IMMIGRATION.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4235, 16 October 1874, Page 3

IMMIGRATION.

o MRS. HOWARD IN DEFENCE. Mrs. O. O. Howard has sent for publication to the Otago Daily Times the following letter, dated London, July 27th, 1874 : I rely on your sense of justice to give insertion to a few lines from me in self-defence. I find from various papers which have reached me from New Zealand, that my conduct as an Emigratien Agent has been made the subject of a considerable amount of adverse comment on account of the shipment of some people from the Cork Union by me. I will, with your kind permission, relate the circumstances which led to my sending them. I do not know if Dr. Featherston has offered any explanation of the matter, if not, in justice to me he should have done so. A list of the names and capabilities of a number of the inmates of the Cork Union was sent to Dr. Featherston by a Mr. Acheson, who had been acting as an Agent for New Zealand Emigration in Ireland before I left Otago. After I had been some time in Limerick—where I succeeded in getting a number of first-class emigrants, whom I forwarded to your colony by various ships—l suggested to the Agent-General that Queenstown being the principal port for the South of Ireland, I should make that my head-quarters. He then told me he had received the abovenamed list, and said he should like me to inspect these people in the Workhouse, and if I found any deserving people among them able to work, he saw no reason why they should not get free passages. Upon this instruction I, upon my return to Ireland, visited the Cork Union, and there selected a number of inmates, who, upon inquiry, I found to bear good characters. It will thus be seen that in selecting these people I was merely acting upon Dr. Featherston’s instructions, and that I have been made the scapegoat in a matter the responsibility for which does not fairly lie upon me. I may remark I was greatly surprised to find that some people in Otago have made the stupid (or malicious) assertion that these people were sent from a reformatory, which is a gross falsehood. In conclusion, I may remark that while it is quite possible that despite the care exercised by me in selecting over 1000 emigrants for your shores, some few undesirable ones may have passed through my hands and deceived my utmost vigilance, yet I can safely assert that the great bulk of the number will prove useful and creditable colonists.