HC Deb 21 May 1860 vol 158 cc1549-50
MR. DALGLISH

said, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether Officers commanding British Ships of War on the coasts of Naples and Sicily have received special instructions to extend the protection of the British Flag to all persons, refugees or others, who may require it?

LORD JOHN RUSSELL

said, in reply, that he had laid on the Table of the House that evening a correspondence on the subject of the reception of refugees on board Her Majesty's Ships; and he had to state that on referring to what had taken place upon former occasions he found that there was a letter written by Mr. Addington under the direction of his noble Friend (Viscount Palmerston), in the year 1849, which seemed to him (Lord John Russell) to convey the orders and instructions applicable to that or to any other cases of the same kind; and he believed the best answer he could give to the question of the hon. Gentleman was to read an extract from that communication. The noble Lord then read the following extract:— I have laid before Viscount Palmerston your letter of the 30th of July last, requesting, by direction of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, his Lordship's opinion on a question which has recently occurred at Naples, as to the extent to which British ships-of-war in a foreign port are entitled to receive on board and shelter the subjects of a foreign Government who may be apprehensive of being persecuted if they remain on shore. Viscount Palmerston directs me to request that you will acquaint the Board of Admiralty that his Lordship is of opinion that it would not be light to receive and harbour on board a British ship-of-war any person flying from justice on a criminal charge, or who was escaping from the sentence of a court of law. But a British man-of-war has always and everywhere been considered a safe place of refuge for persons of whatever country or party who have sought shelter under the British flag from persecution on account of their political conduct or opinions; and this protection has been equally afforded, whether the refugee was escaping from the arbitrary acts of a Monarchical Government or from the lawless violence of a Revolutionary Committee. There seems to be nothing in the present state of affairs at Naples or in Sicily which ought to make a British ship-of-war stationed in a Neapolitan or in a Sicilian port an exception to the general rule; and therefore, although the commander of such ship-of-war should not seek out or invite political refugees, yet he ought not to turn away nor to give up any who may reach his ship and ask admittance on board. Such officer must, of course, take care that such refugees shall not carry on, from on board his ship, any political correspondence with their partizans on shore, and he ought to avail himself of the earliest opportunity to send them to some place of safety elsewhere. That letter appeared to him (Lord John Russell) to be applicable upon the present occasion, and he had directed the Admiralty to adopt that rule.