This is an appeal from a decree of the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Columbia.
The bill was filed in the court below, by the respondents, against the appellant, Pemberton, liquidator of the Merchants' Insurance Company, in the city of New Orleans, representing the interest of that company, which was insolvent, for the purpose of establishing a title to certain moneys in the possession of the Government, which had been received under the convention between the United States and Great Britain, of the 8th of February, 1853. The money had been awarded by the umpire, under that convention, to the company, which had been subrogated to the rights of one of the claimants for compensation against Great Britain, in the case of the brig Creole. The umpire allowed to the company $28,460. The complainants below set up, in their bill, a title to one-half of this fund, as the agents and attorneys of Pemberton in the prosecution of the claim.
The right rests upon the following agreements, entered into between them and the defendant (Pemberton) at New Orleans, dated the 23d of December, 1851:
'For and in consideration of services rendered, and to be rendered, by James G. Berret, Henry D. Johnson, and E. Lockett, of Washington city, D. C., in the prosecution of our claims for the value of slaves freed at Nassau, N. P., which we had to pay for, we do hereby agree to allow to said Berret, Johnson, and Lockett, their heirs or assigns, one-half of any or all such sums of money, principal and interest, as may be recovered on account of our said losses, it being understood that the said Berret, Johnson, and Lockett, are to use their best exertions in the prosecution of said claim, and that no allowance whatever, as expenses or compensation for their services, is to be made by us to the said Berret, Johnson, and Lockett, unless our said claim shall be allowed, in whole or in part. Witness our hand and seal, at New Orleans, this 23d day of December, in the year of our Lord 1851.'
The claims referred to in this agreement originated as far back as the year 1841, in consequence of the unwarrantable interference of the public authorities at Nassau, in the island of New Providence, one of the Bahama Islands, belonging to Great Britain, and liberating a cargo of slaves, who were on a voyage from Virginia to New Orleans, and who had mutinied, overcome the officers, and carried the vessel into that port.
The persons interested in the slaves, of which they were deprived by this interference, immediately appealed to their own Government for redress. A correspondence was opened between this Government and Great Britain on the subject, which continued down to the time of the convention already mentioned, of the 8th of February, 1853.
This convention provided for the appointment of a board of commissioners, one to be named by each Government, and the two to appoint an umpire, to decide upon all claims in which a difference of opinion should occur.
The board sat in the city of London, and were bound, according to the terms of the convention, to receive and peruse all written documents or statements which might be presented to them, by or on behalf of their respective Governments, in support of or in answer to any claim; and to hear, if required, one person on each side, in behalf of each Government, as counsel or agent for such Government, on each separate claim. Each Government appointed an agent to represent it before the board; and, as we have said, the umpire allowed to the insurance company $28,460.