COPY.
sir,
215
Foreign Office,
September 6th. 1892.
You are aware of the correspondence
which has passed between Her Majesty's Legation, Her Majesty'
Consul at Canton, and the Government of HongKong relative
to the case of certain Chinese fugitives from justice
whose extradition was demanded by the Viceroy of Canton,
under the 21st Article of the Treaty of Tientsin. These
men were detained for many months in prison owing to the
belief that notwithstanding the assurance of the Viceroy
to the contrary, torture would be resorted to both as a means of Extorting confession and in the execution of their
sentence.
The prisoners, however, were released
in December last by order of the Supreme Court off the Colony in consequence of some technical informalities in
the warrants under which they were detained.
A protest, of which I enclose a copy,
against the action of the Hong Kong Authorities in this
case has been addressed to me by the Chinese Minister,
and you will see that in my reply I allude to a formal guarantee given by the Prince of Kung to Sir R, Alcock in May 1866, that no torture would be used in the execution
of criminals surrendered by the HongKong Government, which guarantee appears to be unknown to the Viceroy of Canton.
I have to instruct you to inform Prince
Eung that the difficulty in complying with the application of the Chinese Government has arisen from the belief that this engagement has not been observed by the Provincial
and that it is believed that they are even
Authorities,
The Honourable,
T. G. Grosvenor. C., B.,
ignorant
&C.
&C.,
&c.,