[Saint Barts]:

$1,000 · Offered by William Reese Company

BEFORE THE MOST NOBLE AND RIGHT HONORABLE THE LORDS COMMISSIONERS OF APPEALS IN PRIZE CAUSES. (APPEAL FROM ANTIGUA). ELIZABETH, PETER TRIPP, MASTER...[docket ... Three legal briefs filed in an Admiralty Prize Court in St. Barts in the early 19th century. Such briefs are very rare, being printed only for the use of the litigants. These relate to the seizure of the ship Elizabeth, from Hamburg, by a British privateer operating in the Caribbean during the Napoleonic Wars. The British vessel seized the Elizabeth near Monserrat and took her to Antigua, where the vessel was awarded to the attackers. However, the case was reversed on appeal, as a manuscript note on the docket page tells us, and was restored to her original owners.The seizure was made on spurious grounds, since the owners had taken care to register the boat with one John Elders, a merchant residing at St. Barts, which then belonged to a neutral power, Sweden. The vessel was restored to its rightful owner. The evidence contained here gives a detailed picture of commercial arrangements in the Caribbean at the time, and especially the use of St. Barts as free port during the Napoleonic Wars, its first heyday before its modern ultra-hip boom.No copies in OCLC.

Found via Rare Books Intel, a search across rare-book dealers, auction houses and marketplaces worldwide.