I am, Sir, your obedient servant,
T. E. HOLLAND
Oxford, June 3 (1897).
SECTION 7
Destruction of Neutral Prizes
A British ship, the Knight Commander, bound from New York to Yokohama and Kobe, was stopped on July 23, 1904, by a Russian cruiser, and as her cargo consisted largely of railway material, was considered to be engaged in carriage of contraband. Her crew and papers were taken on board the cruiser, and she was sent to the bottom by fire from its guns. The reasons officially given for this proceeding were that: "The proximity of the enemy's port, the lack of coal on board the vessel to enable her to be taken into a Russian port, and the impossibility of supplying her with coal from one of the Russian cruisers, owing to the high seas running at the time, obliged the commander of the Russian cruiser to sink her."
The Russian Regulations as to Naval Prize, Art. 21, allowed a commander "in exceptional cases, when the preservation of a captured vessel appears impossible on account of her bad condition or entire worthlessness, the danger of her recapture by the enemy, or the great distance or blockade of ports, or else on account of danger threatening the ship which has made the capture, or the success of her operations," to burn or sink the prize.
The Japanese Regulations, Art. 91, were to the same effect in cases where the prize (1) cannot be navigated owing to her being unseaworthy, or to dangerous seas; (2) is likely to be recaptured by the enemy; (3) cannot be navigated without depriving the ship-of-war of officers and men required for her own safety.
The case of the Knight Commander was the subject of comment, on the 27th of the same month, in both Houses of Parliament. In the House of Lords, Lord Lansdowne spoke of what had occurred as "a very serious breach of international law," "an outrage," against which it had been considered "a duty to lodge a strong protest." In the House of Commons, Mr. Balfour described it as "entirely contrary to the accepted practice of civilised nations." Similar language was used in Parliament on August 10, when Mr. Gibson Bowles alluded to my letter of the 6th, in a way which gave occasion for that of the 14th.[174]