ADDRESS FOR CORRESPONDENCE. (Hansard, 1 March 1877)

THE EARL OF BELMORE
asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether he is in a position to state that kidnapping in the South Seas has been entirely suppressed; and moved an Address for copies or extracts of Correspondence on the subject (if any) since the last Papers relating to the matter were laid before the House. The noble Earl said, it was now three years since he drew the attention of their Lordships to the abuses of the labour trade in the Polynesian Seas. On that occasion he moved for Papers, which had been produced, but since that time no further Papers on the subject, that he was aware of, had been laid before Parliament. But since the occasion on which he last drew attention to the subject circumstances had occurred which could not have been without influence on the state of things in the Polynesian Seas. Fiji had been taken over as a British Colony, a regular Government had been set up and a Vice Admiralty Court; and as under the administration of the noble Earl (the Earl of Kimberley) within the last five or six years the squadron on the Australian station had been augmented by the addition of one man-of war and four small sailing vessels, no doubt a better state of things was to be found there at present than that which formerly existed. In all probability his noble Friend the Secretary for the Colonies would be able to tell them that the worst abuses of the labour trade had been put down. He feared, however, that there were some minor abuses still. When their Lordships reflected upon the vast expanse of the Pacific and the great number of the Polynesian Islands, and also that the Australian station extended from four degrees south of the Line to the lowest limits of south latitude to which ships went, they would not be surprised that in spite of the most watchful 1198 energy of the five men-of-war supplemented by four small sailing vessels some irregularities should exist. He found that the report of the Melanesian Mission for 1876 called attention to several. First it was complained that in numerous cases the "labourers" when sent away from the place to which they had been brought to work were not conducted to the places whence they had come. On this point he begged to quote an extract from the Journal of the Rev. J. R. Selwyn, now Bishop of Melanesia, who stated— We took up a Mota man who had been landed there—i.e., off Gana—by a Fiji vessel, who by his account was dropping people in a very promiscuous way. The present Fiji Government are sending back large numbers of men, and the masters of the vessels have often great difficulty in finding out where the men come from, and don't care much. The prevalent idea is that so long as a man is put down on his island, or even in his group, it is all right; whereas the chances are that you put him down into the very midst of the people most hostile to him. This man told me that one unfortunate fellow from the north end of Aurora had been carried on, and was put down at Espiritu Santo. He himself was landed at Gana, and Lakona people were landed there also. Lieutenant Caffin, commanding the Beagle, told me that he had met a schooner conveying return 'labour' from Fiji, the captain of which had told him that he had not the vaguest notion where many of the men came from. He could quite understand that it was not now always easy for the Fiji Government to secure that the labourers should be conveyed back to the places whence they had come, because it must in many instances be difficult, if not almost impossible, for that Government to ascertain the native residence of islanders brought to the labour market at a time when there was no regular Government in Fiji; but for the future there could be no excuse for not adopting proper means to keep a record on the subject. Another complaint was that women and children were allowed to be conveyed by the labour ships without the consent of the husbands and parents. On this point Bishop Selwyn's Journal contained the following statement:— Sunday, Sept. 10.—After services on board the two vessels (the Southern Cross and Her Majesty's ship Conflict), we weighed for Opa, and anchored there in the evening. As we let go, a boat came alongside from a large bark which was returning 'labour' from Fiji. They had brought down 470, and were taking back a few which the Government agent candidly 1199 confessed were women and children. They had two on board from Lakona, of whom our boys told us that they were both married, and had come away without their husbands' consent. I spoke out very plainly to the agent about this, which is the crying evil of the labour trade.' There is very little reverence for the marriage tie in any of the islands, especially the Banks, and this sort of thing upsets even that little. The agent was a decent sort of surgeon just out from England, and had his own wife on board; but he did not seem to think it could be helped, because the labour was wanted in Fiji. A third grievance was that of overcrowding. At Cockatoo, near or at Taitahi, Bishop Selwyn wrote— Sunday, July 30.—I was much better and went down three miles to the station, calling en route on a labour vessel which had anchored during the night.… I liked what I saw of the people on board, but the state of the ship must have been very bad when they sailed, as they left Fiji with 205 people on board in a vessel of 84 tons. The Fiji Government is doing its best to send home the men on the plantations. Then there was what was known as "head hunting." It was much to be feared that at present, or, at least, up to a recent period, this continued. Writing from the Solomon Islands, or thereabouts, the Rev. John Still said— The dread of head-hunting chiefs further west is still great, and with good reason, for in this very year they have nearly depopulated several villages not many miles beyond. Wadrokal is a plucky and determined fellow, and won't be so easily frightened as his people, who flee at the first approach of the enemy. If they would only make a stand, I fancy these pirates would give up molesting them. Both Mr. Selwyn and I have other besides missionary feelings when we hear how they are depopulating this island, and almost wish to stay there a while to show them our teeth. Bishop Selwyn added his testimony on this point. Writing on the 2nd of August, he said— My great dread about this place is the head hunters of New Georgia. They have laid waste the whole western coast of Ysabel, and quite down to the south end. Ferguson, the captain of a trading steamer, gave us a long account of their ravages and the mischief they have done and are doing. Every little canoe demands a life; a chief's death or a war canoe, 40 or 50. They keep the unfortunate captives as slaves, make them work very hard, and on any remonstrance tell them they are only 'heads'—i.e., destined to be killed on any such occasion as I have referred to. Captain Noel, of the Sandfly, kept them in check two years ago by saying that he should drive back any canoes he found, and they actually did not go out for a year. A large man-of-war going there would, I think, stop it at once, and I hear the Commodore is likely to go there next year. 1200 He wished to ask his noble Friend the Secretary for the Colonies for any information he could give their Lordships on these several points; and also as to whether he had any information as to a pirate called Hayes, who had commanded at one time a steamer called the Waterlily, a man who had made himself infamously notorious, and who was said to have been an Irishman by birth, though he had adopted American nationality? This man had some years ago been in the custody, at Samoa, of the Consul, Mr. Williams, who, however, had no means of detaining him, and he, consequently, easily made his escape. Subsequently, he (the Earl of Belmore) made a suggestion to Admiral Stirling, who was at that time Commodore of the Australian Station, which that officer was good enough to act on, by putting himself into communication with the Admiral in China, and making arrangements for a ship from each of their squadrons to meet near the Line. The result was that Hayes only escaped capture by a single day. He wished to know, what was the last information respecting him?

THE EARL OF CARNARVON,
in reply, said, that since his noble Friend asked a Question on this subject about this time in 1874, an Act was passed while his noble Friend opposite (the Earl of Kimberley) was in the Colonial Office, and a subsequent one since he (the Earl of Carnarvon) succeeded his noble Friend, and had been carried into effect; besides this, Fiji had been taken up as a British colony. The establishment of Fiji as a British colony was probably the most effective measure that could have been taken for the suppression of the kidnapping; because with such a number of islands it would have been impossible, in the absence of anything like regular Government in Fiji, to put the labour trade under proper control. Accordingly, when submitting to their Lordships the proposal of Her Majesty's Government for taking up the Fiji Islands, the suppression of that traffic was the argument on which he mainly based the proposal. His noble 1201 Friend (the Earl of Belmore) now asked for further Papers on the subject; but, as showing the satisfactory position of things in those Islands, it was gratifying to him (the Earl of Carnarvon) to be able to state that there were no such Papers to produce. He could, however, state his belief that during the last two years the abuses of the labour trade had been brought within very narrow limits. No doubt there had been occasional transactions of that kind, and therefore he should be taking too much on himself to say that they had been entirely suppressed, but certainly they were fast disappearing, and their present limitation led to the hope of its eventual suppression. This would seem to have been inevitable, looking to the fact that Fiji was now a civilized station, that there were two Acts of Parliament in operation which dealt with the labour trade, and that a considerable number of Her Majesty's ships—he believed there were not fewer than nine—were keeping a look-out on the South Seas to prevent abuses. No doubt it was due to the terror which those ships and the Acts of Parliament inspired that such good results had been effected. He remembered that in 1875 some complaints of a rather general and vague character reached this country—they led to the disclosure of some abuses, but these were not of a very serious character. One referred to a ship sailing under the British flag from a French colony to New Caledonia. Representations with respect to the practices of that ship were made to the French authorities, who, he believed, did all in their power to assist us in putting a stop to the abuses complained of. With regard to the labour trade itself, it was carried on within legitimate bounds and very narrow limits, and the abuses were few in number and of no very great importance. No doubt, head hunting had led to horrible massacres; but recently he had not received any statements which would incline him to believe that it was now practised on any extensive scale. With reference to the excessive number of passengers carried by ships trading in the Colonies—no doubt the evil of overcrowding would depend very much on the length of the voyage. On a short voyage in such a climate they would be comparatively light. However, his attention had been turned to the point, 1202 and only a few weeks ago he urged on the Governor of Fiji the importance of providing a larger amount of tonnage in proportion to the number of passengers carried. The Colonial Office had not been asleep on this matter. With regard to the points raised by his noble Friend, after more consideration, he should be able to give a more complete answer. With reference to that notorious filibuster, Captain Hayes, or Williams, he believed there was no iniquity that a man could commit of which he had not been guilty; and in conjunction with his noble Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, every exertion had been made for the purpose of effecting his capture, but unfortunately without effect. Owing, however, to the increased supervision and watchfulness recently exercised, he would have less power of practising his iniquities than he before possessed. All the points to which his attention had been called were of the greatest importance and deserving of the most serious consideration as well as constant watching. At present he believed that no serious abuses existed; still he was aware that if any ships were taken off the station, and there was an absence of supervision, the trade would be carried on on as large a scale as formerly, and therefore it was the intention of the Government to maintain that supervision. Should circumstances give rise to fresh communications on the points raised by his noble Friend (the Earl of Belmore), he should gladly lay before the House any information the production of which might be of public interest.

THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY
expressed his satisfaction at the statement of his noble Friend. Although on other grounds he had regarded the annexation of Fiji with some objection, he thought at the time the annexation was proposed that the strongest argument in its favour was its probable effects in relation to the labour trade. From the statement of his noble Friend he was glad to find that the expectations in that respect had been realized.

THE EARL OF BELMORE,
in reply, said, that after what his noble Friend had stated, and which was very satisfactory, he, of course, would not press his Motion. He regretted that they did not know the length of the voyage which the over-crowded ship he had alluded 1203 is had made. Distance was a relative term, and his own experience of that part of the world was, that between different places they were generally great. He thought that Espiritus Santo, near which this ship was met, must be a considerable distance from Fiji.