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Confederate agents in England.

A correspondence has been issued with regard to the remonstrances of Mr. Adams, on the subject of Confederate agents in England.

Mr. Adams, on the 9th of February, 1863, sends a copy of the "intercepted correspondence," emanating from persons well known to be high officers of the "so called Confederate States," and says:

‘ Taken as a whole, these papers serve most conclusively to show that no respect whatever has seen paid in her own realm by these parties to the neutrality declared by her Majesty at the outset of these hostilities, and that, so far as may be in their power, they are benton making her kingdom subservient to their purpose of conducting hostilities against a nation with which she is at peace. I trust I may be permitted to add, that if my Government could have been induced in any way to initiate similar operations within the limit of this kingdom, I should have regarded it as very justly subject to the remonstrances which your Lordship has been pleased to address to me on account of acts of incomparably smaller significance.

’ On March 9, 1863, Earl Russell replies to Mr. Adams that the intercepted correspondence had been considered by the law officers of the Crown, and adds:

‘ I have now to state to you that this correspondence does not appear to her Majesty's Government to contain any sufficient evidence of "a system of action in direct hostility to the United States." on the part of any of her Majesty's subjects. It goes merely to show that agents of the so-styled Confederate States, resident in this country, have received instructions from their own Government to endeavor to raise money on securities of that Government in England, and to enter into contracts for the purchase of munitions of war and for the building of iron-clad vessels. But there is no proof in these papers that the agents referred to have as yet brought themselves within the reach of any criminal law of the United Kingdom. For even supposing that they have acted on their instructions, it is not contrary to law for her Majesty's subjects to lend money on securities, or otherwise, to "the persons administering the Government of the Confederate States," nor to sell to that Government ordinary munitions of war. With respect to the building of iron clad steamers for either belligerent Government, although this is clearly prohibited by the Foreign Enlistment Act, her Majesty's Government do not find, in this correspondence, sufficient information that anything of that kind has actually been done within this country which could form matter for criminal prosecution.

Mr. Adams, on March 14, expresses his profound regret at having to transmit to Mr. Seward Earl Russell's reply, maintaining that the acts referred to in the correspondence, the appointment of agents in this country to fit out ships and raise money for the purpose, with the appointment of officers to superintend the construction, showed a "deliberate attempt to establish within the limits of the kingdom a system of action in direct hostility to the Government of the United States."

Earl Russell, in reply, on April 2, refers to American precedents;

No longer ago than the 20th of last November, in answer to the remonstrances of Mexico against an alleged organized system in the United States of aiding France in the war in which she is engaged with that Republic, but in which the United States are neutral, Mr. Seward replied by this among other citations, (Mr. Webster to Mr. Thompson;) "As to advances, loans, or donations of money to the Government of Texas, or its citizens, the Mexican Government hardly needs to be informed that there is nothing unlawful in this, so long as Texas is at peace with the United States, and these are things which no Government undertakes to restrain."

You are, without doubt, perfectly aware that many decisions of tribunals in the United States fully establish that a like exposition of the law as to munitions of war and the sale of armed vessels has been always maintained in the United States when they were neutrals.

You do not state that the information which you have communicated to me as to alleged contracts for constructing war steamers, or the proposed establishment of naval officers to superintend them, would be sufficient to found a criminal prosecution in the United States; you are probably aware that it would not suffice for that purpose, and there is, therefore, no reason why you should complain of my statement that the information which you had furnished would not suffice for the like purpose in England.

You are not ignorant that agents have been employed, and munitions of war have been purchased, and that it is now again asserted that her Majesty's subjects are being recruited for the purpose of aiding the United States against the so called Confederate States. And so far, it might be urged, in vague and popular language, by the Confederate States, as well as by the United States as the other belligerent, as it was substantially urged by Mexico against the United States last year, "that there is evidence of a deliberate attempt to establish within the limits of this kingdom a system of action in direct hostility to their Government; " but the question really is, has there been any act done in England both contrary to the obligations of neutrality as recognized by Great Britain and the United States, and capable of being made the subject of a criminal prosecution? I can only repeat that, in the opinion of her Majesty's Government, no such act is specified in the papers which you have submitted to me.

Other precedents are also cited by Earl Russell in the above dispatch.

Mr. Adams replies on April 6th, also enters into the subject, and admits that the sale of arms by the subjects of a neutral is not unlawful, but maintains that the cases go not a step further:

‘ The case is changed when a belligerent is shown to be taking measures to establish a system of operations in a neutral country, with the intent to carry on a war from its ports, much in the same way that it would do, if it could, from its own territory; when it appoints agents, residing in that country, for the purpose of borrowing money to be applied to the feting out of hostile armaments in those very ports; and when it appoints and sends out agents to superintend in those ports the constructing equipping, and arming ships of war, as well as the enlisting of the subjects of the neutral country, to issue forth for the purpose of carrying on hostilities on the ocean.

These are the points to which I desire to call your Lordship's attention in the intercepted dispatches. I affirmed that they went to show a system of operations to the extent thus designated. I did not affirm that they absolutely proved the facts; but did mean to be understood as affirming them to furnish strong corroborative evidence to sustain all the other proof which I have been in the practice of laying before your Lordship for a long time past of the abuses made of her Majesty's neutral territory for the conduct of the war directly from her ports, without the intervention of time even for the vessels to gain the semblance of a national character.

’ Earl Russell replies, on April 22, that he was unable to perceive that the principles maintained by Mr. Adams applied to facts within the cognizance of Her Majesty's Government; and on April 20 he writes as follows on a collateral subject:


Foreign Office, April 20th, 1863.
Sir:
With regard to the complaints which you have made from time to time of British sailors who have entered the Confederate service, I have to remark that no steps have hitherto been taken by the United States authorities to prevent British subjects from entering the military or naval service of the United States.

Mr. Seward has, on the contrary, justified the means used, provided they were not bribery or intimidation, to induce British sailors to enter the Federal service.

You will readily perceive the justice of the request I am about to make, namely; that before you repeat your complaints that British sailors have entered the service of the so called Confederate States, you will furnish me with proofs that all Britain subjects serving in the Federal army or navy have been discharged, and that orders have been given not to enlist or engage such persons to serve in arms contrary to the of her Majesty's proclamation.

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