VOLUNTEER OFFICERS' RANK BILL. (Hansard, 10 July 1806)

On the motion of Mr. Windham, the house resolved itself into a committee on the Volunteer Officers' Rank bill.

§ Mr. Alderman Combe ,
following up the principle, for which he had formerly contended, that rank should not be taken from those who already enjoyed it, moved that the words "shall have been" should be left out, for the purpose of inserting the words "shall hereafter be." The effect of this would be, that the provisions of the bill would extend only to those who might hereafter become colonels of volunteer corps.

§ Mr. H. Addington
said, that he had no unpleasant feelings whatever at the idea of being commanded, in case of his corps being called out for service, by any regular field-officer. On the contrary, he was glad that he was relieved from the responsibility that might attach to him, in case it should have been his fortune to have commanded a field-officer of the regulars. This was the feeling of every volunteer colonel with whom he had conversed on the subject.

Mr. S. Bourne
said, that it was a very, different thing to consider whether this rank ought to have been given originally, and to take it away when given. This was not a new thing. It existed when the right hon. gentleman was secretary at war. The highest rank at present was lieutenant-colonel; but then there were full colonels of volunteers, with the rank of regular colonels in the army. But suppose there should be a regular major in a volunteer corps, it might turn out, that, in case of actual 1041 service, the major might command his own colonel. Old officers in the volunteers might, also, be commanded by in ferior officers in the army.

§ General Tarleton
contended, that no evil whatever could result, from allowing the volunteer officers to retain their rank. The guards enjoyed a different rank from the other parts of the army; yet, though they had served in America, in Flanders, and in other places, no inconvenience had been felt—they had been brigaded by themselves. The militia, the volunteers, and the army, might go on in the same manner without jealousy. He would mix them all without any apprehension. He would have no apprehension that the volunteers would turn their backs, but they might be too rash. How was this to be corrected? By discipline. The country would have to regret the retarding of the discipline of the volunteers by the measures of the right hon. gent. If they had been permitted to have gone on, they would have been fit for any duty.

§ Sir C. Price
said, that, in every step taken with regard to the volunteers, something was done to degrade them. He adverted to the manner in which the volunteers had at first come forward, and thought that they deserved to be complimented instead of being degraded.

§ Lord De Blaquiere
approved of the bill, and thought that serious mischief would arise in the moment of services unless its provisions were adopted. It would then be proper that the volunteers should be commanded by those who had never seen service. An hon. general had talked of the guards, but they had commanded up to their rank in the army, and no inconvenience arose from this circumstance.

Mr. Secretary Windham
could not imagine it to be seriously meant, that officers ranking as colonels of Volunteers could take any offence at being, in case of actual service, obliged to act under the command of officers in the line of inferior rank. Field-officers of volunteers might be very respectable men, and very worthy characters, but then they were not military men in the technical sense of the word; and, of course, could not be competent to take a superior command of troops in actual 1042 service, over the heads of men, who had devoted their. whole lives to the military profession, and-were radically and experimentally instructed in the profession of arms. Would any gentleman, who happened to be on board a man of war, or who held an employment of high rank in the civil department of the navy, take offence because he was not thought competent to take the command of a ship or squadron, in preference to a sailor regularly bred to the profession? Would any gentleman of the highest academic attainments, and political experience, take offence at being thought incompetent to assume the post of a law officer of the crown? In a word, could any man, not bred to a particular profession, feel himself offended at being thought less competent to take a lead in that profession, than a man who had been regularly bred to it? And yet this was the kind of circumstance, at which, in every other case, it would be absurd and ridiculous to conceive offence, which was now termed an insult to the officers of volunteers, without considering that such an arrangement as that contended for, in case of actual danger, might be attended with the very worst consequences, even under the command of the most valiant field-officer of volunteers, that that branch of the service could possibly afford. Courage and zeal formed only one part of the qualification for command; experience and technical knowledge were, to the full, as necessary. The worthy alderman was ready to admit it was very right that the principle should be adopted with volunteer field-officers to be hereafter appointed; but .that the alteration might not take place in respect to those already appointed. Why then, if it was right it should never be done hereafter surely it would have been equally right if the thing had never been done. In admitting the former principle, gentlemen acknowledged the latter; and, therefore, it was better, even late, to correct an error, which was admitted to be one, before any mischief accrued from it. An hon. and learned gent. (Mr. Perceval) had assumed a good deal of merriment upon a former occasion, on the circumstance of his (Mr. Windham's) having procured himself a colonel's command of volunteers in a corps without any other officers; but this, like many other of that gentleman's merry or serious arguments, was founded in gross misconception. It was true, he had been appointed to the 1043 office of a volunteer colonel in some corps in his neighbourhood, but it was an appointment not of his choice or seeking; besides, he never knew that the corps alluded to, the Felbrig volunteers, had not the same proportion of subaltern officers, as other corps of the like description.

§ Mr. Perceval
had only argued from the fact, as it appeared by the papers on the table; and if there was a mistake, it was owing to his friends in office. The corps, however, was as good a corps as one without officers could be expected to be. He believed it had not even a constable, but it appeared that at the time the right hon. gent. Knew so little about his own corps, that it was not till now he was enabled to correct the mistake. But the right hon. gent. did not adopt his own principle to its full extent, otherwise it would apply to the militia. He ought rather to have recalled the commissions of the volunteer colonels. He was now reducing them to the very thing which he bad described them to be. They were now really "the painted cherries." Nothing could lower the officers more, in the eyes of the country, than allowing them the title of colonels, without the effective rank.

§ Mr. Long
said, that if the right hon. gent. favoured the volunteers, they were very ungrateful, for they did not give him credit for it. He asked, whether there were any regulations for doing away the allowances of pay and clothing, as it was understood to be the intention to suffer the volunteers to moulder away?

General Torleton
thought that if the volunteer officers had eagerly put themselves forward, there might be some ground for the measure; but a lieutenant Bayley, who had served at the Havannah with great applause, and who now commanded a corps of 4000 volunteers, had modestly stood aside when they were inspected. Of this corps, captain Gore, whose services in America would be well remembered, was the major; and yet these men were to be degraded.

Mr. C. Wynne
admitted that these were officers of experience, but they were particular exceptions. It would be unpleasant in time of service for inexperienced volunteer officers to command regular field-officers, and this feeling had been expressed by the colonel of the light-horse volunteers, in whose favour an exception might be made, if in any case. Mr. Ryder wished, that the right hon. gent. had condescended to answer his hon. 1044 friend's question as to the pay and clothing, as it might be necessary to have a clear understanding on this point, with a view to the subject which was to come on the next day.

§ Mr. Windham
said, that there was no occasion for his answering what he had stated over and over again, especially as the question was asked with a view to the motion of the next day, the nature of which had not been communicated to him, nor to the house. This might be a stratagem of war against his majesty's ministers, but it was not very candid to the house.

§ Mr. Long
considered it hard that he should suffer for the fault of another.

§ Mr. Windham
said, that he certainly had no inclination to answer, merely on account of the motion for the next day; but he had before distinctly stated, that the pay and clothing was not to be allowed such volunteers as should enter in future.—The amendment was then negatived.