Mahlon Perkins
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mahlon Fay Perkins (23 November 1882 – 1963) was a United States diplomat. After serving in China for many years, he was consul-general in Barcelona during the Spanish Civil War.[1] It was his intervention which saved the lives of Charles Orr and Lois Orr after they had been arrested in the Stalinist crackdown on the Workers' Party of Marxist Unification (POUM). He visited them several times when they were in captivity, securing their release on 1 July 1937, and placing them on a ship bound for Marseilles on 3 July.[2]
Perkins' rescue of the Orr's took place in the context of "the most scrupulous policy of nonintervention" by the US government in Spanish affairs. In its strict application, this policy prevented consular protection of American volunteers, such as those in the Abraham Lincoln Battalion, who enlisted in the armies of the Second Spanish Republic.[3]
Perkins, born in North Adams, Massachusetts, graduated from Harvard University in 1904.[4] He was U.S. Vice Consul in Chefoo, 1911–12; Shanghai, 1915–17; U.S. Consul in Changsha, 1918–20; Tientsin, 1926–27; and counselor of legation in Beijing, 1928-33.[5]
After serving in Barcelona, Mahlon Perkins was counselor of legation in Copenhagen from 1937 to 1941. In October 1940, with Denmark under German occupation, Perkins successfully resisted attempts by the IBM Corporation to use diplomatic channels "to further (its) subsidiary's work with the Nazis there".[6]
