Читать книгу The Nootka Sound Controversy: A dissertation - William R. Manning - Страница 8

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It was on the 5th[82] of May, 1789, that the Spanish ship anchored in Friendly Cove of Nootka Sound bearing Martinez with his instructions for occupying the port and planting a permanent colony that should be a substantial proof of the Spanish claim and serve as a center for spreading Spanish sovereignty over all the coast. Just ten days before this[83] Colnett had sailed from China with instructions and equipment to make it, an English port.[84] During the next two months, while the Englishman was crossing the Pacific, the Spaniard was making good use of the time. When the latter reached Nootka there seems to have been no visible sign that the English had ever occupied the place or even intended to occupy it. The only evidence of civilization was one vessel under a Portuguese captain with Portuguese instructions and a Portuguese flag. It soon became known that there was also an American ship a few miles away up the sound.

It has never been conclusively proved that the house which Meares built the summer before had entirely disappeared. In a letter written three years later to the Spanish commandant at that time the American captains, who had spent the winter of 1788-89 at Nootka, declared that when Martinez arrived there was no trace of Meares’s house in the cove; that there had been a house, or rather a hut, when they arrived in the fall, but that, prior to his sailing for the Sandwich Islands, Captain Douglas had pulled it to pieces, had taken the boards on board the Iphigenia, and had given the roof to Captain Kendrick, who had used it as firewood.[85]

While there is no proof that the statement of these gentlemen is not true, yet they were too plainly prejudiced in favor of the Spanish to permit their testimony to be taken for its full face value in the absence of any corroborating evidence. There is, however, some indirect evidence to support their statement, and its value is the greater because of its being indirect, and still greater because it comes from the side of the English to whose interest it would have been to maintain the contrary. This appears in the extract which Meares quotes from the journal of the Iphigenia. In the entry made two days after his return from the Sandwich Islands and two weeks before the arrival of Martinez the writer says: “[We] sent some sails on shore and erected a tent to put our empty casks in.”[86]

If their house had still been standing they would doubtless have used it for this purpose instead of erecting the tent. Further, the fact that no mention is made of the house in this journal is pretty conclusive proof that it was not in existence on their arrival. Meares’s narrative of the departure of the Iphigenia in the preceding autumn is silent on the subject. In fact, there is no statement made even in Meares’s memorial that his house was still standing; but the memorial is so written, doubtless intentionally, that the casual reader would infer that the house was still there and that evidences of English occupation were unquestionable. This is doubtless what has led most historians who have touched upon the subject, among whom are some of the best, into the error of implying or openly declaring that there was a substantial English colony when the Spanish expedition arrived.[87]

It was also this failure of Meares to tell the whole truth that led the British Parliament and ministry into the error of believing that their rights to the place were unquestionable and that the conduct of the Spanish commandant was little better than high-handed robbery.[88] It is, then, pretty safe to assert that there was no indication whatever of English occupation when Martinez arrived, and that he was consequently perfectly justified in taking possession for Spain and in maintaining his position by force if it should become necessary. The question, therefore, is not, Was he justified in his first act? but, Were his subsequent acts of violence necessary to maintain his position?

Captain Kendrick, of the American ship Columbia, which Martinez found at Nootka, and Captain Gray, of her consort, the Lady Washington, which was out on a trading cruise at the time, were slightly involved in the relations between the Spanish and English commanders. But the vessel under Portuguese colors furnishes the center of interest for the first month of Spanish occupation.

This vessel was the Iphigenia, which had sailed from China in company with the Felice, under Captain Meares, in the spring of 1788, but which had separated from the latter vessel, had spent the summer in trading on the coast of Alaska and had rejoined her consort in the autumn at Nootka, where they again separated, the Felice, under Meares, sailing for China with the furs collected by both vessels, and the Iphigenia, under Douglas, accompanied by the small vessel, the Northwest America, built at Nootka during the summer, going for the winter to the Sandwich Islands.[89] Returning to the American coast in the spring of 1789, the Iphigenia had reached Nootka sixteen days before the arrival of Martinez. Four days after her the little vessel, her consort, arrived, and preparations were immediately made to send the latter out on a trading cruise, that they might not be worsted in competition by the American sloop, the Lady Washington, which had just returned from a six weeks’ cruise to the southward and would soon set out on a similar trip to the northward. In four days more the necessary repairs were made, and on April 27 the Northwest America set out to trade with the natives to the northward,[90] not returning, and consequently not being of any further interest for six weeks, at the end of which time she assumes considerable importance.

The double national character of the expedition to which the Iphigenia belonged has already been discussed.[91] When, on May 5, the Spanish ship appeared, it was evidently thought better—for reasons which are not disclosed—to present the appearance of a Portuguese rather than an English ship. During the first few days all of the commanders seem to have been on the best of terms. According to the journal of the Iphigenia, Douglas was invited to dine on board the Spanish ship on the day of Martinez’s arrival. Three days later the officers of the Iphigenia and of the Spanish vessel all went to dine with Kendrick, the captain of the American ship, and the next day the officers of the American and Spanish ships dined on board the Iphigenia.

Thus, up to the 9th of May the utmost harmony prevailed. Douglas had acquainted Martinez with the distressed condition of his ship and the latter had promised to relieve him as far as lay in his power. On the 8th the Portuguese instructions and passport of the Iphigenia had been presented to Martinez.[92] These seem to be what started the difficulty. In his account to the Viceroy, Martinez says:

On my arrival in it [the port of San Lorenzo de Nootka] I found a packet boat, with its captain (flag) and passport of the Portuguese nation, but its supercargo (who was really the captain), its pilot, and the greater part of its crew English.[93]

The passport was signed by the governor and captain-general of the port of Macao, in China, and began:

Be it known that from the port of this city is sailing for the coasts of North America the sloop named the Iphigenia Nubiana. It belongs to Juan Carvalho,[94] a subject of the same master of this port, and is of 200 tons burden having artillery, powder, balls, arms, and munitions necessary for its defense, and carrying as its captain Francisco Josef Viana, also a subject of the same Crown, and of competent ability.[95]

The instructions were addressed to Viana, captain of the sloop Iphigenia Nubiana, and signed by Juan Carvalho. Besides the perplexity of the double nationality of the vessel, Martinez’s suspicions were aroused by what he considered an obnoxious clause in the instructions. It read:

In case of your meeting on your voyage with any Russian, Spanish, or English vessels, you will treat them with the greatest possible friendship and permit them (if they demand it) to examine your papers that they may see the object of your voyage, taking care at the same time to avoid surprise, if they should attempt to divert you from your voyage. In such case you will resist force by force and protest against such violent and illegal proceedings before a tribunal at the first port in which you arrive, giving also an estimate of the value of the ships and cargoes. You will send to us at Macao a copy of said protest, with a narrative of all that shall have occurred, and another such to Francisco Josef Bandieras and Geronimo Ribeiro Nores, our correspondents at Lisbon, and likewise to the Portuguese ambassador, at the Court of the nation of the aggressor, in order that our Sovereign may demand satisfaction. If, perchance, in such conflict you should have the superiority, you will take possession of the vessel and its cargo, conducting them, with the officers, to Macao, in order that they may be condemned as legal prize and the officers and crew punished as pirates.[96]

Rightly or wrongly, Martinez thought that these instructions justified him in demanding an explanation. Since this is the first of the vessels seized, and in order to show that the Spanish commander considered that he was acting under instructions and with full authority, the whole of the first of a series of affidavits regarding the affair is here quoted:

On board the frigate of His Majesty named Our Lady of the Rosary, alias the Princesa, on the 13th[97] day of the month of May, 1789, I, an ensign of the royal navy, Don Esteban José Martinez, appointed commander in chief of this expedition by the most excellent Señor Viceroy Don Manuel Antonio Florez for occupying and taking possession of this port of San Lorenzo de Nootka, where I am anchored, declare: That, in virtue of the Instructions and other superior orders, dated the 23d of December of the year last passed, 1788, and according to an order of His Majesty in Arto. 17, Tito. 5, Trato. 6, of the royal orders for the navy, I ought to order and leave ordered to appear before me Don Francisco Josef Viana, an inhabitant of Lisbon and captain of the packet boat named the Iphigenia Nubiana coming from Macao, which I found on the 5th of the present month anchored in this aforesaid port, and likewise that he should be accompanied by the so-called supercargo, M. William Douglas, in order that each one, in so far as he is involved, may vindicate himself, in view of the charges which I have to make against them, according to the cited article of the royal orders, on account of sections 18 and 19 of the instructions which the said captain presented to me on the 8th of the present month.

This affidavit was signed by Martinez before the notary, Canizares. Following it is one by the interpreter of the expedition saying that he delivered the above order, and then comes a long one giving an account of the interview that followed.

Viana, the captain, Douglas, the supercargo, and Adamson, the first pilot, immediately answered the summons, and repaired on board the Princesa. Martinez began by demanding an explanation for their having anchored in a port of the Spanish dominions without a license from that Monarch. They replied that they were there in virtue of their passport from the governor of Macao; that, as to this port’s belonging to the Spanish dominions, they were ignorant of it, since the fact had not been published at the European Courts; and that they were informed by the first article of their instructions that this coast had been discovered by the Portuguese Admiral Fonte in 1640.[98] To this last Martinez responded that Portugal was at that time under the dominion of Spain. He likewise charged them to tell who this Carvalho was that had given such despotic instructions as the minister of a sovereign would hardly have given; to which they answered that he was the owner of the vessel. He then charged them with articles 18 and 19 of their instructions (the objectionable clauses quoted above). They replied that the articles in question had been misinterpreted; that they ordered Viana, in case his crew mutinied and he met with the vessel of a foreign nation, to appeal to that vessel for assistance in imprisoning his own crew and conducting them to Macao, and that the mutinous crew were the ones to be punished as pirates. Martinez insisted that this was not the true import of the articles, but a clumsy pretext. Considering their defense unsatisfactory, according to the cited article of the orders for the royal navy, Martinez demanded in the name of the King that they should surrender themselves as prisoners of war. The affidavit giving account of this was signed by Viana, Douglas, and Martinez before Canizares.[99]

This is Martinez’s account of the arrest, written at the time or very soon thereafter, since it bears the signature of Viana and Douglas, and they would have been most unlikely to sign it if they had not been compelled to do so while in captivity. It is very doubtful whether Martinez was truthful in his report of the clumsy fabrication offered by Viana and Douglas in defense of the objectionable clause. To have offered such, expecting it to be believed, they would have had to be either very stupid or absolutely certain that Martinez and all his associates were entirely ignorant of the Portuguese language—a very unlikely circumstance. This false defense may have been invented by the Spanish commander to give more color to the justice of the arrest. It would be more charitable and possibly more just to suppose that owing to his imperfect understanding of the language that they used, or its imperfect translation by his interpreter, he understood them to say this when they really said something very different. It is quite evident that his first translation of what he considered the objectionable clause in their instructions was incorrect. For in his rendering of it in the above account of the investigation he makes the clause read that Viana was to treat with respect all English, Russian, and Spanish vessels whose force was superior to his own, but, if he had the superior force, he was to seize them and carry them to Macao, where their crews should be tried as pirates. This is what he referred to when he spoke of their being so despotic. It is impossible to understand how, in a correct translation, he could have seen anything so obnoxious as he claimed to see. If, however, this rendering had been the correct one, it would have made the Iphigenia virtually a pirate ship, and Martinez would have been fully justified. But if his first translation was faulty, his later one was correct, as will be seen by comparing the quotation from it given above with the instructions of the Merchant Proprietors to Meares, the English commander of the expedition. They correspond almost word for word, differing only in the details necessary to give the appearance of a Portuguese instead of an English expedition.[100]

This error of Martinez is brought out in Douglas’s account of the investigation. He says: