I have just had time to read the note, and there is undoubtedly some
confusion between the Mashona and Maria in the last paragraph but one.
[Inclosure.]
Lord Salisbury
to Mr. Choate.
Foreign Office, February, 1900.
Your Excellency: I have had the honor to
receive your note of the 29th ultimo respecting the merchandise
removed from the British ship Beatrice at
East London.
I think that there is a misunderstanding as to the details of this
case which I can best remove by answering somewhat fully the second
paragraph of your excellency’s note.
You observe in that paragraph that, according to my communication of
the 26th ultimo, the Beatrice carried large
quantities of goods, principally flour, destined for the South
African Republic; that the cargo was so stowed that these goods
could not be landed without discharging at the same time goods
intended for Portuguese East Africa, and that goods destined for
consumption in this last-mentioned territory were allowed to be
removed. Your excellency thereupon suggests that the flour destined
for the South African Republic is still detained.
A British vessel can not lawfully carry merchandise destined for the
enemy’s territory, and when the Beatrice came
within British jurisdiction she was required to land all such
merchandise.
This part of the cargo was therefore put ashore, together with such
other portions of the cargo as had to be removed in order to reach
it.
So far as is known in this department none but British lines of
steamers run from the ports of Cape Colony to Delagoa Bay, and this
circumstance would account for the flour mentioned by your
excellency being still at East London. Such portions of the cargo as
were destined for Portuguese territory could be carried on, and, as
it appears, were carried on, to that territory, and doubtless by
steamers belonging to the several British lines serving the South
African ports.
I trust that the explanations which I have offered on the second
paragraph of your excellency’s note make it unnecessary for me to
say more in regard to the subsequent paragraphs than that the flour
did not, so far as is shown by the information in this department,
come within the definition of contraband, and that it was not
detained as contraband.
I have no doubt that the flour and any other merchandise not
contraband of war from the Beatrice would be
handed over to any person who showed that he was entitled to receive
it.
I think that the flour to which your excellency refers in the final
paragraph of your note as having been detained because it was
enemy’s property must be that marked “Z. A. R.” which formed part of
the cargo of the Mashona.
I trust that I have now made clear to your excellency how the case of
the cargo of the Beatrice stands; but if
there are still any points which appear obscure I shall be pleased
to do my best to throw light upon them, as it is the wish of Her
Majesty’s Government to put the Government of the United States in
possession of the fullest possible information respecting these
several shipping cases, and, as far as possible, to meet their
wishes in regard to them.
I have, etc.,
