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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

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יוון ווווו

C.O.885

Reference :-

SIR,

No. 9.

(TRINIDAD: WENT INDUER.)

BOARD OF TRADE to COLONIAL OFFICE.

[ Mutual Surrender of Vessels Infringing the Revenue Laws.}

Board of Trade (Marine Department),

7, Whitehall Gardens, London S.W., April 7, 1905.

I AM directed by the Board of Trade to acknowledge the receipt of

your letter, 42260/1904 of the 22nd December last, forwarding a copy of a despatch from the Governor of Trinidad relating to a proposal that provision should be made for the mutual surrender by the Governments of the several West Indian Colonies of vessels seeking shelter in one such Colony after infringing the laws of another.

In reply I am to forward, herewith, for the information of Mr. Secretary Lyttelton, a copy of a Minute on the subject by the Solicitor to the Board of Trade, and I am to request that you will be so good as to invite Mr. Lyttelton's attention to the suggestion contained in that Minute that the Commissioners of His Majesty's Customs might be asked for their views in the matter.

I have, &c.,

WALTER J. HOWELL.

16 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON |

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

MINUTE.

BOARD OF TRADE SOLICITOR to Colonial OFFICE

In the year 1800, it was held in the case of the "Fabius" that the Vice-Admiralty Courts in the West Indies have no jurisdiction over offences committed against Revenue laws out of their respective islands, and it is probably the consideration of this case which the Attorney-General for Trinidad had in mind when he sug- gested that the Legal Advisers to the Colonial Office should be asked for their opinion.

By Section 2 (2) of the Colonial Courts of Admiralty Act, 1890, there is con- ferred upon Colonial Courts of Admiralty the like jurisdiction as that exercised by the High Court in Admiralty, and it would seem to follow that if the High Court could detain a vessel which had been forfeited in a Colony for a breach of its Revenue laws, a Colonial Court of Admiralty would have a like power.

I have made enquiry at the Admiralty Registry of the High Court, but could obtain no assistance from either the Registrar or the Marshal, and I have been unable to find any case bearing very specifically upon the point.

I find in an old text book, entitled "Sea Laws." tempore Queen Anne, there is set out the various matters in which the Admiral had jurisdiction; the author (name unknown), quoting Dr. Godolphin in his view of the Admiral's jurisdiction, states that "all defraudings of Her Majesty's Customs or other duties at sea within the Admiral's jurisdiction.

"

are

From this statement it night be suggested that in the days when all our Colonies were Crown Colonies, the Admiralty may have had jurisdiction to arrest, &c., any vessel committing an offence against our Revenue laws, for it may be presumed that the Imperial law ran in the Colony, but it may well be that when our Colonies were granted a Constitution, with power to legislate for themselves. the jurisdiction of the Admiral in this respect was given up. At the same time, if the forfeiture of a ship for breach of a Colonial law enures for the benefit of the Crown, care must be taken not to make any admission which would derogate from the power of the Crown to take that forfeited vessel wherever found within the Dominions.

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