CAREY FAMILY & CITIZEN DIPLOMACY
ARTHUR & AGNES CAREY
In 1905, President Theodore Roosevelt chose Portsmouth, New Hampshire to be the site of negotiations between Russian and Japanese delegations to end the Russo-Japanese War. Roosevelt never came to Portsmouth but won the 1906 Nobel Peace Prize for orchestrating what is now known as multi-track diplomacy that included other world powers, the Russian and Japanese delegations, the US Navy and New Hampshire hosts in the thirty days of negotiations that resulted in the Portsmouth Peace Treaty.
Among the distinguished guests Arthur Astor Carey and Agnes Carey hosted at Creek Farm were members of the Russian and Japanese delegations attending the peace conference.
Newspaper accounts of the proceedings include multiple efforts by local residents to engage the diplomats in social gatherings designed to encourage them to continue to negotiate.
In particular, the Portsmouth Herald reported that Agnes Carey assisted Mrs. Herbert Pierce (Helen Pierce, who had grown up in Portsmouth) with official entertaining by her husband Third Assistant Secretary of State, Herbert H.H. Pierce, President Roosevelt’s representative on site. After assisting Mrs. Pierce, Mrs. Carey took up the cause of providing hospitality by inviting the Russian and Japanese delegations to her home for dinners and garden parties. One garden party in took place on Sunday, August 27th, at the height of tensions over the final terms of the negotiations.
ALIDA CAREY
The Careys' young daughter Alida remembered, decades later, that the garden was decorated with a large Russian flag and a large paper Japanese carp hung so that they could be seen from the Wentworth across Little Harbor.
Alida Carey remembered other dinners where the Russians were quite noisy guests while the Japanese were more reserved. That these social events, this citizen diplomacy provided by the summer residents of Little Harbor was considered valuable at the highest level of the negotiations is evidenced by another details Alida Carey recalled. After the Treaty was signed and the diplomats departed, Roosevelt dispatched his Presidential yacht, the Mayflower to provide a private harbor cruise for the family.
CITIZEN DIPLOMACY
While the hospitality of the Careys was matched by other prominent citizens, church congregations, onlookers at Wentworth By the Sea Hotel and ordinary residents who filled the sidewalks to welcome the delegates in a Welcoming Parade, only the Careys are known to have received an official Presidential acknowledgement of their efforts. That gesture of appreciation is now seen as proof that Roosevelt was aware of the citizen diplomacy the Careys and others in Portsmouth had provided and considered it crucial to the successful outcome of the peace conference. And Carey Cottage at Creek Farm is one of the last private homes still standing where the citizen diplomacy that helped President Theodore Roosevelt win the 1906 Nobel Peace Prize took place.
PORTSMOUTH PEACE TREATY DAY
In 2010, The New Hampshire House and the New Hampshire Senate voted unanimously to pass SB379, “An Act proclaiming September 5 as Portsmouth Peace Treaty Day” and Governor John Lynch signed the bill on August 17, 2010.
Portsmouth Peace Treaty Day commemorates New Hampshire’s role as the host President Theodore Roosevelt designated for the peace conference that ended the Russo-Japanese War, and recognizes the part played by New Hampshire citizens in the multi-track diplomacy of the successful international negotiations between the Japanese and Russian diplomats in Portsmouth that resulted in the Portsmouth Peace Treaty on September 5, 1905. The day is now commemorated, by Governor’s Proclamation as an Official Annual Observance. The bell-ringing that takes place in Portsmouth and across New Hampshire each year on September 5th honors the citizen diplomacy of people like the Careys.