Moreover, when Captain Osborne's fleet returned from China, and it was feared that the vessels composing it might fall into confederate hands, Her Majesty's government interposed both in India and in England to prevent their sale. When the sale and conversion of the Georgia was complained of, a customs notification was published, forbidding vessels of war to be sold and dismantled in British ports. Finally, as will have been shown by the preceding statement, every representation of Mr. Adams was considered immediately on its receipt, and referred, when requisite, to the law-officers or other departments of Her Majesty's government, without even a day's delay. FOREIGN OFFICE, October 30, 1865. No. 12. Mr. Adams to the Earl of Clarendon. LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, London, November 7, 1865. (Received November 7.) MY LORD: I have the honor to submit to your consideration the copy of a letter received by me from the vice-consul of the United States at Liverpool, touching the arrival yesterday of the vessel known as the Shenandoah at that port. Although necessarily without special instructions relative to this case, I do not hesitate to assume the responsibility of respectfully requesting of Her Majesty's government to take possession of the said vessel, with a view to deliver it into the hands of my Government, in order that it may be properly secured against any renewal of the audacious and lawless proceedings which have hitherto distinguished its career. I perceive, by the terms of the vice-consul's letter, that some of the chronometers saved from the vessels which have fallen a prey to this corsair are stated to be now on board. I pray your lordship that proper measures may be taken to secure them in such manner that they may be returned, on claim of the owners to whom they justly belong. Inasmuch as the ravages of this vessel appear to have been continued long after she ceased to have a belligerent character, even in the eyes of Her Majesty's government, it may become a question in what light the persons on board and engaged in them are to be viewed before the law. The fact that several of them are British subjects is quite certain. While I do not feel myself prepared at this moment, under imperfect information, to suggest the adoption of any course in regard to them, I trust I may venture to hope that Her Majesty's government will be induced voluntarily to adopt that which may most satisfy my countrymen, who have been such severe sufferers, of its disposition to do everything in its power to mark its high sense of the flagrant nature of their offenses. I pray, &c., CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS. [Inclosure in No. 12.] Mr. Wilding to Mr. Adams. UNITED STATES CONSULATE, SIR: I beg to inform you of the arrival at this port this morning of the pirate-steamer Shenandoah. She is now anchored in the Sloyne, in the river Mersey. She arrived with the confederate flag flying, but lowered it soon after entering the river. She has a crew of 133 men, as near as I have been able to learn, and has on board a number of the chronometers taken from vessels destroyed. I shall be glad to receive your instructions concerning her. H. WILDING. The Earl of Clarendon to Mr. Adams. FOREIGN OFFICE, November 7, 1865. SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of this day, having reference to the arrival at Liverpool of the late confederate steamer Shenandoah, and I lose no time in confirming to you officially what I stated to you yesterday evening privately, that the Shenandoah was yesterday given up by her commander to Her Majesty's authorities at Liverpool, and that she is now in the custody of Her Majesty's naval force at that port. I have to add that the other points adverted to in your letter will receive immediate attention, and I hope shortly to be able to communicate further with you on the subject. I am, &c., CLARENDON. No. 14. The Earl of Clarendon to Mr. Adams. FOREIGN OFFICE, November 11, 1865. SIR: I have the honor to state to you, in reply to your letter of the 7th instant, that it appears, by a communication from the board of admiralty, that the Shenandoah was on the 10th instant delivered up by the senior naval officer at Liverpool to the United States consul at that port, with everything on board of her, the consul being also furnished with the inventories of the stores, &c., as received by the naval authorities from the late commander of the vessel. With regard to the officers and crew of the Shenandoah, I have the honor to state to you, that on the arrival of the vessel at Liverpool it was ascertained that three bad cases of scurvy were on board of her, and that a number of men had symptoms of that disease; and it was therefore necessary that measures should immediately be taken for disposing of the officers and crew. I need scarcely observe to you that any proceedings against persons in their situation, as indeed is the case with all other persons in this country, must be founded on some definite charge of an offense cognizable by British law, and must be supported by proper legal evidence; and that in the absence of such charge, duly supported by evidence, Her Majesty's government could not assume or exercise the power of keeping any of them under any kind of restraint. Her Majesty's government were not in possession of any evidence which could be produced before any court or magistrate for the purpose of controverting the statement made to them by the commander of the Shenandoah in the letter of which I inclose a copy, or for the purpose of showing that the crime of piracy had in fact been committed by the vessel. It only remained, therefore, to ascertain whether any of the parties were British subjects, and, if so, whether any sufficient evidence could be obtained against them to warrant a prosecution on a charge of violating the provisions of the foreign-enlistment act by taking part in hostilities on board the vessel. Accordingly, the board of admiralty were instructed by the secretary of state for the home department to cause the necessary inquiry to be instituted in regard to the presence on board of persons of the last-mentioned class, and if evidence could be obtained against any of them, to cause them to be detained and taken before a magistrate; and to allow the rest to go free. In pursuance of these instructions, the senior naval officer at Liverpool at once proceeded on board the Shenandoah, and having mustered the crew, he reports himself to have been "fully satisfied that they were all foreigners, and that there were none known to be British-born subjects on board;" whereupon they were all landed with their effects. I am, &c., (Signed) CLARENDON. Captain Waddell to Earl Russell. SHENANDOAH, November 6, 1865. (Received November 7.) MY LORD: I have the honor to announce to your lordship my arrival in the waters of the Mersey with this vessel, lately a ship of war under my command, belonging to the Confederate States of America. The singular position in which I find myself placed, and the absence of all precedents on the subject, will, I trust, induce your lordship to pardon a hasty reference to a few facts connected with the cruise lately made by this ship. I commissioned the ship in October, 1864, under orders from the naval department of the Confederate States; and, in pursuance of the same, commenced actively cruising against the enemy's commerce. My orders directed me to visit certain seas in preference to others; in obedience thereto, I found myself in May, June, and July of this year in the Okhotsk Sea and Arctic Ocean. Both places, if not quite isolated, are still so far removed from the ordinary channels of commerce that months would elapse before any news could reach there as to the progress or termination of the American war. In cousequence of this awkward circumstance, I was engaged in the Arctic Ocean in acts of war as late as the 28th day of June, in ignorance of the serious reverses sustained by our arms in the field, and the obliteration of the governenmt under whose authority I had been acting. This intelligence I received for the first time on communicating at sea, on the 2d of August, with the British bark Barracouta, of Liverpool, fourteen days from San Francisco. Your lordship can imagine my surprise at the receipt of such intelligence, and I would have given to it little consideration if an Englishman's opinion did not confirm the war news, though from an enemy's port. I desisted instantly from further acts of war, and determined to suspend further action until I had communicated with an European port, where I would learn if that intelligence where true. It would not have been intelligent in me to convey this vessel to an American port for surrender simply because the master of the Barracouta had said the war was ended." I was in an embarrassing position; I diligently examined all the law writers at my command, searching a precedent for my guidance in the future control, management, and final disposal of the vessel. I could find none. History is, I believe, without a parallel. 66 Finding the authority questionable under which I considered this vessel a ship of war, I immediately discontinued cruising, and shaped my course for the Atlantic Ocean. As to the ship's disposal, I do not consider that I have any right to destroy her, or any further right to command her. On the contrary, I think that as all the property of government has reverted, by the fortune of war, to the Government of the United States of North America, that therefore this vessel, inasmuch as it was the property of the Confederate States, should accompany the other property already reverted. I therefore sought this port as a suitable one wherein to "learn the news," and, if I am without a government, to surrender the ship, with her battery, small-arms, machinery, stores, tackle, and apparel complete to Her Majesty's government for such disposition as in its wisdom should be deemed proper. I have, &c., No. 15. JAMES J. WADDELL. Mr. Adams to the Earl of Clarendon. LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, London, November 14, 1865. (Received November 14.) MY LORD: I have the honor to acknowledge the reception of your lordship's note of the 11th instant, announcing to me the fact the Shenandoah had been delivered up by order of the board of admiralty to the United States consul at Liverpool, together with all her stores, &c., as received from her late commander. I had already received the same intelligence from the consul who has taken charge of her under my instructions. I entertain no doubt that the promptness of this proceeding will give great satisfaction to my Government. But I cannot affect to conceal my disappointment at the manner in which Her Majesty's government have decided to treat the persons who bave been engaged in the nefarious transactions perpetrated in that vessel, and especially the chief, a copy of whose letter was received with your lordship's note. A narrative of but a portion of these outrages it has already been my duty to submit to your consideration in a series of [151] *voluminous papers, the character of which it is impossible to for get. I shall carefully abstain from any unauthorized word of mine which might tend to make a situation already much too grave still more serious. A copy of your lordship's letter, together with its inclosure, shall be transmitted by the earliest opportunity to my Government. I pray, &c., CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS. No. 16. The Earl of Clarendon to Mr. Adams. FOREIGN OFFICE, November 17, 1865. SIR: Her Majesty's government are glad to find by your letter of the 14th instant that you entertain no doubt that the promptness of the proceeding taken by them for the delivery up of the Shenandoah will give great satisfaction to the Government of the United States. With respect, however, to the disappointment which you express as to the manner in which the officers and crew of that vessel have been dealt with by Her Majesty's government, after having before them the voluminous papers with which you had furnished them, showing the character of the proceedings in which they were engaged, I must observe that there was nothing in the depositions and other papers of which you forwarded copies to this office which, even if it had been capable of being substantiated in evidence in this country by deponents present at Liverpool before the crew of the Shenandoah were dispersed, would have tended to show that any capture had been made or attempted by Captain Waddell or his crew after, and with notice of, the termination of the war; and I must further observe that even if the case had been otherwise, those papers would not have been receivable as evidence before any magistrate, and that unless some material facts could have been deposed to by one or more witnesses present in this country, no magistrate could have kept any persons in custody upon any charge founded upon the statements in those papers. I may add that, if any evidence in support of a charge of piracy had been forthcoming, it was quite as competent for any officer or agent of the Government of the United States, or even of any private person, to have taken the necessary proceedings before a magistrate, as it was for Her Majesty's government to do so. I am, &c., CLARENDON. No. 17. The Earl of Clarendon to Mr. Adams. FOREIGN OFFICE, November 18, 1865. SIR: I have now the honor to reply to the letter which you addressed to my predecessor on the 21st of October last, respecting the proceedings of the late confederate steamer Shenandoah in the Pacific. But I must, in the first instance, observe that in alluding to the answer given to you by Earl Russell on the 26th of September, 1864, respecting the conduct of the yacht Deerhound in rescuing from the sea a portion of the crew of the confederate steamer Alabama after her conflict with the United States cruiser Kearsarge, you omit to notice the principal passage in that answer, in which Lord Russell says, "In point of fact, however, Her Majesty's government have no lawful power to arrest and deliver up the persons in question," (that is, the persons rescued from the sinking Alabama.) They have been guilty of no offense against the laws of England, and they have committed no act which could bring them within the provisions of the treaty between Great Britain and the United States for the mutual surrender of offenders; and Her Majesty's government are, therefore, entirely without any legal means by which, even if they wished to do so, they could comply with your above mentioned demand," (namely, that those officers and men should now be delivered up to the Government of the United States as escaped prisoners of war.) I may add that, if beyond the limits of British territory the commander of the Deerhound had improperly interfered to protect the offi cers and crew of the Alabama from the belligerent rights of the [152] United States, it was for the commander of the *Kearsarge_to use the means in his power for the prevention of such interferOnce upon British soil, they were entitled to the protection of British laws, which they had in no respect violated; and Her Majesty's government could not deprive them of that protection because of the ence. |