Seizure of a Confederate gunboat at Liverpool.--a shipyard under Surveilllance.
Considerable excitement was created in
Liverpool on the 6th ult. by the seizure of the gunboat
Alexandria by the custom-house authorities, on suspicion that she was intended for the service of the
Confederates.
A Liverpool letter in the
London Daily News gives the following particulars of the seizure:
‘
It had been well known for some weeks past that one gunboat, if not more, was fitting out in some of the minor docks in
Liverpool, and those employed about them made no secret of the destination for which they were intended.
On the facts coming to the knowledge of
Mr. Dudley, the United States Consul at
Liverpool, he at once communicated with the
American Minister in
London, and the result was that inquiries were instituted into the whole of the proceedings bearing upon the building of the vessel seized.
These inquiries appear to have been so far successful that the
British Government sent down orders to seize the vessel, and at an early hour yesterday morning (April 6)
Mr. E. Morgan, one of the
Customs Surveyors, went on board the
Alexandria--that being, like "290," the first christening of the gunboat, as no doubt had she got clear off she would have undergone a rechristening — and took possession of her.
The
Alexandria is a wooden screw steamer of about one hundred and twenty tons, and a very fine model.
She was built by
Messrs. Miller & Co., of the South End, for
Messrs. Frazer,
Trenholm & Co., of
Liverpool, the 'depositaries' in
Liverpool (in conjunction with
Mr. James Spence) of the Confederate Government.
At the time the vessel was seized she was lying in the Toxteth dock, a quiet, out of the way place.
An iron ship-building firm, near the builders of the
Alexandria, have a large iron gunboat, of about twelve hundred tons, on the stocks for the Confederate Government; but it is now stated that our Government has issued instructions to the officials here that in all cases where there is the slightest suspicion that ships are being built here for other than neutral powers, they are to seize such vessels and await the decisions of the legal authorities.
Since writing the above we have heard that, although there was every appearance of fittings-up for guns, there were actually no guns on board the
Alexandria.
The vessel, however, is now in charge of Government officials, and no doubt the investigation which is to take place will elucidate whether there were guns on board or not. The excitement among the gentlemen of Southern proclivities is very great.
’
Laird's famous shipyard, at
Liverpool, where the
Alabama was built, it would seem from the following paragraph of a Liverpool letter, published in the Manchester
Guardian, is also to be watched:
‘
The Government, in addition to the seizure of the
Alexandria on the Liverpool side of the
Mersey, are about, if they have not already done so, to put the building yard of
Messrs. Laird & Brothers, at
Birkenhead, under a kind of surveillance, as it is no longer doubted in
Liverpool that the two gunboats now in course of construction at the
Birkenhead Iron Works are intended for the Confederate Government.
Information, we know, has been received in
Liverpool of the above intention of the
Government.
’
