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![handle is hein.slavery/ssactsengr0372 and id is 1 raw text is: individual officers acting in discharge of their duties, could in any case afford a
protection against the claims of a neutral, such protection would have been afforded
by the circumstances of these cases. Yet the captors were held liable by the Court
of Admiralty, and were afterwards, we understand, indemnified at the expense of
the public.
To apply, then, these rules to the facts of this case:
It appears that the ship was captured on the ground of some supposed breach of
blockade. The mate, on his examination, says: I did not hear of any port or place
being blockaded until the 1st of June 1854, when we were taken. When they came
on board they told us there was a blockade, and asked us if we did not know it.
The master says: I did not know of any blockade whatever: I did not hear of
any blockade. It is true I heard from Sir C. Napier, after the capture, that I had
broken the blockade, but I did not knowingly enter or leave any blockaded port,
place, river, or coast. I did not hear of it except from Sir C. Napier, on the morning
following the day of capture. He sent a boat for me, and I was taken on board the
Admiral's ship, and he told me of it.
This is all that appears upon the evidence with respect to the grounds of seizure;
but the papers on board the ship distinctly showed the port from which she had
sailed, and that to which she was addressed ; and it may not be immaterial to observe
that, although some of these documents were in languages of which. English seamen
might well be supposed ignorant, yet the material facts are stated in an English
certificate, signed by the British Vice-Consul at Rostock. From these papers it
appeared that she had sailed from Cronstadt, and was bound for Elsinore for orders.
We took it for granted, therefore, that [179] it was for a supposed breach of blockade
in sailing from Cronstadt that she was seized, and this is the only ground upon which
the case was rested on the argument before us.
Now, in order to justify a condemnation for breach of blockade, three things must
be proved : first, the existence of an actual blockade ; secondly, the knowledge of the
party ; thirdly, some act of violation either by going in or coming out with a cargo
laden after the commencement of the blockade (The Betsy, 1 Rob. 93).
The instructions to Her Majesty's commanders upon this subject for .the present
war are, that if any vessel shall be found coming out of any blockaded port which she
shall have previously entered in breach of such blockade, or if she shall have any
goods on board, laden after knowledge of the blockade, such ship and goods shall be
seized and sent in for adjudication (Article X.).
Now, when the ship was seized, was there any reasonable ground for suspicion
that she was liable to seizure under these instructions?
It appeared distinctly upon her papers, as the facts upon inquiry turn -out to be,
that on the 25th of March 1854, before the declaration of war against Russia, this
ship was on her voyage from Leith to Cronstadt; that she was on that day chartered
for a voyage with a cargo of wheat from Cronstadt to England, or countries in
alliance or amity with England, according to orders which she might receive at
Elsinore; that on the 10th of May the shipment of her cargo had been completed;
that by the 16th she had complied with all the formalities required to enable her to
leave Cronstadt : and that when she was taken she was on her direct course from that
port to Elsinore.
Cronstadt was not blockaded at the time she entered that port; nor at the time
when she took her cargo on board ; nor at the time when she left Cronstadt; nor
even at the time when 'she was captured; nor for more than three weeks afterwards;
and no blockade of Cronstadt had been proclaimed, either by the British Government
or by the Admiral.
It is said that the Admiral had, on the 16th of April, in Kioge Bay, proclaimed
an intention of blockading all Russian ports, and that certain ports in the Gulf of
Finland were actually blockaded on. the 28th of May, and perhaps at an earlier
period ; but there was not the slightest ground for suspecting that this ship had left
any other port than Cronstadt, or had any intention of entering any other Russian
port.
[180] What colour of reason, then, could there be for seizing, under such circum-
stances, this vessel, which did not fall under any one of the conditions which are
required by the instructions to concur in order to justify sending in the ship for
adjudication?
TH E OSTSEE
375
0SP. BOO. & AD. 179.](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.slavery/ssactsengr0372&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)