The Sun.
London, England, 1856-12-29 00:00:00

TO TkIN RDITOR OF Till SUN.

SlR,—The honourable testimony officially given
by the First Minister of the Crown in regard to
the conduct of a late Commander-in-Chief of her
Majesty's naval forces in the Baltic, having been
subjected to severe non-professional criticism, I feel
it a duty to the Crown and to our country, as a
naval officer, to submit the following observations
to the judgment of the whole naval profession.
Admirals as enterprising and brave as any whose
deeds are recorded in history were employed during
the long war between 1793 and 1815. Yet hostile
fleets were passively blockaded by superior force in
bays and roadsteads, having wider entrances,
deeper water, and more capacious anchorages, less
effectually protected by forts and batteries than
those of Cronstadt—nevertheless there is not one
instance of an enemy's fleet having been destroyed
or even assailed in such positions under these more
favourable circumstances.
The attack on Algiers, garrisoned by inexperi-
enced barbarians, is not a case in point ; neither
was the capture of the Danish fleet at Copenhagen,
previous to a declaration of war, nor the naval ac-
tion in the Bay of St. Domingo (ill provided with
the means of offence), nor the battle of the Nile
any proof of the practicability of combustible ships
successfully contending with red-hot shot. No,
nor did the practicable success at Basque Roads
induce even the most sanguine officer there present
to anticipate greater good fortune than to escape
without material damage from the batteries of Aix,
whilst running through a channel half a league in
width into an anchorage nearly three leagues in
circumference, on the distant side of which the
enemy's squadron (driven on shore by fire vessels)
lay in a helpless condition.
Great blame has been imputed by self-constituted
naval critics to the disclosure made of the ineffi-
cient state of the crews of the Baltic fleet ; but I
respectfully submit to the judgment of my brother
officers, whether the fact ought not to be pressed on
public attention, with a view to the safety of our
country by promoting an unanimous call for a re-
currence to our former truly judicious navigation
laws thoughtlessly abolished.
Better would it have been had the Legislature
indemnified influential corporations, and the suffer-
ing shipping interest, out of the public purse and
by the remission of taxes on timber, hemp, and on
all that is used in ship building and navigation,
than to have lowered the pay of our gallant tars to
a parity with that of continental navigators, who
(with their families) can subsist on the most cost-
less food—on stock fish and train oil.
I announced six years ago* that eighty thousand
" blue jackets" had resorted to a foreign land,
where the absence of exactions insure remunera-
tive freights without resorting to the diminution of
wages. Since that period our coasting trade (once
highly prized as a nursery for seamen) has been
thrown open to alien navigators. How many more
of our gallant defenders have thus been forced to
follow the example of their transatlantic brethren
it would be important to ascertain, in order, with
greater zeal, to promote an unanimous expression
of public opinion in favour of liberal wages, and
against the fatal expedient, which must otherwise
be adopted— Navalthat of a Foreign Enlistment
Bill.
Having, through your favour, thus
publicly re-
quested a verdict from my brother officers, I deem
it proper to express my own opinion
rethhot shot, from half a hundred namely, that
at the bows of ships advancing narrow
channel, independent of carca,2„ugand shells
, showered from a thousandartillery (mid
amain , '
It is true that means of
in a few minutes, destroy any number of Ye'sels'
thca'nnohna directed
these hitherto
been communicated at
formidable methods of defencesettinga
defiance have
Govern-
ment—but it is equally aurieou s
that these important
means have failed to obtainr impartial consideration
by minds times to
or political objects,
pre-occupied by PartY
pressed by Powerful influence--such as produced
the expatriation of our unrepresented seamen, and
thus caused the vital interests of our country to be
overlooked. Thirty-three noble ships of the
Spanish line have I seen under weigh. Their
naval Power is now no more. Yet the causes of its
downfall were not so manifest as those which
threaten our naval service, and, consequently, our
national independence. I am, sir,
Your obliged and obedient servant,
London'
Dec. 27. DUNDONALD.

* Observations ou NATaI Affairs, published by Ridg.
way.