IMMIGRATION ABUSES.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4540, 8 October 1875, Page 3

IMMIGRATION ABUSES.

It is a mistake to suppose that because in an extensive scheme of immigration New Zealand has furnished one or two instances in which the arrangements on shipboard were manifestly defective, that therefore New Zealand is in this respect peculiar. A case has just been investigated in Queensland which, placed alongside of any one of those which have occurred on the voyage to New Zealand, quite overshadows it for culpable neglect. The case is given in the Brisbane Telegraph, of September 17th, and is as follows : The inquiry which was gone into yesterday, on board the Kate, steamer, while lying alongside the immigrant ship Star Queen, has disclosed a state of things which, according to the evidence adduced, goes far beyond even the worst that was expected of the promised revelations.

Dr. de Zouche, the surgeon-superintendent, was the first witness examined : He considered that neither the stores nor medical comforts were in sufficient quantities. When the ship had been out ninety-three days he was informed that there were no more biscuits for the passengers, but only for thirty days' consumption for the crew. The passengers were then put on 3Joz. of oatmeal a day. Took stock on August 18 and 19, when it was found that a short supply, of biscuits had been put on board. The weight of the provisions was systematically shortened by the purser ; he gave the baker, for instance, 1301bs. of flour for 14-llbs.; the preserved meat was also served out short; had frequently complained to the captain, who gave him no assistance; the purser had confessed to supplying short weight, stating that if he had not done so, there would have been starvation on board ; some of the immigrants' supplies had been used for the cabin table ; had seen barrels marked indifferently at each end as to contents, " split peas," for example, being painted at one end, and " cabin bread " at the other, so that the surveyor passing down each side of a tier would pass one barrel for two ; there were short rations issued for several weeks during the first part of the voyage ; the captain did not support his authority, but, on the contrary, abused him grossly ; when the ship had been out ninety-eight days, there was flour left for nineteen days ; it was a common thing for him to have a dozen men clamouring round his door for provisions ; the engineer had confessed to him that he had contrived to affix some lead to the scale, and to reduce the weight of the steelyards by burning; the purser used a heavier scoop to reduce the weight of flour served out ; the captain charged him with paying too much attention to the passengers' talk.

E. W. Wright, who helped to serve out the stores, had made and signed a statement, which the surgeon brought forward, a portion of which was as follows: . . . ■ "I do. not know of any liquors being received from Gravesend for the additional ninety passengers ; I saw in the ship barrels marked 'cabin biscuits' on one side and 'flour' on the other, which may have been put down in the bills as biscuits to suit the total ; I have seen barrels marked 'passengers' stores' on one side and 'crew's stores' on the other; Mr. Bellamy first took the tongues out of the meat ; he first proposed doing so ; Captain Downing said to me, ' You have some tongues there, I would not give the people those tongues,' or words to that effect ; he said they would do for the cabin ; he told me to bring them aft ; I have done the best I could with the stores ; had I given them out according to the scale, 1,1 could not have made them last for the voyage; there would have been, starvation on board ; a couple of weeks ago, more or less, I acknowledged to Dr. de Zouche, and Mrs. Currie (the matron), that I had served out short rations of butter and treacle ; when Captain Downin" asked me privately why I had told the doctor, I said there were not provisions on board for 140 days ; he did not blamemc for giving short weight; Captain Downing lias told me not to give the passengers too much, or we should be getting short ; I told him that if I gave the baker half-a-pound of flour for each loaf (a loaf for each statute adult passenger), we should soon be short of flour; lie said, ' You know how to go on, you have to get the cabin stores out of them,' meaning out of the steerage flour ; I have told the baker he must make the flour go as far as possible, as we must get the cabin bread out of the steerage flour ; Captain Downing said to me, "You don't need mo to tell you, as you know better than me what to do ;* I used to give the baker abont 3Ubs. of flour for 51bs. of bread; put the scoop of another pair of scales instead of the ordinary scoop, because the former weighed IJlbs. more ; in this way I saved a good deal of flour ; the overplus bread out of the flour given to the baker was taken aft to supply the cabin table, according to Captain instructions ; this went on for, perhaps, two or three weeks, while the passengers were getting short rations of flour, and after they had the full quantity as ordered by the doctor ; Captain Downing gave me general instructions not to let the people have their full allowance ; lie said, ' Of course the doctor is here to see that they get full rations, but you have been with a doctor before, and know how to manage it;' when I came on board ho said, ' I want you to try and take charge of these stores, and make them last out ; I am afraid of running short ;' he said, ' Our people ' (meaning, I believe, the owners) 'pay for a lot of stores, and I do not believe they'come on board ;' Captain Roberts (the ship's husband) told me to look out what came on board, and what was over at the end of the voyage, and not sleep off the ship at nin-lit; I remember giving a 6-lb tin of meat for two messes on several occasions ; Mr. Bellamy said he thought one tin would do for two messes ; I said, ' Yes, that will do, and in that case we must serve out the 4-lb. tins as if they were 5-lb. tins ; We did so ; most of the tanks are 'not full ; the engineer told me in the early part of the voyage that the boiler was a rotten old thing, and that the whole machine might break down before the end of the voyage ; I have served out the following articles short—salt beef, salt pork, preserved meat, butter, flour, oatmeal, peas, rice, preserved potatoes, onions, carrots, treacle, and limejuice ; the captain used to send the steward to me for preserved meat for the cabin out of the passengers' stores ; a board was removed from the bulkhead between the issuing-room and the engineers' place to pass the steelyard through and have a hole drilled in it to make the weight lighter, but the engineer could not do it ; I asked him to burn a piece off the weight; he tried to do so, and said it was gone to a clinker ; Mr. Bellamy took part in issuing the short rations to the passengers ; I wanted to make up the soup belonging to the medical comforts out of

the cabin stores, but Captain Downing objected." Wright was also of opinion that the stores were put on board in a very strange manner at Gravesend, some of them being sent on board at 11 o'clock at night; he also stated that the provisions were not equal iu quantity to that put down in the bills supplied with them.

William Bellamy, the third mate, confirmed this witness.

Mrs. Currie, the matron, spoke as to the frequent complaints on board as to the quantity of provisions supplied; she considered the doctor must have had a difficulty in preventing riots ; when the biscuits ran out some of the single women cried and suffered very much, as they could not eat the oatmeal; when the passengers charged the purser with robbery, he excused himself on the ground of doing the best for all. This concluded the evidence required by the Board.

Mr. Pring had the authority of the captain to state that he knew nothing as to the provisioning of the ship, and that he had always ordered substitutes to be provided for provisions that had run short. He denied generally the truth of the purser's statement, especially that part relating to conversations between himself and the purser.