14. At the time these outrages were perpetrated on our coast, another, on a larger scale, was planned and executed in the Baltic. Denmark had been “scrupulously neutral”; but the British Government feared that its fleet at Copenhagen might in some way be appropriated by Napoleon, whose Continental supremacy had recently culminated at the Peace of Tilsit. It was determined to seize this fleet, and a naval expedition of corresponding force was directed against Copenhagen. The Danes made a brave resistance; but at last, on the 7th of September, 1807, they were compelled to capitulate. The Danish fleet was surrendered to the British admiral.[22]
15. Then came the American frigate Essex, under Captain Porter, captured by a superior British force in the neutral waters of Valparaiso. The Essex had made a very successful cruise, and become a terror to British navigation. It was important to stop her victories. The newspapers of the time assert that “an Admiralty order was issued, commanding the officers of British ships in the South Seas not to respect any port as neutral where the Essex should be found.” It is certain that the British commander acted in this spirit. With two frigates, the Phœbe and the Cherub, March 28, 1814, he opened fire upon the Essex, then at anchor, according to her log-book, “in nine and an half fathoms water, within half-pistol shot of the shore.” After a desperate battle of two hours and a half, Captain Porter was compelled to surrender. The people glowed with admiration of his gallantry, and indignation at what was called “this glaring defiance of the clearest principle of National Law.” It was said, that, “though the country had lost a ship, it had lost nothing else.”[23] But here the matter ended. The ship was never restored; nor does it appear to have been the subject of reclamation, either by our Government upon Spain, or by Spain upon Great Britain. The President’s message at the opening of the next Congress, while commending the gallantry of Captain Porter, does not even allude to the violation of International Law in his capture. But it will be remarked, that at this time the South American colonies were beginning to be convulsed by that long revolutionary war which closed with their independence, so that there was a practical difficulty in obtaining any remedy for this outrage. We could not apply directly to England, and neither Spain nor Chile was in condition to receive any such application. Silence on our part was the only policy. But the act is not forgotten among the precedents of British history.
16. Then came the General Armstrong, an American privateer, destroyed by a British squadron in the neutral waters of Fayal, in September, 1814. There is a dispute as to certain facts in this case. On the British side it is said that the privateer fired first and killed several men. But it is clear that the privateer was pursued and attacked under the very guns of the Portuguese fortress, and, after being abandoned by her crew, was burned by the British. As war at that time existed between Great Britain and the United States, our Government was compelled to resort for reparation to Portugal, whose neutral territory had been violated. After a protracted negotiation for more than a generation, the question was submitted to the arbitration of Louis Napoleon, while President of the French Republic, who decided that nothing was due from Portugal. This was on the ground of exceptional circumstances, and among other things, that the American commander “had not applied from the beginning for the intervention of the neutral sovereign, and that, by having recourse to arms to repel an unjust aggression of which he pretended to be the object, he had himself failed to respect the neutrality of the territory of the foreign sovereign, and had thereby released that sovereign from the obligation in which he was to afford him protection by any other means than that of a pacific intervention.”[24] In this case the ship was destroyed, so that there was no question of restitution. But Great Britain made no reparation of any kind.
Such are some of the seizures actually made by Great Britain, in defiance of neutral rights, during the wars against the French Revolution and against us.
17. There is another incident, belonging to the latter period, which, though not a consummated seizure, is in the nature of testimony, especially as it concerns the very port of Bahia where the Florida was taken. Commodore Bainbridge, of the Navy of the United States, after capture of the British frigate Java, left Captain Lawrence in the Hornet to cruise off the port of Bahia, instructing him as follows: “You will cruise off here as long as in your judgment you may deem it necessary.… Be on your guard against the arrival of the Montague, seventy-four; and I advise you not to rely too much on the protection of the neutral port of Bahia against the [British] Admiral’s influence to capture you even in port.”[25] Captain Lawrence followed these instructions, and, though driven by the Montague into the port, at once took advantage of the night and escaped to sea, thus eluding British violence in neutral waters. The Hornet was not “gobbled up,” as her capture of the Peacock shortly afterwards amply attests; but it is evident that the will was not wanting.
18. The long interval of peace after the outrages last mentioned caused a lull in British pretensions,—to be awakened by the blast of war. In 1837, Canada was disturbed by a rebellion, soon followed by the invasion of our territorial jurisdiction at Niagara. I refer to the case of the steamboat Caroline, which, while moored to the American shore, was entered in the darkness of night by a British expedition from Canada, set on fire, and pushed into the rapids to be precipitated over the cataract. Some persons on board were killed and others wounded. For this unquestionable violation of our territory there was no offer of reparation,—“no acknowledgment, no explanation, no apology,” as Mr. Webster expressed it,—until, nearly five years afterwards, Lord Ashburton, on his special mission, expressed regret “that some explanation and apology was not immediately made.” The amiable language of the British minister was promptly accepted by Mr. Webster, who was at the time Secretary of State, and the controversy subsided. The steamboat had been destroyed; but there was no offer to restore its value, nor was this question raised by our Government.[26]
19. The latest instance, in point of time, worth while to name in this list, is that of the Brazilian ship Santa Cruz, which, in 1850, was seized and burned, with all her lading and papers, by a British cruiser in the Brazilian waters. The excuse for the seizure was that the ship was engaged in the slave-trade, and for the burning that she was unseaworthy; but both these assertions were denied point-blank by the Brazilian Government, which branded the transaction as “Vandalism,” and gave notice that it would demand indemnity for the loss of the ship. As the ship was destroyed, there was no question of restitution. But there was formal protest against what was called “a violation of every principle of the Law of Nations by acts highly derogatory to the dignity, the sovereignty, and the independence of Brazil,—a nation as sovereign and independent as Great Britain, although it may not have the power to prevent such proceedings.”[27]
20. There is another instance, which, though earlier in time, I have reserved for the last, on account of the authentic declarations of an eminent British minister, bearing on the question now in issue between Brazil and the United States: I refer to the case of the French ships burnt or captured at Lagos, in 1759, within the territorial jurisdiction of Portugal. A British fleet under Admiral Boscawen falling in with an inferior French fleet, the latter took refuge near the coast. What ensued is thus described in the contemporary Memoirs of Horace Walpole. “They made a running fight, but could not escape the vigilance and bravery of Boscawen. Two of their largest ships were taken; two others forced on shore and burnt, in one of which was the commander, who was wounded in both legs, and expired soon after. The action passed on the 18th of August.”[28] This incident took its place among the victories of the year, which, according to the lively remark of Walpole in another place, were so numerous as to force him “to ask every morning what victory there was, for fear of missing one.”[29] But this victory was followed by an unexpected drawback. Pombal, a man of genius and courage, and the greatest administrator Portugal has produced, was at the time Prime-Minister. He complained vehemently that the Portuguese territory had been violated, and demanded satisfaction of Great Britain according to the Law of Nations.[30] In Great Britain, William Pitt, afterwards Lord Chatham, was at the head of affairs, teaching his country success in war as in commerce, and filling the world with English renown. He met this question promptly. In instructions to the British minister at Lisbon, written before the Portuguese complaint had reached him, dated at Whitehall, September 12, 1759, and marked “Most secret,” he says:—
“In case you shall find that any violence has actually been committed by his Majesty’s ships against the immunities of the coasts of Portugal, it is the King’s pleasure that you should express in the strongest terms to the Count de Oeyras [afterwards Marquis of Pombal], and to the other ministers, the extreme pain which such a most unfortunate incident must give to the King as soon as the certain knowledge of it shall reach his Majesty.… At the same time, in case there has actually been a violation of territory on our part, you will take care to avail yourself of all the circumstances of extenuation, of a nature to soften the impressions which the first sense of any insult on that coast may have made. But you will be particularly attentive not to employ any favorable circumstances to justify what the Law of Nations condemns, but you will insensibly throw the same into your conversation with insinuations and address, as considerations of alleviation, which it is to be hoped may prevent all asperity between two courts so mutually well disposed to each other, and whose interests are so inseparable.”