British Blue-Jackets and Californian Lynchers.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume VI, Issue 435, 29 August 1851, Page 2

British Blue-Jackets and Californian Lynchers.

We relate, upon the authority of an Eyewitness, the following exquisite example of the equitable spirit of Lynching, so generally practiced by the people, and so warmly commended by the Press, of California. — We suppose the affair must have ' been much too piquant for the columns of our trans pacific contemporaries-through whoso pages we have searched in vain for the slightest allusion. On the day of tbejta^; great fire, Capt. Harris, of the BritisltfnKlrque Timandra, whilst passing along one of the streets, observed a number of men standing inactively by a mass of burning pitch. " Why don't you put it out ?" inquired the captaito. " Put it out yourself, if you fancy the job," was the insolent reply. The sailor, however, laid hold of a shovel and was actively employed'in smothering the flames with sand, when he was hailed with "I say, stranger, are you an American ?" " No, thank God," returned the other, " I'm an Englishman."' The avowal nearly cost him his fife. In an instant a rope was thrown round his neck and he was dragged through the streets, kicked, cuffed, and abused in every imaginable manner. Fortunately the rope broke, or in all probability he would have been strangled. As it was; he only escaped with broken bones and the clothes torn from his<| back.

Captain Harris immediately proceeded on board H. M. Steam Sloop ' Driver,' where lie stated his case and claimed protection from her commander. This, Capt. Johnson was not slow to afford, having landed and waited upon the Committee of Vigilance, from whom ho demanded reparation for the outrage. But this secret and iniquitous conclave, so prompt and [ omnipotent to destroy life, pleaded, as i apology for non-compliance with Captain Johnson's demand, their utter powerlessness to afford protection, much less to obtain redress. Captain Johnson was not, nevertheless, to be thus baffled, but intimated, in decided terms, that if reparation | was beyond their power, he should try whether it was beyond his, and, to ascertain that, he should proceed down the coast in search of the British Admiral, and proclaim the thirty-first star of the Union as a piratical state, in every port he visited. This had the desired effect ; the amende to Capt. Harris was made, and Capt. Johnson be-larded with a nauseous amount of soft sawder. The San Franciscans have been most insulting in their denunciations of the, Sydneyites. Can they really be so purblind to facts as not to perceive that any comparison between the morality and social virtue of Botany Bay, even in its worst days, with their own, would be a crying injustice offered to the penal colonies ? Can they, in an entire decade, point to a tithe of the robberies, murders, arsons, and other atrocious difficulties which in California are of daily and hourly occurrence ? Even the fiercest Australian bushrangers evinced a kindlier and a manlier spirit than the human tigers of this remarkably pretentious State. That San Francisco has again and again been destroyed is little wonder. This may have been the handiwork of Sydney men, thirsting for revenge for the many taunts that have been hurled against them, but the Californians should learn a lesson of prudence from the past, and cease to exasperate such desperadoes further. If they detect any of them in the commission of crime, punish for the offence committed ; but let them not goad a vindictive class by needless and unworthy vituperations. Let them remember how frequently San Francisco has been consumed in two years, whilst, in ten, Sydney has been visited but by one inconsiderable fire.

The Bight Hon. Earl Grey, KM. Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies. Auckland, 28th August, 1851. My Lord, — I yesterday had the honor of receiving, by command of His Excellency the Lieut.-Governor, your Lordship's reply to the letter of sth July, 1850, addressed by me to your Lordship, complaining of the defamatory charge made by your Lordship against me in a despatch to the Governor of New Zealand on the subject of a letter addressed by His Excellency to the Bishop of New Zealand relative to the Missionary Land Claims — which letter your Loi*d- .. ship charges me with having obtained the possession of "in some surreptitious manner, which I declined afterwards to explain." Having pointed out to your Lordship the •unfounded nature of this charge, I fully expected to have received in return a distinct retractation of it; but am now informed that your.Lordship cannot alter the opinion which you have already expressed, as I " have not thought proper to explain the manner in which I obtained the letter which I published without the permission of the writer, or the party to whomi* was addressed, further than by stating that it was given to me by a gentleman " who had since quitted the Colony." Such being the case,- 1 feel constrained to bring the subject once more under your Lordship's notice, as I must attribute this result to the imperfect manner in which I had brought it before your Lordship, rather than to any unwillingness on your part to do me the justice of apologizing for an injury which your Lordship may have unintentionally inflicted. Permit me shortly to recapitulate the few material facts involved in this matter : When a member of the General Legislative Council here, in 1847, 1 moved for production of certain returns, including amongst them the letter to the Bishop of New Zealand, which his Excellency had written, seeking his Lordship's influence to prevail upon the Missionaries to give up their Land | Claims. His Excellency denied the existence of such a letter. A copy of this letter was put into my hands by a gentleman, which I publishedjba the " Southern Cross" newspaper. His — apparently, extremely irritated'at this disclosure — wrote a despatch to your Lordship, complaining of the publication, and stating that I had omitted therein an important sentence, thus conveying the impression to your Lordship that I had garbled the document for the unworthy purpose of bringing it to bear against his Excellency. On becoming acquainted with this charge at a distant time, through the medium of the Blue Book, I addressed your Lordship on the subject, proving that the published copy of the letter was, verbatim, with the original ; — that his Excellency's assertions were wholly unfounded ; and requesting that my refutation of them should have equal publicity, through the Blue Book, with the charges made -against me. Your Lordship acceded to this request; — coupling it, however, with the remark that

I,_had brought the Governor's accusation upon myself by publishing the Letter "without 'the consent of either the writer or the person to whom it was addressed, a letter of which I obtained possession in some surreptitious manner, which I declined afterwards to explain." I then brought this new accusation of Your Lordship under your notice, as already mentioned, but this you have declined to retract, for the reasons now stated. To prove to your Lordship that these expressions are defamatory and unfair, I need only call your attention to the fact, that the Grovernor's letter to the Bishop was not a private letter, but a public document, and about which, as His Lordship the Bishop remarked, "no secresfy was desired." His Excellency therein requested the Bishop to communicate its contents to the Missionaries, (Blue Book p. 209, 1850) thus affording prima facie evidence, (in your Lordship's possession, — and not to be rebutted without special knowledge to the contrary,') that the letter was so far public that its contents could not have been surreptitiously obtained-^- a charge which your Lordship has not scrupled to make without the smallest evidence to support it. Again : Because I published it without the consent of the writer, or the pai*ty to whom it was addressed: — The propriety or impropriety of that proceeding cannot, however, in the slightest degree warrant the application to me of having "surreptitiously" I obtained it. Your Lordship speaks of my having declined to communicate the name of the party who furnished me with the Letter : — I have never yet been asked to do so, either by His Excellency the - Governor, or by His Lordship the Bishop,— the writer of the Letter, and the party to whom it was addressed, — though the latter went so far as to say that it had been, at one time, his intention to have made" the request, but he never actually did so, — thus taking from Your Lordship the only remaining ground upon which Your Lordship bases the accusation against me. I would now, therefore, again seek from Your Lordship that unqualified reparation for an injury which no man, — however elevated his rank, — who has done an injustice, has a right to refuse to another, however humble his station. In conclusion, permit me to say that in case the name of the gentleman who furnished the copy of the Bishop's Letter should still be of any interest or importance, I will write immediately to the gentleman — now out of the Colony — for his permission to communicate It 5 and have no doubt of its being at once grantad. On obtaining it, I shall apprize Your Lordship of the fact of having obtained such permission, and will engage as a matter of courtesy to Your Lordship to acquaint you therewith so soon as I have received Your Lordship's retractation But I have a right to insist that the retraction should precede the conveyance of this information, upon which I have shown that it in no way depends. I publish this Letter ("Southern Cross" herewith enclosed) in order that the facts — well known to parties here — may be rebutted, should any of them be untrue. I have the honor to be Your Lordship's obedient servant, William Brown.

Ifc may be well to remind our readers of the following appointments :—: — Monday next, September Ist, Criminal Sittings of the Supreme Court. Tuesday next, September 2nd, Transfer of Publican's Licenses, at the Resident Magistrate's Court. Saturday next, September 6th, Civil Sitting of the Supreme Court.