Mr. Edwards to Lord Lyons.
My Lord: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your lordship’s despatch (No. 47) of the 26th instant, (which was not received by me until the 28th,) concerning a report communicated to your lordship by the governor of the Bahama islands, to the effect that the custom-house authorities here had taken measures to impede or prevent the shipment of ordinary supplies to Nassau, and instructing me to ascertain and report to your lordship whether there be any foundation for such a report. In reply, I have the honor to inform your lordship that the customs authorities at this port, acting, as I am informed, in compliance with instructions received at different times from the Secretary of the Treasury, have upon several occasions thrown serious impediments in the way of shipments of coal and ordinary merchandise to Nassau, and in some cases where the goods were already embarked and even cleared at the custom-house have refused to permit the vessel to go to sea until such goods have been re-landed. One of the officials has shown me a copy of an order issued from the Treasury Department, dated the 10th of April, in which shipments of coal are prohibited to any ports or places north of Cape Saint Roque (the easterly point of South America, and west of the fifteenth degree of longitude east,) where there is reason to suspect that it may be intended for the use of the so-called confederate government or ships. This prohibition, as your lordship will perceive, embraces all the British North American colonies, British West Indies, Bermuda, and the British possessions upon the north coast of South America. I inquired of the officer having the superintendence of the clearance bureau whether it was intended that this order should be strictly enforced, and he assured me that such was the collector’s intention. He cited, as a case in point, an application which had just been made to him for permission to send a quantity of coal to Canada, by way of the Hudson river and lakes, which had been refused. A British merchant here, largely interested in the trade of the North American colonies and West Indies, informs me that he has made repeated applications to the custom-house to be allowed to export coal, some of which was to be tendered for the use of her Majesty’s vessels upon the West Indies station, at the same time offering to enter into bonds that it should be landed in foreign ports, but that his applications have all been rejected.
I have the honor to enclose, for your lordship’s information, printed slips, cut [Page 261] from a daily paper, containing instructions issued by Mr. Secretary Chase to the collector of this port. Your lordship will see by the latter that the collector has very great discretionary powers lodged with him; these powers, I regret to say, have been extensively used to the annoyance and injury of British trade. In one case where a quantity of dry goods, consisting of plain and printed cotton fabrics, had been shipped upon a British vessel for Nassau, the shippers were obliged by the custom-house to reland the wares in question before permission for the vessel to proceed to sea could be obtained. In another, a number of packages of shoes were prohibited from exportation. In a more recent case, where an order had been received from some merchants at Nassau to ship a quantity of drugs, consisting of sulphate of quinine, cantharides and acids, only a portion of the order was permitted to be exported. At one time strong exception was taken by the custom-house officials to the (as they alleged) extraordinary quantity of flour and provisions shipped here for the British West Indies, but I am not aware that it amounted to actual prohibition. Much inconvenience has been, and continues to be, experienced by British merchants here from the manner in which the instructions issued by the Treasury Department have been enforced; articles of ordinary export being at times prohibited, while wares which could only be of service to a belligerent have been allowed to pass unquestioned.
I have, &c., &c.,
Lord Lyons.