PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
C.O. 882
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Mr. Antelme against the Governor, and as regards the other three, they never spoke of me and my policy but with praise, until the elections were over.”
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You will see from the enclosed letter addressed to me by one of the memorialists that, long after proceedings of mine that he now condemns, he took the trouble of writing officially to convey his "hearty congratulations to me. He writes of " your Excellency's sound policy," "your Excellency's popularity," &c. In the last paragraph of his letter he refers to his co-memorialist, Mr. Antelme.
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"I am therefore at ease to clap hands at your Excellency's honest, generous, and humane policy and to say: Excellency, do not care of the outburst of hypocrite indignation your Excellency's policy causes on the side of some, wrongly considered as having a great influence in Mauritius. Those whose watchword is justice will always 'be your Excellency's supporters.'
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59. But even Mr. Anteline, before he differed with me on the subject of reform and of flogging, did not at all do so on some of the points that he now finds fault with me. In a letter he addressed to me, on the 7th of September 1883, and which he requested should be forwarded to the Secretary of State, and which I did in despatch of 10th September 1883,* he said, referring to my appointments of some Mauritians to high legal offices hitherto held by strangers :-
*" A beginning is shown of the enforcement of that liberal policy of which you have "declared yourself the upholder, and there is a hope that in future the personnel' of
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our Supreme Court and of the Parquet will no longer be recruited from the mediocrities "and failures of the English and Scotch bar.
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"It is clear that if Englishmen are continually preferred to men of our race, it is no "wonder that such a system should not be to our taste, particularly when in the neighbouring island of Reunion they quote senators, deputies, generals, and admirals, "born in the Colony, and the highest posts in the government and magistracy are
occupied by children of the soil.
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"The movement in favour of the reform of our Legislative Council was, at bottom, only a reaction against the invasion of the foreign element into the country, and your policy, tending to cause the disappearance of this serious complaint, answers exactly my ideas."
69. In Lord Derby's despatch dated 26th January of last year,* he transmitted to me a letter from Sir Thomas Brassey respecting a statement made at the Electoral Commission on the 24th October 1884, by one of the memorialists who now address you, and who, in the Electoral Commission, charged one of my predecessors, Sir William Stevenson, with having received a bribe from the late Mr. Brassey to give him the contract for making a railway. Sir Thomas Brassey expressed a wish to institute a criminal prosecution against the persons who had thus libelled his father and outraged the memory of one of the most high-minded and honourable Governors of this Colony.
61. Lord Derby seemed to think that persons who circulate such an incredible libel might be treated with contempt and not prosecuted, and he left the matter in my hands. 62. Before I received Lord Derby's despatch a letter had appeared in the Mauritius newspapers, signed by Mr. James A. Longridge, the former agent in Mauritius of Mr. Brassey, in which he said :—
"If Dr. Beaugeard's remarks were intended to apply to the Mauritius Railway, will you allow me to inform the Mauritius public, through your columns, that the whole story is a foul calumny, without a vestige of foundation in fact."
Knowing that the intelligent public of Mauritius agreed with Mr. Longridge's estimate of Dr. Beaugeard's story, and agreeing in Lord Derby's view that the libellers might be treated with contempt, I took no steps to prosecute the learned doctor.
Unfortunately there are in every community a few men who do not hesitate to circulate groundless stories, and I believe Dr. Beaugeard is not the only one of the memorialists whose carelessness of assertion has laid him open to language such as Mr. Longridge used.
I have, &c. (Signed)
The Right Hon. Edward Stanhope, M.P.,
&c.
&c.
&c.
• Not printed.
J. POPE HENNESSY.
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Enclosure 1 in No. 31.
Port Louis, Mauritius, SIR,
August 30, 1886. WITH reference to Lord Granville's despatch, by which we were informed that the general statements contained in our Memorial of the 12th April last, unsupported as they are by particular instances, do not appear to his Lordship to furnish sufficient ground for the appointment of a Royal Commission of Inquiry to report upon the Governor's administration of the Government of Mauritius, we have the honour to bring to your knowledge that will receive from us by the next French packet a memorial giving
you those (particular instances) which, in our opinion, render it expedient that the Royal Commission should be appointed.
We have, &c. (Signed)
The Right Hon. the Secretary of State for the Colonies.
SIR,
Enclosure 2 in No. 31.
O. Beaugeard, D.M. C. ANTELME. G. DE CORIOLIS. CHARLES PLANEL.
To the Right Hon. the SECRETARY of State for THE COLONIES.
Port Louis, Mauritius,
September 23, 1886. INFERRING from your predecessor's despatch relating to the memorial dated 12th April last, suggesting the appointment of a Royal Commission to report upon the Governor's administration of Mauritius, that he considered us morally bound to furnish the Colonial Office with particular instances in support of the assertions contained in the said memorial we had the honor to promise those particular instances in our letter of the 30th August following. We now beg to redeem our promise.
1o. When Sir John Pope Hennessy arrived in this Colony the most perfect harmony prevailed among all classes of the population. This result had been secured by the provident administration of his predecessors who, for the most part, had done their utmost to cement the social bond between the population of French and English extraction on the one hand, and between the white and the coloured sections of the community on the other. This is go true that Sir George Bowen, one of our late Governors, speaking at the Royal Colonial Institute on the 15th of June last, could say: "I was Governor of Mauritius (1879-83), in which beautiful Island, as in Canada, English is blended with French colonisation, and where there were many embarrassing questions, but I left all races and classes in amity and contentment."
2o. Sir John Pope Hennessy's one-sided policy has not only produced a split in the above-mentioned sections of the people, but has stirred up feelings of animosity against England among the population of French descent, whose prejudices of race had well- nigh disappeared. The following facts will bring this forcibly home to your mind.
3o. Previous to Sir John Pope Hennessy's arrival here, there existed, it is true, a little journal by means of which some inconsiderate youths sought to acquire notoriety in abusing England and the English, but it had no importance whatever. It was reserved for a representative of Her Majesty to pronounce the first imprudent words which have developed evil passions and made them acquire regrettable proportions. The following are, among others, those of Sir John Pope Hennessy's utterances which have provoked ill-feelings towards England and the English.
1o. At a meeting of the Legislative Council, shortly after his accession to office, the Governor denounced the conduct of one of his predecessors who had, according to him, left a note or minute, in which he recommended that a Mauritian of French origin should never be employed in the Despatch Branch of the Colonial, Secretary's office.
2o. At a dinner given by the "Mauritius club," at which Admiral Hewett was present, in replying to a toast, Sir John Pope Hennessy said that the Mauritians, like the Irish, had felt the heavy hand of the English.
A commission of inquiry would easily establish that the above-stated facts are by no means the only ones which could be cited to prove that Sir John Pope Hennessy has greatly contributed, both by his imprudent language and by his attitude, to
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