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Portsmouth Peace Treaty

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The biggest event in Portsmouth history is back. One of the world’s bloodiest conflicts stopped dead here a century ago. Now a Portsmouth lawyer and many others are asking – why can’t it happen here again? Was the Treaty of Portsmouth a fluke, or does this event embody a formula that might work in an age of renewed war?

 

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We’ve been told that the 1905 treaty that ended the Russo-Japanese War is the only successfully negotiated peace treaty in American history. If you know otherwise, email us. Until then, we’ll keep on saying so – and that it happened here 100 years ago.

You have to admit it is a rare time when two warring nations sit down at a wooden table and a month later agree to cease hostilities. By the time President Teddy Roosevelt got the Russian czar and the Japanese emperor to let that happen, over 500,000 soldiers had died. Both imperial countries were fighting over Chinese territory and thousands of men died horribly to gain just a few yards of turf.

As usual, America stepped in to protect our economic interests, but rather than lobbing bombs, Roosevelt waged peace. He was afraid the entry of Britain and France and others would lead to a world war. Eventually it happened anyway, but for a brief shining moment, the Treaty of Portsmouth worked.

You’ll be hearing a great deal about that event this centennial year. A lot of memorial events and exhibits are planned. It was, as far as we can tell, the biggest event in the city’s history. Delegates from Russia and Japan traveled to little-old Portsmouth, New Hampshire to discuss an end to war. It almost did not happen, but in early September 1905, both parties signed the treaty that eventually earned Roosevelt the Nobel Peace Prize – even though he never actually showed up in person.

Portsmouth historians have been talking about the treaty for a century. Japanese visitors in the last few decades have come to regard the Wentworth by the Sea Hotel, where the delegates stayed during that hot historic August, as almost a shrine. The actual negotiating took place nearby in Kittery at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard.

The driving force behind the centennial celebration is Portsmouth attorney Charles "Chuck" Doleac. He sees the successful treaty as an exemplum for future peacemaking in a world that seems to be growing more dangerous and more violent every day. There are lessons to be learned here, he says, and this web site is a starting point. Here you’ll find a history of the treaty, a photo archive, a complete calendar of centennial events, web links, even the full text of the treaty.

Can the world learn from this delicate moment in time? The first step is to understand what happened back in Portsmouth a hundred years ago.