HC Deb 22 May 1884 vol 288 cc1103-16
MR. STOREY

said, he desired to draw attention to another matter which was of much more importance than the problematical march of Russia towards India. He was not much concerned in what was happening in Central Asia. For his part, he should not be sorry if a civilizing Power like Russia took a great many other places. He wished, however, to invite the attention of the Committee to a question which affected them immediately. They were aware that on several occasions he had asked Questions of the noble Lord the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs respecting some British subjects who, for several mouths, had been the captives of a petty Rajah in Sumatra. He had not obtained from the noble Lord any satisfactory assurance that the English official out there was doing all that was necessary to secure the release of the men; and if the Committee would bear with him, he would very briefly enumerate the circumstances. The Nisero was wrecked on the 14th of November, 1883, and since then the crew had not only been in peril of their lives, but from time to time had been in absolute destitution. At the time they were taken captive the Rajah of Tenom was in conflict with the Dutch Government, who claimed Sovereignty in that part of the world. So far as he could form a judgment, the Dutch Government, and other persons, had behaved in a high-handed and improper manner towards this petty Potentate. However that might be, the Rajah, finding that his captives were British subjects, determined to use them as a means of compelling the Dutch Government to do justice to himself. We had nothing to do with the Rajah of Tenom in this matter. The Dutch Government claimed Sovereignty in those parts; and therefore they owed it to us to produce those men when we demanded their release. He wanted to know what the Foreign Office of England had done to secure the release of these British sailors? They were poor men; they had not the honour to be Generals, or to be connected with noble Lords in the other House, or with officers in the Army or Navy. If they had been, he could understand the shoals of Questions which would have been asked in the House of Commons and in the House of Lords concerning their fate. It had been left to him to raise this matter in the House, inasmuch as these men belonged to the borough which he represented (Sunderland); and if he had not had the support of one or two Members coming from the same locality, and of one Member in whose constituency some of these men lived, he should have been entirely powerless even to make a speech on this subject in the House. If he could show the Committee that these men had been kept in captivity for several months, and that practically nothing had been done for their release, and that unless Members spoke out nothing would be done, he thought he should probably secure the support of some other Members. It was on the 14th of November that these men were made captive. What had been done to release them? Representations were made to the Dutch Government; and when the matter was mentioned in that House the noble Lord the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs had stated that an expedition had been sent by the Dutch Government. That the Dutch Government had sent an expedition he admitted. They sent an expedition on the 7th of January—two months after the men were captured; but what was that expedition? A person who was well able to give information on the subject had described it. He said the expedition went on shore, set fire to a few huts, and returned to their ships, apparently satisfied that they had done their utmost. On turning to the official declarations of the Dutch Government, he found that the official Report stated that the operations were conducted not for the rescue of the captives, but for the chastisement of the district. He thought the noble Lord knew better than he did that it was not in the policy or the intention of the Dutch Government to do anything relating to these poor men except under strong pressure from the English Government. They were quite content to have an open sore between themselves and the Rajah, and that these men should remain in captivity as a bone of contention between him and themselves; but he submitted that it was the duty of the British Government to enforce it on the Dutch Government that they must deal with this matter. The noble Lord had said that the Foreign Office was doing what it could; but he could tell the noble Lord much more that it ought to do. Once in the history of this country, when an English Earl had been taken prisoner by one of his vassals, William the Conqueror demanded his release, and when his captor made excuses as the Dutch Government had now done, he said— By the splendour of God, Guy of Ponthieu ! I will have your prisoner or I will have you ! He submitted to the noble Lord that it was time that the Foreign Office should speak in firmer and more definite language. He thought he had heard an hon. Member say he was speaking in a Jingo spirit. He was not; but they often passed to Jingo actions, because they did not speak definitely. If these men had been in a more important position there would have been a shower of Questions to the Government; but he would recall some of the facts. He did not mean to go into the facts in detail; but he thought it was in the recollection of many hon. Members that on three occasions in the last 10 or 15 years similar questions to this had arisen, only not with regard to poor men, but to men who held positions in society, or had relations with society. What happened? The Foreign Office put all the engines of diplomacy to work, and made its authority so felt that in two cases a remedy was obtained; and in the third case, at any rate, satisfaction was exacted. He would explain why he pressed upon the noble Lord more active measures in this matter. They had not these men alone to consider, though that was a matter of importance. There were more than 20 of them; they were all hard working men, and were now living in a climate that was peculiarly unhealthy at the present time of the year. The noble Lord assured him the other day that he had received a telegram stating that these people were well. He had had a communication from the captain of the ship, who was at present at home. He wished the captain had been with his men to look after them. He entertained an entirely opposite opinion to that in the telegram; and stated that, so far as his judgment, went the message to which the noble Lord had referred was not a message sent by the men at all, but by the Rajah, who held the men in activity, and whose interest it was to make things appear as agreeable as he could. He counselled the noble Lord to ascertain as soon as he could from the men themselves whether they were not at present in jeopardy for their lives, for he thought he knew the temper both of that House and of the people of this country; and he was satisfied that if, through laxity on the part of their officials, those poor men should die while in captivity, there would be considerable irritation expressed against the officials. As he had said, they had not only to consider these men; they had to consider their wives and families. When he asked the noble Lord whether he could do anything for the wives and families of these men, the noble Lord said he regretted that he had no funds at his disposal. He wondered that the noble Lord, having Radical instincts as he had, did not feel ashamed to make such an answer; and he believed the noble Lord would not have made such a reply if he had not been an offi- cial. He had received the following short letter from the wife of one of these men:— I am very sorry to write to you again; but I have remained so long expecting some news from my poor husband, that I do not know what to do. I have four children. I am not able to work. I am dependent on a widowed mother so long that I do not know what to do, so I write to you. If you can help me in any way I shall he most thankful. Please write to me if any steps are taken to release these men. He did not put too much stress upon this letter; but he thought it likely that in a great number of cases the wives and families of these men would be in absolute destitution if they had not found here and there kind friends; and he must say it was little to the credit of the Office which the noble Lord represented that he should have to say that he had no funds at his disposal to help these people. No funds at his disposal! The other day the Foreign Office spent £2,000 or £3,000 on sending certain noble Lords to bestow a Garter; and every time a petty German Prince wanted to come and visit our Royal Family the Government could put a ship at his disposal at a charge of £40 to the State, when he might very well afford to pay for his passage himself. £40 would keep one of these families for 12 months. He could multiply these instances by dozens and by hundreds; but he could assure the noble Lord that if he did not speak much about these matters he took the trouble to note down circumstances under which the money of this country was wasted over the most frivolous and foolish things. But when he asked the noble Lord for money to relieve the distress of these people whose husbands and fathers were kept captive for political reasons—because the Foreign Office dared not be firm with the Dutch Government—he could give no assistance. He did not blame the Foreign Office too much for that, for he did not wish to run them into conflict with the Dutch Government or any other Government; but he most point out that it was because of political consequences that pressure was not brought to bear upon the Dutch Government, and when he asked for a small sum of money to help these people the Representative of the Foreign Office replied that if these people were to be helped it must be done by public subscription. He was very much obliged to the noble Lord for the suggestion; but he was thankful to say that he could do without suggestions from the noble Lord as to public subscriptions. He only pressed upon him and the Committee the impropriety of any public Department saying that they could not afford money in such a case as this, when at some other time they were parties to expenses which no common sense could justify. He had no more to say, except that he thought the Government ought to speak to the Dutch Government with the firmness which a Minister of England ought to employ in such a matter as this. These men were British subjects; they were held in captivity within Dutch territory by men who ought to be amenable to Dutch influence or Dutch power; and if the Dutch Government could not be brought, after six or seven months, definitely to say that it would take effectual measures to release these men, then he thought it was time that the British Government, which could afford to shed blood like water, and spend money by millions, over very much less worthy ends, should itself take steps to assert the honour of England and release these poor men.

SIR HENRY HOLLAND

said, he would not enter into the details of the case of these unfortunate British subjects; but he desired to assure the noble Lord the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs that the greatest sympathy was felt for them by Members sitting on that side of the House. It was no Party question, but one affecting the honour of this country. The hon. Member for Sunderland had said that they had nothing to do directly with the Rajah. That was, no doubt, true; but they had to deal with him indirectly through the Dutch, and they had a right to exercise very direct pressure on the Dutch. They practically owed their position and power in that part of Sumatra to the concessions made by this country in return for the surrender to them by the Dutch of some forts on the West Coast of Africa. The noble Lord would doubtless say, as he had said before, that the Foreign Office had made strong representations to the Dutch authorities upon the matter of these unfortunate captives. Well, they make such representations very freely; they had made them to Russia; they had made them to the Transvaal Government; but there they stopped, as if by making them they had done all that it was their duty or interest to do. Now, he (Sir Henry Holland) protested against this view. He was satisfied that if they took a firm and decided tone with the Dutch authorities, and insisted upon their getting these men restored, either by force or by payment of a ransom, they would succeed. He fully admitted that there were difficulties in the case; but other cases of a like kind, and of like difficulty, had been before now successfully dealt with; and it was intolerable that these innocent men should be left in a captivity which had already lasted too long. He would not detain the Committee any longer; but he desired to uphold strongly the case of these men. and to show by doing so that this was no Party question, and that both sides of the House desired to strengthen the hands of the Foreign Office.

MR. MOORE

said, he knew it to be a fact that those men were not detained through any hostility to this country on the part of the people of Sumatra. The hon. Member for Sunderland (Mr. Storey) agreed with him; but, while agreeing with the hon. Member upon the matter, he must make one distinction. The people of Sumatra had said over and over again that they were anxious that this country should go and take possession of Sumatra, and would fall at our feet if we would go there and give them protection. He was not urging a policy of annexation; but he wanted to bring the Committee to see the true point, which was this— these men were held in captivity in order to draw attention to the tyranny and brutal treatment which the Natives had received from the Dutch. They said their only hope was in that the Foreign Office should speak one word firmly, and that would bring them relief. These men were not held there through any hostility to or defiance of this country, but simply to draw attention to their grievances. The Dutch had closed their ports, and would not allow them to treat freely. They were deeply grieved, and that was why they were holding these men. He should be sorry to say anything that would weaken the responsibility of the Foreign Office in this matter; but these men were being fairly treated according to the poor diet and circumstances of the people, and he hoped the Government would not exer- cise the power of this country against these poor weak Natives, except to speak plainly to the Dutch Government and obtain the release of these prisoners, and see that the influence of the country was exercised in securing justice and fair treatment to these people, instead of oppression.

MR. SLAGG

wished to say a few words on this subject, inasmuch as one of these men was one of his constituents. The hon. Member for Sunderland (Mr. Storey) seemed to think that as this question had not been submitted to discussion in the House these men had not received duo attention. But the noble Lord had been in constant communication with him and his friends upon this matter. They had received the greatest possible attention and manifestations of the greatest interest and solicitude on the part of the Foreign Office. He had been in communication, with Captain Wodehouse, the commander of the Nisero, who had more than once been with him to the Foreign Office, and had been invited, together with others who had interested themselves in the case, to make suggestions for the release of the men. All the suggestions were fully and promptly carried out by the Foreign Office; but the Committee must remember that unusual difficulties surrounded this matter. It was not merely a question of dealing with the Dutch Government, or sending supplies or an armed force from this country. The captain of the Nisero absolutely deprecated the idea of sending an armed force on account of the danger and probable death to which such a step might subject these men; and he was bound to say, on behalf of the noble Lord, that he had only been deterred from active steps of the kind suggested through the danger to the men pointed out by Captain Wodehouse. He joined the hon. Member for Sunderland in the hearty desire that the Foreign Office would take up this matter in such a way as to bring it to a satisfactory conclusion; but he was satisfied that undue pressure might result in disastrous consequences.

SIR WILFRID LAWSON

said, he was very glad to hear the concluding remarks of the hon. Member for Manchester (Mr. Slagg), for it appeared to him that if they went on as they were going on now they would soon be at war with all the world. The hon. Member for Sunderland (Mr. Storey), if he meant anything, meant that they should go to war with Holland, and he had quoted William the Conqueror; but surely they had got past the days of William the Conqueror, and should deal with matters in a different way. He sympathized with these men, and was anxious that they should be brought back safely. He had no doubt that these men were very good men, and he was quite as anxious to get them back as General Gordon. They were not getting the country into any trouble; hut he thought the hon. Member, instead of doing good to these men, would do them harm, because if active steps were taken the Rajah would be more likely to murder them. He hoped the noble Lord would speak in a peaceable manner, and not in a savage manner.

MR. MAC IVER

said, he thought the hon. Baronet had delivered a most heartless speech. He forgot the terrible position of these men, and he wished to say that he himself knew something about this matter. He knew how accurately the case had been put by the hon. Member for Sunderland (Mr. Storey); and he felt that it would be a sad day for England when the House of Commons came to discuss with indifference the question whether they should not only use firm words, but should follow them up. It would be a sad day when they led other countries to believe that they were no longer in earnest, and no longer spoke firmly and followed up their words vigorously. But what he particularly wished to say was, that he also had had some experience of the Foreign Office in regard to a case somewhat parallel to this. There was a case of the illegal detention of two Scotch engineers, which was brought before that House more than once by the hon. Member for Glasgow (Dr. Cameron). That case had some interest for himself, because, although those men were originally Glasgow men, it happened that one of them had come to reside in Birkenhead. He knew the man, and knew how hard his case was; but the Foreign Office did absolutely nothing in the matter, except to write polite letters to the Government of Spain. The case of these men was very similar to this case. They were forcibly imprisoned and taken to Manilla, and afterwards sent home as distressed seamen and entitled to wages. They had a perfectly just claim against the Spanish Government, which the English Government acknowledged, but did nothing. he mentioned this as an illustration of the supineness of the Foreign Office, which had been repeated in the present case, but which he hoped they would no longer adopt.

MR. W. REDMOND

said, attention had been drawn, by the able address of the hon. Member for Sunderland (Mr. Storey), to this matter; and he thought the conclusion generally to be drawn was that Her Majesty's Government were at all times ready to embroil themselves in quarrels with second-rate Powers, or with savage races such as the Zulus, or with such as they imagined the Boers were, but afterwards found they were not. The hon. Member for Sunderland had quoted, to the chagrin of the hon. Baronet the Member for Carlisle (Sir Wilfrid Lawson), some ancient history with regard to William the Conqueror, as to the action that William the Conqueror took respecting some friend of his who had been taken prisoner; and the hon. Member seemed to compare his firm conduct to the wavering conduct of the present Government with reference to these unfortunate men. He did not share the opinion of the hon. Baronet, who found fault, so to speak, with the hon. Member for Sunderland (Mr. Storey) for quoting William the Conqueror; but what he did regret was, that when he was speaking of William the Conqueror and of English history he did not cite the action of another person who figured in English history at a more recent date than William the Conqueror. Had he done so, he would have shown completely the reason why the Government did not take action with regard to these men. The person he referred to was Admiral Van Tromp, who, in a former quarrel between the Dutch and the English, sailed up the Medway and set fire to the shipping, and did a great deal of damage to this country. There was another reason. Probably the sound of the rifles which rang in the Transvaal had not altogether died away, but were still echoing in the ears of Her Majesty's Government. He was not surprised, therefore, that the people, or rather the Government of the country, was somewhat loth to take any firm or decided step which might result in a catastrophe of the nature of that which befel Her Majesty's troops in the Transvaal. He could only say that, listening to the speech of the hon. Member for Sunderland (Mr. Storey), he had confirmed an opinion which he had entertained — namely, that while the country was embroiled in difficulties of this kind the Government was afraid, and altogether too mean, to stand up against a Power which could not be considered at all powerful. These sailors had been taken, he believed, because they were British, and because there was a feeling in that quarter of the world that British subjects, as a rule, were very little better than depredators. If no notice was taken of the holding of these sailors in captivity, the destitute condition of their families he should have thought sufficient to prompt Her Majesty's Government to take some action to secure the release of the men. But because the Dutch Government appeared to be concerned, Her Majesty's Government remained silent, and would do nothing that they considered likely to raise the ire of the Dutch people. Oh, no; before the Dutch and the Boers they had nothing to say for themselves; but wait until some people like the Zulus awakened their displeasure, and they would then have the British lion on the alert, with his tail swinging and his jaws open, ready to devour whatever might come within his reach.

LORD EDMOND FITZMAURICE

said, he was not surprised to hear this subject discussed by the hon. Member for Sunderland (Mr. Storey), as there was a strong feeling with regard to it in the North of England, where the relations of the crew of this unfortunate vessel resided. He would go farther, and say that this discussion would strengthen the hands of the Foreign Office in whatever steps they might think it desirable to take, because when they appealed to the Dutch Government, and urged the consideration of the question on them, they could now say that the question was not so much one in which the Foreign Office took interest as one in which the House of Commons itself was interested. At the same time, he must regret some of the observations which fell from the hon. Member for Sunderland, because he felt that the hon. Member was not justified in leading the Committee to suppose that the Foreign Office had been doing nothing; and he (Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice) had to thank the hon. Member for Manchester (Mr. Slagg), with whom he had had frequent communication on this subject, for having risen and corrected the statement of the hon. Member. He must altogether deny the claim of the hon. Member for Sunderland that he, and he alone, had taken a prominent part in this question. While the hon. Member was still in Egypt, he (Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice) had had frequent communication with many hon. Members on the matter. A deputation, in which were several Members of Parliament, had waited upon the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs some time ago; but the hon. Member did not seem to be aware of what had passed on that occasion; in fact, it really seemed as though he was unaware of what had taken place on the subject from beginning to end, and that his principal desire had been to take advantage of an opportunity for making an attack upon the Government. He (Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice) would not take up the time of the Committee by replying in detail to the observations of the hon. Member, but would state to the Committee very briefly what had occurred. The hon. Member had not given him warning that he was going to bring the subject on that evening, and the first intimation he had of it was contained in the hon. Member's speech. The position of the subject, however, was that he intended tomorrow to lay on the Table Papers giving particulars of what had occurred between the Rajah of Tenom and the Dutch Government. When the House had seen those Papers it would know how undeserved were the observations of the hon. Member for Sunderland to the effect that the Foreign Office had done nothing. But, as the character of the Foreign Office had been already cleared by the independent testimony of the hon. Member for Manchester, it was not necessary for him to go any further into the matter. The Prime Minister had stated the other day, in reply to a further Question from the hon. Member for Sunderland, that the real and essential difficulty of the case was that the Rajah had got the men in his possession, and that if an armed expedition were attempted, or any intervention of that kind were essayed, its object would be very likely to be defeated, as the Rajah would probably take the law into his own hands and destroy the captives. Every means ought to be taken, therefore—every resource of diplomacy ought to be exhausted, before recourse was had to military force, or any strong measures were adopted. He would remind the Committee of this—that the greatest difficulty of all in this case began at the time the Dutch armed expedition was sent out. The men having been taken in November were still on the sea coast in January, and the Dutch were of opinion that something might be done for their relief by an armed expedition. That expedition might have been well or badly managed; but the result was that the Rajah succeeded in drawing off inland and in taking his captives with him into the interior of the country, where they were now out of reach. There were, as the hon. Baronet the Member for Midhurst (Sir Henry Holland) had said, various diplomatic questions put forward between England and Holland, and the position of the Dutch Government in relation to the Sultan of Kemala and his tributary, the Rajah of Tenom. In reply to a Question put by the hon. Member for Sunderland a few days ago, he had informed the House that it was hoped by Her Majesty's Government, by negotiations conducted through the Sultan of Acheen, who resided tit Kemala, and was the Suzerain of the Rajah, that it might be possible to secure the liberation of the captives. That was an opinion which the Government had not abandoned, and at that very moment negotiations were going on. The Dutch Government were appealed to to accept a mediation with regard to all quarrels between them and the Native Princes; but, unfortunately, the Dutch Government had refused that mediation. Her Majesty's Government were still pressing that course on the Dutch Government. He was in great hopes that those steps would prove successful; still, he did not conceal the fact that the whole question was one of great difficulty. He believed that in the opinion of the Foreign Office it was one of the most difficult minor questions they had ever had to deal with, because it was complicated by questions both of policy and International Law. Of one matter he felt certain—namely, that if they made up their minds to send an armed expedi- tion with no other instruction than to secure the captives and punish their captors, it would be the most unwise thing they ever did. He was astonished that the hon. Member for Sunderland had mingled with his sentences of kindness and pity for the suffering sailors and their families taunts about German Princes, and the expenses of the Foreign Office. The hon. Member even took the trouble to show how carelessly he had studied the Estimates which he declared he was always studying, for he had said he (Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice) was responsible for the expenditure of a certain sum of money for the conveyance of a German Prince to his own country. That was a matter with which the Foreign Office had nothing whatever to do. But he (Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice) did not wish to enter into these points, which were entirely irrelevant to the issue before the House. The great necessity was to take every diplomatic means to secure the liberation of the men, and they could only hope that they would escape thereby from such a disaster as that they had experienced on a previous occasion, when violent measures had been taken to liberate persons. The unfortunate gentlemen who were killed in Greece some years ago perished in consequence of an armed expedition sent out to save them. When hon. Members read the Papers which they would have in their hands the day after to-morrow, they would see that no efforts had been or would be spared by the Foreign Office to secure the release of these men.

MR. ASHMEAD-BARTLETT

denied that he had found fault with Russia for advancing her railway, or even for pressing on her conquests. It was natural she should seize all she could. But he blamed Her Majesty's Ministers for throwing away the bulwarks of our Indian Empire, and for their blind indifference towards the unerring advance of the Czar's Forces. As for the noble Lord's eulogy of Russian humanity and civilization it was pure imagination. Skobeleff had butchered over 12,000 of the Turkomans, women and children as well as men, at Geok Tepe. The Mussulmans of the Balkan Peninsula, the mountaineers of the Caucasus, and the oppressed people of Poland, could give the noble Lord some information as to the real character of the civilizing mission of Russia.