The Journal of the Siam Society Vol. LXIV, Part 1-2, 1976 - Khamkoo

AMERICAN DIPLOMATS IN SOUTHEAST ASIA
diplomatic life."177 In Bangkok he attempted to enforce his vision of
American manners and morals, arresting Americans for the "immorality"
of cohabitatiog with Thai or Chinese women. To Washington he wrote,
"My object as you clearly see is to Americanize Society in this respect
regardless of English disapprobation." The British-oriented, governmentsupported
Bangkok Times denounced this "social purity crusade," and
editorialized, "it is startling to find the representative of America, where
every kind of immorality-political, commercial, and social-is ·so
glaring, posing as the knight-errant. "178
Boyd's other major concern was the development of Thai-American
commerce. In a view that Halderman would undoubtedly have
considered ''rosy," he referred to Siam as a "Sleeping Giant" and, in
words reminiscent of generations of believers in the Great China Market,
painted a glowing picture of the prospects for the Great Siam Market.
Although admitting that "we have no commercial relations. We. have
no trade. We. really are ignorant of one another," he looked to a great
future for Siam's "agricultural, mineral, and commercial wealth, awaiting
the touch of American enterprise."l79 Siam's future, however,. was
clouded by the expansionist ambitions of the British, the French, and
the Germans, tao and Boyd reported ominously to W~shington that when
the foreign diplomats in Bangkok were preparing an address to mark
King Chulalongkorn's birthday, ''The [European] Powers declined to
incorporate a wish for the security and permanency of his majesty's
territorial possessions, proposed by your Representative." 181
. . _practically the only diffi9ulty in official Thai-}\m~ricat_l rel~!io~s
during Boyd's stay in Bangkok concerned a complaint of an American
177) Siam Desj;atches, January 17, 1891.
178) Siam Despatches, March 28, 1892, enclosing Bangkok Times clipping. A letter
to the paper alleged that the last American Vice-Consul had openly Jived in
the manner Boyd was trying to suppress. In a margin note on the despatch,
Adee commented that cohabitation, other than bigamous, appeared to violate
no federal law.
179) Siam Desj;(ltches, Febr\lary 9, 1891; February 28, 1891; and March 13, 1891.
180) Siam Despatches, February 12, 1891, and August 13, 1891.
181) SiamDespatches, September 28, 1891.