§ MR. W. WILLIAMS,in moving for the return of which he had given notice, said, that there was at this moment a great deal of agitation in the public mind with regard to the disproportionate number of officers in our cavalry force in the East as compared with the number of men. There was one officer in the cavalry regiments for every ten men; and somewhat more than one officer and one non-commissioned officer for every five men. This was considerably more than twice the number of officers attached to the cavalry regiments serving under the Duke of Wellington in the Peninsular war. With regard to our infantry, the number of officers there was one officer to every twenty-five men, according to the Army Estimates of the present Session. Common sense would point out to any one that so large a proportion of officers in the cavalry could not be required.
§
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That there be laid before this House, a Return of the effective force of Cavalry employed or now under orders for the East; stating the number of Regiments; of Officers, specifying their
1136
respective ranks, in each Regiment; the number of effective Men and Horses actually embarked; and of the General and Staff Officers attached to the Cavalry Service; specifying the Rank and Names of the General Officers, and of their Staff.
§ MR. SIDNEY HERBERTsaid, that the return for which the hon. Gentleman had moved was one which he thought the Government could not grant without departing from its duty. With respect generally to returns moved for relating to the Army, there was no force, he supposed, in Europe which was conducted upon principles so patent to the world as the British Army, and since he had had anything to do with the administration of the Army, he had certainly not erred upon the side of refusing information when wanted. The hon. Gentleman, who took great interest in these things, and was very reasonable in his mode of dealing with them, would, he thought, see that his object could be attained without asking for returns which would, if granted, be prejudicial to the public service. He admitted the greater part of the hon. Gentleman's case. The hon. Gentleman said there was a great disproportion of officers to men in the cavalry regiments, and that there were many more of the former than were requisite to the number of men in those regiments. That was perfectly true, but the converse of it was also true,—that there was not a sufficient number of men to the number of officers. Our cavalry force had been maintained during peace as a skeleton force, and this in itself afforded a very weak framework. The regiments in this country during peace were composed only of six troops; in India they were raised to ten troops; but here they were maintained at six with a very small number of men in each troop, in order that that force might be maintained as economically as possible, and in order that it might be capable of expansion when the necessity arose. This expansion, however, was not a thing which could be attained in a day; and, looking at the hon. Gentleman's Motion, the feeling it inspired him with was rather remorse that they had not kept up the cavalry regiments in a more efficient state. Now, however, they were augmenting the cavalry regiments, and raising additional men for them, and he trusted that the disproportion of officers to men, of which the hon. Gentleman complained, would before long be to a considerable degree remedied. With regard to the return moved for, he thought by granting it the House would in this par- 1137 ticular case create a precedent which, under present circumstances would be a very dangerous one. He feared they would not be able to induce the War Office at St. Petersburg to exchange returns on this subject, and therefore to grant a return of this kind would be to introduce a precedent which might be very inconvenient. At the same time he did not deny the facts of the case as stated by the hon. Gentleman, who, in his vigilance with regard to economy, had very properly looked into this matter.
LORD SEYMOURsaid, he hoped the hon. Member for Lambeth would not press the Motion after the statement of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary at War. At the same time he must call to the recollection of his right hon. Friend what had passed before the Committee on the Army Estimates on this very subject. This question was brought under the consideration of the Committee, and the statement made to the Committee by the army authorities was, "Undoubtedly there are too many officers in the cavalry regiments now. but whenever war breaks out we shall fill up the number of men, and then there will not be too many officers." When, however, we came, as now, to a time of war, we found the cavalry regiments sent abroad without the additional number of men, and then his right hon. Friend said, "Yes, it is quite true there are too many officers, but there are also too few men." So the House was met in either case. The Committee to which he alluded were certainly led to believe that, in case of war, men would have been contributed from the regiments at home so as to fill up and complete the regiments going abroad, instead of sending them out in these insufficient numbers. The Committee had been given to understand that this could be easily done upon an emergency, and he should like to be informed now what was the obstacle which had apparently rendered this course impracticable.
§ MR. SIDNEY HERBERTsaid, that the course which the Government adopted had been the very one which the noble Lord himself suggested. The House must remember, however, that though you might take men from other regiments, leaving them in a low state, you could not altogether destroy those regiments. In the present instance the cavalry regiments which remained in this country had contributed men to those sent abroad, which had al- 1138 ready been considerably strengthened in that way.
COLONEL DUNNEsaid, he considered that the return, if granted, would be a very mischievous one. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. W. Williams) had better move for a return of our whole force and send it to St. Petersburg. He thought the mere transfer of men to one cavalry regiment from the other would not meet what was wanted in the case. The fact was, that a false spirit of economy had prevailed with regard to our cavalry force.
§ MR. W. WILLIAMSsaid, he would adopt the recommendation of the noble Lord (Lord Seymour) not to press this Motion, because the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary at War had admitted everything he had said. As to what had been said by the hon. and gallant Member (Colonel Dunne), the fact was that the military authorities at St. Petersburg knew a great deal more about the state of our Army than the hon. and gallant Member probably did. There was, perhaps, not a secret worth knowing in the office of the Secretary at War but was known at St. Petersburg.
§ Motion put, and negatived.