Colonial Despatches
The colonial despatches of Vancouver Island and British Columbia 1846-1871
Public Offices document
Hammond, Edmund to Merivale, Herman 16 December 1858, CO 60:2, no. 12881, 119.
Abstract
Public Offices document.
Minutes (2), Enclosures (untranscribed) (1), Other documents (1).
Hammond transmits to the CO Booker’s report that Captain Grant and his Royal Engineers had arrived in San Francisco and left for Vancouver Island.
The minutes send this information to the War Department.
Enclosed is Booker to Malmesbury reporting the arrival of Captain Grant’s detachment on 31 October and departure on the Cortez for Victoria, except for one man who deserted; and a draft from Merivale to the Under-Secretary of the War Office forwarding a copy of the letter for their information.
Hammond to Merivale (Permanent Under-Secretary)
With reference to my letter of the 24th
Ultimo,
1
I am directed by the Earl of Malmesbury to transmit to you herewith, for
the information of Secretary Sir Edward Lytton a copy of a despatch from
Mr Booker, Her Majesty's Consul at San Francisco, reporting the
arrival at and departure from that Port for Vancouver's Island of Captain Grant and his Party ofthe
the Royal Engineers.
the Royal Engineers.
Minutes by CO staff
Mr Merivale
The War Dept. would probably like to know that Capt. Grant had arrived at San Francisco?
The War Dept. would probably like to know that Capt. Grant had arrived at San Francisco?
VJ
17 Decr
Send with lith[ographed] form for informn.
HM
D 17
Documents enclosed with the main document (not transcribed)
William Lane Booker to Malmesbury, No. 64, 4 November 1858,
reporting the arrival of Captain Grant's detachment on 31 October and
departure on the
Cortez,
2
except for one man who deserted, for Victoria, on 1 November.
Other documents included in the file
Draft, Merivale to Under-Secretary, War Office, 18 December 1858,
forwarding copy of the letter from Booker for information.
Footnotes
- See Hammond to Merivale (Permanent Under-Secretary), 24 November 1858, 12081, CO 60/2, p. 107.
- The wooden sidewheel steamer Cortez, 220' long and 1117 tons, was built in New York in 1852 for Davis Brooks and Company at a cost of $198,000. Originally christened the Saratoga, it sailed for San Francisco on 10 July 1852 and operated between San Francisco and Panama for the New York and San Francisco Steamship Line until the following summer, when she was purchased by Cornelius Vanderbilt. He ran it between San Francisco and San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua, until March 1855. In 1858 and 1859, it sailed between San Francisco and Panama under contract for ?? the New York and California Steamship Company, and in 1860 for the Atlantic and Pacific Steamship Company. The Pacific Mail Steamship Company purchased it in 1860 and continued it in the Panama service to February 1861, when it sold it to Flint and Holladay, who chartered her to China in 1862, where she remained until 1865 when it burned at Shanghai. Kemble, The Panama Route, 1848-1869, p. 222. Kemble gives Cortes?? The man who deserted in San Francisco was Sapper George Dobbs. Woodward, p. 25.