Correspondence Relating to Executions in Turkey for Apostacy from Islamism Part 6

No. 15.

_The Earl of Aberdeen to Sir Stratford Canning_.

Sir, _Foreign Office, January_ 16, 1844.

I have received your Excellency's despatch of the 17th of December, reporting that a Greek had been executed near Brussa as an apostate from Islamism, and inclosing a copy of the communication which you had directed Mr. Dragoman Frederick Pisani to make to the Porte in consequence of that transaction.

I have to state to your Excellency that Her Majesty's Government entirely approve the prompt.i.tude with which you acted on this occasion. But the repet.i.tion of a scene of this revolting kind so soon after that which had, in the course of last summer, excited the horror and indignation of Europe, evinces such total disregard, on the part of the Porte, for the feelings and remonstrances of the Christian Powers, that it is inc.u.mbent upon Her Majesty's Government without loss of time to convey their sentiments on the matter still more explicitly to the knowledge of the Porte. They take this course singly, and without waiting for the co-operation of the other Christian Powers, because they desire to announce to the Porte a determination which, though it doubtless will be concurred in by all, Great Britain is prepared to act upon alone. Her Majesty's Government feel too that they have an especial right to require to be listened to by the Porte on a matter of this nature, for they can appeal to the justice and to the favour with which the vast body of Mahomedans subject to the British rule are treated in India, in support of their demand that all persons, subjects of the Porte and professing Christianity, shall be exempt from cruel and arbitrary persecution on account of their religion, and shall not be made the victims of a barbarous law, which it may be sought to enforce for their destruction.

Whatever may have been tolerated in former times by the weakness or indifference of Christian Powers, those Powers will now require from the Porte due consideration for their feelings as members of a religious community, and interested as such in the fate of all who, notwithstanding shades of difference, unite in a common belief in the essential doctrines of Christianity; and they will not endure that the Porte should insult and trample on their faith by treating as a criminal any person who embraces it.

Her Majesty's Government require the Porte to abandon, once for all, so revolting a principle. They have no wish to humble the Porte by imposing upon it an unreasonable obligation; but as a Christian Government, the protection of those who profess a common belief with themselves, from persecution and oppression, on that account alone, by their Mahomedan rulers, is a paramount duty with them, and one from which they cannot recede.

Your Excellency will therefore press upon the Turkish Government that, if the Porte has any regard for the friends.h.i.+p of England,--if it has any hope that, in the hour of peril or of adversity, that protection which has more than once saved it from destruction, will be extended to it again, it must renounce absolutely, and without equivocation, the barbarous practice which has called forth the remonstrance now addressed to it. Your Excellency will require an early answer; and you will let the Turkish Ministers understand that if that answer does not fully correspond with the expectations which Her Majesty's Government entertain, your Excellency is instructed to seek an audience of the Sultan, and to explain to His Highness, in the most forcible terms, the feelings of the British Government, and the consequences, so injurious to Turkey, which a disregard for those feelings will involve. Her Majesty's Government are so anxious for the continuance of a good understanding with Turkey, and that the Porte should ent.i.tle itself to their good offices in the hour of need, that they wish to leave no expedient untried before they shall be compelled to admit the conviction that all their interest and friends.h.i.+p is misplaced, and that nothing remains for them but to look forward to, if not promote the arrival of, the day when the force of circ.u.mstances shall bring about a change which they will have vainly hoped to procure from the prudence and humanity of the Porte itself.

Your Excellency will seek an interview with the Reis Effendi, and, having read to him this despatch, leave a copy of it, with an accurate translation in his hands.

I am, &c.,

(Signed) ABERDEEN.

No. 16.

_The Earl of Aberdeen to Sir Stratford Canning_.

Sir, _Foreign Office, January_ 16, 1844.

With reference to my other despatch of this day upon the subject of the execution of the Greek near Brussa as an apostate from Islamism, I inclose, for your Excellency's information, an extract of so much of a despatch from M. Guizot to Count Ste. Aulaire as relates to this matter, which Count Ste. Aulaire communicated to me a few days ago.

Your Excellency will perceive from this paper that M. Guizot antic.i.p.ates that Her Majesty's Government will be disposed to invite the co-operation of the other Great Powers with the view of making a simultaneous appeal to the Porte on that subject. But although Her Majesty's Government would certainly be glad to see the other Powers of Europe declaring their abhorrence of so revolting a system as that against which your Excellency and your French colleague will be instructed to protest, they consider it, nevertheless, unnecessary formally to solicit their co-operation in a matter in which they all may be supposed to take a common interest, and to be prepared to act without previous concert with each other.

I have however directed Her Majesty's Amba.s.sador at Paris to communicate to M. Guizot a copy of my other despatch of this day; and I should wish your Excellency to concert with M. de Bourqueney as to the manner in which the instructions which I have addressed to your Excellency and those which M. de Bourqueney will receive from his Court on this matter, and which I conclude will closely correspond with those addressed to yourself, shall be carried into execution so as to produce a salutary impression on the Porte.

A copy of my former instruction will be transmitted to Her Majesty's Amba.s.sador at St. Petersburgh for communication to the Russian Government; but Lord Stuart de Rothsay will not be instructed, for the reason stated in this despatch, to invite the Russian Government to make a similar representation to the Porte.

I inclose a copy of my despatch to Lord Stuart de Rothsay. A corresponding despatch will be addressed to Sir Robert Gordon and to Lord Westmorland.

I am, &c.,

(Signed) ABERDEEN.

No. 17.

_The Earl of Aberdeen to Lord Cowley_.

My Lord, _Foreign Office, January_ 16, 1844.

I inclose, for your Excellency's information, a copy of a despatch from M, Guizot which has been placed in my hands by the Count de Ste. Aulaire, expressive of the just indignation of the French Government on receiving the tidings that, notwithstanding the representations which were made to the Porte by the Five Powers on the occasion of the execution of the Armenian at Constantinople in September last, a Greek has now been put to death near Brussa for returning to Christianity after having embraced Islamism. This event had been already made known to Her Majesty's Government by a despatch from Sir Stratford Canning of which I herewith transmit a copy.

The Government of the Queen share entirely the feelings of indignation and disgust which the French Government evince on this occasion; and I have consequently instructed Her Majesty's Amba.s.sador at the Porte to make a fresh and more energetic representation than before to the Turkish Government, in condemnation of this repeated act of barbarity.

I inclose a copy of this instruction to Sir Stratford Canning, and also of a further one of the same date, in which I direct his Excellency to concert with the Baron de Bourqueney in carrying that instruction into effect.

Your Excellency will communicate these instructions to M. Guizot.

I am, &c.,

(Signed) ABERDEEN.

No. 18.

_The Earl of Aberdeen to Lord Cowley_.

My Lord, _Foreign Office, January_ 16, 1844.

With reference to my other despatch of this day, inclosing, for communication to M. Guizot, a copy of an instruction which I have addressed to Sir Stratford Canning respecting the execution of a Greek near Brussa who had apostatized from Islamism, I have to state to your Excellency that, in the event of your making the communication to M. Guizot in sufficient time to enable him to send his instructions to the French Minister at Constantinople by the steam-vessel which leaves Ma.r.s.eilles on the 21st of this month, the post for which is made up in Paris on the evening of the 18th, I should wish your Excellency to acquaint Sir Stratford Canning by that opportunity with what may have pa.s.sed between you and M.

Guizot.

The despatch will be sent this evening by post through France so as to go on by the Ma.r.s.eilles steam-vessel of the 21st.

I am, &c.,

(Signed) ABERDEEN.