Charles City Republican intelligencer. [volume] (Charles City, Iowa) 1861-1864, 1863-12-10
Gge ,yntellieenttr.
English Cruelty in Japan.

English Cruelty in Japan.
Mr.. Golden, NJ. p, has sent letter
to the Mayor of Rockdale, from which
we quote: n-.
have been reading the official cor
respondence, just published, respect
ing our recent proceedings in Japan.
1t is q horrible narrative, which l find
difficult to treat with calmness. It
appears that despatch was sent by
Earl Russell instructing the Repre-
sentatives in that country to demand
redress from Prince Satsuma, one of
its feudal chiefs or >daimios, for the
murder of Mr.. Richardson, in default
of which discretion was given to our
naval commander either to "seize or
detain" the Princes steam vessels,
or shell his residence, or blockade his
port Thereupon, according to his
own despatch, the British Admiral
proceeded forthwith to burn the
Princes steamers and set fire to the
town of Kagosima, when, to quote
his language, "thc confagration thus
created continued with undated ardor
up to the time of the departure of the
squadron, forty-eight hours subsequent
to the first attack" which, he proceeds
to say, affords reasonable ground
for believing that the entire town of
Kagosima is now mass Of ruins ~
and he expresses his trust that Her
Majesty's Government will be pleased
to approve his deeds.
1t is stated, know not how truly,
that Kagosima is a city of more than
100000 inhabitants.
Now, let me ask you to consider for
q moment what is really implied by
the destruction, with incendiary shells,
without previous warning, of city
of even 100000 inha bitants. There
are always in such towns hundreds of
infants at the mothers breasts, thou
sands Of children under five years of
age, hospitals with their sick, and
numbers of aged and infirm tottering
on the brink of the grave there, too,
must be women over whom the pangs
of maternity are impending. and there
will be found homes filled with mourn
ing for the dead which are awaiting
the rites Of scpulchre. Such is the
normal condition Of every large city,
whether in Asia or Europe. Now,
picture this great entreport, with all
its contents, reduced in forty-eight
hours, to heap of ashes try to re-
alize in Imagination the fate of its
population and then ask yourself
what great crime they have commit
ted to bring on themselves this havoc
and destruction?
TO our shame and confusion, that
answer must be that this is the way
to which Englshmen, under the COM
mand of Admiral Kuper and Colonel
Neale, administer justice for the muir
der of an individual one hundred
miles away, of which crime the in
habitants of Kagosima were as guilt
less of all knowledge and completely
as your own neighbors in Rochdale.
1t is precisely as though an enemy
should lay Bristol in ashes because an
individual had been murdered on the
highway between London and Brant-
ford. And the chief actors of this
outrage on humanity, instead of ex-
pressing one word of regret or even
emotion, coolly lay claim to the appro-
baton of their Government
There has been much criticism in
this country on the manner in which
the civil war has been conducted by
the Americans. We have been prom pt
to condemn a people over whom we
have no control for acts for which we
are in no wise responsible. remem
her the Indignation with which the
Prime Minister denounced Gen. But
ler's proclamation, in which he threat
ened to consig n to the calaboose those
women who should insult his soldiers
in the streets of New Orleans. Will
. he and his colleagues not make them
selves and the country accomplices
after the fact in these atrocities oil
their own agents who, in contemptu.
GUS disregard of the instructions of
their Government, have brought this
heavy disgrace upon the country?
trust not. But, at all events, let us
not forget that our moral power in the
world is at stake (; that if, as PEG.
pie, we condemn such crimes as these,
when perpetrated in our name by those
for whom, under Heaven, we are alone
responsible, we shall only invite the
scorn of mankind by assuming to sit
in Judgment, as moral censors, upon
the delinquencies of other nations.