dence that the blocks were solely for the ordinary use of the vessel, and were never intended to be used as gun-tackle blocks. That he never ordered them to be stropped as such, or heard them called so until he heard the evidence given in this court.

Comparing, then, the evidence on the one side with that on the other, I agree in the opinion that the mere fact of blocks which might be used for other purposes being called gun-tackle blocks by persons who did not know for what purpose they were intended, is not proof that they were intended to be used as gun-tackle blocks. I think that as the fact of there being more blocks on board the Oreto than were required for her use, is a matter of professional opinion; and as the opinion of several master mariners quite competent to form a correct one has been given in the evidence, that there were not more blocks on board the vessel than might have been required for ordinary use, I ought not, in the absence of any valid and produceable reason for so doing, to adopt the opinion of one party in preference to that of the other. The consequence of which is, that the fact of there being more blocks than could be required for the ordinary use of the vessel is not sufficiently proved.

Lastly, I see no evidence to invalidate the direct and positive testimony of Captain Duguid, that the blocks were not intended to be used as gun-tackle blocks.

If there is not enough proof that the blocks in question were intended to be used as gun-tackle blocks, any observation as to the probability arising from the construction of the ship that they were for her equipment becomes unnecessary.

If the evidence given to prove that any act has been done here subjecting the vessel to the penalties of the foreign enlistment act is not sufficient for that purpose, it is, perhaps, superfluous to say anything about the capacity of the vessel to take cargo, or her connection with the Southern States of America. I will, however, observe that although the ship may not be calculated to carry the ordinary bulky cargo of merchant ships, yet there are certain kinds of cargo of which she might carry a considerable quantity. For example, there were some hundreds of boxes of shells put on board of her, and these were stowed in a compartment called the shell room. There yet remained what is called the magazine, the light rooms, and other places, besides the cabin. Into these a very large number of muskets, sabres, pistols, and other warlike instruments and ammunition might be stowed. And it is not improbable that a fast vessel of this description might be used for what is called "running the blockade," an employment which, however improper in itself, would not subject the vessel to forfeiture here.

I think, too, that the evidence connecting the Öreto with the Confederate States of America, as a vessel to be used in their service to cruise against the United States of America, is but slight. It rests entirely on her connection with a gentlemen named Lowe, who came out passenger in her, and some evidence has been given, from which it may be inferred that this Mr. Lowe is connected in some way with the Southern States. He is said by some of the crew to have exercised some control over the Oreto, This is denied, on oath, by Mr. Harris and Captain Duguid. But, assuming it to be true, and assuming also that Mr. Lowe is connected with the Confederate States, no one can state that Mr. Lowe or his employers, if he have any, may not have engaged the Oreto for the purpose of carrying munitions of war, which we have seen she is capable of doing, and this would not have been an infringement of the act under which she is libelled. But the evidence connecting the Oreto with the Confederate States rests almost entirely on the evidence of the steward, Ward, whose testimony I have already explained my reasons for receiving with much doubt.

Under all the circumstances of the case, I do not feel that I should be justified in condemning the Oreto. She will therefore be restored.

With respect to costs, although I am of opinion that there is not sufficient evidence of illegal conduct to condemn the vessel, yet, I think all the circumstances of the case taken together were sufficient to justify strong suspicion that an attempt was being made to infringe that neutrality so wisely determined upon by her Majesty's government. It is the duty of the officers of her Majesty's navy to prevent, as far as may be in their power, any such infringement of the neutrality. I think that Captain Hickley had prima facie grounds for seizing the Oreto, and I therefore decree that each party pay his own costs.

DEBATE IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS OF FEBRUARY 16, 1864, RELATIVE TO BRITISH AND AMERICAN CLAIMS.*

[From Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, vol. 173, pp. 618–635.]

HOUSE OF LORDS, February 16, 1864.

UNITED STATES-BRITISH AND AMERICAN CLAIMS-MOTION FOR RETURNS.

The EARL OF CARNARVON rose to move for "returns of claims made by British subjects upon the United States government, sustained either in person or property since the secession of the southern States, specifying how and the grounds on which such claims have been disposed of, and to ask for any further information as to claims made by the United States government upon her Majesty's government for damages alleged to be done to American ships by the Alabama and other confederate cruisers." The noble earl said: My lords, the notice which stands upon the paper in my name divides itself into two parts. In the first part I ask for a return of all the claims made on the American government by British subjects for injuries sustained either in person or property since the commencement of the civil war, and for which the federal government is deemed responsible. I presume there can be no real objection to this part of the return. It is not open to the objection sometimes made that it may prejudice negotiations in progress, because it is simply a summarized statement of the particular claims which have been made, and the grounds on which they have been accepted, rejected, or disposed of by the American government. I can easily understand that it may not be quite practicable to make that return complete, or precise, but I shall be satisfied if it is an approximate return, and puts the House and the country in general possession of the facts. I can easily believe that, under the peculiar circumstances of the United States government, many claims have arisen to which many counter claims and objections may have been made, and which require the most grave and serious consideration, and I should be the last person to show any want of forbearance to the government of a country situate as the government of the United States is. Wherever we can safely assume a bona fide intention on the part of the federal government to do that which is right, we ought not to be very minute in marking that which has been done amiss. With regard, too, to those British subjects-and the case is by no means an unfrequent one-who have gone out to the United States within the last few years with the intention of acquiring the rights of American citizens, and consequently of divesting themselves as far as lies in their power of their nationality and allegiance to the Crown, and have only been prevented from carrying out that purpose by recent events—though they may not have wholly forfeited the protection which the British Crown extends to all its subjects everywhere, still they do not come into court with a very satisfactory case, and do not possess a very strong claim on the consideration of Parliament. But in the case of persons who are clearly British subjects, and who on mere suspicion have been arrested, put into prison, subjected to indignities and hardships-sometimes even imperiling their lives-her Majesty's government, I think, are bound to require the amplest compensation and redress at the hands of the federal government. Then, again, there is another class of British subjects who are in a position to make claims for redress. There are British subjects who have engaged in a legitimate trade, and who, while acting in conformity with international law, have, nevertheless, seen their ships condemned in American prize courts on principles which, if correctly reported, are of a very questionable nature. I have indeed always thought that we, who in former wars have jealously maintained certain principles of international jurisprudence, ought not to depart from those principles now that our position is reversed, and we have become neutrals instead of belligerents. But at the same time, if the statements we have received of the judgments in the American prize courts be correct, there can be no doubt that neutral rights are almost brought to the verge of extinction. I will not now go into that question, but there are two cases on which I must say one word. * Transmitted with dispatch No. 599 from Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward, February 18, 1864, see vol. III,

p. 245.

The first is that of the Saxon, which must be familiar to all your lordships, inasmuch as it has already appeared in every newspaper. If that case be correctly reported, it appears to me one of the most monstrous that has ever appeared before Parliament. That ship was an English ship, and was taking in a cargo at an island at no great distance from one of our settlements on the coast of Western Africa. It is said that the island (Angra Pequena) had been annexed by proclamation to the Cape Colony in 1861, by Sir George Grey, but that that proclamation had never been confirmed by the colonial office. I believe that, looking to the practice of the colonial office, it will be found that proclamations of this sort have not been ratified sometimes till one, two, and three years afterward. But however this may be, the ship was taking.in her cargo, and on the point of sailing, when she was boarded by an armed boat's crew, from a federal vessel, the Vanderbilt. The captain was sent down and the American lieutenant ordered the crew below. The mate of the Saxon was going down the ladder when the lieutenant pushed him on the shoulder, and, as the unfortunate man turned round to see who it was that touched him, the American officer drew a revolver and shot him dead. If this statement be true, there certainly never was a more wanton, atrocious, or barbarous murder committed on the high seas. The captain of the Vanderbilt is said to have expressed his regret at the occurrence, but I hope that the government will require something more than a mere expression of regret. The only compensation which can satisfy the honor of the country and the justice of the case is to bring the offender to speedy trial and to execution, if the case be proved against him. This transaction took place in the middle of September five months ago. It is hardly a case which can require much communication or negotiation; and I hope, therefore, that the noble earl will be able to lay the correspondence on the table, or name an early day for its production. There is also another case to which I wish to call the attention of the House, and in doing so I will take the opportunity of asking the noble earl a question with respect to it. I see it stated in the newspapers that a confederate vessel, the Tuscaloosa, has been seized by order of the government, in Simon's Bay, near the Cape of Good Hope. That ship is referred to in the papers recently laid before Parliament, and she is stated to have been a federal ship originally, captured by the Alabama, and converted into an armed tender to that vessel. She appeared at the Cape last year, when the United States consul demanded that she should be detained. The governor, however, did not consider himself at liberty at that time to take that course. facts were brought under the consideration of her Majesty's government, and this is what the noble earl wrote on the subject:

The

"As regards the Tuscaloosa, although her Majesty's government would have approved the British authorities at the Cape if they had adopted towards that vessel a course different from that which was adopted, yet the question as to the manner in which a vessel under such circumstances should, according to the tenor of her Majesty's orders, be dealt with, was not one altogether free from uncertainty. Nevertheless, instructions will be sent to the British authorities at the Cape for their guidance in the event of a similar case occurring hereafter, and her Majesty's government hope that under those instructions nothing will for the future happen to admit of a question being raised as to her Majesty's orders having been strictly carried out."-Correspondence No. 1, (1864,) p. 43. It is, no doubt, under the instructions here mentioned that the authorities of the Cape acted when they arrested the vessel, and I trust that the noble earl will have no objection to lay them on the table. I come now to the second part of my notice, which refers to claims put forward by the United States government upon the British government for damages alleged to have been done to American ships by the confederate cruiser the Alabama. Your lordships have doubtless seen the correspondence relating to the Alabama, which was placed upon the table of the House a few days ago. It is not long, but it contains matter of serious importance. It comprises five different series of applications from Mr. Adams on the part of the United States government. The first application was made on the 19th of February last year, and was presented in consequence of the destruction of the Brilliant and the Manchester, and repayment was demanded for the value of the cargo and the ship, with interest thereon. On the 9th of March the noble earl replies to Mr. Adams, and disclaims all connection with the Alabama, and all responsibility for the mischief she may have done. On the 29th of April another claim was made by Mr. Adams on account of the destruction of the Golden Rule, which was simply acknowledged by the noble earl. Again a third application was made on the 7th of July, and on the 13th of July the noble earl returned an answer referring to his first dispatch, and again disclaiming all responsibility for the acts of confederate cruisers. On the 24th of August there came another claim for the destruction of the ship Nora by the Alabama, and I should like to read to your lordships the description there given of the Alabama. The owners of the ship, in their memorial to Mr. Seward, say:

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*

*

"The vessel calling herself the Confederate States man-of-war Alabama is an English vessel, and no other. The said steamer was allowed to leave port under the pretense of making a trial trip and has never been in any port of the

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so-called Confederate States, so as to change her flag, or to be otherwise than a British vessel. Your memorialists would further represent that said steamer, after thus fraudulently leaving the ports of Great Britain against the Queen's proclamation of neutrality, repeatedly visited or came within the jurisdiction of certain British islands in the Atlantic ocean, when and where it was well known and patent to the world that she had destroyed American vessels on the high seas; and instead of being seized and detained by the British government, as they were in duty bound to do, was allowed every facility for obtaining supplies and advice, and to resume her piratical cruise. In

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view of these matters, and of others which may be made to appear, your memorialists do now and forever enter their solemn protests against the British government and people as willing parties, negligently culpable in the destruction of their property on the high seas, and thus in first violating the proclamation of the Queen by building and manning said steamer, and then allowing her to continue her depredations."—(p. 17.) These are the terms in which the Alabama is described, and in which the claims of the American marine are urged upon the British government. A few days after the noble earl repeats his disclaimer, and winds up with the hope-very properly expressed, I think-that no such claim may ever be brought under the consideration of her Majesty's government again. But the application to which I would call the especial attention of the House is that referred to in a letter from Mr. Adams, dated the 23d of October. In this letter Mr. Adams renews the charges he had previously made with regard to the depredations of the Alabama, and then proceeds:

Upon these principles of law, and these assumptions of fact, resting upon the evidence in the case, I am instructed to say that my government must continue to insist that Great Britain has made itself responsible for the damages which the peaceful, law-abiding citizens of the United States sustain by the depredations of the vessel called the Alabama."-(p. 27.)

I would ask your lordships to observe the similarity of that language with the language used in the dispatch of the 11th of July, which has been so much spoken of. There is, however, this difference-that in the letter from which I have just quoted Mr. Adams proceeds to qualify his language in these terms:

"In repeating this conclusion, however, it is not to be understood that the United States incline to act dogmatically, or in a spirit of litigation. They desire to maintain amity as well as peace. They fully comprehend how unavoidably reciprocal grievances must spring up from the divergence in the policy of the two countries in regard to the present insurrection. They cannot but appreciate the difficulties under which her Majesty's government is laboring from the pressure of interests and combinations of British subjects, apparently bent upon compromising by their unlawful acts the neutrality which her Majesty has proclaimed and desires to preserve, even to the extent of involving the two nations in the horrors of a maritime war. For these reasons I am instructed to say that they frankly confess themselves unwilling to regard the present hour as the most favorable to a calm and candid examination by either party of the facts or the principles involved in cases like the one now in question. Though indulging a firm conviction of the correctness of their position in regard to this and other claims, they declare themselves disposed at all times, hereafter as well as now, to consider in the fullest manner all the evidence and the arguments which her Majesty's government may incline to proffer in refutation of it; and, in case of an impossibility to arrive at any common conclusion, I am directed to say there is no fair and equitable form of conventional arbitrament or reference to which they will not be willing to submit."-(p. 27.)

On the 26th of October, three days afterward, the noble earl, in answering that dispatch of Mr. Adams, uses these words:

"You add, further on, that the United States frankly confess themselves unwilling to regard the present hour as the most favorable to a calm and candid examination by either party of the facts or the principles involved in cases like the one now in question." (p. 42.)

Up to that dispatch I entirely assent to nearly every word used by the noble earl in this correspondence. I had felt persuaded that it contains not merely the drift, but the plain view, of the intentions of her Majesty's government. It appeared to me that from the first the noble earl had declined all responsibility connected with the building of the Alabama, and with the depredations which she was alleged to have committed." Nothing can be plainer and more complete in every way than the noble earl's language; but after all this the noble earl ends by accepting the proposal for an arbitrament. EARL RUSSELL. No.

The EARL OF CARNARVON. At a future period?

EARL RUSSELL. No.

The EARL of CARNARVON. The noble earl says "no;" but on reading the dispatch from which I have just quoted, can any one come to any other conclusion than that the noble earl did accede to the proposal for arbitration at a future period? Mr. Adams asks for arbitration, and the noble earl says:

"With this declaration, her Majesty's government may be well content to await

the time when a calm and candid examination of the facts and principles involved in the case of the Alabama may, in the opinion of the government of the United States, usefully be undertaken."

I very much regret, whatever may be the intentions of the government, that the noble earl ever used such language as that; arbitration applies to a question in which there is some doubt; but if there is a perfectly clear right—a perfectly unquestionable one-then men do not arbitrate, If her Majesty's government feel any doubt as to the propriety of the position which they had taken throughout the previous correspondence, let them say so. It is never too late to go back if one has committed an error; and here I must observe that the noble earl did on one occasion use an ominous expression— namely, that the case of the Oreto and the Alabama was a scandal and a reproach to English law. If the noble earl is decided and clear in his opinion, he had better say so. If he believes that those claims are founded neither on reason nor on justice, then he should hold out no shadow of hope that they can by any possibility be admitted. But it is unwise to endeavor to tide over a present difficulty by creating a much greater one for a future time. I would urge upon her Majesty's government, as far as my feeble voice can do so, to bring this matter to a conclusion. I entirely agree in the opinion expressed by the noble earl in his earlier dispatches, that there is no ground for those claims; but it would be even better to admit and satisfy them, at whatever expense, than to allow the matter to run on unsettled and indefinite, and at length to be compelled to undergo the humiliation of retracting the word you have said. My lords, I cannot see that there is any practical advantage in leaving a question of this sort unsettled. There are two classes of politicians, as this House must know, in America, who look at this matter from different points. One class-composed of, I believe, honest men, but men holding very mistaken views-are convinced that the Alabama sailed from these shores through the fault and negligence of her Majesty's government, and hold us accountable for the damage which she has done to the American marine. The American estimate of the amount of that damage is a very heavy one. I do not at all make myself responsible for its accuracy, but according to that estimate, one hundred and forty-eight American ships were destroyed or bonded from the time of the sailing of the Alabama to the 30th of June, 1863. The tonnage of those ships is stated to be 61,292 tons, which, at a valuation of £10 per ton, amounts in money to a loss of £612,920. To this is added a sum of £20 per ton, making a total of £1,100,000 as the value of the cargoes, and a sum of £700,000 for Chinese cargoes, which bring up the entire loss to £2,412,920. I do not know whether this is a correct estimate, but there can be no doubt that great injury has been inflicted on American commerce. This is shown by the heavy rates for insurance now prevailing, and by the considerable sale of American ships which has recently taken place to other nations. Well, my lords, this class of politicians to whom I have already alluded are smarting under a strong sense of personal injury, and they urge their claims against our government in no measured language. And I must say that the government of America, from whatever motive, have so lent themselves to their views that hereafter, when this sum is rolled up into a very much larger one, it will be absolutely impossible for that government to restrain the machinery which they themselves have put in motion. I therefore think it is most important that her Majesty's government should bring this matter to a settlement one way or the otner. But there is a second class of American politicians, and they make no secret of their object-they have openly and avowedly said that they will wait until the embarrassment of England shall be America's opportunity, when they will be ready to resort to hostilities in order to wipe off some fancied national humiliation. This should impress upon the noble earl the importance of at once settling this question. And, my lords, in our political intercourse with America, if there be any conclusion which we ought to have drawn from past history, it is this-that it is the policy of English statesmanship to limit these debatable questions, and not allow them either from accident or design to be kept open. You might number up a score of those questions, which by being kept open have affected very considerably the good relations between the two countries, caused great initation both here and in America, and at times threatened very disastrous consequences. Such were the questions of Maine boundary line, of the Oregon line, and of the fish controversy. Not many years ago, a dispute arose with regard to the boundary line at Vancouver's Island. The Island of San Juan was taken possession of by a hot-headed American officer, and it was only owing to the exercise of great tact and forbearance that hostilities were averted. Now, it should be the object of good statesmanship to put an end as soon as possible to all these questions of debate and litigation. But in these dispatches, whether intentionally or no I do not know, the noble earl holds out, in order to tide over the present difficulty, some vague and shadowy hopes of means by which differences may be reconciled. But I warn him to beware lest he thus deliberately create, in order to relieve himself from present embarrassment, a difficulty which may be ten times as formidable and ten times as dangerous as a fishery or a frontier dispute, inasmuch as it will be backed by stronger material interests, founded on personal considerations, and in all probability supported by an unreasoning mob. The noble earl then moved an address for "Return of claims made