Efforts made by Great Britain and Guatemala to define Boundaries with British Honduras and Guatemala

Source:

A History of Belize by Narda Dobson 

THE PEOPLE INVOLVED:

Lord Palmerston, British Foreign Secretary, British Prime Minister

Lord Clarendon, British Foreign Secretary (1850s)

Frederick Chatfield, British Consul to Guatemala

Charles Lennox Wyke, replaced Chatfield

Francisco Martin, Guatemalan Foreign Minister

William Stevenson, Superintendent of the British Settlement

Sir William Gore Ouseley, appointed to settle all Central American issues

PART 1

During the 1850s both Mexico and Guatemala had shown renewed interests in settling the outstanding boundary question with Britain for different reasons.Mexico wanted to deal with the continued raids and war by the indian tribes. Guatemala was concern with the ever growing activities of the American filibusters in Central America.

In 1853, Wyke who had succeeded Chatfield was told by the Guatemalan Chief Minister that until the boundaries with British Honduras were settled, America would always have an excuse to interfere. In order to avoid further American interference his government was ready to conclude a secret treaty which would settle the matter forever. This proposal seemed to the English Foreign Secretary Lord Clarendon, fraught with danger and it was ignored.

In 1855, a proposal was made up in which Britain and France should jointly take Guatemala under its protection. This was also ignored.

In 1856, the Guatemala Foreign Minister was instructed to proceed to London to negotiate a boundary treaty and at the same time to obtain some compensation in the form of protection against filibusters for the territory (Central America Federation of former Spanish Colonies) which the treaty should guarantee.

When Francisco Martin arrived in London in May, 1857, he found that William Stevenson, Superintendent of the British settlement was already there to discuss the treaty. Their conversations were followed by the drawing up of two draft treaties defining the boundaries. The only difference between the two treaties was the Guatemalan mention of renunciation of sovereignty over British Honduras for which the British Government should offer some indemnity. It was suggested that this might be financial but Guatemala preferred some kind of guarantee against the threats of filibusters.

No such question of indemnity appeared in the English version of the draft treaty. Superintendent Stevenson was convinced that, unless a similar treaty with Mexico was arranged, there could be no satisfactory solution of the boundary question. Lord Clarendon agreed and it was hoped that the Mexican minister in London would be given power to conclude such a treaty but he was withdrawn before this could be done.

When Sir William Gore Ouseley was entrusted with the task of settling all the outstanding problems in Central America in the autumn of 1857, all the negotiations lapsed. Francisco Martin had already returned to Paris believing that the British Government would never consider the question of compensation.

Martin’s beliefs were fully borne out by the instructions which were sent to Charles Lennox Wyke when he replaced Ouseley in February, 1859. The British negotiator was explicitly told he must not agree to anything which could possibly be interpreted as a cession on the part of Guatemala in case the United States should regard this as an infraction of the 1850 Clayton-Bulwer Treaty. The treaty was to be a simple ‘definition’ of a boundary long existing but not yet ascertained.

Apart from the delicate question of the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty two other important factors were raised by the negotiators with Guatemala. The first was that there had been no treaty definition of the boundaries since the Anglo-Spanish Treaty of 1786, although the British Authorities in Belize had declared the limits of the settlement during the 1830s and had made land grants within those limits.

The other factor was that in spite of continued appeals by the settlers, and the stated opinion of the Law Officers of 1851 that the settlement had become by long possession part of the dominion of the Crown, no definite assertion of sovereignty had been made and the British Government had declined to alter the status of the territory from a settlement to a colony.

Question: Why were the British concerned that the United States may have interpreted a boundary treaty with Guatemala as ‘cession’ on the part of Guatemala and why would the U.S.A. have regarded it as an infraction of the 1850 Clayton –Bulwer Treaty?

The United States and Britain signed the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty in April, 1850 to reconcile British and American interests in Central America. It succeeded in permanently restricting both British and American territorial ambitions in Central America and in ensuring that both countries support the construction of an inter-ocean canal.

Lord Palmerston made sure that the British negotiator, Sir Henry Bulwer obtained a statement excluding British Honduras from the terms of the treaty. The American Clayton made a statement that the British settlement in Honduras and the small islands which were British dependencies were not included in the treaty.

However, in October, 1856, the Dallas-Clarendon Treaty was signed. By its terms the Mosquito Protectorate was to become part of Nicaragua with an Indian reserve; the bay islands were to be part of Honduras; British Honduras was declared to be unaffected by the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty and its southern limit was acknowledged as the Sarstoon River. The hope was expressed that if possible the western limits with Guatemala should be fixed within two years, after which time the boundaries were not to be extended.

The Dallas-Clarendon Treaty failed when the President of the United States, Buchanan refused to rectify it because of a technicality affecting the Bay Islands. At no time however, did the United States Senate question the clauses relating to British Honduras. This will be a matter on the table of the ICJ.

Don’t think it! Say it! The United States of America screwed Belize properly. Had the US Senate rectified the Treaty there would be no Anglo-Guatemalan Dispute because the Sarstoon River would have been recognized as our Southern border.