306 Portsmouth, Treaty of (1905) Members of the Japanese delegation, Jutaro Komura and Kogoro Takahira, arrive for negotiating the Treaty of Portsmouth, which ended the war between Russia and Japan in 1905 Theodore Roosevelt received the Nobel Peace Prize for brokering the peace kind of combat that would occur in World War I a few years later At sea the Japanese also inflicted severe losses on the Russian navy Having found that their Far Eastern fleet had been sunk by the Japanese at Port Arthur, a large Russian fleet arrived in the area from Europe in May 1905 at the Battle of Tsushima Straits, met the Japanese fleet, and suffered a disastrous defeat Many Russian capital ships were destroyed with high loss of life This was the first great naval contest involving the new super battleships The Japanese had defeated the Russians, the first victory of an Asiatic power over a European, but they were in desperate financial shape The moment was at hand for peace The peace treaty was brokered by U.S president Theodore Roosevelt, who received the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts Interestingly, Roosevelt never attended any of the sessions Portsmouth, a pleasant New Hampshire city, was chosen as the site of the negotiations, and a number of the delegates stayed at a local resort, Wentworth by the Sea The talks took place at the Portsmouth Shipyard in Kittery, Maine, for the sake of security During their time off, the delegates mingled with Portsmouth citizens The delegations were headed by Serge Witte for Russia and Jutaro Komura for Japan The negotiations stopped a number of times when the two sides disagreed but finally came to a conclusion brought about through compromise and through Roosevelt’s intervention According to the treaty, Russia conceded that Korea was in the Japanese orbit and that Russia should withdraw from southern Manchuria, leaving it under symbolic Chinese control In addition, the Russian right to build the South Manchurian Railway was handed over to Japan, as well as Liaodong (Liaotung) Peninsula and Port Arthur at its southern tip, along with the southern part of Sakhalin Island The Japanese also received fishing rights near the Russian coast Both Russia and Japan were dissatisfied with