PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
mwimminC.O. 885
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-
COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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6. As regards the appointment of a second clergyman, it will be in the recollection of your Grace, that one of the first Ordinances passed by the Heligoland Legislature was to throw the post of rector of the Colonial School open to a layman, with a view of providing a really superior head school teacher.
7. A wish, however, having been expressed by the Combined Court that the post of rector now again vacant should be filled by a clergyman, I stated that I would raise no objection to the proceeding, but could not sanction any burden being laid on the public treasury for the purpose of covering the expense attendant on the cumbersome system of election unless funds were provided by taxation.
8. Finally, your Grace will observe by the paper which I have now the honour to inclose, that I had placed the amount of taxation for this year at a most absurdly small
amount.
I desired indeed much more to see the will and intention of meeting the financial difficulties of the island than to get this year the absolute amount of money as required by your Grace's paper to the Combined Court, and would have explained such proceeding on my part to your Grace.
I have, &c. (Signed) FITZ MAXSE,
Lieutenant-Colonel, &c.
His Grace the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos,
&c.
&c.
&c.
Government Office, Heligoland, 26th October 1867.
APPOINTMENT of a new RECTOR, and TAXATION.
1. If the House think an election most advisable, I have no objection to this course. I will not, however, consent to a single farthing being taken from the Landescasse for the above purpose.
2. But whether an election takes place or not, and whether an increase of the rector's salary be agreed upon or not, under no circumstances can I accept as taxation anything less than 2,500 marks.
Such taxation must be arranged in accordance with Ordinance No. 7, 1865.
3. By reference to the speech of the Duke of Buckingham the Combined Court will see that taxes ought to have been voted sufficient to pay the yearly interest of the island debt, and to support the island.
I am, however, prepared this year to accept the above vote.
4. The remainder of Madam Biermann's rent, now deposited under strict conditions in the hands of the town clerk, will be paid off the island debt.
my
instructions to
The town clerk only received this money as a deposit, and he has give none of it under present circumstances to the island treasurer.
5. The outstanding taxes for 1866 must be paid in at once; if those members of the House who have not paid this trifling tax commence doing so the others will soon follow. 6. If the Vorstcherschaft agree to the above I am prepared to advise Her Majesty's Government to permit the continuance of the play-tables until the end of the contract, presuming always that the Combined Court for 1868 votes a sufficient taxation for the year.
Should the Combined Court continue to refuse to proceed in accordance with the in. structions of the Secretary of State, it will only remain for me to act strictly in accord- ance with those instructions, and the island having refused to aid itself in the slightest degree, and its representatives exhibiting a fixed impression that taxation is as unnecessary as the revenue from a gambling table is certain and immutable, Madame Biermann will be informed on the 31st December that her contract has ceased, and that she has to remove her roulette tables and other property from the Conversations House as speedily as possible.
Finally, it having been reported to me that some relations and friends of Pastor Petersen in the Vorstcherschaft have advised him to attempt election for the office of rector, I have to inform these persons that they will be only putting their relative to expense and trouble, as under no circumstances can I advise Her Majesty's Government to sanction the appointment of Pastor Petersen in any official capacity whatever.
(Signed) FITZ H. MAXSE,
Governor, &c.
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No. 11.
HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM AND CHANDOS to GOVERNOR LIEUT.-COLONEL MAXSE, C.M.G.
SIR,
Downing Street, 27th November 1867. WITH reference to your separate despatch of the 16th inst., reporting on the memorial addressed to me on the 4th inst. by certain members of the Combined Court complaining of your mode of conducting the Government of Heligoland, I have to request that you will inform them that I have received their memorial, and that you have furnished me with the copy of an address which you had communicated to them on the main points to which their memorial relates, and that I concur in the views expressed by you in that address.
I have, &c.
(Signed)
BUCKINGHAM AND CHANDOS.
No. 12.
GOVERNOR LIEUTENANT-COLONEL MAXSE, C.M.G., to H1B GRACE THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM AND CHANDOS.
>
(Received January 29, 1868.) MY LORD DUKE,
Heligoland, 22nd January 1868. I HAVE the honour to inform your Grace with regret that not only have the Combined Court of 1867 not voted one farthing taxes for the year 1867, but the elected members of the Court have not even paid in the very trifling taxes for which they are personally indebted for 1866. In addition to this, the Colonial Treasurer, Mr. M. Jaspers, has made application to me to permit the sum of 3,000 marks to be deducted from the remaining play-table rent, which I caused to be deposited in the hands of the town clerk for the purpose of paying off a portion of the public debt; the 3,000 marks applied for by the treasurer are due for half-yearly interest on the public debt and for the payment of sundry public works, for which the Combined Court had not thought fit, notwithstanding
I beg to enclose a copy/ No. 1. all which had taken place, to make any provision whatever for. of the protocol of my conversation with the treasurer on the subject.
2. Your Grace's despatch of 27th November 1867+ was translated, delivered to the signers of the memorial, read to the Combined Court, and made public in every possible manner.. Notwithstanding, however, the clearness of its purport the signers of the memorial elect to state that it is not sufficiently so for them, and at a meeting of the Combined Court on the 9th instant, they repeated their statement and said that they did not understand the answer, as they were not told decidedly that they were not to have back their old rights and privileges; the above is naturally only an absurd excuse for again avoiding the necessity of voting taxes, as irrespective of your Grace's despatch above mentioned, and the several previous answers from Colonial Office, your Grace's personal address to them in the month of June has been long printed, laid on the table, and distributed over the island.
3. According to the terms of the Constitution I then dissolved the Combined Court of 1867 for the purpose of allowing the election for that of 1868. The members of the Bürger Committee made use of every possible means to return again the whole of their 12 members, and your Grace may suppose that this was not difficult, when they could point out to the poorer fishermen and handworkers who had signed their original petition that they had successfully combated the Governor on the question of taxation of every kind, that the play tables were to continue, that their old rights and privileges were to be returned, and that this arose in consequence of their successful correspondence and statement of facts to Her Majesty's Government.
4. Notwithstanding this, however, those persons returned but 10 from their number, the two other members having been returned at the head of the poll with 57 votes between them.
5. I caused the new Combined Court to meet on the 20th instant, and desired the town clerk after the election of a chairman to read a communication from myself, which
No. 2.
No. 10. † No. 11.
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