstolarna i Egypten’, Svensk Juristtidning, 1950, 304–​305. Available at http://​svjt.se/​svjt/​1950/​304 (accessed 12 June 2019).

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Sweden established far-​ranging consular jurisdiction in the Ottoman Empire through a trade agreement between the two countries signed in 1737. The agreement was similar to the capitulations with other Western powers but included not only commercial law but even criminal law in the Swedish case. The High Porte accepted that even in cases of criminal assaults against Ottoman citizens, Swedish subjects would be sentenced by their own consuls.72 It came naturally to consuls to engage in the making of the Mixed Courts, as they had always played an important role in extraterritoriality. Similar to previous centuries, smaller nations were part of the process led by the French and the British. From the beginning of its operations until the dissolution of the Union, Sweden-​Norway was always represented by two judges, one from each country. But when a commission for the development of the Mixed Courts was formed in November 1880, Consul General Bödtker replaced the younger of the two judges to act as Swedish-​Norwegian representative alongside Baron Magnus Armfelt. Bödtker’s and Armfelt’s travel expenses, and allowances of 50 and 45 francs per day respectively, were also covered through the consular fund to which both the Swedish Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior consented. The commission convened in Cairo in 1880 and 1881.73 When it reconvened at the request of the Egyptian government in order to review the integration of criminal law in 1884, Bödtker’s successor, Oscar Gustaf von Heidenstam, took up one of the two spots under the same conditions.74 In his classic work on the history and evolution of Scandinavian law, the American legal scholar Lester Orfield remarks that ‘Swedish lawyers played an important role in the Mixed Courts of Egypt …’.75 These lawyers carried out their duties in close cooperation with the Swedish-​Norwegian consuls in Egypt. The Swedish-​Norwegian government was well aware of the political nature of its interests in Alexandria as a result of the Mixed Courts, and that these interests affected the consular post in the city. They ultimately became the reason for halting the reoccupation of the post and opting for a temporary 72 73 74 75

Karl Lippmann, Die Konsularjurisdiktion im Orient. Ihre historische Entwicklung von den frühesten Zeiten bis zur Gegenwart (Leipzig: Veit & Comp, 1899), 93. For the older history usually ignored by modern scholars, see pages 1–​74. ‘ang. ersättning åt de Förenade Rikenas ombud i kommissionen rörande de “blandade” domstolarne i Egypten.’, Ministerial protocol No. 18, 17 June 1881, Vol. 24, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. See also Sandström, ‘Upphörandet av de blandade domstolarna i Egypten’. ‘Angående ersättning åt de Förenade Rikenas ombud i kommissionen rörande “de blandade” domstolarna i Egypten’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 18 July 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. Lester B.  Orfield, The Growth of Scandinavian Law (Philadelphia, PA:  University of Pennsylvania Press for Temple University Publications, 1953), 251.

62 CHAPTER 2 solution with an acting consul when it became vacant in 1883. Foreign Minister Hochschild was clear about the matter, arguing: As several circumstances indicate that Egypt is in a phase of political transition, I am doubtful to recommend Your Royal Majesty to already settle the question regarding the position. It is evident that we ought to not only consider the trade and shipping interest of the United Kingdoms [of Sweden-​Norway] when dealing with the matter. There is a political interest for us to consider as long as a Swedish and a Norwegian judge are members of the Egyptian mixed courts.76 Sweden-​Norway’s attitude towards Morocco followed similar patterns. Just like the rest of the African continent, the country became increasingly insignificant to Swedish-​Norwegian trade and shipping in the nineteenth century. The consular salary was reduced in 1854; fifteen years later it was decided to appoint the Belgian consul general Ernest Daluin without remuneration.77 But this did not prompt Stockholm to abandon its ambitions. Sweden-​ Norway was at the table when the colonial powers convened in Madrid between 19 May and 3 July 1880 to address Moroccan complaints over violations of the French-​Moroccan Agreement of 1863. The agreement had been created to circumvent Moroccan laws that prohibited Europeans from purchasing land and property via a system of brokers (samsars). European interests trebled, and the brokers increasingly abused their quasi-​immunity from Moroccan law and taxation. The Moroccan complaints were first addressed at two conferences, held in 1878 and 1879, which brought together the representatives of the European powers in Tangier. Both failed to find a solution, which prompted the British minister Sir John Drummond Hay to propose an international conference to be held in Madrid the following year.78 At Madrid, the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway were among the 13 Western powers to reject any concessions and ratify the convention, thereby strengthening the Western influence over Morocco. The Swedish-​Norwegian representative Henrik Åkerman was the head of the legation in Madrid, and not a consul; but the convention itself granted consuls, vice consuls and consular agents the same status as legations. This included the right to choose local interpreters, soldiers, two 76

‘angående förordnande till [?]‌af General Konsul i Alexandria’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 13 July 1883, Vol. 26, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 77 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 402–​403. 78 James Stuart Olson (ed.), Historical Dictionary of European Imperialism (New  York, NY: Greenwood Press, 1991), 378–​379.

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servants and native secretaries who, like the Western diplomats or consuls, enjoyed exemption from any duty, impost and tax. The convention also accorded all ratifying powers Most Favoured Nation status in Morocco.79 But, as in the case of Alexandria, nothing could elevate the role of Morocco during this period. When the consular post in Tangier became vacant following Ernest Daluin’s death in 1883, the Foreign Ministry asked the Swedish-​ Norwegian legation in Madrid whether the existing administrative allowance of 2,000 kronor could not be reduced. Though it followed the colonial powers step by step, participating in and profiting from the creation of unbalanced agreements, the government clearly did not believe Africa to be worthy of additional investment; indeed, it was actually considering budget cuts by the mid-​1880s. The legation in Madrid reacted to this attitude with disbelief. It responded by suggesting the reestablishment of Tangier’s salaried position and the appointment of a consul missus with a total budget of 16,000 kronor –​‘regardless of the modest cost of living’ –​as the preferred solution. The reason was that all the Western powers except the United States, Germany and Belgium were engaged in a dispute over the protection of foreigners with the Moroccan authorities. The legation described the appointment of a new Belgian general consul as Swedish-​Norwegian consul ‘the least inappropriate’ option, adding that no cut to the administrative allowance should be considered in such a scenario. It justified its proposal by pointing to the fact that ‘a foreign consul can not be expected to have the same interest in and knowledge about our trade as our compatriots, which is particularly important as this is about preparing’. One reason for this rather determined proposal was that Henrik Åkerman, the head of the legation who had represented Sweden-​Norway at the Madrid conference, had visited Tangier to reach his conclusions. He had studied the local conditions and the reports of the Spanish, Belgian, British, Italian and German representatives to Morocco. It was on this basis that Åkerman argued that there was commercial potential there. He believed the country to be an interesting export market for ‘our most exclusive export articles, iron and wood’, as well as for faience, matches, dry fish, beer and butter.80 The Foreign Ministry in Stockholm did not, even so, consider raising the proposed budget, which would have made Tangier one of the most expensive consulates of the United Kingdoms, but it did accept Åkerman’s analysis 79 80

The Convention was officially entitled ‘Right of Protection in Morocco’, and records are available to view on the website of the Law Library of Congress at https://​www.loc.gov/​ law/​help/​us-​treaties/​bevans/​m-​ust000001-​0071.pdf (accessed 18 October 2018). ‘Angående ledigheten af Generalkonsulatet i Tanger’, Ministerial protocol No. 11, 16 May 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

64 CHAPTER 2 otherwise. It therefore announced the position publicly, leaving the Belgian option ‘as a last resort’. The Swedish Board of Trade consented to the Ministry’s position. It pointed out that not a single Swedish or Norwegian vessel had visited Tangier between 1870 and 1875, and that things had only very modestly improved since then. It also referred to the Consular Committee’s report, which had proposed halving the allowance for Tangier. The Board went on to state that the export prospects, as described by Åkerman, were also not reason enough to second the proposal of the legation in Madrid with regard to a salaried consulate. The Board did, however, agree that the prospects justified the appointment of a Swede or Norwegian who was familiar with the United Kingdoms’ industry and trade. It also argued that the allowance should remain at 2,000 kronor. The Norwegian Department of the Interior had been even more critical of the consulate since the latest vacancy in 1869 had prompted a discussion. At that time, the DfI had advocated the complete termination of the consulate’s budget, and only agreed to ‘the smallest possible amount’ when a compromise was made. It therefore agreed with the stance adopted by Foreign Minister Hochschild and the Board of Trade but suggested following the Consular Committee’s report and halving the administrative allowance to 1,000 kronor. All parties were thus in agreement on everything except the level of the allowance. Hochschild settled for a compromise, and it was decided that the allowance would be reduced to 1,500 kronor.81 The ensuing placement confirmed the doubts that the DfI had about Åkerman’s description. There were only four candidates. One of them was Victor Elias Cassel, who, very much as a result of Åkerman’s support, had been appointed consul to the new post in Madrid the year before. The other three candidates were a captain-​lieutenant of the Swedish Royal Navy, a law graduate, and a regular Swedish citizen, all completely unknown to the Swedish and Norwegian authorities involved in the appointment process.82 Thus the position was given to Cassel. The question is whether Åkerman’s high opinion of the prospects of Morocco as an export market was much more than a consequence of a favour he did for Cassel. The case of Tangier raises issues of a general character: how consuls were appointed and what targets they pursued. The factual case Åkerman made was almost exclusively based on Swedish commercial interests. It ignored both the Consular Committee’s very sceptical recommendations and the fact that the 81 82

‘Angående ledigheten af Generalkonsulatet i Tanger’, Ministerial protocol No. 11, 16 May 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. See also Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 283–​284. ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska generalkonsulsbefattningen i Tanger.’, Ministerial protocol No. 22, 19 December 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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Norwegians had earlier been in favour of closing down the consulate in Tangier altogether. As in most cases, the foremost reason for the many shortcomings of the consular service was not necessarily that consuls and diplomats looked at things through nationalist glasses but rather a result of their lack of economic knowledge and mercantilist skills. Åkerman himself had attended university for less than two years and had graduated with a lower-​class degree in jurisprudence; Cassel, for his part, had no economic training. The general decline of the Barbary Coast consulates is also reflected in the development of the consulates in Algiers and Tunis. The budget of the consulate general in Algiers was reduced from about 16,000 kronor in 1830 to 2,750 kronor in 1857, and finally cut altogether, with the exception of an administrative allowance of 2,000 kronor in 1873.83 Three years later, the post was vacant, and Foreign Minister Björnstjerna pushed through its downgrading from general consulate to consulate with the support of the Norwegian Department of the Interior, but against the will of the Board of Trade. The post still attracted twelve applicants in 1877 and was given to a very well-​qualified candidate, the 32-​year-​old wholesaler Herman Sundelin from Härnösand. Sundelin had travelled to foreign ports, learned French, English, German and Italian, and gained an excellent reputation in his hometown, which resulted in his appointment as dispaschör (from French dispacheur, claims handler). When he died only four years later from arsenic poisoning, only six candidates applied, four of whom were civilians without any relevant qualifications or experience.84 The only qualified candidate was Sundelin’s secretary, Johan Adolf Nordström, who naturally became his successor.85 The consulate in Tunis had always been less significant than the one in Algiers. The Tulin family held it for more than a century, between 1779 and 1882.86 Its decline occurred earlier and more dramatically than that of the other consulates on the North African coast. A decision to close it down at the next vacancy had already been taken in 1851. Foreign Minister Ludvig Manderström refused to implement this decision when it was made in 1864, however. This was criticized by the Consular Committee of 1875, 83 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 387. The conversion was made with the calculator developed by economic historian Rodney Edvinsson, see http://​www.historia.se/​Jamforelsepris. htm (accessed 19 October 2018). 84 Sundelin died from poisonous wallpaper, which was a common problem in the Victorian era, see James C. Whorton, The Arsenic Century: How Victorian Britain Was Poisoned at Home, Work and Play (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), in particular ­chapter 8. 85 ‘ang. återbesättande af General Konsulatet i Alger samt General Konsulatets förändring till Konsulat m.m.’, Ministerial protocols No. 15, 17 August 1877, Vol. 20 and ‘ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet i Alger’, No. 35, 16 December 1881, Vol. 24, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 86 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 388.

66 CHAPTER 2 which concluded its comments about the consulate in Tunis by stating that ‘without doubt’ it should be closed ‘at the first opportunity’.87 When Carl Tulin (af Tunisien), the third Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Tunis with that name, passed away in 1882, the recommendations of the committee were followed, and the consulate was finally closed down and its district assigned to Algiers.88 Considering the very slow development of trade with Africa, and the continent’s role in the Swedish and Norwegian economies, we have to raise the question of the thinking behind the Swedish-​Norwegian participation in the Berlin Conference of 1884. One historian remarked that Africa simply may have been considered a luxury that contemporaries wanted a part of, although they knew they did not depend on it.89 There is nothing to support such an assumption. Quite the opposite: Sweden-​Norway’s policy towards Africa had concrete goals that its decision-​makers were in agreement upon. Oscar reacted to Germany’s invitation with delight, and immediately consented to publicly announcing Sweden-​Norway’s acceptance.90 We have seen that Sweden-​Norway embraced the colonial expansion of other Western powers and was eager to adapt to the political and economic conditions it created. The colonial order was naturally an important element in bilateral negotiations with colonial powers as well. The early 1880s were interesting insofar as Sweden-​Norway had to negotiate several bilateral treaties on trade and navigation with some of the leading colonial powers. During an evaluation of the Treaty of Commerce and Navigation with France of December 1881, Hochschild pointed to the significance of having secured the status of Most Favoured Nation in French colonies for Swedish and Norwegian vessels.91 During similar negotiations with Portugal, the Council for Trade and Navigation (Handels –​and sjöfartsnämnden) in Gothenburg pointed out to the joint cabinet that Great Britain and France had secured a better deal with Lisbon than the United Kingdoms. The Council argued that the status of Most Favoured Nation would benefit both the Swedish export of wood, iron and steel and Norwegian shipping. Again, access to colonies and colonial

87 88

Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 280–​281. Gustaf Fryksén, ‘Konsulsfamiljen Tulin af Tunisien 1779–​1882’, in Makko and Müller (eds.), I främmande hamn, 153–​187. See also Julia Ann Clancy-​Smith, Mediterraneans:  North Africa and Europe in an Age of Migration, c.  1800–​1900 (Berkeley, CA:  University of California Press, 2011). 89 Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika’, 36–​45. 90 Nilsson, Sweden-​Norway at the Berlin Conference, 12. 91 Ministerial protocol No. 3, 13 January 1882, Vol. 25, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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products was mentioned as an important aspect.92 Stockholm was anxious not to neglect Norwegian interests in such negotiations. In discussions with Spain in 1882, Hochschild argued that Sweden had to make concessions about the taxation of important Spanish export products such as wine and fruits in order to facilitate a treaty. Spain had rejected Swedish proposals about a separate treaty between Norway and Spain; therefore, Hochschild argued instead that it was ‘important, even imperative’ for Sweden to make concessions and reduce the taxation on certain types of fruit. The foreign minister maintained that the treaty was ‘of much greater significance to Norway than to Sweden’ and convinced others of this, including the minister of finance, Robert Themptander, who eventually acknowledged that the interests of the United Kingdoms as a whole could be prioritized at the expense of the interests of one of its members.93 The Swedish diplomat Carl Georgsson Fleetwood’s ideas about the dawning of a new colonial era that smaller nations would have to attempt to profit from in one way or another, are well reflected in official documents of the Swedish Foreign Ministry. Foreign Minister Hochschild concluded that Sweden-​Norway had to participate in the Berlin Conference, despite the fact that it had no significant commercial interests in Africa, as it was likely that ‘the growing trade relations between various European countries and Africa will develop further and possibly even extend to Sweden in the future’.94 Oscar telegraphed Sweden-​Norway’s delegate, Gillis Bildt, that securing the status of Most Favoured Nation in any future deal on Congo was of top priority. Stockholm ordered Bildt to support Germany and Belgium in the establishment of Congo as a ‘free state’ against the will of France. With this, Oscar and his diplomats attempted to strengthen their ties with Berlin as an assurance against Germany’s (secret) ally Russia, while at the same time gaining Leopold’s goodwill and improving the odds of integrating into the growing colonial economy.95 Just as Fleetwood had anticipated three months earlier, all of European politics had indeed become intertwined with Africa and Asia.

92 93 94 95

‘Handels  –​och Sjöfartsnämndens i Göteborg underdåniga skrifelse om afslutande af handels–​och sjöfartstraktat med Portugal’, Ministerial protocol No. 9, 6 March 1883, Vol. 26, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Ministerial protocol No. 27, 13 November 1882, Vol. 25, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Hochschild on 28 October 1884, as cited in Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika’, 21. Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika’, 22–​23.

68 CHAPTER 2 3

Eastern and Southern Asia: the “Opening” of a Continent

Scandinavians entered Southern and Eastern Asia long before the emergence of the New Imperialism. The arrival of Vasco da Gama in India in 1498 had sparked trade between Europe and Asia. In 1600, the Dutch Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie became the first European chartered company to systematically explore the trade networks that had developed between the continents. Two years later, the British East India Company followed suit. The Danish Ostindisk Kompagni and the French Compagnie française des Indes orientales were established in 1616 and 1664 respectively. Chinese goods such as tea, porcelain, silk and spices were imported, and had gained popularity among the upper echelons of European societies by the seventeenth century. Indian cotton was another popular product.96 Sweden and Scandinavia were no exception to the rule. Yet several initiatives intended to establish a Swedish chartered company failed between 1626 and 1718, Sweden’s era as a great power. Impoverished by its defeat during the Great Northern War, the Swedish court considered opportunities for trade and commerce more openly, and issued a charter for the establishment of a company supported by both domestic and foreign investors.97 In 1731, the Swedish East Asia Company sent its first expeditions to Canton and established trade relations.98 It followed in the footsteps of similar companies from the above-​mentioned European countries, but soon met resistance as the other Europeans viewed the Swedish latecomers as unwelcome competition. It was only after the opening up of China by the British in 1842 that Sweden-​ Norway could establish relations on a state level and send representatives. This took place surprisingly quickly considering the United Kingdoms’ status, and Sweden-​Norway became the fourth Western power to sign a treaty with China. On 20 June 1844, King Oscar I appointed the merchant Carl Fredrik Liljevalch, on the recommendation of the Swedish Board of Trade, as the agent to negotiate the terms of a treaty. Liljevalch had been operating at the crossroads between business and diplomacy since his youth. He had been employed as a clerk by Stockholm’s largest grocer, Diedrich Engström, at the age of 16. The 96

97 98

Hanna Hodacs, Silk and Tea in the North: Scandinavian Trade and the Market for Asian Goods in Eighteenth-​Century Europe (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), c­ hapters 1 and 2; Sven T. Kjellberg, Svenska ostindiska compagnierna 1731–​1813: kryddor, te, porslin och siden (Malmö: Allhem, 1975). Tore Frängsmyr, Ostindiska kompaniet: människorna, äventyret och den ekonomiska drömmen (Höganäs: Wiken, 1990), 10–​12. For an account of everyday life interaction between Swedes and Chinese, see Lisa Hellman, This House Is Not a Home:  European Everyday Life in Canton and Macao (Leiden:  Brill, c2019).

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year after, in 1813, Engström sent him to St. Petersburg to collect a debt. The young Liljevalch cooperated with the Swedish envoy, Carl Löwenhielm, gained audience with Emperor Alexander I, and completed his mission. Thirty years later, he was considered the perfect candidate for the Swedish establishment in China.99 Liljevalch arrived in Shanghai in 1846, and the treaty was in place on 20 March 1847.100 Three years later, on 25 May 1850, the United Kingdoms decided formally to appoint an unsalaried consulate general for all of China based in the city of Canton (present-​day Guangzhou) and a consulate in Singapore. The post in Canton was filled by the American businessman Paul S. Forbes of Russell & Co. in March 1851.101 This appointment established a close link between the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service and that of the United States of America in China that would last for three decades. Russell & Co. had been established in 1824. The firm mainly dealt with opium, silk and tea, and had become the most important American trading house in Qing China by the time of Liljevalch’s arrival.102 Liljevalch himself had been instrumental in Forbes’s appointment over the British merchant David Jardine, who was the nephew of William Jardine, founder of Jardine Matheson.103 Forbes operated from Canton for seven years before terminating his correspondence with Stockholm for unknown reasons. Attempts to make contact failed, and he was dismissed formally in April 1862. His dismissal did not damage relations with Russell & Co., however, and representatives of the firm would hold the post of Swedish-​Norwegian consul general for another 22  years. In the process of appointing Forbes’s successor, Edward Cunningham, the consulate general was moved to Shanghai, with Canton being downgraded to a vice consulate.104 Cunningham left Shanghai after only six months and was replaced by Francis Blackwell Forbes, the nephew of the first consul, Paul Forbes.105 When the United Kingdoms 99

Rune Kjellander, ‘Carl Fredrik Liljevalch’, in Birgitta Lager-​Kromnow (ed.), Svenskt biografiskt lexikon. Band 23, Liljeblad–​Ljungberger (Stockholm:  Svenskt biografiskt lexikon, 1980–​1981), 54. 100 Cassel, ‘Traktaten som aldrig var’, 441–​445; Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 400. 101 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 400. 102 Sibing He, ‘Russell and Company in Shanghai, 1843–​1891:  U.S. Trade and Diplomacy in Treaty Port China’, unpublished paper delivered at the colloquium ‘A Tale of Ten Cities: Sino-​American Exchange in the Treaty Port Era, 1840–​1950’ held at the University of Hong Kong, 23–​24 May 2011. For the general context of American-​Chinese relations, see John R. Haddad, America’s First Adventure in China: Trade, Treaties, Opium and Salvation (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 2013). 103 Myrstad, ‘Generalkonsulatet i Kina’, 39. 104 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 401. 105 Myrstad, ‘Generalkonsulatet i Kina’, 49.

70 CHAPTER 2 appointed a vice consul who would both function as consular secretary and support consul Forbes by bringing his expertise on Sweden and Norway they opted for Axel Heiberg, a Norwegian who had earlier worked for Russell & Co. as correspondent. 106 In Singapore, the Swedish-​Norwegian consulate was occupied by members of the prominent Read family. The first consul was William Henry Macleod Read, who represented Sweden-​Norway from 1851 to 1874. William arrived in Singapore in 1841 at the age of 22 in order to take his father’s place at A.L. Johnston & Co. He was also appointed Dutch consul in 1857. William Read became a well-​known figure in the social, cultural and political life of the city and was known as a strong advocate of free trade and communal liberties. Read also served as municipal commissioner, and as the first non-​official member of the Legislative Council of the Crown Colony in 1867. In 1874 William retired from his consular position, and his brother Robert Barclay Read took over his consular appointment.107 In his correspondence with the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities the older Read claimed that the reason was that he was planning to return to Europe, but records suggest that he continued both his regular business activities and his position as Dutch consul for another decade, and only returned in 1887.108 In his autobiography he describes his work: It must not be supposed that the work of Consuls is entirely what may be called “office work”. There are occasions when they are called upon to take certain responsibilities, which are often of a very interesting nature. For instance, when I  was Swedish Consul, a vessel from Stockholm arrived, which was chartered to load at Batavia within three weeks. Having landed her cargo, the crew refused to do any further work, and insisted upon being discharged. They were informed that they had shipped for a voyage from home to home, and that their request could not be entertained. This delay threatened to oblige the captain to forgo the handsome freight from Batavia home, which was secured to him by charter. It was necessary, therefore, to take strong measures. I  told the men that I would not discharge them, as I should have, probably, to send them home at a considerable public cost, for they might not find 1 06 Myrstad, ‘Generalkonsulatet i Kina’, 54–​55. 107 Read to Björnstjerna, 16 August 1876, Vol. 23 (1857–​1880 Singapore), 3, E2FA, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 108 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 364–​365; Brenda S.A. Yeoh, Contesting Space in Colonial Singapore:  Power Relations and the Urban Built Environment (Singapore:  Singapore University Press, 2003), s. 68 footnote 13.

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employment before their money was spent. They insisted upon their discharge. The Superintendent of the Police, who was a friend of mine, agreed to assist me; so we went down, with a number of policemen, to the ship, and each man was asked whether he would do his duty or not; and each, as he refused, was placed in irons. I then engaged a native crew to work the ship down to Batavia, at the cost of the Swedish sailors, and the Captain left for his destination. He informed me, afterwards, that the day after they left Singapore, the mutineers agreed to return to their work, and everything went on to his satisfaction. I also reported the matter home to the Minister, and also to the owners at Stockholm. I got a severe reprimand, from the former, for outstepping all law, with a request that I would be more careful in future. From the latter I received a highly complimentary letter, thanking me for what I had done, and expressing a wish that all Consuls would as efficiently protect the interests of their nationals. [sic]109 The episode illustrates that consuls could face varying expectations from governments and ship owners. Singapore became one of the more important ports for Swedish-​Norwegian shipping in the early 1880s. Only three Swedish and Norwegian ships visited the city in 1880, but the year afterwards the number doubled, and rose to 15 in 1882 and 1883. In 1884 the number rose to 27. The consular inspector, Harald Ehrenborg, remarked that Singapore, like Hong Kong, was first and foremost interesting as a distribution centre. Most of the Swedish-​Norwegian ships arrived in Singapore with coal from England and, more importantly, as Ehrenborg pointed out, returned with rice and sugar. Ehrenborg added that, unlike mainland China or Java, neither of the two colonies was economically strong enough to sustain a serious import and export trade. Singapore and Hong Kong were attractive both to large steamboats and to smaller boats which distributed import cargos and collected export goods.110 Thus, Ehrenborg concluded, the interests of the United Kingdoms in Singapore and Hong Kong would remain limited for as long as they sent larger sailing ships, and would only grow if their steamboat traffic to these ports increased. The 109 William Henry Macleod Read, Play and Politics: Recollections of Malaya by an Old Resident (London: Darto & Co., 1901), 85–​86. 110 For a recent analysis of how the transition from sail to steam technology affected the expansion of Norwegian shipping into Asia, see Jakob Haavik Tønnessen, ‘Norske nisjer og nye markeder. Norsk skipsfart i Asia i transformasjonsperioden 1894–​99’, unpublished master’s thesis (University of Bergen, 2016).

72 CHAPTER 2 sailing ships carried matches, beer and steel from Sweden and Norway and met a ready but very restricted market, not least because there was no native businessman to market the products.111 As in many other places, consulship was a family business in Singapore. When Robert Barclay Read died in 1884, Ehrenborg turned to Read’s brother and predecessor William and appointed a partner of the Reads, John Reid Cuthbertson, of the still-​existent company Boustead & Co. as new consul.112 The Consular Committee of 1875 had viewed the early appointments to the first consulates in Canton and Victoria (Hong Kong) in the 1850s as a failure. The Norwegians had been particularly dissatisfied with the development of the consular service in the region. But while Swedish and Norwegian commercial activities in other regions had been in decline for years, East Asian commerce was on the rise, meaning that there was greater consular activity in the region despite the justified criticism. The Swedish-​Norwegian authorities divided the ‘Far East’ region into three areas: China, Japan and East India (Ostindien), comprising consulates in present-​day Burma, India, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Thailand.113 Trade between Sweden, Norway and East Asia was as limited as with Africa but was also very different. In the first half of the 1870s there was very little trade between Norway and Eastern and Southern Asia. There were no imports from and exports to China at all in 1875, and only very little exporting of tar and beer –​worth 2,800 kronor to Southern Asia and the rest of East Asia. There had been some modest exporting of stockfish a few years before, but trade with the region had been marginal.114 This did not change in the following decade. In 1885, Norway imported coffee worth only 500 kronor and sugar and cotton worth only 100 kronor resepctively.115 Official Swedish statistics also hold no records for imports or exports from Eastern and Southern Asia in 1875.116 Imports accelerated in the following years and reached their first peak in 1883, when they amounted to 3,662,000 kronor, or 1,1%.117 Iron and matches were 111 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska Konsulatet i Victoria, Hongkong.’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 24 April 1885, Vol. 28, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 112 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska Konsulatet i Singapore.’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 24 April 1885, Vol. 28, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 113 Underdånigt betänkande 1876, v–​vi. 114 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges handel i aaret 1875, xii, 27, 73 and 97. 115 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges handel i aaret 1884, 50–​55. 116 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Commerce collegii underdåniga berättelse för år 1875, 102–​103. 117 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Commerce collegii underdåniga berättelse för år 1884, 88–​ 89, 208–​209.

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important export goods but struggled to compete with cheaper Japanese products. According to economic historian Jan Larsson, the 1880s were a transitional period in the trade between Sweden-​Norway and China.118 By the mid-​1870s there were different opinions about what was the right strategy to adopt towards Eastern and Southern Asia. When the joint cabinet in Stockholm discussed the resignation of the vice consul of Victoria (Hong Kong), Rudolf Jensen, in May 1876, it also touched upon the instalment of an additional salaried consulate in East Asia.119 The decision-​makers obviously seemed more positive about the political significance and economic prospects of the region than did the Consular Committee. That was particularly true for the Norwegians, who requested that the position be announced. This was against the wishes of the Board of Trade and Foreign Minister Björnstjerna, who thought that the two existing candidates were good enough. The Board rejected the second candidate, the merchant Frédéric Degenau, on the grounds that he was ‘leading an all too secluded life to match the requirements of the job’. When a decision was made seven months later, only one additional candidate, the local Dutch consul Ludvig Beyer, had applied for the position. The Norwegians favoured Beyer, who had established trade relations with Norwegian merchants and therefore received recommendations from the committees for exchange and trade in Kristiania and Christiansand and from several leading Norwegian merchant houses. The Norwegian Department of the Interior also addressed the criticisms levelled at Degenau and maintained that he enjoyed a favourable economic and social position in Hong Kong. They rejected the favourite candidate of the Swedish side, Hans Kjær, referencing a very negative report from Herman Annerstedt, a senior lieutenant (premierlöjtnant) of the Swedish navy who had been on a mission to China to study the trade conditions on behalf of the government a few years earlier.120 In the end, the Swedes asserted themselves and pushed through the appointment of Kjær against strong opposition from the Norwegians.121 In the following years, progress was insignificant. Kjær informed Stockholm in November 1878 that he had to take a leave of absence for economic reasons, 1 18 Larsson, Diplomati och industriellt genombrott, 35–​56. 119 ‘ang. Konsuln i Victoria R. Jensens ansökning om afsked m.m.’, Ministerial protocol No. 9, 12 May 1876, Vol. 19, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 120 Annerstedt had penned a report for Foreign Minister Carl Wachtmeister in 1870 entitled Slutrapport till H.Exc. Herr Statsministern för utrikes ärendena rörande handel och sjöfart i Indien och China. For Annerstedt’s background, see Albin Hildebrand & Sigrid Leijonhufvud (eds.), Svenskt porträttgalleri. 15, Författare (Stockholm: Tullberg, 1900), 11. 121 ‘ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet i Victoria å ön Hongkong’, Ministerial protocol No. 22, 15 December 1876, Vol. 19, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

74 CHAPTER 2 adding that he hoped to resume the position within a short time. Kjær failed to follow up on his promise the following year, and the Foreign Ministry in Stockholm learned that he possessed neither the social nor economic standing that befitted a consul. Foreign Minister Hochschild therefore suggested that Kjær tender his resignation in January 1880. Obviously, the Norwegians had been correct about who would have been the right candidate for the position in Victoria. But this also exposed a wider issue: trade and shipping between Sweden-​Norway and Hong Kong in particular, and China and East Asia in general, left a lot to be desired. Between 1870 and 1874, Victoria had been visited by an average of 17 ships per year, of which eleven were of Norwegian and six of Swedish origin, with a combined cargo of 6,000 tons. In 1879 the numbers were 13 ships, of which 9 were Norwegian, and 5,000 tons.122 Kjær was replaced by John Murray Forbes, another member of the Forbes family. The continued disconnect between Sweden, Norway and the region was clear, also reflected by the fact that neither the merchant associations of Stockholm, Gothenburg, Gefle and Sundsvall, or the other authorities in Sweden, Drammen, Bergen and Kristiania, basically knew anything about any of the candidates. Instead, and unsurprisingly, Forbes was appointed on the basis of a recommendation from the consulate general in Shanghai.123 Forbes also resigned after less than a year. In discussions leading to the appointment of his successors –​Charles Vincent Smith, who also worked as representative of Russell & Co., and Rudolf (Peter) Buschmann, in 1881, 1884 and 1885 respectively –​the joint cabinet concluded that shipping was declining. Between 1876 and 1880 an average of only 11 Swedish and Norwegian ships a year, with a combined tonnage of 5,413, had visited Victoria. This generated about 344 kronor in consular fees per year.124 The numbers went up slightly in the early 1880s, but far from enough to justify any additional allowance or generate greater interest from potential consuls.125 When the position was announced for the fifth time

122 ‘angående afsked fär svenske och norske Konsuln i Victoria å Hongkong, H. Kjær samt befattningens ledighet.’, Ministerial protocol No. 12, 15 August 1880, Vol. 23, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 123 The only exception was that the merchant association in Kristiania knew that the least prominent applicant, a Norwegian helmsman, lacked the attributes befitting a consul; see ‘Ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet å Hongkong’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 22 January 1881, Vol. 24, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 124 ‘ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet å Hongkong’, Ministerial protocol No. 35, 16 December 1881, Vol. 24, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. See also Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 365. 125 ‘Angående ledigheten af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Victoria å ön Hongkong’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 18 July 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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in a decade, the only candidate who applied was the above-​mentioned Dutch consul and merchant Buschmann of the firm Schellhass, from Hamburg.126 The historical development of the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service in India and the East Indies and its situation in the 1870s and 1880s was not very different from China and Japan. From the outset, consular activities centred around a structure made up of a consulate general in Calcutta and a number of regular consulates in other cities such as Bombay, Madras, Colombo, Akyab, Rangoon and Singapore. The first acting consul in the region, Donald Campbell Mackey, was appointed to Calcutta in June 1845.127 Mackey was also appointed Danish consul.128 He would represent Sweden-​Norway for 21 years. As in Canton, Sweden-​Norway lacked contacts in the region, and therefore attempted to profit from the prestige and standing of foreign merchants. Mackey was a partner in a family business registered as Mackey J. & Co.129 In May 1850 it was decided to establish a consulate general in Calcutta that would include British East India and Singapore as districts. But the decision was never actually executed, and six years later it was reversed after the Consular Committee of 1855 recommended suspending it and keeping Mackey as acting consul instead.130 After Mackey’s death in 1865, Calcutta was given the status of an unsalaried regular consulate to which three consuls of foreign background were appointed in the following two decades. These were William Minto (1866–​1868), Heinrich Carl Reinhold (1868–​1880) and Siegfried Eberhard Voigt (1880–​1884), a partner in Reinhold & Co. The post attracted little interest.131 Calcutta failed to become a hub for Swedish-​Norwegian shipping, which, the Consular Committee of 1875 pointed out, was the major reason for the modest status of the consulate.132 In 1884, Alfred Ritz was appointed as consul without announcement, even though the decision-​makers in Sweden and Norway were aware that he struggled financially.133 126 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska Konsulatet i Victoria, Hongkong’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 24 April 1885, Vol. 28, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 127 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 362–​364. 128 Carl Rise Hansen (ed.), Guides to the Sources for the History of the Nations. 3rd series. Volume 3: Sources of the History of North Africa, Asia and Oceania in Scandinavia. Part 1: Sources of the History of North Africa, Asia and Oceania in Denmark (München: Saur, 1980), 176. 129 William Rushton (ed.), The Bengal and Agra Annual Guide and Gazetteer for 1842. Vol I. (Calcutta: William Rushton & Co., 1842), 45. 130 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 362; Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 308–​309. 131 ‘afsked för svenske och norske Konsuln i Calcutta, H. Reinhold, samt befattningens återbesättande.’, Ministerial protocol No. 20, 3 December 1880, Vol. 23, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 132 Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 309. 133 ‘Ledighet och återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Calcutta.’, Ministerial protocol No. 18, 31 October 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

76 CHAPTER 2 India was home to another two unsalaried Swedish-​Norwegian consulates. These were located in Bombay and Madras, present-​day Mumbai and Chennai. The posts were first filled in 1858 and 1859 respectively and given to established merchants from European countries.134 A closer look at the appointments in the region during that era reveals the importance of personal relations and merchant networks to the consular services of European nations. The first Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Bombay was the Swiss business pioneer Johann Georg Volkart, who had established the firm Gebrüder Volkart (‘Volkart Brothers’) in Winterthur and Bombay in 1851 together with his older brother, Salomon.135 Salomon had first travelled to India in 1844 on behalf of several Swiss textile producers in order to explore sales opportunities. He established close ties with European merchants who were active in the region and helped his brother Johann gain employment with the German merchant house Huscke, Wattenbach & Co. in February 1847. Johann Volkart was appointed head of the Bombay branch the year after, but lost his job when the partners of the firm agreed to part ways in 1849 and after his new employer, Wattenbach & Co., closed down later that year. Johann’s unemployment prompted the foundation of the Volkart firm, which his brother Salomon had been planning for years, on 1 February 1851. The firm was established with registered offices in Winterthur and Bombay, and it was decided that Salomon would remain in Switzerland while Johann operated from India. Volkart engaged not only in the cotton and textile trade, but also more generally in both the importing of European products and the exporting of Indian commodities like fish oil, coir, black pepper and curry powder to Europe. By the late 1850s the firm had developed from a small company almost exclusively working on commission into a medium-​sized merchant house with nine European employees based in Bombay, Cochin and Colombo.136 It is obvious that Johann Georg Volkart lent the Swedish-​Norwegian consulship prestige, but it is unlikely that he had real knowledge about, or interest in, the affairs of Sweden and Norway. Volkart’s successor, Julius Achenbach, who served as Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Bombay between 1863 and 1865, was also Austrian consul, and part of a German network of merchants who entered British East India as partners of British companies.137 Many of these German merchants had been naturalized 1 34 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 363. 135 Christof Dejung, Die Fäden des globalen Marktes. Eine Sozial –​und Kulturgeschichte des Welthandels am Beispiel der Handelsfirma Gebrüder Volkart 1851–​1999 (Köln:  Böhlau, 2013), 11–​13. 136 Dejung, Die Fäden des globalen Marktes, 47–​51. 137 Hermann Kellenbenz, ‘German Trade Relations with the Indian Ocean from the End of the Eighteenth Century to 1870’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 13(1), 1982, 143.

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in the process and had anglicized their names. Augustus Charles Gumpert, who served as Swedish-​Norwegian consul to Bombay twice (between 1866 and 1871 and in 1876/​77), and J.H. Riebe (1872–​1875), were both actually German. Gumpert had been born as August Carl and naturalized in 1853, and served not only as consul of Sweden-​Norway but also of Prussia, Oldenburg, Hamburg and Bremen, and later the North German Confederation. Since they were British citizens, both his and Riebe’s appointments thus had to be approved formally by Queen Victoria.138 The often rather modest effect of consular appointments and activities on the commercial success of the consulate is reflected here too, as Swedish-​ Norwegian shipping and trade with Bombay remained marginal despite the fact that the consuls were well-​established. The Consular Committee still held some expectations for Bombay, however, since shipping had increased from zero in 1870 and 1871 to eleven Norwegian and three Swedish ships carrying a combined tonnage of 5,738 lasts (kommersläster) and 703 lasts (nyläster).139 In colonized areas, the representatives of Sweden-​Norway were thus not only part of European expansion and its self-​assigned civilizational endeavour but also often actually European, rather than specifically Swedish and Norwegian. This is reflected nicely in a donation from the Swedish-​Norwegian consular fund to the European General Hospital in Bombay in October 1875. Consul Riebe, the German-​born British citizen who represented Sweden-​Norway, had supported a request from the hospital’s endowment fund because the hospital treated citizens of European nations with consular presence, seamen and others alike. The Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior both noted the limited extent of Swedish-​Norwegian shipping in the port, but still consented to Riebe’s suggestion. It was then decided that it would donate 20 guineas, or £21, equivalent to about £2,223 today.140

138 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 363; Bundes-​Gesetzblatt des Norddeutschen Bundes 1868, No. 28/​157, 469; See also ‘Foreign Office, June 12, 1877’ The London Gazette, 15 June 1877. Available at https://​www.thegazette.co.uk/​London/​issue/​24473/​page/​3670 (accessed 10 November 2018). Gumpert’s naturalization papers are available online at http://​ discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/​details/​r/​C7310793#imageViewerLink (accessed 10 November 2018). On the queen’s approval of Riebe’s appointment, see Various (eds.), The Nautical Magazine, Part 2. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 638. 139 Underdånigt betänkande 1876, 310. 140 ‘Ang. bidrag till “European General Hospital Endowment Fund” i Bombay’, Ministerial protocol No. 21, 29 October 1875, Vol. 18, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. For the conversion, see the inflation calculator of the Bank of England at http://​www.bankofengland. co.uk/​education/​Pages/​resources/​inflationtools/​calculator/​default.aspx# (accessed 10 November 2018).

78 CHAPTER 2 An analysis of the makeup of the consular staff is complicated by the fact that not all consuls do appear in official publications, such as Almquist’s chronicle or the state calendars. Vice consuls, in particular in peripheral and less significant cities, and acting consuls replacing ordinary consuls on leave, are usually left out. Consul Gumpert of Bombay left office due to sickness in March 1877 and handed over the post to J. Brandenburg of Bell Brandenburg. Gumpert lauded Brandenburg as a man of high social standing who had been appointed to consular posts by both the German and Austrian-​Hungarian governments. When Gumpert died two months later, Brandenburg’s application to the post was rejected, because the general consulate in London wrote to Stockholm that his firm was not considered well-​established enough to justify his appointment. Brandenburg never appeared in any official Swedish-​Norwegian publication, although he served as acting Swedish-​Norwegian consul for eight months.141 Consular posts became increasingly prestigious during the final decades of the nineteenth century. Gumpert’s second tenure ended with his death after only four months. One of the four applicants to his position was C.T. Meili, the local manager of Volkart Brothers. The Swedish clearly preferred him over his competitors. The Norwegian Department of the Interior confirmed Meili’s good standing but argued in favour of Hamilton Maxwell of the Hamburg firm W. Nicol & Co. on the basis of a personal recommendation from Wilhelm Christophersen, the influential consul general in Buenos Aires and later Norwegian foreign minister. Foreign Minister Björnstjerna agreed with the Norwegians and appointed Maxwell, despite the excellent experience the department had enjoyed with the representatives of Volkart.142 Bombay did not gain significance in terms of trade and shipping in the coming years, despite the hopes expressed by the Consular Committee of 1875. Consul Maxwell saw his affairs ruined by the collapse of the City of Glasgow Bank in Ocober 1878, and therefore left his position after only nine months. Maxwell wrote to Stockholm that he hoped to be able to get back on his feet and return to his post.143 He was temporarily replaced by Guiseppe (Joseph)

141 ‘ang. reglering och återbesättande af Konsulatet i Bombay.’, Ministerial protocol No. 11, 22 June 1877, Vol. 20, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 142 ‘ang. reglering och återbesättande af Konsulatet i Bombay.’, Ministerial protocols No. 11, 22 June 1877, Vol. 20 and No. 1, 7 January 1878, Vol. 21, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. On Maxwell’s employer, see John Forbes Munro, Maritime Enterprise and Empire: Sir William Mackinnon and His Business Network, 1823–​1893 (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2003), 15–​68. 143 ‘ang. Konsuln i Bombay H. Maxwells ansökning om afsked’, Ministerial protocol No. 18, 1 November 1878, Vol. 21, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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Janni, a 30-​year-​old representative of the shipping company Austrian Lloyd (Österreichischer Lloyd). The decision-​makers somewhat surprisingly agreed to the proposal, and only filled the post with Janni on a permanent basis two years later, when no improvement of Maxwell’s situation had been reported. During the discussion about the consulate’s situation in 1881, none of the involved authorities were of the opinion that there was a need to grant Bombay any kind of allowance. Bombay wasn’t gaining in significance, and there was no applicant but Janni, who was also the local consul of Austria-​Hungary. None of the referral bodies in Sweden had any knowledge of Janni, although he had been in charge of the consulate pro tempore for almost three years. The Board of Trade therefore suggested inquiring about him via the legation of the Austrian-​Hungarian authorities. The Norwegian Department of the Interior doubted Janni’s reputation, and therefore requested the opinion of Ole Jörgensen Richter, the Swedish-​Norwegian consul general in London. Jörgensen Richter confirmed that Janni enjoyed good standing and emphasized that his position at Österreichischer Lloyd was ample evidence of that.144 Bombay did continue to remain insignificant, but at least Janni’s appointment created stability, as he would go on to serve for another decade.145 In Madras, on the eastern coast of the Indian subcontinent, prominent Scots represented Sweden-​Norway for decades. The first consul was John Vans Agnew, son to a prominent British officer in the area, who served between 1859 and 1867. The consul’s brother Patrick served in the British East India Company and was murdered during the Siege of Multan in 1848, which led to the Second Anglo-​Sikh War and the British annexation of the Punjab region in 1849. His successors were members of the Arbuthnot family, which had been present in Madras since the late eighteenth century and owned the mercantile bank Arbuthnot & Co. Sir William Wedderburn Arbuthnot acted as Swedish-​Norwegian consul between 1871 and 1884, a period during which the place saw little development.146 Wedderburn Arbuthnot suggested that the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities should replace him with one of the partners of Arbuthnot & Co. when he tendered his resignation in October 1883. Oscar ii then appointed Alexander Mackenzie on the basis of a statement from the General Consulate in London, which maintained that Mackenzie ‘not only is a partner in one of the most noble and reputable merchant houses of Madras, but has also received

144 ‘Ang. ledigheten af Konsulatet i Bombay’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 22 January 1881, Vol. 24, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 145 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 363. 146 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 363.

80 CHAPTER 2 public commissions of such importance that he must be considered enjoying high esteem … and appropriate for the position of consul’.147 The smaller and more peripheral the place, the more important were the long-​term personal relationships there. There were two consulates in what is present-​day Myanmar (Burma) during the second half of the nineteenth century, Akyab and Rangoon. The consulate in Akyab was the smaller one, and it was only filled with three different consuls during its 45 years of existence. John Ogilvy Hay was a native of the Scottish Shetland Islands and served between 1859 and 1880. He was appointed Danish consul general and elected to the Danish order of the Dannebrog. Hay was also an honorary magistrate of the town, and published a book about railroad connections between India, Burma and China in 1888.148 When Hay left for health reasons it quickly became obvious that the position was not particularly desirable.149 The consulship was announced publicly, but no one applied. The acting consul, George Henri Ruckert, had also been hesitant. Ruckert was already the consul of France, Italy, Belgium and the Netherlands in Akyab. When the Swedish foreign minister asked Ruckert for suggestions after no one had applied, the latter finally agreed to take up the position himself, and held it until his death eight years later.150 In Rangoon, too, the consuls were of French, German or British origin. As mentioned, personal, sometimes even family, ties mattered. By the late 1860s, the Germans were particularly well established in the region. German merchants imported goods such as cloth, machinery or beer, and transported rice to Hamburg and Bremen for onward shipping to the Americas. The economic commitment of the Germans resulted in the founding of the German Club in 1867.151 In 1873, the German merchant Diedrich Barckhausen from Bremen was appointed consul, succeeding his business partner, B.A. Dickmann.152 When he left Rangoon to return to his hometown he proposed his brother, Carl 147 ‘Angående afsked åt Svenske och norske Konsuln i Madras W.W. Arbuthnot samt befattningens återbesättande.’, Ministerial protocol No. 7, 24 March 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 148 ‘angående afsked för Konsuln i Akyab J. Ogilvy Hay och befattningens ledighet.’, Ministerial protocol No. 17, 5 November 1880, Vol. 23, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 149 Hay to Björnstjerna, 21 September 1878 and Cooke to Björnstjerna, 18 March 1879, Vol. 22 (Akyab 1856–​1879; Rangoon 1862–​1880), 3, E2FA, UD/​KfubH, RA. 150 ‘ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet i Akyab.’, Ministerial protocol No. 26, 16 September 1881, Vol. 24, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. See also Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 364. 151 Hans-​Bernd Zöllner, ‘The German Club: Hosiery and Bremen Elephants’, Goethe Institut Myanmar, November 2014. Available at https://​www.goethe.de/​ins/​mm/​en/​kul/​mag/​ 20696722.html (accessed 16 November 2018). 152 ‘ang. återbesättande af konsulsbefattningen i Rangoon.’, Ministerial protocol No. 21, 5 December 1873, Vol. 16, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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Albert, who was a partner in the family’s firm Dickman, Barckhausen & Co. The Board of Trade remarked that the previous consul’s younger brother was only 28 years of age, and requested opinions from the consulates general in London and Bremen, who confirmed that he was a ‘particularly capable honourable man who enjoys a good social standing’.153 The consulate in Colombo was established formally in October 1858, shortly after the ones in Bombay and Madras.154 The first Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Colombo was Binney Scott, who had been partnering with his brother Alex in the coffee business since 1854. While their firm A. & B. Scott & Co. was not a great success, the brothers profited from holding an agency for the Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China, which was the first major banking house to open an office in Sri Lanka.155 When Binney Scott left Sri Lanka in 1870, he proposed a business partner, Hector Cross Buchanan of Alston Scott & Co., as his successor. Neither the Swedish Board of Trade nor the Norwegian Department of the Interior raised objections.156 Like the other ports in the region, Colombo had failed to gain any real significance by the mid-​1880s. In the five years between 1876 and 1880, only three Swedish and one Norwegian ship entered the port. Still, the BoT maintained that ‘this traffic nevertheless indicates that the consulate still could be of use’. In 1882, after 12 years as consul, Buchanan handed over the post to his business partner within Alston, Scott & Co. and vice consul Frederick William Bois.157 The two enjoyed a long partnership, as the records of an insolvency in 1896 show.158 Among the eastern Asian consulates that were established in 1858 and 1859 as a result of deliberations about the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service during prior years, Bangkok may be the most illustrative one. The first consul 153 ‘Ang. afsked för Konsuln i Rangoon H.  Barckhausen och återbesättande af konsulatet.’, Ministerial protocol No. 22, 21 November 1879, Vol. 22, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. For a more general background of Dickmann and the Barckhausens, see Hans-​Bernd Zöllner, ‘Germans in Burma, 1837–​1945’, The Journal of Burma Studies 7, 2002, 29–​69. 154 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 363. 155 See also http://​coins.lakdiva.org/​coffee/​pridmore_​token_​notes.html (accessed 16 November 2018). 156 ‘Ang. Svenska och Norska Konsulatet i Colombo.’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 8 April 1870, Vol. 15, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 157 ‘Ang. Konsuln i Colombo H.C. Buchanans ansökan om afsked m.m.’, Ministerial protocol No. 5, 3 February 1882, Vol. 25, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 158 ‘In the Matter of the Insolvency of Hector Cross Buchanan and Frederic William Bois’, 24 September 1896. The records are available online through the website of the Ministry of Justice Sri Lanka:  https://​www.lawnet.gov.lk/​1977/​12/​31/​in-​the-​matter-​ of-​the-​insolvency-​of-​hector-​cross-​buchanan-​and-​frederick-​william-​b/​ (accessed 17 November 2018).

82 CHAPTER 2 in the city was David Oakes Clark, a partner of Russell & Co. who had arrived in China in 1846 and then Siam eleven years later. Clark was appointed in June 1859.159 He left Siam the same year but was not discharged until 1868. In other words, it took the relevant authorities in Sweden and Norway several years to investigate and reach a decision about the shortcomings of a consul who had left his post after a few months.160 Clark was eventually succeeded by two brothers, Paul and Vincent Pickenpack, who were Swedish-​Norwegian consuls in Bangkok between 1868 and 1871 and between 1871 and 1877 respectively.161 Paul Pickenpack had been appointed acting vice consul upon the departure of Clark.162 Pickenpack was a German merchant from Hamburg and a pioneer who founded Pickenpack, Thies & Co., the first German company in Siam in 1858, at the age of 24. First, he took up the title of consul of the Hanseatic cities Hamburg, Bremen and Lübeck, and later even those of the Netherlands (1860) and Sweden-​Norway. Pickenpack enjoyed an excellent position in his place of residence. Upon his return to Hamburg, he was appointed consul general of Siam.163 Similar to the consulate in Madras, which remained in Scottish hands, the one in Bangkok was only held by Germans (with the exception of the above-​mentioned period under Clark).164 The Pickenpacks proposed to the governments that had appointed them consuls that a partner of theirs, Wilhelm Theodor Müller, should be their successor.165 Müller served as consul for eight years before he retired and proposed yet another German merchant as successor. In 1885, the Board of Trade noted that an average of three Swedish ships with a tonnage of 1,136 had visited Bangkok over the five years since

159 See the list of partners in Russell & Co. made available by the Fitz Henry Lane Historical Archive, which is an online project of the Cape Ann Museum in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Available online at http://​fitzhenrylaneonline.org/​supplemental_​files/​ RB%20Forbes%20List%20of%20Ships%20Owned.pdf (accessed 17 November 2018). 160 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 422. 161 ‘Ang. Consulatet i Bangkok’, Ministerial protocol No. 10, 26 June 1871, Vol. 15, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. For the correspondence between Bangkok and Stockholm, see Vol. 24 (1858–​ 1880 Siam: Bangkok), 3, E2FA and Vol. 17 (Hongkong 1881–​1899, Larnaca 1881–​1900, Madras 1882–​1899, Rangoon 1881, Singapore 1883–​1900), 8 (Brittiska riket i Asien), UD/​KfubH, RA. 162 Dan Beach Bradley (ed.), Bangkok Calendar for the Year of our Lord 1861 (Bangkok: American Missionary Society, 1861), 38–​40. 163 de Goey, Consuls and the Institutions of Global Capitalism, 70–​72. See also Khoo Salma Nasution, More than Merchants: A History of the German-​speaking Community in Penang, 1800s–​1940s (Penang: Areca Books, 2006), 48–​50. 164 Almquist, 422. 165 ‘ang. Konsuln i Bangkok, V.  Pickenpacks ansökning om afsked och befattningens återbesättande’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 26 February 1877, Vol. 20, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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1880. The Norwegian Department of the Interior argued that this was too little, and that there had been insufficient progress since 1870 for Bangkok to play a significant role in the ongoing considerations about the establishment of a salaried consulate in East Asia. Foreign Minister Hochschild did not disagree with the Norwegians, but pointed out that there had been recent attempts to establish Siam as a market for Swedish products. Swedish businessmen had sent samples to Siam, and therefore it was important to appoint a consul to Siam who was as interested in these issues as Müller had been.166 The first two consulates in Eastern Asia were located in Indonesia and the Philippines, which had both been colonized through government rule before other parts of the region. In Batavia, present-​day Jakarta, a Swedish consulate was established as early as 1798. The first Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Manila was appointed in 1839.167 The position in Batavia was taken up by Johan Tranchell, a supercargo of the Swedish East India Company from Gothenburg, who was appointed esquire by the British Crown. Tranchell died seven years later and was not replaced until 1853, when Sweden-​Norway expanded its consular service into the region and appointed the German merchant Eduard Büsing as its representative. Büsing had established the company Büsing, Schröder & Co. in 1842.168 His business partner was part of an old Hanseatic merchant family that had established businesses all over the world, including the leading investment bank Schroders.169 Büsing was only allowed to formally bear the title of consul when Sweden-​Norway signed a declaration with the Netherlands after several years of negotiations. In 1858 he was replaced by the Dutchman Willem Willemzoon Suermondt from Rotterdam, who would hold the position for 38 years.170 Suermondt was a well-​connected figure in Java. He started out as a partner of the trading company J. Cezard & Co. and became the principal agent of the Dutch company Internatio, which mainly traded in sugar, in 1867.171 In October 1879, a Swedish captain complained about Suermondt because the latter had removed him from his position on the ship Emma from Hudiksvall. The consul responded to the allegations by asserting that the captain had been drunk on 166 ‘Ledighet af svenska och norska konsulatet i Bangkok’, Ministerial protocol No. 19, 17 July 1885, Vol. 28, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 167 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 349 and 406. 168 Wiebke Hoffmann, Auswandern und Zurückkehren. Kaufmannsfamilien zwischen Bremen und Übersee (Münster: Waxmann, 2009), 94 footnote 57. 169 Richard Roberts, Schroders: Merchants & Bankers (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1992), 21. 170 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 406. 171 Alexander Claver, Dutch Commerce and Chinese Merchants in Java. Colonial Relationships in Trade and Finance, 1800–​1942 (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2014), 58 and 99–​102.

84 CHAPTER 2 duty, overloaded his ship and threatened to shoot local officials with a loaded gun he was carrying when he was approached. The Board of Trade lent its full support to Suermondt.172 Despite the disconnect between Stockholm and its consulates in many parts of the world, the threshold for accusations from seafolk to succeed against consuls was high. This was certainly part of the reasoning behind consular appointments, for which a good social reputation and secure financial standing were imperative. The early Swedish-​Norwegian consuls in Manila were Danish. The first post-​ holder, William Duntzfeldt Kierulf, was a Danish citizen, born in Serampore in Danish India. He had been appointed to the new Danish consulate in the city two years earlier.173 Kierulf died in 1841, only two years after the establishment of the consulate. His successor, Johan Andreas Ferdinand Wolff, was only 28 years old, and engaged in the cotton business together with the consul of Hamburg, H.C. Peters. Wolff’s tenure ended in 1847, and the position remained vacant for four years before it finally was turned over to the American businessman Henry Parkman Sturgis.174 The new consul had founded the firm Russell & Sturgis in Manila in 1828 together with Georg Robert Russell, son of the well-​known Democrat congressman Jonathan Russell and nephew of Philip Ammidon of Russell & Co. in Canton. Russell & Sturgis was initially backed and later absorbed by Russell & Co., the firm that was instrumental in the establishment of the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service in China, and quickly became the most important American firm in Manila.175 Henry Sturgis was considered very respectable by contemporaries.176 His father, Russell Sturgis, was a partner in one of the world’s largest merchant banks at the time, Baring Brothers & Co., and eventually became head of the bank.177 Henry Sturgis handed over the consular post to his business partner, Charles Griswold, in 1854, who also became American consul in 1861. By 1870, American business

172 ‘ang. sjökaptenen J.P. Palms underdåniga besvär öfver Kommers Kollegii beslut rör. hans förda klagan öfver Konsuln i Batavia W.W. Suermondts förfarande i uppgifvet hänseende’, Ministerial protocol No. 10, 28 May 1880, Vol. 23, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 173 Hansen (ed.), Guides to the Sources for the History of the Nations, 176. 174 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 349. 175 Jacques M. Downs, The Golden Ghetto. The American Commercial Community at Canton and the Shaping of American China Policy, 1784–​1844 (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2014[1997]), 190–​191. 176 Edmund Roberts, Embassy to the Eastern Courts of Cochin-​China, Siam, and Muscat (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1837), 46–​47. 177 Peter E.  Austin, Baring Brothers and the Birth of Modern Finance (London:  Routledge, 2016[2007]).

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and shipping had declined.178 Thus, in Manila the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service was also intimately linked to that of the United States. When Charles Griswold died in 1873, his son Fredrick Griswold-​Heron was appointed in his place. By that time, the Griswolds represented Baring Brothers & Co.179 In 1877, Griswold-​Heron resigned and suggested Rufus Allen Lane, who was an agent of both Peele, Hubbell & Co. and their competitor Russell & Sturgis, as the new consul. The Swedish and Norwegian authorities accepted the suggestion after the Consulate General in London confirmed that Baring Brothers had issued a favourable testimonial.180 4

West Indies: Old Ambitions, New Realities

During the second half of the nineteenth century there were a larger number of Swedish-​Norwegian consulates in the West Indies, or Caribbean basin as the region is also called, than in Africa or Eastern Asia. There are several reasons for that. The West Indies were, of course, a much smaller and less significant potential trade market than Africa or Eastern Asia. But unlike the other regions they had been accessible for centuries and had gained in significance to Swedish and Norwegian shipping. They had also been the centre of attention during the era of colonial ambitions. Therefore, the (Swedish) consular service established itself in this area long before the opening of China in the 1840s, and the new wave of colonialism directed towards the ‘Dark Continent’ paved the way for European presence in East Asia and Africa. Between 1875 and 1885, the number of consulates in the West Indies went from 12 to 15. All but the two consulates in Port-​au-​Prince and San Domingo were located in colonies controlled by Great Britain, Denmark, France, the Netherlands and the United States. Together, they formed a network of consulates that served the interests of Norwegian and, to a lesser extent, Swedish shipping well. The first decision to establish a Swedish-​Norwegian unsalaried consulate in the old Spanish colony of Cuba was taken in 1819, but the post was never filled. Twenty years later, the American merchant George Knight finally took

178 William F. Strobridge & Anita Hibler, Elephants for Mr. Lincoln: American Civil War-​Era Diplomacy in Southeast Asia (Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2006), 86–​110. 179 ‘ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet i Manila.’, Ministerial protocol No. 19, 31 October 1873, Vol. 16, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 180 ‘Ang. Konsuln i Manila F. Griswold Herons begäran om afsked samt befattningens återbesättande.’, Ministerial protocol No. 20, 26 October 1877, Vol. 20, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. See also Vol. 11 (1854–​1880 Filippinska öarna: Manila), 3, E2FA, UD/​KfubH, RA.

86 CHAPTER 2 up the position.181 Knight had been in Cuba since at least 1816 and had co-​ founded Mariátegui, Knight & Co. in the mid-​1820s. His partners were members of two of the most prominent local families. The company had its own warehouses and port installations and was one of the most successful firms. It operated in the sugar and coffee trade, and also imported manufacturing and dry goods from Europe and the United States. Due to its excellent standing, it became Baring’s sole agent in Cuba.182 When he died in 1843 the Swedish-​ Norwegian consulship was transferred to his partner, Juan José Mariátegui, who held it for eight years.183 Under his successor, John Nenninger, Havana was promoted to consulate general –​with no remuneration, but the right to doubled consular fees. Nenninger held the position for thirty years until his death in 1881.184 In the early 1870s, an annual average of 14 Swedish ships of 1,736 lasts (nyläster) and 78 Norwegian ships of 13,139 lasts (kommersläster) visited Havana. The Consular Committee of 1875 described this traffic as ‘not inconsiderable’ and calculated that it would generate 1,700 kronor in consular fees a year; it suggested that an additional office allowance of 4,000 kronor seemed justifiable. Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to Cuba remained stable throughout the second half of the 1870s, with an average of 93 ships carrying a total tonnage of 33,345 tons. Havana was the major hub, visited by an average of 10 Swedish and 51 Norwegian ships carrying 4,279 and 17,095 tons respectively; the remaining traffic of 3 Swedish and 29 Norwegian ships carrying 1,525 and 10,446 tons respectively visited the other Cuban ports where Sweden-​Norway operated vice consulates. The Swedish Board of Trade seconded the proposal of the committee because the ‘large number of Swedish and Norwegians vessels’ only generated an ‘insignificant income’. The Board argued, furthermore, that Nenninger’s successor should also be granted the title of consul general in order to maintain the consulate’s good ties to the colonial governor of Cuba, ‘which can almost be considered a viceroy on the island’. The Norwegian Department of the Interior agreed, but maintained that the allowance should not exceed 3,000 kronor. Foreign Minister Carl Hochschild agreed with the Norwegians,

1 81 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 373–​374. 182 Inés Roldán Montaud, ‘Baring Brothers and the Cuban Plantation Economy, 1814–​ 1870’, in Adriand Leonard & David Pretel (eds.), The Caribbean and the Atlantic World Economy:  Circuits of Trade, Money and Knowledge, 1650–​1914 (Basingstoke:  Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), 243–​249. 183 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 374. 184 ‘Ang. ledigheten af Konsulatet i Havana.’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 27 April 1881, Vol. 24, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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and the decision was taken accordingly.185 The allowance and the rank of consul general were the reasons for the interest that the public announcement of the position attracted in 1881. A total of eleven applicants declared their interest to the Swedish-​Norwegian Crown. Most of them were merchants based in Havana, but there was also a lawyer, as well as the secretaries of the consulate in Cadiz and that of the vice consulate in Baltimore, among the applicants. The position was filled by James (born Jonas) Robert Francke, a merchant from Gothenburg who had been living in Cuba for four decades and whose business Francke & Co. was among the most well-​established in Havana. The Francke family was of Jewish origin and had played a noticeable role in Swedish business life since the days of its progenitor, Johan, who was born in Stockholm in 1790 and converted to Christianity in 1816.186 James Robert Francke also received favourable testimonies from the trade and navigation committees of Stockholm and Gothenburg, as well as from leading merchants from his hometown, members of the Swedish navy, and Consul General Christian Börs from New York. Francke was chosen ahead of the Danish consul of Havana, who had carried on the affairs of the Swedish-​ Norwegian consulate since Nenninger’s death, and the local agent of Lloyd’s, an American of high social standing who had served as acting consul of both the United States and Great Britain for shorter periods. Francke was chosen not least because of his intimate knowledge of the conditions in the home countries. The Norwegian Department of the Interior had received a similar recommendation from the stock exchange committee in Kristiania, which rejected other candidates because of their employment as clerks or because they weren’t included in Spencer’s Weekly Havana Report, which testified to the fact that their ‘mercantile activity was of little importance’.187 The appointment of Francke as consul general in Havana is interesting because it is one of the earliest cases when a Swedish or Norwegian citizen was appointed with particular reference to his origin and knowledge of the conditions in the home countries, and because it displays the relevance of consular salaries and allowances. Francke’s case also testifies to the ambition of the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities to improve the consular service by appointing

185 ‘Ang. ledigheten af Konsulatet i Havana.’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 27 April 1881, Vol. 24, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 186 ‘Francke, släkter’, in Erik Grill (ed.), Svenskt biografiskt lexikon. Band 16, Fich–​Gehlin (Stockholm: Svenskt biografiskt lexikon, 1964–​1966), 415. 187 ‘ang. återbesättande af generalkonsulatet i Havana.’, Ministerial protocol No. 35, 16 December 1881, Vol. 24, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

88 CHAPTER 2 fellow countrymen to salaried posts when there was an appropriate and affordable candidate. The first decision to appoint two consuls to Hispaniola, the second largest island in the Caribbean, was taken in 1825. The idea was to have one consul in Port-​au-​Prince and one in San Domingo.188 Inspired by the French Revolution, the natives had risen up against the French colonizers in the western part of the island in 1791 and established the First Empire of Haiti in 1804. After a series of constitutional changes and the annexation of the Eastern Republic of Spanish Haiti, which itself had declared independence from Spain the year before, the Empire became a Republic encompassing the whole island, in 1822. In 1844 the eastern part broke away again and re-​established independence in San Domingo (the Dominican Republic).189 In 1826, the decision taken the year before was revised. It was concluded that one consulate in Port-​au-​Prince was sufficient. Four years later, the first Swedish-​Norwegian consul, the British businessman John Hearne, took up the position, which he held until he died in 1849. Hearne was one of the most powerful figures in the young republic. Visitors from Europe described him as one of the ‘barons’ of Port-​au-​Prince.190 He was succeeded by John Newman Tweedy, who had been vice consul since 1833 and would also serve until his death in 1865.191 The post remained vacant for two years, before a business partner of the Tweedys, Friedrich Goldenberg, was appointed. After nine years as consul, Goldenberg had to leave Haiti and settle in Hamburg. The post went to Hugh D’Oyly Tweedy, the son of the earlier consul John Newman Tweedy. Hugh Tweedy was a partner in the firm White Hartmann & Co. and enjoyed a good standing among the locals and the Haitian government. He received both the Swedish Order of the Polar Star and Norwegian Order of St. Olav.192 During the discussions about the succession of Goldenberg in early 1876, the Norwegian Department of the Interior pointed out that the Danish consul at San Domingo, David Coën, had recently helped the crews of two battered Norwegian vessels. Therefore, the DfI suggested adhering to the original decision of 1825 and establishing a second consulate in Haiti to which Coën should be appointed. Foreign Minister Björnsterna seconded the suggestion

1 88 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 391 and 420. 189 Steeve Coupeau, The History of Haiti (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2008). 190 Michel-​Rolph Trouillot, Haiti: State Against Nation. The Origins and Legacy of Duvalierism (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1990), 67–​70. 191 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 391. 192 Michael Forbes Tweedie, The History of the Tweedie, or Tweedy, Family; A Record of Scottish Lowland Life & Character (London: W.P. Griffith & Sons, 1902), 164.

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and so did the Swedish BoT, which added that the Norwegian proposal was justified not least due to the permanent political separation of the island.193 Coën had also been serving as British consul since 1874, which surprisingly is not mentioned in the Swedish-​Norwegian protocols.194 Ironically, both Hugh Tweedy and Coën would remain consuls until the summer of 1894. Swedish archivists remarked in the 1960s that the reports from all four consuls in Haiti were remarkably voluminous, in Hugh Tweedy’s case particularly on political matters.195 The consulates in Jamaica and Puerto Rico were established in the early 1850s. The first Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Kingston was Robert Monroe Harrison, who had held the same rank for the United States since 1831 and who would serve Sweden-​Norway from 1851 to 1855.196 Monroe Harrison was a strong supporter of Secretary of State John Calhoun’s struggle against British abolitionists, who were viewed as a danger to civilization.197 His successor, Richard James Cade Hitchens, had been Swedish-​Norwegian vice consul since 1853 before he was appointed consul two years after Harrison’s departure. He would head the consulate in Kingston until his death in 1876, when his son and vice consul of seven years, Richard Hitchens, Junior, was appointed in his place.198 The younger Hitchens was chosen over the U.S. Vice Consul Ralph Nunes. Nunes was the consul of Venezuela, headed a highly regarded firm in Kingston and had submitted a recommendation letter from the prominent London-​based investment bank Dobrée and Sons. Hitchens was a justice of the peace in Kingston and, according to Consul General Theodor Willerding in London, enjoyed excellent ties with the larger merchant houses in the area.199 It seems as though Nunes was the more qualified candidate, but was turned down because the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities put greater emphasis on 193 ‘ang. Konsuln i Port au Prince F. Goldenbergs ansökning om afsked m.m. samt upprättande af ett Konsulat i San Domingo’, Ministerial protocol No. 7, 24 March 1876, Vol. 19, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 194 John Scott Keltie (ed.), The Stateman’s Year Book: Statistical and Historical Annual of the States of the World for the Year 1894 (London, New York: Macmillan and co., 1893), 924. 195 Svenska arkivsamfundet (ed.), Arkiv, samhälle och forskning [1961] (Stockholm: Svenska arkivsamfundet, 1961), 52 och 61. 196 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 368. 197 Edward B. Rugener, ‘Robert Monroe Harrison, British Abolition, Southern Anglophobia and Texas Annexation’, Slavery and Abolition 28(2), 2007, 169–​191. 198 Richard Hitchens junior to Björnstjerna, 24 February 1876, Vol. 153 (1852–​ 1878 Jamaica: Kingston 1852–​1878, Bahamaöarna: Nassau 1864), 26 (Västindien 1842–​1880), E2FA, UD/​KfubH, RA. 199 ‘ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet i Kingston’, Ministerial protocol No. 11, 26 May 1876, Vol. 19, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

90 CHAPTER 2 established ties and the opinion of the Swedish-​Norwegian Consulate General in London. The decision against Nunes eventually proved wrong. In the fall of 1877, the Swedish sailor C.J. Bergqvist filed a complaint against Hitchens, whom he accused of embezzling his documents and money. In the following months and years, Hitchens failed to respond to enquiries on the matter carried out by the Consulate General in London. On 15 October 1880, the Board of Trade sent a final request. When it still had not received a response by 14 October 1881, the BoT sent a sharp note requesting immediate explanation. In the meantime, Hitchens had also failed to send in the annual reports and register of ships (skeppslistor) for the years 1877 and 1878, which, according to §32 of the consular regulations, was mandatory. Inquiries revealed another delicate issue. In 1879 the former Swedish-​Norwegian consul of Bogota, Pedro Nissen, died in Kingston. Nissen had mandated Hitchens to transfer £25 sterling to Count Adolf Eugène von Rosen, the famous ‘father of the Swedish railroads’. Hitchens made initial contact with von Rosen, but never sent the money, and cut off all contact in 1881 instead. The Swedish-​Norwegian authorities ordered Commander Alfred Carl Schönmeyr of the corvette hms Balder to investigate the whereabouts of Hitchens on site. On 2 February 1880 the Swedish Ministry for Naval Affairs sent Schönmeyr’s report, dated 9 January, to the Board of Trade. Not only was Hitchens alive but he had maintained his good reputation, as a request for information to the colonial secretary revealed. The firm in which he had succeeded his father as a partner had gone downhill. Hitchens was now only an employee at one of the larger firms in Kingston, but was in good standing at the firm, Schönmeyr reported. Hitchens claimed that he had sent Count von Rosen the money via letter and apologized for his other shortcomings, which, he explained, were the result of circumstances beyond his powers and the illness of his son. This bought Hitchens some time; but nothing changed. The authorities in Stockholm did not receive a single written message from the consulate in Kingston in the following year. Finally, on 31 March 1882, the foreign minister took matters to the last resort and initiated proceedings for the removal of Hitchens from his post. 200 The matter was finally discussed and decided in June 1882, and Hitchens junior was removed from his post for misappropriation of funds and the missing

200 ‘Kommers Kollegii underdåniga anmälan om ådagalagt vårdslöshet i tjensten af svenske och norske Konsuln i Kingston, R. Hitchens’, Ministerial protocol No. 16, 27 June 1882, Vol. 25, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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records.201 The Hitchens affair was not of particular economic or diplomatic significance, but it does reveal the struggles and weaknesses of the Swedish-​ Norwegian consular service during that era. Communication with representatives of the state in peripheral areas of the world was not always effective. Failures and misconduct on behalf of local consuls, ultimately damaging Swedish-​Norwegian interests, were dealt with rather inefficiently. Therefore, it is unsurprising that Hitchens’ replacement had a strikingly similar profile. Simon Soutar was a 45-​year-​old British citizen whose firm had filed for bankruptcy four years earlier. Like his predecessor, Soutar served as a justice of the peace. He had been consul of Denmark since 1880, but there were naturally doubts about his financial situation and social standing. A statement from the Colonial Bank to the Swedish-​Norwegian Consulate General in London confirmed that Soutar did not possess large means, but that there was no reason to doubt his respectability. Another favourable statement, from the Danish Foreign Ministry, based on testimonials from Copenhagen’s merchant guild, the Grosserer Societet, eventually sealed the deal.202 This appointment was slightly more successful than the earlier one, but it ended in a similar fashion. Soutar remained in office for more than two decades but was ultimately removed in 1904 after several years of missing reports.203 The Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in Puerto Rico’s largest city, San Juan, was the exception to the rule.204 As we have seen, the general pattern was that consuls were often appointed from among locally established individuals who were successful merchants, enjoyed good ties with the local authorities and had a certain social reputation. In the case of San Juan, the first consul was the 35-​year-​old Swede Gustaf Ferdinand Bähr, who headed the consulate from 1854 to 1861. His successor, Charles Alexandre de Villers Hoard, held the post for 22 years, but apparently not without certain problems. In July 1873, the Board of Trade sent a note to de Villers Hoard in which it criticized his negligence in failing to send in the reports about Sweden’s trade and navigation, requesting that he attend to his duties with greater care in the future. Seven months later, the Board activated §24 of the consular regulations and proposed to the foreign 201 ‘Kommers Kollegii underdåniga anmälan om ådagalagt vårdslöshet i tjensten af svenske och norske Konsuln i Kingston, R. Hitchens’, Ministerial protocol No. 16, 27 June 1882, Vol. 25, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 202 ‘ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet i Kingston.’, Ministerial protocol No. 8, 6 March 1883, Vol. 26, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 203 ‘ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet i Kingston.’, Ministerial protocol No. 8, 6 March 1883, Vol. 26, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 204 For the reports from Puerto Rico see Vol. 158 (1859–​1880 Puerto Rico: Aquadilla, Arecibo, Arroyo, Mayagna, Ponce, San Juan), 26, E2FA, UD/​KfubH, RA.

92 CHAPTER 2 minister that the consul be removed because it had not received a response to its letter. The fact that the matter was only brought up in the joint cabinet in March 1878, almost four years later, suggests that Foreign Minister Björnstjerna had requested further inquiries. Björnstjerna reported that the Foreign Ministry had received de Villers Hoard’s delayed annual reports on trade and navigation for the years 1874 to 1876 (which should have been sent to the Board of Trade), and suggested that he should receive another note reminding him of his duties but not be removed from the consulate.205 This is another example of the aforementioned problems that the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service faced during this era –​ and again proof of the fact that the organization lacked effectiveness and professionalism. It appears that misconduct from consuls in peripheral areas was not considered serious or important enough for drastic measures to be taken. This certainly explains the increasing criticism of the consular service from Swedish and Norwegian merchants, shipping companies, and experts and observers. The presence of the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service in the West Indies progressed in phases. The two earliest consulates had been established in Cuba and Haiti in the 1830s, then another three consuls were appointed to Jamaica, Puerto Rico and St. Thomas between 1851 and 1853. The earlier presence was thus restricted to the larger islands. Twenty-​five years later, there were fourteen consuls all over the Caribbean and on virtually all of the colonized minor islands. Four of these consuls took up their posts between 1863 and 1866, and another five between 1875 and 1878. In the Danish West Indies, at St. Thomas, Sweden-​Norway unsurprisingly appointed Danes as consuls. Henrik Krebs served from 1853 to 1869, and his successor, Otto Jakob Marstrand from Copenhagen, from 1869 until 1890.206 Marstrand was a timber trader; he had not only been appointed consul but also fire chief of Charlotte Amalie, the capital of the colony. He was also the older brother of the famous painter Nicolai Wilhelm Marstrand, whose paintings of the consul and his family have been auctioned in recent years.207 The establishment of the first consulate in Bermuda was decided upon in 1863, but it was delayed for two years because the British government initially refused to acknowledge the appointment of James William Musson to the old capital of Saint George. The Swedish-​Norwegian government appointed 205 ‘ang. af Konsuln i San Juan C.A.  de Villers Hoard ådagalagt försumlighet i tjensten’, Ministerial protocol No. 4, 15 March 1878, Vol. 21, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 206 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 378. See also Vol. 155 (1858–​1880 Virgin Islands:  S:t Thomas 1858–​1880; S:te Croix (Fredrikstad) 1878), 26, E2FA, UD/​KfubH, RA. 207 http://​pov.international/​bag-​sin-​herskerindes-​stol/​ (accessed 27 November 2018).

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the British merchant Josiah Taylor Darrel to the new capital, Hamilton, in his stead; he served from October 1865 until July 1866, before he asked permission to leave the post. The British then accepted the second appointment, of Musson.208 The 60-​year-​old Musson served until his death twelve years later, and then was replaced by his earlier substitute, Darrel. Darrel was appointed from a pool of five British applicants on which not even the (recently appointed) consul general in London, Ole Jörgensen Richter, was able to provide information. Richter still recommended Darrel to the Board of Trade because the latter had been encouraged by the Swedish-​Norwegian consul general in New York, Christian Börs, to apply when the consular post in Bermuda was first announced. Darrel also received a favourable testimonial from John Henry Lefroy, the British Governor of Bermuda. In addition, the BoT itself argued, Darrel had proven his capability during his first stint. The Norwegian Department of the Interior and cabinet members did not have an opinion on their choice of consul. They did, however, initially question whether the consulate as such ought to be closed down, considering the fact that during the five-​year period 1870–​1874 only 5 Swedish and no Norwegian ships had visited Bermuda and there were no prospects for future Norwegian shipping at all. They agreed to continue maintenance when they learned from consular reports that several wrecked Norwegian ships had received help in Bermuda in recent years.209 Unsalaried consulates did not burden the state budget, after all, and therefore the threshold for their establishment was not too high. As mentioned earlier, personal experiences were indeed highly valued in appointment procedures where the applicants were often unknown to the Swedish-​Norwegian ­authorities. It was usually the authorities in Sweden and Norway that identified the need to establish or close down a consulate. Such initiatives could be taken by different actors, such as the various consular committees, the Swedish Board of Trade, the Norwegian Department of the Interior or the committees for trade and navigation from different cities. But there were also exceptions, such as in the case of Port of Spain, the main port of Trinidad and Tobago, in the fall of 1875. In that case, the local Danish consul, Ludwig Schöner, contacted the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Copenhagen and reported that he had served several captains of Swedish and Norwegian vessels without charge as a result of the 208 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 369–​ 370. See also ‘Foreign Office, August 20, 1866’ The Edinburgh Gazette, 24 August 1866. Available at https://​www.thegazette.co.uk/​ Edinburgh/​issue/​7670/​page/​1009 (accessed 27 November 2018). 209 ‘ang. återbesättande af Konsulatet i Bermudaöarna’, Ministerial protocol No. 18, 1 November 1878, Vol. 21, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

94 CHAPTER 2 absence of a Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in Trinidad. According to Schöner, the co-​founder of the (still existing) firm Schoener and Co., the number of cases kept increasing, and he therefore suggested that a Swedish-​Norwegian consulate should be established.210 The issue was then handed over to the Danish ambassador in Stockholm, who brought it to the attention of Foreign Minister Björnstjerna.211 Following standard procedure, Björnstjerna requested the opinions of the various authorities. The Board of Trade confirmed that a number of ships had been arriving at Trinidad. More recently, numbers had been on the rise, from 6 ships in 1873 to 19 ships during the first half of 1875. The Norwegian Department of the Interior argued that although this traffic was not considered particularly significant by the Consulate General in London, there clearly was a demand for either the establishment of an unsalaried consulate in Port of Spain or the appointment of a vice consul under the consulate in Bridgetown, Barbados. The government was also in agreement about appointing the Danish consul, Schöner, to the new position.212 Schöner was replaced by his brother August when he died seven years later.213 The Schöner family was originally from Germany; it retained the Swedish-​Norwegian consulate until 1901. Three months earlier, considerations about additional consulates in French dominions had resulted in the appointment of William Joseph Lawless to Saint-​Pierre in Martinique. The appointment was the result of a report sent by Commander Fischerström of the Swedish Navy corvette Gefle from Gustavia to Stockholm in January 1875. Fischerström reported that the number of Swedish and, to an even greater extent, Norwegian ships that visited the island had been growing in recent years. He wrote that in November and December 1874 alone, 15 Norwegian ships carrying coal from England had arrived at Fort-​de-​ France. Some of them had been commissioned by a recently founded steamship company; others served a local sugar company which ran steam-​operated production. Fischerström highlighted potential business opportunities for cargo ships, as 150 lasts of sugar were shipped from Martinique to France every year. He also mentioned that a larger number of beams and boards were 210 On the German community and its activities, see Anthony De Vertueil, The Germans in Trinidad (Port of Spain: Litho Press, 1994). On Consul Schöner, see the website of the company they founded at http://​www.tiecol.com/​history.html (accessed 29 November 2018). 211 ‘Ang. upprättande af ett Konsulat å ön Trinidad.’, Ministerial protocol No. 21, 29 October 1875, Vol. 18, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 212 ‘Ang. upprättande af ett Konsulat å ön Trinidad.’, Ministerial protocol No. 21, 29 October 1875, Vol. 18, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 213 ‘angående återbesättande af Konsulsbefattningen i Port of Spain’, Ministerial protocol No. 14, 27 April 1883, Vol. 26, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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imported from the United States, and he believed that Swedish and Norwegian products could compete. Fischerström therefore recommended the appointment of a consul, and also presented a candidate he had already pursued: the local British consul Lawless. The Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior quickly seconded the suggestion, and the government decided upon Lawless’s appointment as consul.214 Although the authorities in Sweden and Norway had various reports and statistics at their disposal, then, initiatives for further expansion often came from other actors. Sometimes, as we have seen here, a single report from a navy commander could be sufficient. This suggests that the expansion of the consular service was not a sophisticated, well-​organized, long-​term project, but rather the result of a reactive, trial-​ and-​error approach. The decision to establish a consulate in Guadeloupe was made on the same day as the one in Trinidad, namely on 29 October 1875. Eighteen months earlier, Consul Marstrand in Saint Thomas had reported to the Norwegian Department of the Interior that Swedish-​Norwegian captains complained about the lack of a consul in Guadeloupe. They argued that many ships got into trouble on the shores of the island and had to approach foreign consuls for help. The Swedish-​Norwegian mission in Paris was consulted, and responded to Stockholm that Martinique and Guadeloupe, the two most important French colonies in the West Indies, were administratively completely independent of each other. The mission pointed out that in terms of population and exports the two colonies were of equal importance, and it recommended therefore that consuls be stationed in both places. The Board of Trade pointed to the fact that there was neither trade nor any direct shipping between Sweden-​ Norway and the two colonies and that therefore the number of vessels profiting from such consulates was restricted. The Board still did not reject the appointment of one consul for all French colonies in the West Indies ‘if there is a legitimate person living on the island’, because of the evident cases of ship accidents in the area. The Norwegian government did not consider one consul sufficient, for the reasons mainly put forward by the mission in Paris, and insisted on a second separate consulate in Pointe à Pitre with a district including all French domains in the area except Martinique.215 In Pointe à Pitre, the French merchant Eucher Dumoulin was appointed on the personal

214 ‘Angående upprättande af ett Konsulat på ön Martinique.’, Ministerial protocol No. 15, 22 July 1875, Vol. 18, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 215 ‘Ang. upprättande af ett Konsulat å ön Guadeloupe’, Ministerial protocol No. 21, 29 October 1875, Vol. 18, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

96 CHAPTER 2 recommendation of the French naval minister Louis Raymond de Montaignac de Chauvance.216 As we have seen earlier, it did not take much for Swedish-​Norwegian authorities to agree to the appointments of unsalaried consuls in peripheral areas from the second half of the 1850s to the mid-​1870s. In the rare cases of discord between the Swedish and the Norwegian side, the Swedish government usually opted for compromise and made an additional appointment in order to meet  all needs and demands. In almost all cases, any Norwegian request was met. The more peripheral the area, the easier it was for individuals to declare their own interest in becoming consuls. One example is that of the merchant León Vidal Leyba from Willemstad in the Dutch colony of Curacao. Leyba wrote to the Swedish-​Norwegian government that the local port was often visited by Swedish and Norwegian ships, which hired his services due to the absence of an official representative of Sweden-​Norway. Leyba attached a letter of recommendation from David Coën to the foreign minister. Coën himself had been appointed Swedish-​Norwegian consul to San Domingo two years earlier, also as a result of practical demand rather than of centralized planning from Sweden-​Norway. Leyba also provided testimonies from the West Indies agent of the important Hamburg company Schröder, Michaelsen & Co. and the Norwegian Captain Carsten Eckmann of the schooner Elim, who both confirmed his description of the situation in Curacao. The consul general in Amsterdam, Fredrik Egidius, was more critical. Egidius did not provide specific statistics, but pointed out that shipping to Curacao was limited and also did not seem to be developing. He did, however, also confirm that Leyba was a well-​respected merchant and wealthy man. The Board of Trade thus recommended the establishment of a consulate at Curacao mainly because of Leyba’s qualifications and despite the uncertainty of his actual request, which was a result of the lack of hard facts and statistics on Swedish-​Norwegian shipping in Curacao. The Norwegian Department of the Interior also considered it reason enough that Swedish and Norwegian ships might arrive and need the helping hand of a consul to agree to an appointment. This conclusion was reached despite the fact that ‘the shipping of the United Kingdoms at Curacao can be considered utterly insignificant’ because ‘the place appears to have been visited … and this traffic may have some kind of future …’. The Norwegians added that Germany, the United States,

216 ‘Ang. upprättande af ett Konsulat å ön Guadeloupe’, Ministerial protocol No. 21, 29 October 1875, Vol. 18, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA; Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 389–​390.

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Denmark, Spain, Great Britain and Italy were all represented with consuls in Curacao.217 This was reason enough for the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities to maintain the consulate in Willemstad even though it did not serve much of a purpose, furthering their strategy of maintaining their global presence if a post was affordable even if it did not reap significant financial reward. The final consulate in the West Indies was established in Saint John’s in Antigua in November 1882, seven months later the first consul, Frederick Melchertson, took up the position.218 The reason for his appointment was the death of the vice consul in Saint Christopher, who left the islands without consular representation in the Leeward Islands (comprising Anguilla, Antigua, Barbuda, Dominica, Montserrat, Nevis, Saint Christopher and the Virgin Islands). The case was brought up by Foreign Minister Hochschild himself. Hochschild argued that the combined population of the islands of 120,000 and the existing shipping required consular representation. Hochschild suggested that the new consulate should be established in Saint John’s in Antigua, which was the most populated of the islands and the seat of the governor and the colonial administration. A  local merchant named Carl Lyon applied to the Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior before the position was even announced. The Board provided statistics according to which Swedish-​ Norwegian shipping in the Leeward Islands had not exceeded 1,292, 72 and 551 tons in 1878, 1879 and 1880 respectively. The Board also saw little prospect for growth, but nevertheless agreed to yet another consular appointment in the area and suggested that Lyon’s social and financial position was sufficient. The DfI rejected the latter on the basis of additional information provided by the Consulate General in London, and enforced an announcement of the position.219 A few months later, the consul general in London recommended Melchertson, who was a Danish consul, without announcing the position after all.220 With this appointment, the number of Swedish-​Norwegian consulates in the West Indies had doubled in less than two decades. In contrast to Africa, where a new wave of Western imperialist ambition was imminent, and where Swedish-​Norwegian consuls engaged in legal imperialism and efforts to ‘spread 217 ‘ang. upprättande af ett Konsulat i holländska kolonien Curacao’, Ministerial protocol No. 16, 13 September 1878, Vol. 21, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. See also Vol. 156 (1867–​1880 Små Antillerna: S:t Christopher, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Castries, Barbados), 26, E2FA, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 218 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 369. 219 ‘ang. upprättande af ett Konsulat å de Britiska s.k. Läöarna’, Ministerial protocol No. 26, 3 November 1882, Vol. 25, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 220 ‘angående besättande af Konsulatet i St. Johns å ön Antigua’, Ministerial protocol No. 19, 22 June 1883, Vol. 26, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

98 CHAPTER 2 civilization’, and East Asia, where consular presence reflected considerable economic ambitions, the West Indies was a region where the consular service played a modest role. The consuls that officially represented Sweden-​Norway in the West Indies were considerably less prestigious figures who focused on serving the demands of Swedish and Norwegian vessels. Few people in Stockholm, Kristiania or the West Indies believed that this region could become a major factor in Swedish-​Norwegian shipping or trade. But, regardless of their less significant role, the West Indies too were part of the colonial order that the imperialism of Great Britain, France, the Netherlands and Denmark had created in the region. 5

Conclusions

During the early years of the so-​called Age of Empire, from the early 1870s to the mid-​1880s, the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway expanded into territories where imperialist powers of the first rank had either established, or were in the process of establishing, colonial order. Sweden-​Norway did so by expanding its consular service. During that era, the United Kingdoms had but a handful of embassies, or missions as they were called at the time. In many places the highest Swedish-​Norwegian representative was a consul. One main objective of this expansion was political prestige. The fate of Europe would be decided in the remote parts of the world, as one Swedish diplomat put it, and Sweden-​Norway wanted a part in this –​not too far from the larger Western powers’ ‘place in the sun’, as German Foreign Minister Bernhard von Bülow described his country’s imperialist ambitions. And in this globalizing world, economic interests were just as important as political ones, meaning that shipping and trade became a core element of the foreign policy of the United Kingdoms. The consuls were expected to support Swedish and Norwegian merchants, manufacturers and ship owners in their pursuit of profit by providing information about local business conditions and by assisting Swedish-​Norwegian vessels and seafarers. This difficult task was further complicated by the fact that Sweden and Norway had separate rules for trade and shipping, and that the United Kingdoms lacked sufficient consular regulations. We have seen that during this early period the vast majority of Swedish-​ Norwegian consuls were appointed from among Western merchants who established themselves in the areas where they were to serve. Americans in Shanghai, Danes in Trinidad and Tobago, Englishmen in Mauritius, Germans in Burma and Bangkok, Scots in Madras and Haiti, and Swiss in Bombay  –​ all served as consuls of Sweden-​Norway. Yet many of them also represented

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several, sometimes half a dozen, other Western countries. They were firmly integrated into colonial networks  –​ politically, economically and socially. In Bombay in 1875, for example, a German-​born British citizen who served as Swedish-​Norwegian consul secured a donation to the local European General Hospital from the Swedish-​Norwegian consular fund. In Egypt five years later, the Swedish-​Norwegian consul general in Alexandria joined the commission that developed the Mixed Courts. Obviously, Sweden-​Norway did succeed in securing a place in the social, political and legal milieu of the new imperialist order through its consuls, but there remained serious economic obstacles to the functioning of this type of consular service, which ultimately failed to support Swedish and Norwegian shipping as it was supposed to do. The appointment of these consuls was often based on the reputation of the candidate rather than on his qualifications. A partnership or employment with a well-​respected company, a letter of recommendation from one of the important consulate generals in London, New York or Amsterdam, or from a business partner at home, or from a captain of a Swedish-​Norwegian ship, mattered more than formal education, although ‘mercantile skills’ were recurrently mentioned as desirable. There were some cases where Swedes, Norwegians or their descendants were chosen over seemingly more qualified candidates because of their ties to the homeland and their knowledge of the languages, societies and economies of Sweden and/​or Norway. As we have seen in this chapter, most Swedish-​Norwegian consuls in the 1870s and early 1880s lacked the skills and necessary knowledge of Sweden and Norway’s economic interests in order to fulfil their duties. The Swedish-​ Norwegian authorities were aware of this, and of the flaws of the consular service, and in 1875 they appointed a committee that would develop a framework for the necessary reforms. But when the European powers convened in Berlin almost ten years later, none of the issues had been solved. It is fair to say, then, that overall there is little evidence to suggest that the Swedish-​Norwegian government was following a well-​thought out plan in executing the expansion of its consular service. Instead, though it persevered, the administration ultimately failed to stimulate trade and shipping in colonized territories, employing a cost-​effective consular service composed of a majority of foreign merchant consuls, who lacked the necessary skills to perform their roles.

­c hapter 3

Disillusionment and Years of Conflict, 1884–​1905 In 1885, growing tensions between Great Britain and Russia ended a decade of relative ease and no foreign threat to Sweden-​Norway. The two great powers ultimately clashed in Afghanistan in the so-​called Panjdeh Incident on 30 March 1885. The Russian Empire had been advancing into central and southern Asia since 1839, and it pushed on to Afghanistan in the early 1880s. Great Britain considered the advance a threat to India, and quickly entered into discussions about the Afghan border with the Russians in 1882. An agreement on a boundary commission was reached in the summer of 1884, but the Russians kept driving southwards. In March 1885, they crushed the Afghan forces and annexed the Panjdeh district before the commissioners had arrived. The British prepared for war, but the issue was eventually settled following the intervention of the Amir of Afghanistan.1 Before this solution was reached, however, the strained relations between London and St. Petersburg had transferred to the European territories. With the Baltic Sea forming a natural arena for a war between Russia and Great Britain, Sweden-​Norway found itself in the most precarious situation it had been in since the Berlin Congress of 1878. The Swedish-​Norwegian government ordered military preparedness when it learned of the confrontation between the British and the Russians, and quickly decided on the rearmament of what was left of its navy and the reinforcement of Gotland’s defences. It also revised its neutrality policy to better support Russia’s interests after Russia’s foreign minister, Nikolay Girs, told the Swedish-​Norwegian minister in St. Petersburg, Frederik Knut Due, that his country expected Sweden-​Norway not to repeat the pro-​British attitude it had displayed during the Crimean War.2 Although a new war between Great Britain and Russia would be avoided in the end, it became increasingly clear that while Bismarck’s system of alliances had helped maintain Germany’s dominance, it had not diminished the risk of war, and had thus failed in one of its two major goals.3 Over the next few years, tensions between the European great powers increased, fuelling anxiety 1 On the incident, see Christopher Snedden, Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris (London: Hurst, 2015), 103–​104. 2 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 76–​80 and 106. 3 Klaus Hildebrand, Das vergangene Reich. Deutsche Außenpolitik von Bismarck bis Hitler 1871–​ 1945 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-​Anstalt, 1995), 95–​146.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020 | DOI:10.1163/9789004414389_005

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in Sweden and Norway about renewed foreign threats. In December 1888, Oscar received a letter from Berlin in which the new Kaiser, Wilhelm ii, told him that he expected a war on two fronts against France and Germany’s ally, Russia. The Kaiser relieved Bismarck of his duties in 1890, and Germany entered a naval arms race with Britain. He also rejected a prolongation of the secret Reinsurance Treaty between Austria-​Hungary, Germany and Russia offered by Tsar Alexander iii, allowing France to break out of its isolation by allying with Russia. Britain maintained its non-​alignment, but saw its colonial interests increasingly clashing with those of France.4 As a result of these developments, by the early 1890s a growing number of Swedish-​Norwegian decision-​makers considered the need to revise their stance on neutrality.5 This was a more complicated and threatening world for the smaller European states. In Sweden and Norway, old discussions about the status of the Baltic Sea, the Öresund and Denmark’s neutrality resurfaced as a result of Germany’s armament. At the same time, the Nordic Union was shaken by a renewed domestic crisis. The discord between Sweden and Norway widened when a statement by Swedish Prime Minister Gustaf Åkerhielm in the first chamber of the Swedish parliament sparked controversy. During a debate on the duration of mandatory military service on 3 May 1891, Åkerhielm made a comment about conscripts speaking Swedish ‘both towards the east and the west if necessary’.6 Norwegian anti-​unionists viewed his words as a subtle threat against Norway and demanded a separate foreign minister for Norway. The Norwegian Venstre party, under Johannes Steen, eventually settled for the more modest concession of a separate consular service instead. In general, these debates created a widening gap between the foreign policy goals of Sweden, Norway and the Union as a whole. The possible involvement of great powers threatened to complicate things further, becoming more likely with Swedish-​Norwegian relations deteriorating. Ultimately, however, Oscar’s recurring attempts to persuade the Kaiser to guarantee Germany’s military support of Sweden in case of a conflict with Norway failed. At the height of the political disharmony, Wilhelm visited Stockholm and promised support in case of a Norwegian revolt while remaining vague about the nature of his support.

4 On the increasing tensions during the 1890s, see Christopher Clark, The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914 (London: Allen Lane, 2012), c­ hapter 3 and John C.G. Röhl, Wilhelm II. Der Aufbau der persönlichen Monarchie 1888–​1900 (München, C.H. Beck, 2001), c­ hapter 14. 5 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 85–​86. 6 Theodor Westrin, Ruben G:son Berg and Verner Söderberg (eds.), Nordisk familjebok: konversationslexikon och realencyklopedi. 33. Väderlek–​Äänekoski (Stockholm: Nordisk familjeboksförlag, 1922), 963.

102 CHAPTER 3 Among Oscar’s many foreign ministers, only the equally Germanophile and Russophobe Ludvig Douglas, who served between 1895 and 1899, was actually involved in foreign policy-​making. Following Venstre’s electoral victory in 1897, Douglas tried to bring the great powers to issue an official condemnation of Norwegian ambitions. Although all the great powers, including Russia, rejected an independent Norway, none of them wanted to engage in the internal issues of the Scandinavian kingdoms. For instance, the British minister to Sweden-​ Norway, Francis Plunkett, visited Johannes Steen and told him that even a separation of the consular service did not need to lead to a general break-​up of the union with Sweden.7 By the turn of the century, a great European war seemed imminent, and Great Britain abandoned its policy of non-​alignment to forge alliances with Japan and France in 1902 and 1904 respectively. In Sweden, public opinion was transformed in favour of Oscar’s and Douglas’s standpoints on matters of foreign policy. Swedish society underwent a ‘conversion to Germanism’, as the German minister in Stockholm Casimir von Leyden put it, while Russophobia reached new heights, inflamed by recurring spy stories. The shift in public opinion went alongside economic development, as Germany replaced Great Britain as Sweden’s foremost trade partner in those years. During the first years of the twentieth century, a new wave of Scandinavianism seemed to reduce the disharmony between Sweden and Norway. In 1903 and 1904, it looked like this would allow for a solution of the issue of the consular service and the survival of the Union. In reality, however, the Union was taking its final breaths, and quickly collapsed after a series of events in 1905.8 This chapter will analyse the development of the consular service during the period from the mid-​1880s to the dissolution of the union between Sweden and Norway in 1905. We will see that Swedish-​Norwegian consuls integrated well into the colonial order in Africa, Asia and the West Indies but often failed to meet the demands of Swedish industry and Norwegian shipping. It will also demonstrate that King Oscar ii, the Swedish-​Norwegian government and the Swedish Foreign Ministry made efforts, but ultimately failed, to professionalize the consular service in order both to address its obvious shortcomings and to address the continuous criticisms from the Norwegian side. With this, the chapter sets out empirical evidence to provide a deeper understanding of the role of the consular service in the Swedish-​Norwegian response to the New

7 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 86–​96. 8 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 109–​118, 124–​137 and 144–​155.

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Imperialism, the relations between the two countries, and ultimately the separation of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway in 1905. 1

The Consular Regulation of 1886 and Renewed Failures

The new consular regulation was finally adopted on 4 November 1886, more than a decade after the Consular Committee had presented its report to the Swedish-​Norwegian government. The ambition of the Swedish-​Norwegian government had always been to respond to criticisms of the failings of the consular service, but the fact that the budget that was allocated to the service stagnated, despite its continuing expansion, was obviously as much an obstacle to it as the recurring Norwegian complaints about Swedish authority being exercised over foreign affairs. When the new regulation finally came into effect on 1 July 1887, it contained some minor but nonetheless interesting changes compared to the proposal presented by the committee that had drafted it ten years earlier. Most notably, the foreign minister’s role was somewhat diminished in the final version. Earlier passages about the foreign minister ‘handling all common consular affairs of the United Kingdoms’, and an obligation placed on the Swedish Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior to inform him about specifically Swedish and Norwegian matters, were removed. He was nevertheless in a position to ultimately decide on directives that were binding in both countries.9 In the final decade of the nineteenth century, an increasing number of Norwegians would voice doubts about a Swedish foreign minister safeguarding Norway’s interests abroad. The new regulation also formalized further the integration of diplomatic and consular affairs:

§ 6 1. The missions [embassies] of his Royal Majesty shall dedicate peculiar attention to the consular service of the United Kingdoms in the countries where they are employed, follow carefully the work of consuls, protect their rights, provide them with the instructions and the support they may need for the execution of their office as well as attempt

9 Kongl. Maj:ts nådiga Förordning angående konsulatväsendet /​gifven Stockholms slott den 4 november 1886 ; och Allmän instruktion för konsulernas embetsutöfning (Stockholm:  Kongl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1887), 1–​2.

104 CHAPTER 3





to promote the interests of the United Kingdoms and their subjects through unanimous cooperation [with the consuls] otherwise. 2. For the purpose of the above-​mentioned objective, the missions are entitled to request reports and accounts from the consuls in the country as well as to give them instructions. Such instructions may not be in conflict with the instructions presented in this regulation, the general instruction or special instructions issued by the concerned Swedish or Norwegian authorities. 3. The minister of foreign affairs shall inform the missions about instructions and measures taken with regard to the consular service that are of relevance to them.10

With regard to the nationality of consuls (§10 Konsulers nationalitet m.m.), passages stipulating that unsalaried consuls and vice consuls of foreign nationality could not be chosen if they were active in the ship broker business and that Swedish and Norwegian citizens generally were to be given priority over foreigners were deleted without substitution.11 This did not mean that the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities abandoned their ambition to appoint their own citizens and avoid conflicts of interest between consuls and their shipping industries. Rather, the passages were dropped because the government realized that they potentially excluded the only appropriate candidates in many cases, in particular in peripheral colonized territories. Other than that, only minor changes, specifications and corrections were made to the original proposals of the Consular Committee of 1875. The new regulation also made a clear distinction between consular appointments with and without diplomatic assignment. §15, about appointment procedures (Konsulsbefattnings tillsättande. Kungörande af ledighet), placed a duty on the Swedish foreign minister to announce consular positions without diplomatic assignment in suitable Swedish and Norwegian newspapers.12 The regulation also expressed to what extent the foreign minister and the king were practically involved in the decision-​making over the consular service. According to §25 (Om tjenstledighet), about leave of absence, only the foreign minister personally could permit up to a year’s leave of absence. Additional absence could only be approved by the king himself.13 All of this made the new regulation an important step towards the professionalization of the consular service in the late nineteenth century. But, as 10 11 12 13

Förordning angående konsulatväsendet 1886, 3. Förordning angående konsulatväsendet 1886, 4. Förordning angående konsulatväsendet 1886, 5. Förordning angående konsulatväsendet 1886, 8.

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mentioned earlier, it neither solved the most pressing issues nor silenced the critical voices from Norway. From the late 1880s onwards, Norwegian critics, led by Venstre, moved the consular issue to the heart of the general discussion about the union between Sweden and Norway. Many Norwegians argued that the consular service did not really meet the interests of their country’s shipping industry.14 One of the central arguments in this continuous complaint was that most consuls not only lacked both general and business knowledge about Sweden and Norway but also did not receive sufficient economic training. The integration of the consular service with traditional diplomats under the roof of the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs meant that the most prestigious consular posts were filled with lawyers or civil servants, while less prestigious and peripheral consulates and vice consulates usually were operated by foreign merchant consuls. The appointment of these merchant consuls, and of Swedish or Norwegian citizens to more peripheral areas, was usually conducted along the lines of the personal prestige and economic standing of the individual candidate, not his knowledge and skills. The foremost criticism in relation to qualifications was the lack of economic skills in the consular service, particularly with regard to the Swedish and Norwegian economies. A significant number of consuls and consular clerks were foreigners, and while many of them were successful businessmen who knew much about the local economy in which they operated, few knew anything about or were interested in Swedish and Norwegian commercial interests. The circulation of relevant knowledge therefore became more important. In the fall of 1889, the industrialist and editor Reinhold Hörnell published a book in English entitled Export of Sweden: A Compendium Showing the Principal Branches of Export and Industry together with the historian Vilhelm Köersner. According to Foreign Minister Gustaf Åkerhielm, who a short while later became prime minister, it was designed as a handbook for consuls, merchants, bankers and industrialists. Åkerhielm maintained that it offered a useful background on the history and development of Swedish industry and trade, particularly foreign trade, and therefore ordered its circulation within the consular service: Considering the undoubtly substantial benefit that consuls would have from the access to such a work, not only because they can not be expected to acquire such massive knowledge about the economic development of the country they represent themselves but also because it will allow 14

Neumann and Leira, Aktiv og avventende, 27.

106 CHAPTER 3 them to spread this information in business circles and perform an important task as part of their service to our trade and industry.15 Åkerhielm’s comment illustrates both a general awareness of the consular service’s insufficient knowledge about the Swedish economy and the divide between Sweden and Norway. Certainly, he and other members of the joint cabinet should have pushed for a combined compendium on Sweden and Norway if they were to counter the growing dissatisfaction with the Foreign Service in general and the consular service in particular. Increasingly, the Norwegians put a question mark against the Foreign Service as a whole. In 1889, the constitutional committee of the Stortinget in Kristiania pushed for cuts to its budget. The Norwegian parliamentarians demanded a decrease in the number of fixed salaries in the service and suggested closing down the missions in Constantinople and Vienna, as well as assigning additional diplomatic tasks to the consul generals in those cities. Some members of the chamber also questioned why salary gaps existed between Swedish and Norwegian diplomats who served on comparable posts. They referred to the differences between the salary of the Swedish envoy to Paris, Carl Lewenhaupt, who shortly afterwards became foreign minister, and the Norwegian envoy to Washington D.C., Johan Grip. Similar debates about diplomatic salaries took place in the Swedish Riksdag, but with much less ferocity.16 The newly appointed foreign minister, Lewenhaupt, refused to agree to these demands and claimed that the missions in question were vital for political and economic reasons. In the case of the Ottoman capital, this was mainly because of the extent of Norwegian shipping in the area. Lewenhaupt also rejected comparisons between Sweden-​Norway’s representation in European countries and in Japan, where the United Kingdoms were represented by the Netherlands. He described the criticisms of diplomatic salaries as uninformed. These salaries had to be understood in the context of local prices and the expenses needed to maintain the living standards of other Western diplomats. Lewenhaupt tried to address the Norwegian position, nevertheless, and suggested a review of the expenses of the most controversial missions in case of

15 16

‘Angående inlösen och fördelning bland konsulerna af handboken “Export of Sweden”.’ Ministerial protocol No. 24, 25 October 1889, Vol. 32, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Angående möjligheten af inskränkningar i utgifterna för de Förenade Rikenas representation i utlandet.’ Ministerial protocol No. 26, 6 December 1889, Vol. 32, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA.

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future vacancies.17 But the Norwegian parliament maintained its confrontational course. In June 1890 it decided on conditional budgets for the missions in Vienna, Constantinople, Rome and Copenhagen for the following budget year, which only allowed for the provisional fillings of vacancies until the question of Norway’s share in the budget of the Foreign Service was settled. Lewenhaupt acknowledged the right of the national parliaments to raise such issues but continued to stress both the importance of mutual consideration and the inviolability of the common Foreign Service. He tried to follow these principles himself, and successfully defended the expenses of consulates in places like Archangel, Genua and Bilbao during discussions in the first chamber of the Swedish parliament ‘because these consulates are important to Norway’.18 The foreign minister also provided statistics which demonstrated further the relevance of the consular service to the Foreign Service as a whole. The numbers showed that the budget of the diplomatic corps had decreased from 679,200 to 618,800 kronor between 1859 and the years 1872–​1874, before rising to 638,700 kronor in 1887–​1891, and indicated that this increase was partly covered by transfers from the consular fund.19 These discussions not only illustrate the growing rift between Sweden and Norway in the 1890s but also the extent of the integration between diplomatic and consular affairs during this era. People dealing with or serving within the consular service were well aware of the problem; and, tellingly, it was often individuals and not the Swedish-​ Norwegian government who addressed the problems. The aforementioned compendium written by Hörnell and Köersner is one example. Others attempted to formalize some kind of training for consuls. In November 1888, the Swedish state received a donation of 180,000 kronor through the will of the late consul general in Alexandria, Joseph Vilhelm Johnson, for the establishment of a fund with the aim of ‘supporting such gifted young men which pursue a consular career and want to study trade and industry abroad’.20 The Johnsonska donationsfonden was administrated by the Swedish Agency for Public 17 18 19 20

‘Angående möjligheten af inskränkningar i utgifterna för de Förenade Rikenas representation i utlandet.’ Ministerial protocol No. 26, 6 December 1889, Vol. 32, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. ‘Ang. Norska Storthingets beslut rörande de diplomatiska anslagen för budgetterminen 1 juli 1890–​30 juni 1891.’ Ministerial protocol No. 19, 5 December 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. ‘Ang. förslag till de Förenade Rikenas gemensamma Utrikesbudget för år 1892.’ Ministerial protocol No. 19, 5 December 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Ang. f.d. Generalkonsul J.W. Johnsons testamente’, Ministerial protocol No. 17, 16 November 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

108 CHAPTER 3 Management (Statskontoret). The Foreign Ministry initially awarded a stipend worth 4,000 kronor, and later on two stipends worth 7,500 kronor: the larger Johnson stipend (det större Johnsonska stipendiet) of 5,000 to 7,000 kronor and the smaller Johnson stipend (det mindre Johnsonska stipendiet) of 500 to 2,500 kronor. A private donation naturally could not solve the whole problem of consuls lacking proper economic training and skills, but it was a step in the right direction. At the same time, restrictions defined by the donor limited the effect of the initiative. Consul Johnson had specified that applicants from the city of Jönköping and the region of Småland were to be given precedence.21 Norwegian candidates were excluded from the stipend programme, which also did not guarantee entrance to the consular service.22 With this, the Swedes followed up on an earlier initiative taken by the Committee on Constitutional Affairs of the Storting, which had created attaché stipends in 1874. The goal was to prepare young Norwegians who worked in the consular service for diplomatic service. Several of the earliest recipients eventually took up influential positions in the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service, and then, after the dissolution of the Union in 1905, in the Norwegian Ministry for Foreign Affairs. In 1886, the programme was extended to allow Norwegians to enter the consular service. The most prominent among the recipients was Sigurd Ibsen, son of the world-​famous playwright Henrik Ibsen, and later one of the most important figures in the dissolution of the Union in his role as Norway’s prime minister in Stockholm (1903–​1905).23 A total of 24 stipends were awarded up until 1904. The recipients served as Swedish-​ Norwegian consul generals in important places like Bordeaux and Kobe (Peter Ottesen), New York (Carl Woxen) and Rio de Janeiro (Jens Martin Bolstad), or vice consuls to Shanghai (Hans Emil Huitfeldt), and would form the core of the diplomatic corps of the Norwegian Ministry for Foreign Affairs after 1905. One of them, Johannes Irgens, was appointed foreign minister of Norway in 1910.24 The Swedes did not get as much out of the stipend programme as the Norwegians did. The first recipient of the Johnsonska stipend was the consular 21 22 23 24

‘Öfverlemnande till statskontoret af befattningen med framlidne f.d. Generalkonsul J.W. Johnsons testamente’, Ministerial protocols No. 18, 30 November 1888, Vol. 31 and No. 14, 20 June 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Angående utbetalning af reseersättning från Johnsonska donationsfonden’, Ministerial protocols No. 28, 11 October 1893, Vol. 36 and No. 3, 31 January 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. Neumann and Leira, Aktiv og avventende, 41–​44. Sigurd received the stipend after active intervention of his father, see Ivo de Figueiredo, Henrik Ibsen: The Man and the Mask (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2019), 457–​460. Neumann and Leira, Aktiv og avventende, 43.

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clerk Erik Wadner from Jönköping, who used the money to travel to Germany and England in 1891 and again in 1892.25 Wadner then returned home for a short period, met with Foreign Minister Carl Lewenhaupt and a number of interested businessmen in Stockholm, and finally left for Cape Town in early 1893. He later served as vice consul in Mossel Bay in South Africa.26 Within a few years, the stipend was fully established and known as ‘the consular stipend’. There were 16 applicants from very different backgrounds for the 1896 stipend. Some of them were clerks, others were wholesalers, and one of them was a professional translator and writer with a PhD from Uppsala University. The criteria for the stipend explicitly excluded a specific educational background as essential, and thus the stipend could be given to a less well-​ educated candidate with greater practical experience. In 1896 the stipend was awarded to David Georg Thunberg, who had visited and worked as an accountant for several woodware manufacturers and as an agent for an ironworks.27 The Johnsonska stipend programme allowed a considerable number of young Swedes to travel around the globe and gain experience relevant to the consular service. Yet it did not produce many consul generals or even consuls because the criteria for consular appointments did not change. Personal prestige and relationships remained the most important factors in consular appointments until the dissolution of the Union in 1905. Therefore, it was not only Norwegian nationalists who pointed to the overall problem of an ineffective consular service, often detached from the manufacturers and shipping companies in Sweden and Norway, by the turn of the century. When the prolific Swedish writer Axel Ramm published his book on Sweden’s industrial development and reforms for the consular service in 1899, he harshly criticized the lack of economic skills among Swedish-​Norwegian consuls: Our consuls need not be political confidants with diplomatic assignments; our time as a political great power has passed and there are not even ‘Greater Swedish’ ambitions towards Norway. But there is an awful lot left to do abroad in terms of trade policy; we need to spread knowledge about our fatherland, its agriculture, industry and trade; but we also 25 26 27

‘Angående utbetalning af reseersättning från Johnsonska donationsfonden’, Ministerial protocol No. 28, 11 October 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Svensk rikskalender 1908, ‘Generalkonsuler, konsuler och vice-​konsuler’, 297–​299, available online at http://​runeberg.org/​rikskal/​1908/​0224.html (accessed 13 December 2018). ‘Angående tilldelande af Konsulsstipendium.’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 31 January 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

110 CHAPTER 3 need to give an exact and abundant portrayal of the foreign country, its economic conditions and legislation and opportunities for the trade relations of any kind, here at home.28 2

After Berlin: the Scramble for Africa

The European powers concluded the Berlin Conference on 26 February 1885 with a General Act that set up the principles for the colonization of the African continent. The agreement facilitated Germany’s breakthrough as a colonial power of the first rank, finally joining France and Britain. It also lent legitimacy to the power of the Belgian king, Leopold ii, and his Association internationale du Congo (aic) over a vast territory of roughly two million square kilometres. The Swedish-​ Norwegian representative at the conference, the future prime minister of Sweden Gillis Bildt, had been carrying out negotiations with Colonel Maximilien Strauch of the Association since mid-​December 1884, when it had become obvious that Leopold and the aic would be accepted as administrators of Congo. Bildt maintained in a report to Stockholm that such an agreement was of no small importance, as Swedes and Norwegians had, or would have, interests in Congo. Bildt succeeded in prompting the Belgian king to send a direct invitation to Oscar for Sweden-​Norway to enter negotiations on a bilateral trade treaty with the Association before the end of the month. The negotiations profited from 25-​ year-​ old Lieutenant Matts Juhlin-​ Dannfelt’s good relations with the Belgian administration. Juhlin-​Dannfelt was the youngest son of Carl Juhlin-​Dannfelt, a well-​known agronomist who served as Sweden-​Norway’s consul general to Helsinki between 1881 and 1886 and London from 1886 to 1898. The young Juhlin-​Dannfelt had been working for the Association since December 1883, first in Leopoldville and three months later as head of the Manyanga station. He became a personal favourite of Henry Morton Stanley, the famous British-​American journalist and explorer. Juhlin-​Dannfelt fell sick in November 1884 and left Africa for Brussels, where he surprised the Swedish-​Norwegian minister Carl Burenstam with his close relationship with Colonel Strauch and with the Royal Belgian court.29 On 4 January 1885, Oscar reacted positively to Leopold’s invitation, and responded by accepting the invitation and lauding the Belgian emperor’s ‘civilising

28

Axel Ramm, Sveriges industriella utveckling och reformer i konsulatväsendet (Göteborg: Pehrsson, 1899), 30. 29 Nilsson, Sweden-​Norway at the Berlin Conference, 25.

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work’.30 This was but one example of Sweden-​Norway’s good relations with Belgium at the time. Naturally, this closeness proved useful when Swedes and Norwegians followed the European colonizers into Africa for business and missionary endeavours. The Berlin Conference reflected the contemporary enthusiasm regarding Western endeavours on the African continent. The optimism in the exchange between Oscar and Leopold thus did not come as a shock. The Swedish-​ Norwegian consul general in Antwerp, Wilhelm Christopher Christophersen, who would become the second foreign minister of the independent Norway in 1908, also promoted this positive Belgian attitude within the Swedish-​ Norwegian administration. In the fall of 1884, Christophersen played an active role in deliberations about the establishment of Swedish-​Norwegian consulates on the West African coast. In a letter to Foreign Minister Hochschild, Christophersen pointed out that a growing number of captains of Norwegian ships were complaining about the complete absence of Swedish-​Norwegian consuls who could provide assistance and information on the West African coast. According to Christophersen, representatives of Norway’s shipping industry were seriously considering the region’s business potential but viewed the lack of a network of trusted individuals and institutions as a grave problem. Christophersen also presented a solution to the problem. He had made the acquaintance of Willard Tisdel, an American who worked as a diplomatic agent for the Congo Association and who would soon leave Brussels on a mission to West Africa on behalf of the United States government. Tisdel would visit all the significant ports on the West African coast, from Dakar to Angola, and draft a report for his government. Christophersen described Tisdel as ‘a very pleasant, capable, practical and gentlemanlike man’, and asked for permission from Stockholm to approach him with a specific request for assistance in establishing a Swedish-​Norwegian presence in West Africa.31 Foreign Minister Hochschild had earlier raised this issue in a letter to Albert Steenbock, who was both a minister and consul general to Lisbon. Steenbock’s post had come about as a result of a merger following the death of his predecessor in 1882.32 Such mergers were also indicative of the increasing integration between the diplomatic corps and the consular service in the late nineteenth century. Hochschild’s original proposal to Steenbock was to establish a 30 Nilsson, Sweden-​Norway at the Berlin Conference, 26. 31 Christophersen to UD, 28 September 1884, Vol. 620, B (Allmänt om organisationen), 22 (Sveriges konsulära representation i Afrika), 12 (De Förenade Rikenas (Sveriges) konsulatväsen), UD/​1902 [Utrikesdepartementet 1902 års dossiersystem], UD, RA. 32 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 409–​410.

112 CHAPTER 3 new consulate on the island of São Tomé, which had been a Portuguese colony since 1470.33 The discussion on Africa intensified once the negotiations on the future of the Congo in Berlin gained pace.34 Foreign Minister Hochschild responded to Christophersen’s suggestion about Tisdel within a week. In his letter dated 4 October 1884, he agreed with Christophersen that Tisdell’s mission offered an opportunity for deeper cooperation: The development of trade relations with Western Africa and the establishment of a consulate there is on our agenda as well; but we are facing great difficulties because of lack of knowledge about both the local conditions in general and the people on the ground that we could entrust with a consular position. In case you’ve already made the acquaintance of Mr. Tisdel, I may suggest that you ask him whether he would be willing to share information from his trip with the [Swedish] Foreign Ministry –​in a way he finds appropriate  –​that would help us identify places on the Western African coast suitable for a Swedish-​Norwegian consulate as well as fitting candidates for such a consular post.35 Christophersen then travelled to Brussels to meet with Tisdell. The two only found time for a short meeting because Tisdell was summoned to Paris by the American legation at the French capital. Tisdell gladly accepted the Swedish-​ Norwegian proposal and asked for official documents to carry out the task on behalf of the Swedish-​Norwegian government, which Christophersen provided on 11 October.36 Tisdell’s mission was then delayed until early December 1884 because the U.S. government requested his presence at the Berlin Conference.37 Clearly, Sweden-​Norway was eager to cooperate with other Western states, both in Berlin and elsewhere, so as to receive its share of the African pie. In Lisbon, Minister and Consul General Steenbock sought support from the Portuguese Ministry of the Navy and of the Overseas regarding information on 33 34 35 36 37

Steenbock to Hochschild, 5 March 1885, Vol. 620, B22, 12, UD/​1902, UD, RA. Hochschild to Steenbock, ‘Rörande upprättande af ett konsulat i St. Thomé’, 31 July 1884, Vol. 620, B22, 12, UD/​1902, UD, RA. Hochschild to Christophersen, ‘Rörande upprättande af konsulat på West Afrikas kust’, 4 October 1884, Vol. 620, B22, 12, UD/​1902, UD, RA. Christophersen to Hochschild, No. 20, 18 October 1884 and No. 21, 19 October 1884, Vol. 620, B22, 12, UD/​1902, UD, RA. Christophersen to Hochschild, No. 23, 25 October 1884, Vol. 620, B22, 12, UD/​1902, UD, RA.

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the island of São Tomé. The Foreign Ministry in Stockholm not only requested information about local trade, the presence of consuls, possible candidates for a future Swedish-​Norwegian consulate and statistics about foreign vessels traficating São Tomé, but also about Swedish and Norwegian shipping. The Portuguese authorities provided these details, indicating that the island was utterly insignificant to Sweden-​Norway. Only three Swedish-​Norwegian ships had visited the island in the past year, all three as a result of difficulties, none of which had executed any business transactions. Several of the most important maritime nations, including Britain, Germany, the Netherlands and the United States, were not represented in São Tomé either, and none of the more successful local businessmen approached by the Portuguese authorities on behalf of Sweden-​Norway expressed any interest in a Swedish-​Norwegian consulship. On this basis, in a letter dated 5 March 1885 Steenbock advised Hochschild against establishing a consulate on the island.38 The fact that a decision about the establishment of a consulate could be based on exclusively foreign information demonstrates the difficulties with economic information at the time. This is also another example of how a smaller, non-​imperialist Western nation used the colonial order established by its imperialist neighbours to establish its own global presence. As we have seen, Sweden-​ Norway’s decision-​making about the expansion of its consular service in Africa was based on cooperation with and the support of other nations such as Belgium, Portugal, Germany and the United States. In 1885, Sweden still did not import anything at all from Africa, but its exports amounted to 1,773,000 kronor, or 0,72% of its total exports  –​up from 1,278,000 kronor or 0,61% a decade earlier. This was still marginal in terms of total trade, but nevertheless a growth of 38%. Egypt, Algier and the Cape Colony accounted for 92% of these volumes, while Tripoli, Tunis, Morocco and the rest of Africa altogether made up the remaining 8% of Swedish exports.39 Two decades later, Africa played a significantly more important role in Swedish foreign trade. Even so, imports from Africa never gained real significance. For the five years 1901 to 1905 they grew slowly but steadily to a total of 1,692,982 kronor, or roughly 0,06% of Sweden’s total imports. Yet the exports for that period rose to 54,776,485 kronor, or 2,67% of the total exports for that five-​ year period. British South Africa and Egypt were of particular importance, with

38 Steenbock to Hochschild, 5 March 1885, Vol. 620, B22, 12, UD/​1902, UD, RA. 39 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Commerce collegii underdåniga berättelse för år 1885 (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1887), 78–​79.

114 CHAPTER 3 total exports of 36,5 and 14,8 million kronor respectively, making them in turn the ninth and twelfth most important export partners of Sweden.40 Norway’s trade with Africa, on the other hand, remained much less significant than Sweden’s. Between 1901 and 1905, imports from Africa averaged 102,000 kronor, or 0,035% of the country’s total. The corresponding number for exports during that five-​year period was 2,643,000 kronor, or 1,39% of Norway’s total exports. The single most important commodity in Norway’s African trade was timber.41 But Africa contributed to some of the large increases in the country’s global shipping: its share of the total revenue of the Norwegian shipping sector went up from 2,782,000 kronor (1,71%) in 1885 to 5,724,400 kronor (2,48%) twenty years later, having peaked in 1903 at 9,165,500 kronor (4,52%).42 Thus, over the two decades treated in this chapter, while Norway’s trade with Africa stagnated its shipping expanded considerably, while exports from Sweden to Africa increased thirtyfold in value. At the same time, however, the number of consulates only increased from 10 in the mid-​1880s to a peak of 13 in 1901. Sweden-​Norway did not establish a consulate in Congo before 1901, despite the exchange that occurred between Oscar and Leopold, Sweden-​ Norway’s active participation in the Berlin Conference, and the involvement of its citizens in administration and missionary activities in the area. It was only after the turn of the twentieth century that the first consul to Congo was appointed, at the explicit request of Swedish and Norwegian businessmen and employees of the Congo Free State. The number of Scandinavians among Congo’s white population had been significant since the Belgian-​ controlled Association had started its operations. It was estimated that in 1899, 100 of the 1,500 to 1,600 white inhabitants of the Congo were Scandinavian, but ‘although the Scandinavian peninsula has made a significant contribution to the white population of the Congo, it has hardly succeeded exploring markets for its products’, the internal correspondence of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm criticized. Available statistics illustrated that at the time, the trade volume of the Congo Free State was growing year by year, but without any resulting growth for Swedish-​Norwegian products. Therefore, the Congo-​based Swedes and Norwegians argued in their letter that Sweden-​Norway needed to

40 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Kommerskollegii underdåniga berättelse för år 1905 (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1906), 146. 41 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges Handel 1905 (Christiania:  i kommission hos H. Aschehoug, 1906), 20–​21 and 75. 42 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Tabeller vedkommende Norges skibsfart 1885 (Christiania: i kommission hos H.  Aschehoug, 1887, ix and Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges skibsfart 1905 (Christiania: i kommission hos H. Aschehoug, 1907), 9.

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appoint a consul who could report on which products stood up well to the competition and provide general information about the business conditions in the area. A consul would also provide the locals with the necessary support and save them from the ‘helplessness’ resulting from their lack of command of the French language. The authors of the letter proposed to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs that it establish the consulate in the capital, Brazzaville, rather than in the larger and more important trade hub of Leopoldville.43 After receiving this letter, Foreign Minister Alfred Lagerheim gathered information from the missions in Paris, Brussels and The Hague. He also requested the opinions of the Norwegian Department of the Interior and the Board of Trade on the issue in general and on the proposed candidate in particular: Gullbrand Schiøtz, a 40-​year-​old native of Hedmark county in eastern Norway who had made a career in Congo.44 Schiøtz had arrived in the country in 1894 and quickly risen through the ranks of the Force publique, the Belgian colonial gendarmerie and military:  from second lieutenant to lieutenant in 1895, to captain in 1896, and to the highest rank of captain-​commandant in 1897. Schiøtz was appointed as director of the French company Mpoko (Société anonyme des Établissements Congolais Gratry) in the fall of 1900. The firm controlled an area half the size of Belgium and was one of the few profitable Western ventures. He became director general in 1904. The Belgian historian Daniel Vangroenweghe has described how Schiøtz gained a reputation for being one of the Westerners to employ the so-​called ‘Leopold system’, comprising forced labour, hostage-​taking of Congolese women and children and the conferring of bonuses on white employees, all for the sake of deriving maximum profit from the rubber business.45 Schiøtz was awarded both the Royal Order of the Lion and the Service Star by the Belgians. His story is mentioned in the Norwegian author Morten Strøksnes’s 2010 award-​winning thriller Et mord i Kongo (‘A Murder in Congo’), but there generally is little awareness in Norway about this chapter of the country’s colonial past.46

43 44 45 46

‘Angående upprättande af ett svenskt och norskt olönadt konsulat i Brazzaville och befattningens besättande’, Ministerial protocol No. 36, 1 November 1901, Vol. 44, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. ‘Angående upprättande af ett svenskt och norskt olönadt konsulat i Brazzaville och befattningens besättande’, Ministerial protocol No. 36, 1 November 1901, Vol. 44, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. Daniel Vangroenweghe, ‘The “Leopold II” Concession System Exported to French Congo with as Example the Mpoko Company’, Revue belge d’Histoire contemporaire ( Journal of Belgian History) 36(3–​4), 2006, 335. Morten Andreas Strøksnes, Et mord i Kongo (Oslo: Gyldendal, 2010).

116 CHAPTER 3 Rumours about the brutal colonial rule of the Belgians had indeed reached Sweden and Norway, but this did not prevent the authorities from appointing Schiøtz, one of its worst proponents, as consul.47 And on the ground, Swedes and Norwegians played a prominent role in Congo. Scandinavians exclusively operated all six plantation posts and three transit posts of the Mpoko, and Schiøtz in particular ‘subjugated the “savages” and made the natives harvest rubber with an iron fist’. Schiøtz and his closest men were heavily involved in atrocities, as Vangroenweghe has demonstrated: Schiötz founded the trading post Ibali. Both [him and his superior Jules Alphonse Jacques de Dixmude] had to reconnoitre (sic) the region and start the rubber harvest. The Swedish lieutenant Knut Svensson mentioned in his diary in 1895 that 527 natives were killed in four months because of the rubber harvest. The Norwegian Halling reported in November 1899 that 245 natives had been killed during a reconnaissance expedition. Jacques himself wrote to post chief Leyder in Inongo after inhabitants of Inongo had chopped down rubber vines in Ibali (the capital of the Crown Domain): “We have to beat them into complete subjection or into complete extermination. With this prospect in mind I send you my boy to retrieve his father to spare him an unpleasant awakening. Warn the people of Inongo a very last time and carry out your plan to take them to the woods as quickly as possible, or gather them in the village with a good club and address yourself to the proprietor of the first shack: here is a basket, go and fill it with rubber. Go and disappear immediately in the woods. If you have not returned within ten days with a basket of 5 kilos of rubber, I will burn down your shack. And you will burn it as promised. You use the intervening time to force those who refuse to leave the village into the woods. If you burn down the shacks one by one, I believe it will not be necessary to go to the limit (sic). Warn them that if they chop down one more rubber vine I will exterminate them to the last one”.48 The Belgian authorities defiantly rejected accusations of cruel use of force, offering other Western actors a powerful opposing narrative as an excuse for their participation in the brutal exploitation of Congo.49 Yet there is little to suggest 47 48 49

On the public debate in Sweden, see Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika’, 45–​52. Vangroenweghe, ‘The “Leopold II” Concession System’, 335. Guy Vanthemsche, Belgium and the Congo 1885–​1980 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 26–​27.

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that decision-​makers in Sweden and Norway did not view colonial attitudes sympathetically. If nothing else, the language of an official letter from 1901 requesting a consulate for the simple reason that ‘the French colony in the Congo is now open for exploitation’ reveals that the positive Swedish-​Norwegian attitude to colonial expansion of the early 1880s had not changed.50 Schiøtz was never held responsible by the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities for his involvement in atrocities. He was, however, tried before the territorial court in Brazzaville for violating labour recruitment rules in 1902. The court eventually cleared him on the grounds of procedural mistakes; but he later admitted the accusations were true.51 None of the above prevented Sweden-​ Norway from appointing him as consul once approval had been received from the French Ministry for Foreign Affairs and the authorities of the Congo Free State, and Schiøtz then served in good standing with the authorities in Sweden and Norway until 1906.52 The controversy surrounding the colonial rule of Congo was an exception. There was little discussion in countries like Sweden and Norway about the colonial administration of other places in Africa. And the trend towards establishing a larger number of consuls of Swedish and Norwegian origin throughout Africa is well reflected in some of the minor posts. There were several reasons for this reorientation towards Swedish and Norwegian citizens. Appointing a merchant consul or the consul of another, often larger, Western power, guaranteed prestige and local knowledge, but also created a distance between the consulate and Swedish and Norwegian decision-​makers, ship owners and export businesses. It also created a dependency where Swedish-​Norwegian interests came second place at best. In Tamatave on Madagascar, the Swedish-​Norwegian consulate had been operated by the local British consul since its establishment in 1876. In January 1886, consul John Hicks Graves informed the Swedish-​Norwegian government that London had assigned him to a different post. His successor as British consul, John George Haggard, accepted the additional appointment to the Swedish-​Norwegian post four months later, and both the Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior consented to maintaining the

50 51 52

‘Angående upprättande af ett svenskt och norskt olönadt konsulat i Brazzaville och befattningens besättande’, Ministerial protocol No. 36, 1 November 1901, Vol. 44, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. Vangroenweghe, ‘The “Leopold II” Concession System’, 336. ‘Afsked åt konsuln i Brazzaville.’, Ministerial protocol No. 10, 16 March 1906, Vol. 49, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

118 CHAPTER 3 British solution.53 But less than a year later, Haggard requested that he be discharged because his duties as British consul proved too heavy. Haggard also recommended another local British businessman, Robert Aitken, and once again the BoT accepted a British candidate after receiving a positive testimonial from the Consulate General in London. But for the first time the Norwegians now raised the question of whether the interests of Sweden-​ Norway were properly served by giving the position once again to a local British consul. The DfI remarked that there had been two resignations within a year, after all, and that some Norwegian citizens had earlier expressed their interest in the post. In September 1887, Foreign Minister Albert Ehrensvärd (the elder) therefore decided that the position of Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Tamatave would be publicly announced for the first time.54 No formal appointment was made in the following years, however. The reason was the ongoing dispute between France and the Merina Kingdom and the Franco-​Hova Wars, which prevented a legitimate exequatur until 1896.55 Instead, Haggard continued to serve as acting consul. After twelve years of formal vacancy, the first Scandinavian was finally appointed to the post in 1899. Initially, the Swedish native Thure Richmann had applied for the position in July 1898. But while the Swedish BoT accepted his application, it was rejected by the DfI and the position was advertised. By the end of the deadline on 1 March 1899, Richmann had withdrawn his application and no additional candidate had applied. Richmann then proposed the Norwegian merchant Christian Olai Bang, who had been in Madagascar for more than two decades and had recently taken over the British firm Porter Aitken & Co., where he had been a partner. The firm bore the name of Robert Aitken, who had been proposed as Swedish-​Norwegian consul in 1887. Personal relationships and local networks were utterly important. Christian Bang was obviously the perfect candidate for the position of consul in Madagascar: he had mastered both the official local languages, Malagsy and French, as well as English. The Norwegian Department of the Interior also pointed out the country’s missionary interests and consulted the local Norwegian Missionary Society before accepting the appointment in December

53 54 55

‘Ledighet och återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Tamatave.’, Ministerial protocol No. 9, 28 May 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Afsked åt konsuln i Tamatave å Madagascar John Georg Haggard.’, Ministerial protocol No. 21, 30 September 1887, Vol. 30, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Gwyn Campbell, An Economic History of Imperial Madagascar, 1750–​1895: The Rise and Fall of an Island Empire (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 344.

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1899.56 Bang resigned from the position in 1906 but continued to serve as acting consul for another decade, just as his predecessor Haggard had done before him.57 A namesake of Christian Bang, Johannes Bang from Denmark, served as consul in Lourenco-​Marques in Mozambique for 18 years, from 1883 to 1901. During his last year of service, this Bang left for Denmark and applied for leave of absence, citing health issues. The Norwegian government expressed its concern over the abandonment of the post for too long without a person in place possessing the necessary skills and knowledge, and so Bang was only granted six instead of twelve months leave of absence.58 But he never returned to Mozambique, and the post was subsequently given to Bernardus Hendrikus Kup.59 The new consul was a Dutch merchant and partner of the prominent local company Breyner & Wirth; the only other applicant was his partner, Francisco de Mello Breyner.60 We have seen in the previous chapter how the Swedish-​Norwegian consuls in Egypt practiced legal imperialism. In fact, in its discussions about the consular post in Alexandria in the mid-​1880s the Swedish-​Norwegian government referred recurrently to political rather than economic interests relating to the consulate general in Egypt. The Norwegians were particularly clear that they agreed with the Consular Committee of 1875 about the fact that trade and shipping interests in Egypt were rather marginal. The committee had therefore recommended putting the consular affairs in the hands of a foreign nation’s consul. Even the Norwegian Department of the Interior found this too radical a cut and proposed instead a downgrade from salaried to unsalaried consulate general with an office allowance. Oscar Gustaf von Heidenstam, who was acting consul in Alexandria between 1883 and 1887, agreed with this opinion and confirmed that the salaried position could very well be replaced with an unsalaried one, along with some modest office allowance, without hurting Swedish-​ Norwegian commercial interests. But he also reminded the government that the political interests relating to the consulate general in Alexandria justified .

56 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen å Tamatave (Madagaskar).’, Ministerial protocol No. 33, 30 December 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 57 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 389. 58 ‘Angående förlängd tjenstledighet för svenske och norske konsuln i Lourenco-​Marques J. Bang.’, Ministerial protocol No. 19, 31 May 1901, Vol. 44, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 59 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Lourenco Marques.’, Ministerial protocol No. 23, 3 October 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 60 Alan Jeeves, Migrant Labour in South Africa’s Mining Economy: The Struggle for the Gold Mines’ Labour Supply (Montreal: McGill-​Queen’s University Press, 2014), 206.

120 CHAPTER 3 a postponement of such a change. Von Heidenstam specifically related this to the ongoing discussions on a possible merger of Egypt’s mixed and local courts into one integrated judicial system. He pointed out that a weakened consular presence of Sweden-​Norway in Alexandria could lead to ‘our claims to full equality [with the other Western powers] and our stipulated rights being compromised’. It was natural to von Heidenstam to ultimately advocate a postponement of the looming changes, because they threatened to incur a heavy cut to his own salary. Foreign Minister Hochschild sided with the critics and maintained that even Sweden-​Norway’s political interests in Egypt with regard to the Mixed Courts were too insignificant to justify further maintenance of a salaried consulate general. Hochschild cited statistics provided by the Board of Trade, which illustrated that the average shipping traffic to Alexandria over the five-​year period between 1880 and 1884 comprised only 4 Swedish ships carrying an average of 2,487 tons and 7 Norwegian vessels of 7,289 tons. This meant that shipping only generated about 600 kronor annually in consular fees  –​ too little for a place where the Swedish-​Norwegian consul general earned one of the highest salaries paid in the consular service, 18,000 kronor a year. In an era when the budget of the Foreign Service had stagnated for decades, this made Alexandria an untenable financial burden. The Board of Trade maintained that the post could be given to another Western consul without necessarily causing political damage, but also stated that it was preferable for Sweden-​Norway to maintain an unsalaried consulate general of its own with an allowance of 4,000 kronor, and to appoint a capable merchant consul. After the Norwegian Department of the Interior requested an even lower allowance of 3,000 kronor, Hochschild settled for a compromise at 3,500 kronor.61 The diminished budget of the consulate general in Alexandria was thus the result of budget considerations. This did not mean that there was no concern among Swedish-​Norwegian decision-​ makers over the possible loss of their role in European imperialist interventions in Egypt and its vicinity. Rather, it was testament to the fact that Sweden-​ Norway was attempting to participate in the European expansion into other areas of the world at the lowest possible expense. And most of the time it was through its consular service that it tried to do so. Over the following two decades, Alexandria remained significant to the Swedish-​Norwegian government. In May 1887, von Heidenstam was replaced by Joseph Wilhelm Johnson, who had previously served as consul general of

61

‘Reglering af generalkonsulsbefattningen i Alexandria.’, Ministerial protocol No. 17, 22 October 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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the Ottoman Empire in Copenhagen.62 Johnson resigned on health grounds less than a year later and, as mentioned in the introduction of this chapter, bequeathed a large sum to the Swedish Foreign Ministry for the establishment of a fund in support of consular aspirants.63 In the ensuing competition that took place in 1888, the Board of Trade ranked Count Carlo Landberg first and Johnson’s vice consul Henry Barker second, while the Norwegian Department of the Interior supported Barker and did not even consider Landberg among the three most suitable applicants. Foreign Minister Ehrensvärd sided with the Swedish, nonetheless, and opted for Landberg as new consul general in Alexandria. This was one of few cases in which the Norwegian request was completely ignored.64 Landberg was not the usual type of consul. He was a trained orientalist with a PhD from the University of Leipzig and was considered to be one of the leading scholars of the Arabic language at the time. Landberg had travelled across Egypt in the 1870s and been granted the title of count by the Italian King Umberto I  for his services in 1884. He enjoyed a considerable international reputation, and was not only appointed as consul general but also as a diplomatic agent.65 During his stint in Alexandria, Swedish and Norwegian shipping showed signs of growth. Compared to the statistics from the first half of the 1880s, the numbers had roughly doubled for the years 1887 to 1891, to 6 Swedish ships carrying an average of 6,391 tons and 17 Norwegian vessels of 19,830 tons. The Board of Trade nevertheless argued in favour of another cut to the consulate’s allowance in the mid-​1890s, referring to Algier, where a consulate of similar standing enjoyed an allowance of only 3,000 kronor. The Norwegian Department of the Interior rejected this idea, and suggested Henry Barker, the 60-​year-​old long-​time vice consul, as new consul general. Barker’s application for the position had been turned down in 1887 and again in 1888. Unlike the appointment of Landberg, the Norwegians secured the support of Foreign Minister Carl Lewenhaupt this time, and prevailed.66 But Barker was 62

‘Ang. återbesättande af Generalkonsulsbefattningen i Alexandria.’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 13 May 1887, Vol. 30, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 63 ‘Generalkonsuln i Alexandria J.W. Johnsons afskedsansökning’, Ministerial protocols No. 11, 28 July 1888 and ‘Ang. f.d. Generalkonsul J.W. Johnsons testamente’ No. 17, 16 November 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 64 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska Generalkonsulsbefattningen i Alexandria.’, Ministerial protocol No. 20, 14 December 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 65 ‘Angående afsked åt Generalkonsuln i Alexandria Grefve Carlo Landberg.’, Ministerial protocol No. 22, 10 July 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 66 ‘Angående afsked åt Generalkonsuln i Alexandria Grefve Carlo Landberg.’Ministerial protocol No. 22, 10 July 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

122 CHAPTER 3 only appointed acting consul general because the ongoing budget conflict of the mid-​1890s halted regular appointments.67 Barker was the first non-​Scandinavian consul general in Alexandria in over two decades. But he had served as vice consul since 1859 and thus was no stranger to Swedish-​Norwegian interests. Barker nevertheless only lasted for three more years before resigning for health reasons in 1896 from the position that he had sought for so many years. His successor, Claes Gustaf Belinfante Östberg, had served in Messina (1882–​1885), Naples (1885–​1890) and Valparaiso (1890–​1893), and was the only candidate known to one of the trade and navigation committees consulted on the matter. The committees in Stockholm, Gothenburg, Malmö and Helsingborg all stated that they did not know anything about any of the applicants, which is another example of the continuing disconnect between industrial and business circles in Sweden and Norway and the consular service that was intended to serve them.68 Östberg was appointed ordinary consul general after the successful settlement of the budget conflict in the summer of 1896.69 He served until October 1906, one year after the dissolution of the Union.70 Despite the cuts to the budget of the consulate general in Alexandria, and the arguments some politicians and state officials put forward to belittle Sweden-​Norway’s political interests in relation to the Mixed Courts in the late 1880s, both the awarding of the additional title of diplomatic agent to Carlo Landberg and the continued interventions in the Western judiciary and politics in the following years proved that Alexandria retained a special position within the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service. On 1 February 1889, the Western capitulatory powers agreed to a five-​year extension of the jurisdiction of the Mixed Courts to which the Swedish-​Norwegian government had formally consented two weeks earlier.71 The Egyptian government then proceeded to call for an international commission that would deal with the extension of the powers of the Mixed Courts in the areas of civil and criminal law. On 24 May 1889, King Oscar appointed the Norwegian lawyer Johan Bernt Borchgrevink as the representative of Sweden-​Norway to that commission. In the following 67

‘Angående förordnande af svensk och norsk generalkonsul i Alexandria.’, Ministerial protocol No. 4, 7 February 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 68 ‘Angående förordnande af svensk och norsk generalkonsul i Alexandria.’, Ministerial protocol No. 4, 7 February 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 69 ‘Angående utnämning af generalkonsul i Alexandria.’, Ministerial protocol No. 26, 4 December 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 70 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 432. 71 Richard A.  Debs, Islamic Law and Civil Code:  The Law of Property in Egypt (New  York: Columbia University Press, c2010), 56–​66.

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months, the various Swedish and Norwegian authorities discussed Borchgrevink’s mission and decided to cover his travel costs and other expenses from the consular fund.72 In the Egyptian context, the consular service continued to be instrumental to the political interests of Sweden-​Norway. In 1900, consul general Claes Öberg joined Borchgrevink as the second Swedish-​Norwegian member of the international commission of the Mixed Courts. Öberg was expected to attend all commission meetings, whereas Borchgrevink could be excused and replaced by the prominent Swedish lawyer Conrad Cedercrantz if he was prevented from doing so for any reason. Cedercrantz had gained foreign experience as a chief justice of Samoa in the early 1890s and would go on to become a member of the Swedish parliament in 1904.73 At times, the exact relationship between diplomatic and consular tasks came under scrutiny. In these cases, the Norwegian government questioned the decision to cover the expenses of the commissionaries from the consular fund because of the diplomatic nature of its work. In their opinion, Cedercrantz’s expenses should rather be covered by the Foreign Ministry’s budget (Kabinettskassan). Foreign Minister Alfred Lagerheim rejected this objection and maintained that: While the [Norwegian] Department of the Interior has only referred to the diplomatic nature of the task to support its opinion that the expenses should not be covered from the consular fund, I  may subserviently remind about the fact that the Mixed Courts have emerged in order to replace the former consular jurisdiction, which formerly existed on the basis of the so-​called capitulations. These have not been abolished for Egypt but only suspended. The negotiations about the continued preservation of the Mixed Courts are therefore of immediate interest to the consular service of the United Kingdoms [of Sweden-​Norway].74 Oscar and the Swedish members of the joint cabinet accepted the opinion of Lagerheim, whereas its Norwegian members explicitly withheld their

72 73 74

‘Ang. ersättning åt de Förenade Rikenas ombud i en internationel kommission i Egypten’ [sic], Ministerial protocol No. 19, 5 December 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. On Cedercrantz, see Erik Vennberg, ‘O Conrad V Cedercrantz’, in Johan Axel Almquist, Bertil Boëthius & Bengt Hildebrand (eds.), Svenskt biografiskt lexikon. Band 7, Bülow–​ Cedergren (Stockholm: Bonnier, 1929), 776. ‘Angående ersättning åt de Förenade Rikenas ombud i kommissionen rörande de blandade domstolarna i Egypten.’, Ministerial protocol No. 22, 29 June 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA.

124 CHAPTER 3 approval because of the position put forward by the Norwegian authorities on the matter.75 The conflict between economic growth and enduring political interest on the one hand and continuing budget cuts on the other applied not only to Alexandria but also to the three consulates in the Maghreb. In Tangier, consul general Victor Elias Cassel failed several times in his applications for additional funding for the promotion of trade and shipping relations between Sweden-​ Norway and Morocco. In July 1887, Cassel applied for a sum of 4,000 kronor, maintaining that all of his Western counterparts in the city enjoyed much higher salaries despite the fact that he had successfully put a lot of effort into developing relations between Sweden-​Norway and Morocco. Both the Swedish Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior rejected Cassel’s assessment of the situation. The BoT acknowledged that the number of Swedish-​Norwegian ships visiting Tangier had risen, but pointed out that this had resulted in a proportional rise in consular fees and that it therefore saw no reason either to reconsider the budget cuts carried out three years earlier or to grant an additional allowance. The DfI praised the positive developments that had taken place since Cassel had taken office in 1884 but nevertheless argued that the prospects it saw for a livelier market for Swedish and Norwegian products in Morocco were not significant enough to justify any additional expenses. Cassel’s application was therefore rejected.76 But Cassel did not give up, launching a second attempt less than three years later. This time he asked for a rise in the regular allowance of the consulate general in Tangier from 1,500 to 3,500 kronor. Cassel argued that despite the growth of Swedish-​Norwegian shipping, his income from consular fees had only amounted to roughly 191 kronor in 1888, and that as a representative of a foreign power he was not allowed to carry out private business endeavours. He also claimed that the consulate general in Tangier ‘maybe more than any other consulate of the United Kingdoms is associated with extra costs as a result of the local conditions’, and listed a secretary, a translator and armed guards. Cassel also complained about generally rising prices resulting from high levels of immigration and the growing number of travellers coming to the city. The representatives of other nations all enjoyed sufficient financial support from home, the consul general criticized. Cassel even provided a table setting 75 76

‘Angående ersättning åt de Förenade Rikenas ombud i kommissionen rörande de blandade domstolarna i Egypten.’, Ministerial protocol No. 22, 29 June 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. ‘Ang. Svenske och Norske Generalkonsuln i Tanger V.E. Cassels ansökning om extra anslag.’, Ministerial protocol No. 24, 18 November 1887, Vol. 30, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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out the details of the growth in Swedish-​Norwegian shipping during the six years of his tenure. And the numbers indeed seemed impressive: a single Norwegian ship of 72 tons had visited Tangier in 1884, but in 1888 the number had risen to 49 ships of 7,011 tons and a freight value of 175,027 kronor. Cassel also pointed to the emergence of direct imports of wooden products and iron from Sweden and Norway arriving at the ports in his district as a reason to grant him additional resources. The Swedish Board of Trade responded slightly more positively than it had in 1887 and suggested reversing the latest cuts in the allowance to the consulate general in Tangier from 2,000 to 1,500 kronor. The Norwegian Department of the Interior, however, once more ruled out any additional support. The Norwegians rejected Cassel’s claims about the particular conditions in Morocco, and maintained that the additional income stemming from the growing commercial activity was sufficient; thus it either ignored Cassel’s specific identification of the relatively modest consular fees generated in 1888 or questioned the veracity of his information.77 The year after this second refusal, Cassel resigned, and the position was not filled again. Instead, the consular responsibilities were assigned to the German mission in Tangier.78 With this, Sweden-​Norwegian interests in Morocco were put in the hands of a foreign power, despite the growing consensus on the disadvantages of such a solution. The reason behind this, and similar decisions that were detrimental to the alleged goal of professionalizing the consular service and increasing the number of skilled consular officials of Swedish and Norwegian origin, was a combination of inadequate resources and continuous disagreement between Sweden and Norway. Obviously, it was impossible to professionalize the consular service and make it more effective when it was not even possible to assign additional resources to consulates in growing markets. The quarrels over Norway’s foreign representation in the 1890s and the budget conflict of 1895/​ 96 complicated the issue further. Between 1892 and 1899, three different German minister residents represented Sweden-​Norway in Tangier. Foreign Minister Ludvig Douglas complained about the situation in July 1899, three months before he resigned over Oscar’s acceptance of the Norwegian parliament’s decision to remove the Union badge from the Norwegian flag. According to Douglas, it was inappropriate that the consulate general in Tangier was still, and for an indefinite period, maintained by a foreign representative. His intervention seems surprising, considering the 77

‘angående förhöjning af kontorsanslag till generalkonsulatet i Tanger’, Ministerial protocol No. 7, 18 April 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 78 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 403.

126 CHAPTER 3 fact that he had done nothing about it during his first four years in office, but it resulted in a new discussion on the matter nonetheless. While the Swedish Board of Trade supported Douglas’s position, the Norwegian government and its Norwegian Department of the Interior opposed him in an unusually obdurate manner. The Norwegians pointed out that Norway’s interests in Morocco were minor, and that there had been no well-​founded complaint about the German consuls in Tangier from the shipping industry. Therefore, they did not consider the foreign minister’s concerns substantial enough for them to support any changes. Similar to the above-​mentioned case of expenses stemming from the involvement in the Mixed Courts in Egypt, the Swedish foreign minister then pushed through the reannouncement of the position in Tangier, ignoring the explicit reservations of the Norwegian members of the cabinet.79 This is but one example of how the Swedish side adopted an increasingly confrontational attitude to consular and diplomatic matters, particularly during the tenure of Foreign Minister Douglas. As mentioned in the previous chapter, the other two traditional consulates on the Barbary coast had been combined into one district, with Tunis as a vice consulate under the consulate general in Algiers in 1882. In Algiers, the Swedish merchant Johan Adolf Nordström had been consul since the year before the merger. In 1887, he was appointed consul general.80 Nordström served for fourteen years and enjoyed a good reputation. This is reflected in the public obituary issued by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, in which he was described as a ‘very capable and hardworking man who provided considerable services to the two countries that he represented, in particular with regard to the export of woodproducts’.81 It was only several months after his death in December 1895 that criticism both of him and the decision to relegate the consulate in Tunis and put it under his authority appeared.82 Among other things, it was revealed that Nordström had committed book-​keeping fraud.83 Following Nordström’s death, Foreign Minister Douglas ordered the secretary of the Swedish-​Norwegian legation in Paris, Count Herman Wrangel, to 79

‘Angående svenska och norska generalkonsulsbefattningens i Tanger kungörande till ansökning ledig.’, Ministerial protocol No. 22, 29 September 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 80 ‘Konsuln i Alger J.A. Nordströms ansökan att blifva utnämnd till Generalkonsul.’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 4 February 1887, Vol. 30, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 81 ‘Dödsfall’, Tidning för Venersborgs stad och län, 6 December 1895. 82 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 387. 83 ‘Angående gäldande af konsulskassans medel af ett utaflidne Generalkonsulns J.A. Nordström icke redovisadt belopp (återbetalda hamnafgifter, erlagda i Oran)’, Ministerial protocol No. 9, 12 March 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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carry out an inspection of the consulate general in Algiers and inquire whether there was reason to reconsider the ordering of the consular district as laid out in 1882. Douglas reported to the members of the joint cabinet that a request for the reestablishment of the consulate in Tunis had been presented to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs by the company Essviks Aktiebolag in August 1893.84 Wrangel was a member of the Swedish nobility, and would serve as Swedish ambassador in London (1906–​1920) and as Swedish foreign minister (1920–​ 1921) after the dissolution of the Union.85 He travelled to Algiers and Tunis immediately, and sent his report to Stockholm only three months later. Wrangel argued decisively that the district should be separated again for various reasons. The first one was the particularly poor communication between Algiers and Tunis. Wrangel wrote that it could take almost a week to receive an answer via letter, which naturally created problems in urgent cases. He described the work of the authorities in the French protectorate of Tunisia as ‘indescribably slow’. Wrangel argued that this made a consul who would safeguard the interests of his fellow countrymen engaging in direct relations with local authorities particularly necessary. He presented further arguments, such as the rising timber exports to Tunis and the decrease in Swedish-​Norwegian shipping in Algeria resulting from the exclusive cabotage rights of France. Wrangel also criticized the reasons behind the elevation of Algiers to the rank of consulate general presented by Nordström in 1886 as ‘seeming rather than real’. Nordström had stated correctly that only a consul general could become a member of the local International Health Board, but Wrangel pointed out that this not only lacked relevance to Swedish-​Norwegian shipping but was also only true for the eldest consul general in town, in this case the British one, which was why Nordström had never joined the Board in any case. The only international task ever assigned to Nordström had been to oversee the local consular graveyard. Only Austria-​Hungary, Great Britain, Portugal, Spain and Denmark had consul generals in Algiers, while Russia, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Belgium, the United States, Brazil and Greece were all represented by regular consuls. Wrangel also noted that the salary granted to Nordström did not allow the postholder to ‘hold the position a consulate general enjoyed in a fairly exotic country such as Algeria with the necessary dignity’. Undoubtedly, Wrangel concluded, Sweden-​Norway would be served well 84 85

‘Angående ledigheten af svenska och norska generalkonsulatet i Alger.’ Ministerial protocol No. 9, 12 March 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Vem var det? Biografier över bortgångna svenska män och kvinnor samt kronologisk förteckning över skilda ämbetens och tjänstens innehavare (Stockholm:  Kongl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1944), 208.

128 CHAPTER 3 enough by a regular consul, and he proposed that Algiers and Tunis become two separate consulates again. In March 1897 the minister to Paris, Frederik Knut Due, presented a formal request to the government, on the basis of Wrangel’s report, for the reversal of the changes made to the consular districts of Algiers and Tunis 15 years earlier.86 In an attempt to support Wrangel’s suggestion, the Board of Trade provided statistics which illustrated the full extent of the decline of shipping in Algiers during the first half of the 1890s. Over that period, the number of Swedish-​ Norwegian ships visiting the district had decreased by more than 75%. The numbers for the port of Algiers itself were a 70% decrease in ships and a 50% decrease in tonnage between 1891 and 1895. Tunis, on the other hand, had witnessed a significant increase, from an average of three ships in the five-​year period between 1870 and 1874 and four ships in 1877–​1880 to an average of 16,2 ships in the first half of the 1890s. With this, Tunisia accounted for roughly 30% of the shipping in the district, but the value of Swedish-​Norwegian exports into Tunis increased from 75,670 to 321,517 kronor, accounting for 45%. The BoT also pointed out that Swedish products made up about 80% of the total export value, and therefore supported Wrange’s and Due’s recommendations. Typically, the Norwegians disagreed, and rejected both Wrange’s report and the position of the BoT, arguing instead that Tunis and Algiers were both of little significance to Swedish-​Norwegian shipping and commerce as a result of France’s special rights in the area. But, once again, Foreign Minister Douglas pushed through the decision with the support of the Swedish members of the joint cabinet and against the opposition of their Norwegian counterparts.87 Only weeks after the formal decision to re-​establish the consulate in Tunis, negotiations commenced with France on the relations between Sweden-​ Norway and the French protectorate of Tunisia. The French government had first proposed negotiations in December 1896, with the goal of replacing the old bilateral treaties that the former Ottoman Beylik (province) of Tunis had signed with Sweden and Denmark-​Norway in 1736 and 1751 respectively. The French had entered similar negotiations with most Western powers as a response to the end of the traditional consular jurisdiction in Tunis and Algeria in 1883.88 France offered Sweden-​Norway the status of Most Favoured Nation. Minister Due wrote from Paris that the declaration offered by the French 86

‘Angående ledigheten af svenska och norska generalkonsulatet i Alger.’ Ministerial protocol No. 9, 12 March 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 87 ‘Angående ledigheten af svenska och norska generalkonsulatet i Alger.’ Ministerial protocol No. 9, 12 March 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 88 Lippmann, Die Konsularjurisdiktion im Orient, 109–​110.

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government was similar to those it had already signed with Switzerland and Russia, and which it had also offered to other Western nations. Due explained that Britain was the only power that had rejected the negotiations, because its existing treaty had been concluded in 1845 and was not as outdated as most others. The French offer of Most Favoured Nation guaranteed Sweden-​Norway the tariff rate of 8% ad valorem that the British had negotiated in their treaty. Due therefore suggested that Stockholm accept the French offer. The Swedish ministries of finance and of public administration immediately agreed to the French proposal. The Norwegian government accepted as well, but not without making it clear in the joint cabinet that its own bilateral relations with Tunis were of little significance. It provided a report containing detailed statistics on trade and shipping that the Norwegian Department of the Interior had drafted. The report pointed out that one could assume that most imports into Tunis were of Swedish origin, although official Tunisian statistics did not distinguish between Swedish and Norwegian products. Norway’s trade, on the other hand, was made up of little more than the modest exports of horseshoe nails and stockfish.89 This is another practical example of how the Norwegians increasingly distinguished between their own interests and those of the Union as a whole over the course of the 1890s. Foreign Minister Douglas himself only asked the French government for a minor supplement, and concluded the discussion in the joint cabinet with reflections on the position of Sweden-​Norway in the international order: The proposal for a regulation of the relations between the United Kingdoms [of Sweden-​Norway] and the now effectively French ruled protectorate of Tunisia as made by the French side has thus received support from the concerned authorities in both Sweden and Norway. I too can only recommend accepting it. Similar treaties –​ some of which are identical –​have been agreed between France and a majority of Europe’s nations which unconditionally guarantees Swedish-​Norwegian subjects in Tunis treatment equal to that enjoyed by the subjects of the Most Favoured Nation in every regard. We can not ask or aspire for more than that.90 89 90

‘Angående undertecknande af en deklaration med Frankrike rörande ordnande af de Förenade Rikenas traktatförhållanden med Regentskapet Tunis.’ Ministerial protocol No. 14, 4 May 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Angående undertecknande af en deklaration med Frankrike rörande ordnande af de Förenade Rikenas traktatförhållanden med Regentskapet Tunis.’ Ministerial protocol No. 14, 4 May 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

130 CHAPTER 3 The declaration was presented to the Swedish Riksdag and the Norwegian Storting and ratified on 18 August 1897.91 The Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in Tunis was taken up by Carl Gustaf Hjalmar Rosenlund four months later. Rosenlund had been vice consul in La Goulette, the port of Tunis, since 1885. He was ranked first among three candidates by the Swedish Board of Trade, not least thanks to a letter of strong support from the commander of the Swedish corvette hms Balder. The Norwegian Department of the Interior preferred the Norwegian merchant Georg Adolf Andreasen, who was supported by the stock exchange committees of Kristiania, Skien, Kristiansand and Stavanger. Foreign Minister Douglas opted for the Swedish proposal and gave Rosenlund’s long service as vice consul as reason.92 The appointment was in line with the increasing erosion of the consensus between Sweden and Norway. But this was probably not the only reason. Tradition may have been a factor as well, since the post had been held by Swedes, most notably by the Tulin family, since 1737, with only one exception. The decision to re-​establish the consulate in Tunis proved a good one. In 1902, five years into his term, Rosenlund reported a doubling of Swedish-​ Norwegian exports from 461,369 to 887,323 francs and a tripling of shipping from 10 ships carrying 8,683 tons to 33 ships and a tonnage of 30,237. His request for an office allowance of 7,000 kronor and the elevation of Tunis to the rank of consulate general was nonetheless rejected unanimously by the Swedish and Norwegian authorities.93 The twists and turns regarding the consulates in Algiers and Tunis in the 1890s illustrate several issues relevant to the central argument of this book. They demonstrate that prestige often outweighed commercial interests in the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service. Consuls and consular candidates were often more interested in the social status of the position than the actual role itself. Decision-​makers in Stockholm and Kristiania, for their part, regularly accepted justifications that had little relevance to the interests of Swedish and Norwegian commercial actors when they appointed consuls. This was the result of the limited resources of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, a lack 91

‘Angående ratifikation för de Förenade Rikenas del af en deklaration med Frankrike rörande ordnande af de Förenade Rikenas traktatförhållanden med regentskapet Tunis.’ Ministerial protocol No. 24, 18 August 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 92 ‘Angående besättande af nyupprättade svenska-​ norska konsulsbefattning i Tunis.’ Ministerial protocol No. 35, 31 December 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA and Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 388. 93 ‘Svenske och norske konsulns i Tunis framställning om höjande af kontorsanslaget och konsulatets upphöjande till generalkonsulat.’ Ministerial protocol No. 21, 12 August 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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of economic competence, and poor communication between centre and periphery. The various examples discussed above also illustrate the growing dissonance between Sweden and Norway and demonstrate that the Ministry for Foreign Affairs perceived the consular service as a means of maintaining its rightful place in the European concert. In South Africa, Cape Town had been gaining significance to Swedish-​ Norwegian shipping and trade since the establishment of a consulate in 1839. A growing number of Scandinavians had settled in the area, and the consulate was elevated to the rank of consulate general in 1877. Seven years later, inquiries into the local conditions were launched following the death of the longstanding consul general Carl Gustaf Åkerberg, who had held the post for nineteen years. The inquiries showed that the region was more important to Swedish than to Norwegian shipping. Between 1880 and 1884, an average of 84 Swedish vessels with a tonnage of 30,203 tons and 49 Norwegian vessels with a tonnage of 17,669 tons generated an estimated 2,123 kronor in consular fees as income for the consul general.94 This was a tenfold increase compared to the early 1870s. There were two reasons for this development: first, Sweden’s increasing trade relations with East India, in which Cape Town played an important role as a waystation, and second, Sweden’s direct trade with the Cape Colony. But neither the Board of Trade nor the Norwegian Department of the Interior requested a budget increase in this case, even though they were aware of the fact that the Consular Committee of 1875 had based its recommendation not to assign the consulate in Cape Town any allowance or salary on the modest numbers of the early 1870s.95 The filling of the Cape Town vacancy in 1886 is exceptionally interesting. There were two particularly promising candidates: the merchant Anders Ohlsson and the acting consul Karl Vilhelm Lithman, both of Swedish origin. 96 Ohlsson had settled in the city in 1864 and was a successful businessman and politician. He established Ohlssons Cape Breweries Limited and developed it into one of South Africa’s most important breweries; he was elected to the parliament of the colony in 1884.97 Ohlsson was supported by the Board of 94 95 96 97

The Norwegian Department of the Interior provided slightly higher numbers for Swedish shipping during that five-​year period (497 vessels with a tonnage of 188,341) and therefore projected 2,500 kronor in annual consular fees. ‘Ledighet af svenska och norska konsulatet i Kapstaden.’ Ministerial protocol No. 4, 29 January 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Återbesättande af generalkonsulsbefattningen i Kapstaden.’ Ministerial protocol No. 17, 22 October 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Michael G.  Ryan, ‘Anders Ohlsson, Brewer and Politician:  1881–​94’, BA dissertation (University of Cape Town, 1976), chapter ii.

132 CHAPTER 3 Trade on the basis of recommendations from the trade and navigation committees of Stockholm and Carlshamn and because of his superior social and economic position in Cape Town. But Lithman, on his part, received support from the committees of Gothenburg, Gefle, Malmö and Sundsvall, and was also described as a safe option by the stock exchange committee of Kristiania because he had taken over the business of the former consul general, Carl Gustaf Åkerberg. Lithman was also credited for his seven years as vice consul and was therefore ranked first by the Norwegian Department of the Interior, which ignored Ohlsson, who apparently was completely unknown in Norway. Both Ohlsson and Lithman provided testimonies from ship commanders who had visited Cape Town, and from Swedes and Norwegians living both in South Africa and in Sweden and Norway. Lithman also provided a letter of support from an official of the British colonial authorities. Interestingly, Foreign Minister Albert Ehrensvärd (the elder) explained his preference for Ohlsson by drawing on the written testimonials of three Swedish naval commanders, Otto Lagerberg, Carl Christian Engström and Mauritz Per von Krusenstjerna, and not on the candidate’s economic or political standing in the colony. Contrary to similar situations during that period, where the opinions of the Swedish and Norwegian authorities conflicted, all members of the joint cabinet accepted Ehrenvärd’s argument and supported his decision in proposing the appointment of Anders Ohlsson as consul general in Cape Town.98 It would prove a wise decision, and Ohlsson served in that position for twenty years.99 After six decades, during which time Cape Town was the only Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in the southern part of the African continent, a second one was established in Johannesburg in 1897. In the second half of the nineteenth century there were several colonies in the territory of present-​day South Africa. The most important ones were the British Cape Colony, the Dutch Orange Free State and the Republic of South Africa, also known as Transvaal, which was an independent and internationally recognized country. Johannesburg was a young city, founded in 1886 as a result of the discovery of gold in Transvaal and the following gold rush.100 98

‘Återbesättande af generalkonsulsbefattningen i Kapstaden.’ Ministerial protocol No. 17, 22 October 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 99 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 361. 100 For the history of South Africa, see Carolyn Hamilton, Bernard K. Mbenga and Robert Ross (eds.), The Cambridge History of South Africa, Volume I: From Early Times to 1885 (Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 2010); Robert Ross, Anne Kelk Mager and Bill Nasson (eds.), The Cambridge History of South Africa, Volume II:  1885–​1994 (Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 2011)  and Thomas R.  Davenport and Christopher Saunders, South Africa: A Modern History (London: Macmillan, 2002).

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The Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm had considered establishing a consulate in the Dutch-​dominated Transvaal for years, but had lacked reliable information about the number of Swedes and Norwegians living there and about the extent of the trade between Sweden-​Norway and Transvaal.101 This information was eventually provided by Erik Wadner, the first ever recipient of the above-​mentioned Johnsonska stipend. In February 1896 Wadner sent a report to the Ministry on behalf of Swedes and Norwegians living in the area. Wadner argued that a consul could support the local Scandinavians ‘with words and deeds’, and that both Sweden and Norway already had ‘fairly substantial mercantile relations’ with Transvaal. He added that most European states had already established a presence of some kind in Transvaal. Thus, Wadner concluded, there were various reasons for such an appointment. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm requested further and more detailed information from Wadner, particularly on the prospects of Swedish and Norwegian exports to Transvaal. Wadner was not able to provide exact numbers on the existing trade but claimed that there were at least 2,000 Swedes and Norwegians living in Johannesburg and its surroundings. In the spring of 1896, the Foreign Ministry received two additional letters in favour of a consulate in Transvaal, one from Consul General Ohlsson in Cape Town and one from the prominent Swedish physician Frans Lindblom, who had settled in South Africa in 1891 and moved to Johannesburg two years later.102 Both the Board of Trade and the Norwegian government immediately supported the initiative, and the decision was taken to establish an unsalaried consulate with no allowance.103 Seven months later, in September 1897, the 32-​year-​old Norwegian merchant Cato Nicolai Benjamin Aall was appointed as the first Swedish-​Norwegian consul to Johannesburg. Aall was a member of a prominent Norwegian family, and the great-​great-​grandson of the famous merchant Nicolai Aall. Cato Aall also held a commercial stipend awarded by the Norwegian government.104 Aall 101 For the reports from South Africa, see Vol. 12 (1881–​1900 Freetown 1891, 1894; Jamestown 1881–​1899; Johannesburg 1898–​1900; Kapstaden, 1881–​1900; Port Louis 1881–​1899), 6 (Brittiska riket i Afrika), E2FB (Skrivelser från konsuler 1881–​1901), UD/​ KfubH, RA. 102 On Lindblom, see Alfred Levertin, ‘Frans Peter Lindblom’, i Albin Hildebrand and Alfred Levertin (eds.), Svenskt porträttgalleri. Band 13, Läkarekåren (Stockholm:  Tullberg, 1899), 268. 103 ‘Angående upprättande af ett svenskt och norskt konsulat i Johannesburg.’ Ministerial protocol No. 5, 5 February 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 104 ‘Angående besättande af nyupprättande svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Johannesburg.’ Ministerial protocol No. 26, 16 September 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA.

134 CHAPTER 3 served for two years, then moved to Tokyo in 1904, where he was appointed Norwegian consul in 1919.105 Although neither the establishment of the Johannesburg consulate nor Aall’s appointment were controversial, it is telling that the authorities in Sweden and Norway had to make these decisions without having reliable statistics about the existing trade or the prospects for future trade at hand. The Norwegian citizen Ernst Bernhard Suhrke, one of the two rejected applicants in the first appointment procedure, became Aall’s successor in February 1900. Suhrke was the only candidate this time, and even four years younger than Aall had been at the time of his appointment.106 The post in Johannesburg was not interesting or lucrative enough to attract strong candidates. The foremost reason for this was the Second Boer War, which was fought between the British and the two Dutch-​dominated Boer States, the Orange Free State and the South African Republic from October 1899 until May 1902. The British employed overwhelming numbers of troops after suffering initial losses, eventually forcing the Boers to surrender after two years of a hard-​fought guerrilla war. As a result of the war, Transvaal and the Orange Free State became British colonies.107 The Swedish-​Norwegian government reacted to the outcome of the war by adding the new British colony of Orange River to the district of the Johannesburg consulate in October 1904. The Swedish Board of Trade believed that the integration of the formerly independent Boer states into the British Empire was very likely to lead to a brisk and sweeping period of development, and to open up ‘much greater opportunities for the sale of certain Swedish products than it had been the case hitherto’.108 Four months earlier, the British minister in Stockholm, William Barrington, had informed the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs that his government rejected representatives who had been accredited by the Boer states, forcing Suhrke to resign from his position in Johannesburg.109 Suhrke would nonetheless return in a similar role within a short time. In July 1906, the British government approved him as consul of Norway.110 105 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 361; Steenstrup (ed.), Hvem er hvem, 12. Available at http://​ runeberg.org/​hvemerhvem/​1930/​0012.html (accessed 6 December 2018). 106 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Johannesburg (Transvaal).’ Ministerial protocol No. 5, 8 February 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 107 Thomas Pakenham, The Boer War (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, c1979). 108 ‘Utvidgning af konsulatets i Johannesburg distrikt.’ Ministerial protocol No. 31, 14 October 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 109 ‘Afsked för konsuln i Johannesburg E.B. Suhrke.’ Ministerial protocol No. 22, 22 June 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 110 ‘Foreign Office, July 17, 1906’ The London Gazette, 20 July 1877. Available at https://​www. thegazette.co.uk/​London/​issue/​27933/​page/​4974 (accessed 6 December 2018).

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As mentioned earlier in this chapter, discussions about bringing in additional presence on the West African coast gained traction in conjunction with the Berlin Conference of 1884–​1885. Until then, the only Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in the area was located in Monrovia, the capital of the independent republic of Liberia. This consulate had been given to the local American consuls ever since its establishment in 1865, before the Dutchman Marinus Adrianus Aenmeij was appointed as the first non-​American in 1884. The BoT had earlier expressed its doubts regarding the need for a presence in Monrovia, but during the second half of the 1880s a growing number of proponents appeared. In early 1889, the Norwegian African Trading Company (atc) requested greater consular presence from the government and suggested the establishment of a consulate in Freetown in Sierra Leone. The company had started trading general goods, including gunpowder from the Norwegian manufacturer Nitedals Krudtverk, with Liberia since the beginning of the 1880s. It criticized the fact that Monrovia was the only consulate on a coast that stretched nearly 5,000 kilometres from Saint-​Louis in Senegal all the way to Cameroon. The atc complained that the situation did not meet the needs of Swedish-​Norwegian shipping, claiming that there was space for commercial growth. It also maintained that Scandinavian traders already received help from the Dutch consul in Freetown, Frederik Burman, who had declared his interest in taking care of a future Swedish-​Norwegian consulate. While the company’s suggestion to grant the consulate in Monrovia an office allowance was quickly rejected, the Swedish-​Norwegian government did follow up on the idea of a consulate in Sierra Leone and decided to offer the post of an unsalaried consul to Burman.111 Contrary to what the atc claimed, Burman rejected the offer. This delayed the appointment for another eighteen months. Burman recommended the British merchant Henry Burnett in his stead. Burnett received a positive testimonial from the Swedish-​Norwegian consul general in London, which outweighed the letter of recommendation from the captain of the Norwegian first-​class gunboat Ellida that his main competitor provided. Burnett was thus appointed as first Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Sierra Leone in December 1890.112 This quickly proved a bad decision. Burnett failed to provide the compulsory annual reports or the more detailed information about whether the new consulate actually ‘contributed to the development of our commercial

111 ‘Upprättande af ett konsulat i Freetown å Sierra Leonekusten.’ Ministerial protocol No. 7, 29 March 1889, Vol. 32, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 112 ‘Ang. besättande af konsulatet i Freetown.’ Ministerial protocol No. 19, 5 December 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

136 CHAPTER 3 and maritime relations’, as the records of his dismissal two years later stated.113 Failures were not unusual in peripheral consulates, as we have seen earlier. Burnett was replaced by George Alfred Williams, an agent of the Liverpool-​ based company Elder, Dempster & Co., without public announcement of the vacancy in 1893. Williams was considered to be of good standing, since the company he represented was in charge of all regular ship traffic between Sierra Leone and Great Britain.114 But the new appointment quickly proved as unfortunate as the first. Williams started travelling forth and back between Freetown and England a few months after his appointment, and left both his employer and Sierra Leone in 1895. He handed over the consulate to another Englishman, Th. Davey, who worked for the Sierra Leone Coaling Co. The Swedish-​Norwegian authorities did not react to this transfer until Davey applied officially for the post in November 1901, having held the title of acting consul for six years. 115 It certainly would not have been possible for an individual to act as consul without proper accreditation, had the consulate been more important than the one in Sierra Leone. But the fact that no one in Stockholm reacted to six years in post of an acting consul who was never accredited properly, nor to twelve years of maintaining a consulate that never provided a single annual report, illustrates the recurrently amateurish nature with which Sweden-​Norway operated in colonized areas it considered less important. In further contrast to the claims of the atc, Swedish-​Norwegian trade and shipping on the western coast of Africa never flourished. In fact, the company itself ceased to exist a few years later. Obviously, Sierra Leone had been a fruitless endeavour. In 1902 the consulate in Freetown was finally closed down. Foreign Minister Lagerheim prompted the decision rather laconically. He claimed that ‘it can be assumed that Norwegian shipping is utterly limited in the area since almost all regular traffic is going through Liverpool and Hamburg’ while admitting that he actually had no data at hand to substantiate the claim.116 There were also two smaller consulates, located on islands east and west of the African mainland: one in Port Louis in Mauritius and one in Jamestown in Saint Helena. Both islands were British Crown colonies. The Swedish-​Norwegian

113 ‘Angående afsked åt svenske och norske konsuln i Freetown, Sierra Leone H.  Burnett.’ Ministerial protocol No. 10, 29 March 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 114 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulatet i Freetown.’ Ministerial protocol No. 31, 24 November 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 115 ‘Svenske och norske konsuln i Freetown G.A. Williams’ skiljande från konsulsbefattningen.’ Ministerial protocol No. 17, 13 June 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 116 ‘Indragning af svenska och norska konsulatet i Freetown, Sierra Leone.’ Ministerial protocol No. 22, 12 August 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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consulates there existed throughout the period treated in this book. Both consulates were always held by the British. The decisions to establish them were made by the Swedish-​Norwegian Crown during the earlier phase of expansion, in 1843 and 1845 respectively. The consulate post in Jamestown was immediately filled by a local British merchant, William Carrol.117 Three members of the Carrol family held the post for 44 years. In 1887, William’s brother Charles Andrew Carrol wrote to Stockholm asking for some kind of gratification because he had run into economic troubles.118 By that time Charles had served as consul and vice consul for 25 years.119 Usually, pensions or other forms of remuneration in relation to retirement from the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service were only granted to salaried consuls. Carrol did not specify an amount but explained that he was unable to work and was ‘almost living in poverty’. The Swedish Board of Trade recommended the rejection of Carrol’s application, arguing that he had neither served Sweden-​Norway for a particularly long period of time nor had carried out duties important enough to merit such a reward. The Norwegian Department of the Interior acknowledged his dutiful work but still did not see any justification to deviate from the existing practice.120 Carrol’s successor, Saul Solomon, belonged to the most important business family in Saint Helena. His family’s conglomerate of companies was generally known as ‘Solomons’, and engaged in import and export, retail trade and wholesale businesses, as well as shipping business and financial services. The first member of the Solomon family arrived on the island in 1790. By the 1830s they were the only large-​scale employer apart from the government.121 Saul Solomon already represented Germany, Denmark, Austria-​Hungary, the Netherlands and Portugal as consul when he was appointed as Swedish-​Norwegian consul. He was a well-​respected businessman, and naturally received a positive testimonial from the Swedish-​Norwegian consul general in London. Solomon 117 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 360. For the correspondence see Vol. 5 (1858–​1880 S:t Helena: Jamestown), 1, E2FA, UD/​KfubH, RA. 118 ‘f.d. svenske och norske konsuln å St. Helena C. A. Carrols framställning om erhållande af en gratifikation.’ Ministerial protocol No. 13, 29 August 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 119 ‘Ang. återbesättande af konsulatet i Jamestown.’ Ministerial protocol No. 15, 26 August 1873, Vol. 16, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 120 ‘f.d. svenske och norske konsuln å St. Helena C. A. Carrols framställning om erhållande af en gratifikation.’ Ministerial protocol No. 13, 29 August 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 121 David L. Smallman, Quincentenary. A Story of St Helena, 1502–​2002 (Penzance: Patten, 2003), 65.

138 CHAPTER 3 held the consulate between 1888 and 1894.122 But Saint Helena remained insignificant to the Swedish-​Norwegian government, a fact stated in two later appointment procedures in 1897 and 1902. In both cases, the consulate was handed over to business partners within Salomon & Co. without public announcement of the vacancy.123 It becomes apparent from the many African examples treated in this chapter that consuls in less prestigious and economically negligible consulates such as Jamestown were at the bottom of the Swedish-​Norwegian foreign representation’s hierarchy. Conversely, this explains why such smaller consulates were more likely to be run badly, and why the expansion of Sweden-​Norway into the colonial peripheries of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries most often fell short. These official representatives of the Scandinavian kingdoms had little reason or opportunity to invest too much of their time into truly understanding and pursuing the interests of the state and the two countries they represented. The consulate in Port Louis remained vacant for eight years after its formal establishment before it was first taken over by Robert Stein in 1853. The Canton-​ based vice consul Robert Berry, who called himself ‘consul of East India’, had sent reports from Port Louis as early as 1815 and 1816, but was never formally appointed to a position in Mauritius.124 Robert Stein remained in the position for 25 years before he left it to his vice consul, William Henry Brougham Wilson, in 1878.125 Both Stein and Wilson worked as agents for Scott & Co., one of Mauritius’s premier firms at the time, and today the second oldest company on the island.126 When Wilson died eight years later, in 1886, the position was given to Robert Stein’s nephew, Hamilton. The Swedish-​Norwegian authorities initially wanted to appoint Hamilton Stein without public announcement, as was often the case in smaller, 122 ‘Beviljande af afsked åt svenske och norske konsuln å St. Helena C. A. Carrol och utnämning af efterträdare.’ Ministerial protocol No. 5, 9 April 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 123 ‘Angående afsked åt svenske och norske Konsuln i Jamestown, St. Helena, G.  W. Hogg, och befattningens återbesättande.’ Ministerial protocol No. 31, 26 November 1897, Vol. 40 and ‘Afsked för svenske och norske konsuln i Jamestown, St. Helena, W. J. Williams.’ Ministerial protocol No. 21, 12 August 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 124 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 361; Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce, 232. 125 For reports and correspondence from Port Louis, see Vol. 4 (1869–​1880 Mauritius: Port Louis), 1, E2FA and Vol. 12 (1881–​1900 Freetown 1891, 1894; Jamestown 1881–​1899; Johannesburg 1898–​1900; Kapstaden, 1881–​1900; Port Louis 1881–​1899), 6 (Brittiska riket i Afrika), E2FB (Skrivelser från konsuler 1881–​1901), UD/​KfubH, RA. 126 ‘ang. Konsuln i Port Louis R. Steins ansökning om afsked m.m.’ Ministerial protocol No. 8, 24 May 1878, Vol. 21, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. See also http://​www.scott.mu/​about-​us/​who-​ we-​are/​ (accessed 11 December 2018).

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peripheral places. But when two additional candidates emerged, the position was opened up for competition. 127 Stein’s chief competitor was Frederick Charles Estill, who was a partner of the prominent trading firm Blyth Brothers, itself an offshoot of the London-​based Blyth, Green, Jourdain & Co. The third candidate was the Port Louis-​based merchant Edward Cleather Fraser. Ultimately, the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities chose the safe option and appointed Hamilton Stein after all. The Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior were in agreement on the matter, and both ranked Stein ahead of Estill.128 Estill’s testimonials from prominent London businessmen could not match the prestige of Stein’s employer or the trust that had been built between his family and Swedish-​Norwegian authorities during the 25 years of his uncle’s service. When Hamilton Stein died 20 years later, the above-​mentioned Edward Fraser became his successor.129 We can easily recognize familiar patterns from the examples of Jamestown and Port Louis. In both Crown colonies the consulates were always held by British citizens and represented the most important firms on site. In both cases the consulate was basically inherited by business partners or family members of the first consuls. But neither the service of those consuls nor the trust they built with the authorities in Stockholm and Kristiania were significant enough to result in any kind of additional financial commitment on behalf of Sweden-​ Norway, as illustrated by their response to the downfall of Consul Charles Carrol in the 1880s. 3

Eastern and Southern Asia: Growth, Tension and Hesitation

During the last two decades of the nineteenth century, Swedish and Norwegian companies became increasingly interested in Eastern and Southern Asia as a potential export market. In 1885, the trade with the region was essentially as insignificant as the African trade. Sweden imported goods worth 1,080,000 kronor, or 0,31% of its total imports, from Eastern and Southern Asia. The imports comprised roughly two million kilograms of flaxseed and an equally large amount of sugar. None of the imports were transported on Swedish vessels,

127 ‘Ledighet af konsulsbefattningen i Port Louis å ön Mauritius.’ Ministerial protocol No. 17, 22 October 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 128 ‘Återbesättande af konsulsbefattningen i Port Louis å ön Mauritius.’ Ministerial protocol No. 13, 13 May 1887, Vol. 30, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 129 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 362.

140 CHAPTER 3 less than 15% on Norwegian ships and more than 85% on foreign ships.130 Norway imported nothing but small amounts of corn worth 80,800 kronor and colonial goods worth 100 kronor, which totalled 0,055% of its imports.131 Neither Norway nor Sweden exported anything to Eastern and Southern Asia at that time.132 Norwegian shipping, on the other hand, grew substantially. In the mid-​1880s, Southern and Eastern Asia accounted for 5,444,000 kronor or 3,35% of the shipping industry’s revenues, which was twice as much as Africa.133 Twenty years later, the numbers had increased sevenfold, to 31,409,100 kronor or 13,6%.134 Swedish trade with the region also looked much more promising. Imports from Eastern and Southern Asia to Sweden had been growing slowly but steadily since the turn of the century, from 1,612,783 kronor or 0,34% of the total imports, to 5,671,361 kronor or 0,97% of the total imports. Exports were developing in a similarly positive fashion, increasing from 122,406 kronor or 0,35%, in 1901 to 4,721,233 kronor or 1,05%.135 The most important import goods were oil and fat from China and rice from Japan. The most important export goods were paper, metals and wood pulp to Japan and China.136 With this, southern and eastern Asian trade still remained much more limited than African trade. Even so, Eastern Asia in particular was considered a more fruitful and increasingly prestigious market than Africa and moved into the orbit of the decision-​makers in Stockholm and Kristiania. August Christiernsson, who served as vice consul in Shanghai between 1874 and 1885, described China as a ‘centre of the ongoing expansion of international trade and shipping’ at the first Scandinavian navigation meeting in Gothenburg in May 1883.137 In contrast to Africa, this belief found expression in both increasing budgets and a 130 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Commerce collegii underdåniga berättelse för år 1885 (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1887), 74. 131 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Tabeller vedkommende Norges handel i aaret 1885 (Christiania: i kommission hos H. Aschehoug, 1886), 51. 132 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Commerce collegii underdåniga berättelse för år 1885 (Stockholm:  Kongl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1887), 79; Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges handel i aaret 1885, 155. 133 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges skibsfart 1885, ix. 134 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges skibsfart 1905, 9. 135 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Kommerskollegii underdåniga berättelse för år 1905 (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1906), 146. 136 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Kommerskollegii underdåniga berättelse för år 1905 (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1906), 142. 137 Myrstad, ‘Generalkonsulatet i Kina’, 62. Christiernsson published his speech, see August Bernhard Christiernsson, Om Skandinaviens handels  –​och sjöfartsintressen i Kina och angränsande länder.:[Föredrag med diskussion.] (Gothenburg, 1884).

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growing number of consuls of Swedish and Norwegian origin placed in the most important Asian consulates. The American connection and Russell & Co.’s grip on the consulate general in Shanghai, described in the previous chapter, ended when the last postholder from the Forbes family left the position in May 1883. Following his departure, the consulate general in China was filled with a non-​American for the first time since its establishment and entered a greater period of instability.138 The new postholder was Austria-​Hungary’s consul general, Josef von Haas, who initially was only asked to maintain the consulate general until Vice Consul Christiernsson returned from his leave of absence. When Christiernsson prolonged his leave for health-​related reasons, Foreign Minister Hochschild turned to another prominent alternative: Oscar Lagerheim, the son and brother of the two foreign ministers Elias and Alfred Lagerheim. Oscar Lagerheim had been a resident of Shanghai for years and had supported the Swedish-​Norwegian consular officials in various matters. He was first assigned the post of vice consul in November 1883, and half a year later was made consul general after von Haas was assigned to a position in Korea by the government of Austria-​Hungary. The decision was the result of deliberations about the pending instruction on the consular jurisdiction in China and other places. The Norwegian government in particular argued, furthermore, that it was important to have an adequate representative in Shanghai in times of growing tension, which shortly afterwards culminated in the Sino-​French War of 1884/​1885, but left it to Foreign Minister Hochschild to decide whether it was preferable to appoint a foreign consul general or a Swedish or Norwegian subject. Hochschild, on his part, expressed his general desire to appoint a fellow countryman since ‘a person of Swedish or Norwegian nationality can be expected to possess a greater interest in and knowledge of our relations than a foreigner’; he added that this was particularly true now that war was looming in the region.139 In 1884, the consular inspector Harald Ehrenborg recommended to Hochschild the permanent appointment of Oscar Lagerheim as the new 1 38 Myrstad, ‘Generalkonsulatet i Kina’, 55–​56. 139 ‘Angående upprätthållandet tillsvidare af generalkonsulsbefattningen i Shanghai.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 16 May 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA; Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 401. On the War itself, see Kwang-​Ching Liu and Richard J. Smith, ‘The Military Challenge: The North-​West and the Coast’, in John K. Fairbank and Kwang-​ Ching Liu (eds.), The Cambridge History of China. Vol. 11. Late Ch’ing, 1800–​1911, p. 2 (Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 1980), 251–​269. On the broader context of the decline of Qing China, see John K.  Fairbank, China: A New History (Cambridge, MA: Belknapp Press of Harvard University Press, 2006), ­chapter 11.

142 CHAPTER 3 consulate for all of East Asia, to be shared with Denmark. But Lagerheim died only two years later, at the age of 49, and the idea never materialized. In 1886, Hochschild’s successor, Albert Ehrensvärd (the elder), reappointed von Haas, who had returned from his post as commissioner of customs in Korea after only one year, as consul missus, and the Norwegian scientist and traveller Carl Alfred Bock as vice consul instead. Over the course of the following seven years, von Haas received the office allowance of 4,000 kronor as salary and focused on representative duties, while Bock received 12,000 kronor and took care of the daily consular routines and the practical issues relating to shipping and trade.140 Interestingly, both Russell & Co. and Schellhass & Co., the Hamburg firm that employed the Swedish-​Norwegian consul at Hong Kong, offered their representatives as alternatives to von Haas in 1886. The Foreign Ministry in Stockholm rejected these proposals because the Chinese government clearly expressed its refusal to fully accredit merchant consuls.141 The discussions following Lagerheim’s death reflected once more the conflict between the will to expand the consular service and the lack of resources to realize this goal. In June 1883, Foreign Minister Hochschild raised questions about a proposal of the Swedish Board of Trade to establish a salaried consulate general for all of East Asia with a total budget of 56,000 kronor. This would have made Shanghai by far the most expensive consulate. It would also have guaranteed the consul general in the Chinese metropole a salary 50% higher than that of the consul general in London. Considering the fact that London was the most important and profitable consulate, Hochschild obviously disagreed with this idea, and requested new statements from the Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior. In the end, the Foreign Ministry succeeded in suspending the reorganization of the consular service in Eastern Asia and preventing the suggested budget increase, despite the insistence of the Norwegians, who wanted to see a commitment.142 Once more, the Swedish-​Norwegian government ultimately displayed its inability to make a serious commitment by refusing to execute the proposal for a sharp budget

140 Myrstad incorrectly states that Ehrenborg suggested a shared vice consulate with Denmark, see Myrstad, ‘Generalkonsulatet i Kina’, 56. 141 ‘Ledighet af generalkonsulatet äfvensom af vice konsuls  –​och konsulatsekreterarebefattningen i Shanghai.’ Ministerial protocol No. 17, 22 October 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 142 ‘Ledighet af generalkonsulatet äfvensom af vice konsuls  –​och konsulatsekreterarebefattningen i Shanghai.’ Ministerial protocol No. 17, 22 October 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA.

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increase and make a substantial effort to extend commercial relations with China and East Asia. In 1893, Consul General von Haas retired for the second time and Carl Bock succeeded him as consul general. Bock had actively pushed for von Haas’s removal during a visit to Norway in the fall of 1892. In a letter to the head of the Norwegian Department of the Interior in Kristiania, Bock requested that he be appointed instead of von Haas, whom he criticized heavily. He described the existing situation as an obstacle to the future growth of Norwegian trade and shipping. Bock explained that the way the consulate general in Shanghai had been run, first by American merchant consuls and now by an unsalaried Austrian consul general and a salaried vice consul, was flawed. He suggested that the salaried official naturally should be given the rank of consul general and argued that the 18,000 kronor salary proposed by the third Consular Committee of 1891 was too low. Bock also asked for permission to accept the offer to become Danish consul with a salary of 6,000 kronor paid to him in 1888. The idea of a combined consul for Sweden-​Norway and Denmark in Shanghai had first been discussed in 1884, as mentioned above. According to Bock, the Danes would only request that he represent the interests of the Great Northern Telegraph Company (Det Store Nordiske Telegraf-​Selskab A/​S). It is noteworthy that Bock focused mainly on how Norway’s interests in China were being neglected, rather than those of the Union as a whole. Both the BoT and the DfI responded in February 1893 that a final decision could not be made because of the ongoing discussions about a separate Norwegian consular service, but supported Bock otherwise and decided to dismiss von Haas.143 Bock was also granted advance payment of his salary, which was very unusual.144 But his salary remained at 12,000 kronor –​ almost ten years after the Board of Trade had requested tripling it to 36,000 and seven years after the decision to reorganize the consular service in East Asia had been postponed on the initiative of Foreign Minister Ehrensvärd (the elder).145 There was consensus that Eastern Asia was important for the future of Sweden’s and Norway’s economies, but things stagnated nonetheless. Bock’s appointment was in stark contrast to the earlier system of American merchant consuls with excellent business ties in China. It also opposed the increasingly vocal calls for a 143 ‘Angående tillförordnande af generalkonsul i Shanghai.’ Ministerial protocol No. 5, 3 February 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 144 ‘Angående t.f. generalkonsulns i Shanghai framställning om ett förskott å löneförmåner.’ Ministerial protocol No. 7, 24 February 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 145 Contrary to the information provided by Almquist, the salary of the consul general at Shanghai was not raised to 24,000 kronor in 1893, see Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 401.

144 CHAPTER 3 consular service with strong economic expertise, because he was more of an adventurer than a businessman. Carl Bock was born to a Norwegian business family in Copenhagen in 1849 and grew up in Kristiansand. His family owned a cotton factory in Sweden. In 1868, aged 19, he left for Britain to work with the merchant Oscar Steweni, who was the Swedish-​Norwegian vice consul in Grimsby, a major port town on the east coast of England. The idea was that this working experience would prepare Bock for the family business. But when Steweni died in 1875, Bock left for London to study zoology and natural sciences. Three years later, he departed for journeys of discovery to East Asia, first to Sumatra and Borneo and later to Siam, Laos and China. Bock started publishing his impressions in the early 1880s and quickly made a name for himself as an explorer.146 He established friendly ties with powerful figures in East Asia, and his travels were carried out with the support of the governor general of the Dutch East Indies, Johan van Lansberge, and of King Chulalongkorn of Siam.147 As consul general, one of Bock’s first tasks was to initiate and secure a proper investigation into the murder of the first two Swedish missionaries to China, Anders Daniel Johansson and Otto Wikholm, which occurred in the merchant town of Songbu in Hubei province on 1 November 1893.148 The Mission Covenant Church of Sweden (mccs, Svenska Missionsförbundet) had first established itself in Wuhan in 1890 and had decided to operate in places in the hinterland which had not yet been visited by Christian missionaries. Johansson and Wikholm came to Songbu in 1892 and rented a shop, but were met with hostility and beaten to death by local martial arts fighters during a festival at midday a few months later. Bock investigated the matter and negotiated with the Chinese authorities, and two people were sentenced for murder and executed. More Swedish missionaries returned to Songbu, but six years later their church was razed and they were driven out of town again.149 Obviously, Bock was an excellent candidate to carry out such legal and diplomatic tasks, but doubts remained whether he was equally qualified 146 His most famous works were Carl Alfred Bock, The Head-​Hunters of Borneo: A Narrative of Travel Up the Mahakkam and Down the Barito: Also, Journeyings in Sumatra (Singapore, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985[1881]) and Temples and Elephants: Travels in Siam, 1881–​1882 (Singapore; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986[1884]). 147 Henning Siverts, ‘Carl Bock’, i Norsk biografisk leksikon. Available online at https://​nbl.snl. no/​Carl_​Bock (accessed 17 December 2018). 148 Bengt Johansson, Shanghai. Svenskars liv & öden 1847–​2012 (Hong Kong: Viking Hong Kong Publications, 2012), 27–​28. 149 William T. Rowe, Crimson Rain: Seven Centuries of Violence in a Chinese County (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, c2007), 41 and 221–​222.

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to provide the service and information on economic matters necessary to improve Swedish-​Norwegian commercial relations with China. In 1896, Bock had to leave the Danish post because the government in Copenhagen asked him to start working in support of Denmark’s shipping. Bock had never provided any information about the opportunities and future prospects for Danish shipping. He had only accepted the Danish offer because he had been convinced that he was only expected to work as a consul missus in order to support the Telegraph Company and Danish citizens in the region. He had therefore believed that the interests of Sweden-​Norway and Denmark would not conflict. As mentioned earlier, the Swedish-​Norwegian government did not want him to help a European rival. Swedish-​Norwegian shipping increased by almost 530% between 1887 and 1894, from 25,075 tons to 132,551 tons. According to Bock, the real numbers were even higher because many steamships traficated ports without vice consulates or visited Korea and Siberia, which formed an administrative district under the consulate general in Shanghai. The number he gave for 1895 was 238,410 tons, of which only 11,813 tons were carried by Swedish ships. Bock estimated the combined tonnage for all ports in the district from Vladivostok to Hong Kong at over 400,000 tons. He also reported that he spent much of his time supporting the ‘large number of missionaries and the annually increasing number of Swedes and Norwegians settling in the district’. Other tasks that took up his time included reporting seafolk, mediating between captains and crews and between crews and Chinese locals, and finding work for unemployed Swedish and Norwegian seamen. Bock described how busy his position had become: What concerns the missionaries, they require a lot of time and among other things, the number of letters from the Chinese [authorities] related to them was 74 in 1893, 159 in 1894 and 125 until October 1st in 1895. The Swedish and Norwegian citizens living in the country often ask for the consulate general’s council and support or raise concerns or claims against Chinese in time-​consuming matters. The total number of incoming and outgoing correspondence in 1894 was 922, excluding the Chinese, and in 1895 before October 1st 700.150 It was against this background that Bock requested a doubling of his salary from 12,000 to 24,000 kronor in the summer of 1896. Foreign Minister Ludvig 150 ‘Angående förlängning af den till t.f. svenske och norske Generalkonsuln i Shanghai, C. Bock, senast anslagna lön.’ Ministerial protocol No. 14, 27 June 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA.

146 CHAPTER 3 Douglas acknowledged Bock’s considerable workload but ultimately rejected his request. Instead, he followed the recommendation of the Norwegian consular committee and agreed to compensate Bock for the loss of his Danish salary, raising his salary by 50% to 18,000 kronor. Bock was also granted additional administrative support.151 Because of the ongoing controversy about the consular jurisdiction he was not, however, appointed ordinary consular general for another year.152 In October 1896 the clerk Emil Enhörning, another recipient of the Johnsonska stipend, was appointed as unsalaried vice consul in Shanghai. This was another way of keeping expenses low, because stipend holders usually did not receive a salary. But just three months later, Enhörning resigned from the post for health reasons stemming from the climate in China, and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm had to assign a salaried vice consul after all. In the correspondence between Consul General Bock and Foreign Minister Douglas, the right person for the post of vice consul was defined as a clerk or secretary of Swedish or Norwegian origin who was fully capable of taking charge in case of Bock’s absence, including essential legal matters.153 In January 1897, Carl Filip Alexander Hagberg was appointed as vice consul and Bock finally became ordinary consul general, although the issue of the consular jurisdiction still had not been solved.154 Hagberg proved capable. He strengthened his position when Bock refused to return to Shanghai after one year in Antwerp, where he had stepped in as acting consul, in November 1899. Bock also cited health issues, and was granted six months of leave of absence with full remuneration. When he requested a prolongation of his paid absence for another six months in March 1900, Foreign Minister Lagerheim suggested that he would give half of his salary to Hagberg. The Board of Trade even suggested that Bock be assigned two thirds of his salary, whereas the Norwegian Department of the Interior rejected any restitution and recommended granting his application for continued leave.155 Once again, conflict occurred along national lines. The Swedish foreign minister and 151 ‘Angående förlängning af den till t.f. svenske och norske Generalkonsuln i Shanghai, C. Bock, senast anslagna lön.’ Ministerial protocol No. 14, 27 June 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 152 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 401. 153 ‘Angående anställande af lönadt biträde vid svenska och norska generalkonsulatet i Shanghai.’ Ministerial protocol No. 20, 9 October 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 154 ‘Angående t.f. generalkonsul Bocks utnämning till generalkonsul i Shanghai.’ Ministerial protocol No. 3, 29 January 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 155 ‘Angående ytterligare tjenstledighet för svenske och norske generalkonsuln i Shanghai C. Bocks.’ Ministerial protocol No. 14, 11 May 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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the Swedish authorities wanted to punish a Norwegian consul, while the Norwegian authorities lent him their support. Later that year, the BoT voiced harsh criticism of the high salary that Bock received, despite his continued absence from Shanghai, and suggested cutting it by 75%.156 Time did not stand still just because Bock stayed in Europe, and Hagberg faced serious challenges. On 27 July 1900, Hagberg requested that a Swedish-​Norwegian battleship be dispatched to China following reports about the Chinese army attacking foreign legations in Beijing. Both the Norwegian government and Foreign Minister Lagerheim rejected this idea because they feared that such a move could easily result in a war with China. Lagerheim acknowledged Hagberg’s warning that Shanghai may need protection from a Chinese attack may very well be correct, but the responsibility for that is first and foremost that of the European powers that have large material interests to protect. No measures for the protection of Swedish or Norwegian trade or shipping in China in general have been proposed [by Consul Hagberg], which is the only condition under which I could have advised Your Majesty to inquire the opportunity of sending a battleship to Chinese waters. Under these conditions, I suggest that the request of the acting consul general may not lead to any measure.157 In January 1902, after Hagberg had been acting consul general in Shanghai for three and a half years, and with Bock now provisionally in charge of the consulate general in Lisbon, Bock’s salary was finally completely assigned to Hagberg. According to §115 of the consular regulation (Vikaries arfvode under vakans), acting consuls were only to receive two thirds of their regular salary, but the Norwegian government successfully argued that such a provision was null and void after such a long period of absence.158 It was also decided that the consular secretary, Sigurd Theodor von Goës, would receive the vice consul’s salary of 9,000 kronor.159 Bock was formally discharged from both his permanent position as consul general in Shanghai and his temporary position in Lisbon in

156 ‘Angående ytterligare tjenstledighet för svenske och norske generalkonsuln i Shanghai C. Bocks.’ Ministerial protocol No. 39, 7 December 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 157 ‘Angående ifrågasatt utsändande af krigsfartyg till Kina.’ Ministerial protocol No. 26, 8 August 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 158 Förordning angående konsulatväsendet 1886, 44. 159 ‘Angående aflöning åt t.f. generalkonsuln i Shanghai och t.f. konsulatbiträdet därstädes.’ Ministerial protocol No. 2, 11 January 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

148 CHAPTER 3 December 1902, four years after he had left China.160 Hagberg was appointed ordinary consul general four months later.161 He would be the last consul of Sweden-​Norway in Shanghai and would become the first solely Swedish one when the union between the two countries was dissolved two years later. The fact that it took four years of discussion and growing irritation before Bock was formally discharged is further indication of the ineffectiveness of Sweden-​ Norway’s diplomatic and consular bureaucracy at the time. Throughout the 1890s, the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities discussed Shanghai as part of a strategy for all of East Asia. As part of this, Japan played an increasingly important role. Japan initially belonged to the district of the consulate general in Shanghai between 1867 and 1870. Sweden-​Norway was one of the last Western powers to agree a treaty with the Japanese in 1868, ten years after the United States, the Netherlands, Russia, Britain and France had signed the so-​called ‘Ansei Five-​Power Treaties’.162 In November 1870 the interests of Sweden-​Norway were put into the care of the Netherlands, which was represented by commercial agents in Yokohama, Tokyo, Nagasaki, Osaka and Hiogo.163 When the Swedish-​Norwegian government negotiated a revision of the treaty of friendship and commerce with the Japanese government in 1886, it concluded that Japan was not of particular significance to either shipping or trade. But, just like every other Western power, the belief in future development and the will to establish a presence prevailed. Sweden-​Norway modelled its strategy for Japan against the actions of the larger European powers, just like it did in the cases of expansion into Africa or China. In most cases, the European powers attempted to present a unified front against the Japanese. When the Japanese government attempted to negotiate varying tariff deals with the Western powers in 1878, Germany’s chargé d’affaires in Japan, Felix Freiherr von Gutschmid, responded on behalf of his government that this was incompatible with the common interests of the Europeans. Von Gutschmid also offered representatives of Sweden-​Norway to help coordinate efforts and negotiate with the Japanese together; an offer Stockholm immediately accepted. When the negotiations between Germany, Britain and Japan broke down in December 1881, the Dutch minister resident

160 ‘Afsked med expektansarfvode åt generalkonsuln i Shanghai C.A. Bock.’ Ministerial protocol No. 31, 19 December 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 161 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 401. 162 Michael R.  Auslin, Negotiating With Imperialism:  The Unequal Treaties and the Culture of Japanese Diplomacy (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004), 211. See also Ottosson, ‘Kanonbåtsdiplomati med förhinder’. 163 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 399–​400.

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Joannes Jacobus van der Pot turned down the Japanese treaty proposal on behalf of Sweden-​Norway as well. In early 1882, the representatives of the European powers convened in Yokohama to discuss a common strategy on the basis of the latest deal that the Japanese had struck with Austria-​Hungary. When a first proposal was circulated and discussed in Sweden and Norway, the Swedish Board of Trade remarked that it contained substantial tariff increases; but it pointed out that during the period 1868–​1881, only two Swedish vessels had visited Japan and that there actually was little reason to believe in substantial growth. It was nevertheless important, the memorandum remarked, that Sweden should enjoy the same conditions granted to European powers with greater commercial interests in Japan. The Norwegian Department of the Interior essentially viewed the negotiations in a similar way, stating that Norway’s shipping and commercial interests in Japan were very limited, but that it was important to receive Most Favoured Nation status nonetheless.164 A first breakthrough in the negotiations occurred in October 1884, when the Japanese government presented a treaty that convinced the German government in Berlin. But the treaty proposal set certain conditions for Most Favoured Nation status, which led the Netherlands, Sweden-​Norway, Russia and Britain to reach a consensus that they would ultimately reject it. The final deal agreed upon at a later stage was not completely satisfactory from the Swedish-​ Norwegian point of view either, because it included higher tariffs for potential future export products. But it was ultimately accepted for the same reason that earlier proposals had been rejected, namely a harmonious European approach to Japan: The trade and shipping of the United Kingdoms [of Sweden-​Norway] in Japan is not of such significance that we for these reasons should separate ourselves from the other [European] powers, which have seen it necessary to oblige Japan’s wishes, although these concessions without doubt may lead to noticeable burdens to the commercial interests of the larger powers. A refusal to align with the other European powers would surely be viewed by the Japanese as a lack of good will … The main objective of our treaty relations with Japan, which was kept in sight when the Ministry for Foreign Affairs negotiated [the original treaty], is in my view that the United Kingdoms [of Sweden-​Norway] under all circumstances 164 ‘Revision af vänskaps-​, handels –​och sjöfartstraktat med Japan.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 5 June 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. For the earlier correspondence between the Dutch consulate in Yokohama and the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs, see Vol. 12 (1870–​1880 Japan: Kanagawa, Yedo, Yokohama), 3, E2FA, UD/​KfubH, RA.

150 CHAPTER 3 table 6

Development of Swedish-​Norwegian shipping in Japan from 1870–​1895

Norwegian steamships 1870 0 /​0 1895 238 /​235,703 tons

Swedish steamships

Norwegian sailing ships

Combined numbers

0 /​0 3 /​2,910 tons

6 /​449 tons 6 /​3,445 tons

6 /​449 tons 247 /​242,058 tons

are guaranteed an equally favourable treatment as any other nation, and it actually seems as if this objective will be achieved because the Tokio Conference has adopted our view that the status of Most Favoured Nations must be guaranteed without any restrictions.165 Another decade, during which the Dutch minister residents represented Sweden-​Norway, would pass before the potential for trade and shipping in Japan was reconsidered anew in 1897. The main reason was that Norwegian shipping grew rapidly during that period. In 1870 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping in Japan comprised only 6 Norwegian vessels carrying 449 tons. Twenty-​five years later, the numbers had skyrocketed to 247 ships carrying 242,058 tons. Almost 99% of the ships and tonnage was Norwegian.166 As part of his evaluations, Foreign Minister Douglas cited additional information provided by two holders of commercial stipends named Gadelius and Arnold, which confirmed that the outlook was very bright now that Japan was on the verge of opening up the whole country for trade. But in order to realize the potential, the young authors remarked, a reorganization of the consular service in Japan and all of East Asia was inevitable: In order to further the trade and shipping relations of the United Kingdoms [of Sweden-​Norway] in this quickly developing country, it is necessary to receive accurate and regular reports from there about the market conditions and the opportunities for Swedish and Norwegian 165 ‘Revision af vänskaps-​, handels –​och sjöfartstraktat med Japan.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 5 June 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 166 ‘Angående utskickande till Japan af ett särskildt ombud för att undersöka bästa sättet för organisation af de Förenade Rikenas representation derstädes.’ Ministerial protocol No. 16, 14 May 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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businessmen, as well as serve and effectively protect the interests of the subjects of the United Kingdoms in accordance with the law of the land, treaties or international law which they will not be able to exercise otherwise, in particular in a land where conditions ought to remain less stable for an extended period of time because of the transition from oriental despotism and stagnation to European civilization and progress and where, as a result of the suspension of the consular jurisdiction, the local administration of justice towards foreigners should be monitored carefully and eventual violations should be investigated.167 There had been discussions about the establishment of Swedish-​Norwegian consular representation in Japan since 1884. It was decided to integrate the country into the district of the Shanghai general consulate, but the question was not dropped from the agenda.168 In 1897, Foreign Minister Douglas and the various authorities in both Sweden and Norway were finally in agreement that the diplomatic and consular representation in China and Japan was in need of reorganization. Douglas complained about the lack of a proper examination of whether Sweden-​ Norway would be best served by a common mission for China and Japan or by new, separate representations in Japan, either of a diplomatic or consular nature. The foreign minister argued that the issue needed to be examined carefully by someone with intimate knowledge of the conditions in and relations between Sweden-​Norway, Japan and China. He proposed granting the envoy diplomatic status for the duration of his mission and dividing the expenses between the state budget and the consular fund.169 In May 1897, the Norwegian diplomat Ove Gude was assigned to this mission. Gude was the son of the renowned Norwegian painter Hans Gude. He had studied law in Kristiania and entered the diplomatic service in 1877. He was first appointed as clerk to the legation in Berlin in 1884 and seven years later to the legation in London. After he completed his mission to China and Japan in 1898, Gude moved on to become envoyé in Madrid (1897–​1902) and

167 ‘Angående utskickande till Japan af ett särskildt ombud för att undersöka bästa sättet för organisation af de Förenade Rikenas representation derstädes.’ Ministerial protocol No. 16, 14 May 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 168 ‘Angående tillsättande af en svensk-​norsk komité för utarbetande af förslag till instruktion rörande Konsulernes jurisdiktion i vissa länder.’ Ministerial protocol No. 3, 18 January 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 169 ‘Angående utskickande till Japan af ett särskildt ombud för att undersöka bästa sättet för organisation af de Förenade Rikenas representation derstädes.’ Ministerial protocol No. 16, 14 May 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

152 CHAPTER 3 then Copenhagen (1902–​1905).170 Gude started out his mission by consulting Swedish and Norwegian exporters, before leaving Europe for East Asia from Le Havre on 17 July 1897. The mission was initially intended to take six months but was eventually extended to one year.171 Gude travelled as ministre plénipotentiaire and visited Tokyo, Yokohama, Kobe, Kyoto and Nagasaki in Japan; Beijing, Tianjin, Chefoo (present-​day Yantai) and Shanghai in China; Hong Kong, Saigon and Singapore. He brought together the data he collected and published them in a six-​part report. The various parts dealt with the conditions for trade and shipping in Japan (part 1) and China (part 2), discussed Sweden’s and Norway’s trade with China and Japan (part 3), made proposals for Sweden-​Norway’s consular (part 4) and diplomatic (part 5) representation in East Asia, and concluded with a report on Sweden-​ Norway’s shipping in East Asia (6). The first three parts were published in the 1898 issues of the official Swedish and Norwegian trade journals Svensk Export and Beretningar om Handel og Söfart.172 For Japan, Gude proposed a salaried consulate general in Kobe, a salaried consulate in Nagasaki and two unsalaried consulates, one in Yokohama and one in Twatutia in Taiwan (which was under Japanese rule between 1895 and 1945). Kobe had passed Yokohama as the most important Japanese port in the early 1890s, but Norwegian shipping was struggling to compete with the British, German and Japanese, and needed the support of competent consuls. Gude noted that while Britain, Germany and the United States had professional consuls, and Russia, Spain and France had professional vice consuls in Kobe, Sweden-​Norway was part of a group of small states like Denmark, Belgium or Peru that were only represented by foreign merchant consuls.173 In China, his report proposed complementing the salaried consulate general in Shanghai with salaried consulates in Hong Kong and Tianjin. Gude also proposed setting up a salaried consulate in Singapore and appointing a commercial agent in Vladivostok. 170 Theodor Westrin (ed.), Nordisk familjebok: konversationslexikon och realencyklopedi. 10. Gossler–​Harris (Stockholm: Nordisk familjeboksförlag, 1909), 533. 171 ‘Angående förlängning af tiden för O.  Gudes mission spéciale till Japan och Kina.’ Ministerial protocol No. 3, 28 January 1898, Vol. 41, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 172 ‘Angående omreglering af de Förenade Rikenas konsulatväsen i Östasien.’ Ministerial protocol No. 27, 30 November 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 173 ‘Minister O. Gudes rapport öfveren honom i nåder anbefald resa till Japan och Kina för undersökning af bästa sättet för organisation af de Förenade Rikenas representation i dessa länder.’ Supplement No 1 to ‘Angående omreglering af de Förenade Rikenas konsulatväsen i Östasien.’ Ministerial protocol No. 27, 30 November 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA.

153

Disillusionment and Years of Conflict, 1884–1905 table 7

Budget for the consular service in East Asia proposed in the Gude Report (1898)

Consular Office Translator and salary allowance clerk/​secretary

Estimated Total consular fees

Kobe Yokohama Nagasaki

17,000 -​-​-​ 15,000

-​-​-​ -​-​-​ -​-​-​

1,000 2,000 1,000

1,500 1,200 2,000

19,500 3,200 18,000

Japan

32,000

0

4,000

4,700

40,700

Shanghai Hong Kong Tianjin

18,000 15,000 15,000

6,000 -​-​-​ -​-​-​

9,000 1,000 1,000

5,200 2,500 2,600

38,200 18,500 18,600

China

48,000

6,000

11,000

10,300

75,300

Singapore

16,000

3,000

-​-​-​

-​-​-​

19,000

TOTAL

96,000

9,000

15,000

15,000

135,000

Gude justified the substantial expansion he proposed by arguing that a consular service could only make a significant contribution to national interests in the areas of trade, shipping and jurisdiction if it was made up of Swedes and Norwegians serving their own countries, rather than foreigners, who most often put Swedish-​Norwegian interests second because they had to serve their own countries, who possessed no command of Scandinavian languages, who lacked knowledge of Swedish-​Norwegian trade customs and working methods, or who simply were not willing to allow foreign interests to interfere with their own. Gude stated that this was particularly true for East Asia, where much trade was done through invitation to tender. A foreign merchant consul, Gude explained, was unlikely to actively stimulate competition for a product that his own firm traded with by informing Swedish-​Norwegian manufacturers.174 174 ‘Minister O. Gudes rapport öfveren honom i nåder anbefald resa till Japan och Kina för undersökning af bästa sättet för organisation af de Förenade Rikenas representation i dessa länder.’ Supplement No 1 to ‘Angående omreglering af de Förenade Rikenas

154 CHAPTER 3 Gude also stated that the majority of the ship captains he had interviewed did not ask for more consulates, but for Scandinavian consuls of appropriate rank who could communicate with Swedish and Norwegian seafolk and enjoy the respect of Chinese and Japanese authorities, which vice consuls often lacked. Gude not only provided detailed statistics for every city he considered important to the future consular service in the area but also gave numerous examples of how both Swedish and Norwegian commercial interests and individual seamen in China and Japan suffered from inadequate communication or information passed on to them from the consuls. And these kinds of problems were believed to have grown as a result of the end of extraterritoriality and consular jurisdiction in Japan in 1899.175 Gude’s proposal was remitted to the Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior on 22 November 1898. The Norwegians responded in September 1899, more or less completely rejecting Gude’s grand plans. With regard to Japan, the DfI did accept Gude’s suggestion for a salaried consulate general in Kobe but refused to grant additional allowances elsewhere. It also considered unsalaried vice consulates in Yokohama and Nagasaki sufficient and saw no need for any consular presence in northern Japan and present-​day Taiwan. For China and the rest of the region it also rejected the proposed salaried consulates in Tianjin, Hong Kong and Singapore, as well as the idea of a commercial agent in Vladivostok. Instead of Gude’s 135,000 kronor budget, the DfI proposed assigning Japan as little as 22,000 kronor and the Shanghai consulate general only another 39,000 kronor.176 The head of the DfI, Ole Anton Qvam, explained at length the position both of his department and the Norwegian government after extensive exchanges with his country’s most important committees of commerce.177 While Qvam agreed with Gude on the necessity of appointing Swedish and Norwegian consuls instead of foreign merchant consuls, he described Gude’s budget proposals as ‘throughout too high’. He referred to a statement from the konsulatväsen i Östasien.’ Ministerial protocol No. 27, 30 November 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 175 ‘Minister O. Gudes rapport öfveren honom i nåder anbefald resa till Japan och Kina för undersökning af bästa sättet för organisation af de Förenade Rikenas representation i dessa länder.’ Supplement No 1 to ‘Angående omreglering af de Förenade Rikenas konsulatväsen i Östasien.’ Ministerial protocol No. 27, 30 November 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 1 76 ‘Angående omreglering af de Förenade Rikenas konsulatväsen i Östasien.’ Ministerial protocol No. 27, 30 November 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 177 On Qvam, see Anders Kirkhusmo, ‘Anton Qvam’, i Norsk biografisk leksikon. Available online at https://​nbl.snl.no/​Anton_​Qvam (accessed 17 December 2018).

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stock exchange committee in Kristiania, which pointed out that agents and brokers used the telegraph to provide ship owners with information about the conditions for freight ‘and other information of mercantile nature’ in a more effective way than consuls were able to do with their written reports. The committee in Kristiania also argued that the direct trade between Sweden, Norway and East Asia was too insignificant to justify increased spending on behalf of the state. The overall position of the Norwegians was therefore that the consular service’s role essentially was judicial and political rather than economic.178 Considering the longstanding Norwegian criticism of the lack of economic skills in the consular service, this verdict should be understood as its way of preventing growing costs and preparing the ground for renewed demands for a separate Norwegian consular service. The Board of Trade submitted a response from the Swedish Export Association (Sveriges exportförening), along with its own opinion, to the Foreign Ministry four weeks later, on 24 October 1899. The BoT was a little more ambitious than the Norwegian Department of the Interior, but not by much. It proposed a separate salaried consulate general for Japan in Kobe, supported Gude’s position on appointing consuls rather than vice consuls to Hong Kong, Tianjin, Yokohama and Nagasaki, and also agreed with the idea of using the recently established scholarship system for the appointment of a commercial agent in Vladivostok. But at the same time the BoT acknowledged that both Sweden’s shipping-​related interests in and trade with East Asia were still modest. The reorganization of the consular service in the area was therefore primarily to be conditioned on the basis of Norway’s shipping interests. Prime Minister Erik Gustaf Boström, who also was acting foreign minister in the fall of 1899, told King Oscar ii that ‘I view the arrangement suggested by the authorities as a minimum, but I am not prompted to object to the statements issued by the Norwegian side considering the fact that Norway’s interests in East Asia are predominant’. Boström therefore withheld his support for the establishment of four new salaried consulates in Nagasaki, Tianjin, Hong Kong and Singapore, the unsalaried consulate in Taiwan, and the commercial agency in Vladivostok that the Gude Report had proposed.179 He described it

178 ‘Gjenpart af den Kongelige norske regerings underdanigste indstilling af 29de september 1899 betræffende den fremtidige ordning af Norges og Sveriges repræsentation i Østasien.’ Supplement No 2 to ‘Angående omreglering af de Förenade Rikenas konsulatväsen i Östasien.’ Ministerial protocol No. 27, 30 November 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 179 The claim that the government followed Gude’s recommendation, as published in the Nordisk familjebok, is thus incorrect. See Westrin (ed.), Nordisk familjebok, 533.

156 CHAPTER 3 table 8

Budget for the consular service in East Asia approved in 1899a

Consular salary

Office Translator and Estimated allowance clerk/​secretary consular fees

Kobe Yokohama

18,000 -​-​-​

3,000 1,000

Japan

18,000

4,000

Shanghai

24,000

China TOTAL

-​-​-​ -​-​-​

Total

-​-​-​ -​-​-​

21,000 1,000

0

0

22,000

6,000

9,000

0

39,000

24,000

6,000

9,000

0

39,000

42,000

10,000

9,000

0

61,000

a  Supplement B to ‘Angående reglering af utgifterna Riksstatens Hufvudtitel.’ Ministerial protocol No. 2, 13 January 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

as particularly regrettable that the authorities did not realize the need to establish a salaried consulate in Nagasaki, where it would be otherwise impossible to find a suitable candidate to look after shipping-​related interests.180 With this, the Norwegians seemingly set the agenda for the consular service in East Asia for the few remaining years that the Union existed. But considering how little resistance they met from the Board of Trade and from the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs, one can assume that the Swedes were not really willing to meet Gude’s recommendations either. As a result of the above-​ mentioned ideas about the consular service’s priorities, only Swedes and Norwegians with sufficient legal skills were appointed to the more important posts in China and Japan between 1900 and 1905. The first consul general to Japan was Peter Martin Ragnar Ottesen, a Norwegian who served between March 1901 and April 1904.181 Ottesen was a native of Kristiania. He graduated with a law degree from his hometown university in 1881 and entered the diplomatic ranks the year after, aged 25. Ottesen first served in London, and later for eleven years at the Norwegian Department of 180 ‘Angående omreglering af de Förenade Rikenas konsulatväsen i Östasien.’ Ministerial protocol No. 27, 30 November 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 181 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 399–​400.

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the Interior, before being appointed to the salaried post of vice consul in Bordeaux in 1897.182 Six months before his appointment to Japan in the fall of 1900, the joint cabinet had discussed whether judicial skills should be a precondition for an appointment to the new post in Kobe, despite the fact that extraterritoriality had been abolished in Japan the year before. Foreign Minister Alfred Lagerheim argued that such skills were now even more important precisely because of the weakened position of foreigners under Japanese law and early reports about their unfair treatment in the Japanese courts.183 The Board of Trade supported Lagerheim’s position and suggested that a formal degree in law should be added to the necessary qualifications presented in the announcement, but nevertheless warned that this could lead to attracting candidates who lacked other relevant skills. The DfI, on the other hand, rejected the whole idea outright, and maintained that although legal skills would be advantageous, and should be given a degree of importance, they should not be defined as a formal precondition. In the end, the Swedes forced through their opinion and made judicial skills a requirement for the post of consul general in Kobe.184 The disagreement continued when the time came to finally appoint the first consul to Japan. There were eleven applicants, among them several vice consuls and clerks serving in other places, as well as ship captains, agents and lawyers. The DfI ranked Ottesen, who indeed possessed a degree in law, as its top candidate, and argued that advantage should be given to a Norwegian candidate in cases where there were candidates with similar merits because of the predominantly Norwegian interests in Japan, a fact the Swedes themselves had acknowledged during the discussions about the Gude Report. The Board of Trade favoured Filip Hagberg, then acting consul general in Shanghai, but Lagerheim eventually sided with the Norwegians and recommended Ottesen.185 The line of argument was similar when the vacant position of vice consul in Shanghai was discussed in 1904. There were 16 candidates for the position, among them several vice consuls, prominent ship captains, merchants, and three recipients of consular stipends. The captains of thirteen Norwegian steamships sent a letter to the Norwegian Department for Trade and Industry, 182 Hildebrand & Bergenstråhle (eds.), Svenskt porträttgalleri.  3, 84 and Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 380. 183 ‘Angående juridisk bildning såsom kompetensvillkor för erhållande af svenska och norska generalkonsulsbefattningen i Kobe.’ Ministerial protocol No. 20, 15 June 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 184 ‘Angående den definitiva organisationen af svenska och norska konsulatväsendet i Japan.’ Ministerial protocol No. 33, 9 October 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 185 ‘Angående besättande af den nyupprättade svenska och norska generalkonsulsbefattningen i Kobe m.m.’ Ministerial protocol No. 12, 22 Mars 1901, Vol. 44, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

158 CHAPTER 3 pointing out that the major interests of Norwegian shipping in China would profit from the appointment of a Norwegian man as vice consul in Shanghai. The Norwegian government also adopted this attitude in the joint cabinet discussions. It cited statements issued by six of Norway’s most important shipping companies making a similar request, referring to statistics that illustrated the dominance of Norwegian over Swedish shipping interests in China. For this reason, the Norwegian authorities ranked three Norwegian candidates for the post. Various Norwegian trade and navigation committees proposed the 55-​year-​old Hans Jörgen Gundersen, a native of Trondheim and trained lawyer who had served in the consular service since 1877. But the Norwegian government excluded him from the appointment, claiming that the exhausting Chinese climate would be a problem for someone of his age. The idea of nationality as a factor in consular appointments met with firm resistance from Lagerheim, who pointed out that relevant skills were the only legitimate criteria. The Norwegian authorities defended their position with a vigour rarely found in such discussions and singled out the Norwegian lawyer Hans Emil Huitfeldt as their favoured candidate. Huitfeldt had practiced law before working for the Norwegian Department of the Interior for several years during the 1890s. He had travelled to London and Paris on consular stipends between 1900 and 1902, and had returned to the DfI as principal secretary of foreign affairs.186 Huitfeldt specialized in consular matters, and was obviously qualified for the job, so the Swedish side did not oppose him as a candidate. But during the final discussions in December 1904 the recently appointed foreign minister, August Gyldenstolpe, nonetheless reinforced Lagerheim’s position on nationality as irrelevant to appointing consuls. Gyldenstolpe also presented a new pre-​condition, namely that officials who had only served in the central administration like Huitfeldt should yield to consuls who had actually served in the field. The trade and navigation committees of Stockholm, Gothenburg, Helsingborg and Gefle supported this position and proposed the above-​mentioned Gundersen, who had been rejected by the Norwegian government. In an attempt to avoid conflict, Gyldenstolpe then accepted the exclusion of Gundersen for the reasons presented by the Norwegian authorities and agreed to Huitfeld’s appointment –​though insisting explicitly that nationality was irrelevant to the decision.187 The strict position against nationality as a factor in the appointment procedure must of course be understood in terms of the longstanding controversy about a separate Norwegian 1 86 Neumann and Leira, Aktiv og avventende, 43. 187 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska vicekonsulsbefattningen i Shanghai.’ Ministerial protocol No. 41, 31 December 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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consular service and the looming dissolution of the Union. Huitfeldt served as vice consul in Shanghai until the end of the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service and then went on to have a long career in the Norwegian diplomatic ranks, culminating in his post as minister in Copenhagen and The Hague in the 1920s.188 The high salaries recommended in the Gude Report eventually appeared more reasonable when the consuls who took up their new posts in China and Japan almost immediately, and repeatedly, complained about the high living costs in those countries. Ottesen received compensation for living expenses resulting from his relocation from Bordeaux to Kobe in 1901 but was denied additional office allowance for the consulate general in the Japanese metropole two years later.189 The Swedish-​Norwegian authorities received similar complaints and applications for compensation or additional allowances from Shanghai.190 This was troubling, as more and more of Gude’s claims and recommendations seemed justified. Norwegian shipping grew further, and Japan appeared increasingly important. In August 1904, the authorities revisited the consular service in Japan after ‘repeated requests’ from Ottesen’s successor Ole Skybak had led Foreign Minister Lagerheim to task Peder Bernt Anker, a counsellor at the mission in Tokyo at the time, who later became Norwegian consul general and ambassador to Japan, with inquiring into the matter. Anker reported to Stockholm that the consulate general in fact had experienced a significant increase in its workload, and also described what he considered the regrettable shortcomings of the vice consul in Nagasaki. Anker’s statements had an immediate effect, and the Swedish-​Norwegian government finally granted additional resources for the employment of clerks in Kobe and Nagasaki in the summer of 1904. Anker also suggested sending the clerk Torsten Uddén from Kobe to Nagasaki and replacing him with Cato Aall, who had earlier been vice consul in 188 Theodor Westrin, Eugène Fahlstedt &Verner Söderberg (eds.), Nordisk familjebok: konversationslexikon och realencyklopedi. 36. Globe–​Kövess (Stockholm: Nordisk familjeboksförlag, 1924), 488. 189 ‘Angående ersättning åt svenske och norske generalkonsuln i Kobe P. Ottesen för förlust genom försäljning och inköp af bohag i anledning af hans förflyttning från Bordeaux till Kobe.’ Ministerial protocol No. 28, 17 August 1901, Vol. 44 and ‘Generalkonsulns i Kobe framställning om ersättning för brist i kontorsanslag.’ Ministerial protocol No. 23, 10 July 1903, Vol. 46, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 190 See for example ‘Generalkonsulns i Shanghai F.  Hagbergs anhållan om ersättning för utrustningskostnad m.m.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 15 April 1904, Vol. 47 and ‘Vicekonsuln i Shanghai Huitfeldts anhållan om ersättning för utrustningskostnad.’ Ministerial protocol No. 12, 25 April 1905, Vol. 48, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

160 CHAPTER 3 Johannesburg and now held a commercial stipend for Japan. The proposal was initially received favourably as well, but never materialized.191 Anker’s mission was a direct consequence of the Russo-​Japanese War that had broken out in February 1904. The Nordisk Defence Club (Nordisk Skibsrederforening), a special-​interest organization of Nordic ship owners, called on the Norwegian Department for Trade and Industry to protect the interests of its concerned Norwegian clients in East Asia and provide ‘a fully effective and energic protection’ against the seizure of merchant ships. The matter was brought before cabinet by Foreign Minister Lagerheim, who argued that the diplomatic representation provided by the Dutch had been satisfying and no Swedish-​Norwegian mission in Japan was necessary. Instead, he proposed relocating a diplomat and moving Anker from St. Petersburg to Tokyo, where he could assist the Dutch minister and work closely with the Swedish-​ Norwegian consul general in Kobe and his vice consuls in other parts of Japan. Half of the expenses of Anker’s mission were covered by the consular fund.192 This again illustrates the extent to which diplomacy and consular affairs where integrated by the early twentieth century. As mentioned earlier, the British dominions of Hong Kong and Singapore were part of the reorganization of the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service in East Asia. Both were established in the early 1850s and operated by foreign merchant consuls. In Hong Kong it was a group of German merchant consuls working for the leading firms Russell & Co. and Schellhass that also played an important role in Shanghai.193 Another similarity between the consulates in Hong Kong and Shanghai was a certain turbulence that occurred in the 1870s and 1880s. In April 1885, the Swedish-​Norwegian government appointed the fifth consul in twelve years in Rudolf (Peter) Buschmann, a German merchant who was a senior partner of Schellhass and served as Dutch consul. Buschmann only lasted for three years and was replaced by Friedrich Seip, who would become the last consul in Hong Kong.194 In 1895, the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities were informed that not a single Swedish ship had visited the port of Hong Kong during the five years that had passed, and the necessity of appointing a

191 ‘Anvisande af medel för extra kontorshjälp till generalkonsulatet i Kobe och vicekonsulatet i Nagasaki.’ Ministerial protocol No. 28, 27 August 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 192 ‘Kostnaderna för legationsrådet Ankers uppdrag till Japan bestridande till hälften från konsulskassan.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 31 March 1905, Vol. 48, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 193 See Solomon Bard, Traders of Hong Kong:  Some Foreign Merchant Houses 1841–​1899 (Hong Kong: Urban Council, 1993) for an overview. 194 ‘Utnämning af konsul i Victoria, kolonien Hongkong.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 24 May 1889, Vol. 32, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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successor for Seip was therefore questioned.195 Therefore, in May 1896 the consulate in Hong Kong was downgraded to a vice consulate under the consulate general in Shanghai, a decision which had been supported by the former foreign minister and then minister to London, Carl Lewenhaupt, and by Consul General Bock in Shanghai.196 The situation in Singapore was similar to that of China in that Norwegian shipping interests set the agenda. In 1890, a letter from a ship captain named Müller to the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities sparked discussions in the joint cabinet in Stockholm about the consular service in the Straits Settlements, the group of British territories which today form Malaysia. Müller proposed the establishment of a consulate in Penang, which he described as a quickly expanding city in which Scandinavian products could find a new market. The Norwegian Department of the Interior rejected this idea, insisting that a vice consulate under the consulate in Singapore would equal the representation of most European countries in the area, and thus be sufficient. The Swedish Board of Trade concurred, adding that not a single Swedish ship had traficated Singapore during the five-​year period between 1888 and 1992, whereas Norwegian shipping comprised an average of 22 ships carrying 28,303 tons. The BoT concluded that Sweden had no interests in the area, leaving it to the Norwegians to decide on the right strategy for Singapore and the Straits Settlements. In 1893, therefore, the district of the Singapore consulate was extended to include Penang and Malacca, and the British merchant Percy Mountcastle was appointed vice consul in Penang.197 Mountcastle was a partner in Huttenbach Brothers & Co., a firm founded by the German brothers August and Ludwig Huttenbach in 1885. Their firm offered a steamship service in the area and introduced Western technology to the region. It developed into one of the leading firms in Penang.198 The Huttenbachs belonged to the same network of German traders in southeast Asia as the Pickenpacks, who had earlier been in charge of the Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in Bangkok. These German traders were also well-​acquainted with the employer of John Cuthbertson, who was Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Singapore between 1885 and 1898.199 These 195 ‘Angående afsked åt svenske och norske Konsuln i Victoria, Hongkong, Friedrich Seip.’ Ministerial protocol No. 23, 4 October 1895, Vol. 38, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 196 ‘Angående indragning af svenska och norska Konsulatet i Victoria, Hongkong, och föreläggande af dess distrikt under Generalkonsulatet Shanghai.’ Ministerial protocol No. 10, 22 May 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 197 ‘Angående utvidgande af Konsulatets i Singapore distrikt.’ Ministerial protocol No. 29, 3 November 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 198 Nasution, More than Merchants, 61–​62. 199 Nasution, More than Merchants, 43 and 46–​47.

162 CHAPTER 3 networks lent Sweden-​Norway their considerable prestige, but were not primarily interested in promoting the economic interests of Sweden and Norway, as the Gude Report had ascertained in 1898. Despite the expansion of its district, the consulate in Singapore remained an unsalaried and therefore increasingly unattractive post. When it was announced vacant in 1900, only the Swedish engineer Svante af Klinteberg applied.200 Af Klinteberg was from the small town of Ör, near Växjö, in Kronoberg County in southern Sweden. He had left Sweden at the age of 22 to work for a British company in railroad construction in Argentina for three years, before taking up a job with the Scottish-​owned passenger and ferry company Irrawaddy Flotilla Company in Burma and finally arriving in Singapore, where he was employed by the engineering and architect firm Swan & Maclaren in 1896.201 Consul General Daniel Danielsson in London described Af Klinteberg’s employer as having ‘neither a significant nor leading position or being known for its wealth but enjoying a reputation as trustworthy’. Danielsson’s assessment soon proved correct, and it turned out that trustworthiness was not enough to be appointed consul to a port of Singapore’s significance. The Swedish authorities were alone in deeming that Af Klinteberg could be trusted with the task. Norwegian ship companies operating in the area informed the authorities that they had no knowledge of the applicant, and therefore rejected his appointment. In January 1902 the Norwegian Department of the Interior acknowledged that it had refused the idea of a salaried consulate in Singapore, despite such demands having been made from various actors in Norway during the discussions about the reorganization of the consular service in the region three years earlier. The Norwegians argued nonetheless that it was necessary to appoint ‘a man who can benefit Norwegian shipping’ and added specific stipulations that made it clear that this had to be a man of their choice. The increasing determination with which the Norwegians emphasized their right to have their say when their interests were greater than those of Sweden was telling of the growing tension between the two countries in the late 1890s and early 1900s. When a final decision on the consulate in Singapore was made in November 1902, the Norwegians endorsed the 56-​year-​old British merchant William Paterson Waddell over two Swedes, the aforementioned Af Klinteberg and Georg Thunberg, the latter a consular clerk and the former a recipient of a consular 200 ‘Angående ny kungörelse rörande ledigheten af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Singapore.’ Ministerial protocol No. 5, 18 January 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 201 Albin Hildebrand, Svenskt porträttgalleri. 17, Ingeniörer (Stockholm: Tullberg, 1905), 143.

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Swedish and Norwegian shipping in Singapore, 1895–​1900a

Norwegian (ships/​tonnage in tons)

Swedish (ships/​tonnage in tons)

1895 1896 1897 1898 1899 1900

76 /​72,950 68 /​70,130 139 /​131,627 67 /​76,617 83 /​105,140 82 /​99,319

2 /​1,922 15 /​17,715 7 /​10,236 0 0 2 /​1,978

TOTAL

515 /​555,783

26 /​31,851

a  ‘Angående ny kungörelse rörande ledigheten af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Singapore.’ Ministerial protocol No. 5, 18 January 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

stipend. Waddell was an associate of the same firm as the outgoing Consul Cuthbergson, Boustead & Co. In other comparable cases, such as Hans Jörgen Gundersen’s application to the position in Shanghai mentioned earlier in this chapter, the Norwegians considered a consul of such an age to be too old and unfit for an appointment to East Asia. The Swedish side obviously did not like the increasingly confrontational Norwegian attitude, countering it by ranking both Af Klinteberg and Thunberg ahead of Waddell. They cited §8 (Olika slag af konsulattjenstemän) and §10 (Konsulers nationalitet, m.m.) in the consular instruction to argue that appropriate Swedish and Norwegian citizens should be given preference over foreigners. Foreign Minister Lagerheim obtained information from London confirming that Waddell enjoyed a prominent social and economic position in Singapore. Lagerheim used this information to go against the wishes of the Swedish Board of Trade and side with the Norwegians. The Gude Report and the consular instruction clearly dismissed the continued utilization of foreign merchant consuls but, in contrast to his predecessor Ludvig Douglas, Lagerheim attempted to avoid deepening the conflict over the Foreign Service.202 He therefore pushed through Waddell’s appointment. The new consul succeeded

202 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Singapore.’ Ministerial protocol No. 28, 14 November 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

164 CHAPTER 3 in securing an office allowance of 1,000 kronor in 1903, increasing it by another 50% in 1904. But all in all, Sweden-​Norway never committed substantial resources to the consulate in Singapore either.203 The system with foreign merchant consuls also prevailed in Bangkok, where Sweden and Norway would be represented by German merchants throughout the whole period until the outbreak of the First World War.204 After the Pickenpack brothers, Paul and Vincent, the consulate had been maintained by Wilhelm Müller, who was a partner at the German-​British firm Windsor, Rose & Co. The firm had been founded by Germans in 1871, and it became a leading actor in the import and export business as well as in trade and shipping more generally in Bangkok.205 The Swedish-​Norwegian Consulate General in London described it as ‘very important’.206 During his visit to Bangkok in 1884, the consular inspector Harald Ehrenborg learned of Wilhelm Müller’s desire to leave office after seven years in service. Müller suggested a successor in his business partner Otto Weber, a man of ‘very good pecuniary circumstances and satisfactory reputation’, as it was put in the discussions about the succession of consul Müller in the joint cabinet. The Swedish-​Norwegian authorities were certain that Weber was fully qualified for the task, but nevertheless decided to announce the vacant position publicly.207 This would most likely not have happened had Weber’s reputation been judged better than ‘satisfactory’. Somewhat awkwardly, Weber was the only applicant to respond to the public announcement, and he was given the position in January 1886 after all.208 Earlier analyses carried out by various Swedish and Norwegian authorities in the 1870s and early 1880s had described Bangkok as insignificant, and not much did change during the 1890s. During the five-​year period 1887–​1891, for instance, Bangkok was only traficated by twelve Swedish vessels carrying 5,846 tons of cargo.209 Bangkok was neither highlighted in the 1899 Gude Report nor 2 03 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 364. 204 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 421–​422. 205 Edward van Roy, Siamese Melting Pot:  Ethnic Minorities in the Making of Bangkok (Singapore: ISEAS, 2017), 123 and 162. 206 ‘Ledighet af svenska och norska konsulatet i Bangkok.’ Ministerial protocol No. 19, 17 July 1885, Vol. 28, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 207 ‘Ledighet af svenska och norska konsulatet i Bangkok.’ Ministerial protocol No. 19, 17 July 1885, Vol. 28, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 208 ‘Återbesättande af Konsulatet i Bangkok.’ Ministerial protocol No. 4, 29 January 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 209 ‘Angående afsked åt konsuln i Bangkok, O.  Weber., och C.  Brockmanns utnämning till befattningen.’ Ministerial protocol No. 10, 29 March 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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seriously considered in the related discussions about the reorganization of the consular service in East Asia, although earlier discussions in the joint cabinet about the Siamese capital had explicitly referred to it.210 Weber’s resignation after seven years in office in 1893 followed the usual pattern. He recommended a German business partner, Christian Brockmann from Hamburg, who in turn received a positive testimonial from Sweden-​Norway’s consul general in Hamburg, Berndt Anker Bödtker, and then was appointed without further ado.211 The German occupation of the Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in Bangkok that started in 1868 with Paul Pickenpack continued when Alfred Edgar Mohr, who was the head of A. Markwald & Co., succeeded Brockmann in 1904. Mohr’s firm was involved in the same business areas as Windsor, such as rice production.212 The Swedish-​Norwegian consul general in Berlin, Robert von Mendelssohn, testified to Mohr’s and the firm’s excellent standing. The Norwegian stock exchange committee of Bergen provided additional information, writing of Mohr as ‘intelligent, business-​minded and skilled in languages as well as generally suitable for the position’.213 Mohr spoke German, English, French and Siamese and also served as consular judge.214 In the late nineteenth century, the Swedish-​Norwegian government and commercial actors in the two Scandinavian countries did not consider India as important as East Asia in terms of potential growth in the areas of shipping and trade. But there were interesting parallels in their approach to the two regions, nonetheless. Firstly, the system of merchant consuls prevailed in places like Bombay, Calcutta and Madras throughout the whole period. Secondly, a

210 ‘Ledighet af svenska och norska konsulatet i Bangkok.’ Ministerial protocol No. 19, 17 July 1885, Vol. 28, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 211 ‘Angående afsked åt konsuln i Bangkok, O.  Weber., och C.  Brockmanns utnämning till befattningen.’ Ministerial protocol No. 10, 29 March 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 212 Toshiyuki Miyata, ‘Tan Kim Ching and Siam “Garden Rice”: The Rice Trade Between Siam and Singapore in the Late Nineteenth Century’, in John Latham and Heita Kawakatsu (eds.), Intra-​Asian Trade and the World Market (London; New York: Routledge, 2006), 127. 213 ‘Återbesättande af konsulsbefattningen i Bangkok.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 15 April 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 214 Sverige, Kungliga Vetenskapsakademien, Sveriges statskalender för året 1915 (Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksells Boktryckeri, 1915), 250. On consular jurisdiction and the International Courts in Siam, see Akiko Iijima, ‘The “International Court” System in the Colonial History of Siam’, Taiwan Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 5(1), 2008, 31–​64. Like other Western states, Sweden-​Norway established consular jurisdiction in 1868 as a follow-​up to the Bowring Treaty between the United Kingdom and Siam, see Eldon R. James, ‘Jurisdiction over Foreigners in Siam’, The American Journal of International Law 16(4), 1922, 590–​591.

166 CHAPTER 3 prominent member of the Swedish diplomatic corps was sent on a mission to explore the conditions for business and trade. Gillis Bildt travelled to India and China on behalf of the Swedish Export Association (Sveriges Allmänna Exportförening) in 1890. His full name was Daniel Johan Gillis Bildt, and he must not be confused with his two prominent namesakes, his paternal uncle Didrik Anders Gillis Bildt, who was prime minister of Sweden in 1888–​1889, and his first cousin, Knut Gillis Bildt, who was a military man and later became a member of the upper house of the Swedish parliament for the Protectionist Party of the Upper House (Första kammarens protektionistiska majoritetsparti). All three were addressed by the same first name, Gillis. Daniel Johan Gillis Bildt compiled a report to Foreign Minister Carl Lewenhaupt in which he claimed that it was important for Sweden-​Norway’s consul in Calcutta to be elevated to the rank of consul general. Bildt argued that this would not only add to the social and official prestige of Sweden-​Norway’s representative but would also allow him to protect commercial interests and Swedish trademarks and generally process formal matters more effectively. The Swedish-​Norwegian Mission in London confirmed that according to information provided by the India Office –​the British government department in charge of the administration of British India –​there could be no doubt that a consul general enjoyed a much better position than a regular consul. A consul general was therefore more likely to successfully establish friendly ties with government officials. The mission in London also stated that comparable countries such as Denmark were represented by a consul general in Calcutta, and it therefore endorsed Bildt’s recommendation. The Norwegian Department of the Interior and the Swedish Board of Trade were more interested in economic aspects, however, and pointed out that Sweden-​Norway’s commercial interests in Calcutta were ‘not particularly significant’, and that the city and its consular district therefore were ‘not at all’ as relevant economically as was usually required for the establishment of consulate general. But out of regard for the, partly at least, more political reasons presented by Bildt and the mission in London, and because ‘Calcutta is the seat of the central government of India and in several other respects is the most distinguished city in East India’, none of them ultimately opposed the idea. On 5 September 1890, Calcutta became consulate general.215 Consul Siegfried Eberhard Voigt, who had returned to the office he had already held between

215 ‘Svenska och norska konsulatets i Calcutta förändring till generalkonsulat.’ Ministerial protocol No. 16, 5 September 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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1880 and 1884 two years earlier, received the new title without remuneration. He remained in the position until 1906.216 In Bombay, one of the most interesting appointments was made when Giuseppe Janni (who was also Austrian-​Hungarian consul) asked to resign in December 1892 after 14 years as Swedish-​Norwegian consul. There were three candidates. The first one was the above-​mentioned Gillis Bildt, who, as we know, was simultaneously an agent of the Swedish Export Association, acting consul in Bombay and member of one the most prominent families in Sweden. The second applicant was the British banker Thomas Withey Cuffe of King, King and Co. The third applicant was O. von Hoffer, a partner of Janni at Österreichischer Lloyd who had maintained the consulate at times, and who had also taken over Janni’s position at the firm. This put von Hoffer ahead of Cuffe and in first place in the ranking of the Norwegian Department of the Interior. The trade and commerce committees of Stockholm, Gothenburg, Malmö, Helsingborg, Gefle and Sundsvall were –​unsurprisingly –​in unison about Bildt as the most appropriate successor of Janni, and the Board of Trade immediately issued its support of their position. The Norwegian authorities pointed out India’s potential for various export products, but deemed Bildt’s position as agent of the Swedish Export Association as incompatible with that of a consul. When Bildt informed the authorities back home that the favoured candidate of the Norwegians, von Hoffer, had fallen ill and left Bombay, the Norwegian Department of the Interior was asked to reconsider its statement, but still it ended up recommending Cuffe over Bildt. The fact that the Swedish side unanimously supported a prominent member of its own ranks, while the Norwegians at the same time decidedly rejected him, certainly put pressure on Foreign Minister Carl Lewenhaupt. In the end, as was often the case, conflict was avoided with the Swedish side giving in. Lewenhaupt accepted that there would be a conflict of interest if a salaried agent paid to promote Swedish exports was appointed consul, since consular officials were expected to work on behalf of both Swedish and Norwegian commercial actors. Lewenhaupt therefore accepted Thomas Cuffe’s appointment as Swedish-​Norwegian consul in Bombay.217 The new consul maintained his position for four years before it was given to the Swiss citizen Wilhelm Friedrich Bickel in 1898. Bickel was a representative of the prominent firm Volkart Brothers. As we have seen in the previous 216 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 362. On his second appointment in 1888, see’Konsuln i Calcutta A.  Ritz afskedsansökning och utnämning af efterträdare.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 28 July 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 217 ‘Svenska och norska konsulatets i Calcutta förändring till generalkonsulat.’ Ministerial protocol No. 5, 30 March 1894, Vol. 37, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

168 CHAPTER 3 chapter, it was the partners of this firm who represented Sweden-​Norway during the first two decades of the Bombay consulate. As was often the case, with Bildt’s application being an exception to the rule, there were only foreign applicants. This time, the only other applicant besides Bickel was a German.218 It would have required a conscious effort on behalf of the Swedish-​Norwegian government to meet the growing condemnation of foreign merchant consuls and replace them with citizens of their own, possibly through the system of consular and commercial stipends that emerged in the 1890s. But this never happened. And in the few cases where qualified native candidates did appear, like Gillis Bildt, Swedes and Norwegians could not agree either. In Bombay, the consulate would therefore remain in the hands of Volkart representatives throughout the whole period studied in this book.219 The lowly and stagnating relevance of India to Swedish-​Norwegian trade and shipping led to the Board of Trade questioning the existence of the consulate in Madras following the death of consul Alexander Mackenzie in 1895. This position was certainly justified. It took months before the authorities even learned of the death of the former consul, and more than two years before they decided to carry on as before –​ not because it was deemed necessary but because a partner of the firm that had long held the post applied. In the case of Madras, this was the mercantile bank Arbuthnot & Co. and its partner John Montgomery Young. No concrete arguments as to why a consul in Madras was still necessary were presented to the joint cabinet.220 Two of Young’s business partners were members of the Arbuthnot family that had held the consular post between 1867 and 1884.221 Young remained in office until 1905, the year of the dissolution of the Union. The situation was certainly characteristic of the Swedish-​Norwegian consular service in India as a whole. In Colombo, the consulate was basically handed over to a network of a handful of families and business partners. In 1904, after 22 years in office, Frederick William Bois, who himself had succeeded a business partner and a relative of earlier consuls, was replaced by his younger brother Percy Bois.222 Percy had been in Colombo since 1872. He established 218 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Bombay.’ Ministerial protocol No. 30, 30 December 1898, Vol. 41, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 219 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 363. 220 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Madras.’ Ministerial protocol No. 31, 26 November 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 221 ‘P. Macfadyen & Co.’ Supplement to The London Gazette, 23 February 1905, 1383. Available at https://​www.thegazette.co.uk/​London/​issue/​27767/​supplement/​1383/​data. pdf (accessed 17 December 2018). 222 ‘Återbesättande af konsulsbefattningen i Colombo.’ Ministerial protocol No. 18, 20 May 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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Bois Bros. and Co., Ltd. with his youngest brother, Stanley, in 1891. The Bois brothers exported cocoa, rubber and tea, and owned large warehouses in the city.223 They were also the official agents of the British India Steamship Company and engaged in the shipping trade business. Their success resulted in the knighting of Stanley, who gained an esteemed reputation and held high positions in the public life of Colombo, such as chairman of the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce and Mercantile Member of the Legislative Council. Sir Stanley Bois also represented Sweden as acting consul in 1910–​1911.224 The same pattern emerges from an analysis of the two Burmese consulates in Akyab and Rangoon. In Akyab, the German merchant Friedrich Müller replaced George Ruckert in 1889. Müller was the local manager of Mohr Brothers & Co., described as one of the oldest and most important firms in the city. The firm was based in Rangoon and specialized in the rice business.225 The post was not announced publicly because of the insignificance of the consulate, but Müller was described as having a reputation that was ‘as good as that of any other merchant.226 While Ruckert had also been consul for Belgium, France, Italy and the Netherlands, Müller solely represented Sweden-​Norway. Both were appointed as consuls in Akyab, including the district of Arakan (present-​ day Rakhine State). When the Swedish-​Norwegian Mission in London sought exequatur for Müller from the British government, it learned that the British considered Arakan part of Burma province, and that Müller therefore could only be accredited as consul of the city of Akyab. The Board of Trade pointed out that Swedish-​Norwegian shipping interests were only linked to the city in any case, and the government accepted the British demands without further discussions.227 Arakan was added to the district of the consulate of Rangoon, where German merchants from Bremen had held the Swedish-​Norwegian consular post since 1869. In 1888, Carl Albert Barckhausen left the position, which was given 223 On the economic development of Ceylon during that era, see for example Roland Wenzlhuemer, From Coffee to Tea Cultivation in Ceylon, 1880–​1900:  An Economic and Social History (Leiden: Brill, 2008). 224 Alister Macmillan, Extracts from Seaports of India and Ceylon (New Delhi, Chennai: Asian Educational Service, 2005[1928]), 444; Arnold Wright (ed.), Twentieth Century Impressions of Ceylon: Its History, People, Commerce, Industries and Resources (New Delhi, Madras: Asian Educational Service, 1999[1907], 138 and 425. 225 Government of India. Legislative Department, Legislation and Orders Relating to the War (Calcutta: Superintendent Government Printing, 1918), 277. 226 ‘Friedrich Müller nämnd konsul i Akyab.’ Ministerial protocol No. 26, 6 December 1889, Vol. 32, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 227 ‘2.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 16 May 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

170 CHAPTER 3 to George Gordon of Gladston & Wyllie without public announcement.228 Gordon’s employer engaged in the shipping business, and offered rival non-​ contract steamer services on some of the routes mainly operated by the British India Steam Navigation Company.229 Gordon took a leave of absence for a whole year in November 1892, during which time he was replaced by his business partner J.R. Bertram. His request for a prolongation of his leave was denied in November 1893. While the Norwegian Department of the Interior was indifferent, the Swedish Board of Trade recommended turning him down, and Foreign Minister Lewenhaupt reacted harshly, offering only three months, and calling for Gordon to leave the post if that was not enough.230 According to the consular instruction, the king could grant additional absence after one year, but this was considered unacceptable in most cases.231 Gordon accepted Lewenhaupt’s decision and remained consul in Rangoon for another eight years, before he left in 1901. His successors were all British. John Moncrieff Wright was appointed in February 1902 ahead of the 26-​year-​old John Ailwyn Manyon.232 But Wright never assumed office and so the post was given to Manyon, who was initially appointed on a temporary basis before receiving the post officially in July 1907.233 Foreign merchant consuls also dominated in Manila, which came under American control as a result of the Spanish-​American War in 1898. An interesting appointment occurred in 1888, when Foreign Minister Ehrensvärd (the elder) and the Board of Trade requested information about a potential candidate for the post of consul in Manila from the Consulate General in London. Instead of a proposal, they received a counterproposal suggesting the appointment of the local Belgian and Dutch consul Jean Philippe Hens to the post.234 Hens had started his career as a junior partner of George van Polanen Peter, whose family had been in business in Manila since the early 1840s. Hens managed his

228 ‘Afsked åt konsuln i Rangoon C.A. Barckhausen och utnämning af efterträdare.’ Ministerial protocol No. 22, 31 December 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 229 Munro, Maritime Enterprise and Empire, 43. 230 ‘Angående en af svenska och norska konsuln i Rangoon gjord ansökning om ytterligare tjenstledighet.’ Ministerial protocol No. 22, 31 December 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 231 Förordning angående konsulatväsendet 1886, 8. 232 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Rangoon.’ Ministerial protocol No. 23, 3 October 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 233 ‘Utnämning av konsul i Rangoon.’ Ministerial protocol No. 24, 12 July 1907, Vol. 50, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Kommerskollegium, 364. 234 ‘Återbesättande af konsulsbefattningen i Manila.’ Ministerial protocol No. 8, 3 October 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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employer’s dealings in the import of salt and manufacturing and the export of tobacco products. He later co-​founded E. Boustead jr., G. Petel and J. Hens and owned his own cigar factory, La Hensiana.235 Hens succumbed to cholera in June 1889, only one year after his appointment as Swedish-​Norwegian consul. He was replaced on an interim basis by his business partner Georges Nyssens, another Belgian.236 But health would continue to be an issue. Hens’s ordinary successor, Walter Ferguson Stevenson, was appointed in June 1890, but never took up the post because he fell sick. Instead, Nyssens maintained the consulate as acting consul for another three years before he too died, in April 1893. Stevenson was still formally consul at the time of Nyssens’s death, so his 34-​year-​old business partner Francis Edwin Coney took his place, and was then formally appointed consul eight months later, in December 1893. This finally stabilized the consulate after four turbulent years with four different consuls, and Coney retained the post until 1904. Francis Coney was not only a partner in Stevenson’s firm but also the local branch manager of the reputable London firm Horsley, Kibble & Co.237 The fact that most appointments in Burma and Manila were made without public announcement testifies to the minor importance these places were given by the Swedish-​Norwegian government. Indonesia is the final Eastern Asian example of how merchant consuls continued to dominate the Swedish-​Norwegian presence in the region in the late nineteenth century, despite the growing awareness of their flaws in serving Swedish-​Norwegian interests. The consulate in Batavia, present-​day Jakarta, was held by the Dutch merchant Willem Suermondt for 38 years, from 1858 until the year of his death in 1896. There were only two applicants to Suermondt’s position, and both were intimately linked to him: his 25-​year-​old son Henri and his business partner Willem s’Jacob, who had been appointed acting consul following Suermondt’s death. While Foreign Minister Ludvig Douglas labelled the younger Suermondt’s application as ‘inappropriate’, though without giving specific reasons, s’Jacob received favourable references from the Swedish-​ Norwegian missions in Brussels and The Hague. Most likely, Suermondt junior was simply considered too young and, with an apparently capable competitor 235 Otto van den Muijzenberg, ‘Philippine-​Dutch Social Relations 1600–​2000’, Bijdragen tot de Taal-​, Land –​ en Volkenkunde, Vol. 157(3), The Philippines: Historical and social studies, 2001, 484–​487 and Daniel F.  Doeppers, Feeding Manila in Peace and War, 1850–​1945 (Madison, WI: The University of Wisconsin Press, 2016), 106. 236 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 350. 237 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulatet i Manila.’ Ministerial protocol No. 13, 20 June 1890, Vol. 33 and ‘Angående afsked åt konsuln i Manila och befattningens återbesättande.’ Ministerial protocol No. 38, 30 December 1893, Vol. 36, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA.

172 CHAPTER 3 available, there was no need to take chances. Therefore, he had to yield to ­Willem s’Jacob.238 The new consul only lasted for two and a half years. He resigned from his post in December 1899, and was succeeded by the German Carl Heinrich Friedrich Weber six months later. Weber was a native of Hamburg, but the consulate remained in Dutch hands in one sense, since he was a naturalized Dutch citizen who had settled in Amsterdam in his younger years.239 Weber took a leave of absence seventeen months later and never returned to the post, marking the beginning of the end of the consulate in Batavia. This made way for the first consul of Scandinavian origin in Indonesia, Johan Henrik Landberg. Weber had been absent for almost a year and a half before the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm reacted to the situation and set a deadline for either his return or his resignation, finally forcing a decision. Weber responded that his business affairs had kept him in Europe and that he could not state with certainty the date of his return to Indonesia, and he therefore resigned.240 In May 1903, Landberg was appointed acting consul; shortly afterwards, discussions about a reorganization of the consular service in Dutch East Indies commenced. The discussions gained traction because of the input of a Swedish broker based in Java, Isak Alfred Berg, who asked for the appointment of a Swedish-​speaking consul who was knowledgeable about the conditions for trade in the region, particularly regarding imports and exports. Berg recommended appointing a vice consul to Batavia and relocating the consulate to Surabaya. Berg argued that Batavia was the centre of political life, while both Surabaya and Samarang were larger cities and more important trade hubs which had become the basis of the growth in Swedish-​Norwegian shipping between Java and other ports in China and East Asia. Berg argued that the population in eastern Indonesia was wealthier than in the western part of the country as a result of the cultivation of sugar, coffee and true indigo, and therefore was home to a larger number of potential customers for imported goods. The Norwegian Department of Trade and Industry countered that the highest consular representative of Sweden-​Norway should be close to the seat of the colonial government, and that a move to Surabaya should only be considered if there was no single suitable candidate in Batavia sufficiently qualified 238 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Batavia.’ Ministerial protocol No. 9, 12 March 1897, Vol. 40, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 239 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Batavia.’ Ministerial protocol No. 21, 22 June 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 240 ‘Afsked för konsuln i Batavia C.H.F. Weber.’ Ministerial protocol No. 13, 8 May 1903, Vol. 46, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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to serve Swedish and Norwegian interests. The Board of Trade qualified its own statement with specific numbers demonstrating that the shipping of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway comprised an annual average of 26 Norwegian ships carrying 22,937 tons of tonnage and one Swedish ship carrying 1,308 tons. The majority of the Norwegian traffic went through Surabaya. There were no direct imports from Sweden to Batavia either and, all in all, the stakes were too small for Berg’s suggested changes to be considered. Herman Wrangel, then Swedish-​Norwegian Minister in Brussels and The Hague, met with the Dutch Minister of Colonial Affairs, Alexander Idenburg, to discuss the matter. Idenburg assured his Swedish counterpart that the Dutch government would not consider moving the consul to Surabaya as a breach of etiquette. With the Dutch consent secured, Wrangel chose to endorse the proposed changes to the consular service in Indonesia. Even the various Norwegian stock exchange committees supported moving the consulate to Surabaya as a result of these statements, and in the light of the additional statistics about Norwegian shipping in the area. The numbers specified that the traffic comprised 19, 9 and 30 ships carrying a tonnage of 21,088 tons, 8,617 tons and 29,607 tons in 1900, 1901 and 1902 respectively, and that it had largely passed through Surabaya. The Norwegians also pointed out that the Norwegian interests in Indonesia nonetheless were ‘very small’, and gave in. Finally, in January 1905 it was decided to close down the consulate in Batavia after 107 years and move it to Surabaya.241 4

West Indies: Colonial Periphery and Merchant Consuls

As we have seen in the previous chapter, the West Indies were less important to Swedish-​Norwegian trade than Africa and Eastern and Southern Asia. In the mid-​1880s, Swedish trade with the region was almost exclusively made up of the importing of sugar and fertilizer, worth 2,237,000 kronor, or 0,65%, of the country’s total imports. Because of the absence of exports, its total share of Sweden’s trade was only 0,45%.242 Norway’s trade with the West Indies remained virtually non-​existent, with cotton worth 7,400 kronor being the only commodity dealt with in 1885.243 Between 1896 and 1905, Norwegian trade 241 ‘Reglering af de Förenade Rikenas konsulära representation i nederländska Ostindien.’ Ministerial protocol No. 4, 20 January 1905, Vol. 48, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 242 Sverige, Kommerskollegium, Commerce collegii underdåniga berättelse för år 1885, 76 and 78–​79. 243 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges handel i aaret 1885, 155.

174 CHAPTER 3 with the West Indies only once surpassed 0,01% of its total trade.244 Again, it was Norwegian shipping that made a difference, as it quadrupled in the West Indies during the early 1880s, reaching a value of 3,348,000 kronor, or 2,06% of the total revenue of the industry, in 1885.245 Twenty years later, the numbers had doubled again, reaching 8,707,967 kronor (3,77%).246 The Swedish-​Norwegian consular service established its presence in the West Indies in waves, mainly between the 1850s and the 1880s. There were fifteen consulates in the West Indies by 1885. The expansion was by then almost complete, as only one additional consulate would be established, in Fort de France in 1903. The most important change thereafter was that the United States of America established its hegemony in the Caribbean and created a new order to which the European powers had to adapt.247 The only Swedish-​Norwegian consulate with an office allowance (of 3,000 kronor) was Havana. This was natural, as Cuba was the largest and most important island.248 This consulate had been in Swedish hands since 1881, when James Robert Francke from Gothenburg was appointed consul. Francke died five years after that and was succeeded by his son, Edward Jasper Francke, who would come to hold the position until 1903. Edward Francke had been vice consul since 1885 and was chosen from a pool of eleven applicants. Among them were not only merchants, bankers and clerks from Havana, various places in Norway, and even remote places like Bilbao, but also the Norwegian writer and consular secretary in Madrid, Emil Johannes Gamborg –​listed as a literatör (‘literary man’). Three applicants were Swedish, seven were Norwegian. The Swedish Board of Trade ranked Francke first, whereas the Norwegian Department of the Interior preferred a Norwegian merchant from Bergen, Diedrich Voss. But Voss had to give way to Francke because the latter had gained relevant experience assisting his father as vice consul and was a more established figure in Cuba.249

244 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Tabeller vedkommende Norges handel i aaret 1903 (Christiania:  i kommission hos H.  Aschehoug, 1904), 19* and Norges Handel 1905, 20*–​21*. 245 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges skibsfart 1885, ix. 246 Det Statistiske Centralbureau, Norges skibsfart 1905, 56 and 58. 247 Brenda Gayle Plummer, ‘Building US Hegemony in the Carribean’, in Stephan Palmié & Francisco A.  Scarano (eds.), The Caribbean:  A History of the Region and Its Peoples (Chicago; London: The University of Chicago Press, 2011), ­chapter 28. 248 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 373–​374. 249 ‘Återbesättande af generalkonsulsbefattningen i Havana.’ Ministerial protocol No. 21, 30 September 1887, Vol. 30, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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The consulate in Cuba would remain in Swedish hands until the dissolution of the union between Sweden and Norway. In 1904, it was given to the diplomat Carl Axel Hansson Wachtmeister, who had been an attaché at the mission in Paris for four years. Wachtmeister had gained knowledge in consular affairs as vice consul to Chicago between 1893 and 1899, during shorter assignments at the consulate general in Le Havre, and as vice consul in Liverpool. One of Wachtmeister’s competitors was the famous Antarctic explorer Carsten Borchgrevink, whose brother Johan Bernt Borchgrevink was the Swedish-​Norwegian representative at the international commission of the Mixed Courts in Egypt at the time. Another competitor was Carl August Arnoldson, who was the son of Swedish parents from Hamburg and whose business success in Cuba had earned him the position of consul of the Netherlands in 1899.250 Arnoldson was also a cousin of the eminent Swedish banker and conservative member of parliament Jonas C:son Kjellberg.251 The Board of Trade actually ranked him ahead of Wachtmeister, but Foreign Minister Lagerheim gave two reasons why he preferred a consul missus like Wachtmeister over a merchant consul like Arnoldson. Firstly, and most importantly, Sweden-​Norway had not negotiated a trade treaty with Cuba after the island had become independent in 1899, and would therefore soon have to enter negotiations which required greater authority than that of a merchant consul. Secondly, Lagerheim added, any merchant consul would be in a tough spot because of the fact that the acting Swedish-​Norwegian consul, A.C. Hernandez, represented Havana’s most important company.252 Cuba was the exception to the rule. In most other consulates in the West Indies, the system of foreign merchant consuls appointed on the basis of their local business contacts remained intact during the two final decades of the Union. In Haiti and San Domingo, Sweden-​Norway was mainly represented by companies or family dynasties. In Port-​au-​Prince, the consulate was mainly in Scottish hands. Hugh D’Oyly Tweedy left the post in 1894, after 18 years, and 41 years after his father had first been appointed consul. He proposed his brother Arthur Hearne Tweedy as successor, but before the matter was decided the younger Tweedy was appointed British vice consul and withdrew his

250 ‘Återbesättande af generalkonsulsbefattningen i Havana.’ Ministerial protocol No. 24, 8 July 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 251 About Kjellberg, see Elsa-​Britta Grage, ‘Jonas H R C:son Kjellberg’, in Erik Grill (ed.), Svenskt biografiskt lexikon. Band 21, Katarina–​Königsmarck (Stockholm: Svenskt biografiskt lexikon, 1975–​1977), 185. 252 ‘Återbesättande af generalkonsulsbefattningen i Havana.’ Ministerial protocol No. 24, 8 July 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

176 CHAPTER 3 application. He agreed to help out Sweden-​Norway, and served as acting consul for another year, but was moved by the British government to the Dominican Republic in December 1895, leaving the Swedish-​Norwegian consulate vacant.253 This not only testifies to the continuous importance of personal ties but also to the position of Sweden-​Norway as a second –​or third-​rank power at the time. Clearly, the position of British vice consul was more prestigious than that of Swedish-​Norwegian consul. The position in Port-​au-​Prince was filled again in May 1896. As had always been the case since the consulate was established in 1830, the new consul was familiar with the old one. Arthur Tweedy suggested Georg Keitel, who received favourable references from the representatives of the consulate generals in London and Hamburg.254 When Keitel resigned as consul in 1902, he too nominated his successor, naming the local merchant Henry Roberts, who, after positive testimonies issued by the Swedish-​Norwegian consul general in Hamburg and the minister of Haiti in Paris, was appointed to the post.255 Haiti remained marginal throughout this period, and neither the transition in 1896 nor the one in 1902 included a public announcement of the post. In San Domingo, in the eastern part of the Hispaniola, the situation was similar. There were two transitions in 1894 and 1899, both without public announcement of the vacant position, and with the consulate maintained by Jewish merchant consuls from Denmark. The first transition was a family affair, in which the 53-​year-​old Abraham Coën Léon succeeded his older brother, David Coën, who had been Sweden-​Norway’s first consul in San Domingo and who died in Paris in July 1894. 256 Five years later he was replaced in similar fashion by Eliesar “Lazar” Pardo, who was a native of Altona.257 In Kingston, Jamaica, the two-​decades-​long tenure of Consul Simon Soutar ended just like that of his predecessor Richard Hitchens: with absent reports, complaints and a dishonourable discharge. Soutar cut off all contact with the

253 ‘Angående afsked åt konsuln i Port au Prince, Hugh Tweedy.’ Ministerial protocol No. 15, 8 June 1894, Vol. 37, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 254 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Port-​au-​Prince (Haïti).’ Ministerial protocol No. 10, 22 May 1896, Vol. 39, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 255 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Port-​au-​Prince, Haiti.’ Ministerial protocol No. 23, 3 October 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 256 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulatet i San Domingo.’ Ministerial protocol No. 23, 2 November 1894, Vol. 37, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 257 ‘Angående afsked för svenska och norska konsuln i San Domingo A.C. Léon och befattningens återbesättande.’ Ministerial protocol No. 10, 2 June 1899, Vol. 42, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA.

Disillusionment and Years of Conflict, 1884–1905 table 10

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Norwegian shipping in Jamaica, 1901–​1902a

Total Norwegian shipping (ships/​tonnage in tons)

Norwegian steam navigation (ships/​tonnage in tons)

1901 1902

101 /​68,390 109 /​72,427

93 /​64,133 100 /​68,288

TOTAL

210 /​140,817

193 /​132,421

a  ‘Återbesättande af konsulsbefattningen i Kingston.’ Ministerial protocol No. 4, 20 January 1905, Vol. 48, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm in 1899. The consulate in Kingston sent ten letters to the Norwegian Department of Trade and Industry over the following years, but not the compulsory shipping lists and trade-​related annual reports. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs issued reminders and requests for these documents for four years, but it was only in the fall of 1903 that the authorities finally reacted with practical measures and initiated Soutar’s ­dismissal. While it was acknowledged that the consul had ‘done his best’ to support the crew of a Norwegian vessel that suffered shipwreck in 1902, nothing could save Soutar from being dismissed.258 Letters to the Norwegian authorities testify to the fact that Soutar maintained his post as consul and ignored the increasingly irritated messages from Stockholm. Jamaica was one of the larger and more important outposts in the Caribbean, and a consular position offered considerable advantages. According to statistics from the Norwegian dti, 101 Norwegian ships carrying 68,390 tons visited Jamaica in 1901, and Norwegian steam navigation was second only to that of Great Britain.259 But the post in Kingston was obviously still marginal enough for a consul to get away with such behaviour for years before the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities took any measures. In this regard, little had changed since the 1870s,

258 ‘Afsked för konsuln i Kingston S. Soutar.’ Ministerial protocol No. 6, 26 February 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 259 ‘Återbesättande af konsulsbefattningen i Kingston.’ Ministerial protocol No. 4, 20 January 1905, Vol. 48, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

178 CHAPTER 3 despite the improved communications that had been brought about by technological advances such as the telegraph.260 Interestingly, Soutar reacted to the final letter from Foreign Minister Alfred Lagerheim, dated 16 September 1903, in which he was summoned to submit his resignation by 1 December or be discharged dishonourably. The 76-​year-​old Soutar wrote that he deeply regretted the situation. He claimed that he had dispatched the missing shipping lists and annual reports, and asked Lagerheim for a last chance to prove himself for the future, or at least be granted a regular discharge otherwise. Lagerheim maintained in the joint cabinet that there were no guarantees that Soutar would take his duties more seriously in the future, and that the various people he had been in touch with wished for changes to the consular representation of Sweden-​Norway in Kingston.261 Soutar was therefore temporarily replaced by Charles Ernest de Mercado, who was one of Kingston’s most eminent merchants and a member of the city’s magistracy. De Mercado was described as wealthy, and was appointed ordinary consul one year later, ahead of Italy’s consul, his sole competitor.262 The retreat of the Spanish Empire after its losses in wars in the nineteenth century not only resulted in the independence of Cuba, mentioned earlier, but also the cession of colonies to the United States. This was the case with Puerto Rico, which went from being a Spanish colony to becoming an unincorporated organized territory of the United States in 1898.263 For European powers that maintained a consular presence on the island, like Sweden-​Norway, this meant that they had to adapt anew. In San Juan, the Scandinavian kingdoms had been represented by William Henry Latimer since 1883. Latimer was also a consul of Austria-​Hungary, and was chosen over a prominent local merchant even though he had been involved in a bankruptcy in London a few years earlier. The alleged reason for his selection was his competitor’s bad health, but it is more realistic to assume that his representation of another important European nation strengthened his position in local society, and thus his application. 260 On the role of the telegraph during the period, see Roland Wenzlhuemer, Connecting the Nineteenth-​Century World: The Telegraph and Globalization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012). 261 ‘Afsked för konsuln i Kingston S. Soutar.’ Ministerial protocol No. 6, 26 February 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 262 ‘Återbesättande af konsulsbefattningen i Kingston.’ Ministerial protocol No. 4, 20 January 1905, Vol. 48, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 263 See César J. Ayala & Rafael Bernabe, Puerto Rico in the American Century: A History Since 1898 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, c2007) and Charles R. Venator-​ Santiago, Puerto Rico and the Origins of the U.S. Global Empire: The Disembodied Shade (Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge 2014), ­chapter 2.

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The prestige of being consul of Austria-​Hungary simply overshadowed both his own failures and his competitor’s good economic standing.264 Latimer held the post for 14 years until his death in 1897.265 In contrast to the other examples given above, the consular post in San Juan was exceptional in that it had not been held by members of a company or family but had even been given to a local, named Joaquin Fernandez, in 1898. Yet this was not as unusual as it seems at first sight, since Fernandez was Latimer’s son in law and business partner. Fernandez’s application was accepted, and the vacancy was never announced publicly once the Swedish-​Norwegian consul generals in London and Hamburg had acquired positive testimonials about him.266 Fernandez served as Swedish-​Norwegian and Swedish consul in Puerto Rico for eight years before he left the post in 1906.267 The Swedish-​Norwegian consular service in the Danish colony of Saint Thomas remained in the hands of Danish citizens throughout the era treated in this book. Attempts by these consuls to acquire additional support from Stockholm and Kristiania usually failed, however. The Swedish-​Norwegian government rejected an application for a monthly office allowance of 100 kronor by Vice Consul Peter Aubeck in 1888. Aubeck had just replaced the 80-​ year-​old consul Otto Marstrand, who left the post for good because of his age and deteriorating health. Aubeck found that the large number of Swedish and Norwegian ships that visited the island incurred the consulate significant expenses without generating sufficient returns. But his complaints fell on deaf ears. The Board of Trade rejected his application outright and without further explanation. The Norwegian Department of the Interior reached a similar verdict, but at least elaborated on it. It acknowledged that the increasing ship traffic had not led to Saint Thomas being allocated sufficient income in consular fees, insisting that the overall budget of the consular service simply did not allow for fixed allowances or salaries to peripheral consulates. The Norwegians nevertheless recommended a one-​time payment of 1,000 kronor as a sign of gratitude, which Foreign Minister Albert Ehrensvärd (the elder) approved and King Oscar ii granted in the end.268 As with many other cases in Africa and

264 ‘angående återbesättande af konsulatet i San Juan.’ Ministerial protocol No. 27, 23 November 1883, Vol. 26, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 265 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 350. 266 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i San Juan (Puertorico).’ Ministerial protocol No. 8, 24 March 1898, Vol. 41, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 267 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 350. 268 ‘Begäran om anslag till kontorskostnader vid konsulatet å St. Thomas.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 28 July 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

180 CHAPTER 3 Asia, the Swedish and Norwegian decision-​makers were not unaware of the needs of their representatives in the Caribbean, but simply lacked the resources to meet them. Disagreement between the Swedes and Norwegians occurred when Aubeck was finally appointed consul at Saint Thomas in 1890. The Swedish Board of Trade claimed that the consulate was so insignificant and remote that it could be handed over to Aubeck without prior announcement or open competition, adding that Aubeck had submitted sufficient information earlier and done a good job during the two years of temporarily replacing the old consul. The Norwegians were not happy with this suggestion, countering that the number of Swedish and Norwegian ships visiting the island was ‘not insignificant’, despite a certain decline in recent years. In contrast to the harsher controversies that occurred from the mid-​1890s onwards, the Norwegians seemed anxious to avoid conflict, and spoke of Norwegian and Swedish ships and ‘the interests of our shipping’. The Norwegian Department of the Interior also remarked that Aubeck would be unwilling to remain in office if he was not eventually granted the allowance he had applied for two years earlier. The Norwegians persisted, and the position was declared vacant.269 Two procurators then challenged Aubeck’s application. The first one was 35-​ year-​old Christian Bügel from Copenhagen. Bügel had emigrated to the colony in 1885 and would later serve as Austria-​Hungary’s consul from 1893 to 1910. He was also appointed chairman of the local colonial council.270 The second challenger was Jens Peter Jørgensen, a native of the small Danish city of Kolding in Jutland County who had settled in Saint Thomas in 1875 and become a highly respected lawyer and well-​known figure in local business and politics.271 None of the Swedish trade and navigation committees had information about any of the candidates, so the Board of Trade filed a request to the Swedish-​Norwegian Consul General Herman Bernhoft in Copenhagen. Bernhoft maintained that Aubeck was the most ideal candidate because of his earlier experience with the consular service, and because he possessed greater mercantile skills as a result of his role as owner of the firm Klingberg,

269 ‘Ang afsked åt svenske och norske konsuln å St. Thomas, O. Marstrand.’ Ministerial protocol No. 2, 11 January 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 270 Rudolf Agstner, Austria (-​Hungary) and its Consulates in the United States of American Since 1820: ‘Our Nationals Settling here count by the Millions now…’ (Wien:  lit, 2012), 357; ‘Christian Daniel Stampe Bügel’, Danish Family Search, Available at https://​www.danishfamilysearch.com/​kbid305957 (accessed 17 December 2018). 271 Jan Tuxen, ‘Jens Peter Jorgensen’. Available at http://​www.tuxen.info/​lawyer_​jorgensen_​ eng.htm (accessed 17 December 2018).

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Krebs & Co. The only Norwegian authority that knew anything about any of the candidates was the stock exchange committee in Stavanger, which favoured Bügel. In the end, Bernhoft’s statement proved decisive and Aubeck was appointed.272 The Swedish-​Norwegian consulates in the smaller British dominions such as the Bahamas, Bermuda, Barbados or Antigua were all very similar. Most of them were in the hands of British merchant consuls, who held the positions for very long periods, often along with consular appointments of other nations, before passing them on to confidants, usually business partners or relatives. To the Swedish-​Norwegian government, and those of other European powers, this guaranteed a certain stability and continuity in their consular services in the area. In Nassau in New Providence, which was part of the Bahamas, consul Samuel Otis Johnson died in June 1887 after 24 years as representative of Sweden-​ Norway. Johnson was a native of the island and a prominent figure in Nassau’s political and economic life. As such, he was appointed member of the Legislative Council of the Bahama Islands in 1870 and its executive council five years later.273 He was succeeded by a partner of his firm Johnson & Brothers, Lewis J. Taylor. A competitor emerged and submitted his application to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm, despite the fact that the vacancy was never announced; but he was not seriously considered.274 Instead, Taylor held the post for more than three decades, until the interwar period.275 In Bridgetown, in Barbados, John Gardiner Austin served as Swedish-​ Norwegian consul for more than 35  years until he died in March 1902.276 Austin was a shipper, and mainly active in the sugar trade. He owned one of the largest commercial houses in Bridgetown.277 In 1888 he sent Foreign Minister Ehrensvärd (the elder) a request for an office allowance, similar to the

272 ‘Återbesättande af lediga svenska och norska konsulatet i St. Thomas.’ Ministerial protocol No. 16, 5 September 1890, Vol. 33, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 273 ‘Downing Street, March 21, 1870’, The London Gazette, 22 March 1870. Available at https://​www.thegazette.co.uk/​London/​issue/​23600/​page/​1833 and ‘Downing Street, February 22, 1875’, The Edinburgh Gazette, 26 February 1875. Available at https://​www. thegazette.co.uk/​Edinburgh/​issue/​8558/​page/​146 (both accessed 17 December 2018). 274 ‘Återbesättande af konsulsbefattningen i Nassau å New Providence, Bahamaöarna.’ Ministerial protocol No. 21, 30 September 1887, Vol. 30, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 275 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 369. 276 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 369. 277 Michael Sleeman, ‘Sugar in Barbados and Martinique:  A Socio-​economic Comparison’, in Paul Sutton (ed.), Dual Legacies in the Contemporary Caribbean: Continuing Aspects of British and French Dominion (London: Frank Cass, 1986), 86.

182 CHAPTER 3 above-​mentioned one submitted by Consul Aubeck in Saint Thomas in the same year. Like his counterpart in the Danish colony, Austin argued that the increasing shipping traffic to Barbados created more work for him without generating adequate compensation. Ehrensvärd went by the book and requested statements from the Board of Trade and the Norwegian Department of the Interior; but this time he argued that it could not be denied that Austin was right about the growth in shipping and the work it created. The foreign minister therefore suggested a one-​time payment of 1,000 kronor, which both the Swedish and Norwegian authorities agreed to.278 Austin most likely knew that a regular office allowance was out of the question, and it is uncertain whether he and Aubeck reacted to similar developments in their respective district, or whether they were aware of each other and coordinated their attempts to receive additional compensation from Sweden-​Norway. In 1902, the consulate in Bridgetown was handed over to Austin’s 25-​year-​ old son Harold Bruce Gardiner Austin. Similar to the transition in the Nassau consulate mentioned above, there was one competitor for the post, who never really stood a chance. The Swedish-​Norwegian authorities valued long-​time relationships. The younger Austin also submitted a letter of recommendation from the governor of Barbados, Frederick Mitchell Hodgson, which confirmed his personal appropriateness.279 Harold Austin later became speaker of the lower house of the parliament of Barbados and was awarded the Order of the British Empire (obe) and even knighted. He also rose to international fame as a cricketer.280 In Bermuda, the consulate moved several times between the capital, Hamilton, and the largest city, Saint Georges. It was occupied by the British merchants James Musson and Josiah Darrel during the first two decades after its establishment in 1865, and was then given to James Adam Conyers, who operated it from 1884 until his death in 1908. Conyers had been vice consul for several months before his appointment. He owned a shipping agency and was also a ship’s chandler. Such involvement in shipping was usually considered a conflict of interest by the Swedish-​Norwegian government, but he was accepted when the Consulate General in London explained to the government that

278 ‘Begäran om anslag till kontorskostnader vid konsulatet å Barbados.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 28 July 1888, Vol. 31, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 279 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Bridgetown, Barbados.’ Ministerial protocol No. 30, 5 December 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 280 James C. Brandow, Genealogies of Barbados Families: From Caribbeana and The Journal of the Barbados Museum and Historical Society (Baltimore, MD: Reprinted for Clearfield Co. by Genealogical Pub. Co., 2001), 260.

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almost every serious merchant in Bermuda was involved in business. During the early 1880s, an annual average of ten Norwegian ships carrying 3,727 tons and one Swedish ship carrying 371 tons visited Bermuda. The traffic generated about 260 kronor in consular fees a year.281 Another example of the often longstanding tenures of merchant consuls in the Caribbean was Saint John’s in Antigua. It was unusual in the sense that Frederick Melchertson, the first ever consul there, was a Dane and not British. But, like many of his British counterparts in the region, Melchertson served for a long time, 18 years, and remained in office until his death. His successors were British.282 In 1895 Melchertson was refused office allowance, like many other consuls in the Caribbean before him. His request was based on the fact that the number of standing ships in his district was rising, and that he had to move between seven islands at any one time to perform his consular duties.283 Melchertson was succeeded by Robert André Llewellyn Warneford, who occupied a position in Antigua similar to that of Harold Gardiner Austin in Barbados. Warneford was born in Antigua and served on the Legislative and Executive Councils of the Leeward Islands, and also received the obe.284 Port of Spain in Trinidad was the exception to the rule among the British dominions in the Caribbean. It was in the hands of the German Schöner family for the first 26 years after its establishment in 1875.285 During the first three decades it was occupied by five consuls: four Schöners and Edgar Tripp. The reason for this was as unusual as it was unpleasant:  the first three Schöner consuls all died in office and at a young age. Ludwig Schöner died in 1882, aged 38. His brothers Justus and Christian shared his fate. Justus was murdered in 1885, aged 32 and Christian died in 1899, 38 years old.286 After the death of his brother, the 25-​year-​old Christian was appointed because of his experiences 281 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Hamilton å ön Bermudas.’ Ministerial protocol No. 13, 18 July 1884, Vol. 27, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 282 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 369. 283 ‘Angående Konsulns i St. Johns, Antigua, ansökan om anslag till kontorskostnader.’ Ministerial protocol No. 21, 6 September 1895, Vol. 38, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 284 ‘Central Chancery of the Orders of Knighthood, St. James’s Palace, 3rd June, 1930’, Supplement to the London Gazette, 3 June 1930. Available at https://​www.thegazette. co.uk/​London/​issue/​33611/​supplement/​3485 (accessed 17 December 2018). 285 For the correspondence between Port of Spain and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm, see Vol. 157 (1876–​1880 Sydamerikansk Antillerna: Trinidad, Curacao), 26, E2FA and Vol. 13 (Belize (Honduras) 1881–​1900, Bridgetown (Barbados) 1881–​1900, Hamilton (Bermudas) 1881–​1900, Kingston (Jamaica) 1882–​1894, Nassau (Bahamas) 1889–​1895, Port of Spain (Trinidad) 1881–​1900), 7 (Brittiska riket i Amerika), UD/​ KfubH, RA. 286 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 369.

184 CHAPTER 3 assisting his brother in both the consulate and the family firm. There were critical voices raised because of his young age and his lack of knowledge of Scandinavian languages. His competitors were not only older and more experienced but also were of Danish or Norwegian origin. But Christian Schöner received positive testimonials regarding his earlier work at the consulate, and from the Consulate General in London in relation to his standing in Trinidad, and was therefore appointed nevertheless.287 In the mid-​1880s, personal relations were still more important than intimate knowledge of Sweden’s and Norway’s languages, cultures and commercial interests. As we have seen, this only changed to a certain extent with the introduction of the consular regulation of 1886. When Christian died in October 1899, his younger brother Wilhelm became the fourth brother to occupy the Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in Port of Spain. Wilhelm had served as vice consul for six years, and there was not much of a discussion about whether he would be appointed to the post.288 After all, the Swedish-​Norwegian authorities had had positive experiences with the Schöner family for more than a quarter of a century. But Wilhelm asked to be dismissed only one year later ending the Schöner dynasty in 1901. He did not suggest a replacement, so the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm had to instruct the Consulate General in London to find an appropriate candidate and compile a list of names. Several of the suggested candidates rejected the offer to take over the consulate. Therefore, it was offered to Edgar Tripp, one of the most successful and colourful businessmen in the history of Trinidad.289 Tripp had emigrated from England to Trinidad in 1870 at the age of 20. In 1890, he formed a consortium to build a high-​class hotel, and four years later he founded the Electric Light and Power Company and introduced electricity to the island.290 The Swedish Board of Trade immediately accepted him as new consul, but the Norwegians hesitated, because they believed that his role as commercial agent of Canada created a conflict of interests with regard to the fishing trade, in which Norway and Canada competed. In the end, Foreign Minister Lagerheim disregarded the vocal protests of various Norwegian navigation and trade

287 ‘Ledighet och återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Port of Spain.’ Ministerial protocol No. 9, 28 May 1886, Vol. 29, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 288 ‘Angående och återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Port of Spain, Trinidad, B.W.J.’ Ministerial protocol No. 5, 8 February 1900, Vol. 43, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 289 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulatet i Port of Spain, Trinidad.’ Ministerial protocol No. 21, 12 August 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 290 ‘The Queen’s Park Hotel:  The Queen of Hotels’, The Trinidad and Tobago Guardian, 14 January 2017. Available at http://​www.guardian.co.tt/​lifestyle/​2017-​01-​14/​queen’s-​park-​ hotel-​queen-​hotels (accessed 17 December 2018).

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committees and suggested Tripp’s appointment because there simply was no other appropriate candidate.291 Martinique and Guadaloupe were the two French dominions where Swedish-​Norwegian consuls had been active since 1875. The characteristic longevity of the consular tenures in the Caribbean also characterized the neighbouring island of Guadeloupe, where three individuals were in charge of the consulate in Pointe-​à-​Pitre between 1875 and 1914.292 Pointe-​à-​Pitre included all French dominions in the West Indies excluding Martinique. The first consul of Sweden-​Norway was Eucher Louis Paul Dumoulin, who served from 1875 until his death in 1892. He was succeeded by James Japp, whose appointment was the subject of some debate. Japp had been British vice consul since 1887. The Swedish Board of Trade had no objections to his appointment because of the very limited Swedish shipping in the area, which, during the five-​year period between 1886 and 1890, averaged six ships of 1,762 tons annually. There was more at stake for the Norwegians, however. Norwegian ships mostly imported coal to Guadeloupe and exported sugar and rum. Their annual average between 1884 and 1890 was about four times the size of Sweden’s: 28 ships carrying 9,276 tons, which, according to the Norwegian Department of the Interior, was ‘not without significance’. Both the Swedes and the Norwegians considered the fact that Japp was British consul proof enough of his aptitude.293 In November 1893, Japp wrote to Stockholm asking for a ‘minor office allowance’ to cover his expenses, stemming from what he described as very time-​consuming assistance to Swedish and Norwegian captains, who usually were not conversant in the French language. Japp wrote that he was usually forced to assist personally in any matters involving the port authority, the police or hospitals because the only translator in the city and the few merchants capable of speaking the English language were rarely available. His request was denied, however, because otherwise ‘the holders of numerous other consulates without a fixed allowance could raise a similar and even more legitimate claim’.294 Japp resigned from his Swedish-​Norwegian post when he became British consul in 1898, but the intimate link to the British consular service remained intact because he was

291 ‘Återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulatet i Port of Spain, Trinidad.’ Ministerial protocol No. 21, 12 August 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 292 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 390. 293 ‘angående återbesättande af den lediga svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i Pointe-​ à-​Pitre.’ Ministerial protocol No. 16, 17 June 1892, Vol. 35, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 294 ‘Angående konsulns i Pointe-​à-​Pitre ansökan om anslag till kontorskostnader.’ Ministerial protocol No. 20, 29 July 1895, Vol. 38, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

186 CHAPTER 3 replaced with his vice consul at the British consulate, the 23-​year-​old Joseph Emile De Vaux, who retained the position until the First World War effectively ended the age of imperialism.295 In Martinique, the Swedish-​Norwegian consulate was first established in Saint-​Pierre and given to the local British consul William Lawless, who served for 22 years until his death in 1897. There were five applicants for the post after Lawless’s death, although the post was never publicly announced vacant. One of the applicants was the acting consul Gustave Borde, who was the previous consul’s son in law. Even the local Danish consul and the then British consul of Guadaloupe, James Japp, applied. In addition, locals sent a letter to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm requesting the appointment of the local American consul to the post. Sweden-​Norway’s minister to France, Frederik Due, wrote from Paris that Gustave Borde was the most suitable candidate. All of the involved authorities immediately supported this opinion, and Borde was appointed consul to Martinique in April 1898.296 Four years later, on 8 May 1902, the volcano Mont Pelée erupted and destroyed the town of Saint-​Pierre, killing almost all of its 29,000 inhabitants, including the acting Swedish-​Norwegian consul Paul Borde.297 Paul had taken charge of the post on an interim basis when his half-​brother, Gustave, left Martinique a few months earlier. As a result of the horrific event, the consulate was moved 40 kilometres south to Fort-​de-​France in 1903. Gustave Borde returned to service and maintained the new consulate in Fort-​de-​France for 18 months until a new ordinary consul could be appointed. In Stockholm, the Swedish-​Norwegian joint cabinet discussed whether the consulates in Fort-​de-​France and Pointe-​à-​Pitre ought not to be merged after the disaster. They stressed that the islands had always been of little significance to Norwegian trade and shipping –​Swedish interests were not even mentioned –​and with the northern half of Martinique completely destroyed, much of that island’s import and export capacities had been lost. Frederik Due’s successor at the mission in Paris, Henrik Åkerman, argued that, taken together with the improved communication between the two islands, this was

295 ‘Angående afsked åt svenske och norske konsuln i Pointe-​à-​Pitre å Guadeloupe, James Japp, och befattningens återbesättande.’ Ministerial protocol No. 24, 25 November 1898, Vol. 41, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 296 ‘Angående återbesättande af svenska och norska konsulsbefattningen i St. Pierre, Martinique.’ Ministerial protocol No. 10, 29 April 1898, Vol. 41, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 297 ‘Anmälan af konsulatets i St. Pierre förstöring genom olyckshändelse och fråga om konsulatets förflyttning till Fort-​de-​France.’ Ministerial protocol No. 19, 4 July 1902, Vol. 45, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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reason enough to add Martinique to the district of the existing consulate in Pointe-​à-​Pitre in Guadeloupe. The Norwegians supported the idea. Åkerman ended his statement with the observation that a full picture on the future of Martinique could only emerge after the conclusion of the investigations carried out by the French authorities. Foreign Minister Lagerheim and the Board of Trade rejected the idea of a merger because Gustave Borde was willing to maintain the consulate in Fort-​ de-​France until further notice and without additional cost.298 In October 1904, the French merchant Paul Langellier-​Bellevue was finally appointed as consul to Fort-​de-​France on the recommendation of Borde. Åkerman supported the nomination from Paris, stating that his French counterparts had confirmed that the nominee enjoyed ‘the best personal standing’. Before the decision was formalized, the local British consul, Henry Meagher, also applied for the position, but neither the Department of Trade and Industry, nor the Board of Trade, nor Foreign Minister Lagerheim, seriously considered him.299 There had also been a Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in Willemstad in the Dutch colony of Curacao since 1878. This was one of the most peripheral presences maintained by Sweden-​Norway –​and one of the most stable ones. Only one consul served throughout the four decades, a local merchant named León Vidal Leyba.300 5

Conclusions

Sweden-​Norway was among the European imperial powers that ratified the General Act agreed by the Berlin Conference of 1884–​1885. King Oscar ii, along with many politicians and diplomats, believed this to be the beginning of an era in which Sweden-​Norway would finally return to the rightful place that Sweden had lost in the eighteenth century and when the Congress of Vienna had established a new order in 1815. This rightful place would be achieved through participation in the new imperialism and the establishment of a presence in old and new colonies. The consular service was the main vehicle in this endeavour. It was mainly through consuls that the Swedish-​Norwegian government and its authorities 298 ‘Förordnande af konsul i Martinique.’ Ministerial protocol No. 11, 4 April 1903, Vol. 46, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 299 ‘Afsked för t.f. konsuln i Fort de France och befattningens återbesättande.’ Ministerial protocol No. 31, 14 October 1904, Vol. 47, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 300 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 407.

188 CHAPTER 3 participated in colonial affairs. Consuls performed political and diplomatic tasks in China, participated in the execution of legal imperialism in Egypt or Thailand, and supported the maintenance of Belgian colonial rule in Congo and the colonial trade order in the Caribbean. The main purpose of the consular service had always been to pursue economic interests. And it was in the age of imperialism, and particularly throughout the two decades after the Berlin Conference, that it reached the height of its political and diplomatic function. The reason was that, as a smaller European state, Sweden-​Norway had become less competitive militarily than ever, either before or after this era. Commercial aspects and trade policy gained significance within foreign policy, and as a consequence the consular service grew ever more important within the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. This chapter has demonstrated how Swedish-​Norwegian consuls performed various acts of informal imperialism by supporting Swedish and Norwegian industrial and business actors, as well as other groups such as missionaries or settlers, in Africa, Southern and Eastern Asia and the West Indies, within the colonial order established by greater powers. The Swedish-​Norwegian authorities believed that Africa and Asia would serve as important future markets, but they lacked the political and economic resources to professionalize the consular service in a way that could allow it to meet the needs of Swedish and Norwegian shipping and trade. There was a consensus that Sweden and Norway were in need of a professional consular service, with more formalized rules, made up of Swedes and Norwegians primarily skilled in economics, business and trade. A first step towards professionalization was taken with the adoption of the consular regulation of 1886. The endowment of consular stipends in both Sweden and Norway, and the publication of guidelines attempting to spread knowledge among the hundreds of consular officials all over the globe, marked further attempts in that direction, but ultimately the stagnating budget of the Foreign Service and the consular service prevented any real development, and the flawed system of foreign merchant consuls appointed on the basis of prestige and personal relationships instead of economic skills and relevant knowledge persisted in most places. Sweden-​Norway’s participation in the Berlin Conference put further emphasis on political prestige as a factor in the expansion of the consular service into Africa and East Asia, undermining the strictly economic approach necessary to reform it properly. Many of the consuls in smaller places accepted their appointment as a way to elevate their reputation but did not prioritize the post because it was of no real financial benefit to them. In Pointe-​à-​Pitre, for instance, Consul James Japp complained about how much effort he had to put

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into communicating with the port authority, the police, hospitals and other institutions in order to assist Swedish and Norwegian ship captains. In Shanghai, Consul Carl Bock complained about the amount of time he had to dedicate to assisting missionaries. In Kobe, it was actually German diplomats and Dutch officials who spoke on behalf of Sweden-​Norway until the turn of the century. And in places like Jamaica or Sierra Leone there were no repercussions for the several years of missing reports that should have been sent from the consulates to the authorities in Sweden and Norway. The many failures of the consular service added to the growing division between Sweden and Norway, which culminated in the controversies of the 1890s and, ultimately, the dissolution of the Union in 1905. The Norwegians wanted the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs to lower its political ambitions and to give greater consideration to economic matters and the interests of their shipping industry instead. They demanded the closure of diplomatic missions and the expansion of the consular service outside Europe. When the Swedes rejected these demands, the Norwegians looked for ways to pursue their own interests. This chapter has presented many examples of how Swedish and Norwegian officials approached the economic and political challenges of their era from what became an increasingly nationalist perspective. All too often, so many key figures spoke exclusively of Swedish or Norwegian goals that in the end it became impossible for the necessary common efforts to be developed and carried out in the name of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway.

­c hapter 4

From Informal Empire to Small State Realism, 1905–​1914 On 7 June 1905, the Norwegian parliament unilaterally declared the end of the union between Sweden and Norway and dismissed Oscar ii as king of Norway. The formal decision was the culmination of months of frenetic political activity and polemic between leading political and public figures from both countries. Norway’s prime minister, Christian Michelsen, successfully employed prominent Norwegians, such as the famous traveller and later diplomat and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Fridtjof Nansen, to prepare the ground for Norwegian independence. On 17 May, Norway’s national day, Nansen had declared to a large crowd in Kristiania, ‘Now all ways of retreat have been closed. Now remains only one path, the way forward, perhaps through difficulties and hardships, but to ourselves, to a free Norway’.1 Six days later, the Storting passed the Consular Act to set up a separate consular service for Norway. This debate about the dissolution of the union was not just carried out on in the chambers of the Swedish and Norwegian parliaments and in the national presses but also in leading international outlets such as the The Times, where Nansen laid out the legal case for Norway’s position in four articles written between March and September 1905.2 The Norwegians hoped to gain international recognition for their statehood through engagement in the European debate, where some spoke of Norway’s breakaway from Sweden as a revolution. There was a great outcry in Sweden in the immediate aftermath of Norway’s decision, not so much about the political development itself but rather about the attitude displayed by the Norwegians in the process. Most Swedes realized that the separation was inevitable, but nevertheless perceived the confrontational course of the Norwegians as an insult against the king and an affront against their country.3 In its initial reaction, the Swedish Riksdag declared on 1 Fridtjof Nansen, ‘Vor Selvstendighed og vor Selvbestemmelsesret’, Aftenposten, 18 May 1905. Available at http://​virksommeord.no/​tale/​101/​ (accessed 17 December 2018). 2 Fridtjof Nansen, ‘The Swedish-​Norwegian Conflict’, The Times, 25 March 1905, 30 March 1905 and 4 April 1905, ‘Sweden and Norway’, 16 September 1905. Nansen had been publishing articles on the matter in The Times since 1898. For the general context, see Evert Vedung, Unionsdebatten 1905: en jämförelse mellan argumenteringen i Sverige och Norge (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1971). 3 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 155–​156.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020 | DOI:10.1163/9789004414389_006

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28 July 1905 that the union could not be dissolved unilaterally and demanded either new elections or a popular referendum on the issue in Norway. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm launched attempts to prevent the great powers Austria-​Hungary, Britain, France, Germany and Russia from acknowledging Norway as an independent state. But the Swedish front was not as united as the parliament wanted its people at home and abroad to believe. The writing had been on the wall for some time. Nationalism had prevailed over Scandinavianist ideas, and the conflict between the two countries had been looming for fifteen years. Some important figures, among them the crown prince and soon-​to-​be king Gustaf V, advocated a quick and painless divorce in order to avoid great power interventions into Scandinavian affairs, in particular on the part of Russia. All in all, the Swedes failed to contain the Norwegian attempt for recognition. Both Germany and Russia informed Stockholm that it was regrettable that Sweden was not willing to force the survival of the union with Norway through the necessary –​i.e. military –​means. But the dissolution of the Scandinavian union was not important enough for either Berlin or St. Petersburg to consider stirring up political turmoil or engaging in military adventures to secure it. Tsar Nicolas ii in particular had to deal with problems of his own, as he was fighting revolutionaries for the survival of the Russian monarchy. Both Tsarist Russia and imperial Germany feared that Norway could become a republic, and therefore sided with Britain and Austria-​Hungary in recommending that the Swedes accept the Norwegian offer of enthroning a younger member of the Bernadotte family as the new king and settling the matter once and for all. When the Swedes responded to the Norwegian offer with hesitation, the German Kaiser was among the first to accept Kristiania’s alternative candidate, Prince Carl of Denmark, who was the son in law of the British king, Edward vii. Vienna persuaded the other great powers to declare their neutrality in the conflict, but it soon became obvious that the Norwegians had successfully established informal channels nonetheless.4 The Norwegians strengthened their position considerably when final negotiations about the formal dissolution of the union began in the city of Karlstad on 31 August. In addition to their diplomatic success with the major powers, they had won public sympathy and secured acceptance for their favoured candidate to the Norwegian throne. This put the Swedish government and its delegation to Karlstad under severe pressure. As a consequence, the initial atmosphere of the negotiations was very intense. The Swedish delegation presented 4 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 157–​161.

192 CHAPTER 4 harsh demands, most notably the demolition of several historical border fortresses. At the same time, however, the distance between Karlstad and the two capitals, Stockholm and Kristiania, allowed for a constructive conversational atmosphere because the discussions took place out of the public eye. The Swedish argument soon shifted from initial one-​sided outrage over Norway’s actions towards a more constructive exchange of arguments. Respected figures attempted to describe the dissolution of the union as an opportunity. Pontus Fahlbeck, professor of political science in Lund and a member of parliament for the conservative Protectionist Party, pointed out that the end of the union would allow Sweden to develop a more active foreign policy again.5 After roughly three weeks of negotiations, the conference in Karlstad reached an agreement on 23 September 1905. In the following month, the Swedish and Norwegian parliaments accepted the results of the negotiations, allowing Swedish Foreign Minister Fredrik Wachtmeister and Norway’s representative, Thor von Ditten, to formally end the existence of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway after 91 years.6 Obviously, this was a caesura for Sweden. This was particularly true for the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm and for the now solely Swedish consular service. With Norway’s shipping interests gone, a re-​evaluation became an imminent necessity. On 17 November 1905, just three weeks after the formal end of the union with Norway, a committee was given the task of proposing the reorganization of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and its diplomatic and consular services. The weeks and months after the dissolution of the Union were a turbulent period on all fronts in Sweden. Shortly before the appointment of the new committee, the liberal politician Karl Staaff had formed Sweden’s third government in seven months. The political instability had commenced earlier that year, in mid-​April, when Prime Minister Erik Boström resigned after nearly three years in office as a result of the escalating conflict with Norway. His successor, Johan Ramstedt, formed Sweden’s last non-​political government but failed to secure support for the negotiations on Norway’s exit from the Union and therefore only lasted for three and a half months. Ramstedt’s cabinet was the first government to resign en-​masse since 1809. Ramstedt’s ministry was followed by Sweden’s first ever fully democratic cabinet formed on the basis of the actual distribution of mandates in parliament and without the interference of the king. The new government comprised a coalition between the Protectionist Party, whose leader, Christian Lundeberg, became prime minister, and 5 Lindberg, Den svenska utrikespolitikens historia, 168–​178. 6 The minutes of the conference were published in Arne Wåhlstrand (ed.), Karlstadkonferensen 1905: protokoll och aktstycken (Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1953).

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the two parties that had gained majority in the lower house, the Liberal Party and the Lantmanna Party (the ‘Party of the Rural People’). While the democratic composition of the cabinet was considered a breakthrough in Swedish parliamentarism, Lundeberg himself remained an ultraconservative enemy of further democratic progress and universal suffrage. Following the solution to the Union crisis, Lundeberg failed to secure political support for his administration because he was not expected to be able to resolve the issue of suffrage. Therefore, he too only lasted for three months before he was forced to resign and make way for Karl Staaff on 7 November.7 The dissolution of the union with Norway had a severe impact on the Swedish consular service and on Sweden’s neutrality as a whole. Reacting to the break in the alliance, Sweden made further attempts at reform, which did improve the consular service but ultimately failed to elevate it to a level where it could meet the demands and needs of the Swedish export industry. 1

Zero Hour: Reorganizing the Foreign Service

The political turmoil of 1905 naturally affected the Ministry for Foreign Affairs very heavily. Staaff’s new foreign minister, Eric Trolle, had been in office for only ten days when the new Diplomatic and Consular Committee took up its task. Trolle was the third in line, following August Gyldenstolpe and Fredrik Wachtmeister, the two short-​lived successors of Alfred Lagerheim, to try to tackle the challenges faced by the Ministry. Trolle was well-​aware of the importance of the new committee when he addressed government about the matter: The organization of the consular service is so intimately linked to the organization of Sweden’s diplomatic representation abroad that your Royal Majesty will not want to present to parliament a proposal about the consular organization without close consideration about changes which eventually should be made in the diplomatic organization.8

7 Tommy Möller, Svensk politisk historia, ­chapters 3 and 4 (Lund: Studentlitteratur, 2015) and Stig Hadenius, Modern svensk politisk historia: konflikt och samförstånd (Stockholm: Hjalmarson & Högberg, 2008). 8 Betänkande afgifvet av den enligt nådigt beslut den 17 november 1905 förordnade kommitté om nya organisationer af Utrikesdepartementet, diplomatien och konsulatväsendet jämte förslag till utgiftsstater (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet. P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1906), 2.

194 CHAPTER 4 The new foreign minister identified the separation of authority over the consular service between the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and the Board of Trade as being of central concern. Trolle also argued in favour of recruiting ‘practically-​ minded young men’ to diplomatic and consular posts regardless of their financial circumstances and maintained that greater attention should be paid to the mercantile training of consular officials. ‘Finally’, Trolle said in an address to the cabinet, ‘I shall emphasize the importance of establishing a lively collaboration between diplomacy and the consular service’.9 The goals that Trolle formulated were of course a criticism of the earlier organization of the Foreign Service, its flawed recruitment practices, lack of training and insufficient degree of cooperation between the diplomatic and the consular services. With this, Trolle confirmed the earlier Norwegian criticism while putting considerable pressure on the new committee. The Diplomatic and Consular Committee of 1905 was made up of some of Sweden’s most prominent figures from the country’s Foreign Service, industry and shipping-​related businesses. It was led by the previous foreign minister and member of the Consular Committee of 1875, Alfred Lagerheim, who had taken up the role of director general of the Swedish Board of Trade after leaving government. The other members were the conservative member of parliament Fredrik von Rosen, the consul general to Helsinki Carl Martin Laurentius Fallenius, the prominent businessman Olof A. Söderberg, and Dan Broström, one of Sweden’s leading shipping owners, who later served as naval minister.10 All in all, this group was far more qualified than its predecessors of the mid-​1870s. The committee presented its report to the Swedish government on 23 March 1906. The main part of the report ran to 122 pages and discussed all aspects of the Swedish Foreign Service; further supplements amounted to 500 extra pages.11 The report dealt with a much larger number of diplomatic and consular issues, in much greater detail, than any of the previous reports from similar Swedish-​Norwegian committees. In the introduction to the report, the committee pointed out that it had not managed to study in detail the vast amount of materials collected by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs from all the missions and consulates. Instead, it had had to focus on the general premises.12 9 10 11

12

Betänkande 1906, 4. Betänkande 1906. Bihang till 1905 års diplomat –​och konsulatkommittés betänkande: muntliga yttranden inför kommittén: skriftliga svar på kommitténs frågor: uttalanden af enskilda personer: utlåtanden af handels –​och sjöfartsnämnder: utlåtanden af andra korporationer: svar på cirkulär från ministern från utrikes ärendena (Stockholm:  Kongl. Boktryckeriet. P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1906). Betänkande 1906, 2.

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The committee reiterated Foreign Minister Trolle’s heavy focus on recruitment, pointing out that ‘the rigorous selection of capable people in all ranks’ would be decisive in determining Sweden’s success in establishing a foreign service that could sufficiently serve its interests. The commissioners also highlighted the importance of the technological developments that had taken place in the past fifty years. Improved communications via telegraph, steamboat and railroad had brought about enormous change, and now posed new challenges. At one time, the commissioners explained, the Swedish government had relied entirely on the political information provided by its diplomats, but the era when Sweden could make her voice heard in international matters was over: the country had lost its previous political and military rank. From now on, the report determined, Sweden would instead have to maintain its good reputation through economic advancement and cultural development. New types of diplomat and consul were dearly needed in order to meet this new challenge: Thus, high standards apply to the modern diplomat. Attentive intelligence, vigorous work ethic, sound judgement and practicality are the positive qualities required for him to fulfil his duty. He must also be broadminded and must not suffer from the hubris that diplomatic privileges often tempt otherwise capable men into. It is therefore no wonder that less capable [men] tend to make an excessive point of their so-​called dignity. But this kind should therefore not be kept in the position. The sooner they are gone, the better. On the whole, the above is equally true for consuls. The requirements for the consular service are as high as they are for the diplomatic service. It is therefore no longer enough that diplomats and consuls treat the administrative work conscientiously and display interest when compiling mandatory reports. It is also vital that they turn careful attention to what may benefit the commercial interests of the motherland, i.e. anything of practical significance to trade, industry, shipping and agriculture or what is also termed commercial information.13 These conclusions were the result of numerous interviews and conversations with many of Sweden’s most important ship owners, industrialists and merchants. The majority of the commercial actors interviewed by the committee stated that in most cases missions and consulates indeed were courteous and 13

Betänkande 1906, 8.

196 CHAPTER 4 supportive but had nonetheless failed to provide sufficient and timely information about trade and commerce. The committee was also surprised to learn that a considerable number of Swedish firms and merchants did not engage with missions and consulates because either they did not need them or simply did not know that such help was available.14 The committee raised two important matters that had been decisive for the development of the consular service since the 1850s: firstly, the needs of the shipping companies and secondly, the statistics that were used to assess the significance of areas or single ports to Swedish shipping. Leading shipping companies like Nordstjernan or Tirfing had become increasingly independent, as they had developed the capacity to meet most of their legal, commercial and technical needs. The commissioners stated that the fact that these companies often worked with private agents or insurance companies, rather than relying on consuls, should be taken into consideration when assessing the need for a consulate in a specific area. The problem with the official statistics was that the numbers of ships and the tonnage they carried were accumulated. This meant that ships operating on shorter routes in European ports inflated the numbers. According to the official statistics for the year 1904, a total of 2,019 ships with a combined total of 911,133 tons had visited Copenhagen. But on closer examination the committee revealed that only 83 different ships were actually registered. One steam ferry of 778 tons alone made 622 trips, which meant that its traffic was registered as 622 ships of 483,916 tons –​ a third of the total number of ships and half of the traffic in tonnage for Copenhagen. Similar issues appeared when the committee looked at the numbers for other European ports, such as Lübeck, Newcastle upon Tyne or Vasa. The committee therefore compiled a separate assessment of the real significance of shipping to various consular districts. It pointed out that the composition of the official statistics exaggerated the need for consular services in Europe while diminishing their role overseas and in more remote areas.15 With this, the committee confirmed the accuracy of one of the most substantial complaints made by the Norwegians in the controversy about the Union’s consular service. Representatives of the Swedish export industry, export-​oriented merchants and ship owners believed that only salaried consuls could provide sufficient service and support. Alfred Lagerheim and the other commissioners generally agreed, but did not hide the limited economic muscle of the Swedish state, declaring:  ‘The committee is certainly inclined to agree to this opinion, but

14 15

Betänkande 1906, 9. Betänkande 1906, 10–​11.

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must remind that even here the question of costs matters’.16 At the same time, the commission argued that many of the (mostly unsalaried) foreign merchant consuls were performing their duties ‘zealously’, sometimes even at their own expense. Consuls of Swedish ethnicity were preferred, but nationality was not to be the single decisive criterion. What was more important, according to the commission’s report, was that the personal interests of a consul did not collide with those of Sweden. Therefore, they recommended that appointing consuls from countries which were in competition with Swedish industry should be avoided. Another important suggestion was to remove §13 (Generalkonsulat) of the consular regulation, which stipulated that only consulates of especial importance could be consulates general. This restrictive rule had been written into the regulation because of Norwegian legislation. In the view of the commissioners, it deprived the government of the opportunity to use prestige when recruiting the best possible consuls. With Norway and Norwegian law out of the equation, the commissioners could suggest that the Swedish government shift towards a more flexible rule, allowing it to appoint consulates as consuls general and vice consulates as consuls. These titles would be personal and not change the status of the consulate itself.17 The commission finally criticized the fact that §6 of the regulation (Beskickningarnas åligganden m. afs. å konsulatärenden), on the relationship between missions (embassies) and consulates, had never created the ‘organic connection’ between them that was sorely needed.18 Diplomats were still considered the ‘real’ foreign service –​ consuls some kind of inferior attachment, and their relationship ‘artificial’ as a consequence. The functions of the diplomatic service and the consular service were to remain separate, but it was necessary that both pay greater attention to economic matters than they had earlier. To facilitate this, the commissioners recommended that Sweden adopt the British and German practice of commercial attachés working at missions or consulates. These commercial attachés would be ‘young but experienced merchants with the necessary language skills and if possible some technical education’. The new attachés would prepare themselves by visiting the most important trade and industrial centres in Sweden and establishing ties to important commercial actors, ties which they then would maintain in the future. Their foremost tasks would be to collect relevant information on technological and industrial developments and identify risks for Swedish exports in the country where they were stationed. This idea had already been presented to 16 17 18

Betänkande 1906, 11. Betänkande 1906, 12–​13. Betänkande 1906, 13–​14.

198 CHAPTER 4 the Riksdag in 1886, but ultimately rejected. The commissioners favoured this system of trade attachés similar to that of Germany or Britain, rather than establish Swedish chambers of commerce in some of Europe’s larger capitals headed by consuls general, as some of the advisors they spoke to proposed.19 Another object of criticism was that the stipends created in the early 1890s, to allow young men to get acquainted with the conditions for trade and commerce abroad, had increasingly been used for other purposes. The committee outright rejected the idea of the Trade and Shipping Committee of 1898 suggesting the removal of the differences between holders of trade stipends and export agents. To Lagerheim and his commissioners, stipend holders clearly lacked the experience necessary to promote Swedish export products adequately. This insufficiency resulted in inadequate semi-​annual reports produced by the stipend holders. The committee therefore proposed reforming the stipend program rather than changing its nature as such. It suggested splitting the program’s annual budget of 30,000 kronor into three types of stipends. The first category would be three stipends of 5,000 kronor, to be awarded to merchants who were in a good position to establish themselves in remote areas or in Russia and returned once the economic conditions of the stipend holder permitted. The second type would be five stipends of 2,000 kronor, to be awarded to graduates of commercial colleges who wanted to travel to remote countries or Russia. The third and final category was made up of five stipends of 1,000 kronor for graduates of commercial or technical colleges to travel to Germany, England or France for work and to improve their language proficiency. The duration for all stipends was one year, with the possibility of a second year, which the stipend holder would have to spend in a different country.20 With this, the committee separated the stipend program from the Foreign Service. The committee also proposed setting up concrete rules for the establishment of the diplomatic and consular services abroad. Missions would only be set up in countries where they were necessary because of Sweden’s political and economic interests. In such cases, the head of a mission would also lead the consular service. In countries where Sweden’s political and economic interests were paramount, the head of the mission would be appointed as a minister. In countries where Sweden had limited political interests but significant economic interests at stake, or in countries where circumstances required there to be representatives with diplomatic status, the head of the

19 20

Betänkande 1906, 15–​18. Betänkande 1906, 19–​20.

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199

mission would receive the lower rank of chargé d’affaires. Salaried consulates general would be established in countries where Sweden did not need a mission but had vital economic interests. Finally, salaried consulates would be established where they were needed. It was also suggested that commercial attachés should be employed if the head of a mission were tied by political or administrative tasks, or if the position of consul general required legal skills. Unsalaried consulates and vice consulates were to receive funding for the employment of assistants with knowledge about Sweden and who had a command of the Swedish language.21 On the basis of these criteria, the Lagerheim Committee suggested a number of changes to the Foreign Service. Only the heads of the missions in Kristiania, Copenhagen, Berlin, St. Petersburg, Paris, Washington D.C. and Tokyo would receive the rank of minister, whereas the heads of missions in Madrid, Rome, Vienna and Constantinople would be relegated to the rank of chargé d’affaires. The missions in Brussels and The Hague would be closed down and replaced with ministers with side accreditation. The minister in Paris would be given side-​accreditation for Brussels and the minister in London would be given side-​accreditation for The Hague, to cover the needs of the consular service in Belgium and the Netherlands respectively. The consuls of Antwerp and Rotterdam would then be elevated to consulate generals to cover the needs of the consular service in Belgium and the Netherlands.22 The Lagerheim Committee also proposed shorter and more accessible annual consular reports and fixed physical and educational requirements for entrance to the Foreign Service in order to avoid replacements for health reasons. It also made rule changes to consular regulation so that consuls could be moved around like diplomats without the traditional appointment procedures following proposals from the Board of Trade after vacancies. Integration between the diplomatic and consular services would also be furthered by allowing aspiring diplomats to be trained in consulates and vice versa.23 With regard to the territories studied in this book, the committee focused heavily on China and Japan but paid little attention to Africa, the West Indies and India. The few recommendations that were made with regard to those regions included budget cuts to the consulates in Alexandria, Havana and Singapore. The notable exception was the proposal for a new salaried consulate in Cape Town.24

21 22 23 24

Betänkande 1906, 23. Betänkande 1906, 69–​71. Betänkande 1906, 24–​29, 106–​109 and 116–​119. Betänkande 1906, 93–​94, 97 and 99–​102.

200 CHAPTER 4 The work of the Lagerheim Committee provoked considerable internal dissent and public criticism. Three of the committee’s five members  –​Fallenius, von Rosen and Broström –​disagreed on various issues and published separate statements in the appendix of the report. Von Rosen criticized the proposed closure of the missions in Brussels and The Hague as ignorant of the important ‘very lively trade’ with both Belgium and the Netherlands. He suggested maintaining one mission for the two countries alongside two unsalaried consulates in Antwerp and Rotterdam. Von Rosen also opposed the idea of replacing the ministers in Vienna and Rome because he believed that proper etiquette required a nation of Sweden’s rank to maintain its representation in the capitals of the major powers –​ among which he obviously counted both Austria-​Hungary and Italy –​at the ministerial level. In order to work within the financial limitations, he proposed that the minister should mainly operate from Rome but travel to Vienna on a regular basis, where a legation clerk would be in charge of daily duties.25 Outside the committee there was further backlash, and the press criticized the committee for rushing things and condemned its report as the result of ‘over-​hasty’ work.26 Nevertheless, the new consular regulation was adopted on 24 September 1906, six months after the Diplomatic and Consular Committee had presented its report. The introduction to its section, made up of general instructions for the execution of consular duties (Allmän instruktion för konsulernas ämbetsutöfning), set out a new formulation which was very clear about the intensified degree of integration within the Swedish Foreign Service that Trolle and Lagerheim had intended: Like other countries, Sweden has special representatives abroad, diplomats and consuls. The purpose for both is safeguard Sweden’s interests. In this respect Sweden’s Foreign Service is uniform and in a material sense, one can hardly draw a clear line between the diplomatic and the consular area. The diplomats have been entrusted with Sweden’s political ties with foreign powers whereas the consuls have been instructed to exercise certain local administrative work in the areas of trade and shipping, to vigilantly monitor the development of the economy and to take care of seafarers and distressed Swedish subjects. But there is a large economic area of practice within these boundaries of the Foreign Service which are common for diplomats and consuls and in some respects, both have

25 ‘Särskildt yttrande af Grefve v. Rosen.’, in Betänkande 1906, 221–​224. 26 Håkansson, Konsulerna och exporten 1905–​1921.

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to equally assist Swedish authorities and individuals. The organization of the Swedish Foreign Service has considered these circumstances. It is built upon cooperation between diplomats and consuls.27 2

Africa: Maintaining the Status Quo

In 1905, few Swedes were as enthusiastic about the African continent as they had been 20  years earlier. The belief in Africa’s economic promise had decreased significantly; furthermore, uneasiness over reports about the cruel treatment of the indigenous population in Congo and the related diplomatic dispute between Britain and Belgium had increasingly overshadowed the earlier euphoria over Europe’s ‘enlightenment of the Dark Continent’. Now, the deepening conflict and ultimate escalation of diplomatic strife between Sweden and Norway, and the increasing tension between the major powers in Europe and in colonized territories, pushed the foreign policy decision-​makers in Stockholm to adopt a stricter neutral attitude.28 Even so, during the decade prior to the outbreak of the First World War, trade with Africa developed well. Imports from Africa rose from 900,941 kronor in 1905 to 1,732,707 kronor in 1913 after reaching a peak of 3,149,852 kronor in 1910. Exports went up from 11,200,024 kronor to 18,765,348 kronor over the same period. During the five-​year period between 1909 and 1913, the total value of imports from Africa was 11,863,613 kronor and that of exports 82,460,584 kronor. Imports from Africa had increased sevenfold in value in less than a decade, while exports had also increased by 50 percent. This development was reflected in the consular presence, as the number of consulates rose from 12 to 14 after the dissolution of the union with Norway. A second consulate was opened in Egypt and a new one was established in Senegal, with the only closure occurring in Sierra Leone.29 But, while Swedish trade with Africa swelled considerably in the early 1900s, its share of total Swedish imports and exports remained modest because it was outnumbered by the growth of other markets in Europe and the Americas. Along with the disputes over African territories,

27 28 29

Konsulatförordningen: och Allmän instruktion för konsulernas ämbetsutöfning: jämte konsulär författningssamling m.m. (Stockholm: Kongl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1908), 47. Yngfalk, ‘Sverige och den europeiska kolonialpolitiken i Afrika’, 37–​43. Sverige, Statistiska centralbyrån, Statistisk årsbok för Sverige 1915 (Stockholm:  Kungl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1915), 135.

202 CHAPTER 4 table 11

Swedish trade with Africa in the early 1900s in kronor (share of total Swedish imports, exports and trade in percent)a

Imports from Africa to Sweden Exports from Sweden to Africa Total Swedish trade with Africa Total Swedish imports Total Swedish exports Total Swedish trade

1901–​1905

1909–​1913

1,692,982 (0,06%)

11,863,613 (0,33%)

54,776,485 (2,67%)

82,460,584 (2,49%)

56,469,467 (1,20%)

94,324,197 (1,36%)

2,666,956,316 2,052,230,936 4,719,187,252

3,602,693,629 3,307,683,092 6,910,376,721

a  Statistisk årsbok för Sverige 1915, 134–​135

this explains why Sweden did not allocate additional resources to its African trade. South Africa, now completely under British control, and Egypt, remained the most important regions to Swedish trade, but they were less dominant than earlier, as trade with the Barbary States in the Maghreb grew in proportion. Swedish trade with Congo also thrived during the first years of the twentieth century but collapsed after its peak in 1910. The French colonies of Madagascar and on the West African coast, as well as the Portuguese colonies on the eastern shores and German Cameroon, remained less important.30 Morocco and its capital Tangier saw the strongest economic development. Exports from Sweden to Morocco rose exponentially from an average of less than 100,000 kronor in 1905 to 2,2 million kronor in 1913. Still, Stockholm never reversed the decision taken in April 1900 to entrust the local German mission with its consular service, and only appointed a Swedish vice consul to support the German minister. Obviously, the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs considered the established order, with the German ministry as Sweden’s main representative in Morocco, as a good and functioning one, and therefore decided to uphold the arrangement. Sweden was nonetheless well-​integrated into the local colonial hierarchy in Morocco. In 1904, Sweden-​Norway had contributed 30

Statistisk årsbok för Sverige 1915, 134–​135.

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to the construction of the encircling wall of the new Christian cemetery in Tangier with money from the consular fund. The initiative came from the European diplomatic corps of the city since the church lacked the necessary means. When the wall collapsed five years later, the Swedish government again contributed to the restoration. This time, the money for the support of the cemetery in Tangier was taken from the budget of the Swedish Foreign Service.31 Along with the Ottoman Empire and its vassal states in Egypt, China, Persia and Siam, Morocco was one of the countries where Sweden maintained its role in legal imperialism through consular judges. In Tangier, the task of consular judge was given to the Swedish vice consul, Emil Dahl.32 The two other consulates, in Algiers and Tunis, had been interlinked since the latter was closed down and integrated into the district of the former in 1882. This decision was the subject of some controversy in the 1890s until a separate consulate was restored in Tunis in 1897, as we have seen in the previous chapter. Both consulates justified their existence as trade grew disproportionately large compared to other parts of Africa. Swedish trade with Algiers increased from 745,574 to slightly over 2 million kronor between 1905 and 1913. Almost all of the growth resulted from Swedish exports to Algeria. The numbers for Tunis were equally positive, as the total trade went up from 714,227 to 1,425,049 kronor.33 This positive economic development ended the discussions about necessary changes to the consular service in the area. In June 1907, one year after it cut the office allowance of 2,000 kronor, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm appointed local bank director Julien Thibaud as Swedish consul in Algiers at the recommendation of Sweden’s minister in Paris, August Gyldenstolpe.34 This was a departure from tradition, as Thibaud was only the second foreigner to be appointed to the post since its establishment in 1729.35 In Tunis, Otto Minck replaced Carl Rosenlund, who was moved to the more important post in Cape Town.36 The Swedes also made some important changes to their consular service in Egypt. Most notably, Stockholm moved back the consulate general from 31

‘Bidrag till återuppbyggande af muren omkring den kristna kyrkogården i Tanger.’, Ministerial protocol No. 29, 13 August 1909, Vol. 52, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 32 ‘Förordnande af konsulardomare.’, Ministerial protocol No. 44, 3 December 1909, Vol. 52, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 33 Statistisk årsbok för Sverige 1915, 134. 34 ‘Utnämning av konsul i Alger.’, Ministerial protocol No. 21, 21 June 1907, Vol. 50, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 35 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 387. 36 ‘Förordnande av konsul i Tunis.’, Ministerial protocol No. 5, 8 February 1907, Vol. 50, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 388.

204 CHAPTER 4 Alexandria to Cairo in 1908.37 The move was the result of an initiative by consul general Carl-​Axel Hansson Wachtmeister, who argued that the main reason for having moved the consulate general to Alexandria in 1826 in the first place, Norwegian shipping, was gone. He pointed out that Swedish exports were now his main concern, and that Cairo was much more important in that respect as it was twice as large as Alexandria and had experienced a commercial upswing, with many companies moving to the city. Wachtmeister recommended maintaining Alexandria as a consulate for the purpose of marketing Swedish products. Foreign Minister Trolle agreed with the need to move the consulate general and cited a similar statement from a stipend holder to the Board of Trade according to which Cairo was declared an important city to ‘European industrial products which is why the nations that dominate the Egyptian import trade have focused on winning the market it offers’. But at the same time Trolle disagreed with Wachtmeister about the need to maintain a consulate in Alexandria, arguing that the city’s insignificance to Swedish shipping did not justify such a presence. As a result, for four years the city only hosted a vice consul.38 This position was revised four years later, however, and in 1912 a new consulate was established in Alexandria despite these objections. The reasoning was that Sweden remained the only Western power without a representative at the rank of consul now that Belgium and the United States had elevated the rank of their representatives. This put Sweden in an awkward position: The consequence of this is that the Swedish representative always has to take the last seat at official gatherings, in particular during meetings of the consular corps. This does not correspond with the prestige of our country and our interests in an oriental city like Alexandria where so much emphasis is put on such things.39 For this reason, Foreign Minister Albert Ehrensvärd (the younger) came to agree with Consul General Wachtmeister and a number of commercial agents who all suggested reversing Trolle’s decision and re-​establishing Alexandria as a separate consulate. Ehrensvärd appointed the 40-​year-​old vice consul Carl Silfverhjelm to the post.40 Silfverhjelm was a merchant from Stockholm with 37 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 431–​432. 38 ‘Generalkonsulatet i Alexandria, flyttning till Kairo.’, Ministerial protocol No. 13, 27 March 1908, Vol. 51, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 39 ‘Upprättande av ett olönadt konsulat i Alexandria.’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 19 January 1912, Vol. 55, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 40 ‘Upprättande av ett olönadt konsulat i Alexandria.’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 19 January 1912, Vol. 55, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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20 years’ experience in international trade. He had worked on behalf of various Swedish firms in places such as Paris, London and Congo before coming to Alexandria in 1903, where he was appointed vice consul three years later.41 The consular service also remained intimately linked with Sweden’s participation in the Mixed Courts of Egypt. In 1909, Wachtmeister was appointed as consular judge; Carl Silfverhjelm later served as substitute in his absence.42 The Swedes also contributed actively to the reform of the Mixed Courts system.43 But Sweden’s involvement in the colonial rule of Egypt was not limited to the judicial system. Just like other Western nations, Sweden was generally involved in most issues on the domestic political front. In the early 1900s, the government in Cairo requested Sweden’s consent to various domestic reforms to Egyptian property taxes, the country’s land register or to its loan system.44 One request concerned the intended property tax increases in cities such as Cairo or Port Said, from one-​twelfth to ten percent of the property value, as a means of financing the construction of sewer systems. As in most other parts of Egypt and other colonized territories, the Swedes based their approval on that of the other Western powers.45 Congo was another area where various aspects of colonialism gained significance in relation to untrammelled economic interests. As mentioned in the previous chapter, Belgian rule over Congo was viewed negatively by the Swedish public by 1905, even though many Swedish officials tried to cast the horrific reports as exaggerated. Sweden’s trade with Congo never gained real traction. In 1905 there was no trade at all, and in the following years, although imports from the African colony did rise to a record-​breaking 1,1 million kronor in 1910, they quickly shrank to less than a third of that volume only three years later. It became increasingly obvious that the exploitation of Congo was not as lucrative as Swedish and Norwegian officials had hoped for a decade or two earlier. 41 42 43 44 45

https://​www.adelsvapen.com/​genealogi/​Silfverhielm_​nr_​93 (accessed 17 December 2018). ‘Förordnande af konsulardomare i Egypten.’, Ministerial protocol No. 18, 12 May 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. See also ‘Förlängning af de blandade domstolarnas i Egypten verksamhet.’, Ministerial protocol No. 2, January 1910, Vol. 53, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Framställning från egyptiska regeringen om ändring i art. 12 af den för de blandade domstolarna i Egypten gällande “Code civil mixte” samt i blandade domstolarnas organisation’, Ministerial protocol No. 39, 9 December 1910, Vol. 53, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Godkännande af egyptiskt lagförslag om fastighetsböcker.’ and ‘Egyptisk framställning om rätt att upptaga lån’, Ministerial protocol No. 33, 14 October 1910, Vol. 53, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. ‘Egyptiska regeringens begäran om medgifvande till höjande af fastighetsskatten i Port Said och övriga egyptiska städer.’, Ministerial protocol No. 29, 13 August 1909, Vol. 52, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

206 CHAPTER 4 By the early 1910s, Stockholm was not only bothered by the lack of profits but also burdened with the increasing work needed to secure the rights of Swedish citizens who were employed by the Congo Free State but who had illegally left their station because of the bad conditions. The Swedish Cabinet discussed numerous cases where Swedes had fled to other parts of Africa and ended up in the custody of other colonial powers, and who were now in need of help from consuls and diplomats.46 The consular presence –​such as it was –​remained a challenge for several years. The consulate in Brazzaville, in charge of the French and Belgian territories, was left vacant in 1906 when its first post holder, Gullbrand Schiøtz, left following charges made against him of the cruelties he had purportedly committed earlier in the service of Belgian companies. However, four years later, Sweden’s interests in the Belgian Congo seemed to have improved and become more promising than ever; this became the reason for the establishment of a consulate in Leopoldville (present-​day Kinshasa) in November 1910.47 In 1910 the Swedish minister in Brussels, Albert Ehrensvärd (the younger), who would be appointed as foreign minister a year later, wrote to his government in Stockholm that a consul in the Belgian Congo was desirable. Ehrensvärd explained that the mission in Brussels had often been forced to give unsatisfactory answers to requests about employment in Congo because it had little relevant information at its disposal. Another aspect justifying an extended consular presence was, according to the minister, the fact that ‘there is prospect that the territory of the colony will be opened for world trade’ because of the transformation of the Congo Free State into a Belgian colony two years earlier. The new position in Leopoldville was given to Carl Sjögren, a former reserve office who had served in the Congo Free State for several years before starting his own business in the city.48 Yet, as mentioned above, the Swedish authorities were mistaken about the potential of the Belgian Congo, and so instead the focus of the consulate increasingly shifted to non-​economic matters. Most often it was the Mission Covenant Church of Sweden which asked for assistance. In the spring of 1911, the Mission requested the help of the government in Stockholm in negotiating an exception for its schools in the French Congo from the requirement to conform

46

‘Kostnaderna för C.P. Johansson Flygares och A. Anderssons fortskaffande från Kongo till Bryssel.’, Ministerial protocol No. 5, 29 January 1909, Vol. 52, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 47 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 353. 48 ‘Upprättande af konsulat i Kongo och utnämning af konsul i Kinshasa.’, Ministerial protocol No. 37, 25 November 1910, Vol. 53, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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to local school law.49 The Mission Covenant had expanded into the French colony two years earlier after more than 25 years of missionary activities, including schooling, in the Belgian part of Congo.50 It had purchased a plot in Brazzaville for the construction of a new station, and had introduced a school in two other buildings in the area. But shortly afterwards the French authorities closed the school down down because it did not follow the school law –​a law which had originally been legislated for Gabon, but which had more recently also been introduced to the French Congo. According to this law, all teaching had to be in French and half of the curriculum dedicated to French language classes. The Swedish Mission Covenant argued its case that the law should only concern public elementary schools, so-​called ‘écoles primaires’, and not missionary schools. It believed the French authorities should actually value the primary objective of their schools, namely ‘spreading Christian education to the heathen indigenes’. The Foreign Ministry advised the mccs in the matter, and Foreign Minister Arvid Taube instructed the minister in Paris to communicate the Swedish government’s support.51 Another example of the consular service’s significance in political and altruistic matters in Congo concerned a similar request from the mccs regarding the ownership of property in the colony. According to French law, foreigners could not own property. The mccs argued that this created considerable problems. Property had to be registered in the name of individual missionaries, who usually had to leave within a few years because of the unbearable climate. Therefore, the mccs wanted to apply for an exemption in order to be able to register its property in the name of the organization. In this particular case, however, the Swedish government advised the missionaries against proceeding with the matter because it viewed it an impossible task.52 The local consuls were not necessarily always key figures in these kinds of non-​economic matters in colonized territories, but they certainly were 49 50 51 52

‘Svenska missionsförbundets begäran om framställning hos franska regeringen i syfte att gällande skollag må förklaras icke äga tillämpning på förbundets missionsskolor i franska Kongo.’, Ministerial protocol No. 8, 10 March 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Simon Larsson, ‘Att bygga ett samhälle vid tidens slut: Svenska missionsförbundets mission i Kongo 1881 till 1920-​talet’, Ph.D. Thesis (University of Gothenburg, 2016), chapter and Lundqvist, Ett motsägelsefullt möte. ‘Svenska missionsförbundets begäran om framställning hos franska regeringen i syfte att gällande skollag må förklaras icke äga tillämpning på förbundets missionsskolor i franska Kongo.’, Ministerial protocol No. 8, 10 March 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Ang. Svenska missionsförbundets hemställan om åtgärder för erhållande av dispens från de bestämmelser, som hindrar förbundet att besitta fastighet i Franska Kongo.’, Ministerial protocol No. 11, 19 March 1913, Vol. 56, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

208 CHAPTER 4 important as official representatives of the Swedish state and as messengers between the Swedish government and its citizens. In the Belgian Congo this had been the case ever since Gillis Bildt and Maximilien Strauch had concluded the agreement between Sweden-​Norway and the International Association on 10 February 1885, which had laid down the vital role of consuls in the colony.53 Unlike Congo, South Africa maintained its position as an important market for Swedish exports during the decade prior to the First World War, with about one percent of Sweden’s total exports sold to the British dominion.54 On the recommendation of the Diplomatic and Consular Committee, the Riksdag granted the new consul general in Cape Town, Carl Rosenlund, a considerable salary of 18,000 kronor in 1906. Seven years later the amount was increased to 21,000 kronor.55 Rosenlund had earlier served in Tunis and was a respected member of the consular corps. The Swedish government also granted the consulate in Johannesburg a smaller allowance of 600 kronor and appointed the Swedish merchant John E. Johnsson as consul after discharging his Norwegian predecessor, Ernst Suhrke.56 Increasing trade was also the main reason for the final establishment of a Swedish consulate in Africa, in Dakar, in 1911, prior to the outbreak of the First World War. It was the Swedish minister in Paris, August Gyldenstolpe, who recommended this appointment. Gyldenstolpe believed that this could stimulate further the Swedish export trade to French West Africa. Gyldenstolpe cited statistics for the year 1908, in which exports had reached a value of 317,963 kronor. Two years later, these numbers had actually already risen by another 60%.57 The minister also pointed out that other European countries, including Norway, were already represented in Dakar, and that Swedish vessels who visited the colonies would profit from a Swedish representative in the area.58 The government consented, and the position was filled by the French merchant 53 See ‘Convention entre les Royaumes-​ Unis de Suède et de Norvège et l’Association Internationale du Congo’, annexed to ‘Ratifikation af konvention med Internationela Congo Associationen.’ [sic], Ministerial protocol No. 13, 24 April 1885, Vol. 28, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA, in particular articles v, ix and x. 54 Statistisk årsbok för Sverige 1915, 134. 55 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 361. 56 ‘Utnämning af konsul i Johannesburg.’ And ‘Tilldelande af kontorskostnadsersättning till konsulatet i Johannesburg’, Ministerial protocol No. 40, 11 December 1908, Vol. 51, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 57 Statistisk årsbok för Sverige 1915, 134. 58 ‘Upprättande af konsulat i Dakar.’, Ministerial protocol No. 34, 29 September 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

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and local politician Jules Sergent, whom Gyldenstolpe had personally recommended.59 Sergent participated actively in the politics of French West Africa. He was an active supporter and confidant of Blaise Diagne, the first black African deputy to the French Chamber of Deputies, who served as mayor of Dakar between 1920 and 1934.60 Sergent himself enjoyed a high standing, serving as mayor himself for a shorter period in 1921.61 In the following years, Swedish exports to West Africa shrank by over 70%, however.62 3

Eastern and Southern Asia: Concentrating Efforts

In the early 1900s, interest in Africa declined, while Asia became the most alluring region and potential market of the future in the eyes of Swedish and Norwegian politicians, diplomats, industrialists and shipping companies. As we have seen in the previous chapter, China and Japan were clearly at the centre of this interest. Stockholm considered the consulate general in Shanghai in particular as the potential hub for strengthened political, economic and cultural ties with China and the region. Since the appointment of Carl Bock in 1893, only Scandinavians were selected to the position that once was so dependent on the American merchants of Russell & Co. After the dissolution of the Union, only Swedes were appointed. The first consul general of the new era was Carl Richard Esaias Bagge, who served between 1906 and 1910. Bagge was a 46-​year-​old lawyer who had earlier served in different roles in London, Hamburg and Quebec.63 His successor, Johan Erik Evald Hultman, was a diplomat who was transferred to Shanghai from the vice consulate in St. Petersburg. Hultman was a prime example of the type of diplomat and consul that the Diplomatic and Consular Committee of 1905 had suggested. He was highly educated, with a master’s degree in Law and a PhD in Languages from Uppsala University. This also qualified him for 59

‘Utnämning af konsul’, Ministerial protocol No. 34, 29 September 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA. 60 Raymond F.  Betts, ‘The Establishment of the Medina in Dakar, Senegal, 1914’, Africa:  Journal of the International African Institute 41(2), 1971, 143–​152. See also G. Westley Johnson, The Emergence of Black Politics in Senegal: The Struggle for Power in the Four Communes, 1900–​1920 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1971). 61 ‘Liste des anciens Maires de Dakar’, Ville de Dakar. Available at http://​www.villededakar. org/​pages/​liste-​des-​anciens-​maires-​de-​dakar (accessed 17 December 2018). 62 Sverige, Statistiska centralbyrån, Statistisk årsbok för Sverige 1916 (Stockholm:  Kungl. Boktryckeriet, P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1916), 138. 63 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 357 and 370.

210 CHAPTER 4 the position of consular judge.64 Hultman served as consul general for nine years, before he moved on to the post of consul general in Hamburg and later as ambassador to Finland, Japan, China and Siam in the 1920s and 1930s.65 He also represented Sweden on the consular council that drafted the proposal for the establishment of a new international court of consuls in Guangzhou in 1912.66 Cooperation with other Western powers also continued in the economic sphere, for example during the negotiations with China about property rights.67 Foreign Minister Ehrensvärd discussed the matter with the heads of the ministries of justice and finance before reporting to cabinet about the necessity of cooperating with other Western European states via the consular system in order to protect commercial interests: Since some non-​Christian countries, including China, do not offer opportunities to protect industrial property rights through their own authorities, a number of European states and the United States of America have entered special agreements with each other about the mutual protection of industrial property rights through the consular jurisdiction in the non-​ Christian countries in question. The only European states in addition to Sweden which still lack such agreements should be Norway, Switzerland and the Balkan States.68 Britain and Denmark had approached the Swedes to conduct such negotiations a few years earlier, but they had only been initiated after the legal formalization of the consular jurisdiction in 1909. In the introduction to the Swedish Foreign Service’s budget for the year 1914, the government criticized its diplomatic representation in China and Japan. In 1914, the authority over the consular service in China was therefore formally 64 65 66 67

68

‘Utnämning af generalkonsul i Shanghai.’ and ‘Förordnande af konsulardomare i Kina.’, Ministerial protocol No. 7, 28 February 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Vem är det?:  svensk biografisk handbok 1933 (Stockholm:  Kungl. Boktryckeriet. P.A. Norstedt & Söner, 1932), 386. ‘Ang. inrättandet af en internationell konsulardomstol i Hankow.’ and the annex ‘Rules for the Court of Consuls, Hankow.’, Ministerial protocol No. 34, 12 August 1912, Vol. 55, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. See for example the agreement with Belgium in ‘Ang. öfverenskommelse med Belgien om ömsesidigt skydd för industriellt äganderätt i Kina.’, Ministerial protocol No. 42, 25 October 1912, Vol. 55, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Sweden made similar agreements with France, Italy, Portugal, Russia and the United States. ‘Ang. inledande af underhandlingar med främmande makter om skydd för industriell äganderätt i Kina.’, Ministerial protocol No. 12, 22 March 1912, Vol. 55, A3A, UD/​ KfubH, RA.

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transferred from Sweden’s ambassador to Beijing (and Tokyo), Gustaf Oscar Wallenberg, to the above-​mentioned Hultman, who also received a salary raise from 21,000 to 29,000 kronor and an additional budget of 7,500 kronor for the employment of a clerk.69 With this, Shanghai became Sweden’s third most expensive consular representation after New York and London, whose budgets were only slightly higher.70 China and Shanghai were intimately interlinked with Japan and Tokyo during the first years after Norway’s departure into independence. In September 1906, the consulate general in Kobe was merged with the mission in Tokyo, where Gustaf Oscar Wallenberg received the double appointment as Swedish minister and consul general to Japan. Axel Torsten Uddén, who had been consul general to Japan for nine months since December 1905, moved to Tokyo as well and received the rank of vice consul. Uddén stayed for two more years before leaving for Antwerp.71 Shortly after his arrival in Japan, Wallenberg wrote to Stockholm requesting means for the permanent employment of his assistant, Harald Bildt, as a legation clerk. Foreign Minister Trolle supported Wallenberg’s request, as there was general agreement between politicians, diplomats and Swedish business circles about the potential of East Asian trade in general and Japan as an export market for Swedish products in particular. Developing ties with these countries was considered a necessity in Sweden, and as a result Wallenberg was granted an additional 7,500 kronor for this purpose.72 He also penned a lengthy memorandum detailing his plans for the development of Sweden’s trade with Japan.73 By the fall of 1910, however, Wallenberg had run into serious problems. His former legation clerk, Folke Cronholm, Vice Consul Torsten Uddén, and the naval attaché Charles de Champs, complained to the Swedish government 69

‘Förordnande för generalkonsuln i Shanghai att utöva högsta ledningen av konsulatväsendet i Kina samt fastställande av vissa föreskrifter rörande förhållandet mellan honom och beskickningschefen i Peking.’, Ministerial protocol No. 50, 31 December 1913, Vol. 56, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 70 ‘Ang. Regleringen av utgifterna under Riksstatens tredje hufvudtitel för 1914.’, Ministerial protocol No. 2, 14 January 1913, Vol. 56, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA, 60–​61. 71 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 400. 72 ‘Tilldelande ur handels–​och sjöfartsfonden av arvode för bestridande av en legationssekreterarbefattning vid beskickningarna i Tokio och Peking.’, Ministerial protocol No. 30, 6 September 1907, Vol. 50, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 73 Bert Edström, ‘Japan as a Distant Friend:  Scandinavian Countries Adjusting to Japan’s Emergence as a Great Power’, in Tosh Minohara, Tze-​ki Hon and Evan Dawley (eds.), The Decade of the Great War: Japan and the Wider World in the 1910s (Leiden:  Brill, 2014), 211–​230.

212 CHAPTER 4 that Wallenberg was ‘not worth the trust, which an official in his high position should enjoy’. Foreign Minister Arvid Taube described the accusations as ‘extraordinary’ and ‘serious’ and initiated investigations into the matter.74 It is questionable whether such measures would have been introduced had the critics not been well-​regarded individuals themselves. Cronholm and Uddén were both trained lawyers. Cronholm had earlier served as consul general to Quebec, and would be appointed to the same position in Hamburg and as chargé d’affaires in Mexico after his time in Japan.75 Uddén had served as Wallenberg’s predecessor in Kobe in 1905–​06, and was later appointed consul general to Antwerp.76 De Champs served in London after his time in Asia and rose up through the ranks of the Swedish navy, reaching the highest rank as chief in 1937. The trio accused Wallenberg of several cases of misconduct, including wrongful use of state funds, contentious reporting, and inappropriate behaviour at various official appearances towards subjects as varied as Swedish merchants in Japan, the earlier consul general to Shanghai Carl Bagge, and members of the legation in Tokyo. Several prominent Swedish businessmen, such as the Tokyo-​based Knut Gadelius and Lennart Brusewitz, as well as August Kjellberg from Gothenburg, joined in the criticism of Wallenberg. Gadelius and Brusewitz accused Wallenberg of damaging Swedish trade in Japan in various ways, such as creating competition between Swedish businesses, lending his support to foreign competitors and badmouthing their firms.77 This lent the original accusations additional weight. Gadelius was the founder of the first Swedish firm in Japan. His company Gadelius & Co. focused initially on the import of iron, steel and paper, but would later also act as the agent of some of Sweden’s major companies and is still active to this day.78 Brusewitz was the head of J.A. Kjellberg & Söner in Japan. In 1928, the Swedish government appointed him to a group that was tasked with purchasing building land for a new mission in Tokyo.79 74

‘F. Cronholms, Ch. de Champs och T. Uddéns m.fl. anmälan mot envoyén G. Wallenberg.’, Ministerial protocol No. 35, 30 September 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 75 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 370, 403 and 439. 76 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 353 and 400. 77 ‘F. Cronholms, Ch. de Champs och T. Uddéns m.fl. anmälan mot envoyén G. Wallenberg.’, Ministerial protocol No. 35, 30 September 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 78 Sven A. Hansson, ‘Knut J Gadelius’, in Grill (eds.), Svenskt biografiskt lexikon 16, 706. See also the current website of the company:  http://​www.gadelius.com/​company/​story_​ e.html (accessed 18 December 2018). 79 The other members of the group were the legendary businessman Ivar Kreuger and Swedish envoy Oscar Ewerlöf.

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Foreign Minister Taube acknowledged that Wallenberg had struck the wrong tone in dealing with subordinates and Swedish businessmen but ultimately rejected the accusations against him as inappropriate gossip and slander.80 Taube tried to settle the problem in a constructive way. Wallenberg kept his post, despite the criticism. Cronholm was awarded a stipend of 3,600 kronor and eventually moved to a salaried post in Hamburg. Uddén became vice consul in Antwerp.81 There were at least two reasons for Taube’s support of Wallenberg. As a member of Sweden’s most important business family, and as a former politician, Wallenberg represented the new type of diplomat that the Diplomatic and Consular Committee had promoted. Wallenberg also enjoyed considerable respect in Japan. Contemporaries testified to his tireless work for the promotion not only of Swedish trade but also of his country’s ties with Japan and China more generally. Wallenberg himself often felt frustrated over the fact that most Swedes showed little interest in what he considered substantial opportunities for business.82 Ultimately, however, the episode can be understood as another example of the divide between the Swedish state and Swedish industry in approaching foreign markets during that era. Unlike in earlier decades, the Swedish Foreign Service now focused its Asian activities more heavily on China and Japan. Other places that earlier had been considered promising now received lower priority. In Singapore, the modest office allowance granted first in 1903 and increased in 1904 was suspended in 1906. The Swedish consulate also remained in the hands of relatively little-​ known British merchant consuls.83 The consulate in Bangkok was elevated to the rank of a consulate general in December 1912  –​but only because other Western countries had done so, and without any changes to its status as an unsalaried post.84 India was maybe the clearest example of the new priorities. In 1890, the Swedish Export Association had sent an agent on a mission to China and 80

‘F. Cronholms, Ch. de Champs och T. Uddéns m.fl. anmälan mot envoyén G. Wallenberg.’, Ministerial protocol No. 35, 30 September 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 81 ‘Upphörande af förordnande för F.  Cronholm att vara legationssekreterare i Tokio och Peking äfvensom förordnande för Cronholm att vara legationssekreterare öfver stat.’, ‘Tilldelande af attaché stipendium.’, ‘Utnämning af vicekonsul i Tokio.’ and ‘Utnämning af vicekonsul vid konsulatet i Antwerpen.’, Ministerial protocol No. 35, 30 September 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 82 Edström, ‘Japan as a Distant Friend’, 211–​230. 83 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 365. 84 ‘Ang. upprättandet af generalkonsulat i Bangkok och utnämning af generalkonsul därstädes.’, Ministerial protocol No. 48, 6 December 1912, Vol. 55, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

214 CHAPTER 4 India. Twenty years later, considerable resources were invested into exploring conditions and opportunities available in China and Japan, whereas little had changed in India. There, too, the consular posts remained unsalaried and in the hands of foreign merchants. In January 1907, the Swedish consular service in the region was restructured, and all of British India, including Ceylon, was put under the authority of the consulate general in Calcutta. Similar to Bangkok, the new post given to the British merchant Daniel King remained without remuneration.85 Two years later, King resigned from the post and was replaced by his vice consul, Andrew Yule (the younger).86 Yule belonged to one of the most prominent business families of Calcutta. A  relative of his of the same name was the first to arrive in India in 1858 and started Andrew Yule and Co. five years later. The Yules established a strong position in the trade of coal, cotton, jute and tea. They also engaged in ship repair and lighterage and represented British manufacturers and insurance companies.87 Like his predecessor, Yule resigned from the Swedish consular post after roughly two years, handing over the position of Swedish consul general to William Wanklyn, whom he had recruited personally in 1906, first as a chief engineer of the Port Engineering Company and later as a partner in the parent company. As consul general, Wanklyn mostly dealt with social and representative duties.88 In Bombay, the Swedes maintained their longstanding partnership with the Swiss merchants of Volkart Brothers. Hermann Uehlinger served between November 1908 and July 1910 before he was replaced with a member of the Volkart family, Lucas Volkart. In Madras, too, the tradition of Scottish merchants as representatives of Sweden continued with Charles William Prest and Ernest Logan. Another similarity among the consulates in major Indian cities after 1905 was the high staff turnover, with most consuls leaving office after two or three years. This indicates that the Swedish government failed to improve the conditions of the consuls in the region. The situation was similar in the more peripheral consulates in Colombo and Rangoon. In Colombo, Frank Mitchell Mackwood and William Walker Kenny preserved the status quo. Mackwood had been in Ceylon since 1861. His family

85 86 87 88

‘Upprättande af ett generalkonsulat i Ostindien.’ and ‘Förordnande af generalkonsul i Calcutta.’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 25 January 1907, Vol. 50, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. ‘Utnämning af generalkonsul i Calcutta.’, Ministerial protocol No. 10, 11 March 1909, Vol. 52, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. Stephanie Jones, Merchants of the Raj:  British Managing Agency Houses in Calcutta Yesterday and Today (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1992), 23–​26. Jim Allaway, Hero of the Upholder: The Story of Lieutenant Commander M.D. Wanklyn VC, DSO** (Shrewsbury: Airlife, 1991), 16–​17; Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 362.

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was successful in the tea business, and their firm flourished and developed into one of Sri Lanka’s most important business conglomerates. Frank Mackwood had served as chairman of the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce between 1895 and 1900 and frequently represented the European community in the Legislative Council of Colombo.89 In Rangoon, the post was occupied by John Ailwyn Manyon, who was the manager of Messrs. George Gordon and Co., a firm that imported Manchester goods and served as an agent for Lloyds.90 The last Swedish-​Norwegian consul during this period, Edwin Theodore Hicks, was also a partner of that firm.91 In the Philippines, the tradition of consular dynasties was as strong as the Volkart family’s position in Calcutta. Walter George Stevenson served as Swedish consul to Manila between 1904 and 1910; his father, Walter Ferguson Stevenson, had done so before him since 1890.92 The younger Stevenson was appointed pro tempore, but remained in his position for six years because the Swedish legation in Washington D.C.  failed to identify a suitable candidate for the post. This only changed in August 1910 with the nomination of the American merchant Herman Forst.93 In Indonesia, Alfred Isak Berg handed over the consulate to his brother Allan Erik in September 1911.94 Allan was a coffee exporter and married to a Dutchwoman of Javanese origin.95 The only notable addition to the consular service in East Asia occurred in Saigon (present-​day Ho Chi Minh City) in the fall of 1911. The initiative was taken by the Swedish legation in Paris because several European countries were already represented in the city and it was feared that Swedish firms would be treated unequally in the port. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs asked Dan Broström, the founder and ceo of the Swedish East Asia Company (Svenska Ostasiatiska Kompaniet) and a member of the Diplomatic and Consular Committee of 1905, for his opinion on the matter. Broström lent his strong support, and the ministry moved on and established an unsalaried consulate with all of 89 90 91

See for example Wenzlhuemer, From Coffee to Tea Cultivation in Ceylon, 188. Arnold Wright, Twentieth Century Impressions of Ceylon. ‘Ang. utnämning af konsul i Rangoon.’, Ministerial protocol No. 12, 22 March 1912, Vol. 55, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 92 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 350. 93 ‘Utnämning af konsul i Manila.’, Ministerial protocol No. 27, 31 August 1910, Vol. 53, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 94 ‘Afsked åt och utnämning af konsul i Soerabaja.’, Ministerial protocol No. 34, 29 September 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 95 ‘Sonja Berg Pleijel, 1909–​1976’, Svenskt översättarlexikon. Available at https://​litteraturbanken.se/​översättarlexikon/​artiklar/​Sonja_​Berg_​Pleijel (accessed 18 December 2018).

216 CHAPTER 4 French Indochina as district and the 34-​year-​old Dutch merchant Didrik Gustaf Röst as the first post holder.96 As we have seen, Sweden clearly intensified its focus on Eastern and Southern Asia, and on China and Japan in particular. In Shanghai and Tokyo, the Swedes established a more professional service comprising trained Swedish diplomats and other civil servants. In more peripheral areas, however, the system of unsalaried foreign merchant consuls persisted despite the criticism voiced against it by the Diplomatic and Consular Committee in 1906. 4

West Indies: Falling into Oblivion

During the first decade of the twentieth century, the Swedish government abandoned its earlier ambitions relating to the New Imperialism. There were several reasons for this. Despite the efforts towards cooperation made at the Congress in Berlin in 1884–​1885 and elsewhere, colonial matters caused increasing tension between Europe’s major powers after the turn of the century. In the domestic sphere, the dissolution of the union with Norway resulted in diminished interests involving shipping. With most imperialist dreams ending in disillusionment, and with increasing fears of a European war, the Swedish government shifted its focus back onto matters of national security and core economic interests. By the early 1910s it was apparent that the colonial sphere was not a substitute for the loss of the country’s earlier status as a great power that had been hoped for by the likes of Carl Fleetwood or Alfred Lagerheim in the 1880s and 1890s. From an economic perspective, the West Indies were virtually insignificant. Swedish trade with the region doubled between 1905 and 1914 but amounted only to about 0,06% of Sweden’s total foreign trade. Therefore, the Swedish state reduced its efforts in the region to a minimum. In terms of presence, there had been Swedish and Norwegian involvement on all relevant islands in the West Indies since 1903. Vacancies did occur in Bermuda and the Dominican Republic in 1913, where the posts were not filled for several years, but formally the consulates continued to exist.97

96

‘Upprättande af konsulat i Saïgon.’, Ministerial protocol No. 30, 11 August 1911, Vol. 54, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 97 Sverige, Kungliga Vetenskapsakademien, Sveriges statskalender för året 1921 (Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksells Boktryckeri, 1921), 254.

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In Cuba, the region’s most important island, the office allowance of the consulate in Havana was gradually reduced from 3,000 in 1881 to 500 kronor.98 A similar reduction occurred in Haiti, where the modest allowance of the consulate in Port-​au-​Prince, granted in 1903, was removed after only three years.99 Oscar Arnoldson, who replaced Carl-​Axel Wachtmeister as consul general in Havana in 1907, was indeed a Swede, but nonetheless represented a return to the earlier system. Wachtmeister was a trained lawyer who went on to become a consular judge at the Mixed Courts in Alexandria. Arnoldson was a merchant with strong local ties who also served as consul general of Spain.100 Certain change thus occurred in Sweden’s consular representation in the West Indies, but not of the type that the authorities had deemed desirable. In San Domingo, for instance, the transition from Danish-​Jewish merchants to locals that had occurred in 1899 persisted. Between 1906 and 1912, the journalist and writer José Ramón Abad acted as Sweden’s consul in the port. Abad had spent much of his life in Puerto Rico, where he had built a reputation as a writer and proponent of reforms that attracted the hostility of the Spanish colonial authorities. The Dominican minister of public affairs gave Abad the task of compiling a fact-​book about the Dominican Republic, which was subsequently presented at the 1889 World Exposition in Paris.101 These merits obviously meant that Abad was a well-​respected figure, but they were exactly the sorts of merits that the Diplomatic and Consular Committee of 1905 had deemed irrelevant. In some cases, Sweden had to appoint new consuls because post holders were not willing to resign from the new Norwegian position. One such case was Kingston, Jamaica, where Charles de Mercado did not want to give up his appointment as Norway’s consul and therefore resigned from the Swedish post in November 1905.102 It took more than two years before the position was filled again, in January 1908. The appointee was Edmund Archibald

98 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 373. 99 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 391. 100 ‘Sees Prosperity for Cuba. Spanish Consul General Thinks Intervention Will Be Unnecessary’, New York Times, 3 April 1921. Available at https://​timesmachine.nytimes. com/​timesmachine/​1921/​04/​03/​98662827.pdf (accessed 18 December 2018). 101 The book appeared the year before the fair, see José Ramón Abad (Dominican Republic Secretaría de fomento), La Republica Dominicana: Reseña general geografico-​estadistica (Santo Domingo: Imprenta de Garcia Hermanos, 1889). 102 ‘Afsked åt konsuln i Kingston.’, Ministerial protocol No. 4, 26 January 1906, Vol. 49, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA.

218 CHAPTER 4 Haggart, a coffee trader who also served as consul for Brazil and the Netherlands.103 At that time, Stockholm still clearly preferred individuals with a European background. These did not always have to be merchants, a trend that continued despite the ambition of appointing consuls with knowledge of Sweden’s business culture and economy. In Puerto Rico, the German merchant Johann von Uffel Schomburg replaced Joaquin Fernandez –​who most likely had only been appointed because he was the son-​in-​law of his predecessor in the first place –​in 1907.104 The Swedish authorities also maintained the tradition of appointing consuls of Danish origin to the position in Saint Thomas. From 1910 onwards, the prominent banker Axel Holst served as Sweden’s consul. Holst was appointed director of the National Bank of the Danish West Indies in 1914. He maintained the position for over 20 years, and naturally became an important figure in the economic life of the island.105 There were also politicians like Robert Harley James, who served as mayor of Saint Georges in Bermuda and was appointed Swedish consul at the age of 55.106 In most peripheral places, however, things remained the way they had been since the establishment of the consular service in the mid-​nineteenth century. In Trinidad, the prominent English businessman Edgar Tripp resigned in 1906. His successor, Ellis Grell, was a shipping and commissions agent operating out of Port of Spain. Grell’s spell was a short one, as he died in the fall of 1908. His successor, Alexander Fraser, a merchant of Scottish origin, was appointed on the recommendation of Sweden’s consul general in London, Daniel Danielsson.107 A similar development took place in Saint John’s, Antigua, where the 45-​year-​old William Gumbes Richardson became consul of Sweden in July 1907.108 Yet in some places ultimately nothing changed at all: the consuls

103 ‘Utnämning af konsul i Kingston.’, Ministerial protocol No. 3, 18 January 1908, Vol. 51, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA; ‘Consuls’, 1910 Commercial Directory of Jamaica http://​www.jamaicanfamilysearch.com/​Members/​1910d09.htm (accessed 18 December 2018). 104 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 350. 105 Jens Worm Begtrup, ‘Dansk-​vestindisk Nationalbank 1904–​1935. En undersøgelse af bankens oprettelse, drift og lukning, herunder dens ret til at trykke penge med dansk værdi på et amerikansk ejet territorium’, unpublished master’s thesis (University of Copenhagen, 2008), 54–​55. See also ‘Utnämning af konsul i St. Thomas.’, Ministerial protocol No. 20, 18 June 1910, Vol. 53, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 106 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 369–​370. 107 ‘Utnämning af konsul i Port of Spain.’, Ministerial protocol No. 39, 22 October 1909, Vol. 52, A3A, UD/​KfubH, RA. 108 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 369.

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appointed before the dissolution of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway remained in office in the Bahamas (1887), Guadeloupe (1898), Martinique (1904) and Wilhelmstad (1878).109 5

Conclusions

The dissolution of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway meant that Sweden was reduced to its core territory after centuries of controlling or representing other parts of Scandinavia in the international realm. As a consequence, the Swedish government in Stockholm abandoned most of its earlier imperialist and colonial ambitions once and for all and adopted a position of small-​state realism. In 1905, a new committee under the leadership of Alfred Lagerheim compiled a report for the reorganization of the Swedish Foreign Service. It criticized the earlier amateurism and recommended the establishment of a foreign service that would integrate the diplomatic and consular areas and recruit its personnel on the sole basis of relevant skills and merits. The new kind of diplomat and consul would preferably be a young Swedish man with a theoretical and practical background in either law or economics –​or both. In more peripheral places, locals could be appointed as consuls if they possessed a good reputation and strong business ties in their place of residence and a solid knowledge of Sweden and Swedish business interests. But within a decade it became obvious that while much of the Lagerheim Committee’s analysis was correct, its goals remained wishful thinking. The Swedish state was both too poor and too slow to establish a foreign service that could meet the interests of Swedish industry. Sweden’s most important firms appointed agents of their own and took their destiny in their own hands, increasingly undermining the earlier economic significance of the consular service. In the early twentieth century, the regions studied in this book developed in different directions from an economic standpoint. While the West Indies proved economically insignificant, African trade grew quickly, and Asia became a major arena of interest in the eyes of leading Swedish traders. The Swedish consular service in Africa and the West Indies remained virtually unchanged until the eve of the First World War. In many places, foreigners –​ well-​respected locals, preferably of European origin, or representatives of other Western powers –​would still inherit the title of Swedish consul from a relative or a business partner. In other places, Stockholm appointed Swedish 109 Almquist, Kommerskollegium, 369, 389–​390 and 407.

220 CHAPTER 4 businessmen or members of the Foreign Service who ended up complaining about the lack of resources, just like their predecessors had done in earlier decades. The situation was no different in most of Asia, with the most important ports in China and Japan as the notable exceptions. While their economic relevance was fading, then, Swedish consuls continued to engage in Western legal imperialism in both Africa and Asia. But when the Age of Empire came to an end in 1914, nine years after Norway had forced its way out of the union with Sweden, the Swedish consular service was still failing to meet the hopes and ambitions of politicians, diplomats and businessmen at home. Not much had really changed since the 1870s.

Conclusion The history of New Imperialism has long been a tale of the great imperialist powers and the territories and peoples they colonized. With the exception of Belgium and its brutal rule of Congo, smaller Western countries, including Sweden and Norway, have usually been excluded from the narrative. But, as we have seen, Swedes and Norwegians were part of the process of Western expansion in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Politicians and diplomats in Stockholm aspired to advance the rank of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway among the European nations by participating in the imperialist endeavours of their more powerful neighbours. The owners and shareholders of Swedish and Norwegian shipping companies and export businesses hoped for a share of the vast riches of distant places in Africa, Asia and elsewhere. Explorers dreamt about ‘discovering’ the world, Christian missionaries about spreading the word. They all tried to achieve their aspirations by employing practices of informal imperialism, most often of an economic and legal nature. Sweden-​Norway was among the first Western states to conclude unequal treaties with China and Japan after the so-​called opening of those countries. Swedish and Norwegian lawyers and consuls played important roles in the Mixed Courts of Egypt and exerted extraterritorial jurisdiction in both China and Japan. The consular experience was manifold. Consuls were instrumental in the punishment of the murderers of Swedish missionaries in China, or became guilty of colonial atrocities committed in Congo. Sweden-​Norway participated in the Berlin Conference, also known as the Congo Conference or West Africa Conference, in 1884–​1885, and in various other negotiations where imperialist powers decided the conditions of colonized territories. The consular representatives of Sweden-​Norway usually maintained close and friendly relations with the representatives of other Western states in Africa, Asia and the West Indies. These Westerners often formed tightknit communities that were not only social but also allowed them to coordinate their positions before negotiations with local authorities –​sometimes they even buried the locals’ dead in their own cemeteries. The Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs controlled the foreign policy of Sweden-​Norway during the Age of Empire and adapted to the New Imperialism by establishing a Swedish and Norwegian presence on a global scale through the consular service. Swedes and Norwegians who travelled, worked or lived in colonized territories turned to these consuls when they needed assistance. It was not unusual for the consuls to take up diplomatic and political tasks as

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020 | DOI:10.1163/9789004414389_007

222 Conclusion well, but their foremost purpose was to protect Swedish and Norwegian trade, shipping and investments. The consular service was therefore instrumental in Sweden-​Norway’s attempts to profit economically from the imperialist politics of the British, French, Germans, Belgians and others. In most cases, the consuls serving posts in Africa, Asia or the West Indies were not of Swedish or Norwegian origin but had been appointed because of their social and economic status on site and their relations with the local authorities and business community. It was not uncommon for consular posts to be passed on to relatives or business partners, which resulted in numerous cases of consular dynasties such as the Tulins in Tunis, the Schöners in Port of Spain in Trinidad, the partners of the Swiss merchant house Volkart in Bomaby and the American firm Russell & Co. in Shanghai. The biggest problem with these local consuls was that they often knew very little about Swedish and Norwegian economic interests and business culture. Swedish and Norwegian shipping companies and export businesses increasingly complained about the obvious inadequacy of the consular service. The intensifying Norwegian drive for independence politicized the matter and made a solution even more complicated. The Swedish-​Norwegian authorities assigned several committees the task of inquiring into the matter. The committees produced lengthy reports, which all concluded that the consular service needed to be professionalized and granted larger resources. The work of the committees resulted in new consular regulations and a number of reforms that brought the diplomatic and consular services closer together. By the early twentieth century, salaried consular posts in capitals or larger countries could very well be attractive to ambitious diplomats. Yet a genuine professionalization of the consular service was never achieved, and therefore very little changed in most smaller stations between the 1870s and 1914. Only in the most important consulates general, in major cities like London, Hamburg, Alexandria or Shanghai, would distinguished local businessmen or representatives of other Western nations be replaced with well-​trained Swedes and Norwegians, who then often moved on to prestigious diplomatic posts. The holder of a smaller consular post was still very likely not to meet Swedish and Norwegian interests. The more peripheral and less prestigious a post, the less qualified the consul. As we have seen, this was very often the case in Africa, East Asia and the Caribbean. The Swedish –​and to a lesser extent Norwegian –​dream that imperialism would offer a way of regaining at least some of its former prestige among Europe’s powers never materialized. Instead, the vehicle that the decision-​makers in Stockholm and Kristiania had chosen to realize their goals ultimately became a major reason for the dissolution of the union with Norway in 1905, an

Conclusion

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event which confirmed Sweden’s decline from great power status in the seventeenth century to a small state in the twentieth century once and for all. The Norwegians, on their part, were never satisfied with the fact that the consular service was part of an ultimately Swedish controlled foreign service led by a king primarily residing in Stockholm and a Swedish foreign minister. At the same time, it was not least through the Foreign Service, and most notably the consular service, that Norway also participated in Western imperialism and colonialism and found a way to separate itself from Sweden. The rise of the field of global history has given new impetus to the study of imperial and colonial history. It is critical that this development allows for the inclusion of smaller countries, less prominent actors like consuls and others, and various, less formalized forms of imperialism and colonialism. As we can see in the case of Sweden and Norway, many more than those who were at the forefront of Western expansion were involved in the making and maintenance of the imperialist world system and its colonial spaces.

Appendix

Swedish Foreign Ministers (of the United Kingdoms), 1814–​1905 Lars von Engeström, 1809–​1824 Gustaf af Wetterstedt, 1824–​1837 Adolf Göran Mörner, 1837–​1838 Gustaf Algernon Stierneld, 1838–​1840 Albrecht Elof Ihre, 1840–​1848 Gustaf Algernon Stierneld, 1848–​1856 Elias Lagerheim, 1856–​1858 Ludvig Manderström, 1858–​1868 Carl Wachtmeister, 1868–​1871 Baltzar von Platen, 1871–​1872 Oscar Björnstjerna, 1872–​1880 Carl Fredrik Hochschild, 1880–​1885 Albert Ehrensvärd the Elder, 1885–​1889 Gustaf Åkerhielm, 1889 Carl Lewenhaupt, 1889–​1895 Ludvig Douglas, 1895–​1899 Alfred Lagerheim, 1899–​1904 August Gyldenstolpe, 1904–​1905 Fredrik Wachtmeister, 1905 Eric Trolle, 1905–​1909 Arvid Taube, 1909–​1911 Albert Ehrensvärd the Younger, 1911–​1914 Knut Wallenberg, 1914–​1917



Norway’s Prime Ministers, 1814–​1905

Peder Anker, 1814–​1822 Mathias Sommerhielm, 1822–​1827 Poul Christian Holst, 1827 Jørgen Herman Vogt, 1827–​1828 Severin Løvenskiold, 1828–​1841 Frederik Due, 1841–​1858

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020 | DOI:10.1163/9789004414389_008

226 Appendix Georg Sibbern, 1858–​1871 Christian Bretteville (acting), 1858–​1859 and 1861 Otto Richard Kierulf, 1871–​1873 Frederik Stang, 1873–​1880 Christian Selmer, 1880–​1884 Ole Bachke (acting), 1884 Niels Raye (acting), 1884 Christian Schweigaard, 1884 Johan Sverdrup, 1884–​1889 Emil Stang, 1889–​1891 Johannes Steen, 1891–​1893 Emil Stang, 1893–​1895 Francis Hagerup, 1895–​1898 Johannes Steen, 1898–​1902 Otto Blehr, 1902–​1903 Francis Hagerup, 1903–​1905 Christian Michelsen, 1905(–​1907)



Norway’s Prime Minister in Stockholm, 1873–​1905

Otto Richard Kierulf, 1873–​1884 Wolfgang Henzel Haffner, 1884 Carl Otto Løvenskiold, 1884 Ole Jørgensen Richter, 1884–​1888 Jacob Stang, 1888–​1889 Gregers Gram, 1889–​1891 Otto Blehr, 1891–​1893 Gregers Gram, 1893–​1898 Otto Blehr, 1898–​1902 Ole Anton Qvam, 1902–​1903 Sigurd Ibsen, 1903–​1905 Jørgen Løvland, 1905



Governor-​General in Norway, 1814–​1873

Hans Henric von Essen, 1814–​1816 Carl Mörner, 1816–​1818 Johan August Sandels, 1818–​1827

Appendix Baltzar von Platen, 1827–​1829 Office vacant, 1829–​1836 Herman Wedel-​Jarlsberg, 1836–​1840 Office vacant, 1840–​1841 Severin Løvenskiold, 1841–​1856 Office vacant, 1856–​1873 Office abolished, 1873



Norway’s First Minister in Kristiania, 1814–​1873

Frederik Haxthausen, 1814 Marcus Rosenkrantz, 1814–​1815 Mathias Sommerhielm, 1815–​1822 Jonas Collett, 1822–​1836 Nicolai Krog, 1836–​1855 Jørgen Vogt, 1855–​1858 Hans Christian Petersen, 1858–​1861 Erik Røring Møinichen (acting), 1861 Frederik Stang, 1861–​1873



Swedish-​Norwegian Consular Committee of 1875

Per Axel Bergström (1823–​1893) Hermann Severin Bernhoft (1824–​1894) Christian Christiansen (1825–​1894) Emil Ekman (1815–​1900) Alfred Lagerheim (1843–​1924) Jacob Andreas Michelsen (1821–​1902)



Swedish Diplomatic and Consular Committee of 1905

Daniel (Dan) Broström (1870–​1925) Carl Martin Laurentius Fallenius (1858–​1907) Alfred Lagerheim (1843–​1924) Fredrik von Rosen (1849–​1917) Olof A. Söderberg (1872–​1931)

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228 Appendix

Swedish-​Norwegian and Swedish Consulates in Africa, 1875–​1914 Office holders Alexandria

Oscar Gustaf von Heidenstam (1875–​1887), Joseph Vilhelm Johnson (1887–​1888), Carlo Landberg (1888–​1893), Henry Barker (1893–​1896), Claes Gustaf Belinfante Östberg (1896–​1906), Carl-​Axel Hansson Wachtmeister (1906–​1908), Carl August Ehrenfried Silfverhjelm (1912–​1914)

Algiers

Joseph Kuhlman (1875–​1876), Herman Richard Leopold Sundelin (1877–​1881), Johan Adolf Nordström (1881–​1895), Per Gustaf Ivar Samzelius (1895–​1897), Severin Segelcke Houge (1897–​1906), Julien Henry André Thibaud (1907–​1914)

Brazzaville

Gullbrand Øvergaard Schiøtz (1901–​1906)

Cape Town

Carl Gustaf Åkerberg (1875–​1885), Anders Ohlsson (1886–​1906), Carl Gustaf Hjalmar Rosenlund (1906–​1914)

Dakar

Jules Mathieu Sergent (1911–​1914)

Freetown

Henry Burnett (1890–​1893), George Alfred Williams (1893–​1902)

Jamestown

Charles Andrew Carrol (1875–​1887), Saul Salomon (1888–​1894), Guy Weir Hogg (1894–​1897), Joseph William Williams (1897–​1902), Homfray Welby Solomon (1902–​1906), John William Broadway (1906–​1913)

Johannesburg

Cato Nicolai Benjamin Aall (1897–​1899), Ernst Bernhard Surke (1900–​1904), John E. Johnsson (1905–​1914)

Leopoldville

Carl Vilhelm Anders Sjögren (1910–​1914)

Lourenco-​ Marques

Johannes Bang (1883–​1901), Bernhardus Hendrikus Kup (1902–​1906), George Ritchie Kennedy (1908–​1914)

Monrovia

William Frederick Nelson (1875), Edward Wilmot Blyden (1877–​1878), Garretson Warner Gibson (1878–​1879), Charles Anthony Snetter (1879–​1882), Marinus Adrianus Aenmeij (1884–​1899), Jacob Vieweg (1899, 1904–​1914), Willem Reilingh (1914)

Port Louis

Robert Stein (1875–​1878), William Henry Brougham Wilson (1878–​1886), Hamilton Stein (1886–​1906), Edward Cleather Fraser (1907–​1914)

Tamatave

Thomas Conolly Pakenham (1875–​1883), John Hicks Graves (1883–​1886), John George Haggard (1886–​1887), Christian Olai Bang (1899–​1914)

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Appendix

Office holders Tangier

Ernest Daluin (1875–​1883), Victor Elias Cassel (1884–​1892)

Tunis

Carl Tulin af Tunisien (1865–​1882), Carl Gustaf Hjalmar Rosenlund (1897–​1906), Otto Henrik Minck (1907–​1914)



Swedish-​Norwegian and Swedish Consulates in Southern and Eastern Asia, 1875–​1914 Office holders Akyab

John Ogilvy Hay (1875–​1880), George Henri Ruckert (1881–​1889), Friedrich Müller (1889–​1904)

Bangkok

Vincent Pickenpack (1875–​1877), Wilhelm Theodor Müller (1877–​1885), Otto Weber (1886–​1893), Christian Brockmann (1893–​1903), Alfred Edgar Mohr (1904–​1914)

Batavia

Willem Willemzoon Suermondt (1875–​1896), Willem s’Jacob (1897–​1899), Carl Heinrich Friedrich Weber (1900–​1903), Johan Henrik Landberg (1903–​1905)

Bombay

J.H. Riebe (1875), Augustus Charles Gumpert (1876–​1877), Hamilton Maxwell (1878), Guiseppe Janni (1878–​1892), Thomas Withey Cuffe (1894–​1898), Wilhelm Friedrich Bickel (1898–​1908), Hermann Uehlinger (1908–​1910), Lucas Volkart (1910–​1914)

Calcutta

Heinrich Carl Reinhold (1875–​1880), Siegfried Eberhard Voigt (1880–​1884, 1888–​1906), Alfred Ritz (1884–​1888), Daniel Willis Peter King (1907–​1909), Andrew Yule (1909–​1911), William Lewis Wanklyn (1912–​1914)

Colombo

Hector Cross Buchanan (1875–​1882), Frederick William Bois (1882–​1903), Percy Bois (1904–​1910), Sir Stanley Bois (1910–​1911), Frank Mitchell Mackwood (1911–​1913), William Walter Kenny (1913–​1914)

Kobe

Peter Martin Ragnar Ottesen (1901–​1904), Ole Skybak (1903–​1905), Axel Torsten Uddén (1905–​1906)

230 Appendix Office holders Madras

Sir William Wedderburn Arbuthnot (1875–​1884), Alexander Mackenzie (1884–​1895), John Montgomery Young (1897–​1905), Charles William Prest (1907–​1909), Ernest R. Logan (1909–​1914)

Manila

Frederick Griswold-​Heron (1875–​1877), Rufus Allan Lane (1877–​1887), Jean Phillipe Hens (1888–​1889), Georges Nyssens (1889–​1893), Walter Ferguson Stevenson (1890–​1893), Francis Edwin Coney (1893–​1904), Walter G. Stevenson (1904–​1910), Herman Forst (1910–​1914)

Rangoon

Diedrich Hermann Heinrich Barckhausen (1875–​1879), Carl Albert Barckhausen (1879–​1888), George Gordon (1888–​1901), John Moncrieff Wright (1902), John Ailwyn Manyon (1902–​1907), Edwin Theodore Hicks (1912–​1914)

Saigon

Didrik Gustaf Röst (1911–​1914)

Shanghai

Francis Blackwell Forbes (1875–​1882), Henry de Courcey Forbes (1882–​1883), Joseph Haas (1883–​1884, 1886–​1893), Oscar Edvard Alfred Ferdinand Lagerheim (1884–​1886), Carl Alfred Bock (1893–​1902), Carl Filip Alexander Hagberg (1903–​1906), Carl Richard Esaias Bagge (1906–​1910), Johan Erik Evald Hultman (1911–​1914)

Singapore

Robert Barclay Read (1875–​1884), John Reid Cuthbertson (1885–​1898), William Paterson Waddell (1900–​1905), John Sommerville (1906–​1907), Merville Edward Plumpton (1907–​1914)

Surabaya

Alfred Isak Berg (1905–​1911), Allan Erik Berg (1911–​1914)

Tokyo

Gustaf Oscar Wallenberg (1906–​1914)

Victoria (Hong Kong)

Rudolf Jensen (1873–​1876), Hans Kjær (1876–​1880), John Murray Forbes (1881), Charles Vincent Smith (1881–​1884), Peter Julius Rudolf Diedrich Buschmann (1885–​1888), Friedrich Seip (1889–​1895)

231

Appendix



Swedish-​Norwegian and Swedish Consulates in the West Indies, 1875–​1914 Office holders Bridgetown

John Gardiner Austin (1875–​1902), Harold Bruce Gardiner Austin (1902–​1914)

Fort de France

Gustave Borde (1903–​1904), Paul Langellier Bellevue (1904–​1914)

Hamilton

Josiah Taylor Darrel (1865–​1866, 1878–​1884), James Adam Conyers (1884–​1908)

Havana

John Nenninger (1875–​1881), James Robert Francke (1881–​1886), Edward Jasper Francke (1887–​1903), Carl Axel Hansson Wachtmeister (1904–​1907), Oscar Arnoldson (1907–​1914)

Kingston

Richard James Cade Hitchens (1875–​1876), Richard Hitchens jr. (1876–​1882), Simon Soutar (1883–​1904), Charles Ernest de Mercado (1904–​1906), Edmund Archibald Henderson Haggart (1908–​1914)

New Providence

Samuel Otis Johnson (1875–​1887), Lewis Taylor (1887–​1914)

Pointe à Pitre

Eucher Louis Paul Dumoulin (1875–​1892), James Japp (1892–​1898), Joseph Emile De Vaux (1898–​1914)

Port of Spain

Friedrich Ludwig Wilhelm Schöner (1875–​1882), Justus Georg August Schöner (1883–​1885), Christian Schöner (1886–​1899), Wilhelm Schöner (1900–​1901), Edgar Tripp (1902–​1906), Ellis Grell (1907–​1908), Alexander Fraser (1909–​1914)

Port-​au-​Prince

Friedrich Goldenberg (1875–​1876), Hugh D’Oyly Tweedy (1876–​1894), Georg Keitel (1896–​1902), Henry E. Roberts (1902–​1914)

San Domingo

David Coën (1876–​1894), Abraham Coën Léon (1894–​1899), Lazar Pardo (1899–​1906), José Ramon Abad (1906–​1912), Julio Senior (1912–​1913)

San Juan

Charles Alexandre de Villers Hoard (1875–​1883), William Henry Latimer (1883–​1897), Joaquin F. Fernandez (1898–​1906), Johann Friedrich von Uffel Schomburg (1907–​1914)

St. George’s

James William Musson (1875–​1878), Robert Harley James (1908–​1913)

232 Appendix Office holders Saint John’s

Frederick Melchertson (1883–​1901), Robert André Llewellyn Warneford (1902–​1906), William Gumbes Richardson (1907–​1914)

Saint-​Pierre

William Joseph Lawless (1875–​1897), Gustave Borde (1897–​1902)

Saint Thomas

Otto Jakob Marstrand (1875–​1890), Peter Aubeck (1890–​1896), Waldemar Riise (1897–​1906), John Alfred Michael Tofft (1907–​1909), Axel Holst (1910–​1914)

Wilhelmstad

Léon Vidal Leyba (1878–​1914)

source: almquist, kommerskollegium.

Appendix233 table 12

Foreign service and consular service budgets of the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway, 1875–​1906 (in kronor)

Budget year

Budget of Budget the Foreign of the Service consular service

Budget of the consular service in Africa

Budget of the consular service in Southern and Eastern Asia

Budget of the consular service in the West Indies

1875 1876 1877 1878 1879 1880 1881 1882 1883 1884 1885 1886 1887 1888 1889 1890 1891 1892 1893 1894 1895 1896 1897 1898 1899 1900 1901 1902 1903 1904

908,100 908,100 908,100 908,000 914,300 914,300 914,300 914,300 921,350 918,700 951,700 918,700 918,700 918,700 918,700 918,700 918,700 908,700 908,700 908,700 908,700 908,700 904,600 904,600 904,600 936,500 954,500 964,600 974,600 1,462,600

10,000 27,200 26,000 28,000 28,000 28,000 28,000 28,000 28,000 23,000 23,000 22,500 22,500 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 8,000 17,000

16,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,500 21,000 21,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 32,000 32,000 32,000 43,000 61,000 61,000 66,000

0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 3,000 4,000

280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 294,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 280,000 743,000

234 Appendix table 12

Foreign service and consular service budgets (cont.)

Budget year

Budget of Budget the Foreign of the Service consular service

Budget of the consular service in Africa

Budget of the consular service in Southern and Eastern Asia

Budget of the consular service in the West Indies

1905 1906

1,458,850 1,467,850

17,000 17,800

66,000 66,500

4,000 4,000

table 13

Budgets of the Swedish Foreign Service, 1907–​1914 (in kronor)

Budget year

Budget of the Foreign Service

1907 1908 1909 1910 1911 1912 1913 1914

2,264,400 1,414,200 1,553,662 1,643,500 1,728,900 1,755,500 1,956,700 2,335,900

762,000 763,500

Missions Budget and of the Consulates consular service in Africa 831,600 831,600 873,600 887,200 897,300 897,300 897,300 1,047,400

18,000 18,000 22,400 22,400 22,400 22,400 22,400 25,400

Budget of the consular service in Southern and Eastern Asia

Budget of the consular service in the Caribbean

69,000 69,000 69,300 69,300 69,300 69,300 69,300 90,300

0 0 500 500 500 500 500 500

sources: ministerial protocols, 1875–​1 914, sveriges officiella statistik 1907–​1 914, statistisk årsbok för sverige 1915 and emanuelson, den svensk-​n orska utrikesförvaltningen 1870–​1 905, ­c hapter 3.

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Index A. Markwald & Co 165 Aall, Cato Nicolai Benjamin 133, 159 Aall, Thomas Jacob 54 Abad, José Ramón 217 Achenbach, Julius 76–​77 Aenmeij, Marinus Adrianus 135 Africa  colonization of  Sweden-​Norway’s involvement in 14, 34, 54. see also Berlin Conference consular services in  Consular Committee (1875) report on 51, 65–​66 of Sweden 201–​209 of Sweden-​Norway 54–​67, 111–​139. see also under specific countries and cities Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to  Alexandria 120, 121 Algiers 128 Cape Town 131 São Tomé 113 Tangier 125 Tunis 128 trade of  with Norway 114, 129 with Sweden 113–​114, 201–​202, 202t, 203, 205–​206, 208 with Sweden-​Norway 55, 130 African Trading Company (atc) 135, 136 ‘Age of Empire,’ definition of 1 Age of Empire (Hobsbawm) 25–​26 Agnew, John Vans 79 Agnew, Patrick Vans 79 Aitken, Robert 118 Åkerberg, Carl Gustaf 131 Åkerhielm, Gustaf 101, 105 Åkerman, Henrik 62, 63, 186–​187 Akyab 80, 169 A.L. Johnston & Co 70

Aldler-​Nissen, Rebecca 15 Alexander iii, Tsar of Russia 101 Alexandria  Swedish consulate in  move to Cairo 203–​204 reestablishment of 204–​205 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  in general 54–​55 appointment of staff of 120–​122 budget of 119–​120 and Mixed Courts 61–​62, 99, 120, 122–​123 political interests in 119–​120 proposed closure of 51 reoccupation of 61–​62 salaries of staff of 59–​60 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 120, 121 Algeria. see Algiers Algiers  Swedish consulate in 203 Swedish trade with 203 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  in general 54–​55 consuls at 126 minimum maintainment of 51 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 128 Almquist, Johan Axel 6 Alston, Scott & Co. 81 Ancien Régime 25 Andreasen, Georg Adolf 130 Anker, Peder Bernt 159–​160 Annesley, G.F.N. Beresford 57 Ansei Five-​Power Treaties 148 Antigua  Swedish consular services in 218 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 97, 183 appointment. see recruitment Arbuthnot, William Wedderburn 79 Arbuthnot & Co. 79, 168

Note: The index differentiates between Swedish, Norwegian and Swedish-​Norwegian. For instance: there are entries for Swedish shipping, Norwegian shipping and Swedish-​Norwegian shipping. There is also a preference for the older geographical names, as used in the period the book describes. Page numbers ending on a ‘t’ refer to tables.

Index Arbuthnot family 79, 168 Armfelt, Magnus 54, 61 Arnold (stipend holder) 150–​151 Arnoldson, Carl August 175 Arnoldson, Oscar 217 Åselius, Gunnar 11, 19, 33 Asia  consular services in  Consular Committee (1875) report on 52, 72, 73, 75, 77 of Sweden 209–​216 of Sweden-​Norway 68–​85, 140–​173. see also under specific countries and cities Norwegian shipping to  in general 140 Singapore 163t Swedish shipping to 163t Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to  Bangkok 82–​83 Bombay 77 Dutch East Indies 173 Japan 149–​150, 150t Singapore 71 Victoria 74 trade of  with Europe 68 with Norway 140 with Sweden-​Norway 72–​73, 139–​140, 149–​151 Association internationale du Congo (International Association of the Congo) 110 atc (African Trading Company) 135, 136 atrocities 116–​117 Aubeck, Peter 179–​181 Austin, Harold Bruce Gardiner 182 Austin, John Gardiner 181–​182 Austria. see Vienna Bagge, Carl Richard Esaias 209, 212 Bahamas 181 Bähr, Gustaf Ferdinand 91 Baltic Sea 101 Bang, Christian Olai 118–​119 Bang, Johannes 58, 119 Bangkok  Swedish consulate in 213 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  appointment of staff of 81–​83, 164

253 insignificance of 164–​165 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 82–​83 Barbados 181–​182 Barbary States 51, 55. see also Algiers; Tunis Barckhausen, Carl Albert 80–​81, 169 Barckhausen, Diedrich 80 Baring Brothers & Co 84, 85 Barker, Henry 121–​122 Barker, Theo 8 Barrington, William 134 Batavia (Jakarta) 83–​84, 171–​173 Bayly, Christopher 23–​24 Belgian Congo. see Congo Free State Belgium, colonial rule of Congo Free State 2, 34, 115–​116, 205 Bellevue, Paul Langellier-​ 187 Bergström, David 11 Bergström, Per Axel 37, 45, 46 Berlin Conference (1884–​1885; Congo Conference)  General Act of 1–​2, 110 Sweden-​Norway’s participation in 66, 67, 188–​189 Swedish views on 34–​35 Bermuda  Swedish consular services in 218 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 92–​93, 182 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 93, 183 Bernhoft, Herman Severin 45, 47, 54, 180 Berry, Robert 138 Bertram, J.R. 170 Beyer, Ludvig 72 Bickel, Wilhelm Friedrich 167 bilateral treaties on trade  of Sweden-​Norway  in general 66 with China 68–​69 with Tunisia 128–​129 Bildt, Carl 34 Bildt, Daniel Johan Gillis 34, 67, 110, 166, 167, 208 Bildt, Didrik Anders Gillis 166 Bildt, Harald 211 Bildt, Knut Gillis 166 Bismarck, Otto van 41–​42, 100–​101 Björnstjerna, Kristian Carl Magnus Gustaf  on Algiers consulate/​consuls 65 on Bombay consulate/​consuls 78 and Consular Committee 44, 48

254 Index Björnstjerna, Kristian Carl Magnus Gustaf (cont.) on Consular Regulation 53 diplomatic career of 12 on Haiti consulate/​consuls 88–​89 on Port of Spain consulate/​consuls 94 on San Juan consulate/​consuls 91–​92 Björnstjerna, Oscar 41 Bock, Carl Alfred 142, 143–​147, 161, 190, 209 Bödtker, Berndt Anker 59, 61, 165 Bois, Frederick William 81, 168–​169 Bois, Percy 168–​169 Bois, Stanley 169 Bois Bros. and Co., Ltd. 169 Bombay (Mumbai)  Swedish consulate in 214 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  appointment of staff of 76–​79, 166–​167 donations from 77 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 77 Borchgrevink, Carsten 175 Borchgrevink, Johan Bernt 122–​123, 175 Borde, Gustave 186 Borde, Paul 186 Boström, Erik Gustaf 155–​156, 192 Brandenburg, J. 78 Brautaset, Camilla 15 Brazzaville 115, 206, 207 Bridgetown (Barbados) 181–​182 British Cape Colony. see Cape Town British East India Company 68 British Foreign Office 21 British foreign policy 28 British shipping 26, 27t, 133 Brockmann, Christian 165 Broström, Dan 194, 216 Brusewitz, Lennart 212 Buchanan, Hector Cross 81 budgets  of Swedish consular services  in Africa 203 In Asia 211, 213 in West Indies 217 of Swedish-​Norwegian consular services  in general 43–​44, 52 in Africa 63–​64, 65, 119–​120, 124–​125, 130, 131 overview 233

in Asia 142–​143, 153t, 156t, 159, 164 in Europe 107 in West Indies 86, 174, 179, 181–​182, 183, 185 Bügel, Christian 180–​181 Bülow, Bernhard Ernst von 41 Burenstam, Carl 110 Burma (Myanmar)  Swedish consular services 215 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services 80–​81, 169–​170 Burman, Frederik 135 Burnett, Henry 135 Buschmann, Rudolf (Peter) 74, 75, 160 business partners  in consular services  in general 222 Bois Bros. and Co., Ltd. 169 Russell & Co. 69–​70, 74, 82, 84, 141, 142, 160 Schellhass & Co. 75, 142, 160 Volkart Brothers 76, 78, 167–​168, 214. see also family dynasties Büsing, Eduard 83 Cairo 203–​204 Calcutta  Swedish consulate in 214 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 75, 166–​167 Canton (Guangzhou) 69, 72 Cape Town  Swedish consulate in 208 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 55, 131–​132 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 131 Caribbean. see West Indies Carl of Denmark, Prince 191 Carrol, Charles Andrew 137 Carrol, William 137 Cassel, Pär 19 Cassel, Victor Elias 64, 124–​125 Cedercrantz, Conrad 123 cemeteries, Christian 203 Ceylon (Sri Lanka)  Swedish consular services in 214–​215 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 81, 168–​169 chambers of commerce 198

Index Champs, Charles de 211–​212 Charles xiii, King of Sweden and Norway 30 Charles xiv John, King of Sweden and Norway 30, 41 Charles xv, King of Sweden and Norway 11, 32, 40, 41, 53 Charlotte Amalie (Saint Thomas) 92, 179, 180–​181 Chennai (Madras). see Madras China  bilateral treaties on trade with 68–​69 consular services in  cooperation between 210 Gude Report on 152–​154 of Sweden 209, 211 of Sweden-​Norway 69–​70, 72 see also Shanghai Swedish business endeavours in 18–​19 Christiansen, Christian 45, 48 Christiernsson, August 140, 141 Christophersen, Wilhelm Christopher 111–​112 Clark, David Oakes 82 Coën, David 88–​89, 96, 176 Coën Léon, Abraham 176 Colombo  Swedish consulate in 214–​215 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 81, 168–​169 colonialism. see imperialism/​colonialism Compagnie française des Indes orientales 68 Coney, Francis Edwin 171 Congo Free State  atrocities perpetrated in 116–​117 Belgian colonial rule of 2, 34, 115–​116, 205 consular services in  to missionaries 206–​207 of Sweden 202, 206–​207 of Sweden-​Norway 114–​117 establishment of 110 research on 13 Scandinavian population of 114 Swedish trade with 205–​206 views on Belgian rule of  of Sweden 205 of Sweden-​Norway 14, 67, 115–​117 Constantinople (Istanbul) 106–​107 Consular Archive (Konsulatarkivet) 5–​6

255 consular aspirants, stipends for 108–​109, 198 Consular Committee (1875)  in general 37 appointment of 43, 45 composition of 45–​48 information gathering by 48–​49 report of  in general 49 on African consulates 51, 65–​66 on Asian consulates 52, 72, 73, 75, 77 and improving of existing conditions 49–​50 and laws and regulations 50–​51 on West Indian consulates 51–​52, 86 consular judges 165, 203, 205, 210, 217 consular jurisdiction, law on 54 Consular Regulation (1858; Sweden-​ Norway) 36 Consular Regulation (1886; Sweden-​ Norway) 103–​110 adoption of 103 changes to proposal 103–​104 committee for drafting of. see Consular Committee (1875) Consular Regulation (1906; Sweden) 200–​201 consular regulations, of European countries 44 consular reports 8, 90, 135, 176–​178, 199 consular services  research on 7–​9 of Sweden. see Swedish consular services of Sweden-​Norway. see Swedish-​ Norwegian consular services of Western countries  cooperation between 210 growing significance of 22 reforms of 44–​45 consuls  and foreign policy 5 research on 9–​12 Convention of Moss 30 Conyers, James Adam 182 Copenhagen 107 Cronholm, Folke 211–​213 Cuba  Swedish consular services in 217 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 85–​87, 173–​174 Cuffe, Thomas Withey 167

256 Index Cunningham, Edward 69 Curacao 96–​97, 187 Cuthbertson, John Reid 72, 161 Dahl, Emil 203 Dakar  Swedish consulate in 208–​209 Swedish trade with 208 Daluin, Ernest 62, 63 Danielsson, Daniel 162, 218 Danish shipping 145 Dannfelt, Carl Juhlin 12 Darrel, Josiah Taylor 93, 182 Davey, Th. 136 De Goey, Ferry 5, 8, 9, 11, 22 De Vaux, Jospeh Emile 185 Degenau, Frédéric 72 Dejung, Christof 2 Denmark  consulates of 143–​144 imperialism/​colonialism of 2, 16 neutrality of 32, 101 relationships of, with Sweden-​ Norway 32, 41 shipping of 145 see also Copenhagen Diagne, Blaise 209 Dickmann, B.A. 80 Diplomatic and Consular Committee (1905 års diplomat-​och konsulatkommitté)  in general 19, 20–​21, 219 composition of 194 dissent within 200 report of  criticism of 200 implementation of 200–​201 on nationality 197 on needs of shipping companies 196 on official statistics 196 on ranks within consular services 199 on recruitment of staff 195 on relationship missions and consulates 197–​198 on rules for establishing consular/​ diplomatic services 198–​199 on salaries 196–​197 on stipends 198 diplomatic missions. see Swedish diplomatic services; Swedish-​Norwegian diplomatic services

Ditten, Thor von 191–​192 Dixmude, Jules Alphonse Jacques 116 Dominican Republic  history of 88 Swedish consular services in 217 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 88–​89, 176 Donald Campbell Mackey 75 Douglas, Ludvig  on Asian consulates 151 on Batavia consulate/​consuls 171 on Japanese trade 150 policymaking of 102 on Shanghai consulate/​consuls 145–​146 on Tangier consulate/​consuls 125–​127 on Tunisian consulates 128, 129 Due, Frederik Knut 128–​129, 186 Dumoulin, Eucher Louis Paul 95–​96, 185 Dutch East Indies (Indonesia)  Swedish consular services in 215 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 83–​84, 172–​173 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 173 East Asia. see Asia East India Company (eic) 68 Eckell, Harald August Waldemar 12 economic imperialism 28, 43 Egidius, Fredrik 96 Egypt  consular services in  of Sweden 201, 202, 203–​204 of Sweden-​Norway. see Alexandria Mixed Courts in 60, 61, 120, 122, 205 reforms to legal system in 60 Ehrenborg, Harald 71–​72, 164 Ehrensvärd (the elder), Albert  on Alexandria consulate/​consuls 121 on Bridgerown consulate/​consuls 182 on Cape Town consulate/​consuls 132 on Charlotte Amalie consulate/​ consul 179 on colonial politics 34 on Manila consulate/​consuls 170 on Shanghai consulate/​consuls 142 on Tamatave consulate/​consuls 118 mention of 42 Ehrensvärd (the younger), Albert 204, 206 Ekman, Jacob Emil 37, 45, 47 Emanuelson, Kjell 17, 50

257

Index embassies. see Swedish diplomatic services; Swedish-​Norwegian diplomatic services Engström, Diedrich 68–​69 Enhörning, Emil 146 Erik, Allan 215 Estill, Frederick Charles 139 Europe  political instability in 100–​101 relationships of, with Japan 148–​149 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 107 trade of, with Asia 68 Evans, Richard 23 Export of Sweden: A Compendium Showing the Principal Branches of Export and Industry (Hörnell) 105 Exportrådet (Swedish Trade Council) 38–​39 extraterritorial powers/​extraterritoriality  in general 30, 34 in Asia 154, 157, 221 of consuls 60–​61, 157 Fahlbeck, Pontus 192 Fallenius, Carl Martin Laurentius 12, 194 Falsen, Conrad 12 Falsen, Henrik 12 family dynasties  in consular services  in general 222 Arbuthnot family 79, 168 Barckhausen family 81–​82 Bois family 168–​169 Carrol family 137 Forbes family 74, 141 Pickenpack family 82, 164 Read family 70–​71, 72 Schöner family 93–​94, 183–​184 Tulin family 65–​66, 130 Tweedy family 88, 175–​176 see also business partners Far East. see Asia Fernandez, Joaquin 179, 218 Finland 16 Fischerström, Commander 94–​95 Fleetwood, Carl Georgsson 14, 33–​34, 67 Forbes, Francis Blackwell 69 Forbes, John Murray 74 Forbes, Paul S. 69 Forbes family 74, 141

foreign minister, role in consular affairs of 104 see also under specific foreign ministers Forst, Herman 215 Fort-​de-​France (Martinique) 186 France 66–​67, 128–​129 Francke, Edward Jasper 174 Francke, James (born Jonas) Robert  87–​88, 174 Fraser, Alexander 218 Fraser, Edward Cleather 139 fraud. see misconduct Frederick iii, German Emperor 42 free trade, imperialism as 28–​29 Freetown 135–​136 French Congo 207 French Indochina 215–​216 French West Africa 208–​209 French-​Moroccan Agreement (1863) 62 Gad, Ulrik 15 Gadelius (stipent holder) 150–​151 Gadelius, Knut 212 Gadelius & Co. 212 Gallagher, John 26–​27 Gamborg, Emil Johannes 174 Gammelien, Stefan 33 Gebrüder Volkart (Volkart Brothers) 76, 78, 167–​168, 214 German Empire 41–​42, 44–​45, 54, 67, 101, 191 Gihl, Torsten 17–​18 Gladston & Wyllie 170 global competition 23–​25 globalization 25–​26 Goës, Sigurd Theodor von 147 Goey, Ferry de 5, 8, 9, 11, 22 Gordon, George 170 Graves, John Hicks 57, 117 Great Britain 24, 28, 44, 100 Great Northern Telegraph Company (Det Store Nordiske Telegraf-​Selskab A/​S). 143, 145 Grip, Johan 106 Griswold, Charles 84–​85 Guadeloupe  shipping to 185 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 95–​96, 185–​186 Gude, Ove 151–​156

258 Index Gude Report 152–​156, 153t Gumpert, Augustus Charles 77, 78 Gundersen, Hans Jörgen 158 Gustaf v, King of Sweden 191 Gutschmid, Felix Freiherr von 148 Gyldenstolpe, August 158, 203, 208–​209 Haakon vii, King of Norway 191 Haas, Joseph von 141, 142, 143 Hagberg, Carl Filip Alexander 146, 147–​148, 157 Hagelin, Karl William 12 Haggard, John George 117–​118 Haggart, Edmund Archibald 217–​218 Haiti  history of 88 Swedish consulate in 217 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services 88, 175–​176 Hamilton (Bermuda) 93 handbooks 105–​106 Harrison, Robert Monroe 89 Havana  Swedish consulate in 217 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 85–​87, 173–​174 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 86 Hay, John Drummond 62 Hearne, John 88 Heiberg, Axel 70 Heidenstam, Oscar Gustaf von 61, 119–​120 Hens, Jean Philippe 170–​171 Hernandez, A.C. 175 Heron, Fredrick Griswold-​ 84–​85 Hicks, Edwin Theodore 215 High Porte (Ottoman government) 61 Hildebrand, Bengt 47 Hispaniola. see Port-​au-​Prince; San Domingo Hitchens, Richard 89–​91 Hitchens, Richard James Cade 89 Hoard, Charles Alexandre de Villers 91–​92 Hobsbawn, Eric 1, 25–​26, 28 Hochschild, Carl Fredrik  on African West coast consulates 111–​112 on Alexandria consulate/​consuls 59–​60, 62, 120 on Bangkok consulate/​consuls 83 becoming foreign minister 42 on Havana consulate/​consuls 86 on Lourenco-​Marques consulate/​ consuls 58

on particpation in Berlin Conference 67 on Saint John’s consulate/​consuls 97 on Shanghai consulate/​consuls 141, 142 on Tamatave consulate/​consuls 57 on Tangier consulate/​consuls 64 on Victoria consulate/​consuls 74 Hoffer, O. von 167 Holst, Axel 218 Hong Kong 72–​75, 160–​161 Hörnell, Reinhold 105 Huitfeldt, Hans Emil 158–​159 Hultman, Johan Erik Evald 209–​210, 211 Huttenbach Brothers & Co 161 Ibsen, Sigurd 108 Iceland 16 Idenburg, Alexander 173 imperialism/​colonialism  of Denmark 2 economic 28, 43 as free trade 28–​29 goals of 27–​28 of Great Britain 28 informal 4–​5, 18–​19, 28, 188, 221 legal 30, 60, 97–​98, 119, 203 New 1–​2, 8, 51, 216, 221 of Sweden. see Swedish foreign policy of Sweden-​Norway. see Swedish-​ Norwegian foreign policy India  Bildt’s Report on 166 consular services in  high staff turnover in 214 of Sweden 214–​215 of Sweden-​Norway 75–​80, 166–​168 Indonesia. see Dutch East Indies (Indonesia) informal imperialism 4–​5, 18–​19, 28, 188, 221 International Association of the Congo (Association internationale du Congo) 110 Irgens, Johannes 108 Ismail Pasha 60 Istanbul (Constantinople). see Constantinople Italy. see Rome s’Jacob, Willem 171–​172 Jakarta (Batavia). see Batavia

Index Jamaica  consular services in  of Sweden 217–​218 of Sweden Norway 89–​91, 176–​178 Norwegian shipping to 177, 177t James, Robert Harley 218 Jamestown (St. Helena) 55, 136–​138 Janni, Guiseppe (Joseph) 78–​79, 167 Japan  consular services in  of Sweden 211 of Sweden-​Norway 157–​159 Gude Report on 152–​154 relationships of, with Europe 148–​149 Swedish-​Norwegian envoy to 151–​152 Swedish-​Norwegian trade with 149–​151 Japp, James 185, 186, 189–​190 Jardine, David 69 Jardine Matheson Holdings Limited 69 Jensen, Rudolf 68 Johannesburg  founding of 132 Swedish consulate in 208 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 133–​134 Johansson, Anders Daniel 144 Johnson, Joseph Vilhelm 107–​108, 120–​121 Johnson, Otis 181 Johnsonska donationsfonden 107–​109 Johnsson, John E. 208 Jørgensen, Jens Peter 180 Jörgensen Richter, Ole 79, 93 judicial skills, of consuls 157 Juhlin-​Dannfelt, Carl 110 Juhlin-​Dannfelt, Matts 110 Karlstad Conference (1905) 191–​192 Kayaoğlu, Turan 30 Keitel, Georg 176 Kenny, William Walker 214 Kierulf, William Duntzfeldt 84 King, Daniel 214 Kingston  Swedish consulate in 217–​218 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 89–​91, 176–​178 Kinshasa (Leopoldville). see Leopoldville Kissinger, Henry 23 Kjær, Hans 73–​74 Kjellberg, August 212 Kjerland, Kirsten Alsaker 14–​15, 56, 175

259 Klinteberg, Svante af 70–​71 Knight, George 85–​86 Kobe  Swedish consulate in 211 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  157–​158, 159 Köersner, Vilhelm 105 Kommerskollegium. see Swedish Board of Trade Kommerskollegium och Riksens Ständers Manufakturkontor samt kon-​–​1910: administrativa och biografiska anteckningar (Almquist) 6 Konsulatarkivet (Consular Archive) 5–​6 Krebs, Henrik 92 Kup, Bernardus Hendrikus 119 Lagerheim, Alfred  on Brazzaville consulate/​consuls 115 career of 46–​47 on colonial policies 35 and Consular Committee 37, 45 and Diplomatic and Consular Committee 194, 219 on judicial skills of consuls 157 on Kingston consulate/​consuls 178 on merger of consulates Point à Pitre and Fort-​de-​France 187 on Mixed Courts 123 on nationality in consular appointments 158 on Port of Spain consulate/​consuls  184–​185 on salaries of consuls 196 on Shanghai consulate/​consuls 147 on Singapore consulate/​consuls 163 mention of 141 Lagerheim, Elias 141 Lagerheim, Oscar 141–​142 Lagerheim Committee. see Diplomatic and Consular Committee (1905) Landberg, Carlo 121 Landberg, Johan Henrik 172 Lane, Rufus Allen 84–​85 Larsson, Jan 7, 18–​19 Latimer, William Henry 178–​179 Lawless, William Joseph 94–​95, 186 lawyers, and Mixed Courts 61, 221 Leeward Islands 97. see also Antigua Lefroy, John Henry 93

260 Index legal committee, for law on consular jurisdiction 54 legal imperialism 30, 60, 97–​98, 119, 203, 220 legal skils, of consuls 157 Leira, Halvard 7–​8 Leopold ii, King of the Belgians 2, 14, 110 Leopoldville (Kinshasa) 115, 206 Lewenhaupt, Carl 106–​107, 161, 167, 170 Leyba, León Vidal 96, 187 Leyden, Casimir von 102 Liberia 55, 59, 135 Liljevalch, Carl Fredrik 68–​69 Lindblom, Frans 133 Lindman, Arvid 20t Lithman, Karl Vilhelm 131–​132 Logan, Ernest 214 Lourenco-​Marques (Maputo) 56, 58, 119 Lundeberg, Christian 192–​193 Lundqvist, Pia 13 Lyon, Carl 97 Mackenzie, Alexander 79–​80, 168 Mackwood, Frank Mitchell 214–​215 Madagascar  Swedish consular services in 202 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 56–​58, 117–​119 Madras (Chennai)  Swedish consulate in 214 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  79–​80, 168 Magnusson, Lars  28 Malaysia. see Straits Settlements (Malaysia) Manderström, Ludvig 43–​44, 65 Manila  Swedish consulate in 215 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 84–​85, 170–​171 Manyon, John Ailwyn 170, 215 Maputo (Lourenco-​Marques). see Lourenco-​ Marques Mariátegui, Juan José 85–​86 Marstrand, Nicolai Wilhelm 92 Marstrand, Otto Jakob 92, 95, 179 Martinique  eruption of Mont Pelée on 186 shipping to 94–​95

Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 94–​95, 185–​186 Mauritius 136–​139 Maxwell, Hamilton 78 Meagher, Henry 187 Meili, C.T. 78 Melchertson, Frederick 97, 183 Melissen, Jan 8–​9 Mello Breyner, Francisco de 119 Mendelssohn, Robert von 165 Mercado, Charles Ernest de 178, 217 merchant shipping (international)  growth of 25–​26 in tonnage 27t see also Norwegian shipping; Swedish shipping; Swedish-​Norwegian shipping Messrs. George Gordon and Co 215 Michelsen, Christian 190 Michelsen, Jacob Andreas 45, 47–​48 Millward, Robert 26 Minck, Otto 203 Minto, William 75 misconduct  of Swedish consuls 211–​212 of Swedish-​Norwegian consuls 90–​91, 126, 135–​136 mismanagement. see misconduct Mission Covenant Church of Sweden (mccs; Svenska Missionsförbundet) 144, 206–​207 missionary activities/​missionaries 56, 144, 145, 206–​207 Mixed Courts (Egypt) 60–​61, 99, 120, 122–​123, 205, 221 modern imperialism. see New Imperialism Mohr, Alfred Edgar 165 Monrovia 55, 59, 135 Mont Pelée 186 Et mord i Kongo (‘A Murder in Congo’; Strøksnes) 115 Morocco  Swedish consular services in 202 Swedish trade with 202 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in. see Tangier Swedish-​Norwegian view on 62–​63 Most Favoured Nation status 30, 63, 66, 67, 128–​129, 149–​150 Mountcastle, Percy 161

261

Index Mozambique 56, 58, 119 Mpoko (Société anonyme des Établissements Congolais Gratry) 115 Müller (ship captain) 161 Müller, Friedrich 169 Müller, Leos 10 Müller, Wilhelm Theodor 82, 164 murder investigations 144 Musson, James William 92–​93, 182 Myanmar (Burma). see Burma Nagasaki 159 Nansen, Fridtjof 190 Nassau (Bahamas) 181 nationality  and consular appointments 104, 117–​119, 158, 163 of Swedish consuls/​consular staff 197 naval power  and global competition 24–​25 in tonnage 29t Nenninger, John 85–​86 Netherlands  colonialism/​imperialism of 2 consular services of 44 neutrality of 2 Neumann, Iver 7–​8, 15 neutrality  of Denmark 32, 101 of Netherlands 2 of Sweden 4, 10, 16, 39, 193 of Sweden-​Norway 39, 41, 100 New Imperialism 1–​2, 8, 51, 216, 221 Nicolas ii, Tsar of Russia 191 Nilsson, David 14 Nissen, Pedro 90 nms (Norwegian Missionary Society) 56, 57 Nordisk Defence Club (Nordisk Skibsrederforening) 159 Nordström, Johan Adolf 65, 126–​127 Det Norske Misjonsselskap (Norwegian Missionary Society; nms) 56, 57 Norway  constitution of 31 criticism on consular services by 31, 37, 43, 105, 106–​107 independence of 16, 190 and Scandinavianism 32–​33 suppression of colonial memory in 14–​15

Swedishization of 32 trade of  with Africa 114, 129 with Asia 140 Norwegian Committee of Constitutional Affairs 108 Norwegian Department of the Interior (DfI)  on Alexandria consulate/​consuls 119, 120, 121 on Asian consulates 77, 166 on Cape Town consular/​consuls 131, 132 on Congo Free State consulate/​consuls 115 on Gude Report 154–​155 on Haiti consulate/​consuls 88 on Hamilton consulate/​consuls 93 on Havana consulate/​consuls 86 on judicial skills of consuls 157 on Pointe à Pitre consulate/​consuls 95 on Port of Spain consulate/​consuls 184 on Shanghai consulate/​consuls 143, 146 on Singapore consulate/​consuls 162 on Tamatave consulate/​consuls 118 on Tangier consulate/​consuls 64, 124, 125, 126 on Victoria consulate/​consuls 73 on Willemstad consulate/​consuls 96–​97 Norwegian Department of Trade and Industry 157–​158, 172–​173, 177, 187 Norwegian Missionary Society (Det Norske Misjonsselskap, nms) 56, 57, 118 Norwegian shipping  to Asia  in general 140 Singapore 163t and consular services 7–​8 importance of 26, 31 in tonnage 27t to West Indies  Bermuda 183 Jamaica 177, 177t see also Swedish shipping; Swedish-​Norwegian shipping Nubar Pasha 60 Nunes, Ralph 89 Nyssens, Georges 171 Nyström, Per 7 Öberg, Claes 123 office allowances. see budgets

262 Index Ohlsson, Anders 131–​132, 133 Okano-​Heijmans, Maaike 9–​11 Orfield, Lester 61 O’Rourke, Kevin 25–​26 Oscar i, King of Sweden and Norway 32, 52–​53, 68 Oscar ii, King of Sweden and Norway  and Berlin Conference 34, 187 and Consular Committee 42, 45 and lawyer for Mixed Courts commission 122 and Madras consulate/​consuls 79 pro-​German strategy of 40–​42 and trade with African colonies 54 mention of 179 Östberg, Claes Gustaf Belinfante 122 Osterhammel, Jürgen 25 Ostindisk Kompagni 68 Ottesen, Peter Martin Ragnar 156–​157, 159 Ottoman Empire 61, 106–​107 Pakenham, Thomas Conolly 56, 57 Pålsson, Ale 13 Panjdeh Incident (1885) 100 Pardo, Eliesar “Lazar” 176 Penang 161 Peters, H.C. 84 Peyron, Claes 58 Philippines  Swedish consular services in 215 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 84–​85, 170–​171 Pickenpack, Paul 82, 164 Pickenpack, Vincent 82, 164 Plunkett, Francis 102 Pointe à Pitre (Guadaloupe) 95–​96, 185–​186 political prestige, as reason for expansion of consular services 98, 188 Port Louis (Mauritius) 55, 136–​139 Port of Spain (Trinidad)  Swedish consulate in 218 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 93–​94, 183–​184 Port-​au-​Prince  Swedish consulate in 217 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 88, 175–​176 Portugal 2

Pot, Joannes Jacobus van der 14 Prest, Charles William 214 protectionism 31, 33 Puerto Rico  history of 178 Swedish consular services in 218 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 91–​92, 178–​179 Qvam, Ole Anton 154–​155 Ramm, Axel 109–​110 Ramstedt, Johan 192 Rangoon  Swedish consulate in 215 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 80–​81, 169–​170 Read, Robert Barclay 70, 72 Read, William Henry Macleod 70–​71 recruitment  of consuls/​consular staff  among business partners. see business partners among family relatives. see family dynasties among foreign merchants 75, 98–​99, 105, 168–​171, 175, 221 and diplomatic assignments 104 and nationality 87–​88, 104, 117–​119, 158, 163 qualification based 18, 157, 219 reputation based 75, 76, 99, 105, 109, 130, 139, 162, 188, 197, 222 in Sweden 20, 194, 195, 219 in Sweden-​Norway 20, 35–​37 reforms/​reorganizations  of BoT 52–​53 of Egypt’s legal system. see Mixed Courts of Swedish consular services. see Diplomatic and Consular Committee (1905) of Swedish-​Norwegian consular services  in Asia 160, 172–​173 see also Consular Committee (1875) of Western consular services 44–​45 Reinhold, Heinrich Carl 75 Reinsurance Treaty 101 reorganization. see reforms/​reorganizations

Index reports. see Consular Committee (1875); consular reports; Diplomatic and Consular Committee (1905); Gude Report research 7–​19 Richardson, William Gumbes 218 Richmann, Thure 118 Riebe, J.H. 77 Riksarkivet (Swedish National Archive) 5–​6 Riksdag 40, 106, 130, 190–​191, 208 Ritz, Alfred 75 Robinson, Ronald 26–​27 Rome 107 Rosen, Fredrik von 194, 200 Rosenlund, Carl Gustaf Hjalmar 130, 203, 208 Röst, Didrik Gustaf 216 Ruckert, George Henri 80, 169 Runblom, Harald 19 Russell & Co. 69–​70, 74, 82, 84, 141, 142, 160 Russell & Sturgis 84, 85 Russia 24, 100–​101, 191 Russo-​Japanese War 159 Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) 215–​216 Saint Barthélemy 3, 13–​14 Saint George (Bermuda)  Swedish consulate in 218 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 92, 182 Saint Helena 55, 136–​138 Saint John’s (Antigua)  Swedish consulate in 218 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in 97, 183 Saint Thomas  Swedish consular services in 218 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services in 92, 179–​181 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 180 Saint-​Pierre (Martinique)  destruction of 186 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  94–​95, 186 salaries  of Swedish consuls/​consular staff  in general 196–​197 in Asia 211 in South Africa 208 of Swedish-​Norwegian consuls/​ consular staff  in Africa 59–​60

263 in Asia 142, 143, 145–​146, 147, 153t, 159 discrepancies in 106 see also budgets Salomon & Co. 137–​138 San Domingo  Swedish consulate in 217 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  88–​89, 176 San Juan 91–​92, 178–​179 São Tomé  suitability for consulate 112–​113 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 113 Scandinavianism 30, 32–​33, 102 Schellhass & Co. 75, 142, 160 Schiøtz, Gullbrand 115–​117, 206 Schöner, August 94 Schöner, Christian 183–​184 Schöner, Justus 183 Schöner, Ludwig 93–​94, 183 Schöner, Wilhelm 184 Schönmeyr, Alfred Carl 90 Schroeder, Paul W. 23 Scott, Binney 81 Second Boer War 134 security policies 11 Seip, Friedrich 160 Senegal  Swedish consular services in 201, 208–​209 Swedish trade with 208 Sergent, Jules 209 Shanghai  Swedish consulate in  appointment of staff of 209 salaries of staff of 211 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  appointment of staff of 141–​142, 143, 146, 157–​159 budget of 142–​143 district of 148, 151 establishment of 69 salaries of staff of 142, 143, 145–​146, 147 work of consuls of 144–​145 shipping companies  and consular services 196 see also Norwegian shipping; Swedish shipping; Swedish-​Norwegian shipping Shlala, Elizabeth 60

264 Index Siam (Thailand)  Swedish consular services in 213 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services 81–​83, 164–​165 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 82–​83 Sierra Leone 135–​136, 201 Silfverhjelm, Carl 204–​205 Singapore  as distribution centre 71 Swedish consulate in 213 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  appointment of staff of 70, 72, 161–​163 budget of 164 district of 161 establishment of 70 importance of 71–​72 work of consuls of 70–​71 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 71, 163t Sjögren, Carl 206 Skarin, Reinhold 54 Skybak, Ole 159 Smith, Charles Vincent 74 Söderberg, Olof A. 194 Solomon, Saul 137–​138 Songbu 144 sources 5–​6 Soutar, Simon 91, 176–​178 South Africa  colonies in 132 consular services in  of Sweden 202, 208 of Sweden-​Norway 55, 131–​134 South African Republic (Transvaal). see Johannesburg Southern Asia. see Asia Sri Lanka (Ceylon). see Ceylon Staaff, Karl 20, 192–​193 Stanley, Henry Morton 110 Steen, Johannes 101, 102 Steenbock, Albert 111–​112 Stein, Hamilton 138–​139 Stein, Robert 138 Stevenson, Walter Ferguson 171, 215 Stevenson, Walter George 215 stipends, for consular aspirants 108–​109, 198 Det Store Nordiske Telegraf-​Selskab A/​S (Great Northern Telegraph Company). 143, 145

Stortinget 30, 40, 108, 130, 190 Straits Settlements (Malaysia) 161. see also Singapore Stråth, Bo 7 Strauch, Maximilien 110, 208 Strøksnes, Morten 115 Sturgis, Henry Parkman 84 Sublime Porte (Ottoman government) 61 Suermondt, Henri 171 Suermondt, Willem Willemzoon 83–​84, 171 Suhrke, Ernst Bernhard 134, 208 Sundelin, Herman 65 Surabaya 173 Svenska Missionsförbundet (mccs; Mission Covenant Church of Sweden) 144, 206–​207 Svensson, Knut 116 Sveriges Allmänna Exportförening 38 “Sveriges historia” (Nyström) 7 Sweden  and aftermath of dissolution 192 colonial memory in, suppression of 14 decline in status of 33 economic development of 18 foreign policy of. see Swedish foreign policy Foreign Service of 200–​201, 213. see also Diplomatic and Consular Committee (1905) industrialization of 31 kings of 40–​41. see also under specific kings Ministry for Foreign Affairs. see Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs neutrality of 4, 10, 16, 39, 193 and Scandinavianism 32–​33 security policies of 11 shipping of. see Swedish shipping trade of  with Africa 113–​114, 201–​202, 202t, 203, 205–​206, 208 with Asia 68, 139–​140 views of  on Belgian rule of Congo Free State 205 on Berlin Conference 34–​35 on dissolution of Sweden-​ Norway 190–​191

Index Sweden-​Norway, United Kingdoms of  and Berlin Conference. see Berlin Conference bilateral treaties on trade  in general 66–​67 with China 68–​69 Consular Regulations of. see under specific Consular Regulations foreign policy of. see Swedish-​Norwegian foreign policy and Most Favoured Nation status 30, 66, 67, 128–​129, 149–​150 neutrality of 39, 100 relationships of  with Belgium 110–​111 with Congo Free State 14, 67 with Denmark 32, 41 with France 66–​67, 128–​129 with German Empire 41–​42, 54, 67 internal 101–​102, 129, 130, 131, 146–​147, 162–​163 with Japan 148–​149 with Tunisia 128–​129 security policies of 11 shipping of. see Swedish-​Norwegian shipping trade of  with Africa 55, 130 with Asia 72–​73, 149–​151 with West Indies 173–​174 union of. see Union of Sweden and Norway views of  on Belgian rule of Congo Free State 14, 67, 115–​117 on Morocco 62–​63 Swedish Board of Trade (Kommerskollegium, BoT)  abolishment of 52–​53 on Alexandria consulate/​consuls 120, 121 on Asian consulates 166 on Cairo consulate/​consuls 204 on Cape Town consular/​consuls 131 on Charlotte Amalie consulate/​ consuls 179 on Colombo consulate/​consuls 81 on Congo Free State consulate/​ consuls 115 criticism on 52

265 decline in role of 36 on Dutch East India consulates 173 on Gude Report 154 on Hamilton consulate/​consuls 93 on Havana consulate/​consuls 86 on Jamestown consulate/​consuls 137 on judicial skills of consuls 157 on Kingston consulate/​consuls 90 on Madras consulate/​consuls 168 main archive of 5–​6 on Manila consulate/​consuls 170 on merger of consulates Point à Pitre and Fort-​de-​France 187 and Ministry for Foreign Affairs 53–​54 on Monrovia consulate/​consuls 135 on Pointe à Pitre consulate/​ consuls 95, 185 on Port of Spain consulate/​consuls 184 and recruitment of consuls 35–​36 reorganization of 52–​53 on San Juan consulate/​consuls 91–​92 on Shanghai consulate/​consuls 143, 146–​147 on Singapore consulate/​consuls 161 on Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to Algiers/​Tunis 128 on Tangier consulate/​consuls 64, 124, 125, 126 on Willemstad consulate/​consuls 96 Swedish consular services  in Africa 201–​209, 228–​229 in Asia 209–​216, 229–​230 budgets of. see budgets and dissolution of union  aftermath of 193–​194 role in 7–​8 report on. see Diplomatic and Consular Committee (1905) rules for establishing 198–​199 and stipends 198 and Swedish diplomatic services  197–​199 in West Indies 216–​219, 233–​234 see also consular services; Swedish-​ Norwegian consular services Swedish consular staff 20, 194, 195, 219. see also Swedish-​Norwegian consular staff Swedish consuls  misconduct of 212

266 Index Swedish consuls (cont.) nationality of 197 salaries of 196 see also consuls; Swedish-​Norwegian consuls Swedish diplomatic services 197–​199 Swedish East Asia Company 68 Swedish Foreign Ministers 225. see also under specific names of Foreign Ministers Swedish foreign policy  economic aspects of 33–​34 and imperialism/​colonialism  abandonment of 3, 219 as informal 18–​19 legal 203 New Imperialism 2–​3, 216 research on 7–​8, 13–​15, 16–​19 parliament’s influence over 40 and protectionism 33 and Scandinavianism 30, 32–​33 and Union 30–​31 see also Swedish-​Norwegian foreign policy Swedish Foreign Service 200–​201, 213. see also Diplomatic and Consular Committee (1905) Swedish kings 40–​41. see also under specific kings Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs  and BoT 53–​54 and consuls/​consular services  after dissolution 193–​194 expansion of 42–​43 and recruitment 36–​37 role within 37, 38t, 221–​222 letters send to 36, 38t research on 17–​18 and Swedish-​Norwegian fleet 35 Swedish National Archive (Riksarkivet) 5–​6 Swedish shipping  to Asia 163t see also Swedish-​Norwegian shipping; Swedish Norwegina shipping and consular services 10 importance of 26 official statistics of 196 in tonnage 27t to West Indies 185 see also Norwegian shipping Swedish Trade Council (Exportrådet)  38–​39

Swedish-​Norwegian co 58 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services  in Africa  overview 54–​67, 228–​229 in general 51 decline in 59–​60 expansion of 111–​139 mismanagement of 126, 135–​136, 138 see also under specific countries and cities annual reports of 8, 90, 176–​178, 199 in Asia  overview 68–​85, 229–​230 in general 52 Consular Committee on 72 expansion of 140–​173 see also under specific countries and cities and British consular services 185–​186 budgets of. see budgets and diplomatic services 103–​104, 160 and dissolution of union 222–​223 expansion of  in general 42–​43 and lack of resources 142–​143 and political prestige 98, 188 and use of established colonial order 29–​30, 43, 54, 66–​67, 113, 222 in West Indies 85–​98 family dynasties in. see family dynasties ineffective steering of 49 lack of resources for 142–​143, 180, 220 Norway’s criticism on 31, 37, 43, 105, 106–​107, 190 prestige of 78 professionalization of 35, 125, 188, 222 profits from 44 purpose of 188 reorganization of. see reorganization report on. see Consular Committee (1875) role of foreign minister in 104 size of 22 and Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. see Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs in West Indies  overview 85–​98, 231–​232 in general 51–​52 expansion of 173–​187

Index initiatives for expansion of 93–​96 mismanagement of 90–​91 see also under specific countries and cities Swedish-​Norwegian consular staff  in general 78 number of 20t recruitment of. see recruitment salaries of. see salaries see also Swedish consular staff Swedish-​Norwegian consuls  and accusations from seamen 84 categories of 37 expectations of 70–​71 handbooks for 105–​106 importance of 19 and laws and regulations 50–​51 misconduct of 90–​91, 126, 135–​136 and prestige/​social status 10, 130, 179 qualification of  judicial skills 157 lack of economic skills of 65, 105, 109–​110 recruitment of. see recruitment salaries of. see salaries status of 62–​63 training for 107–​109 well-​connectedness of 99 see also consuls; Swedish consuls Swedish-​Norwegian diplomatic services 103–​104, 160 Swedish-​Norwegian fleet 35 Swedish-​Norwegian foreign policy  and consuls 5 and imperialism/​colonialism  New Imperialism 3, 8, 12, 43, 51, 187, 221–​222 use of established colonial order  29–​30, 43, 54, 66–​67, 113, 222 and protectionism 31, 33 Swedish King’s powers in 40 see also Swedish foreign policy Swedish-​Norwegian Foreign Service 107 Swedish-​Norwegian legations 62–​63 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping  in general 38 to Africa  Alexandria 120, 121 Algiers 128 Cape Town 131

267 São Tomé 113 Tangier 125 Tunis 128 to Asia  Bangkok 82–​83 Bombay 77 Dutch East Indies 173 increase in 145 Japan 149–​150, 150t Singapore 71 Victoria 74 expansion of 44 to West Indies  Bermuda 93 Havana 86 Leeward Islands 97 Martinique 94–​95 Saint Thomas 180 Trinidad and Tobago 94 see also Norwegian shipping; Swedish shipping Tamatave (Taomasina) 56–​58, 117–​119 Tangier  Christian cemetery in 203 shipping to 125 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  in general 54–​55 budget of 63–​64, 124–​125 decline of 62 German representation of 125–​126 minimum maintainment of 51 Taomasina (Tamatave). see Tamatave Taube, Arvid 207, 212, 213 Taylor, Lewis J. 181 Thailand (Siam). see Siam Themptander, Robert 67 Thibaud, Julien 203 Thomasson, Fredrik 13 Thunberg, David Georg 109, 162–​163 Tietgen, Carl Fredrik 58 Tisdel, Willard 111–​112 Tokyo 211 trade  of Europe, with Asia 68 of Norway  with Africa 114, 129 with Asia 140 of Sweden 

268 Index trade (cont.) with Africa 113–​114, 201–​202, 202t, 203, 205–​206, 208 with Asia 139–​140 of Sweden-​Norway  with Africa 55, 130 with Asia 72–​73, 149–​151 with West Indies 173–​174 see also Norwegian shipping; Swedish shipping; Swedish-​Norwegian shipping trade attachés 198 training, for consuls 107–​109 Tranchell, Johan 83 transport costs 26 Transvaal (South African Republic)  and Second Boer War 134 see also Johannesburg Treaty of Peace, Amity, and Commerce between the King of Sweden and Norway and the Empire of China (1847; Treaty of Canton) 19, 30 Trinidad and Tobago  shipping to 94 Swedish consular services in 218 Swedish-​Norwegian consular services 93–​94, 183–​184 Tripoli 51 Tripp, Edgar 184–​185 Trolle, Eric 193–​194 Tulin, Carl (d. 1882) 66 Tulin family 65–​66, 130 Tunis  Swedish consulate in 203 Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  in general 54–​55 closure of 65–​66 proposed closure of 51 re-​establishment of 126–​128, 130 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 128, 130 Tunisia  and Sweden-​Norway 128–​129 see also Tunis Tweedy, Arthur Hearne 175–​176 Tweedy, Hugh D’Oyly 88–​89, 175 Tweedy, John Newman 88 Uddén, Axel Torsten 211–​213 Uddén, Torsten 159

Uehlinger, Hermann 214 Uffel Schomburg, Johan von 218 Union Act (1815) 31 Union of Sweden and Norway  dissolution of 7–​8, 190–​194, 222–​223 establishment of 30 political form of 30–​31 see also Sweden-​Norway, United Kingdoms of United Kingdom. see Great Britain United Kingdoms. see Sweden-​Norway, United Kingdoms of Vangroenweghe, Daniel 115, 116 Venstre party 101, 102, 105 Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie (voc) 68 Victoria (Hong Kong)  Swedish-​Norwegian consulate in  appointment of staff of 73–​75, 160 Consular Committee on 72 downgrading of 161 establishment of 160 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to 74 Victoria, Queen of Great Britain and Ireland 77 Vienna 106–​107 Vienna Congress (1815) 23–​24 Voigt, Siegfried Eberhard 75, 166–​167 Volkart, Johann Georg 76 Volkart, Lucas 214 Volkart, Salomon 76 Volkart Brothers (Gebrüder Volkart) 76, 78, 167–​168, 214 Voss, Diedrich 174 Wachtmeister, Carl-​Axel Hansson 175, 204–​205, 217 Wachtmeister, Fredrik 191–​192 Waddell, William Paterson 162–​163 Wadner, Erik 109, 133 Wallenberg, Gustaf Oscar 18–​19, 211–​213 Wanklyn, William 214 Warneford, Robert André Llewellyn 183 Weber, Carl Heinrich Friedrich 172 Weber, Otto 164–​165 Weibull, Curt 10 Weibull, Lauritz 10 Weiss, Holger 13–​14

269

Index West Indies  consular services in  Consular Committee (1875) report on 51–​52, 86 of Sweden 216–​219, 231–​232 of Sweden-​Norway 51–​52, 85–​98, 173–​187, 231–​232 see also under specific countries and cities Norwegian shipping to 177, 177t, 183 Swedish shipping to 185 Swedish-​Norwegian shipping to  Bermuda 93 Havana 86 Leeward Islands 97 Martinique 94–​95 Saint Thomas 180 Trinidad and Tobago 94 trade of  decline in 216, 219 with Sweden 216 with Sweden-​Norway 173–​174

Wikholm, Otto 144 Wilhelm ii, German Emperor 42, 101 Willemstad (Curacao) 96–​97, 187 Willerding, Theodor 89–​90 Williams, George Alfred 136 Williamson, Jeffrey 25–​26 Wilson, Victor 14 Wilson, William Henry Brougham 138 Windsor, Rose & Co. 164 Wolff, Johan Andreas Ferdinand 84 Wrangel, Herman 126–​128, 173 Wright, John Moncrieff 170 Yngfalk, Carl 14 Yngfalk, Nilsson 14 Young, G.M. 17 Young, John Montgomery 168 Yule (the younger), Andrew 214 Zamoyski, Adam 23