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 Copy 1 
 
 An Incident of the 
 Alabama Claims Arbitration 
 
 "STEADFAST FOR GOD AND COUNTRY 
 
 BY RALPH E. PRIME, D.C.L., LL.D. 
 Past Governor General of the General Court 
 
 READ BEFORE 
 
 THE NEW YORK SOCIETY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 ORDER OF THE FOUNDERS AND 
 PATRIOTS OF AMERICA 
 
 MARCH 23, 1906 
 
Gift 
 The Society 
 
No. 14 
 
 An Incident of the 
 Alabama Claims Arbitration 
 
 "STEADFAST FOR GOD AND COUNTRY 
 
 BY RALPH E. PRIME, D.C.L., LL.D. 
 
 Past Governor General of the General Court 
 
 READ BEFORE 
 
 THE NEW YORK SOCIETY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 ORDER OF THE FOUNDERS AND 
 PATRIOTS OF AMERICA 
 
 MARCH 23, 1906 
 
 <J^rV^ \ y 
 
E 5^<\ 
 
THE NEW YORK SOCIETY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 Order of the Founders and Patriots of America 
 
 OFFICERS 
 
 FOR THE YEAR ENDING APRIL IQ, I906 
 
 Governo?' 
 THEODORE FITCH 
 
 Deputy Governor 
 WALTER SETH LOGAN 
 
 Chaplain 
 Rev. EDWARD PAYSON JOHNSON, D.D. 
 
 Secretary 
 HOLLISTER LOGAN 
 
 Treasurer 
 GEORGE CLINTON BATCHELLER 
 
 State Attorney 
 HENRY WICKES GOODRICH 
 
 Registrar 
 WINCHESTER FITCH 
 
 Genealogist 
 CLARENCE ETTIENNE LEONARD 
 
 Historian 
 HENRY LINCOLN MORRIS 
 
 Councillors 
 
 Hon. WILLIAM WINTON GOODRICH 
 
 CoL. RALPH E. PRIME 
 
 WILLIAM ALLEN MARBLE 
 
 THEODORE GILMAN 
 HOWARD SUMNER ROBBINS 
 
 JAMES LE BARON WILLARD 
 
 CoL. HENRY W. SACKETT 
 
 EDWARD HAGAMAN HALL 
 
 COLGATE HOYT 
 
AN INCIDENT OF THE 
 ALABAMA CLAIMS ARBITRATION 
 
 By Ralph E. Prime, D.C.L., LL.D. 
 
 [ The writer appreciates that there are some matters in the paper which do not 
 strictly belong to the incident, but he believes that they are necessary, to many who 
 do not know the story of the Alabama, for a full understanding of the incident, "l 
 
 No man who ever knew Benjamin Franklin Stevens, who was 
 for so many years the American Despatch Agent at London, 
 England, but valued that acquaintance. Mr. Stevens was a rare 
 man, and, notwithstanding his long residence in England, he 
 was a thorough American and an intense lover of his country. 
 He was born in Vermont in 1833, and after a short experience 
 at the Capitol of that State, at Albany and at Washington, he 
 was called to London to aid his brother, who had preceded him 
 to England. He became so useful to Americans that his merits 
 were recognized, and in 1866 he was appointed Despatch Agent 
 for the United States of America, resident at London, and con- 
 tinued to discharge his duties as such as long as he lived. He 
 died in 1904. 
 
 It was my privilege to form his acquaintance about ten years 
 ago on one of my visits to London, and ever afterwards when I 
 visited that city I enjoyed his fellowship, and looked forward to 
 it as one of the pleasures of my vacation. 
 
 Mr. Stevens' service extended over so many years of our na- 
 tional history, in its most stirring times, in which he must have 
 been an actor, that his memory must have been stored with many 
 incidents, intensely interesting, connected with the history of 
 our country and yet unknown to written history. 
 
 On one of my visits to England with my wife and daughters 
 I spent nearly a week with Mr. Stevens and his wife in the 
 George Hotel at Winchester. Sometimes together we were off 
 in the daytime visiting things that interested both of us, and 
 then again he and I would be off in the daytime separately, each 
 visiting something of interest to himself, and in the evenings we 
 
would sit together in the enclosed and covered garden and talk 
 until late, while he entertained us with incidents which had hap- 
 pened during his residence in London. During that week he 
 told me many such events, in which he was an actor himself, 
 and which were of absorbing interest to me, and are utterly un- 
 known to the mass of Americans, and have never been written, 
 and which are probably even now unknown to any one connected 
 with any recent administration of the national government. 
 
 I have been invited to write, as nearly as I can recall, the state- 
 ment which Mr. Stevens made to me concerning one of those in- 
 cidents, and which, so far as memory serves me, I have never 
 spoken of to exceed on four occasions. 
 
 But to the appreciation of it by many of the generation since 
 born, and who never learned much about its details, it will be 
 necessary briefly to recall other things connected with the his- 
 tory of the Civil War, and there are many older persons who at 
 the time were of mature years, but to whom, with the flight of 
 time and the fullness of these later years, those events are at 
 least very dim to recollection, and for them we will be excused 
 if we to some extent recall some of the events of those days, and 
 details which perhaps even they never knew. 
 
 The great and detestable heresy of the right of a State to se- 
 cede from the American Union probably had its birth in Massa- 
 chusetts as early as the differences of 1808, Encouraged by the 
 disloyal acts thus early of New England men, John C. Calhoun, 
 a Southern man, a citizen of South Carolina, and then Vice- 
 President of the United States, in 1830 set forth his form of the 
 heresy under the name of Nullification. Andrew Jackson, 
 another Southern man, a native of the Carolinas, but a citizen 
 of Tennessee, was then President of the United States, and to him 
 the nation owes a like debt as to Abraham Lincoln, for Andrew 
 Jackson, with the ardor and violence of his Southern nature, 
 stamped out that crime with a remarkable proclamation, and by 
 his even more remarkable threat that for the first overt act he 
 would place John C. Calhoun, the great Nullifier, and Vice- 
 President of the United States, behind bars. In November, i860, 
 Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the United States ; 
 and from that time, if not before, commenced preparation for 
 secession of the Southern States from the Union, the greatest 
 crime against our country which history records, and which 
 
then ripened, and in April, 1861, culminated in the first acts of 
 overt resistance to law and authorit)' in our great Civil War. 
 
 The war was on. The Southern coast was effectuallj^ block- 
 aded against the entry of ships into Southern ports, and the is- 
 sue of ships from them, and the blockade was officially pro- 
 claimed to the world. 
 
 For a long time before those events the subject of the aboli- 
 tion of privateering and treatment as pirates of vessels of war 
 having letters of marque had occupied the attention of Great 
 Britain, France and the United States and other nations. Ne- 
 gotiations toward an agreement to that end had extended over 
 several years, and up to i86ihad not resulted in the adoption of 
 that international rule. At that time, when the powers were all 
 of one mind. Great Britain refused to enter into the agreement 
 with the United States unless it was also agreed that it should 
 not apply to the two belligerents in the American War then on. 
 Thus, perhaps inferentially, but later in other clearer language, 
 all in harmony with the desire of the shipbuilders and mer- 
 chants of England, was there a recognition of the belligerency 
 of the rebellious Southern States and a distinct position taken of 
 unfriendliness to this country. These matters were publicly ex- 
 ploited in speeches delivered in the two houses of Parliament 
 and by the Ministers of the Queen in public addresses all over 
 the Kingdom, and the position of the government on the ques- 
 tions, then acute, no doubt encouraged in their acts such of the 
 English people who were of that mind, and also naturally resulted 
 in supineness and carelessness of public officials in the perform- 
 ance of the duties they owed to our country, then in fact and in 
 law a friendly power. This was so much so that Mr. Laird, the 
 builder of the Alabama, and a member of Parliament, in a speech 
 in the House of Commons, found it easy, as he desired, to avow 
 and defend his acts. Happily in the change of English senti- 
 ments toward us and ours toward them, such conditions have 
 forever ceased and the results can never occur again. 
 
 As early as October, 1861, agents of the Rebel States con- 
 tracted with the Laird Company for the building of a ship of 
 war, named the Alabama. Another English firm contracted also 
 to build another ship of war for the Rebel States, called the 
 Florida. The Alabama was the larger vessel, and her building 
 progressed more slowly. The Alabama was launched May 15, 
 
8 
 
 i862, and made her trial trip June 12, and June 23, our Minister, 
 Mr. Adams called the attention of Lord Russell, the British Sec- 
 tary of Foreign Affairs, to the character of the vessel, and an 
 examination was made, and the commissioners reported to the 
 British Secretary that she was evidently a war vessel, and that 
 the information given by Mr. Adams was correct. An order 
 was given for the detention of the vessel, but was so intention- 
 ally slow in transmission that she was allowed to escape, and she 
 was actually manned on the coast of the Island of Anglesia on 
 the Welsh Coast with the full knowledge of the British officers 
 at Liverpool. 
 
 Practically the same is the story of the Florida and the 
 Sumter, two other vessels. 
 
 The funds for building these vessels and for their armament 
 and supplies, and for the money chests on board, as also for 
 their subsequent supplies, was furnished at Liverpool and other 
 British ports, of all of which our Minister apprised the Brit- 
 ish Secretary, who refused to interfere, alleging want of proof, 
 and took no steps to ascertain the facts for himself. He was, as 
 early as March, 1863, apprised by Mr. Adams of what was going 
 on, and that had called out from Lord Russell a letter, in which 
 he stated clearly enough the duty of the British Government in 
 the premises. 
 
 Our own navy was busy enough in its blockade of our South- 
 ern coast, and the Alabama and the other Rebel craft had almost 
 free course in all other waters, and preyed upon our merchant 
 ships on all the seas, and also on the vessels of the Treasury, 
 which were unarmed or only slightly armed, and pursued their 
 business of supplying the lighthouses and other peaceful duties. 
 
 The end of the depradations of these vessels was gradually 
 accomplished. The end of the Alabama was a great event of 
 the Civil War. She came into the port of Cherbourg for supplies 
 and repairs in June, 1864. Our sloop of war, the Kearsarge, in 
 command of Captain Winslow, was in those waters, and at 
 Flushing, in the Netherlands, and hearing of the arrival of the 
 Alabama at Cherbourg, immediately proceeded there, and, send- 
 ing a boat ashore, steamed out of the harbor and took station 
 outside, and maintained a close watch on the port. Semmes, 
 the commander of the Alabama, had long warred against de- 
 fenceless merchant ships, and could not afford to refuse battle 
 
now, for the first time forced upon him, by a foe of nearly his 
 own strength. For four days he remained in the port preparing 
 for battle. On the 8th of June, a Sunday, the Alabama came 
 out of the harbor escorted by a French man-of-war and by a 
 British yacht, the Deerhound. The high French shores were 
 covered with spectators to see the fight. The Kearsarge, which 
 had lain off the eastern entrance of the harbor, steamed far out- 
 side the three-mile limit, and to a point full seven miles off shore, 
 to prevent Semmes running away if the battle should be against 
 him, and then turned and steamed for the enemy. The Kearsarge 
 was the faster boat. She had a few more men and a few heavier 
 guns, but in point of the number of guns, the Alabama had one 
 more than the Kearsarge, and in the battle actually fired twice as 
 many shots as did the Kearsarge. But the real advantage of the 
 Kearsarge was that she was manned by Americans and patriots, 
 while the crew of her adversary were largely foreigners and hire- 
 lings. The Alabama opened the battle and the Kearsarge re- 
 received a full broadside, and a second, and part of a third. It 
 was before the era of ironclad ships, and Captain Winslow had 
 hung the sides of his vessel with chain cables. This device 
 proved, however, to be of no material value, for only two of the 
 shots from the Alabama struck those cables, in places, too, 
 where, if the cables had not been there, they could have done no 
 serious injury. The vessels sailed in a circle, firing upon each 
 other. They made seven complete circuits of the circle. The 
 battle continued for more than an hour, when the Alabama 
 headed for shore to escape, and then it was that she exposed a 
 vulnerable spot, which the guns of the Kearsarge blew out, and 
 she began sinking and was rapidly filled, and being headed off 
 by the Kearsarge, Semmes struck his flag, but soon the vessel 
 sank forever below the waters of the English Channel. The 
 Deerhound came up and assisted in saving the ship's company 
 and sailed off with those it rescued to Southampton. It was 
 an unpardonable act. The crew, helpless in the water, were 
 part of the fruits of the victory, and belonged to the Kearsarge, 
 and should have been surrendered to the victorious commander, 
 whose officers, seeing the contemptible act, implored him to turn 
 his guns on that vessel. 
 
 Such was the end of the Alabama. And after this long intro- 
 duction, now for the story I am to relate. 
 
lO 
 
 The Treaty of Washington was negotiated for the settlement 
 of controversies between the United States of America and the 
 Kingdom of Great Britain. It was negotiated in March, April 
 and May, 1871. The high commissioners comprised, on the part 
 of the United States of America, five well-known Americans, 
 namely, Hamilton Fish, then our Secretary of State; General 
 Robert G. Schenck, then our Minister to the Court of St. James; 
 Hon. Samuel Nelson, then one of the justices of the Supreme 
 Court of the United States; Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar, of Massa- 
 chusetts, and Senator George Henry Williams, of Oregon ; and 
 on the part of Gieat Britain, five of the best-known subjects of 
 the Queen of Great Britain, namely, the Earl of Grey and Ripon, 
 also Viscount Goderich and Baron Grantham, a Baronet, a Peer 
 of the United Kingdom, &c.,&c., and at the time Lord President 
 of Her Majesty's Most Honorable Privy Council, &c., &c.; the 
 Right Honorable Sir Stratford Henry Northcote, Baronet, one 
 of Her Majesty's Most Honorable Privy Council; Sir Edward 
 Thornton, Baronet, &c., then the Minister of Great Britain to 
 the United States, Sir John A. McDonald, the Canadian states- 
 man, and Mr. Montague Bernard, of Oxford University. After 
 thirty-six conferences of these high commissioners, the conven- 
 tion or Treaty was concluded at Washington in May, 1871, and 
 is known as the Treaty of Washington, and the ratifications 
 were exchanged June 17, 1871. The Treaty provided for the 
 settlement of differences between the two governments, and prin- 
 cipally the settlement of the claims generally known as the 
 "Alabama Claims." 
 
 In its first Article it provided for the formation of a tribunal 
 of arbitration, composed of five arbitrators. The second Article 
 provided for the meeting of the tribunal at Geneva, in Switzer- 
 land. The third Article provided for the delivery in duplicate 
 of a written or printed case of each of the two parties to each of 
 the arbitrators, and to the agent of the other party, "as soon as 
 may be after the organization of the tribunal, but within a period 
 not exceeding six months from the date of the exchange of rati- 
 fications of this Treaty." The fourth Article provided that 
 within four months after the delivery of such case either party 
 might in like manner deliver in duplicate to each of the arbi- 
 trators and to the agent of the other party a counter-case, aind the 
 second paragraph of that Article provided that the arbitrators 
 
might extend the time for the delivery of such counter-case when 
 in their judgment it becomes necessary in consequence of the 
 distance of the place from which evidence to be presented is to 
 be procured. 
 
 The day of the week on which the ratifications were exchanged 
 was Saturday, and, as stated, the seventeenth day of June, 1871. 
 The six months mentioned in Article III would have expired with 
 the eighteenth day of December, 1871, which was Monday. 
 
 While sitting together one of those evenings in Winchester, 
 with Mr. Stevens, something suggested the Treaty of Washington 
 and the Alabama claims arbitration, and Mr. Stevens related to 
 me the incident I am about to relate, and which I will attempt 
 to recall as nearly as I can — as Mr. Stevens told it — although 
 after this lapse of time, nine years and more, I cannot pretend 
 to give his exact words, and hence they must be mine, as nearly 
 as I can repeating Mr. Stevens' story as he told it to me. 
 
 He had received, as the Agent for the American Government, 
 a cop)'^ of the case of that government, and being the agent of the 
 government for all such purposes, he was looking out for the 
 arrival of the duplicate copies to be delivered to the British 
 Government, and that was the reason why his attention was 
 upon it. The last steamer which could have brought those 
 copies for the British Government had arrived, and sufficient 
 time had elapsed for bringing the package to him from Liver- 
 pool, but no package had come. His interest in the matter, and 
 his general interest for all that belonged to his people and his 
 country, led him on that Saturday, December 16, 187 1, to take 
 a hansom cab and drive to the office of General Schenck, the 
 American Minister. He entered the office and soon saw General 
 Schenck, and asked him if he had received the American case, to 
 which General Schenck replied, "Oh, yes; there it lies upon my 
 table," pointing to it. "But," said Mr. Stevens, "have you re- 
 ceived the duplicate copies to be delivered to the British Gov- 
 ernment?" Mr. Schenck replied that he had not. "Well," said 
 Mr. Stevens, " I think I will drive to the British foreign office 
 and see if they have been sent there direct." Whereupon he 
 left the American Embassy, called another cab, and drove in it 
 to Downing Street and to the office of the British Secretary of 
 Foreign Affairs, and soon had an audience with the British 
 Secretary, of whom he inquired had he received the copies of 
 
the American case pursuant to the Treaty of Washington. He 
 was told that they had not been received. " Well," said Mr. 
 Stevens, "I suppose that you will extend the time in case they 
 do not come?" "Oh, no," said the British Minister, "there is 
 no provision in the Treaty for the extending of the time for the 
 service by either party of their case, but there is a provision in 
 the Treaty for extending the time for service of the counter-case, 
 and I am bound to suppose that the learned and distinguished 
 representatives of both countries in drafting that convention or 
 treaty had the best of reasons for making a difference of provis- 
 ion in the one case from the other, and for using different lan- 
 guage as to one act to be done, than as to the other act to be 
 done, and that by so saying that the time might be extended for 
 the delivery of the counter-case they meant it, and by not saying 
 so as to the time within which the case itself was to be delivered, 
 they consequently meant that there should not be any extension 
 of time." Mr. Stevens asked: "What will be the result in case 
 you do not receive the case within the limited time?" The Brit- 
 ish Secretary replied: "There is but one result that can follow, 
 and that is that the failure to deliver the case within the stipu- 
 lated time is an abandonment of the provisions of the Treaty by 
 the government that fails of compliance with that provision of 
 the Treaty." After the exchange of proper courtesies Mr. Stev- 
 ens left him, and, calling a cab again, drove hurriedly back to 
 the American Embassy, and was again in the presence of Gen- 
 eral Schenck, to whom he related what had transpired between 
 himself and the British Secretary of Foreign Affairs. " Well," 
 said General Schenck, "it is none of your business and none of 
 mine; neither you nor I have failed in any duty; the responsibility 
 must rest where it belongs — upon those who have failed in the 
 performance of their duty." " But," said Mr. Stevens, " will you 
 do nothing?" To which General Schenck replied," Nothing." Mr. 
 Stevens then said to General Schenck: "Will you lend me your 
 copy of the case ?" "No," said General Schenck, "you have your 
 copy, and this copy belongs in the archives of the Embassy." 
 "Well," said Mr. Stevens," General Schenck, suppose it is missing, 
 what then ?" " Oh," said General Schenck, " I do not think it will 
 matter much; I do not think I will take any notice of it if it is 
 missing." Wherepon Mr. Stevens quietly backed to the table 
 upon which the document lay, and passed his hands behind him 
 
13 
 
 and took the thin book (less than one inch in thickness), and 
 slipped it into the skirt pocket of his coat, and quietly bade 
 General Schenck "Good-morning" and again took a street cab. 
 Said he to me: " I knew that my printer had a new font of type, 
 which, as nearly as I could judge, was such a counterpart of the 
 type from which the American case had been printed, a copy of 
 which I had, that no one but an expert printer would be able to 
 distinguish between the two fonts. It was Saturday, and it was 
 nearly noon, and the beginning of the customary Saturday half- 
 holiday approached. Arriving at the printer's office I observed 
 the typesetters all coming down-stairs, and I accosted them, 
 asking where they were going, to which I received a reply 
 that it was the Saturday half-holiday and the 12 o'clock hour 
 was striking; and I shouted to the line, *'A shilling a day to 
 each one of you who will return to his case." The line turned 
 back. Mr. Stevens, as he said, entered the foreman's room and 
 produced General Schenck's copy of the case and also his own 
 copy, and he said to the foreman: "You have a new font of type, 
 I know, from which you can reproduce this book, and I want to 
 have it reproduced by Monday morning early. It must be done 
 although to-morrow is Sunday, for great issues hang upon it." 
 "But," said the foreman, "it cannot be done; this is Saturday 
 half-holiday this afternoon, and all of the typesetters are "-one 
 by this time." "Oh, no," said Mr. Stevens; "I have met tliem 
 on the stairs and promised them a shilling a day apiece for 
 every man who would return to his case, and they have all gone 
 back." " Well," said the foreman, " if that is so, it can be done." 
 And the foreman and Mr. Stevens took the two copies of the 
 case and tore them to pieces and they were distributed to the 
 compositors, and Mr. Stevens left the printer's office with the 
 assurance that the job would be done and 100 copies of it printed 
 in sheets by Monday morning at 9 o'clock. Mr. Stevens, leaving, 
 took with him the single lithograph print contained in the book 
 (it was a rough map of our Southern coast, the Gulf of Mexico 
 and the islands— the Antilles and the Bahamas), and d/ove at 
 once to a lithographer's and made the same arrangements with 
 him to have 100 copies of the lithograph plate ready at the same 
 time on Monday morning. He then drove to a case-maker and 
 binder and made the same arrangement to have 100 cases ready 
 in which to insert the book on Monday morning at 9 o'clock, and 
 
14 
 
 then he went home assured that he controlled the situation. On 
 that Monday morning, at the hour appointed, he appeared at the 
 printer's office and took into his hands the sheets of the loo 
 copies printed complete (even to the typographical errors in the 
 original copies), and drove to the lithographer's, where he 
 secured the loo copies of the lithograph print, and with the 
 whole drove to the case-maker's, where he deposited his load. 
 Four copies of the work were assembled, and, as well as time 
 permitted, stitched and put into four cases, and Mr. Stevens 
 with them entered a cab and drove to Downing Street and to 
 the office of the British Secretary of Foreign Affairs, and deliv- 
 ered, before 12 o'clock of that day, the last day pursuant to the 
 Treaty, two copies of the American case to Lord Tenterden, the 
 Under Secretary of Foreign Affairs, who had been named as the 
 British Agent. He then drove to General Schenck's office and 
 returned to him one of the other copies reproduced in the place 
 of the one which he had taken on the previous Saturday, and 
 told General Schenck the story of what he had done. 
 
 " Well," said I, "Mr. Stevens, that is a most interesting and 
 wonderful story. Of course it has been told and gone well into 
 history." *' No," said he, " never, save to a few persons, and 
 you are one of that few, and it must never go into print as long 
 as I live." "And," said I, "of course the United States Govern- 
 ernment repaid you the expense of what you had done ?" To 
 which he replied: " Never a cent of it." I said: " Why, what do 
 you mean ?" Said he: " I never presented any bill or claim for 
 it. The fact is that before Parliament assembled that evening 
 the news of the service of the American case on the British Gov- 
 ernment was well known to many, and the next day I was called 
 upon by many, to obtain copies of it, and I sold to members of 
 Parliament for a pound apiece every copy that I had to spare, 
 and I realized more than enough to cover the expenditure." 
 "Well," said I, "how do you account for the failure of the 
 Washington authorities to comply with the terms of the Treaty?" 
 " Oh," said Mr. Stevens, " when the next steamer arrived the 
 bundle came. Instead of committing so important a matter to 
 the hands of a special messenger to bring it across the Atlantic, 
 or sending the number of necessary copies at the time that a 
 single copy was sent to General Schenck and a single copy was 
 sent to me, the bundle was entrusted to the custody of an ex- 
 
15 
 
 press company, and as it was thought in time for the last steamer, 
 but the express messenger, knowing nothing of the importance 
 of the package, treated it like any other, and it reached New 
 York after the steamer had sailed." 
 
 To understand the importance of the act performed bv Mr. 
 Stevens, we must remember that it saved the arbitration at 
 Geneva to us, and that the award of that tribunal to America 
 for the depredations of the Alabama and the Sumter and the 
 Rebel vessels was a round sum of $15,500,000. 
 
LIBRftRV OF CONGRESS 
 
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