Signing The Treaty of Portsmouth
Sometime even the Encyclopedia Britannica gets it wrong. Below is a picture that appears in the Britannica. The caption reads, “Theodore Roosevelt (center) with the peace envoys from Russia and Japan at the signing of the treaty in 1905. However, the treaty was not signed at Sagamore Hill.
The photo was actually taken on the Mayflower weeks before the signing. The two sides dropped anchor in Oyster Bay on Saturday, August 5th, 1905. Edith took the kids to Cooper’s Bluff to watch the arrival. They had lunch on the Mayflower, met with TR and then steamed north to cooler weather. Four weeks later on Tuesday August 29th they agreed to end the conflict. TR was in the library when the Associated Press bulletin was relayed to him by phone. William Loeb remembered TR saying, “This is splendid. This is magnificent. It was a good thing for both parties and a mighty good thing for me too!”
A week later on September 5th, 1905, the official treaty was signed on the Presidential Yacht Mayflower at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine.