necessary by the circumstances of the occasion for the safety and protection of Her Majesty’s subjects, and justified by the same motives and principles which upon similar and well-known occasions have governed the conduct of illustrious officers of the United States.  The steamboat Caroline was a hostile vessel engaged in piratical war against Her Majesty’s people, hired from her owners for that express purpose, and known to be so beyond the possibility of doubt.  The place where the vessel was destroyed was nominally, it is true, within the territory of a friendly power, but the friendly power had been deprived through overbearing piratical violence of the use of its proper authority over that portion of territory.  The authorities of New York had not even been able to prevent the artillery of the State from being carried off publicly at midday to be used as instruments of war against Her Majesty’s subjects.  It was under such circumstances, which it is to be hoped will never recur, that the vessel was attacked by a party of Her Majesty’s people, captured, and destroyed.  A remonstrance against the act in question has been addressed by the United States to Her Majesty’s Government in England.  I am not authorized to pronounce the decision of Her Majesty’s Government upon that remonstrance, but I have felt myself bound to record in the meantime the above opinion, in order to protest in the most solemn manner against the spirited and loyal conduct of a party of Her Majesty’s officers and people being qualified, through an unfortunate misapprehension, as I believe, of the facts, with the appellation of outrage or of murder.

I avail myself of this occasion to renew to you the assurance of my distinguished consideration.

H.S.  FOX.

Mr. Forsyth to Mr. Fox.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

Washington, December 31, 1840.

SIR:  I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your note of the 29th instant, in reply to mine of the 26th, on the subject of the arrest and detention of Alexander McLeod as one of the perpetrators of the outrage committed in New York when the steamboat Caroline was seized and burnt.  Full evidence of that outrage has been presented to Her Britannic Majesty’s Government with a demand for redress, and of course no discussion of the circumstances here can be either useful or proper, nor can I suppose it to be your desire to invite it.  I take leave of the subject with this single remark, that the opinion so strongly expressed by you on the facts and principles involved in the demand for reparation on Her Majesty’s Government by the United States would hardly have been hazarded had you been possessed of the carefully collected testimony which has been presented to your Government in support of that demand.

I avail myself of the occasion to renew to you the assurance of my distinguished consideration.

JOHN FORSYTH.

WASHINGTON, January 4, 1841.