Chapter XXVI: Part 26

Gentlemen, he appears before the Committee upon the 22nd of July, 1842, and the Chairman says to him, “You have seen some statements that have been made to this Committee upon the subject of a transaction in which your house was engaged; have you any observations to offer upon it?--I received from the Clerk of the Committee a letter.” He accounts for having heard of it, and then says, “I would beg, first of all, to refer to the letter which I had the honour to address to the Chairman.” That letter ought to have been brought before you--it is not--we have it not, and have no control over it. The prosecutor could have produced it, because, with the permission of the House, by which he has produced this evidence, he might have produced that letter, or had a copy of it. He says, “My reason for wishing to be examined before this Committee was, that the statements contained in the evidence which I have mentioned are all of them more or less incorrect, some of them totally so. I will begin by stating what has been the nature of our, I will not say trade, for we have not had a trade ourselves, but of our connexion with the shipment of goods to the coast of Africa.” I pray your attention to this--it is not, as my learned friend Mr. Serjeant Talfourd seems to assume in a question put to Captain Denman, it is not that this house has ever traded, in the proper sense of the word, to the coast of Africa; they never send goods there on their own account, and they never received goods from there; they never had any transaction or correspondence with any person at the Gallinas, or any where else upon the coast of Africa; all their transactions were confined to the execution of foreign orders from the Havannah, and other parts of the world; all that they did being to dispatch the vessels and ship the goods; and from the moment of shipping the goods in England, from that moment their interference entirely ceased. He says, “I will begin by stating what has been the nature of our, I will not say trade, for we have not had a trade ourselves, but of our connexion with the shipment of goods to the coast of Africa. We have been established as merchants for upwards of 70 years in Spain, for nearly 20 years in this country, and we have had connexions to a large extent in Spain, and in the Havannah, and in South America, and in several other places; among them we have had connexions, or commercial intercourse, with the house of Pedro Martinez & Co. of the Havannah, and with Blanco and Cavallo of Havannah. With them we have carried on a regular business in consignments of sugars and of cochineal, which they have made to us.” I pray you to put this case--Suppose the house of Zulueta & Co. received a consignment of cochineal and sugars from the house of Martinez, the value of the consignment being 5,000_l._, they convert it into money, and they have that 5,000_l._ at the disposal of Martinez & Co.; suppose any one of the gentlemen, who are doing me the honour of attending to me, had money of Martinez by him, say 10,000_l._, the house of Martinez, instead of drawing it out, order it to be invested in English goods; suppose they write and say, we have received your account sales of sugars and cochineal, we find we are credited for 10,000_l._, and we request you to ship the undermentioned goods by the Augusta, Captain Jennings, for the Gallinas, or any other place on the coast of Africa, and they set one against the other--would you hesitate in doing it? would you dream you were committing a felony? It is not that this is an only transaction (I do not know whether that would affect the case)--there is a trading for twenty years--it is a little more than ten years that they have had transactions of that kind, and have shipped goods to, they did not know who--they have never heard of the goods being seized, or the vessels seized, or what became of the money, whether invested in the slave trading, or any other traffic--all they know is, that they have received the consignments of cochineal or sugars, that they have sold them, and hold 5,000_l._ or 10,000_l._ in their hands--they are ordered this day to pay part of the money by accepting bills, and the next day they are ordered to send the remainder of the money they owe, in brandy, tobacco, or iron, to be shipped to the Gallinas, or any where else, and they act upon it--whether the goods are sold for slaves, whether they are used, whether they are sold for money, and the money spent in the purchase of other merchandise or in the support of the families of those who have received them, to them is indifferent--they have shipped the goods, they have debited the account, and there the matter ends, that is perfectly clear. He says, “With them we have carried on a regular business in consignments of sugars and of cochineal, which they have made to us; and in specie received by the packets from Mexico and other places. We have several times acted for them here in this country, buying raw cotton for instance at Liverpool, and re-selling it very largely; that has been principally with Pedro Martinez & Co.” “They are general merchants?--They are general merchants, and their transactions with us have been of that nature. As general merchants, we have bought stock here for them rather largely; and, in the course of those transactions, we have received orders from Don Pedro Martinez & Co., of the Havannah, and from Don Pedro Martinez, of Cadiz, to ship goods to the coast of Africa.” It must be doubtless so that they received the order one day to remit money, and the next to remit goods to the coast of Africa. If they were slave traders, you have no right to assume that they knew it; it is not proved that they knew it; and if Martinez & Co. were notorious slave dealers, if they are also much larger traders in cochineal and sugars, what right had they to suppose, if, instead of the money they owe, they are to ship merchandise, what right have they to suppose that they will deal unlawfully with this commodity? It is a case to which the law never pointed, and it would go to the destruction of commerce if any man was bound to pause or make any inquiry at all before he shipped. He is then asked, “Have you received orders from Pedro Martinez for shipments for the coast of Africa?--Yes; in the course of business we have received orders to ship goods upon the funds in our hands belonging to them; and we have shipped the goods described in the letter, and sent the bills of lading to Pedro Martinez; but beyond that we have never had any returns from the coast of Africa.”

This is the whole case; it is a full defence to this prosecution, and disposes of the offence it is supposed this young man was committing. And further, he says, “Nor any control of any kind from the moment the cargoes left the ports of this country.” Now here again, if this is false, it might be proved. They have given us notice to produce the accounts, and all letters that have passed between Martinez and Zulueta & Co.; they might have shown that this was false, that they had dealt in some other way, and that they had some interest in the final event of the shipment: they have not proved any thing of the kind. I say they have proved the contrary, and _I will never in my person establish so fatal a precedent as to recognise the notion that any man upon his trial for a felony is to prove himself innocent before evidence is given to prove him guilty_.

He is then asked, “You have had no interest in the result of the venture?--No, nor any notice, nor any acquaintance, nor any correspondence with any one upon the coast; we have never had any kind of knowledge, either subsequently or previously, of the shipments, except the mere fact of buying the goods and shipping them.” “Your whole interest was a commission upon the transaction?--Entirely. The extent of those transactions has been so limited in the course of nearly twenty years that we have been in this country, that the amount of the invoices that we have sent out has been something like 20,000_l._ or 22,000_l._ in the course of all that time. That is one part of the operations we have performed. The other operations are the acceptance of bills drawn by people on the coast; among them Pedro Blanco when he was there, upon ourselves, on account of Blanco & Cavallo, of Havannah, upon funds which Blanco & Cavallo had in our hands: for instance, the people at the Havannah, or in Spain, open a credit with us, and we accept the bills of the parties on that credit with us, just the same as we should do with any other correspondent in any other part.” “You would have funds in your hands, arising from some commercial transactions between you and the Havannah merchant, or the Cadiz merchant; and Pedro Blanco, upon the coast of Africa, would draw upon the credit of those funds, being authorised by the Cadiz or the Havannah merchant?--Yes; and if Pedro Blanco had drawn 5_s._ beyond that, we should have protested, and in some instances we have protested.” This shews they had nothing to do with the owner of the property abroad. They had received consignments, and had accounted for the sums of money, and they either accept bills or consign goods; if bills are drawn beyond the amount due, they protest them, and if they are asked to consign goods beyond that amount, they refuse to do so. “With regard to the vessel alluded to in this Report, the Augusta, our part in that concern has been simply that which appears from one of the letters: that is to say”--

Now here again, Gentlemen, I must refer you to the mode in which this prosecution has been carried on.

In this evidence before the Committee, the prisoner now at the bar refers to one of the letters received by the house from Martinez & Co.: I must say where the counsel for the prosecution availed themselves of this evidence before the Committee, as evidence against the prisoner upon the charge of felony, I think they were bound to make evidence of every document he referred to in it, as explanatory of the evidence he gave.

I speak this subject to the correction of their Lordships; and I know that their Lordships will overrule and correct what I say, if I am wrong, and therefore I say it with the more confidence, because I know it will not be controverted; I say, that in a prosecution for a felony, or any other crime, if the counsel for the prosecution give in evidence a statement made by a prisoner, charged with a crime which refers to a document, he ought--

Mr. Serjeant _Bompas_. I understood this was the letter about the 500_l._; that and all the other letters are in the Appendix, and to be found there: they are deposited, every one.

Mr. _Kelly_. We will try my learned friend’s accuracy by looking at what it was. He says, “With regard to the vessel alluded to in this Report, the Augusta, our part in that concern has been simply that which appears from one of the letters: that is to say, Pedro Martinez, of Cadiz, had made choice of Jennings to buy the vessel, and lent him money to buy the vessel; because Pedro Martinez wanted him to have a vessel in the trade, for the purpose of taking his goods to their destination.” He says that the object of Pedro Martinez was, that Captain Jennings should buy the vessel, and that it should be conducted in the way he states. That may appear in a letter--how could it appear but in a letter from Martinez & Co. to Zulueta, containing their instructions? That letter my learned friend should have called for--he has given notice to produce it, and he ought to have called for it and made it a part of the examination, as if the witness had produced and read the letter, and it had not been set out in the evidence. He then says, “I have now described the three kinds of operations in which we have been concerned, and our knowledge of all of them terminated with the execution of the orders of our correspondents. We had nothing more to do than to follow the orders of the purchaser in shipping the goods. With regard to the purchase of the vessel by Jennings; Jennings is a man--” Here is a solution of every thing called concealment. “Jennings is a man who has been employed some time by Martinez; he has served Martinez as a chartered captain, and Martinez, having been satisfied with his services, agreed to lend him that money on the security of the vessel, provided it did not exceed a certain amount.” Now the next question is put by Mr. Forster, the member for Berwick. Mr. Forster all the world knows, and I hope you know, is very extensively concerned in the African trade; he is a man as perfectly conversant with this subject as any man in Britain; and I cannot help making the same observation as to him which I did as to Lord Stanley and Lord John Russell, I cannot help thinking, if there had been any thing dishonourable in the character of the trade and to the character of a British merchant, instead of bringing out the true colour of the transaction, as you will see he did, he would have done every thing to hold it up to reprobation. He learns from the witness the nature of the transaction as to the purchase of the vessel, that Captain Jennings had been engaged in similar transactions; he catches at it in a moment, and puts it in a few words--“You advanced the money to Captain Jennings for the purchase of the vessel, Jennings transferring the vessel to you as a security for the money so advanced?--That is just the description of operation, which is a very general one in business.” If the counsel for the prosecution says it is not the ordinary course of business, why does he not call Mr. Forster, or any other gentleman in the trade, to show that it is not correct, and that it is not a usual transaction? He has attempted no such thing; the evidence is a blank; you have only the evidence of this young man. I do not pretend to say that because this gentleman has given a long statement, in which he has vindicated his house from the statement made against them, that you are bound to believe all he says; but I do appeal to you whether, if what he says could be proved false by the prosecutors, they would not have done so? They have proved nothing false. He is speaking of an ordinary transaction of commerce before some of the first commercial men in Britain: there was a check upon his evidence which would have restrained him, if wicked enough to tell a lie, which would have prevented him saying what was not true. I say that the character of the Committee is a guarantee of the correctness of his statement, speaking of it as the ordinary course of trade.

The Chairman then says, “What is the object of such an operation?--I know very little, or almost next to nothing, of the operations in those parts of the world.” Is that true or untrue? That is the very essence of the case, as I submit to you: he has been only six or seven years in the business; they have only in the last ten years had seven or eight transactions, and in the last six or seven years they may have two or three. He says, “I know very little, or almost next to nothing, of the operations in those parts of the world.” Why, are you to suppose that he, by intuition or by magic, was to know all that Captain Hill, Captain Denman, and Colonel Nichol knew in twenty-five years of constant observation? Mr. Serjeant Bompas asks you to believe he knew every thing as well as any body living upon the spot. Then he speaks of the object of the transaction, which I will not weary you in repeating.

Then he is asked, “What advantage would there be in Mr. Jennings taking the articles rather as the owner than as captain under Martinez; was not he commander of the vessel as well as owner of the vessel?--Yes.” “He is made the owner, instead of being captain?--He is the owner as well as the captain of the vessel; he stands indebted to Martinez, and gives a bottomry bond for the vessel.” Then he goes on to illustrate what he says.

Then Mr. _Forster_ says, “You acted in this transaction merely as agent in the usual manner, as you would have acted for any house in any part of the world?--Exactly; if Martinez had told me, ‘You have got 500_l._ in your hands, pay that to Captain Jennings,’ I should have known nothing more of the transaction; I should have paid the money. But Martinez did not wish to go beyond a certain amount; and he says, ‘You exercise control, do not allow the man to pay more than 500_l._ for the vessel.’” “But beyond the purchase of the vessel and the shipment of the goods, the other arrangements and the subsequent transactions were entirely between Jennings and Martinez & Co.?--Most assuredly; except with the order of Martinez, I do not know how we could have done any thing with him in any way.”

Gentlemen, that reminds me of this fact: my learned friend has sought to give in evidence certain papers, which were found in the year 1841 on board this vessel, and which it is now perfectly manifest were put on board that vessel in Cadiz long after she had sailed from Liverpool; I objected to that evidence. Gentlemen, I will not go over again what I said at the time: I certainly did think, considering that these letters were in print and before my Lords, that the only object of the discussion was to have a legal opinion of my Lords whether these letters were admissible in evidence. My learned friend could have argued the point without referring to the contents of the letters, and so filling your minds with the contents of those letters, which, as they were rejected, ought not to have been submitted to you; for any one, knowing how the human mind is constituted, must feel that in the mind of one or two out of the twelve the effect might have been to draw your attention to something foreign to the matter; and I objected and complained of Mr. Serjeant Bompas for referring to the letters. My Lords held that they were not evidence, but my learned friend seemed to be pressing upon you their contents in opposition to the opinion of my Lord. I will remind you that these letters were written by Martinez & Co., and put on board this vessel at Cadiz months after the vessel had sailed from England. Mr. Zulueta had never heard of these proceedings; and whether he is guilty or innocent, all that is charged against him had been committed months before these letters were in existence, and therefore to attempt to use what Martinez had said or written, against the prisoner, was only calculated to raise a prejudice injurious to the administration of justice. You may easily imagine that Martinez may be, for aught I know, a man who, besides dealing to the extent of a million a year in sugars and other things, does deal to some extent in slaves, and it is possible he may have written letters to his correspondents in Africa relating to the slave trade; and consider the wickedness of using these letters against Mr. Zulueta, who never saw the letters, and could not know any thing of them or their contents, or have any control over them. It was this sentence reminded me of that: he is asked, “But beyond the purchase of the vessel and the shipment of the goods, the other arrangements and the subsequent transactions were entirely between Jennings and Martinez & Co.?--Most assuredly; except with the order of Martinez, I do not know how we could have done any thing with him in any way.” It therefore comes to this, whatever might have passed between Martinez and Captain Jennings, Captain Jennings may be responsible for, or Martinez; but Mr. Zulueta is wholly irresponsible: all that passed through his hands he is ready to account for and abide by, and stand to the consequences of it; but what took place between Captain Jennings and Martinez is wholly beyond his knowledge; and it is unjust and unreasonable that I, as his counsel, should for one moment permit it to be given in evidence if I could prevent it.

Then Sir _Thomas Acland_ asks him, “Do you mean that you know that the Augusta was not engaged in any slaving transactions during the voyage upon which she left Liverpool?--Most assuredly not; in fact, my testimony is hardly required of that, because every thing proves that. When she was detained, it was never said that she was upon a slaving operation at all. Before she left this port, after she was bought, she was completely rendered useless for that purpose.” Here again have they attempted to prove that the contrary was the fact, and that this answer was false? Remember that this is not said by this young man as if then upon his trial and defending himself against the charge of felony, and when he would have a strong temptation, if capable of falsehood, to say what was false to protect himself against the heavy punishment. All this is said freely. If any one of you were to hear to-morrow morning that another had said of you, you had been offered a bribe to give a particular verdict, you would go before the first tribunal and deny the statement, and request that it might be made public; that is all this young man has said, he is denying the accusation and submitting that what his accusers have said is untrue. If he was saying what was untrue, they could have shown it. He says, “After she was bought she was completely rendered useless for that purpose;” and it is proved that she was--for the leagers, the water-vessels, it was proved to you were rendered useless; and though my learned friend would not admit it, I proved that they were put ashore at Liverpool, and therefore this is every word of it true, and my learned friend has failed in proving it false.

The Chairman then says, “The charge is, that she was engaged in carrying goods to a person engaged in the slave trade; not that she was engaged in the slave trade herself?” Then he says, and here is a very important answer--“I most certainly say, that I do not know whether the person is so engaged or not.” That is, the consignee of the vessel. The Chairman observes, “The charge is, that this vessel was sent to somebody engaged in the slave trade?” And what does he say?--“I do not know whether he is or not; I do not know any thing about him.” Whether they could have proved the contrary as to Ximenes or Rolo, or all of them, I do not know. Then he goes on to say, “It seems to me that English captains and English subjects are not prohibited from borrowing money from Spaniards.” There is no doubt of that; it is quite lawful. “She was bought with money lent by Pedro Martinez to Captain Jennings for the purpose.”

Then Mr. _Wilson Patten_ asked him, “You have stated that yours is an agency trade?--It is so; and in the multitude of business, any one can understand that 20,000_l._ in 15 or 20 years, can only be a mere trifle in the business of any merchant, without laying claim to a large business; and in following that business, we have executed shipping orders.”

This is another repetition of the observation made before, that it was a shipping order in the transactions of their house, and that he had only executed the orders given by a foreign correspondent. Then he is asked, “To what part of the coast of Africa has that business been chiefly conducted?--I believe, almost exclusively to the Gallinas.”

Then he goes on, and this is the part of the evidence upon which Mr. Serjeant Bompas relies--this is really the only part of this body of evidence given by this young man upon which the learned Serjeant relies in support of the prosecution--“Do you know the nature of the trade of Pedro Martinez at the Gallinas?--I know from general report, that Don Pedro Martinez himself is supposed to deal in slaves, and I believe it is so.” “Is he known at the Havannah as a dealer in slaves?--I do not know, but I believe so. I do not know why it should not be known at the Havannah, if it is known in other parts.” From that my learned friend says he does know it. You must take the whole of the evidence together. He says his house “never had any thing to do with any slave transaction, nor does he know that any vessel that ever went from their house was engaged in slave transactions, but he had heard that Pedro Martinez was engaged in the slave trade;” but you have it from other parts of the case, that he was a large dealer in other transactions quite lawful.

Now this is a statement, not of what this young man knew at the time he participated more or less in the transaction now under your consideration--these transactions took place in 1840--this examination takes place in July 1842. He does not say, that at the time they sent the Augusta they knew that Pedro Martinez was engaged in the slave trade; he says, “I know it,” speaking in the present tense, meaning “I now know it.”

Now, Gentlemen, I beg your attention to a question I besought my learned friend to read, I besought in vain--I thank God I have now the means of reading it--

Mr. Serjeant _Bompas_. Yes, I did read it.

Mr. _Kelly_. “Have you reason to suppose that a large portion of the trade that they carry on at the Havannah is the slave trade?”--His answer is, “I had no reason to know any thing of the kind; I have known more of their transactions with the slave trade since these things have been mooted than I ever knew before; I have had more knowledge of these things lately than I ever had in my life before; and when I say, ‘I,’ I beg to state that I ought to state, ‘we,’ for all my partners are in the same situation.”

Now, what does this come to? This gentleman tells you, that out of many hundred thousand pounds, a few trifling orders are sent to the coast of Africa; he is asked in 1842 if he knows of their correspondent being engaged in the slave trade, and he says he does only from common report; and in another part of the evidence, when his attention is more particularly called to it, he says, “I had no reason to know any thing of the kind; but since these transactions have been mooted I have known more of their connexion with the slave trade.” What is the meaning of this? I do implore you to remember that we are here upon a grave crime, the effect of a conviction upon which would expose this young man to utter and irremediable ruin, and bring disgrace upon his family; he is called upon after a loose examination upon the subject to explain what he has in a long examination loosely admitted, that a man was a slave trader, and also that these goods were to be so used. Looking at it fairly, what is it?--I had no reason to know it four years ago; but since these matters have been discussed I have inquired more about it, and have found, from the evidence of Captain Denman, that an event took place there which made the Gallinas, and in the character of the trading there, a matter of as much notoriety as the battle of Waterloo, or any other great event.--It appears that this officer of Her Majesty’s navy descended upon the coast and burnt every slave establishment upon the spot, and the consequence is, that reclamations have been made and actions have been brought; it was the subject of investigation before this Committee, and is the subject of proceedings in Courts of Justice, and the attention of every body has been called to it, and of course that brings to the mind of this young gentleman a great deal of knowledge of the character of the place, and those who have lived in it, more than he ever possessed before; and I put it to you, if this was a civil instead of a criminal case, and in which a man was to pay a sum of money, whether the fair inference is not, that, they shipped these goods without knowing that they were to be employed in the slave trade, that they did not know that Martinez was engaged in it till it became the subject of discussion; and I ask you, what is there to establish that it was so notorious that Martinez was a slave dealer, that Mr. Zulueta must have known that the goods were to be so employed? I ask you, why may not Mr. Zulueta, as much as any other merchant or manufacturer in the kingdom, who is asked to sell goods to go to the coast of Africa, why may he not, when there is an immense extent of lawful trade to that coast, have supposed that they were to be used in the lawful trade as in the unlawful trade, which it would be criminal in him to promote? I say that in a civil case, but in a criminal case, if there is a shadow of doubt upon your minds whether he is innocent or guilty--and in this I shall be sanctioned by my Lords the Judges--if doubt be left in your minds, when it was the duty of the prosecutor to remove that doubt, the prisoner must have your verdict. It is not because it is probable or possible that the goods might have been so employed--it is not because there is something doubtful in the transaction--you must be satisfied that he knew they were to be so employed, and that he shipped them with that object--and unless you are convinced of that, there is no case fora verdict of guilty. I say the whole question rests upon the notoriety of the place and the character of the parties, and upon that you find that this gentleman knew nothing at the time of these transactions either of the nature of the trade or the character of the persons there.

Then they talk about the ship, and so on. Then Mr. _Forster_ says, “Your house had nothing to do with any letters that might be put on board the Augusta after she sailed from this country?--Nothing whatever.” And that is the way that was perfectly disposed of, and so the Judges have held in rejecting the letters put on board after the vessel left the country. He says, “The Augusta was seized on the coast of Africa, on the charge of slave trading?--I believe that was the case.” Then he is asked, “Have you reason to suppose that the whole of that large commerce is subservient to the carrying on of the slave trade by the house of Blanco and Martinez at the Havannah?--I do not know; I know that they have large transactions in general business. I know that a short time ago I got 40,000_l._ or 50,000_l._ of Spanish bonds in the market for Martinez. I know that he is a large speculator in Spanish bonds and in securities of state.” Then he names the house for whom that was done. Then he goes on, “Have you been employed by the house at the Havannah to ship manufactured goods from this country to Havannah, suitable for the African trade?--We have sometimes shipped goods to the Havannah of the same kind as those that were in the ‘Augusta;’ cotton goods and other things of that sort.” Would that make it felony if you shipped goods to the Havannah, if the persons there used them in the slave trade? Where is it to stop? It is essential that it should be so understood by juries, as well as mercantile men; there must be some clear and distinct rule. Men are not, while carrying on their fair and mercantile transactions, to be treading on the verge of transportation every moment of their lives, which they would be if they deal in these goods which are sent in these ships, and may be so employed or engaged.

Then he is asked, “Have you been employed by the house at the Havannah to ship manufactured goods from this country to Havannah, suitable for the African trade?--We have sometimes shipped goods to the Havannah of the same kind as those that were in the ‘Augusta;’ cotton goods, and other things of that sort.” “Have you sent any goods of that description since you first began to send goods out direct to the coast of Africa?--They have been mixed; I cannot draw a distinction between the two destinations; some have gone to the Havannah, some to the Gallinas.” Then he is asked, “How long have you conducted the trade upon the coast of Africa?--As I said before, I do not think we have conducted any trade on the coast of Africa, either legal or illegal.” He persists in maintaining, as I do on his behalf, that his transactions were closed at Liverpool; he knows nothing more about it. Then he is asked, “How long have you acted as agents for Martinez, on the coast of Africa?--As long as we have had any connexions with Martinez; it is part and parcel of other operations; that is to say, in the multitude of other operations that have intervened we have shipped goods as I have said.” And it would be a strange thing if these gentlemen, for the sake of putting into their pockets an inconsiderable sum of money by this purchase--I am afraid to calculate it, for fear I should fall into an error--were to put themselves in jeopardy of an indictment for a felony, and transportation for fourteen years. If they have done so, it must be from some strange ignorance. To suppose they would do so for that which would not pay their clerks’ salary for a day, when they have stood so far above suspicion, is absolutely incredible and impossible.

Then he is asked, “Have you ever received consignments from them, or on their behalf, of palm oil, gold dust, or ivory, from the coast of Africa?”--He says, “Never; we never have received any thing from the coast of Africa whatever. With regard to all these transactions, it will perhaps appear strange to the Committee that I should not know more of the coast of Africa, having shipped things there; but if we had shipped to the amount of 100,000_l._ to the coast of Africa, or carried on any considerable trade there, we should certainly have known more about the coast of Africa; but in transactions of a very large amount, an invoice occasionally of about 2,000_l._ or 3,000_l._ of goods was a thing that we sent as a matter of course, and did not trouble our heads about, especially as the remuneration we got was a mere trifle, not of itself worth pursuing, if it had not been for the general business we had?”

Now you see, Gentlemen, this in one respect confirms what I do not intend to dispute, the testimony of these naval gentlemen that there are not shipments from this colony; but the question is not whether that is the fact, or what information it conveyed to them, or what information it conveyed to Mr. Zulueta; he says, “We never received any produce from that country but that would not show that there were no produce. “Our shipments were in discharge of former liabilities; we had received sugars and sold them, and we were called upon to make shipments to the coast of Africa, and we do so; and the nature of the transaction is such that we could not have any return;” and therefore he says, “if our transactions had been larger, we should have known a great deal more of this trade than we do. We had a sum of money, the proceeds of sugar and other articles, and we sent a small shipment to Africa debiting the house with that shipment; that being all we knew, and our transactions closing the moment the ship left Liverpool, how can we know any more of it? We know no more, and that accounts for our ignorance.”

Then he is asked about another vessel in which the name of Mr. Kidd was introduced--that is quite unimportant. He is asked, “You have no connexion with Mr. Kidd in any way?--No, nor any knowledge of him.” He then says something to which I should call your attention. Something had been said by another witness, “Zulueta, the gentleman in London to whom the vessel was sent, and who sold her again to her former Spanish owner, is a name well known on the coast in connexion with the slave trade.” That is what somebody had said before the Committee, which he came before the Committee voluntarily to contradict; he says, “Now, what is known on the coast I really cannot pretend to say; but I believe that not many persons can say that which I can say, that neither myself, nor my father, nor my grandfather, nor any body in our firm, has ever had any kind of interest of any sort, or derived any emolument or connexion from the slave trade.” Gentlemen, would to Heaven that every gentleman in a mercantile house could say the same I But this gentleman is challenging contradiction, he is speaking in the presence of those conversant with the trade, and in the presence of the Secretaries of State he is laying himself open to contradiction, and he says openly, knowing it will be published to the world, and knowing he may be denounced as a man guilty of gross falsehood if it is untrue, he says, “Neither myself, nor my father, nor grandfather, ever made one shilling by the slave trade:” and yet this young man is to be selected out of the firm and made the victim in respect of the Augusta, and that upon this statement, as my learned friend reminds me; that he who comes before the Committee and challenges disproof--he says, “I challenge any one to say that I was ever engaged in the slave trade--” that that is to be made evidence and offered in a British Court before a British Jury. Now see what follows, and I believe it is not a vain boast, it is not a mere statement--he says, “My father had at one time an interest in a bankrupt’s estate at the Havannah, upon which he was a creditor. There were some slaves on the estate, and they formed part of the property assignable to the creditors, and my father got the slaves assigned to him; because the other gentlemen and the creditors were not of the same opinion.” That is, because the other people did not think there was any thing wrong in the slave trade. “He got them assigned to him, and made them free; and that is all the connexion we have ever had with any slaves in the world. I do not know how far that may be considered irrelevant to the point, but I state it because we are here mentioned three or four times as connected with slave dealers, as a name well known in connexion with the slave trade. That sort of statement--” Well indeed may he say so, and I say on his behalf, “that sort of statement is rather a difficult thing to deal with.” It is indeed, Gentlemen. When I hear my learned friend say, that because he sent out a vessel with an English captain, and because at Portsmouth there are some shackles, and because Captain Hill and Captain Denman knew this was a slave trading colony, therefore you are to convict him; I say, “it is a very difficult thing to deal with.” That is what he said before the Committee; this has been published fifteen months, and before the public; the prosecutor has had it fifteen months--has he contradicted any one letter in it? He says, “My father, and my grandfather, and my house, never had any connexion with the slave trade; except that he took some slaves, because he wished to make them free, under a bankrupt’s estate, and he made them free, that is the only connexion we ever had with the slave trade in the world.” That is his evidence, and I beg you to contrast it with the other evidence of my learned friend and the doubtful inferences he has suggested.

Then he is asked, “If it is meant to insinuate by these observations that you ever had any other connexion with the slave trade, than being the shipping agent of goods which were sent to a man who was a dealer in slaves, you entirely deny it?” He says, “I assure the Committee, that although I have a general notion as to what interest Blanco and Martinez have in slaves, yet, if I was put upon my oath to make any particular statement, I really could not, because I do not know it. Of course I believe it; but my personal knowledge amounts only to that which the knowledge of what we read in a newspaper amounts to.” It is quite evident what he means--I know nothing of their being slave traders: since these matters have been under consideration I have read the newspapers, and I see enough to lead me to suppose that they deal in slaves. But he does not say he had that knowledge in 1840, when these transactions took place. Then he is asked, “There was nothing upon the face of the transactions which you had with those parties which spoke of a connexion with traffic in slaves?--Nothing whatever. It is well known, that, fifty years ago, it was in the ordinary course of business in Cadiz”--There is another point inviting attention and contradiction.--He says, “It is well known, that, fifty years ago, it was in the ordinary course of business in Cadiz to insure operations in slave trading.” So it was at that time: slave trading, in all its branches, and of the worst character, was perfectly legal both in Spain, and I grieve to say, also in England, or English colonies. And he goes on to say, “My house at that time were underwriters, and it was notorious that a policy of that kind would never enter the doors of our house; and nobody would come to offer such a thing to us upon any terms. It is notorious, both here and in Spain, that we set our faces distinctly against having any interest of any kind in the slave trade.”

Now, Gentlemen, is it not grievous, is it not cruel, that this young man, almost just entering life, belonging to a family, belonging to a house, which can say this with truth, that while the slave trade was deemed lawful by the British law and universally practised throughout Spain and the Spanish colonies, and recognized in all its forms, “My house would not execute a policy for slaves?” Is it not cruel, that the youngest partner at the very outset of life is to have his character blasted and held up as a felon, because it is said he had done something to assist that trade?

Then he is asked, “It is further stated, ‘It appears, that it is a regular thing sending vessels to him, that is to Mr. Zulueta; if they come to England to him, he sends them to Cadiz, and they get out again to the Havannah and come again into the trade.’ Have you any observation to make upon that?--It is all untrue, the whole of it; I have never received a vessel from those gentlemen; there has been nothing of the kind.” He denies it; it might have been proved, and it has not been proved. “Have you any thing further to state upon the subject?”--Then he states a number of other matters, which as nothing has been said upon them I do not comment upon. Then he says, at the end of the last answer, “‘My answer was intended to describe only the course of that particular transaction and not to apply to any other case.’ I never received a single vessel from the coast of Africa at any time, nor any body for us.”

Then Mr. _Forster_ says, “Then that statement is entirely untrue?--Totally, from beginning to end; we never did so, and nobody for us; and nobody to our knowledge, or with our connivance; I deny it in the most distinct manner. In answer to Question 5487, Mr. Macaulay is asked, ‘Have you any thing further to say with regard to the connexion of Zulueta with the slave trade?’ The answer is, ‘I would refer to his connexion with the Gollupchik, which was lately captured. In that case it appeared that the vessel went out direct to the Gallinas from London.’--That is the same vessel as the Augusta, which I have already explained; it formerly bore the name of Gollupchik.”

Then he is asked about some other matters, but as they have not been made the subject of evidence here I will not comment upon them. He speaks upon the moral point, and he enters into a very lengthened statement in which he says, “I am not here to discuss the moral propriety or impropriety of the slave trade; I have my own opinions upon it, and if I thought it was a justifiable trade I should not shrink from expressing it.” That is the result of a long statement: and, in answer to a very comprehensive question of Sir Thomas Acland, “You have stated in your letter, that your principle is, that of ‘not wishing to derive profit or advantage from the sufferings of humanity, whether avoidable or unavoidable,’ and you have acted upon that principle?”--He says, “That is the principle upon which we have acted.” Then there is a great deal about the nature of various other transactions.

Then we come to something that appears upon another point--a point made a distinct matter, and which I very much rejoice is the last one to which I shall have to refer, and that not requiring any large consumption of your time. Among other reasons urged upon you as tending to the conclusion that this ship, was dispatched for the purposes of the slave trade was this by Mr. Serjeant Bompas, that the vessel in the course of the voyage unnecessarily put into Cadiz, as if there was some previous concert or arrangement that the vessel though dispatched nominally for the Gallinas should go to Cadiz, and that there some one or other should afford them facilities for carrying on the slave trade. Upon that I have some observations to make. First, one does not see how that was to be better promoted by touching at Cadiz than if she had proceeded direct to the Gallinas, and for this reason, if it had been found when she arrived on the coast of Africa that she had taken on board any materials to facilitate the carrying on the slave trade, that would be something to draw an inference from; but no such thing appears. Why she should have touched there to facilitate the carrying on the slave trade I do not understand, and still less do I understand why it is to be imputed to Mr. Zulueta that a vessel to all outward appearance cleared for the Gallinas, that it was intended she should touch at Cadiz; and I pray you to answer the question to yourselves, you cannot answer it to me, if it was intended for the purpose of good or evil she should touch there, why conceal it? Why not give out “with liberty to touch at Cadiz,” if any suspicion attached to the transaction?

_Foreman of the Jury._ Did we not understand that the English sailors were landed at Cadiz, and took in Spanish sailors there?

Mr. _Kelly_. No, some English sailors were discharged; but there is nothing about the Spanish sailors being taken in: there is nothing about that--some English sailors, two or three of them, did go on shore, but it was not in any way connected with Mr. Zulueta, or to which he could be a party. You understand, when they had sailed from England some of the sailors rebelled and mutinied; the captain, like a clear-sighted man, said, if I go to Cork these men will all leave me; I will not do that, but as it is necessary to go somewhere, I will go to Cadiz. It was not the result of any previous concert. They say it was intended before he left that he should stop there. If it had been intended I do not see why it should not have been stated in the charter-party, it would not have had a more suspicious appearance that the vessel should touch there than go to the Gallinas direct, the suspicion of the slave trade was the mention of the Gallinas. Captain Denman, who knew the place, might draw his suspicious inference from the mention of the Gallinas, but nobody would suspect it from Cadiz. It was from some mutiny of the men, added to the stress of weather, the master would not go to Cork, he went to Cadiz: it was an event arising from something in the course of the voyage, and not from any thing that occurred before the vessel left England, and it was when the vessel left England that the participation of Mr. Zulueta in the whole transaction ceased; but if it were of any importance for the purpose of the prosecution, you should have had it distinctly explained to you what took place on board the vessel, what the nature of the bad weather was which should have made it desirable to go to Falmouth or to Cork: why do they not produce the log? they have the ship’s papers.

Mr. Serjeant _Bompas_. My learned friend says he has not it.