No. 8

In my despatch of even date on the subject of the Bute
Inlet massacre I mentioned that I proposed to address your
Grace respecting the defenceless state of this Colony. I wish
to make no unreasonable requests. I prefer no complaints.

2. During my administration of the Government of Honduras,
there seldom passed any long interval of time without my having
to make application for the support of a ship of war. I cannot
call to my mind a single occasion in which reluctance was shewn
to furnish me with the aid required. Whether addressed to
Jamaica or Greytown my applications were at once complied with.

3. In British Columbia I find the arrangements in these matters
very different. A frigate and two gunboats were in Vancouvers
Island when the news of the massacre was received; but the
transmission to me of the intelligence was delayed two days, and
then sent by the ordinary mail packet.

*

My urgent request for naval assistance was, after some hesitation,
complied with by the Senior Naval Officer, to the extent of supplying
the gunboat "Forward," coupled
with the request that she should be detained in the Colony as
short a time as possible.

**

I am therefore left in doubt whether she is available for keeping up the
communication between head quarters and the force I have despatched to
Bute
Inlet under Mr Brew.

***

Your Grace will have seen from the statements made
in my despatch above referred to, that I am not grudging in
the expenditure of the resources of this Colony, but the want
of a sea-going steamer—cannot be supplied here. We have river
steamers drawing 18 or 20 inches, with two or more stories
of cabins upon them, which would not be safe in rough water.
I have done what I can to make up for our deficiencies, by
despatching an Agent to purchase from my own travelling
allowance a small vessel at Portland in the state of Oregon.
I shall not however be able to depend upon her in bad weather.

4. At this present moment there are in Esquimalt harbour
three vessels of war. The "Tribune" frigate, the "Columbine"
sloop and the gunboat "Grappler." In British Columbia we have
merely the gunboat "Forward," which I have been requested
to return as early as possible. Lord Gilford the present
Senior Officer has, though with perfect civility, thus
disposed of my urgent application for aid, in a crisis which
may be one of great importance to the Colony. He informed
me, it is true, that the "Tribune" has not sufficient steam
power to proceed to the head of Bute
Inlet, and that the
"Grappler" has received severe damage in a cruize to the
Northwest. Mr Brews expedition, it should also be added had
been dispatched before the arrival of the "Columbine" at
Esquimalt was known to Lord Gilford. The great urgency for
her assistance had therefore passed before I was informed that
she could not be spared for service in this Colony.

5. I am ignorant of the instructions furnished to the
Admiral of the Pacific Station, and it may be beyond the power
of any subordinate authority, if even of the Admiral himself,
to employ ships of large size in the navigation of this coast;
but I should conceive that the gunboats ought to be freely placed
at the disposal of the Governor of British Columbia
****

in any case of emergency, when their services are not indispensably
required in Vancouvers Island. Or that if the "Grappler" and "Forward"
are specially attached to the neighbouring Colony, one or two
vessels of the class might be allotted to this. This large and
important province which now costs the Imperial Government
absolutely nothing for its maintenance, and does not absorb
a fraction of Her Majesty's land forces, has claims I conceive,
in the still early stage of its existence, to receive a share
of the naval protection the mother country affords to other and
less exposed prossessions.

6. I regret that I have to make these representations
at the particular time when a person so obliging and anxious
to please in other respects as Lord Gilford, is Senior Naval
Officer. But it is well at the outset, that I should understand
what assistance I may expect from Her Majesty's Naval forces,
in case there should be an imminent risk of isolated massacres
swelling into insurrection.

7. I should add that the fear of the Indians is now very
general along the coast, and that I have been requested by the
workmen in the Copper Mines of Queen Charlotte's Island to
afford them some protection or else permit them temporarily
to abandon their labours, with the right to resume them at
some safer time. My reply is that I can afford no naval protection,
but that the Company will not forfeit their Charter should they
now have to retire from the island.