CHAPTER IX. PRIVATEERS. THAT every State when at war has a right to claim the aid of all its citizens in the prosecution of war is a principle so clear that it has never been contested. It has indeed been carried so far that the nations of the Continent claim and exercise the right, not only when actually at war but when at peace with all mankind; since by the system of universal military service, which is now in many countries established, they enrol all their citizens in peace, and during peace train and prepare them all for war. Since then the State thus compels its citizens to give aid in war, there can be no doubt that it has also the right to accept their aid when voluntarily offered. This is the case with Privateers, which are vessels provided, manned, and armed by private individuals, furnished with a commission by the Sovereign, and sent forth to attack the enemy in his commerce. Though the right to send forth Privateers has never been contested, yet the propriety of exercising it has nevertheless been questioned, on grounds, which it is proposed here summarily to examine. In order to make the matter clear it will be as well to state here more exactly what a Privateer is, and under what conditions alone it can act. This is the more necessary, because, either from ignorance or from insincerity, the most erroneous and absurd notions have been promulgated on this point, by men whose names and position should have been a guaranty that their speech was honest and accurate. A Privateer (or Corsair, as it is sometimes called) is then, a vessel armed and equipped by a private person or persons, to the captain of which the Sovereign of a State at war, upon application of the owner, has issued a commission or letter of marque and reprisals empowering him to levy war upon the enemy by capturing his property. The essence and sole origin of the right thus to cruise and to seize enemy's property lies in this commission; without it the Privateer would be a Pirate. With it the Privateer becomes a vessel of the State and a ship of war,' for all the purposes for which it is commissioned, so long as the war lasts. As such, Privateers are, equally with vessels of the State navy, subject to all regulations which the State may lay down for their conduct, and in order to secure the observance of these regulations, it has always been customary to cause them to give security (beyond any that the navy gives) by depositing a sum of money before sailing on their cruise, that they will duly observe the regulations in question." 66 66 1 "A ship furnished with a letter of marque is manifestly a ship of war, and is not otherwise to be considered because she "acts also in a commercial capacity. The mercantile character being superadded, does not predominate over or take away the other" (Lord Stowell, in the "Fanny," 1 Dodson, 448). Privateers are private property in one sense, but they have at "the same time a public character impressed on them by their employment; though they are private property they are still "private property employed in the public service." On which ground it was decided by Lord Stowell that a Privateer was liable to seizure under a capitulation which stipulated that "all "private property should be respected." 1 Edwards, 271. 66 2 See Act of Congress of 1812, sec. 3; see also the last Prize Act, 55 Geo. III., cap. 160. In the second place it is to be observed that the Privateer, like the State ship, has only the right to carry the property he captures into port for adjudication, that no Privateer can touch a rope-yarn on board an enemy's vessel, or appropriate an ounce of merchandise except after final adjudication as lawful prize in the High Court of Admiralty,' and that if the master or crew commit any acts of outrage, or in excess of their authority, even in the performance of legitimate acts, both they and the owners are liable to the full value of the property injured or destroyed." That there may remain no doubt as to the character and the obligations of the Privateer, a copy of the form of the commission and of the regulations he was bound to observe, as they were last issued in 1812 and 1815, are printed in the Appendix.3 Thus it will be seen-1. That a Privateer can only act by virtue of a commission regularly issued by the State. 2. That in thus acting he is bound to adhere to the regulations imposed by the State. 3. That he gives heavy security for their observance. 4. That all he can do is to bring the property he seizes into port, there to be adjudicated upon. 5. That unless the property be declared lawful prize, he acquires no claim to it. 6. That if he has made seizure of property without probable cause he is liable to pay costs and damages to the owners. Nevertheless, in face of all this, there have been found men ready to assert that the Privateer, who acts by public authority under the regulation of law, is not to be distinguished from the Pirate who acts 1 See 55 Geo. III., cap. 160. 2 See the case of the "Amiable Nancy," 1 Paine, iii. without any authority, acknowledges no regulation, and bids defiance to the law. Thus Lord Clarendon, then Foreign Secretary, said hastily at the Conference of Paris, "La course n'est "autre chose qu'une piraterie organisée et légale❞— as though piracy ever could be legal. But writing a considered despatch ten years later, in the name of the British Government, he was forced to retract this monstrous proposition, and laid it down that "The character of a Privateer is determined by her commission, and if that is issued by the Sovereign Power of the "State whose colours she bears, neither her captain nor her crew can be deemed to be pirates.' 46 Mr. John Bright, again, who, as a member of the Privy Council and once a Minister of State, should have spoken with some knowledge, said at a public meeting, "In the reign of Queen Elizabeth more than half of the shipowners, and especially those on the southern coasts, were engaged in piracy-their ships were either pirates or corsairs, and I do not know the difference between them."3 Again, in the debate in the House of Commons on the 13th April, 1875, Mr. Bourke, the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, said, "Privateers can do whatever they choose, and "are bound by no rules whatever except those which 66 they make themselves." When such is the ignorant notion held of Privateers and privateering by men in authority it is the less surprising that a prejudice should exist in the minds of men at large against the practice of accepting volunteer aid at sea. It is remarkable, indeed, since there 1 See 22nd Proposal of the Conferences of Paris, 1856: State Papers, vol. 46, p. 128. 2 Despatch to the Spanish Government, 6th January, 1866. See Times report of Mr. Bright's speech, 26th June, 1875. is no such prejudice against the acceptance of volunteers on land, and since there is no kind of comparison between the much greater increase of strength which a maritime country must receive from volunteer aid on the sea, where her power is, as compared with that she gains from volunteers on shore, where her power is not. The objections made to privateers do not, as has already been said (for they cannot)—touch the right to accept their services-they only deal with the propriety of the policy of exercising the right. These objections are mainly of a sentimental character. It is said and repeated that privateering is a "barbarous ' method of making war, that it is a "relic of bar"barism," that "the motive of privateers is plunder," that "they are one of the greatest scourges of war," that privateering is "opposed to civilization and humanity," and that to abandon it tends to "mitigate the horrors of war." It is simply necessary to say in reply to all this that Privateers act against property alone; that the one sole object with which they set out is to take property; and that they neither propose to take nor are permitted to take life, except in case of resistance to their taking of property. Unless, then, it be less barbarous and more civilized to take life than it is to take property; unless it be less humane to seize a cargo than to blow a ship's crew into the air; unless it be more horrible to capture inanimate merchandise than to dismember and destroy animate men; unless this be true, it must follow that the Privateer is far less barbarous and more humane in his method of injuring the enemy than any can be who go out only "to sink, burn, and destroy." The very fact that "his motive is Prize" is his greatest justification, |