Chapter XIII: The Laird Rams (2)

The actual governmental seizure of the Rams did not occur until mid-October, though they had been placed under official surveillance on September 9. Both sides were jockeying for position in the expected legal battle when the case should be taken up by the courts[1033]. At first Russell even thought of making official protest to Mason in London and a draft of such protest was prepared, approved by the Law Officers and subsequently revised by Palmerston, but finally was not sent[1034]. Possibly it was thought that such a communication to Mason approached too nearly a recognition of him in his desired official capacity, for in December the protest ultimately directed to be made through Consul-General Crawford at Havana, instructed him to go to Richmond and after stating very plainly that he was in no way recognizing the Confederacy to present the following:

"It appears from various correspondence the authenticity of
which cannot be doubted, that the Confederate Government
having no good ports free from the blockade of the Federals
have conceived the design of using the ports of the United
Kingdom for the purpose of constructing ships of war to be
equipped and armed to serve as cruisers against the commerce
of the United States of America, a State with which Her
Majesty is at peace...."

"These acts are inconsistent with the respect and comity
which ought to be shewn by a belligerent towards a
Neutral Power.

"Her Majesty has declared her Neutrality and means strictly
to observe it.

"You will therefore call upon Mr. Benjamin to induce his
Government to forbear from all acts tending to affect
injuriously Her Majesty's position[1035]."

To carry out this instruction there was required permission for Crawford to pass through the blockade but Seward refused this when Lyons made the request[1036].

Not everyone in Britain, however, approved the Government's course in seizing the Rams. Legal opinion especially was very generally against the act. Adams now pressed either for an alteration of the British law or for a convention with America establishing mutual similar interpretation of neutral duty. Russell replied that "until the trials of the _Alexandra_ and the steam rams had taken place, we could hardly be said to know what our law was, and therefore not tell whether it required alteration. I said, however, that he might assure Mr. Seward that the wish and intention of Government were to make our neutrality an honest and bona-fide one[1037]." But save from extreme and avowed Southern sympathizers criticism of the Government was directed less to the stoppage of the Rams than to attacks of a political character, attempting to depict the weakness of the Foreign Minister and his humiliation of Great Britain in having "yielded to American threats." Thus, February II, 1864, after the reassembling of Parliament, a party attack was made on Russell and the Government by Derby in the House of Lords. Derby approved the stopping of the Rams but sought to prove that the Government had dishonoured England by failing to act of its own volition until threatened by America. He cited Seward's despatch of July II with much unction, that despatch now having appeared in the printed American diplomatic correspondence with no indication that it was not an instruction at once communicated to Russell. The attack fell flat for Russell simply replied that Adams had never presented such an instruction. This forced Derby to seek other ground and on February 15 he returned to the matter, now seeking to show by the dates of various documents that "at the last moment" Adams made a threat of war and Russell had yielded. Again Russell's reply was brief and to the effect that orders to stop the Rams had been given before the communications from Adams were received. Finally, on February 23, a motion in the Commons called for all correspondence with Adams and with Lairds, The Government consented to the first but refused that with Lairds and was supported by a vote of 187 to 153.[1038]

Beginning with an incautious personal and petty criticism of Russell the Tories had been driven to an attempt to pass what was virtually a vote of censure on the Ministry yet they were as loud as was the Government in praise of Adams and in approval of the seizure of the Rams. Naturally their cause was weakened, and the Ministry, referring to expressions made and intentions indicated as far back as March, 1863, thus hinting without directly so stating that the real decision had then been made, was easily the victor in the vote[1038]. Derby had committed an error as a party leader and the fault rankled for again in April, 1864, he attempted to draw Russell into still further discussion on dates of documents. Russell's reply ignored that point altogether[1039]. It did not suit his purpose to declare, flatly, the fact that in April assurances had been given both to Adams and through Lyons to Seward, that measures would be taken to prevent the departure of Southern vessels from British ports. To have made this disclosure would have required an explanation _why_ such assurance had been given and this would have revealed the effect on both Russell and Lyons of the Northern plan to create a _cruising squadron blockade by privateers_. _There_ was the real threat. The later delays and seeming uncertainties of British action made Adams anxious but there is no evidence that Russell ever changed his purpose. He sought stronger evidence before acting and he hoped for stronger support from legal advisers, but he kept an eye on the Rams and when they had reached the stage where there was danger of escape, he seized them even though the desired evidence was still lacking[1040]. Seward's "privateering bill" plan possibly entered upon in a moment of desperation and with no clear statement from him of its exact application had, as the anxiety of British diplomats became pronounced, been used with skill to permit, if not to state, the interpretation they placed upon it, and the result had been the cessation of that inadequate neutrality of which America complained.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 966: In other respects, also, this question of belligerent ship-building and equipping in neutral ports was, in practice, vaguely defined. As late as 1843 in the then existing Texan war of independence against Mexico, the British Foreign Secretary, Aberdeen, had been all at sea. Mexico made a contract for two ships of war with the English firm of Lizardi & Company. The crews were to be recruited in England, the ships were to be commanded by British naval officers on leave, and the guns were to be purchased from firms customarily supplying the British Navy. Aberdeen advised the Admiralty to give the necessary authority to purchase guns. When Texas protested he at first seemed to think strict neutrality was secured if the same privileges were offered that country. Later he prohibited naval officers to go in command. One Mexican vessel, the _Guadaloupe_, left England with full equipment as originally planned; the other, the _Montezuma_, was forced to strip her equipment. But both vessels sailed under British naval officers for these were permitted to resign their commissions. They were later reinstated. In all this there was in part a temporary British policy to aid Mexico, but it is also clear that British governmental opinion was much in confusion as to neutral duty in the case of such ships. See my book, _British Interests and Activities in Texas_, Ch. IV.]

[Footnote 967: Bullock, _Secret Service under the Confederacy_.]

[Footnote 968: Bernard, _Neutrality of Great Britain during the American Civil War_, p. 338-9.]

[Footnote 969: _Parliamentary Papers_, 1863, _Commons_, LXXII. "Correspondence respecting the 'Alabama.'" Also _ibid._, "Correspondence between Commissioner of Customs and Custom House Authorities at Liverpool relating to the 'Alabama.'" The last-minute delay was due to the illness of a Crown adviser.]

[Footnote 970: State Department, Eng., Vol. 81, No. 264. Adams to Seward, Nov. 21, 1862.]

[Footnote 971: Selborne, in his _Memorials: Family and Personal_, II, p. 430, declared that in frequent official communication with all members of the Cabinet at the time, "I never heard a word fall from any one of them expressive of anything but regret that the orders for the detention of the _Alabama_ were sent too late." Of quite different opinion is Brooks Adams, in his "The Seizure of the Laird Rams" (_Proceedings_, Mass. Hist. Soc., Vol. XLV, pp. 243-333). In 1865 his father, the American Minister, made a diary entry that he had been shown what purported to be a copy of a note from one V. Buckley to Caleb Huse, Southern agent in England, warning him of danger to his "protegé." "This Victor Buckley is a young clerk in the Foreign Office." (_Ibid._, p. 260, _note_.)]

[Footnote 972: Fox, _Confidential Correspondence_, I, p. 165. Fox to Dupont, Nov. 7, 1862.]

[Footnote 973: It is interesting that the opinion of many Continental writers on international law was immediately expressed in favour of the American and against the British contention. This was especially true of German opinion. (Lutz, _Notes_.)]

[Footnote 974: Lyons Papers. To Lyons, Dec. 20, 1862.]

[Footnote 975: I am aware that Seward's use of the "Privateering Bill," now to be recounted is largely a new interpretation of the play of diplomacy in regard to the question of Southern ship-building in England. Its significance became evident only when British correspondence was available; but that correspondence and a careful comparison of dates permits, and, as I think, requires a revised statement of the incident of the Laird Rams.]

[Footnote 976: Bullock dreamed also of ascending rivers and laying Northern cities under contribution. According to a statement made in 1898 by Captain Page, assigned to command the rams, no instructions as to their use had been given him by the Confederate Government, but his plans were solely to break the blockade with no thought of attacking Northern cities. (Rhodes, IV. 385, _note_.)]

[Footnote 977: _U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence_, 1862, p. 134.]

[Footnote 978: Wallbridge, _Addresses and Resolutions_. Pamphlet. New York, n.d. He began his agitation in 1856, and now received much popular applause. His pamphlet quotes in support many newspapers from June, 1862, to September, 1863. Wallbridge apparently thought himself better qualified than Welles to be Secretary of the Navy. Welles regarded his agitation as instigated by Seward to get Welles out of the Cabinet. Welles professes that the "Privateering Bill" slipped through Congress unknown to him and "surreptitiously" (Diary, I, 245-50), a statement difficult to accept in view of the Senate debates upon it.]

[Footnote 979: Cong. Globe, 37th Congress, 2nd Session, Pt. IV, pp. 3271, 3325 and 3336.]

[Footnote 980: _Ibid._, 3rd Session, Pt. I, pp. 220, 393, and Part II, pp. 960, 1028, 1489.]

[Footnote 981: Brooks Adams, "The Seizure of the Laird Rams." (Mass. Hist. Soc. _Proceedings_, Vol. XLV, pp. 265-6.)]

[Footnote 982: _U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence_, 1863, Pt. I, p. 116, Feb. 19, 1863.]

[Footnote 983: F.O., Am., Vol. 878, No. 180. Lyons to Russell.]

[Footnote 984: _Ibid._, Vol. 879, No. 227. Lyons to Russell, March 10, 1863.]

[Footnote 985: _Ibid._, No. 235. Lyons to Russell, March 13, 1863. Privately Lyons also emphasized American anger. (Russell Papers. To Russell, March 24, 1863.)]

[Footnote 986: _U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence_, 1863, Pt. I, p. 141. Seward to Adams, March 9, 1863.]

[Footnote 987: F.O., Am., Vol. 869, No. 147. Russell to Lyons, March 24, 1863.]

[Footnote 988: _Ibid._, Vol. 869, No. 155. Russell to Lyons, March 27, 1863.]

[Footnote 989: Welles, _Diary_, I, pp. 245-50.]

[Footnote 990: Bigelow, _Retrospections_, I, 634, Slidell to Benjamin, March 4, 1863.]

[Footnote 991: For example of American contemporary belief and later "historical tradition," see Balch, _The Alabama Arbitration_, pp. 24-38. Also for a curious story that a large part of the price paid for Alaska was in reality a repayment of expenses incurred by Russia in sending her fleet to America, see _Letters of Franklin K. Lane_, p. 260. The facts as stated above are given by F.A. Golder, _The Russian Fleet and the Civil War_ (_Am. Hist. Rev_., July, 1915, pp. 801 _seq_.). The plan was to have the fleet attack enemy commerce. The idea of aid to the North was "born on American soil," and Russian officers naturally did nothing to contradict its spread. In one case, however, a Russian commander was ready to help the North. Rear-Admiral Papov with six vessels in the harbour of San Francisco was appealed to by excited citizens on rumours of the approach of the _Alabama_ and gave orders to protect the city. He acted without instructions and was later reproved for the order by his superiors at home.]

[Footnote 992: _The Liberator_, March 6, 1863.]

[Footnote 993: American opinion knew little of this change. An interesting, if somewhat irrational and irregular plan to thwart Southern ship-building operations, had been taken up by the United States Navy Department. This was to buy the Rams outright by the offer of such a price as, it was thought, would be so tempting to the Lairds as to make refusal unlikely. Two men, Forbes and Aspinwall, were sent to England with funds and much embarrassed Adams to whom they discreetly refrained from stating details, but yet permitted him to guess their object. The plan of buying ran wholly counter to Adams' diplomatic protests on England's duty in international law and the agents themselves soon saw the folly of it. Fox, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, wrote to Dupont, March 26, 1863: "The Confederate ironclads in England, I think, will be taken care of." (Correspondence, I, 196.) Thurlow Weed wrote to Bigelow, April 16, of the purpose of the visit of Forbes and Aspinwall. (Bigelow, _Retrospections_, I, 632.) Forbes reported as early as April 18 virtually against going on with the plan. "We must keep cool here, and prepare the way; we have put new fire into Mr. Dudley by furnishing _fuel_, and he is hard at it getting evidence.... My opinion _to-day_ is that we can and shall stop by legal process and by the British Government the sailing of ironclads and other war-ships." (Forbes MS. To Fox.) That this was wholly a Navy Department plan and was disliked by State Department representatives is shown by Dudley's complaints (Forbes MS.). The whole incident has been adequately discussed by C.F. Adams, though without reference to the preceding citations, in his _Studies Military and Diplomatic_, Ch. IX. "An Historical Residuum," in effect a refutation of an article by Chittenden written in 1890, in which bad memory and misunderstanding played sad havoc with historical truth.]

[Footnote 994: _U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence_, 1863, Pt. I, p. 157. To Seward, March 24, 1863.]

[Footnote 995: _Ibid._, p. 160. To Seward, March 27, 1863.]

[Footnote 996: State Department, Eng., Vol. 82, No. 356. Adams to Seward, March 27, 1863.]

[Footnote 997: Palmerston MS. Russell to Palmerston, March 27, 1863.]

[Footnote 998: Rhodes, IV, p. 369, _notes_, April 4, 1863. Bright was made very anxious as to Government intentions by this debate.]

[Footnote 999: This topic will be treated at length in Chapter XVIII. It is here cited merely in relation to its effect on the Government at the moment.]

[Footnote 1000: Trevelyan, _John Bright_, 307-8.]

[Footnote 1001: Hansard, 3rd Series, CLXX, 33-71, for entire debate.]

[Footnote 1002: _U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence_, 1863, Pt. I, p. 164. Adams to Seward, March 28, 1863.]

[Footnote 1003: Rhodes, IV, 369-72.]

[Footnote 1004: Palmerston MS.]

[Footnote 1005: Bernard, p. 353. The case was heard in June, and the seizure held unwarranted. Appealed by the Government this decision was upheld by the Court of Exchequer in November. It was again appealed, and the Government defeated in the House of Lords in April, 1864.]

[Footnote 1006: _Manchester Examiner and Times_, April 7, 1863. Goldwin Smith was one of the principal speakers. Letters were read from Bright, Forster, R.A. Taylor, and others.]

[Footnote 1007: F.O., Am., Vol. 869, No. 183.]

[Footnote 1008: "Historicus," in articles in the _Times_, was at this very moment, from December, 1862, on, discussing international law problems, and in one such article specifically defended the belligerent right to conduct a cruising squadron blockade. See _Historicus on International Law_, pp. 99-118. He stated the established principle to be that search and seizure could be used "not only" for "vessels actually intercepted in the attempt to enter the blockaded port, but those also which shall be elsewhere met with and shall be found to have been destined to such port, with knowledge of the fact and notice of the blockade." (_Ibid._, p. 108.)]

[Footnote 1009: F.O., Am., Vol. 869, No. 158. Russell to Lyons, March 28, 1863.]

[Footnote 1010: F.O., Am., Vol. 881, No. 309. To Russell.]

[Footnote 1011: _Ibid._, No. 310. To Russell, April 13, 1863.]

[Footnote 1012: Russell Papers. To Russell, April 13, 1863.]

[Footnote 1013: F.O., Am., Vol. 882, No. 324. Copy enclosed in Lyons to Russell, April 17, 1863.]

[Footnote 1014: Russell Papers. To Russell.]

[Footnote 1015: F.O., Am., Vol. 882, No. 341. Lyons to Russell, April 24, 1863.]

[Footnote 1016: Lyons Papers, April 27, 1863. Lyons wrote: "The stories in the newspapers about an ultimatum having been sent to England are untrue. But it is true that it had been determined (or very nearly determined) to issue letters of marque, if the answers to the despatches sent were not satisfactory. It is very easy to see that if U.S. privateers were allowed to capture British merchant vessels on charges of breach of blockade or carrying contraband of war, the vexations would have soon become intolerable to our commerce, and a quarrel must have ensued."]

[Footnote 1017: _Parliamentary Papers_, 1863, _Commons_, LXXII. "Memorial from Shipowners of Liverpool on Foreign Enlistment Act."]

[Footnote 1018: _Ibid._]

[Footnote 1019: _U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence_, 1863, Pt. I, pp. 308-10.]

[Footnote 1020: The despatch taken in its entirety save for a few vigorous sentences quite typical of Seward's phrase-making, is not at all warlike. Bancroft, II, 385 _seq_., makes Seward increasingly anxious from March to September, and concludes with a truly warlike despatch to Adams, September 5. This last was the result of Adams' misgivings reported in mid-August, and it is not until these were received (in my interpretation) that Seward really began to fear the "pledge" made in April would not be carried out. Adams himself, in 1864, read to Russell a communication from Seward denying that his July 11 despatch was intended as a threat or as in any sense unfriendly to Great Britain. (F.O., Am., Vol. 939, No. 159. Russell to Lyons, April 3, 1864.)]

[Footnote 1021: _Parliamentary Papers_, 1864, _Commons_, LXII. "Correspondence respecting iron-clad vessels building at Birkenhead."]

[Footnote 1022: See next chapter.]

[Footnote 1023: State Department, Eng., Vol. 83, No. 452, and No. 453 with enclosure. Adams to Seward, July 16, 1863.]

[Footnote 1024: Rhodes, IV, 381.]

[Footnote 1025: Many of these details were unknown at the time so that on the face of the documents then available, and for long afterwards, there appeared ground for believing that Adams' final protests of September 3 and 5 had forced Russell to yield. Dudley, as late as 1893, thought that "at the crisis" in September, Palmerston, in the absence of Russell, had given the orders to stop the rams. (In _Penn. Magazine of History_, Vol. 17, pp. 34-54. "Diplomatic Relations with England during the Late War.")]

[Footnote 1026: Rhodes, IV, p. 382.]

[Footnote 1027: The _Times_, Sept. 7, 1863.]

[Footnote 1028: _Ibid._, Editorial, Sept. 16, 1863. The Governmental correspondence with Lairds was demanded by a motion in Parliament, Feb. 23, 1864, but the Government was supported in refusing it. A printed copy of this correspondence, issued privately, was placed in Adams' hands by persons unnamed and sent to Seward on March 29, 1864. Seward thereupon had this printed in the _Diplomatic Correspondence_, 1864-5, Pt. I, No. 633.]

[Footnote 1029: State Department, Eng., Vol. 84, No. 492. Adams to Seward, Sept. 8, 1863.]

[Footnote 1030: _U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence_, 1863, Pt. I, p. 370. To Seward, Sept. 10, 1863. Adams, looking at the whole matter of the Rams and the alleged "threat of war" of Sept. 5, from the point of view of his own anxiety at the time, was naturally inclined to magnify the effects of his own efforts and to regard the _crisis_ as occurring in September. His notes to Russell and his diary records were early the main basis of historical treatment. Rhodes, IV, 381-84, has disproved the accusation of Russell's yielding to a threat. Brooks Adams (Mass. Hist. Soc. _Proceedings_, Vol. XLV, p. 293, _seq._) ignores Rhodes, harks back to the old argument and amplifies it with much new and interesting citation, but not to conviction. My interpretation is that the real crisis of Governmental decision to act came in April, and that events in September were but final applications of that decision.]

[Footnote 1031: Russell Papers. Monck to Stuart, Sept. 26, 1863. Copy in Stuart to Russell, Oct. 6, 1863.]

[Footnote 1032: _Ibid._, Lyons to Russell, Oct. 16, 1863.]

[Footnote 1033: Hammond wrote to Lyons, Oct. 17: "You will learn by the papers that we have at last seized the Iron Clads. Whether we shall be able to bring home to them legally that they were Confederate property is another matter. I think we can, but at all events no moral doubt can be entertained of the fact, and, therefore, we are under no anxiety whether as to the public or Parliamentary view of our proceeding. They would have played the devil with the American ships, for they are most formidable ships. I suppose the Yankees will sleep more comfortably in consequence." (Lyons Papers.) The Foreign Office thought that it had thwarted plans to seize violently the vessels and get them to sea. (F.O., Am., Vol. 930. Inglefield to Grey, Oct. 25, and Romaine to Hammond, Oct. 26, 1863.).]

[Footnote 1034: F.O., Am., Vol. 929. Marked "September, 1863." The draft summarized the activities of Confederate ship-building and threatened Southern agents in England with "the penalities of the law...."]

[Footnote 1035: F.O., Am., Vol. 932, No. 1. F.O. to Consul-General Crawford, Dec. 16, 1863. The South, on October 7, 1863, had already "expelled" the British consuls. Crawford was to protest against this also. (_Ibid._, No. 4.)]

[Footnote 1036: Bonham. _British Consuls in the South_, p. 254. (Columbia Univ. Studies, Vol. 43.)]

[Footnote 1037: Lyons Papers. Russell to Lyons, Dec. 5, 1863. Bullock, _Secret Service_, declares the British Government to have been neutral but with strong leaning toward the North.]

[Footnote 1038: Hansard, 3rd Ser., CLXXIII, pp. 430-41, 544-50, 955-1021. The Tory point of view is argued at length by Brooks Adams, _The Seizure of the Laird Rams_, pp. 312-324.]

[Footnote 1039: Hansard, 3rd. Ser., CLXXIV, pp. 1862-1913. _The Index_, naturally vicious in comment on the question of the Rams, summed up its approval of Derby's contentions: "Europe and America alike will inevitably believe that it was the threat of Mr. Adams, and nothing else, which induced the Foreign Secretary to retract his letter of the 1st September, and they will draw the necessary conclusion that the way to extort concessions from England is by bluster and menace." (Feb. 18, 1864, p. 106.)]

[Footnote 1040: Lairds brought suit for damages, but the case never reached a decision, for the vessels were purchased by the Government. This has been regarded as acknowledgment by the Government that it had no case. In my view the failure to push the case to a conclusion was due to the desire not to commit Great Britain on legal questions, in view of the claim for damages certain to be set up by the United States on account of the depredations of the _Alabama_.]