Colonial Despatches

I have the honor to acknowledge receipt of Your Grace's Despatch No 32 of the 30h July 1863 referring to the circumstance of one Thomas Burke, a distressed British Subject, having been improperly provided with a passage from Vancouver's Island to Queenstown at the public expense under an Order issued by a Justice of the Peace.

2. Mr Stamp, the Justice ofthe the Peace referred to was at the time of the occurrence the Superintendent of the Spar and Lumber Establishment at Alberni on the South west Coast of Vancouver's Island. He was constituted a Justice of the Peace from the necessity which existed for having some local authority in an isolated and distant settlement capable of preserving Law & order, not only amongst the Settlers, but also amongst the Crews of Ships arriving there for Cargoes, and who otherwise might have availed themselves of the opportunity offered for desertion. Mr Stamp has since left, and has recently returned to England, and I am therefore unable to call upon him for an explanation, but Idoubt doubt not he acted under a mistaken idea that the 17 and 18 Vic Cap. 104 sec. 211 applied to all British Subjects.

3. I have cautioned Mr Stamps Successor in respect of this matter, and I will not fail to observe that persons in the Colonies are not entitled to passage to England at the Expense of the British Government.