Hammond to Merivale (Permanent Under-Secretary)
18 October 1858
Sir,
I am directed by the Earl of Malmesbury to request that you will suggest to Secretary Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, with reference to your Letter of the 12th Instant 1 relative to the right of certain subjects of Great Britain to navigate the River Columbia, whether it might not be desirable, in the first instance, to request the Hudson's Bay Company to prepare a full Statement of the grounds on which they consider the claim to navigate the Columbia River after the expiration of theirtradingManuscript image trading monopoly is to be maintained, and after the cession to the United States of their Possessory Rights, if an arrangement for such cession should be made.
I am etc.
E. Hammond
Minutes by CO staff
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Mr Elliot
I apprehend that on a question arising out of Treaty obligations the For: Office are entitled to decide & call for what infn they may require. And that, therefore, we have nothing else to do than to send the Co a copy of this Letter and ask them to furnish us with the statement which the For: Off: desire.
ABd 20 Oct
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Lord Carnarvon
The only doubt that occured to my mind was whether the letter already obtained from the H.B. Company (23 Sept 1858) 2 was not intended to afford the very information—so far as tis in their power—which the For: Office here ask for. But I am so imperfectly acquainted with the subject that I dare say there may be a distinction, & at all events I suppose that the Company will not complain of an opportunity to make a fuller statement. If so, they would probably be apprized of the terms of thisManuscript image demand from the Foreign office?
TFE 25 Oct
I suppose that a copy of this had better be sent to the HBC.
C Oct 28
Yes.
EBL Oct 29
Footnotes
  1. = M-FO, 12 Oct 58 re navigation of Columbia FIND ?? Cf. Merivale to Foreign Office, 12 October 1858, 101.
  2. = letter from HBC (Colvile to Lytton, 23 September 1858, 9790, CO/60/2, p. 143).
People in this document

Blackwood, Arthur Johnstone

Carnarvon, Earl

Elliot, Thomas Frederick

Hammond, Edmund

Lytton, Edward George Earle Bulwer

Malmesbury, James, Howard

Merivale, Herman

Organizations in this document

Foreign Office

Hudson's Bay Company

Places in this document

Columbia River