The Sun.
London, England, 1842-01-01 00:00:00

LORD PALI%JERSTON TO MR. STEVENSON,

Foreign-office, Aug. 27, 1841.
The undersigned, her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State
for Foreign Affairs, his had under his ,consideration the note
which Mr. Stevenson, Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Ple.
nipOtentiary of the United States, did him the honour to ad-
dress to him, under date of the 15th of May, 1840, complain-
ing of the detention of a brig under American colours, called
the Mary, by her Majesty's ship Forester.

In this note Mr. Ste-vensonn, assuming the information. fur-
nished to the United States Government by Mr. Trist, their
Consul at the Havannah, to he complete and correct, prefers a
claim for indemnity to ;he owner of the Mary, and asks for the
exemplary punishment of the commander of the Forester, and
those concerned in the proceedings taken by that officer against
the Mary, proceedings which, in Mr. Stevenson's opinion, seem
to want nothing to give them the character of a most flagrant
and daring outrage, and very little, if anything, to sink them
into au et of open and direct piracy.,
• 4-lirt-trfthirsi gittfetig" "link the honour to inform Mr. Steven-
son that the more -particular information which has been fur-
nished to her Majesty's Government, as to this vessel, places
the question in a very different light from that in which it has
been presented to th.s Government ePthe. United Sratos; and
the undersigned trusts that the following statement will satisty
Mr. Stevenson that, although the vessel herself, being ill built,
might not have been intended actually to convey negroes
the coast of Africa, yet she was in reality the property of a
Spanish slave-dealer, and was employed by him for the pur•
poses of slave trade.
The papers found on board this vessel by the commander of
the Forester showed that, on the 24th of January, 1839, a
bill of sale was prepared at the Hava.nnah by Mr. J. A. Smith,
the Vice-Consul of the United States at that port, setting
forth that a permahent American register (No. 48) had been
granted to the brig Mary, of Philadelphia, on the 17th of June,
1837, and that the brig was at that time owned by Jossph
Snowden, of Philadelphia, and was commanded by J. 11. Haven.
Joseph J. Snowden, the original owner, then gave a power
of attorney and substitution to Charles Snowden, who again
nominated Pedro Manegat, the notorious slave dealer, but who
was described in that document merely as a merchant at Ha-
vannah, to sell and transfer the Mary.
Eight days afterwards Pedro Manegat professedly sold the
Mary to a person named Pedro Sabate, of New Orleans, who,
on the 2d of May, appointed as her master Charles Snowden,
thessame person who, three months before, had named Pedro
Manegat as his agent to sell the Mary; and on the 18th of.lune
Pedro Sabate replaced Snowden, by appointing David Tomlin-
son to the command. •

This Pedro Manegat, the pretended seller but real purchaser
of the Mary, is the sanie indiVidual who, in like manner,
owned the following nominally American vessels, namely, the
Hyperion, which left the .Havannah in December, 1838, as an
American vessel, and was afterwards condemned as the Spa-
nish schooner Isabel ; the schooner Hazard, .whiefi' was de-
tained and erroneously released in February, 1839, under cir-
cumstances similar to those which mark the case of the Mary;
and the Octavia, also condemned as Spanish property; which
last named vessel Pedro Manegat had only employed as he did
the Mary, namely, to carry goods for the purchase of slaves to
agents on the coast.
The Spanish master, Thomas Escheverria, and a Spanish
crew, were shipped on board the Mary as passengers; among
them were several individuals who were recognised as having
been formerly captured in slave•vessels, Escheverria himselt
having been master of the Spanish schooner Norma, when that
vessel was captured with 231 slaves on board. The ship's
articles set forth that the crew was engaged to naviffate the
Mary from the port of Havannah to the Gallium, or wherever
else the master may direct. •
In twoor three papers which the master David Tomlinson
produced to prove his American citizenship, he is styled Pils
B. Tomlimorty, and in the third P. B. Tomlinson, while in
the log, enclosed in Mr. Stevenson's note, he is called Captain
Thomason.

The clearance and bills of lading show that the owners of
the cargo were Blanco and Carvelho, Pedro Martinez and
Co., Pedro Manogat, and Thomas Eseheverria, the Spanish
captain, all well known slave traders ; and the consignees.
Thomas Rodriguez Baron, Ignacio P. 8010, and Theodore
Canot, of the Gallinas, long and well known to the naval
officers employed in suppressing the slave trade on the coast as
factors for the purchase and shipment Of slaves.
Thus the papers produced to the Captain of the Forester, b\
Tomlinson, were of themselves sufficient to show that this was
one of the then frequent cases in which the flaw of the United
States had been fraudulently assumed; and all doubt was
removed as to the real character of the undertaking in which
the vessel nas employed, when, on farther search, there were
found on board slave coppers, two bags of shackles,' large
water leaguers, and a slave deck—the latter being noted as
shipped under the denomination of five hundred feet of lumber.
Under these circumstances, the undersigned is of opinion
that the commander of her Majesty's ship Forester was fully
justified in considering the Mary to be a Spanish vessel, and,
consequently, in taking her before the British and Spanish
Court ; and, accordingly, when the British Commissioners
reported to her Majesty's Government that the Judges had
refused to allow the Mary to be libelled in that Court, under
the impression that the mere fact of her having the Ameri-
can flag hoisted should have protected her from visitation
and search by a British cruiser, the British Commissioners
-were told that there was, in the opinion of her Majesty's
Government, reason to suppose that the Mary was a
Spanish, and not an American vessel, and the Judges ought
therefore to have allowed her to be libelled in the British and
Spanish Court ; for that, although British ships of war
are not authorised to visit and search American vessels on the
high seas yet if a vessel which there is :rood reason to suppose
is in reality Spanish property is captured and brought into a
port in which a mixed
.British and Spanish Court is sitting,
the CommisSioners may properly investigate the case, and,
upon sufficient proof being adduced of the Spanish character
of the vessel, and of her having been guilty of a breach of the
treaty between Great Britain and Spain for the suppression of
the slave-trade, the Court may condemn her, notwithstanding
that she was sailing under the American flag, and had Ame-
rican papers on board.
With respect to the general question of the search of vessels
under the American flag by British cruisers, the undersigned
begs to refer Mr. Stevenson to his other note of this day's
date relative to the case of the Susan, in which the under-
signed has fully, and he hopes satisfactorily, replied to the re-
presentation made by Mr. Stevenson on that subject.
The undersigned begs to return to Mr. Stevenson the log
kept by John Hutton, while acting as mate on board the Mary ;
and avails himself of this occasion to renew to Mr. Steven-
son the assurances of his distinguished consideration.
PALMERSTON.

LORD PALMERSTON TO MR. STEVENSON.
Foreign-office, Aug. 27, 1841.
The undersigned, her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State
for Foreign Affairs, has the honour to acknowledge the receipt
of the note from Mr. Stevenson, Envoy Extraordinary and
Minister Plenipotentiary from the United States at this Court,
dated the' 14th of April, 1840, on 'the subject of a complaint
made by the American Government against the officer in com-
mand of her Majesty's brig Grecian, for having boarded the
American merchant ship usan, when off the light of Cape
Frio, in the month of April, 1839.
The undersigned begs leave to state to Mr. Stevenson, in
reply to the remarks contained in his last note, that her Ma-
jesty's Govermnent do not pretend that her Majesty's naval
officers have any right to search American merchantmen, met
with in time of peace at sea, and if in some few cases such
merchantmen have been searched when suspected of having
beentengaged in the slave trade,'this has been done solely be-
cause the British officer who made search imagined that he was
acting in conformity with the wishes of the United States Go-
vernment, in endeavouring to hand over to the United States