5283. In your last evidence you spoke of a vessel captured of the name of Jack Wilding, at Accra, upon that ground; in which court was she prosecuted?—Before the Mixed Commission Court, but the captor had the option of prosecuting her before the Admiralty Court; the expenses are so much less in our court, and the proceedings so much more rapid, that he preferred bringing her before ours.
5284. Is not the evidence taken before the Mixed Commission Court transmitted to England?—Yes; and it is published by the Foreign Office.
5285. But the evidence in trials before the Vice-Admiralty Court is never made public?—It is not, and a very great disadvantage it is, for this reason: our ability to condemn many of the vessels that were condemned in 1839 depended very much upon evidence found on board vessels brought before the court; this evidence conclusively proved the employment in the slave trade of other vessels not then before us, which were afterwards captured. Now, all evidence of that kind, which might be made use of subsequently in the condemnation of other vessels, is completely shut up from the public or from general knowledge, by the proceedings before the Vice-Admiralty Court being never made public. In the Mixed Commission Court papers can be invoked by the proctor which have been filed in a particular case against another vessel that is subsequently prosecuted.
5286. Chairman.] Is there no advantage in the secrecy of such papers?—None whatever.
5287. The proceedings before the Mixed Commission Court are public in themselves, and are published afterwards?—The examinations are not public, but strictly private in the first instance, but they are read in open court at the trial of the vessel, and they are sent home to the Foreign Office; an abstract of the evidence of every witness is given.
5288. The evidence taken before the Vice-Admiralty Court is not published in any way?—No.
5289. Is it communicated to the Mixed Commission?—No.
5290. Mr. Aldam.] Are the proceedings of the Vice-Admiralty Court there carried on in the same form as the proceedings of the Admiralty Court here?—Yes, very much the same.
5291. With any greater degree of secrecy?—No, but here the public papers publish them; we have no newspapers there to publish accounts of the proceedings.
5292. Chairman.] Would there be an advantage if the proceedings of the Vice-Admiralty Court were always communicated to the Mixed Commission?—Yes; and I recommended at the time when vessels began to go so frequently to the Vice-Admiralty Court, in 1839, that we should be informed of the papers filed in that court.