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From: "Sue Mackay" <>
Subject: [ZA-EC] Settler Correspondence (1826) - James BARRY
Date: Fri, 11 May 2007 19:14:24 +0100


Transcribed from CO48/86 at the National Archives in Kew, London

66
Cape Town
Nov 1st 1826
My Lord
I did myself the honor to address a letter to Your Lordship several
months since thro' HM Commissioners of Inquiry referring to the cruel,
disgraceful & I contend unjustifiable manner in which I had been deprived of
my office, my professional character materially injured & my fair prospects
in life quickly blighted. I did set forth the proximate cause of these
transactions but the first, the predisposing cause, I held back, trusting
that when Lord Charles SOMERSET reflected coolly and dispassionately upon
the circumstance his sense of justice would induce him to see me righted. I
have waited; nothing has been done; but to my uttermost astonishment I have
just learned thro' my friends in England that my conduct respecting a
statement that I had made of an opinion of Col. BIRD's regarding Lord C.H.
SOMERSET has been much misrepresented to Your Lordship. This indeed accounts
for the delay. I therefore hasten to inform you that I have consequently
communicated confidentially the whole and every circumstance in detail to my
friend Sir Jahleel BRENTON, who is authorised by me to communicate the same
personally to your Lordship if necessary, and in the event of his not being
able to do so, thro' either of my friends Mr James STUART or Mr. Henry
ELLIS. And I have only further to say that my silence hitherto on this
subject arose (and my present backwardness arises) from my sincere and
ardent wish to do nothing that could in any way injure Lord Charles; but
solely to rescue my good name from dishonor, and this I have endeavoured to
impress thoroughly on the minds of my friends, who are men of strict honor.
I have the honor to remain
Your Lordship's most obed't serv't
James BARRY

79
Cape Town
Nov 20th 1826
Sir,
I have this morning received your letter of the 25th June last,
acquainting me that Earl BATHURST "sees no reason to doubt the propriety of
the arrangement which has been recently made by the Government of the Cape
for investing in a Medicine Board the execution of the duties which had
previously been assigned to the Colonial Medical Inspector." This death blow
to my well founded hopes that Earl BATHURST would not sanction the ruin
which I have been so unmeritedly involved in compels me once more to bring
my case to his Lordship's notice. To prevent to motives of my application
being misunderstood I beg to disclaim any intention of requesting the
restoration of my situation as Colonial Medical Inspector. Since I do not
complain of the abolition of the office or of its duties being transferred
to a Medical Board, but I do complain of the unprecedented & to me injurious
& disgraceful manner in which it was done & in which I was so abruptly
removed - & also I contend the injustice in not being placed at the head of
that Board after the arduous and zealous professional labours in which I had
been engaged for a series of years without any imputation on my conduct
during that period.
On the 1st of this month I addressed a letter to Earl BATHURST of
which the enclosed is a copy. I beg to express thro' you my hopes that when
his Lordship shall have considered the circumstances under which I was
deprived of my situation, my professional reputation defamed & my peace of
mind destroyed (which will be laid before him by my friends) his Lordship's
sense of justice will induce him to consider me as entitled to that redress
which an injured man has a right to expect at his hands. It is here perhaps
needless for me to enforce how dear, how very dear, to me my good name is,
and how very anxious I am to make every human effort in order to avert the
heavy calamities consequent to the loss of it. I therefore deem it my
bounden duty to vindicate my integrity & to rescue it as soon as possible
from the unworthy imputations which have been heaped upon it; and to
manifest my honorable transactions to the world, without which even my fair
claims to, and anxious expectations of, military promotion may continue to
be obstructed if not totally annihilated.
I am Sir your most obedient Servant
James BARRY

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