The Portland daily press., 1869-04-17
THE EXTENT OF OUR LOSSES.

THE EXTENT OF OUR LOSSES.
Individual losses may be estimated with
reasonable accuracy. Ships burned or sunk
with their cargoes may be counted and their
value determined; but this leaves without
recognition the vaster damage to commerce
driven from the ocean, and that other damage
to commerce, immense and infinite, caused
by the prolongation of the war, all of which
may be called national in contradistinction
| to individual.
How to authenticate the extent of nationa
loss with reasonable certainty is not without
difficulty but it cannot be doubted that suct
a loss occurred. 1t is folly TO question it
| The loss may be seen in various crcum.
| stances, as in the rise in insurance on Amer
ican vessels; the fate of the carrying trade
which was one of the great resources of ou
country; the elimination of our tonnage
with the corresponding increase of British
| tonnage; the falling off in our exports an(
imports, with due allowance for our abnorma
| currency and the diversion of war.
The interesting report of Mr.. Morse, ou
consul at London, made during the last yea
and published by the Secretary of State
shows that, on the breaking out of the rebel
| lion in 1861, the entire tonnage of the Uni
ted States, coasting and registered, wa:
| 5,539,613 tons, of which 2,642,625 tons wert
registered aud employed in foreign trade, anG
that, at the close of the rebellion IN 1865, not
withstanding an increase in coasting tonnage
| our registered tonnage had fallen to 1902 ,52s
tons, being loss during the four years o
more than a million tons, amounting t.
| about forty per cent. of our foreign commerce
/ During the same four years the total tonnag,
| of the British empire rose from $500, $50 ton
to 1922 ,6O4 tons, the increase being especially
| in the foreign trade.
| Beyond the actual cost in the national ton
mage, there was further loss in the arrest O
our naturalincrease in this branch of industr,
which an intelligent statistician puts at five
per cent, annually, making in 1886, tota
loss on this account of 1884, ,95S tons, which
must be added to ], 1926, ,035 tons actually lost
/ The same statistician, after estimating the
| value of ton at forty dollars gold, and max
ing allowance for old and new ships, puts the
sum total of national loss on this account al
| $110,000,O00.
This is what 1 have to say for the present
| on national losses through the destruction O
commerce. These are large enough; bu
| there is another chapter, where they are far
larger. / refer, of course, to the natona
losses caused by the prolongation of the wal
and traceable directly to England. No candle
person, who studies this eventful period, can
doubt that the rebellion was originally en-.
| Sould ldSCu Wy hOPC Oh ouPPoip AAOAa AAuSiduu
that it was strengthened at once by the con.
cession of belligerent rights on the ocean
| that it was fed to the end by British supplies
that it was quickened into renewed life with
every report from the British pirates, flaming
anew with every burning ship; nor can it be
| doubted that without British intervention
the rebellion would have soon succumbed un.
der the well-directed efforts of the nationa
government. Not weeks or months, but
years were added in this way to our war, SC
full OF the most costly sacrifice.
| The sacrifice of precious life is beyond hu
man compensation; but there may be an ap.
proximate estimate of the national loss in
money. The rebellion was suppressed at
cost Of more than four thousand million dol
lars, a considerable portion of which has beer
already paid, leaving twenty-five hundred
millions as national debt to burden the peo
pie. II through British intervention, the
war was doubled in duration, or in any way
extended, as cannot be doubted, then is Eng
land Justly responsible for the additional ex
penditure to which our country was doomed
| and, whatever may be the final settlement o