After the insincere peace of Amiens, resumption of war occurred when the fully-laden French and Dutch fleets were returning to Europe from their erstwhile colonies East and West.
Sat 17th Sept 1803
Now we are at war again, the Bombay Presidency expects to receive a commission from the Lords of Admiralty to adjudicate prize cases locally and avoid the former delay attendant on sending cases to London to be heard.
Sat 3rd Dec 1803
The costs of colonial produce on the Amsterdam market has risen 15% in the first few weeks of renewed war. A considerable number of French and Dutch ships have been seized by us as prizes already. The Dutch convoys from Batavia and West Indies are both expected to arrive soon.
Sat 3rd Dec 1803
The French have sent instructions to their returning merchant fleet from Santo Domingo to divert to any Spanish or Portuguese port rather than make for a French port and risk interception by the British blockading frigates.
Sat 4th Feb 1804
The numbers of prizes being brought into Jamaican ports is so great, the British colonial government is unable to house all the prisoners.
Sat 3rd March 1804
Sweden was a signatory to the Convention of St Petersburg of 1801 whereby Neutral rights on the High Seas were proclaimed. Now British diplomacy has achieved a volte face by Sweden - she has qualified her accession to the Treaty.
In return the two Swedish convoys we seized (and condemned in the Admiralty Prize Court) are to be indemnified. This is intended to open a renewed British friendship with Sweden. We hope our belated settlement with the Americans will induce a more friendly relationship with them as well.
Sat 10th March 1804
Capt Cochrane MP objected to aspects of the prize system in House of Commons 28th June 1803. The property in a prize belongs to the King until a judicial order of condemnation is obtained whereupon the value of the prize becomes the property of the captors.
Whilst under the King’s ownership, prize property is supervised by the King’s Proctor Heseltine. That Proctor handles the matters in consultation with Sir Stephen Lushington, one of whose sinecures is Protector of Captors’ Interests.
Abuses have been alleged against the Proctor – specifically, Cochrane says legal fees are unjustifiable and excessive.
Some MPs said, now the Admiralty is being investigated and malpractice curbed, there should be less reasons in future for complaint by captors.
Sat 24th March 1804
The French privateer Generale de Caen that was captured as prize by HMS Caroline has been sold at Calcutta to Capt MacIntosh. His old ship Sarah was burned in February 1803 and he needs a replacement. The log book of Generale de Caen revealed that 17 prize-masters boarded her at Mauritius, so confident were they of success. Their instructions were to send back only ships worth £40,000+ and to ransom, burn or sink the others.
Sat 5th May 1804
The Mauritian prize-takers are doing something new. An American ship Derby has just arrived at Calcutta from Mauritius and says only the Countess of Sutherland and the Eliza Ann have been brought in to Port Louis so far.
These ships were caught by Admiral Linois’ squadron. None of the captures of the town’s own merchant privateers have arrived although we have lost many ships to them.
Sat 19th May 1804
The Flora transport, part of the convoy to Gibraltar, got ahead of the convoy and was taken by a French privateer cruising off Gibraltar for just such an opportunity. The Flora carried forty soldiers and the wives and children of several officers attached to the Gibraltar garrison. She was taken into Algeciras with her colours reversed and run aground in full sight of the Gibraltar garrison. We were indignant. The crew of the privateer was largely Italian and Spanish with only one Frenchman amongst them.
We had to exchange an equal number of French prisoners to get our people back. The baggage of the women was confiscated and even their personal jewellery was taken from them.
Spain is supposedly neutral but she acts thus because she expects France to protect her. The Spanish do not seem to care about us at all. They do not allow us to take French prizes into their ports, indeed we are not permitted to remain in Spanish ports longer than necessary to water and provision, but they harbour, arm and fit-out privateers against us. It is said the cargoes of British ships are landed and sold on the quay without any legal process at all.
Sat 19th May 1804
The treasure seized by General Arthur Wellesley’s army during the war with the Marathas, as reported to the General, is 1,152,196 Hyderabadi Rupees.
The Governor-General authorises its distribution to the army in the usual shares as prize money. The ordnance and military stores seized from the Marathas are reserved for the Company’s use. As the reported prize money is inadequate compensation for the officers they will also receive six months batta.
Sat 4th Aug 1804
For sale on 9th Aug for ready money - prize of the Indiaman Sir Edward Hughes, the French brig Jeune Clementine, 115 tons, and her cargo of 180 Zanzibar slaves, as is, caveat emptor.
In Nov 1804 the French national ship Zephyr is also auctioned, 54 tons, fast sailer, suitable for Persian Gulf trade (sold to Stephen Beaufort, a Bombay merchant, for 3,000 Rupees).
Later the same month the merchantman La Fortune (30), 480 tons, oak-built and coppered, is auctioned with its guns and stores while the schooner Marengo, another capture of HMS Concorde, was sold privately to the Company and renamed Assaye.
(NB – there is no Admiralty Jurisdiction at Bombay and no judicial involvement apparent in these advertisements)
Sat 25th Aug 1804
The diamonds, emeralds, rubies and pearls seized from the Marathas in the Deccan in the late war are to be sold by raffle. The items are valued by the Shroffs of Poona at 220,775 Rupees and by the Shroffs of the Nizam at 315,225 Rupees. Taking the median figure as indicative of value, 2,680 tickets at 100 Rupees each are to be issued. The jewellery is divided into 147 prizes worth 200 – 40,000 Rupees each. Tickets are on sale in Bombay, Madras and Calcutta. The draw will take place at Bombay where the prizes will be displayed.
Sat 1st September 1804
We have just learned that HMS Investigator (Flinders) put into one of the Mauritian ports eight months ago and was arrested. His papers and maps were seized contrary to the Rules of War. Flinders name is on the latest list of English prisoners at Mauritius available for exchange.
Sat 17th Nov 1804
HMS Swift (Leake) has been captured by the French privateer L’Esperance. The warship was carrying Lord Nelson’s dispatches for the Admiralty. He is CiC of the British Mediterranean fleet. The documents were regrettably not destroyed before the capture and have been seized by the French.
Sat 8th Dec 1804
Admiral Rainier, commander of our East India fleet, has stationed a couple of frigates off Port Louis to recover any British ships seized by French privateers. Mauritius is the only French base in the East. The Mauritian privateers have little choice but to return there with their prizes. When they do our frigates often intercept them and recover the captured ships. HMS Tremendous has just recaptured the Indiaman Mornington off Port Louis.
Sat 9th Feb 1805
The Company permits sale of prizes in India although the country still lacks an Admiralty Jurisdiction. It appears intended to convert the prizes to money prior to seeking for an award of the Prize Court:
The officers and crews of HMS Tremendous, Lancaster, Phaeton & Terpsichore are offering the cargo of the Dutch East Indiaman prize Elizabeth for sale. Samples may be inspected in Adamson’s Warehouse in Bombay. Sugar, coffee, tea, pepper, tin, nankeens, silk and a wide variety of foods and drinks are to be sold in small Lots. 10% deposit once the Lot is knocked-down and balance in 14 days.
On 23rd Feb the ship itself, 750 tons, with all its stores was offered for auction. It was built in Liverpool and is ideal for the China trade. List of stores may be had from the offices of Ardaseer Dadisett. (Both adverts in English and Parsee)
In March the cargo of the American ship Penman (nutmegs, mace and sugar from Dutch Colonies - another prize of the squadron) was auctioned and immediately afterwards, the ship itself - 420 tons of American oak, 4 years old - together with her guns and stores.
In April it was the French ship La Minerve and her stores - 230 tons, coppered, suitable for live cattle transport or Basra trade. Nasservanjee Cowasjee is the successful bidder. He will employ Capt John Cummings to operate the ship on Persian Gulf routes.
Sat 9th Feb 1805
The historical submission of the Spanish Court to France has persuaded the British cabinet to capture a treasure fleet that is coming from Montevideo. Pitt says he permitted this attack against a neutral because he expected the silver cargo would be sent to France.
The London Gazette (undated) has a report on the engagement. Capt Moore commanded the four frigates - HMS Indefatigable (Moore), Medusa (Gore), Amphion (Sutton) and Lively (Hammond) – and met the Spanish treasure fleet on 5th Oct en route to Cadiz. A fifth ship, HMS Triumph (Sir Robert Barlow), was off Gibraltar and Moore sent Medusa to advise Barlow of his orders and rejoin him together with Amphion.
Moore engaged the Spanish fleet off Cape St Mary. He placed his ships on the weather beam of the Spanish frigates and directed them to shorten sail but they ignored him. He fired a shot across the Spanish Admiral’s bows which persuaded that officer to shorten sail. Moore sent Lt Ascott of HMS Indefatigable in a ship’s boat to advise the Admiral that his flotilla was detained. Moore waited a while then signalled the boat to return. After debriefing Ascott, he put another shot across the Admiral’s bows. La Mercedes, the second ship in the Spanish line, then fired at HMS Amphion and the Admiral’s flagship fired upon HMS Indefatigable. Battle commenced. In a few minutes La Mercedes blew-up and sank with the loss of 200+ crew. In 20 more minutes the Admiral surrendered but one of the other two ships tried to escape. Moore sent HMS Lively, which is a fast sailer, after her and she obtained her surrender at about dusk.
Once he had got the Admiral to surrender, Moore put out his boats and rescued 40 survivors of La Mercedes. Moore reported the specie found in the ships was consigned $1,307,634 for the Spanish government and $3,128,885 for private merchants. The government also owned 4,732 bars of tin according to the Bills of Lading. $807,756 in silver and 1,139 bars of tin were lost with the foundering of Le Mercedes and should be deducted from the above totals.1
Moore brought the three prizes into Portsmouth. The treasure and bar silver was landed and sent to the Bank of England under the escort of the 4th regiment of Dragoon Guards. Pitt says he will keep the money safe until the war is over.
Pitt’s ministry has published an explanation. This was not an act of war but of precaution - England does not wish Spain to take advantage of her. We cannot treat the Spanish survivors as Prisoners of War as we are not at war but they have given their parole not to disappear. The bloodshed was considerable but fortunately British losses were slight.
Sat 23rd March 1805
Pitt has conditioned his approval of the seizure of the Spanish treasure fleet. He has told British merchants involved in Spanish trade that Spanish ships in England will be allowed to load and depart even if Madrid declares war against England. They will receive passports to their destinations to enable them to pass through the British blockades at Cadiz and elsewhere. He hopes the Spanish government will do the same. The Admiralty has arranged convoy escort of Spanish merchant ships to the Mediterranean. It will depart Spithead on 20th Oct.
Sat 13th April 1805
A rare disincentive to privateering has been identified at the Court of King’s Bench in the case of James Farr & Co v John Anderson & others. The Plaintiffs are Liverpool slavers claiming for the total loss of their ship Mercury and a cargo of 256 slaves at £50 a head. The defendants are insurance underwriters.
During the voyage the Mercury encountered an alluring prize and captured it. This comprised a ‘deviation’ under the policy and exempted underwriters’ liability for the later foundering of the Mercury and the total loss of her cargo.
Sat 18th May 1805
The final distribution of prize money from the sale of the Dutch ship Elizabeth occurred on 26th March at Adamson’s office (he is in a loose partnership with Ardaseer Dady, the great Bombay financier). The unclaimed shares have been sent to M/s Wilson and McInerheny, prize agents for the captors in London, to be disposed of in accordance with the Act of Parliament.
Sat 21st Dec 1805
HMS Harrier captured a Spanish ship in the approaches to the Canton River. It carried a valuable cargo of bird’s nests but the prize went aground in a storm and was lost.
Sat 8th Feb 1806
The prize money for the Indian army of Egypt is starting to be paid. It will be received in three tranches. The first payment is 13/6d for each soldier.
Sat 8th March 1806
Notice – the Insurance Companies of India have agreed that British ships captured by French privateers and condemned and sold in Mauritius will not be insured by them in their new owners’ names should they come to India for business. These Mauritian condemnations are not judicially ordered and are considered illegal by the insurance companies.
Sat 7th June 1806
Sir George Keith, commander of HMS Protector, has captured a valuable Dutch East Indiaman Prince of Augustenburgh formerly known as the James Sibbold of Bombay. The prize was taken off the Cape of Good Hope whilst sailing under Danish colours. She has a cargo of ivory, indigo and cotton estimated to be worth £250,000. Keith has opted to sail her himself to London for condemnation and sent his warship off for reprovisioning of 5 months victuals.
Sat 30th Aug 1806
The Company has established a vice-Admiralty Court at Bombay for disposal of prizes. One small brig and the cargo of another are advertised today. The Agent to the Captors in both cases is M/S Leckie and Malcolm of Bombay.
Sat 11th Oct 1806
Capt Crowte and the owners of the Plymouth privateer Lord Nelson are feeling warm and contented. The £40,000 of tea on the Concordia and the ship itself have been condemned to them. Not long ago they captured £30,000 of wool on another ship which was also condemned.
Sat 25th Oct 1806
HMS Greyhound and Harrier have engaged a small Dutch squadron convoying the annual Dutch spice ship and captured it near Sunda Straits. Capt Thomas Troubridge of HMS Harrier has reported the engagement of his ships:
We bore up under French colours until we were within hailing range then raised the British flag and opened fire. They were expecting it and quickly returned our shot but after forty minutes of close action they ceased fire.
We captured the frigate Pallas (ex Trowbridge) and two merchantmen Victoria and Batavier. These last carried a rich cargo of spices. An armed corvette William escaped.
The mace, nutmegs and cloves were pledged by the captors to the Governor of Penang (through the intermediary of Carnegie & Co) for totally £200,000.2
The captured Dutch frigate Pallas has been bought by the Royal Navy – not bad for 40 minutes work but the Insurance Society of Calcutta paid a claim for the original seizure of the Trowbridge and in March 1807 asserted an interest in the Bombay courts (when the Pallas (ex Trowbridge) was passing through that port en route to London) noting that Penang has no Admiralty Jurisdiction and cannot condemn prizes.
The value of this prize would completely reimburse insurers but the action was struck out by the Bombay Recorder.
Sat 8th Nov 1806
$30,095 Spanish will be sold by auction on 14th Nov. The money is from the American ship Erin (W. Stevenson) that was captured by HMS Pitt recently.
Mr Stevenson has apparently not lost his ship – he is advertising in this edition for passengers to the Cape and Baltimore.3
Sat 6th Dec 1806
The prize money for Sir Home Popham’s capture of the Cape has been assessed by Thomas S Sorel, the Army Prize Agent, at Rix $1.2 millions. The CiC gets 47,500 Rupees, Brigadier Generals 23,750 Rupees, Field Officers 5,785 Rupees, Rank & File 32 Rupees.
Sat 20th Dec 1806
The annual Spanish ship from Manila and Amoy has been captured. With her cargo, she is estimated to be worth £250,000.
Sat 4th April 1807
HMS Caroline has captured the annual Spanish ship San Rafael from Lima and Manila. She is estimated to be worth about $1 million, hull and cargo. She was taken just outside Manila. She had $500,000 in silver dollars, 1,700 quintals of bar copper and much other cargo.
Her Spanish officers say the British government of Buenos Aires that Popham set-up has been overthrown by an act of the people.4
Sat 18th April 1807
The recent British attack on shipping in the harbour of Batavia fell mostly on individual merchants. One alone has lost property worth $300,000.
Sat 22nd Aug 1807
The American ship Minerva came into Bombay in the normal course of her voyage and was discovered to have some Manila indigo in her cargo. She has been arrested and is to be sold with her cargo. There is a great demand for Manila indigo in London. The ship also contained $5,633 Spanish.
Joseph Cook Allen, the Minerva’s supercargo tried to sell the forbidden cargo to avoid detection. A Notice is published in the Bombay Courier dated 11th Aug warning all residents to beware of Allen. The ship is 230 tons and was built on the Ohio River.
Sat 5th Sept 1807
The sale of the American ship Minerva and her cargo is postponed due to a Protest lodged by her Master at the Bombay Admiralty Court.
Sat 19th Sept 1807
The Bombay Prize Court has considered the facts of the capture of the Minerva (Hussey) and given judgment in favour of the owners who appealed the capture of the ship and cargo. The instructions of the King in the Order-in-Council dated June 1803 to his ship commanders were inter alia to distress the enemy’s trade in his colonial ports. The Netherlands and Spain have declared war against us and Batavia and Manila were said by the captors to be the enemy’s colonial ports.
The Minerva was not trading directly between an American port and either Batavia or Manila. It had sailed from Mauritius to Batavia to Tegall to Manila and was returning to Batavia when it was taken.
The invariable practice in Prize Courts is to construe the instructions of the King as binding law. Here in Bombay we also honour the Law of Nations. The Defence has shown that Batavia and Manila had a freedom to trade with places other than their mother country’s ports during peacetime. They were not colonies in the sense of British colonies as inferred in the King’s instruction.
We do not consider the trade of Batavia or Manila illegal in time of war. We would only do so if such trade was prohibited in time of peace (the Rule of 1756). The evidence shows peacetime trade with both ports was open to all.
Judgment for the Appellant.5
Sat 23rd Jan 1808
The government of Mauritius has received instruction from Paris to cease harassing Arab shipping and only arrest them if their cargoes are indisputably English. It is present French policy to accommodate the Arabs.
Sat 20th Feb 1808
Notice, 3rd Feb - The Company has learned that British Customs duties are charged on prize goods when captured ships are brought into English ports for adjudication. Formerly they were duty-free but times change and the captors do not mind as its a windfall profit anyway. The Company gives notice it will also levy the same deduction in India with immediate effect.
Sat 27th Feb 1808
The Danish port of Frederiksnagore (Serampore) was occupied by British troops on 28th Jan in consequence of the outbreak of war between England and Denmark. Twelve Danish ships in the Hooghly were also arrested.6
Sat 27th Feb 1808
The Dutch fleet at Surabaya on Java has been destroyed by Sir Edward Pellow’s squadron.
Sat 26th March 1808
A list of captures made by Mauritian privateers between Aug – Oct 1807 is published. Althea, Gilwell, Elizabeth, Trafalgar, Mangles, Susanna, Caroline, Succedany, Maria, Eliza, Udny, Highland Chief, Resource, Louisa and Mersosa. They are valued at approximately 3 Million Rupees.
Sat 30th April 1808
The King has promulgated new rules for prize-taking by Orders-in-Council. They will take effect in India on 1st May 1808.
Sat 14th May 1808
We have done quite well out of the arrest of Danish shipping. The frigate Spurknoy contained 170,000 Ducats, $500,000 Spanish, some bars of silver and copper. She is a fine ship of 50 guns. The transport Vilhelmina had much clothing and naval stores. They were due to leave port on Thursday but we managed to catch them the day before.
Sat 21st May 1808
22 ships trading around the Mediterranean have been arrested by us between 1st June and 21st Aug and taken to Malta. We have applied to the Malta Prize Court for their confiscation for trading contrary to the new Order-in-Council. They are chiefly Americans and Danes.
Sat 28th May 1808
As Denmark has declared war against England, the British ministry feels at liberty to sell the Danish fleet we recently impounded and it is expected to raise about £1 million for the captors. It comprises 14 capital ships, 13 frigates and 6 sloops.
The statutory distribution of prize-money will give the two CiC’s an eighth, the other commanders likewise. Captains get a quarter; lieutenants and warrant officers get a quarter, petty officers an eighth and crew members the last eighth.
Sat 25th June 1808
Madras news – Lt Panton, the officer of marines (and 3rd Lieutenant) of HMS Fox, has been killed. He was in a boat on the Manila coast trying to cut-out some potential prizes when the boat’s magazine exploded and everyone died.
His sister is Mrs Lautier, wife of the French supercargo of a Danish ship Joe Venner. She lives at Tranquebar. The captain of Joe Venner is a debtor of her husband and tried to abandon him at Tapanooly whilst he was ashore. The ship was later taken as prize by the English but Mr Lautier got a boat to Padang and found his way back to India. Before his return, Mrs Lautier had assumed both her husband and brother had been lost.
Sat 2nd July 1808
Popham is in dispute with Admiral Beresford about the division of the freight on the Buenos Aires spoils. Capt Donnelly of HMS Narcissus, which frigate brought the silver home via Rio, offered to pay Popham a third (the usual share of freight for the Admiral) but Beresford stopped him. They could not agree and Popham brought a petition before the Privy Council. He has already tried the Courts and been denied. He applied for a retrial and that was denied too. Popham’s position is he expects to be ranked as a Flag Officer to get a third share of the freight but the Courts say he is just a Captain and was only acting in command of the Buenos Aires invasion.
The Privy Council has delayed commenting on the petition as Popham is being investigated on precisely this subject under a prior agreement with Sir David Baird at the Cape. Apparently he gave Baird a commitment to a share of the Buenos Aires loot in return for provision of the ships and men for the invasion. Baird expects Popham to perform his agreement. It seems Popham thought he would be getting the lion’s share as commander of the expedition and thus was rather too generous in his promise to Baird.
These spats commenced before his attack on Copenhagen. The prize money from that is worth £50,000+ to him personally. Perhaps that will mollify him or perhaps he will use that money to prosecute his Buenos Aires claims further.
Sat 9th July 1808
The House of Commons has been discussing prize money. It seems the plunder of the Spanish warships that preceded the outbreak of renewed war with that country could not be considered as prize money in view of the state of peace existing between England and Spain. It was classified as a droit of the Crown and went not to the captors but to the King. These droits of Admiralty are a valuable source of monarchical funds. The King’s account is not published but the Royal dukes have received £139,500 in three payments (Oct/Nov 1805, April 1806 and early 1808) from the fund.
The debate revealed that a considerable part of the droits fund from the Spanish captures was disbursed to Moore and his group in spite of their legal incapacity. In former similar circumstances, about two thirds of the real value of the captures was granted to captors. Giving a small amount to one’s children as the King has done is reasonable.
Sir Francis Burdett told the House that he had heard the Droits fund had swollen to such immense size that ministers could not endure its being left the private property of the King in light of all these new taxes people are paying. A Grant has been made to government. Some payments are said to be made from this fund to merchants whose overseas property is seized due to an outbreak of hostilities. Moore’s squadron was paid an indemnity not prize money. Some payments from the fund had also been made to neutrals for a variety of reasons.
Adam said the King’s income was considered in 1760 when he was crowned. The droits were continued to him then. The King gave parliament £1 million in 1795 and another million in 1806 from this Fund. On both occasions we thanked him. Our gratitude would appear to constitute an estoppel to parliament reviewing his control of the Fund.
Sheridan reminded the House that the Prince of Wales had a claim on the revenues of Cornwall but had been denied both by the King and by the House. Here was a fund from which to draw funds for the Prince.
Sat 9th July 1808
In the debate concerning droits of the Crown and of Admiralty, Lushington (one of the India Company’s MPs) incidentally revealed some historical information about Popham. It appears the Company is distancing itself from his acts:
He says Popham left the navy on half-pay. In 1787 he applied to go to India, agreeing to abandon his half-pay and reside in a Danish town. On these undertakings he got a licence from the Company to reside in India. He then went to Ostend, the centre of smuggling of India goods into Europe, where he bought a ship and sailed East. He visited every British settlement in India in breach of his undertaking to the Company and in 1789 carried on an illegal trade at Calcutta in the Ville de Vienne.
He returned to Europe and formed a business connection with Charlotte & Co, a notorious smuggling business in Ostend, and made a second voyage East under false colours without the consent of the Company in which he delivered a cargo of cannon and ammunition to unidentified buyers in Asia. He made a voyage from Calcutta to Penang and back and then bought the American ship President Washington which he renamed as Etrusco. He went to Canton in 1792 and loaded a cargo of tea in a joint venture with a French supercargo Constant and a Monsieur Peron, the then French Resident at that port. He off-loaded some tea and rhubarb into small boats at Dungeness for sale in the British market and continued to Ostend where he was intercepted by HMS Brilliant (Robinson) and his ship and the balance of its cargo came before the Admiralty Court for condemnation as part French property. Popham told the Judge he was a friend of Cornwallis and Sir Charles Stuart in an attempt to avoid the consequences of his acts. This failed to obtain the effect he sought and the ship was condemned. Popham absconded.
Soon afterwards the King issued him a Treasury Warrant for £25,000 equating with the value of Popham’s share of the Etrusco cargo. Capt Robinson got no prize money for his capture of the ship and cargo.
Lushington said he mentioned all this because he considered the case was an abuse of the droits Fund and the facts comprised reasonable grounds for parliamentary investigation of its control and disbursement.
Popham is now MP for Ipswich and was in the House of Commons when Lushington told MPs this story. He said that whilst in India he had been commended by Governor-General Cornwallis for his survey of Penang and was therefore doing good for his country. He regretted going to India under a neutral flag but many other officers had done the same and it was twenty years ago. He himself had never smuggled anything but some of his crew may have taken dutiable goods ashore in an informal way.
The Attorney General said it seemed Popham had broken the law and infringed the Company’s monopoly in which case the confiscation of his ship and cargo was an inevitable process of law and not really a prize. Capt Robinson had lost nothing. The Speaker called the Attorney General to order for creating a defence for Popham.
Sat 9th July 1808
The ethics of our attack on Denmark have been considered in a House of Lords debate. The liberal Whig Lord Holland argued that the suggestion it was necessitated by the secret articles at Tilsit is wrong and he rejected it. The suggestion it was a pre-emptive strike is also rejected. Many of the Danish warships were almost unseaworthy, he says, although the navy says they were in excellent shape and could have been ready for sea in three weeks.
By eliminating Tilsit and pre-emption, Holland concludes it was simply a wish to remove maritime competition that motivated the attack and he deplores the likely effect of bringing up a generation of Danes with a hatred of England.7
Sat 16th July 1808
Tierney has spoken in the Commons debate whether to give the thanks of parliament to Lord Gambier and Sir Home Popham for the attack on Copenhagen and the capture of the Danish fleet. The House has voted 100/19 to do so but Tierney queried the decision.
He says Popham draws his support from the City (Tierney calls them ‘Lloyd’s Coffee House Men’) and from the Mayor of Birmingham. The merchants applauded, indeed, he says, may have instigated his invasion of Buenos Aires. Popham has been on the one hand court martialled and on the other appointed to the command of the Danish invasion fleet over the heads of his seniors.
The pre-emptive strike may have prevented the formation of a great Baltic fleet of the navies of Russia, Sweden and Denmark to oppose our maritime hegemony (the prophecy of the ministry) but it caused the capture of the British merchant fleet in Russian ports which must have been a disappointment to the City.8 Tierney wondered in the circumstances whether parliament’s gratitude was misplaced.
Sat 6th Aug 1808
Popham’s recent mercantile war at Buenos Aires has turned-out to not be original. In 1762, during the Seven Years War, another group of private merchants from England and Portugal bought two British frigates and did the same. They renamed the frigates, both 50-gunners, Lord Clive and Ambuscade and placed the expedition under Captain MacNamara, the ex-commander of an East Indiaman. They were joined by two Portuguese warships and five merchant ships carrying stores. Regrettably, on that occasion they were beaten off by the Spanish defenders and the Lord Clive was lost.
Sat 17th Sept 1808
An American named Beare, who has long been in the service of an Indian Prince, was required to retire by Governor-General Wellesley’s regulation prohibiting foreigners to serve in the armies of native princes. Beare had rendered occasional assistance to the Company and in recognition of this assistance was permitted to load a cargo of 300 tons of saltpetre for export. He bought the ship Martha for the purpose.
Saltpetre is, by the Company’s own Regulations, a contraband substance (used in the manufacture of gunpowder) but Beare got a special dispensation from the Calcutta government in view of his past services.
On rounding the Cape, the Martha was stopped and searched by the Royal Navy and arrested and taken into port in respect of the war materiel discovered on board. The Prize Court considered the matter and declined to acknowledge the validity of the Company’s permit issued to the captain. His saltpetre was confiscated but in view of the mitigatory circumstances, he was permitted to retain his ship.
Sat 24th Sept 1808
Lushington’s motion in the House of Commons to censure Popham was lost on a division 57/126.
Sat 4th Feb 1809
An American ship consigned to Mr Wilcocks, the China trader, has been captured by pirates off Macau. She was laden with furs and $300,000 in silver. The Americans complained to the Canton provincial government which told them the incident occurred outside their jurisdiction. At that time there were four American ships at Whampoa and no ships of another nationality in port except British.9
Sat 29th April 1809
Court of Common Pleas, Duckworth v Tucker - The complexities of shifting national alliances has affected the distribution of prize money and a topical dispute has now been litigated:
In 1798 the Portuguese fleet commanded by Admiral Neiza was put under the command of the Earl St Vincent by an order of the Portuguese Court. Portugal was then at peace with Spain and at war with France while England was at war with both France and Spain. The AngloPortuguese treaty required that, should the combined Portuguese/English fleet meet a Spanish fleet, the Portuguese ships were to withdraw; if it met a combined Spanish French fleet the Portuguese would attack only the French ships!
Admiral Neiza’a fleet was actually employed blockading Malta. Some French and Spanish ships were captured off Gibraltar in which actions the Portuguese were not involved but, as a flag officer in our Mediterranean fleet, Neiza claimed a share of one eighth the value of prizes taken by the English part of the combined fleet.
The Defendant Tucker was the Naval Prize Agent responsible for distributing the fund. He retained £7,000 in respect of French captures and £1,600 in respect of Spanish captures for the account of Neiza.
Admiral Duckworth is the Plaintiff. He queried the right of an absent Portuguese Admiral to a share of the French prizes. He specifically denied the Portuguese should have any share of the Spanish captures. The Defendant claims that although Portugal and Spain were formally at peace they were secretly at war at the time. Neiza told the Court he was completely under St Vincent’s and Nelson’s control and subject to their every order.
St Vincent gave evidence that although the Iberian countries were at peace, the Portuguese War Minister Roderigo de Souza told him that if he encountered a superior Spanish fleet he might order the Portuguese warships to assist and he (de Souza) would take the consequences upon himself.
The Court (Sir James Mansfield) directed the French prize money to be paid to the Plaintiff Duckworth. The Spanish prize money was to be held over, pending for further advice on the present state of international law.
Sat 12th Aug 1809
The Company has been litigating with the Crown in London concerning its right to a share of the proceeds from prize-taking. In cases arising within its Asian jurisdiction it routinely takes half the proceeds plus any appropriate import tax on the cargo. The case is before the Court of vice-Admiralty and involves our capture of the ship Burma. The Court ruled that the Company’s Charter restricts its prize-taking rights to ships originating in India.
The hull and cargo of the Burma are accordingly declared ‘droits’ of Admiralty. Each party is to pay its own costs.
In a second case the Company also suffered a rare reversal. The Governor-General has issued Letters of Marque including one to the Calcutta privateer Bee. The Resource was formerly a Bombay ship until captured by the Mauritian privateer Piedmontese about two years ago. Subsequently, the Bee recaptured the Resource and claimed it as prize. Hull underwriters of the ship when it was first captured, who became subrogated to the rights of the then owners on settlement of their claim, alleged the Bee’s commission was illegal and the Court agreed. The Company’s government was held to lack the power to issues Letters of Marque.
Ownership of the Resource was passed to the underwriters whilst the cargo was deemed a ‘droit’ of Admiralty. Owners of the Bee get 20% of the value of both the Resource and its cargo as salver’s rights.
Sat 16th Sept 1809
Editorial - The Company is not having a spectacular year commercially. War has hitherto been good for business but the French have been privateering more successfully of late and the weather has been bad. The Travers, Walpole, Asia, Admiral Gardner and Britannia have been lost; the Europe and Streatham were captured and seven ships are presently listed as missing (of which four - Calcutta, Bengal, Duchess of Gordon and Lady Jane Dundas – are hopefully just delayed)
Sat 30th Sept 1809
Advice to military and naval commanders:
The definition of prize under the Prize Act generally exempts private property of colonists but, in the recent occupations of St Eustatius and Martinique in West Indies, some of the residents bore arms against the British invasion force and that was considered sufficient to put their property within the grasp of the captors.
On both islands the residents were required to prove they had not borne arms in order to preserve their property. Castlereagh has sought a legal opinion on the point and the Law Officers endorsed what the military commanders did.
Sat 23rd Dec 1809
The Streatham Indiaman has been captured by a French privateer late in Aug. Her crew was comprised of 44 Britons, 40 Lascars, 33 Chinese and 16 foreigners.10
Sat 3rd March 1810
For sale by auction, 10th March - The American ship Rebecca, captured in the China Sea by HMS Doris and Psyche and brought to Bombay where the new vice-Admiralty Court has condemned her. She is a 600 ton teak-ship built at Pegu.
For sale by auction 7th March - the Rebecca’s cargo (4,000 bags of Batavian sugar and 13,710 pieces of sapan-wood).
Contact Bruce Fawcett & Co, Captors’ Agents.
Sat 3rd March 1810
HMS Culloden put in to Plymouth on 15th Aug for refit and the crew have received one third of their outstanding wages and prize money. It equates with about £80 per man on average although one received £460. They were granted 14 days leave. It was depressing to see the fluent ease with which the brokers and agents who infest our ports transferred the crew’s payouts to themselves.
Sat 3rd March 1810
Admiral Lord Collingwood has accumulated over £200,000 in prize money but it does not seem to have done him any good. He is reportedly very sick and is being called back for retirement. Duckworth is to replace him.
Sat 10th March 1810
The Copenhagen prize money is being distributed and the navy is discontented. Captains are receiving £736.17.6d whereas brokers were trading their entitlements at over £1,000 before the apportionment was published.
Sat 14th April 1810
The Portuguese ship Oviedo Pereira has been taken at the Malacca Straits by the French ship L’Entreprenante. She was returning from Macau with $400,000 in silver, the proceeds of last season’s trade.
Sat 5th May 1810
Mr Cochrane Johnstone MP was assigned to go to Vera Cruz and escort a shipment of Spanish silver to London in repayment of money spent on behalf of the Seville junta. Johnstone was promised a commission of 2½% of the value of the shipment.
He went out in HMS Undaunted (Malling) with two other frigates and was supposed to bring the treasure back in the same ship. Johnstone and Malling had a dispute over distribution of the commission, resulting from which Johnstone determined to freight the silver on a Spanish capital ship then at Vera Cruz. Capt Malling was opposed (freighting treasure pays a percentage commission to Royal Navy captains – the cause of their dispute) and said if the Spanish warship sailed with the treasure, he would use his naval squadron to force it to surrender. This induced the Spanish captain to offload the shipment. Capt Malling should prevail – he has orders to bring the shipment to London.
Sat 5th May 1810
Amboinya has been captured. HMS Cornwallis, Dover and Semarang and a detachment of the Madras European Regiment did the deed. The booty, chiefly 20,000 lbs of cloves in the warehouse at Amboinya and its three dependent islands, is valued at £300,000. Head and gun money will add another £100,000 to the prize fund as the garrison numbered 1,500 Javanese soldiers. We also took two big ships, six brigs and some merchant ships.11
Having secured Amboinya the expedition continued to Banda, the next nearest, and chief, spice (nutmeg) island.
Sat 16th June 1810
The Port Admiral of Plymouth has received £52,000 in the five years he has had command of the port. Its his share of prizes captured by ships sailing under his command. His 2ic, who was recently superseded, got £21,000 from the same source over the same period.
Editor - These port management jobs are simple and mainly administrative. They should be held by the numerous old, disabled and needy officers in our navy not the young and active friends of the minister.
Sat 27th Oct 1810
Lord Thomas Cochrane is upset with all the fiddles going on and the popular assumption that every office-holder is involved in them. He was particularly irritated by the recent House of Commons debate on sinecures and peculation that implicated the Admiralty and, as he is an Admiral, somewhat himself. He has announced to the House of Commons details of the proceeds of the sale of the Dutch fleet that was brought-in before 5th Nov 1795, prior to the first raid on Copenhagen.
In the preamble to this disclosure His Lordship maintained that the entire system on which England was fighting was flawed.
He noted that the number of English seamen trading from British ports was 16,000 whereas 29,000 foreign seamen are trading to our ports. He noted that British tonnage trading in our ports had decreased from 37,000 tons to 25,000 tons whereas foreign tonnage had increased from 417,000 tons to 560,000 tons. British production of experienced seamen is the foundation on which the Royal Navy rests, he asserts.12
He is confident that one half of our present naval and marine force could terminate the war in a year. He said one thousand men on a flying squadron could keep the entire coast of France in chaos and oblige Napoleon to keep his armies at home.
He said the problem was that the King and the ministers derive a profit from war and want it to continue. He particularly deplored Droits of Admiralty which had produced an income to date of £11 millions to the Crown. The Registrar of Droits (Perceval’s brother) received immense fees from them.
The duties of the King’s Proctor (even more fundamentally involved in Droits) are widely misunderstood. This official can only be complained against if he himself agrees to permit the complaint to be forwarded to the Judiciary. Thus the entire subject of Droits is closed-off and made unamenable to parliamentary or Judicial review. This diminished the effectiveness of prize-taking which rested on its appeal to the greed of naval officers.
Since the time of Queen Anne (in 1708) it has been settled that the value of prizes should be shared by the captors and that they might litigate to fix the distribution. Since 1779 this fine arrangement had been superseded by an institution called the King’s Proctor. A gentleman named Stanisforth who is now Proctor has been graciously endowed by an Order-in-Council with the monopoly for determining all prize claims. Stanisforth’s power flows from the King and he necessarily acts for the King and the King’s friends.
The Law Courts admit actions by captors, allow them to insure their interests and make them liable for costs and damages. The King’s Proctor however is not amenable to legal process. On 13th June 1806 the Proctor was handling 16 cases; by 30th June it was 23 cases and by 19th November it was 59 cases. With so many prize funds stopped by the Proctor, no naval officer could rely on his expected income from prizes.
It was not just the pecuniary interest. There was doubt over the Proctor’s patriotism. Mr W Moyer was a British subject and is now a naturalised Dane (a good many Britons trading to Europe in Danish ships have naturalised as neutrals to avoid British law and the blockades). Stanisforth has sworn an affidavit describing Moyer as a faithful British subject when he had in fact received the thanks of the French government in the Revolutionary War for his services to the French Marine. Thus a traitor is deemed worthy of remuneration by the King’s Proctor. Cochrane concluded with the observation that £11 millions in the King’s hands was bound to incite mischief.
Sir John Nicoll denied Cochrane’s complaints - the Admiralty had been diligent in calculating and apportioning prize money to captors. All cases have been fully settled, he said. Captain Beresford said the King’s Proctor had always acted honourably. Cochrane’s resolutions sank 76/6.
Sat 3rd Nov 1810
HMS Caroline has arrived at Madras with news of the capture of the Banda spice islands on 8th August. About 400 men were landed from the ships but only half of them could be assembled in the dark to storm Fort Belgica. The sentries discovered them but they put their ladders up and quickly escaladed in.
The Dutch commander and ten men were killed. The rest fled. It appeared there had been about 700 men in the island. After capturing Belgica, there remained the smaller fort of Nassau but that surrendered without a shot. About 100 disciplined troops were made prisoner.
The store of loot (nutmeg) is enormous. Colonel Yates has been appointed Prize Agent and Paymaster.
Mon 21st Jan 1811 Extraordinary
The conquest of Mauritius has been a rewarding action for our soldiers and sailors. There was little opposition. We seized 50 merchant ships in the harbour and we found £500,000 in silver on one of the French frigates. The prize money will be marvellous - an army captain can expect over £800 for his share. Irwin is appointed prize agent for the Madras and Bombay contingents; Playfair for the Bengal troops and Admiral Bertie’s secretary Decotligan will act for the navy.
Sat 9th Feb 1811
Ternate has been captured by the European Corps from Madras and the marines and seamen of HMS Dover. It is a tiny market for our exports (the other spice islands we have captured are already flooded with India goods) but it will be good for the Company to have a supply of Ternate cloves for sale.
The prize money is less than expected. The public property found by the captors was said to be worth only £100,000 (in spices) but there were only 200 of our people involved in the invasion so it should represent a satisfactory dividend.
Sat 30th March 1811
Montagu is the Port Admiral of Portsmouth. Janverin is Captain of HMS Pluto attached to the Portsmouth squadron. They are in dispute over the distribution of freight for specie shipped on HMS Pluto in July 1808, when the ship carried £100,000 silver (11 tons) from Portsmouth to Gijon in Spain (on the north coast, for Sir John Moore’s army) on account of the British government. The Government paid Janverin £540. 8. 0d for freight.
It has become customary in the Royal Navy for those captains receiving specie as cargo, to share one third of the freight with their Admiral. If there are two Admirals involved, the senior pays one third of what he gets to his junior.
On the other hand, an order of 8th March 1807 from the Treasury revealed that frigate captains had no legal right to freight which was paid as a boon of the King at a rate of ½% ad valorem to the person having care and custody of the cargo. The King’s instruction to freight bullion, which is signed by the King and a Treasury official, is addressed to the Captains and Commanders of HM ships generally and requires the freight be paid to them without deduction. This definition seems to exclude the Admirals’ share and was the basis to Janverin’s attempt to retain the third that customarily would go to the senior officer.
A few Admirals gave evidence that they always got a third, regardless of whether it was public or merchants’ money that was freighted. One said, as a special case, if merchants put bullion on a ship, the Captain might retain the whole freight but he took the chance that his frigate might be diverted to some inconvenient place whenever he neglected the Admiral’s interest.
Admiral Bickerton told the Court that the ministry stopped freight payments for bullion in July 1806 as a measure of economy but had to recommence payment a year later after it had become apparent that the Admiralty had encountered difficulty transporting specie to those places the government needed it sent.
Judgement for the Admiral in £180. 2. 8d.
Sat 29th June 1811
HMS Salsette (ex Pitt) made prize of the French slaver La Expedition off Mauritius on 15th June 1806. We sent the ship and cargo beyond English legal jurisdiction to Goa for disposal, the sale of slaves being illegal in British India.13
The nett proceeds have now been received at the Admiralty Court of Bombay and will be distributed on 5th July. Prize money is shared by agreement of HMS Salsette with the crews of HMS Drake and HMS Cornwallis.
Contact John Leckie of the late firm of M/s Leckie and Malcolm, Prize Agents.
Sat 7th Sept 1811
On 17th Jan, Admiral Lord Cochrane arrived at Malta to investigate into the conduct of Judge Sewell of the Admiralty jurisdiction, and Locker his Registrar. There are two grounds for Cochrane’s enquiry. The court fees charged for determination of prize cases have been uniquely high in Malta for many years, and the functions of the Court are united in just a few individuals.
Cochrane’s initial act was to demand a table of fees be prominently displayed outside the Court Registry where the public could see it instead of within one of the judicial offices where they are forbidden to enter.
He personally took the table of fees outside and this caused Judge Sewell to issue a Warrant for Cochrane’s arrest. His Lordship was imprisoned for three days until he escaped down a rope from his cell window. He got on board a convoy then leaving for Gibraltar where he transferred to HMS Prometheus to return to London. By this means he was able to arrive in London ahead of the news of his experiences from other sources.14
Sat 19th Oct 1811
HMS Piedmontaise has brought 57,000 lbs of mace and 170,000 lbs of nutmegs from the conquest of Banda. They are to be sold at auction at Madras on 20th Nov for the benefit of the captors. Payment in three days of successful bid. Contact the Prize Agents James Balfour and /or Richard Bromley.
Sat 16th Nov 1811
The prize money from the conquest of Batavia is expected to be enormous. One naval captain turned-down a broker’s offer of 8,000 Sicca Rupees (£1,000) for his share. Quite apart from head and gun money, the principal warehouses of Batavia were found full of coffee, sugar and spices. There is also a great amount of naval stores and numerous brass cannon.
Surabaya may not be as good as expected for prize money. One of our two blockading frigates, HMS Akbar, left station to water and the enemy frigates took the opportunity of its absence to evade HMS Bucephalus and sail away.
Sat 14th Dec 1811
Lord Thomas Cochrane has returned from the Mediterranean and introduced his House of Commons motion to investigate the Malta Prize Court. He says if the Admiralty Courts could properly distribute prize money without enormous deductions for ‘fees’, it would be possible to achieve all Britain’s aims for its Royal Navy with only one third of the ships we presently use. He said he had evidence that the Judge of the Malta Court had unilaterally changed the tariff of court fees.
Our sailors are human beings - if they get the rewards they expect, they will be better motivated to serve the national interest, he said
He said there had been cases in which the Court took half the value of a prize in ‘fees’ and one appalling case in which they took nearly all of the proceeds. He read a letter from an officer on the East India station who had been deprived of his reward by the vice-Admiralty Court of Bombay which took the entire proceeds of the prize in ‘fees’. He noted in that case that the Bill of Costs had been taxed and reduced by 50 Crowns but the costs of taxation were 85 Crowns. This was a case in which the captured vessel had been formulaically valued at 8,608 Crowns but the actual nett proceeds of sale were 1,900 Crowns.
Cochrane was aware that Capt Bentham had protested the court costs of 3,767 Crowns relating to one of his prizes and threatened to have a question asked in parliament, whereupon the Court agreed to deduct 3,500 Crowns and settled for costs of only 267 Crowns.
Judicial costs were fixed in three enactments of the 39th, 41st and 45th of George III and should invariably be followed, Cochrane thought.
Yorke, for the Admiralty, said getting papers from Malta would take time and the matter would be set down for debate next session.
Sir John Nicholl noted that any appeal from the decisions of the Malta Prize Court lay with the King-in-Council.
Cochrane thought the office of Proctor and Marshall should not be combined in one man. The Malta Proctor had charged him for services done by the Marshall. He sought to have his costs taxed by Judge Sewell but was referred back to the Proctor who said his Bill of fees had been passed and could not now be reviewed. Cochrane had complained at that and was then arrested for ‘contempt of Court’ and gaoled. He escaped and reward notices were posted throughout Valletta offering £200 for his apprehension. Relying on the authority of the Burdett case, he asked the Speaker to confirm that the privileges of the House (and jurisdiction of his Writ) extended beyond the Houses of Parliament without limit.15 Cochrane’s motion to investigate the Malta Prize Court was rejected without a vote.
Sat 25th Jan 1812
The prize fund from the invasion of Batavia remains unknown. The naval Prize Agent says discoveries of public property are still being made and he cannot yet make-up his accounts. Our chief regrets relate to the burning of part of the stock of spices, the destruction of marine stores and the escape of several frigates, which latter was accomplished with the help of some Dutch residents. We fear a large shipment of treasure was taken away in those frigates. The only warship we captured was the 18-gun brig Surabaya.
Raffles proposes to allow many of the Dutch army/navy officers to remain. Many of them have local wives and families. Only the French contingent are being entirely removed and most of them have already reached Calcutta.
Sat 22nd Feb 1812
Lord Thomas Cochrane is still fighting his lonely battle against the costs of administering the law in Prize Courts. He says the Treasurer of the Navy wrote to Capt Mason of HMS Fishguard that the expenses of adjudication are the same regardless of the value of a prize. The Treasurer said the naval officers’ interests are better cared for by the King’s Proctor than by private Prize Agents. Cochrane noted that over 1,000 cases had been litigated – its was clearly beyond the control of one man. He said of the 300-odd cases still before the Courts today, only 92 were Royal Navy cases and the rest were on behalf of Privateers, presumably that select company of 20-odd British ships that had been granted Letters of Marque.
Cochrane thought the whole business of fees was out-of-control. He had just heard that the Attorney General gets 22 guineas in fees automatically for every case registered in the Court of Appeal whether he attends or not.
He had received details of a case in which the captors had a prize which realised £163 and after adjudication the captors were in debt to the Court for £111 for costs in excess of the Prize value.
The Royal Navy and Privateers were choosing not to arrest neutral ships because of the likelihood of litigation and its attendant expense. They concentrated their efforts on French or Dutch ships. This meant the purpose of prize taking, ‘to distress the King’s enemies’, was not being fully met.
The King’s Proctor had a rule that fees should be moderate in all successful cases and should be taxed in all unsuccessful ones – what does that mean, he asked.16 He had examined the first 19 entries in the Proctor’s Prize Book and the fees never exceeded 8 guineas but he was personally familiar with two of those cases – the Two Sisters and the Experiment - and knew the costs of each were near £600 of which the Proctor’s take must have been about £500 each. Cochrane thought the whole system of ‘Doctor’s Commons’ was injurious to the Navy. He felt confident that a revision of the system would produce £5 millions more a year in distributable prize money than the present system produced. By restoring value to prize-taking, he thought the country could operate on a Navy half its present size as the officers would be better motivated.
He particularly objected to Prize Courts overseas. It was notorious that all the business of the King’s Proctor was done by bribery (‘no, no’ from the Treasury benches) and he would prove it. Capt Skene paid £500 to clerks of the Proctor to get service whilst the Captain of HMS Lapwing did not. The cases were contemporaneous and Skene’s prize was instantly condemned whilst the Lapwing’s prize case is today still buried under a mountain of paper.
Cochrane was particularly unhappy that Naval Officers had to use the King’s Proctor whilst the hooligans who operated privateers out of Gibraltar and Malta could employ any one of a large number of Agents.
He thought one step that would improve experience was to publish the Table of Court Fees prominently. The list of Malta Fees had just emerged after 5 years in a locked drawer, he said. Another notice adding one third to the authorised fees was displayed in the Barrister’s Robing Room. Cochrane thought the House should discover what the Proctor means by ‘moderate fees’ and just how much is he taking each year.
Rose for the Admiralty said the £500 paid by Capt Skene had been for enquiries made by the Proctor’s clerks to better establish his case. It was not a bribe. He had a letter of satisfaction from the captors to prove it.
Capt Farquhar MP said the Proctor’s charges are very reasonable.
Cochrane said the entire officer corps of the Royal Navy knew they were being cheated and the House should investigate. Not to do so is a disgrace.
Sir J Nicholls said Cochrane has moved this subject previously and got 6 votes in support.17
Sat 29th Feb 1812
House of Lords, 21st June – The Army Prizes Bill is being debated. This is a Bill to prevent abuse of the prize system:
Suffolk says that at present c. £250,000 is held by Army Prize Agents which should be distributed to captors. The existing arrangements give no interest on payment. One Agent had held £10,000 for 8 years and might have doubled his money, he said. He thought all prize money should be collected by a special government agency. Admiral Nelson once told Suffolk that he never got all the prize money due to him. Field Marshal Beresford who is doing such important work in Iberia, had £27,000 in prize money but he gave it to a relative for speculation and it was said to have been entirely lost.
The distribution of naval prize money is necessarily delayed because there are so many cases, over 1,000 are being adjudicated right now, but army prize money arose more infrequently and should be processed quicker.
Nevertheless, we don’t want the naval system for the army. The King’s Proctor is overwhelmed with cases and gets £20,000 – 30,000 a year in fees. There should be many more Proctors for army claims.
The Earl of Liverpool disagreed. This Bill is to divert unpaid Prize Money to the Chelsea Hospital not to address the problems in prize-money distribution and dry-up a source of charitable funds. Suffolk said it was shameful that the Bill referred to the transfer of only 6,000 Crowns (£1,500) to the hospital when the amount actually held as unpaid was 8,000 Crowns.
The Lord Chancellor said the Judge and Proctor of the Admiralty Prize Court had both been examined by the House of Lords but Doctor’s Commons (a prize court) was an arrangement that is generally agreed to be free of venality.
Suffolk said he would bring further evidence in the next session.
Sat 28th Mar 1812
On 30th May 1811, the London Admiralty Court passed judgment in the prize case of the American merchant ship Fox:
The ship was captured on 15th Nov 1810 whilst en route from Boston to Cherbourg. The interested naval officers base their claim on the Order-in-Council of 26th April 1809. They merely have to establish that the ship is trading with the enemy. The ship- and cargo-owners say the British government agreed to repeal the Order once France repealed the Berlin and Milan Decrees. As those Decrees had been repealed, they say, the Order was equally extinct and no action is maintainable. Alternatively, the defendants plead that, if the Order is still valid, they have equitable grounds for relief.
The Court was asked to rule on the conflict of the Law of Nations with the domestic law of England (by Orders-in-Council - whereby the King and his Privy Council make law). The American defendants believe they are not obliged to know the laws of every country they trade with; it is sufficient for them to know the law governing international maritime trade (the Law of Nations). This case involves their ship whilst sailing on the High Seas well beyond the national jurisdiction of any particular state. They expect the Court to uphold the principles of international law.
The Admiralty Court adjudicates the King’s legislative power in much the same way as the Common Law Courts adjudicate Acts of Parliament.
The Court categorises the Orders-in-Council relative to prize-taking as retaliatory Orders - they respond to the acts of other states, in this case the French enemy. If they could not be categorised as retaliatory Orders they would cease to be enforceable. The Court agrees that evidence of French repeal of the Decrees would extinguish the rationale for the Orders. This evidence should be by a Declaration of the French government on behalf of France herself.
The nature of the French act that induced the Order-in-Council is also relevant. It must likewise have been in breach of the Law of Nations. If the French act was merely an exercise of domestic policy it could not justify the British government in pursuing an illegal response. The Court must assume that the Legislature maintains the current law. If the Orders have not been repealed, the cause of their enactment must be assumed judicially to still operate.
Defence counsel has alluded to occasions on which this Court has modified the terms of the Orders. In the Lucy this Court ruled that all ships transferred by an enemy to a neutral flag were liable to confiscation during war. What the Court has done is not to modify law but to protect the principle of exact retaliation. The Order of 26th April 1809 was passed expressly to provide reciprocity for the prior French act. If, in certain circumstances, the French do not assert a right, we will likewise withhold that right from Plaintiffs under the Orders. Whenever there is a French exemption there will be a British exemption. There is some precedent for the belief that this Court has presumed a revocation when no revocation was in fact extant. Those decisions are no authority. It is also true that this Court may anticipate a revocation where it has been declared to be government’s policy but is yet to be formally enacted.
The American Government, which is interested in this case, has adopted the position that it does not expect this Admiralty Court to rule on the legality or otherwise of the Order but it does expect the ministry to repeal it.
The Defendants have drawn the Court’s attention to the Baltic Order-in-Council whereby the British ministry gave an immunity to capture to the Swedish mercantile marine whilst trading within the Baltic Sea. This Court held that that Order had been revoked when the Swedish people replaced their King with Bernadotte18 and the character of the Baltic states changed from allies to enemies of this country. It was considered unnecessary to await its specific revocation when Britain had already made a general Declaration of War.
Even if there are decisions that presume revocation, it is still necessary for the Defendants to show that this is such a case.
The Defendants have not established a revocation of the French Decrees. They have produced no Edict, no references to cases decided after revocation – nothing for the Court to take notice of. They have adduced the sole case of the New Orleans Packet but it was presented in such a minimalist way as to preclude all reliance on it.
The French Government has repeatedly characterised its Decrees as fundamental laws of its Empire. They have been thus described since the facts of this case occurred. The Declaration of the Duc de Cadore (the French foreign minister) mentions a conditional revocation, which condition has not been complied with. This Court respects the Acts of foreign governments. It understands that the American government has taken a different view but it cannot willy nilly follow the American lead unless it is equally convinced of the case. The Duc de Cadore’s Declaration is awash with stipulations that cannot conceivably be met. Even if there had been a clear revocation in the Duc’s Declaration, it was moderated by the Duc permitting the British government until 2nd Feb to revoke the Orders. Clearly in matters of reciprocity, the dates of revocation by each side should be more or less contemporaneous. So we have a doubtful ‘revocation’ by the French and no revocation by the British. This Court inevitably concludes that no revocation has yet occurred.
Defence Counsel (Herbert) has noticed that British subjects are Licensed to trade with the enemy. Their boats are allowed through the blockade which the British Navy maintains outside all French ports. Thus British subjects are exempt from a restraint of trade that is harshly exercised on the people of other nations. The Court agrees that a blockade established for the purpose of monopolising a nation’s maritime trade is illegal but queries whether the blockade of French ports should be considered under the Law of Blockade at all. It is true that huge numbers of Licences have been granted to British merchants to trade with France but in the absence of a Licence, the trade is illegal. Most of these Licences are issued to foreign-flag ships. The British blockade of France is not governed by the common rules of blockade. It is a retaliatory measure enacted to respond to the enemy’s prior initiative. France declared that the people of Europe should have no trade with Britain and Britain responded with the same restraint on trade with France. Neutrals accordingly cannot trade with France because France forbids them to trade with England.
Turning to the argument in equity, the American government has been misled by a misrepresentation of France. Effectively it has been defrauded. That is sufficient to exclude these Defendants from an equitable defence although they might have rights under another action against either / both the French or American governments.
From the Defence documents it is apparent the ship cleared Boston with its destination publicly declared. They knew at departure that the British blockade was then in place. The documents show they hoped it might have been raised before their arrival at Cherbourg. They were willing to take the risk of capture because they were tempted by the commercial advantage of arriving in France first. The Defence Counsel has said that evidence of a formal French revocation of the Decrees has just been received in Paris by the American minister there. This is fundamental to a judicial decision in this case and I therefore withhold judgment until the papers are made available to this Court.19
Sat 2nd May 1812
A vast amount of the prize property taken from the Dutch at Batavia still remains for sale. An American ship recently took 80,000 piculs (133 lbs per picul) of prize coffee at $4 per picul. Prize sugar is selling at $3.50 a picul. There remains in stock 200,000 piculs of coffee, 80,000 piculs of sugar, 2,500 piculs of Japanese camphor, 9,000 piculs of black pepper, 10,000 piculs of Banca tin and a large quantity of teak logs, teak planks, Japan wood, beeswax, cotton thread, indigo and various spices.
Sat 1st Aug 1812
Lord Cochrane’s ‘egregious complaints’ about the administration of Prize Courts has earned his family a ministerial prosecution.20 A search of the India Company’s records discovered something to stick-on his uncle Basil who has been convicted in London:
Basil Cochrane commenced business for the India Company at Madras in May 1769. In 1797 he became paymaster to the Madras forces. Soon afterwards he returned to England. Prior to his promotion to paymaster, up to 1796, Cochrane and a colleague named Jackson had the contract to provision HM ships and they received 5% commission from the navy on all trades. At that time the Admiralty supplied all seamen with 2 ounces of tea a week. Gardner, the senior naval officer on Madras station, ordered the tea from Basil who charged 2/6d per lb plus 5%, however Basil had bought the tea from M/s Lee & Shaw, China traders of Madras, for 2/- a lb. An Agent gets commission, a merchant does not. Basil was first a merchant and later an Agent. By assuming both roles, he got 25% profit on tea sales to the navy.
In his defence, Basil said he financed M /s Lee and Shaw to buy their tea direct from China and that involved him in expense. He was found guilty and ordered to repay £2,600 to the Navy being his 20% loading on purchase price.
Sat 1st Aug 1812
Its tough to be a shipowner in the coasting trade these days. The Happy Maria sailed from St Bria to St Malo with a salt cargo. Passing Ile d’Yeu she was taken by an English privateer and ransomed for £2,000. Four days later another British privateer ransomed her again for £2,000. The following day a third British privateer asked for money. The shipowner had none left. The third privateer seized the two ransom receipts, off-loaded the French crew into a passing Swedish ship, and took away the ship and salt cargo, probably to Plymouth.
Ransoming has become more popular than prize-taking as rewards are faster than formal prize distributions.
Sat 22nd Aug 1812
We did very well at Jog Jakarta for prize money. We found $800,000 Spanish in the Treasury and there was also a heap of gold and jewels which is estimated to be worth about $1 million. These seizures together equate with £500,000 and constitutes the best prize money we have had for some years. Sepoys will get $26, Lieutenants $2,831 and the Lt Colonel gets $16,984.
Sat 26th Sept 1812
The treasure taken at Jog Jakarta is calculated to be worth 4 million Rupees. Most of it has been distributed amongst the expeditionary force.
Wed 19th May 1813 Extraordinary
Calcutta 16th May – The Betsey (Chardon) was the only American ship in the Hooghly at the time that the Declaration of War by America was notified to India. Chardon was released on his parole; the crew are detained in the fort; the ship and cargo are arrested.
Sat 12th June 1813
The American ship Alligator has been seized as prize at Calcutta. Her British Licence is suspected to have been forged. The crew have been imprisoned in the fort and will be sent to Europe on the next Extra ship.
Sat 7th Aug 1813
The French Navy does not seem to understand the attractions of prize-taking. Perhaps their Prize Courts are less accommodating.
The French frigate La Gloire captured four small British warships off Brest in Dec 1812. She made them throw their guns overboard and accepted a cartel signed by all the officers permitting the exchange of a similar number of Frenchmen. She then released them.
Two days later she captured the British merchant ship Minerva from Surinam with a cargo of coffee, cotton and sugar worth 600,000 Francs. She took off the crew and sank the ship with her cargo.
Whilst doing so the American ship Powathan arrived. She was prize to HMS Horatio with a small British crew aboard. The French captain renounced his rights to her and returned the Powathan to her American Captain, who was a prisoner on board his own ship.
Sat 18th Sept 1813
A couple of American ships have been captured off St Helena. The Derby was caught returning to America from China with a valuable cargo worth £40,000. Another American was captured by HMS Sir Francis Drake (Peachey).
Sat 30th Oct 1813
Notice, 29th Oct - The recent Prize Acts create licences to regulate Prize Agents and mitigate abuses in the distribution of shares. The licensed Agents M/s Francis Brothers and M/s James Leith are handling many claims for absent claimants and have appointed Shotton Calder & Co as their Bombay agents. Prize money will continue to be payable only in England.
Sat 30th Oct 1813
Notice, 30th Oct - The Commissioners appointed by the British Treasury for the care of American ships and cargoes condemned as Droits of the King since 13th Oct 1812 have appointed John Leckie as their Bombay agent. Anyone in Bombay who controls arrested American ships or cargoes, or holds the proceeds of their sale, should hand-over the property to Leckie for the Treasury.
Sat 12th March 1814
Governor Nepean of Bombay (formerly the Admiralty insider) has formed a committee to consider the distribution of prize money from sale of public goods captured at Broach in the recent Mahratta War. They recommend native rank & file (R&F) get 2/3rds of a share and European R&F get one share. The list continues up to majors at 240 shares and Lieutenant Colonels at 350 shares. All claims should be presented before 1st March 1815.
Sat 12th March 1814
The unrestrainable Lord Cochrane, has launched another scathing attack in the House of Commons on the administration of the Royal Navy and called for an enquiry. He says our warships are being disproportionately captured by the Americans because our crews are dispirited and amotivated by harsh conditions and lack of promotion prospects. Promotions are now made by parliamentary influence and usually involve corruption. We should revive the promotion of men by merit, he said.
He also reverted to a favoured topic - all naval seamen have difficulty recovering their wages and prize money.
Croker, Secretary of the Admiralty, said it was an exaggeration. Some seamen misbehave but the majority are good men. They are better fed now than ever before. The new practice, whenever a ship returned to its home port, was to pay a part of the wages earned and permit seamen to go home. If they were Irish or Scottish they got extra time for the journey. Since instituting this system there had been fewer desertions.
Croker characterised Cochrane’s complaint as a treasonable libel on the Navy, the House of Commons and the country. And he accused Cochrane and some of his family of corruption.21
Only Sir Francis Burdett voted with Cochrane.
Tues 5th July 1814 Extraordinary
One of the last great prizes of this long war was made off the Azores in late Jan/early Feb 1814. A British squadron took the Spanish prize of a French frigate. It had been coming from Lima to Cadiz and had £2 million (220 tons) in silver on board.
Sat 9th July 1814
The Bengal brigs Betsey, Mary and Favourite have all been captured off the west coast of Sumatra by the American privateer Hyder Ali of Boston. The name of this privateer seems intended to offend us. All the crews of the three brigs were put ashore at Tapanooly. They say they heard that three other privateers are in the vicinity and the USS Constitution is cruising off Malabar.
USS Essex has captured eight of our whalers off the Galapagos Islands. 7,000 – 8,000 barrels of whale oil have been lost. Three of the whalers have been fitted out as additional cruisers to the Essex. The Galapagos is a popular watering and provisioning stop for south sea shipping. The islands are uninhabited but abound in turtle and other delicacies.
Sat 6th Aug 1814
The Boston privateer Jacob Jones (John Roberts) took the Bombay ship Adele in Pontianak harbour (west Borneo). He took out 40 chests of opium and the piecegoods and permitted the Adele to continue. These American privateers are provisioning at Manila. There are at least three cruising around Borneo.
Sat 13th August 1814
HMS Doris has brought the American merchant ship Hunter to Bombay to be condemned. She captured the prize on 18th March off Macau. There is now an Admiralty Jurisdiction at Bombay.
Sat 13th August 1814
The American privateer Hyder Ali has been captured by the Royal Navy and two interesting documents were discovered on board. They are from the owners M/s Bryant & Sturgis in Portland to the commander Nicholas Thorndike. The Royal Navy Commissioner at Madras has published them for the information of British warships and privateers:
24th Jan 1814 – This deals with your management of our ship. Privateering is a commercial not an honourable venture. You are not to seek out fights with enemy warships but to avoid them and capture enemy merchant ships.
These are your trading instructions. We give you two Letters of Credit each for $20,000 – one on Perkins & Co of Canton and the other on M/s Samuel Grey, Charles Saunders and Thomas Ward, guaranteed by William Gray of Boston. Go to Manila, check the market and the exchange rates, get the best return available on your Bills and buy a cargo of indigo. Then come home via Cape Horn.
If the market or exchange is unworkable at Manila, go to Canton where you may readily negotiate Bills. You may employ Perkins & Co at Canton, if their commission is 2% or less, as Mr Cushing is experienced and reliable. Your ship will carry about 3,000 chests of tea. Buy Congou or Champoi either of which will sell here if war continues or in Holland if war ends. We have no objection to 1-2 year-old teas if the quality is good but they should be of the lowest prices as you will have to pay top-dollar for insurance. If tea is expensive you may draw on us for your deficit up to $10,000.
Get in and out of the Canton River as quickly as possible. If you leave before October head for the Bashi Channel, steer north to Lat 35º and ride the wind across the Pacific, pass Hawaii well to its east and turn for Tahiti, thence directly to Cape Horn; if you leave after October, head south for Sunda Straits and give Mauritius and the African Cape a wide berth.
To get into Canton, steer for the Grand Lima Islands then turn north with the islands south west of you and head straight in as fast as you can. The Chinese river boatmen will tell you all you need to know about patrolling warships. You are safe in the inner harbour of Macau or within the Bocca Tigris. You are not safe in Taipa Roads or the estuary.
The risk of your capture is greater at Canton than Manila and you go there only as a last resort but Manila is also dangerous in so far as quality of cargo is concerned. Sgd Thomas Ward.
The second letter contains the privateering instructions. It reveals the nature of British trade in Asia:
Captain Thorndike is advised to sail to Aceh and sail down the south west coast of Sumatra disguised as an English merchantship. He is to visit each port along the coast and check what vessels have visited and what cargo they have. The British routinely exchange opium and piecegoods for gold dust and silver. They usually return to Bengal in June. Beware of any vessel getting information of your presence to Penang (the nearest British naval base).
If Sumatra is lucrative come straight home; if not, cautiously patrol the western entrance to Malacca Straits or sail through those Straits for Banca, Borneo etc. Rhio (Riau) has valuable ships all year long, especially June – Aug, and seldom any warships.
There is a great trade in opium and piecegoods from Bengal to the west coast of Borneo (mainly Pontianak) where it is exchanged for gold and silver. The ships arrive in March and leave by about July. They often stop at Rhio on their return leg to sell-off any remaining goods and buy tin.
If your potential victims are in port they will send their gold ashore as soon as they are aware of your presence - to address this, arrest the ship anyway and ransom it for the gold.
Moluccan spices are taken to India in August. A good place to collect them is at Bonthain Bay, south of Celebes, from whence the carrying ships sail south passed Komodo. All the spice trade sails this route.
Whenever you ransom the ship for the cargo, ensure you take a certificate from the master that the cargo is British and is given voluntarily. Take all the papers covering the ship and cargo and bring them home. You have 50 crew although your ship can be adequately manned by 30 men. The extras are to crew any prizes you take and decide to retain.
On the Atlantic side of the Cape of Good Hope, all British shipping encountered will be valuable. If you capture any of these, we would prefer you to man them and bring them home. You must give your Prize Master a copy of your Commission and write your orders to him on the back. Give him all the papers found on board the prize but seal them in a package first. If your prize is manned by Lascars you can safely leave a few of them on board – they will work for anyone.
When you return to America, time your arrival on this coast for November when the sea is rough, the nights are long, daylight reduced and the British cruisers remain in port. You may return earlier if, after paying costs of the voyage, all prize shares and duties etc., you still have $50,000 balance for owners.
Sat 20th Aug 1814
Letter from Canton, 11th May – On 8th May HMS Doris (O’Brien) chased an American schooner from New York up the Pearl estuary and into the river. The American was faster than HMS Doris and succeeded in reaching Whampoa where she anchored. HMS Doris than sent her boats with 70 men into the river and captured the American ship. Only one British seaman was killed but several of the Americans died. HMS Doris cut the American’s cables to remove her from Chinese jurisdiction but the ship went aground in the river and the British abandoned her.
There are reportedly several American ships amongst the Ladrone islands waiting an opportunity to enter the river. HMS Doris is lurking in the estuary to catch them should they try to enter port.
Sat 22nd Oct 1814
Admiral Stirling has been convicted at Court Martial of charging fees of merchant ships for convoy protection and irritating the merchants. He remains an Admiral.
He was the senior officer at Jamaica. He appointed Atkinson Bayles & Co of Kingston as his agents. Initially the Agent set a fee of $2,000 being 2½% on a cargo of specie shipped to another Caribbean island. Thereafter, the sum of $2,000 became a customary fee for all subsequent freight of bullion and convoy services. Stirling’s punishment is to be put on the half-pay list. He is to be denied any future promotion.
Sat 24th Dec 1814
USS Syren took two Guineamen from Liverpool on the African West Coast run. She took-off their cargoes of ivory and sank them. Soon afterwards HMS Medway encountered and captured USS Syren and has sent her in to the Cape for condemnation.
Mon 6th Feb 1815 Extraordinary
Lord Cochrane, who was ejected from his seat in the House of Commons for his criminal conviction, has been ‘unanimously’ re-elected by the Westminster electorate. In his defence in the House of Commons, Cochrane was scathing about the Judiciary in his prosecution and asserted he was not guilty and was convicted due to the malignity of the ministry – specifically a conspiracy by Melville at the Admiralty with Ellenborough the Chief Justice. His alleged offence was to have received information of a French emissary named de Bourgh arriving at Dover to sue for peace and using that information to profit from the likely effect of that information on the funds.
According to Cochrane, Ellenborough found the other five defendants guilty but, as all six were said to have conspired, he added Cochrane’s name as well noting he might appeal if he wished (an appeal required the other five’s approval, due to the costs aspect, and would be both difficult procedurally and expensive). Cochrane said the judicial finding was unjust and the sentence excessive – it was a put-up job. He reiterates his innocence and objects the payments to prosecution witnesses and the communications between ministers and the Committee of the Stock Exchange. He notes that the type of conspiracy alleged is routinely heard in the Old Bailey before a common jury but he was tried by a special tribunal with a special jury that was carefully selected by the prosecution.22
He attributes the attempt to disgrace him to his earlier revelations of ministerial corruption at the Admiralty. A few days after his expulsion, de Beringer, the man whose evidence obtained the convictions, published a confession saying he erred from mistaken principles. It was Cochrane Johnstone who proposed the stock-jobbing, noting it was a daily event on the Exchange. de Beringer was merely the frontman for a small fee whereas Cochrane Johnstone was to get all the profit and restore the losses that had derived from their previous speculation.23 Cochrane has published his letters to evidence his refutation of the charge.
Sat 4th March 1815
The American privateer Hyder Ali has been condemned and auctioned for 25,000 Rupees to Fairlie Ferguson & Co.
Sat 26th Aug 1815
Privateering has been a lucrative business to the maritime states of New England. The owners of one Boston privateer have cleared $600,000 during this short war (the War of 1812). The particularly high profitability stems from the dearth of British and colonial goods in the American market – privateers can sell their prize cargoes for top dollar.
Sat 11th July 1818
The amount of silver coming out of Mexico is fabulous. At Jamaica since the peace of 1814, the amount of freight on bullion sent to London exceeds £300,000. Freight on British warships is normally about 1 - 2% of value – that suggests $15 millions in silver and gold has been shipped to London from Jamaica in the last three years. One third of the freight money goes to CiC West Indies.
Sat 8th July 1820
There is a dispute over the distribution of prize money won in the recent Mahratta War. It has been referred to the Regent and by him to the Duke of Wellington. In the former Mahratta War of 1803, the Bengal and Madras armies were combined although one operated in Hindustan and the other in the Deccan. The Bengal army under Lord Lake acquired considerably more property than the Madras army under Arthur Wellesley. At that time the Bengal officers declined to combine their plunder with Madras and each army was paid its own prize money. The same difficulty has again arisen and this time the Madras army demands arbitration.
Sat 15th July 1820
Bombay Castle, 23rd May 1820 – a further payment of 15,465 Rupees in the Seringapatam Prize money is distributed by the Prize Committee.
Sat 14th Oct 1820
The prize money dispute between the Madras and Bengal armies concerning the late Pindari or Maratha Wars has been referred to the King-in-Council for resolution. The Company has entered its usual claim for 50% of the proceeds.
Sat 13th Jan 1821
And talk of prize money? No, not a word
For though the gallant fellows well have won it
And sacrificed their youth and health – and heard
How much they may fairly expect upon it;
No hand to make e’en dividends is stirred
And they who ought to do it seem to shun it!
Look back to Amulnair, Bhurtpore and Kurry.
You’ll find Prize Agents seldom in a hurry.
Letter to the Editor – will any of the Prize Agents refute this poetic assertion that is published in the Gazette? What has happened to those many hundreds of thousands of Rupees that were realised by the army in the late Pindari war? Subalterns were told long ago to expect thousands of Rupees each.
Sat 21st April 1821
Captain Robertson is auctioning a huge collection of jewels at Poona using the good offices of the Company’s Collector in the Peshwa’s lands. It may be part of the seizures made in the Pindari War.24 There are 1,000+ pearls, 200+ diamonds and 100+ emeralds. The auction is 1st May.
Sat 5th May 1821
Notice of Prize distribution, 26th April – The 2,500 men under Colonel Imlack are assessed to share 11,430 Rupees from the Concan part of the Pindari War. The Prize Agent gets 432 Rupees; Imlack gets one sixteenth = 714 Rupees; and the rest is distributed to the officers and men.
Sat 22nd Sept 1821
HMS Icarus arrived at Portsmouth from Pernambuco on 25th May and reports Lord Cochrane and General san Martin have captured Lima. This is the city in which the Royalists had concentrated their treasure and the prize money is fabulous.
HMS Icarus brought only £40,000 in silver but her captain says there is £2½ millions (280 tons) at Pernambuco awaiting a frigate for shipment.25
Sat 16th March 1822
Notice, 11th March - Cap 61 of the last parliament enacted that all unclaimed prize-money payable to members of the Company’s forces is to be appropriated to the Company. The army’s money will be paid into Lord Clive’s Fund whilst the navy’s money will go to the Poplar Seamen’s Hospital. Prize agents are to make payment to the appropriate charity within six months of this notice.
Sat 23rd March 1822
Cap 61’s treatment of prize money was mentioned in the 16th March edition above. It applies to prize money, head money, bounty money, salvage money and all booty derived from warlike service of the Indian army or navy.
Accounting for receipts of prize money is to be done on Oath (thus making false declarations matters of perjury). It exempts all prize accounts which have been lawfully closed.
The Company’s power to enforce this law is equivalent to the Admiralty jurisdiction in England but jurisdiction of offences is retained in England irrespective of the location of the prize fund.
Sat 22nd June 1822
John Bull in the East says George IV has pressed Lord Hastings (Moira) to accept that part of the Indian prize-money that is due to him from the wars with the Marathas during his rule. He formerly refused to accept it although it should be a considerable sum. If Hastings does not take his, it pressures the Generals to decline theirs too. The money would then be considered a droit of the Crown and go to the King’s Civil List.
Sat 13th July 1822
Wood, the secretary of Sir Thomas Hislop, is returning to India as Prize Agent.
Sat 8th March 1823
The first estimates of the prize-money from the war in the Deccan are arriving from London and they are rather promising. It is expected Sir Thomas Hislop will receive £200,000 and a subaltern about £2,000. Payments are said to be likely to commence in Jan 1823.
Sat 21st June 1823
The dispute over shares of the prize-money from the Deccan War has reached the Treasury Chambers where the Prime Minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer and three nobles are adjudicating the claims of Governor-General Hastings (Moira) and the Grand Army on the one part and Sir Thomas Hislop and the Army of the Deccan on the other.26
They wish to base their apportionment on actual captures as suggested by Hastings. On that division the Poona, Mahidpore and Nagpore loot goes mainly to the Deccan Army. The claim of the India Company for an over-riding 50% has been dismissed. This payment featured in all previous prize distributions in India. A commission is appointed to calculate the precise details. (on the proposed basis, Hislop’s own share is about £300,000)
1 Spanish accounts include other merchandise - alpaca wool, seal skins, tin and copper - and put the value higher – a cargo list for La Medee, La Mercedes, La Fama and la Clara is printed in the Bombay Courier.
As Britain is not at war with Spain the value of the seizures is not prize money and is legally considered a ‘droit’ of Admiralty, i.e. the King’s property, but compensation equivalent to prize money was later paid to the captors.
2 They later discovered the price was too modest and resolved to send the ship to London. Governor Dundas responded that he really meant to offer £500,000
3 The captors want Sight Bills on London to get the money home – several of the Agency Houses, the Royal Navy and the Company all issue Bills. As noted earlier the Hong merchants of Canton pay a premium for Carolus dollars.
4 See the South America chapter and the main text for more information about Sir Home Popham.
5 This is an unexpected result for the Americans. The Court’s reference to the Law of Nations should irritate the British ministry. This decision is totally opposed to the sense and reasoning of similar cases in Doctors Commons, the London court dealing with most prize cases..
6 The Company effects these seizures safely and expeditiously because it receives advice from Europe overland more quickly than other European nationals.
7 A perceptive comment. Denmark remains the faithful friend of France throughout the war.
8 This was a frightful blow to British commerce but insufficient to induce peace.
9 Wilcocks was said to have deducted $300,000 from his debts to Hong merchants on account of this loss.
10 I published this article to indicate that at least this Indiaman had 25% Chinese crew. The Company actually has great difficulty crewing its ships. The Royal Navy often presses direct from Indiamen and the officers have to make-up their crews as best they can.
11 Head and gun money are substantial army prizes, payable on the numbers of soldiers and cannon taken in a conquered town.
12 These shipping statistics are misleading – much smuggling into Europe is done in British-owned ships with foreign registry and crews. The preponderance of Licensed Europe trade in British manufactures and colonial goods must be done in foreign bottoms.
13 In fact the Company is a buyer of girls in Indian slave markets for the entertainment of the men in the garrison towns, but that is a domestic matter.
14 In the then British administration it was advantageous to get one’s version in first and obtain a commitment of support from the ministry before the other party could influence any other power-holder.
15 See the Chapter on Libel for details of Burdett’s interesting case.
16 It has become common practise today. Successful cases always cost far more in fees than unsuccessful ones.
17 This is the beginning of the end for Cochrane in British public life. After a series of difficulties in London, including an anomalous prosecution of a relative, he adjourns to South America and becomes the Admiral of the Chilean Navy.
18 The French General married the sister of the ex-Queen of Spain
19 The new evidence was not presented and the Fox, and several other American ships whose condemnation depended on this case, were likewise condemned.
20 He was already suspect for offering assistance to Sir Francis Burdett in evading the Speaker’s Writ (see the libel chapter). He later leads a fun life as Admiral of successively Chile, Brazil and Greece.
21 Lord Cochrane is about to be indicted for conspiracy to manipulate share prices – it will remind him ‘he is one and they are many’.
22 Special juries were supplied from a list of 48 men selected by the Crown of whom 12 are picked to hear the case. Jurors get a guinea a case and they are said to often pay to get on the list. If they displease the Judge they are struck-off. Cochrane concludes he was not tried by a jury of his peers.
23 That Napoleon would beat Prussia and secure the service of that country’s army against the AustroRussian force. Such an event would cause British funds to lose value.
24 The Company’s army officers are incensed by the endless delay in distribution of prize money which is now at least partially outstanding back to Cornwallis’ wars.
25 See the South American chapter for better details of the independence struggles. There are in fact two British frigates on the South American west coast ‘for observations’.
26 Moira is a reluctant party to these proceedings. He had sought to forego his entitlement but that would have pressured other less reluctant officers to act likewise.