The Sun.
London, England, 1830-10-04 00:00:00

" We have said that the above statement, as far as

it goes, is correct; we mean correct as to the names
of the parties, the stations they filled, the offences
imputed to them, and the number of lashes they
received. But we do not mean to say that it con-
tains the names of all the men that were punished
on board the flow, during the interval alluded to.
Certainly not ; for, although we should not like to
swear to the exact number of men we saw flogged
on board that ship during the interval before alluded
to, we are, nevertheless, ready to make oath that
the statement does not contain the names of one
half the number of men we slaw flogged on board
the Howc, between the months of July, 1805, and
January, 1806: add to which, the log-book makes
no mention of the innumerable startings which were
daily, and, we might with truth say, hourly inflicted,
which were in many instances incomparably worse
than flogging.
. _ . . _

" After Ili; attentive examination of the statement
which we have inserted above, a reader not exactly
conversant with the subject, would, in all proba-
bility, ask how it came to pass that a man who had
merely behaved insolently and contemptuously to
his superior officer, should be punished with greater
severity than another man, who had struck his supe-
rior officer while that officer was in the execut ion, of
his office ? How it came to pass that drunkenness
and disrespect were visited with much greater seve-
rity than theft? And whether the word drunken-
ness was meant to imply that the parties were.habi-
tually drunkards ? In answer to the two first later-
o a
that the punishing of con-
tgreater severity than
striking,
of drunkenness and dis-
respectthan theft, were the
r con-
tempt
m cas na,d n we
insolence
un should
punishing s
with
the
et.
effect
of
withe "
In answer to the third interrogatory, i.e. what
aprifCre greater
atteird nothingseverity
but caprice.
is meant to be implied by
there can be no doubt that i the word drunkenness;
t should be taken in its
literal sense; which, according to Dr. Johnson, is
intoxication, inebriety—that is to say, that the
parties were detected in a state of intoxication. As
the offences imputed in the foregoing statement are
a fair sample of the offences for the committing of
which men are most frequently flogged on board of
a man-of-war, and indeed on board of any ship; and
as we can speak with certainty as to most of those
offences for which the men were flogged on board the
Howe, we shall proceed to narrate the circum-
stances which led to, and were connected with, the
flogging of the individuals named in the statement
to which we have so frequently had occasion to
allude.
" We begin, then, with Joseph Cratz—Joseph
Cratz was an ordinary seaman, and did his duty in
the after guard, or the waist, we do not exactly re-
member which, and occasionally assisted the purser's
steward; he was helping to weigh and sift bread,
when tempted to commit the offence, that very
venial offence, for the committing of which his de-
voted back was afterwards lacerated with two dozen
lashes. It so happened that the purser's steward
had to be absent from the steward's room a few'
minutes, and that there stood near unto Joseph
Cratz a black jack, in which there was a small
quantity of spirits. Now Joseph, having high
authority for believing that the ox should not be
muzzled when he treadeth out the corn, and that he
who laboureth in the vineyard should taste the juice
of the grape, and not having the fear of the gang-
way before his eyes, ventured to take advantage of
the steward's absence, anti to regale himself a little
with the exhilarating cordial he found in the black-
jack. Every man that has followed the sea must be
aware that there are men who, in consequence of a
weakly constitution, require little more than a glass
of grog and a kick of the breech, to make them quite
drunk, enough for an exhibition at the gangway.
" `The head and front of Joseph Craves offend-
ing
.bad that extent, and no mote. Joseph was not
habitually a drunkard, and therefore we at the time
thought, and still think, that his punishment fur,
very far, exceeded his offence; and yet his was not
the only back which had
to undergo the torture of
the lash ott account of his having misconceived the
privileges which attach to labouring in the vineyard.
On Joseph Cratz being interrogated as to how he
came by the liquor which he bad been drinking, and
which had caused him to become intoxicated, fear-
ing that his having ventured to help himself to a
tittle might be construed into a theft, he said
that purser's steward had given him the liquor
thegrog
which had made him unfit to do his duty. Poor
Carrington, than whom a more diligent or decent
fellow was not to be found on board of the ship, was
immediately hauled over the coals, for having Con-
travened a positive order of the captain's, which was
to the following effect :—" That the purser's
steward should not remunerate any body that assisted
him in the store-room, by giving them grog." In
vain the poor fellow urged that it was the first time
that he had contravened the order; that the drop
of weak grog which he bad given Cratz could not
possibly have made him drunk ; its vain he pleaded
his otherwise unimpeachable conduct, and that he
would be more cautious in future : the wrath of the

captain was not to be assuaged, and poor Carting.

• Why, we ask, should a specific offence be visited
with a reprimand only in some ships, while in others
only two dozeu lashes would not be considered suffc►ent
atonement ?