Mr. Adams to Earl Russell.—(Received April 11.)
My Lord: I have the honor to acknowledge the reception of two notes from your lordship, both dated the 9th instant.
One of these notes expresses regret that officers Thornton and Haley, of the United States steamer Kearsarge, who, in your view, appear clearly to have violated the municipal law of this country, should still be retained in the service of the United States.
The other transmits to me extracts from a deposition of one Daniel O’Connell, in further support of an inference that the captain of the Kearsarge must have known of the enlistment of the Irishmen at Queenstown.
I would respectfully call your attention to the manner in which this latest testimony affects that which has been published heretofore. Edward Lynch, in his deposition taken on the 16th of November last, affirms that he went on board the Kearsarge in company with the said Daniel O’Connell, and that he saw the boatswain ship the said O’Connell at Queenstown after he had passed the usual inspection. This was on or about the 3d of November. He admits that the captain was not on board, but that he heard the commander say to the boatswain, “I’ll leave them in charge to you now.” This is all the evidence [Page 771] that appears in any degree to implicate the first officer, here called the commander, Mr. Thornton, in the charge of enlistment within this kingdom.
But Daniel O’Connell himself on his side changes the whole scene of the transaction. He avers in the extract you have been pleased to furnish to me that the enlistment took place when one of the officers, whom he does not name, and who was not likely to have been Thornton, took eight or ten of the men in a boat for the purpose of landing them at Brest, in France. This must have been at the time when Captain Winslow affirms that he ordered them so to be landed for the purpose of getting rid of them. It would seem that this officer, instead of obeying orders, then offered to them the choice of landing or else of enlisting, upon which they all chose the latter, returned to the vessel, and were then enlisted. This enlistment was then made in a port of France.
It necessarily follows, from this exposition, that if O’Connell was enlisted at Queenstown, as Edward Lynch affirms, there was no enlistment of him at Brest, as O’Connell himself avers. If, on the other hand, O’Connell is right, that he was enlisted by an officer in a boat at Brest, then it is clear that there was no enlistment of him at Queenstown by officer Thornton, as alleged by Lynch. Two successive enlistments of the same man, at about the same time, are not necessary or customary in any service. On the other hand, officer Thornton himself denies that he ever enlisted anybody. He affirms that he expressed himself willing to accept the men at Queenstown, if the captain, on his return from shore, should approve of the proceeding. But the captain did not so approve, and nothing more was done about it by him.
If the officer who had charge of the boat to place the men on shore at Brest, in obedience to the order of the captain, took the responsibility of then and there enlisting and returning them to the ship, it is plain that he must have been acting directly in the face of his authority; and, furthermore, that he was immediately disavowed by his principal, for the steamer was forthwith ordered to leave Brest and make a direct course back to Queenstown, for no other purpose than to get rid of these very men, who are said to have been enlisted for three years. The contradiction is too apparent and palpable to permit of further doubt as to the character of the testimony. On the other hand, Captain Winslow himself says that when he found, after leaving Queenstown, that the men who, against his orders to clear them out of the vessel, were still on board, having been secreted there, he decided upon landing them at his first stopping-place at Brest, They were landed accordingly; but upon a reconsideration of their destitute condition, and of the danger of their falling into the hands of the insurgents, notoriously without scruple about enlisting the subjects of Great Britain or any other nation, he determined to take them on board again for the purpose of returning them to Queenstown, which was accordingly done with promptness and despatch.
I am constrained to believe this account to be altogether the most consistent and credible. The others conflict with each other and with probability so strongly that I trust I may be pardoned for withdrawing the little credit I have been heretofore disposed to give them.
The only remaining piece of circumstantial evidence to sustain the idea of enlistment is the admitted fact of the men having been landed whilst dressed in the clothing of seamen in the United States service. That such clothing was given out to them, probably with the connivance of the petty officer, whose agency first induced them to come on board, is very certain. That it was not taken away from them is alleged to be solely owing to the fact that their own clothing was in every respect unfit for them to appear in decently on board. During the period of their stay they were rated on the ship’s books to make the accounts regular, and when they left it was deemed more proper to let them have the dress they had already worn for some time. Had it been thought that more seriously this liberality would be urged by your lordship as a proof of [Page 772] their enlistment, nothing would have been more easy to obviate the suspicion than to return them in rags as they came.
I am not, however, disposed to withdraw my former admission, that in the original proceedings there is evidence of some connivance on the part of one or more of the petty officers of the Kearsarge in the endeavor to enlist these men in the seryice of the United States. That the first officer, Thornton had any intention of the kind, I am constrained more seriously to doubt. I do not regard myself as possessed of authority to direct a pursuit of the investigation on this side of the Atlantic. But understanding it from your lordship’s note to be the wish of her Majesty’s government that further measures should be taken to ascertain the precise nature of the action of the suspected parties, and that they should be visited with suitable penalty if found guilty, I shall do myself the honor to communicate your wish for the consideration of my government. I do not doubt that the proper authority will direct further proceedings to be had, in order to arrive, at the precise truth, and to give just satisfaction to your lordship in case of the proof of any offence.
I pray, &c.,