The National Register. — London, England, 1808-11-21 00:00:00

THE NATIONAL REGISTER, 748 " We thick it necessary tint: an enquiry should be made by the Cxeneral Officers hereinafter named, into the conditions of the said Armistice and Convention, and into all the causes and cir cnnistances ( whether arising from the previous operations of the British army or otherwise), which led to them, and into the conduct, behaviour and proceedings of the snid • Lieutenant- General Sir new Dalrymple, and of any other officer or officer vs no way have held the command of our troops in Portugal ; and of any other pet son or persons, as far as the same were c 0...- fleeted w ith the said Armistice and Convention, in order that the said General Olfice•rs may report to Us, touching the matters afore-aid tor our better information. Our will and pleasure therefore L, and we do hereby nominate and appoint the Gene va Officers of our Army, whose names are revectively mention ed in the list annexed, to he a Board, of which we do hereby app , tint General Sir David Dundas, K. Y, to be President, w ho are to meet accordingly for the purposes above-mentioned. — And you are hereby required to give notice to the said General Officers when and where they are to meet for the said examina tion and inquiry, and you are hereby directed to summon such persons as may be judged necessary by the said General Officers kwhetle..r the Geueral Officers employed in the Expedition, or others,) to give information ;ouching the said matters, or whose examination shall be desired by those employed in the said Ex pedition. And the said General Officers are hereby, directed to hear such persons as shall offer to give information touching the same, and they are hereby authorized,empowered, and required strictly to examine into the matters before-mentioned, and to report a state thereof as it shall appear to them, together with their opinion thereupon, and also with their opinion, whether any or what further proceedings should be had - tnereupon ; all which y - ou are to transmit to our Commander in Chief, to be by him laid before us for our consideration ; and for so doing this shail,as well to you as to our said General Officers, and all others concerned, be a sufficient Warrant. " Given at our Court at St. Jame 's this first day of N ovem. ber, 1508, in the 49th year ofour Reign. " By his Majesty's command, (Signed) " JAMES PULIENEY. 44 To our right trusty and well-beloved Counsellor, the lion. Richard Ryder, Judge-Advocate Genet al, or his Deputy. The Judge Advocate next read an official Copy of the Armis tice agreed upon between Lieut.-Gen. Sir A. Wellesley and Gen. Kellerman, the definitive Convention for the evacuation of Por ugal by the French Army, and of the other documents which atopelred in the London Gazette of Friday, the lfith ofSeptem ther last. A 1 - *c r a short consultation among the Members of the Board, the President observed, that in obedience to his Majesty's War rant, it was incumbent upon them to proceed with all conve nience to the examination of Witnesses, and in order to make the neees,ary arrangements, it would he proper for them to de liberate in private. The President then turning to the auditory, intimated, that a 5 it. was prohable there would not be any more busiocss of a pohlic nature transacted this day, it was the pleasure of the ioard that strangers should withdraw. The Court was accord iorly Strangers «•ere not re-admitted, and at half pact one the Court adjourned WI eleven o'clock on Thursday morning. SECOND DA Y. THURsDAY, NOVEmBEIt 17. The Court assembled this day at half past ten o'clock. It was afterwards engaged for about three quarters of an hour in private coibultation, after which the doors v%cie opened to the public, but the mode of access to those parts of the Court where it was possible to • judge with accuracy of what was going for ward, was so badly arranged, that it was filliV by the utmost exertion, and indeed, even at the hazard of life, that any person could venture to approach them. The business opened by the Judge Advocate reading certain letters which he had received from General Sir Hew Dalrym ple, and from Sir A. Wellesley, relative to the future proceed ings of the Court, and declaratory of their wish fully to meet the Inquiry, while, at the same time they craved certain evi dence in the hands of Ministers to be produced to the Court. letters, and the answer of Lord Castlereagh, agreeing to the request contained in thcm, being read, the Judge Advocate NOV. 0/. said, that he was desired by the Court, publicly to state it to be their whim's wish, to state the necessity of refraining from th e publication of any part of the proceedings of the• Court, not only till their conclusion, but till hip Majesty's pleasure .4 ) 0 4 be known, if any farther proceedings of a military nal me. were to take place, because, if any itch procerdingS were to he adopt. cd, justice to those implicated, required that the publiralio q should be kept hack till such, farther military pruceCding as it might be proper to adopt had also been concluded. The Judge Advocate then proceeded to read the. variou 9 Official Cm respondence between Lord C;otlereagh, Sir A. Wei. ley, Sir H. Dalrymple, Sir H. Burrard, Sir C. Cotton, Goirral Spencer, &c. and between these Otheeri among them-elve,, down to the dispatchie of the `list of September. this illlsl - the Court was orcopied till three o'clock. Sir Hew Dalrymple then came fora ard and addressed the Court. lie stated, that before he gave in the narratise o f hi s proceediags, which it was his inte.ai , m to lay hefw. +tic ('our., he felt himself called on to say a word or two hi vindication i•f* his character, which had been grassly aspersed in the public papers, to serve, as it would seem, the cause of a more fay..ur. Othcer. The Convention had been very getter:illy reprobated in this country, but be had no doubt that, in a short time, it would be inure favourably, because 1111M' justly, appreciated. By the publications in question, however, be the Contention ca lamitous or otherwise. he was represented as the sole author ois it ; that fr,an the moment of his arrival, he had had the stspii presumption to act in opposition to the plan of proceed previously agreed on, and to order it to be changed ; that So, had dashed the laurels from the brow of the Victor! And that Sir A. Wellesley had protested against, or at all esew, had strongly disapproved of, the terms of the Conventioa! —For himself, he had carefully abstained from stating any thing in the Public Papers, although he was nut ignorant that, previous to his quitting the army in Portugal, there were per sons at work there with similar imputations to those thrown out against his character in this country ! Ile had purposely sh stained from any newspaper appeals, reserving himself Inc this day, when he could with confidence, and with the candaur am, openness becoming a British Officer, state his case. lie tio,s pledged himself to that Court, and to his country, that sir Harry Burrard, Sir Arthur Wellesley and himself, were all present with Gieneral Kellerman when the Preliminaries of Convention of Cintra were discu-sect and settled, Sir A. Wel lesley bore that prominent part in the discussion, to which lite important situation he held in the country, the glorious victory he had lately gained, and the imporant iaformatiou, more par ticularly of a local nature, which he possessed, so well entitled him to assume. Ile, therefore, had discussed, and assented to, not only the principle of the Convention, hut the general detail , of it ; and so far from its being correct that Sir A. NVelleslev had signed the preliminasies by the order, or rather by tile compulsion, of hint (Sir H. Dalrymple), as had been insinuated, the fact was, that he himself was stepping up, for the pupa. of putting his own name to the preliminary articles, ss hen 1w was put rig,ht by General Kellerman in point of form, who re minded him that he, as Commander in Chief, could not sign a Preliminary Treaty, where the Officer on (heather side was only a tieueral of Division! Sir A. Wellesley then signed the Pre liminary Treaty, without any order from him, (Sir 11. Dal ey mple). The conversation, he agreed, was carried on in the French language, and it might be true, he believed it was, that General hellerman took minutes of it, As already said, how• ever, he had never inserted his own representations, or his own wishes, in the public prints. Ile had not, as was stated in hi, name, insisted on a COurt Martial. Ile was happy that no should meet a Court like the present, vs here his case would le! . fully gone into, and would not be checked by the trammels of legal proceedings. He was not afraid of any ingniry, being con vinced that his cause, and that of truth; would he found to so hand in hand. Ile assured the Court that he should not avail himself of the privilege of declining to answer any question, lest it should criminate himself ; on the contrary, lie should teel pleasure in the business being sifted to the bottom, and he himself should he ready to give every satisfaction which might be de manded of him, or which it was in his power to give. He ha t not, as already stated, demanded a Court Martial, and one reason_ for it was, because no charges of a distinct nature had !wed u r g ed against him. If his conduct had been so called in question as to have rendered it necessary for him to insist on a Court-Mar tial, it would have been incumbent on him to have called i o h s is defence of the Officers of note engaged at present in Spain amt t Portugal. Ile was happy to say, however, that , a t pres' ''' s no °Sheer was abseut front his did ) on his (Sir 11. Dalr,s 1 V