Publications of the Navy Records Society

This practice appears to have grown up during the seventeenth century, and for some time payment of the ransom was enforced against the ship by the Admiralty Court at the instance of the hostage (pp. 180, 234). Its legality, at least in case of capture by a King's ship, was questioned in 1712 (p. 225), and in 1744 the practice was forbidden to all captors (p. 430). The form of a ransom bill is given at p. 222.

Stay of suspected Ships

In 1712 enquiry was ordered to be made as to a ship which, it was alleged, was being fitted out for the Czar of Russia (p. 225); it does not appear what the result was, but the government was advised that there was no power to stop her. On three occasions the East India Company applied for the stay of ships upon the ground that they would make trouble in the East, apparently with more success (pp. 196, 333). A ship fitted out by Lord Mordaunt in the seventeenth century was stayed upon similar grounds, and was afterwards bought into the Navy.

Convoy

At the beginning of the eighteenth century this subject was attracting considerable attention. The owners of English goods in Swedish ships, and the trade to Swedish ports in Russian hands were both calling for protection (pp. 219, 235). The unruliness of convoys, complained of in 1711 (p. 220), was afterwards dealt with by legislation.

Recapture from Pirates

In early times the Lord Admiral claimed pirate goods, which were granted to him by his patent (Vol. I, p. 271). In 1701 a pirate's booty was condemned as Admiralty droits (infra, p. 184), but a few years afterwards the Admiralty was advised that the original owners of goods found in pirates' hands were entitled to them upon payment of salvage (p. 250). Recaptures from Moors and Algerines always occasioned difficulties (Vol. I, P. 407; infra, p. 239).

Trial of Pirates

At the close of the seventeenth century, difficulties arose as to the trial of pirates captured in American and East Indian waters, the Act of Henry VIII requiring that they should be tried in England. In 1700 an Act (11 & 12 Will. III, c. 7) was passed enabling their trial abroad; but so that the trial should be in or near some colony or plantation or factory, and a suggestion that they might be tried on the high sea was declared to be contrary to law (p. 252). The pirate Kidd was tried in England, and the sentence condemning his booty and the precept for his execution are printed below (pp. 184, 263). An order for a commission to try pirates abroad under the Act of William III is printed at p. 262.

Joint Operations with France against Pirates

A proposal to this effect by France in 1725 was reported against by the Lords of the Admiralty, mainly upon the ground that the assistance of French ships was not required, and that if accepted,

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it would lead to difficulties in connexion with the disposition of goods captured in pirates' hands (p. 258).

Contraband: Corn and Provisions

Corn and provisions in neutral ships were seized in the war of 1689 and subsequent wars, to "distress the enemy," though doubt seems to have been felt as to the propriety or expediency of doing so. As in the case of naval stores, sale to the crown or otherwise at the port to which the ship was brought was either enforced or allowed (pp. 160, 211, 323, 331, 345, 418). In 1746 an order was sent to H.M. ships in the West Indies to detain such ships, even after they had been ordered by the court to be restored (p. 325); this, however, was speedily recalled.

British Seamen in Foreign Ships

The claim of England to take British seamen out of foreign ships was the subject of special instructions in 1576, 1640, 1643, 1673, and throughout the eighteenth century (Vol I, pp. 213, 513, 523, and infra, p. 86). In 1759 it led to an awkward incident in the case of a ship which appears to have been an English privateer under Prussian colours (p. 385).

Powers of the Crown

The power of the crown to affect by treaty the right of a British subject to claim his goods, brought to England in a foreign belligerent prize, was discussed in several cases (pp. 59, III, 124); also its power to restore a friend's ship brought as prize into an English harbour by a

foreign belligerent (p. 84); also its power to alter or review a sentence of the Admiralty Court or of the Lords of Appeals (pp. 133, 204, 227). The crown appears to have exercised or assumed the right to intervene in a prize suit before sentence (pp. 134, 289); to award to allies a share in prizes captured by the joint forces (pp. 37, 307); and to deal with captures made before war declared, or by way of reprisal (pp. 296, 325).

Report upon the Action of Frederick the Great in Connexion with Reprisals and the Silesian Loan

Although this document (p. 348) has recently been reprinted at length, together with much of the correspondence which accompanied it and which had not been before printed, it had not previously been very accessible, and its importance is perhaps a sufficient reason for reproducing it here. The original has been searched for without success, but there are contemporary prints of it, one of them, which was used by Sir Ernest Satow, is stated to have been issued 'by authority.' That reproduced below is from Collectanea Juridica. It was circulated through the chancelleries of Europe, and has been generally accepted as an authoritative and exhaustive statement of the law and practice of the English Courts of Admiralty. That it was not acquiesced in by Frederick is well known, and France,2 amongst other powers, protested against some of its law. A change in the European situation prevented the points in dispute coming to an issue.

1 The Silesian Loan and Frederick the Great, by Rt. Hon. Ernest Satow. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1915.

S.P. Foreign, Foreign Ministers, &c., 9, 20th April, 1753.