This was all the official answer I had to make, and the lieutenant, whose bearing was that of an intelligent gentleman, assented to the correctness of my position. I then said to him:—“But aside from the official aspect of the case, I desire to show you, that your Admiral has had his credulity played upon by his informant, the Consul, and whatever other parties may have approached him on this subject. They have made false statements to him. It is not only well known to hundreds of citizens of the Rock, who were eye-witnesses of the burning of the Neapolitan, that that vessel was burned at a distance of from six to seven miles from the African coast, but I have the testimony of the master of the captured vessel himself, to the same effect.” I then sent for my clerk, whom I directed to produce and read the deposition of the master, which, according to custom, we had taken immediately upon effecting the capture. In that deposition, after having been duly sworn, the master had stated that the capture was made about five miles from Europa Point, the southern extremity of the Rock of Gibraltar. The Strait is about fourteen miles wide at this point, which would put the ship, when captured, nine miles from Ceuta! The lieutenant, at the conclusion of the reading, raised both hands, and with an expressive smile, ejaculated, “Es possible?” “Yes,” I replied, “all things are possible to Federal Consuls, and other Federal pimps and spies, when the Sumter and Yankee ships are concerned.”
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE SUMTER IN TROUBLE—FINDS IT IMPOSSIBLE TO COAL, BY REASON OF A COMBINATION AGAINST HER, HEADED BY THE FEDERAL CONSUL—APPLIES TO THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT FOR COAL, BUT IS REFUSED—SENDS HER PAYMASTER AND EX-CONSUL TUNSTALL TO CADIZ—THEY ARE ARRESTED AND IMPRISONED AT TANGIER—CORRESPONDENCE ON THE SUBJECT—THE SUMTER LAID UP AND SOLD.
The Sumter’s boilers were very much out of condition when she arrived at Gibraltar, and we had hoped, from the fact that Gibraltar was a touching-point for several lines of steamers, that we should find here, machine and boiler shops sufficiently extensive to enable us to have a new set of boilers made. We were disappointed in this; and so were compelled to patch up the old boilers as best we could, hoping that when our funds should arrive, we might be enabled to coal, and run around to London or Liverpool, where we would find all the facilities we could desire. My funds arrived, as before stated, on the 3d of February, and I at once set about supplying myself with coal. I sent my first lieutenant and paymaster on shore, and afterward my engineer, to purchase it, authorizing them to pay more than the market-price, if it should be necessary. The reader will judge of my surprise when these officers returned, and informed me that they found the market closed against them, and that it was impossible to purchase a pound of coal in any direction!
It has been seen, in the course of these pages, how often I have had occasion to complain of the conduct of the Federal Consuls, and one can scarcely conceive the trouble and annoyance which these well-drilled officials of Mr. Seward gave me. I could not, of course, have complained, if their bearing toward me had been simply that of open enemies. This was to be expected. But they descended to bribery, trickery, and fraud, and to all the other arts of petty intrigue, so unworthy of an honorable enemy. Our Southern people can scarcely conceive how little our non-commercial Southern States were known, in the marts of traffic and trade of the world. Beyond a few of our principal ports, whence our staple of cotton was shipped to Europe, our nomenclature even was unknown to the mass of mere traders. The Yankee Consul and the Yankee shipmaster were everywhere. Yankee ships carried out cargoes of cotton, and Yankee ships brought back the goods which were purchased with the proceeds. All the American trade with Europe was Yankee trade—a ship here and there excepted. Commercial men, everywhere, were thus more or less connected with the enemy; and trade being the breath of their nostrils, it is not wonderful that I found them inimical to me. With rare exceptions, they had no trade to lose with the South, and much to lose with the North; and this was the string played upon by the Federal Consuls. If a neutral merchant showed any inclination to supply the Sumter with anything she needed, a runner was forthwith sent round to him by the Federal Consul, to threaten him with the loss of his American—i. e. Yankee—trade, unless he desisted.
Such was the game now being played in Gibraltar, to prevent the Sumter from coaling. The same Federal Consul, who, as the reader has seen a few pages back, stated in an official letter to the Spanish Admiral, that the Neapolitan had been captured within the marine league of the Spanish-African coast, whilst the captain of the same ship had sworn positively that she was distant from it, nine miles, was now bribing and threatening the coal-dealers of Gibraltar, to prevent them from supplying me with coal. Whilst I was pondering my dilemma, I was agreeably surprised, one morning, to receive a visit from an English shipmaster, whose ship had just arrived with some coal on board. He was willing, he said, to supply me, naming his price, which I at once agreed to give him. I congratulated myself that I had at last found an independent Englishman, who had no fear of the loss of Yankee trade, and expressed as much to him. “If there is anything,” said he, “of which I am proud, it is just that thing, that I am an independent man.” It was arranged that I should get up steam, and go alongside of him the next day. In the meantime, however, “a change came o’er the spirit” of the Englishman’s dream. He visited the shore. What took place there, we do not know; but the next morning, whilst I was weighing my anchor to go alongside of him, according to agreement, a boat came from the ship of my “independent” friend to say, that I could not have the coal, unless I would pay him double the price agreed upon! He, too, had fallen into the hands of the enemy. The steam was blown off, and the anchor not weighed.
Finding that I could do nothing with the merchants, I had recourse to the Government. There was some coal in the Dock-Yard, and I addressed the following note to my friend, Captain Warden, to see if he would not supply me:—
Confederate States Steamer Sumter,
February 10, 1862.