THE HANGO BUTCHERY.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume XIV, 3 November 1855, Page 3

THE HANGO BUTCHERY.

[From the Times.']

It has never fallen to our lot, in the course of a long experience, to cdhrment upon any one event so distressing to the feelings of this nation, so disgraceful to the enemy with whom we are at war, so shameful to humanity, as the massacre committed by the Russians, on the boat's crew of a British man-of-war, on the sth of June, at Hango. Not only do we mourn the loss of sixteen gallant young fellows, whose fate would have been glorious if they had fallen by any of the common accidents of war ; not only are we revolted by the treachery which first allowed this boat to reach the shore under a flag of truce, and then butchered the erew — unarmed, unresisting — with an overwhelming force of troops, who sprang up from their lurking-places in the rocks ; but, while we deplore the passion and violence which so base and ferocious an action will impart to every future encounter in this war, we participate in the conviction that no effort is too great, and no measure too strong to bring the authors of this crime to the condign punishment they deserve. War, no doubt, is full of horrors, and is marked by a long track of devastation and of blood ; but it is also the- school of honour, and no laws are more sacred than those which regulate its excesses. -

A flag of truce, visible from the shore, was flying all the time on the ship, and on approaching the jetty the officer in command of the boat again waved the same ensign of peace. It is, however, apparent from the result, that the approach of this boat on its friendly errand had been deliberately used by the Russian officers in command at Hango to organize one of the most detestable and bloody stratagems recorded in history. Five hundred armed men lay concealed in the immediate neighbourhood of the landing-place. The liberated prisoners and the officers jumped out of the boat ; they were immediately surrounded by this overwhelming force. The miscreant commanding the party seems to have been a man of some education, for he spoke English — enough, at least, to utter a brutal oath upon that flag of truce which he was about to violate. By his order the riflemen opened a sharp fire immediately and indiscriminately on the officers who had landed, on the men in the boat, and even on the Finnish prisoners who hadjustbeen seton shore, and who fell to a man under the merciless bullets of their own tyrants. One wounded man was dragged out of the bottom of the boat, where he had fallen, and bayontted upon the jetty. One sole survivor marvellously escaped by feigning death as soon as he was hit, and ultimately cutting the boat adrift.

This awful crime was not, therefore, left without a living witness to relate and attest the tale, and to denounce to mankind and to posterity, in the strongest language of indignation and horror, the atrocious cruelty of this unmanly deed. Among the dacoits who infest the banks of the Irrawaddy, or the savage and piratical tribes of the Eastern Archipelago, our seamen are on their guard against every stratagem of bloodthirsty and faithless barbarians ; but what is termed Christian warfare, at a spot to which orders can be forwarded in a few hours from the seat of Government, separated only by a few miles of inland sea from the capital of the Russian empire, and consequently under the direct control of the supreme authority in that country, we certainly were not prepared for a breach of military honour and of common humanity which would disgrace the remotest settlement and the most barbarous savages of the habitable globe. Had the authorities of Hango had any motive to prevent the boat from entering their port, or for refusing to receive the flag of truce, nothing was easier than to have stopped the approach of our men by firing a shot across the bow of the boat. Had they even attempted to take them prisoners for any alleged misconduct or breach of the privileges of a flag of truce, nothing was more easy, for the party were unarmed, and the disproportion of numbers on the side of the Russians quite irresistible. But such were not their intentions. Such is the nation which barely half a century ago wrested the province of Finland, the scene of this tragedy, from the mild and free Government of the Crown of Sweden.

A crime of this nature — a violation of all that is held sacred and honourable and brave among men — leaves an indelible trace upon the annals of a nation. A period of 227 years has not effaced from the memory of the people of England the atrocity of the Amboyca massacre, when an English sea captain and nine of his men were sacrificed to the suspicious policy of the Dutch ; and a century has not diminished the infamy which the night of the Black Hole of Calcutta left upon the memory of the ruler of Bengal. As long as the annals of this memorable year are recorded in the pages of history, the massacre of Hango will rank with these sinister achievements, for no parallel can he found to it save in the worst and most perfidious actions which have disgraced humanity. Indeed, this surprise exceeds them all, for our gallant countrymen were cut off in the very performance of an act of courtesy and kindness, and under the shelter of an ensign which every nation but the Russian knows how to respect. Throughout the world, wherever this tale is told, the compassion felt for the untimely end of these brave young fellows will be filled with a thrill of horror at the guilt of their murderers. Throughout the world, wherever the British navy can carry its flag or point its guns, an avenging spirit will walk the deep ; and not a British seaman afloat but will remember the boat's crew of the Cossack in the hour of battle. It is not the least of the evils of such bad actions that they invest Justice herself with the fiercer passions, and render war more pitiless and destructive ; but, on the other hand, they show us more clearly with what an adversary we have to deal — how false, how cruel, how unscrupulous ! They prove how impossible it is to bind the Russians even to the observances held sacred among enemies, except by the influence of fear and of superior force.

A shilling subscription has been entered into at Brighton for the purpose of raising a fund to purchase a bust of General Sir De Lacy Evans, the work of Mr. Pepper, a local sculptor.