190 ANDREW FISH
"This Government will be responsible for the acts of British Subjects and punish all offences committed by such on the Arro Islands, and I trust your Excellency is disposed to exer- cise the same vigorous control in that quarter over the conduct of citizens of the United States."
It is to be remarked that the Hudson's Bay Company is not once mentioned in this letter. Mr. Griffin, the aggrieved Brit- ish subject, however, was Mr. Douglas' subordinate in the employ of that Company, and the property seized belonged to the Company and not to Mr. Griffin. It was apparently con- sidered easier to appeal on behalf of a certain British citizen named Griffin than on behalf of a Company already, rightly or wrongly, in bad odour. "The Island of San Juan has been in the possession of British Subjects for many years," pleads the Governor-Factor. In actual possession not so very many after all. It was only on the 13th of December, 1853, that the sheep were landed, an event which represents the first actual settlement, and the letter was written on April 26, 1855, about sixteen months after. It is not known that any use whatever was made of the island before 1850, when the Company began to use it for a few weeks, or perhaps a few months, during the year. On the matter of sovereignty the instructions were quite clear. In September, 1854, presumably after the Sankster- Webber incident already related, Douglas received the follow- ing direct from the Foreign Office in London :
"In conveying to you the approval of Her Majesty's Government of your proceedings with respect to the sov- ereignty of the Islands in the Canal de Arro, I have to authorize you to continue to treat these Islands as part of the British Dominions." 19
It did not go through the Colonial Office which would have been the more usual route. Is it a possible explanation that the Hudson's Bay Company in London had more influence at the Foreign Office than at the Colonial Office ?
The reply of Governor Stevens left no room for doubt as to his attitude. San Juan was United States territory, and the
19 Hudson's Bay Company correspondencne. Copy consulted at the British Columbia Archives, Victoria. B. C
