The New Hampshire Gazette

Seizure of an American Ship by a British Cruiser.

—By the arrival of the Ann McKim at New York; we have information of an unwarrantable outrage committed on an American merchant vessel by a British cruiser. The bark Jones, of New York, was seized at St. Helena in September last by the British brig of war Dolphin, and sent to Sierra Leone, on suspicion of being engaged in the slave trade. The only grounds for the suspicion seems to have been the representations of a mutinous and revengeful mate, and the circumstance of finding on board the Jones five sets of hand cuffs, three wooden spoons, a quantity of codfish, upon which the British officer stated he had on one occasion seen slaves fed, together with a few battings on one side of the vessel to keep a quantity of powder dry when originally shipped at Boston—these were the only items discovered to justify them in their proceedings Liquor was taken on board the bark, and the mate kept in a state of intoxication most of the time.

The vessel seized, was the barque Jones, Capt. Gilbert, of New York. She had on board part of a cargo of ivory, palm oil, &c, she had brought from the coast of Africa, and about $9,000 in specie, besides a part of her outward cargo. After the seizure, the officers of the Jones were refused admission on board, and were not permitted even to take their clothes on shore.