Friday, June 20, 2014

Confederate European Affairs

JUNE 20TH, 1864:  Secretary Mallory wrote Flag Officer Barron in Paris:  "I am surprised at the expression of your opinion that a battery for a certain vessel can not be purchased in England, because her laws permit the exportation of guns and ordnance stores daily, and no system of espionage, it would seem, could prevent the shipment for one port and their being landed at another, or placed at another on board the ship awaiting them.

"Could they not be shipped for any port in the United States, in the Mediterranean, China, Brazil, or Austria, and carried to a given rendezvous"  They will involve the carter of a steamer, or other vessel, and be thereby expensive; but such expense is not to be compared for a moment with the risks of her attempting, unarmed, to reach the Confederacy, watched as she is."

This procedure had been used before successfully in the case of the CSS Alabama.

Not sure which ship they were referring to in this case.

--Old B-Runner

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