Papers Relating to Foreign Affairs, Accompanying the Annual Message of the President to the First Session Thirty-ninth Congress
Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams
Sir: I give you for your information, and for such use as you may think proper, a copy of a communication of the 2d of January last, which Mr------ of London, has addressed to this department in regard to the Rappahannock, her origin, and to the proceedings of Rumble in connexion with that vessel.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
Charles Francis Adams, &c., &c., &c.
Mr. —— to Mr. Seward
Sir: As every right-minded, intelligent person in this country sympathizes with the northerners in their efforts to crush the rebellion which now rages in America, I shall make no apology for addressing you on the subject, but at once assume {hat the expression of our sympathy, though it be the mere ipse dixit of one single Englishman, will find a warm-hearted reception.
Sir, those of us who are worthy of attention on the part of our American brethren have considered the origin of this war with a feeling and unprejudiced mind. We do not forget, in our estimate of the causes of the horrors and the tendency of the deplorable struggle which is now going on in America, those inspired yet tragic narratives which have emanated from the pen of a Stowe and the tongue of a Beecher, those thrilling and soul-rousing prose dramas which, having for their theme the violated laws of God in the cause of the poor slave, have caused our blood to boil, and have established in us a loathing and aversion towards the rascally southerners which no subordinate after-considerations, no policy based on expediency, nor temporary commercial distress, can cause to vacillate or subside. No, sir; I repeat, that every thinking Englishman whose sentiments and opinions are worth a moment’s consideration is, heart and soul of him, a well-wisher to the north; and though he would gladly see the struggle terminated, and the fair fields of America smiling with the results of peaceful industry, he does not and cannot wish for so desirable a consummation on other than principles of Divine-justice, and on the ground of liberty to the poor slave;. and for this cause we have hailed with heartfelt joy the President’s proclamation annulling slavery throughout the United States. That was a righteous and glorious act, no less so than the Declaration of Independence, and worthy to be held in honored remembrance. And though philosophers of a cold-blooded and time-serving school on this side of the Atlantic see in it nothing beyond the aggressive and retaliatory, and deprecate it as an unwise provocative of the south, the brave spirits who flung this firebrand into the camp of the rebels will never have cause to blush for this act of their policy. All honor to it ! Freedom to [Page 207] the slave in the United States of America ! Shame to the wretch, whether on this or the other side of the water, who will not rejoice at it.
In connexion with my subject, I will now advert to what may seem to our transatlantic brethren a scurvy and treacherous course of conduct on the part of Englishmen. I refer to the Alabama and the team-rams and the Rappahannocks which have been fitted out on these shores with hostile intentions towards the north; and here I cannot but feel the most profound indignation towards those scabby sheep among us who disgrace the name of Englishmen by originating these things; for, if these privateering vessels be regarded by the north as an exponent of the feelings of the British people generally towards them, a profound mistake must exist as to the actual facts. Those vessels, sir, are prepared and smuggled out of this country just as contraband articles are exported by “wretches (as Dr. Johnson terms them) who do not pay the customs.” Their preparation is confined to a few, and although in some instances they are wealthy, I can speak from personal knowledge that they are of the worst class and among the most base in this country; and these speculatists have taken advantage of the state of the times to enrich themselves by methods which, as an honest man, I am sure that my countrymen would almost universally condemn. Let not America, therefore, associate the name of England with these things. Englishmen abhor such detestable treachery. Englishmen do not like pirates nor piracy. Englishmen have no notion that buccaneering is a legitimate occupation because brother Jonathan has his hands full of intestine trouble. But there are scoundrels here as well as elsewhere; there are cut-throats and bravos in England who will find means to carry out their omni murderous and incendiary schemes in spite of the laws, and against the government of a sovereign whose expressions of regret for America no good man will doubt. These infernal blackguards are the originators of the Rappahannocks, &c, which were fabricated on our shores, and which are calculated to create so false an idea in the American mind as to the nature of English brotherhood.
In order to make good these assertions I will now give (so far as my personal knowledge and information extend) a true relation of the origin of the Rappahannock, and supply some highly important particulars which do not appear in the published accounts of this case. We are informed in the evidence recorded in the newspapers that Robert Gordon Coleman is the owner; that one Mr. Fergusson was chief engineer, and one Mr. Carr was second engineer: that Fergusson, Oar, Pearson, the partner of Coleman, (and a bankrupt to the amount of some 600,000 during the past summer,) and the defendant, Rumble, were all concerned together in the common cause of enlisting engineers and stokers to serve on board; that Fergusson and Oar were evidently empowered by Pearson (whom the witnesses style “one of the owners”) to hire men, and that they did so with as much authority as Pearson himself; that Rumble had told Firth (one of the witnesses) that “He should like to go his halves,” meaning that he, Rumble, would like to receive half of Firth’s share of the piracy which they intended to carry out in the Rappahannock; that Pearson was captain on leaving Sheerness, and that a government tug took them out from Sheerness.
Now, all this and much more, important as it undoubtedly is, is but half the tale; for neither Pearson nor Rumble had either the audacity or brains to concoct this mischievous piece of business; and, considering the notoriety in the naval service of the other half of the facts, it is somewhat astounding that nothing should have been elicited respecting them. For example, Fergusson and Oar, the engineers, though prime actors in the case, do not appear in court either as defendants or witnesses, and they most assuredly ought to have appeared in one of these capacities; for neither of them was engineer of the boat before she was bought by Coleman, Pearson & Co.; they became her engineers solely by the instigation of one Mr. David Partridge, an admiralty officer, who is at the bottom of the whole job, (thinking the American state of affairs was an [Page 208] excellent one for enriching himself,) and who persuaded Pearson to buy the boat He it was that sent Fergusson and Carr to Rumble and made a cat’s-paw of the latter by causing him to appear in all the salient points of the case, while he himself acted as the powerful but cautious motor of it. To him, as I said, not only these men, but W. Aylmer, another engineer, (together with several other men whose names do not appear in the evidence,) owe their connexion with the scheme. In short, he is the father of it; yet Partridge, ergusson, Carr, nor Aylmer, though the first three are principals, appear on the trial, and this is a very serious and astonishing matter: it is serious, for, as I have before said, all true Englishman must wish to repudiate all sympathy with this vile affair, and that will not appear to brother Jonathan while a British court of justice ignores these facts. What more natural than to suppose that these men would have been brought forward on the trial? They are, as I have said, notorious participators, nay, principals, in the affair; yet, although the case is put off on the mere mention of the circumstance that Rumble’s son was present at a conversation between Rumble and one of the witnesses at Sheerness, similar facts of far greater importance, detailed in evidence respecting Fergusson and Carr, are passed over as of no import. Had these men been cited and cross-examined, the most vital facts of the case would have been elicited. Fergusson formerly kept a public house (the Royal Albert) in the town of Woolwich, in the county of Kent, and Carr works in a government dock-yard there. Rumble’s son is as perfectly aware that the said Partridge egged on the elder Rumble as the latter himself is; and were he questioned by the lawyers of the Crown, could fully bear out this statement. He is also aware of all the facts as to the hiring of Fergusson, Carr, Aylmer, and others; and these prime facts not only could be brought out, but ought to be, for the love of common justice as well as justice to our American brethren.
It is astonishing that Mr. O’Kelly, who gave the information respecting these doings at Sheerness, should have contented himself with the meagre piece of information which he has brought to bear on the case. He appears to have taken a too hasty survey of these doings, and finding them so gross, collected those which appeared on the surface, and laid the information; whereas had he made a more patient observation he would have been richly rewarded with a multitude of correlative facts (and the above among them) by which the ringleader, and all concerned as principals in this, affair, would have been put on their de-fence; whereas, as it is, Rumble, “the mildest-mannered man” among them, is the only defendant. Now, the said Partridge, the ringleader, was frequently at Sheerness taking the lead (but cautiously) in the proceedings, and on the occasion of the Rappahannock being towed out of Sheerness by a government tug, he was in the Rappahannock directing the proceedings, (for as to Pearson acting as captain, that was done merely as a blind, Pearson being manifestly unfit for the offíce.) This Mr. Partridge, as I have said, directed the proceedings between Sheerness and the Nore, where finding something which aroused his suspicions that all was not quite so safe in a legal point of view as he wished it to be, he slunk into a tug and came back, leaving the others to do the best they could. I say it is very remarkable that these and many more similar facts have escaped the knowledge of Mr. O’Kelly, considering their notoriety, and it is a matter of much regret that such is the case; for, if a full expose were made on this occasion, and the principal offenders brought to justice, it would operate as a check on others, and prevent a repetition of such offences, which is one result that the writer aims at, and to show that these doings have no general character on the part of Englishmen, but are entirely instances of hole and corner work by cliques of dirty rogues.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward,&c., &c., &c.