Star. — 1819-10-08 (London, England)

THE EDITOR OF THE STAR. .  • t Sift—l beg to offer you my best thanks for having given a place to my letter of Auguit 15, and should have, in the present instance, followed up the facts therein contained, by some others no less important to the Naval interests of the Empire, were it not for an article which appeared in The STAR of Saturday: September 11th, relating the outrageous conduct of a Seamai' employed on the Smuggling Prevention Service at Margit*. However well intentioned the arrangements, by, which our Officers and Seamen were appropriated to this duty, may have been, I can assure you, Mr. Editor, that the circumstance stated by your Margate Correspondent, although highly aggravating; is very trifling indeed, compared with many others which. have occurred almost daily, ever since the commencement of the Coast Blockade System, as it is not unaptly called by the people. The presiding Magistrate and Borough Patron of a populous town on the Coast of Sussex, has mote than once been menaced and put in bodily fear, by sailors of the blockade service, whom he met drunk, armed with loaded pistols and cutlasses, which were frequently brandished in air, while all those who came too near the lawless tars, thus improperly at large, stood a very good chance of being shot through the head ! It is not more than five weeks ago that the following circumstance was communicated by myself to aGentleman, through whose zeal in the cause of humanity I hoped it would have reached the quarter in which a remedy for such irregularities might have been found. Looking one morning out of my window, and down an ill-paved street of an agreeable watering-place, I observed a party of seamen armed with cutlasses and pistols, marching up toward me, followed by a large concourse of people: on their approaching somewhat nearer, I perceived that six of the sailori had each another man attached to his arm by a handcuff; a very venerable person, almost bent doable with age, and evidently in an agony of terror, vainly endeavoured to keep pace with the prisoners and their guard, and I found, upon inquiry, that he was father to one of the former, a fine youth of 18. In this order they passed by the house, leaving me to meditate on the extraordinary spectacle I had just witnessed.  Anxioui to obtain some further information on such unusual proceedings, I called up my landlord, uho told me, that gi the six men in smock-frocks," had been caught on the preceding morning, in an attempt to co-operate with smugglers, by one of the Naval Officers, and a party of,his men ; that they were now returning from examination at the Custom. house, and going to lodge the prisoners in jail. On asking whether any contraband goods were found on the people thus treated ? he answered in the negative. I subsequently ascertained that the prisoners were released, on their severally paying a fine of £25, as a commutation of the old Excise penalty of £lOO, or imprisonment. It was afterwards very confidently (but, perhaps, untruly) reported, that the Secretary of the Admiralty, in consequence of representations made to him by the Superintending Captain of the District, stated his intention of prosecuting the Colkctor,-because he did not levy the whole fine, by which the zealous Captain and his vigilant under-scrappers were deprived of considerable emolument ! Soon after the establishment of this service a man was shot by nne of the seamen. near Beachy Head ;1 the Inquest which sat on the body, brought its a verdict of wilful murder, against some person or persons unknotua, and they have remained so to this day. The disconsolate widow, is, in the mean time, occupied in soliciting a subseriptionfor the support of herself and children, who are left totally destitute by the untimely death of their father. Upon the certain effect of thus lining the coast with armed bands, not recognized by any legislative act, and for the mere purpose of doing that duty which had been very successfully performed for centuries by the Civil Authorities of the Country, it is needless to expatiate. But what will the Public say, if it should be het eafter found, that no material diminution has taken place, as to the quantity of smug. gled goods imported, since the new arrangements; whereas, a very heavy expense has been incurred by it. To prove the above assertion, in some degree, I should add, that the prohibited articles, such as Tea, Spirits, and Silks, continue to be retailed at exactly the same prices they bore previous to the establishment of the Coast Blockade. Oct. 1, 1819.