§ ADMIRAL WALCOTTobserved that as he saw the right hon. Baronet the First Lord of the Admiralty in his place, he desired to call his attention to an omission in the programme for the spectacle of to-morrow; he meant the absence of any adequate representation of the navy. No feeling of envy existed between the navy and the army, but the same courage, zeal, heroism, and true contempt of danger had been exhibited by the blue jackets as by the soldiers, and for the first time the seamen would feel regret at being debarred from co-operation with his brethren in the red jackets on the occasion of the interesting ceremony to which he alluded, and this feeling would be, he was convinced, shared in and reciprocated by the army. There had never been less dissimilarity in the nature and character of operations of the sister services than had occurred in the Crimean war. What were the arrangements proposed for representing the navy? Fifty pensioners had, it was true, been ordered up from Greenwich, but they had not shared in the dangers and glories of the late war. He had been told that this afternoon an order had been sent to Portsmouth for 100 seamen to come up, but they were not the recognised parties who ought to appear in the Park, taken promiscuously from men not in the aggregate employed in the Crimean war. Thank Heaven, the jolly marines would be there. Eight hundred of them were coming up from Woolwich and Chatham. But he was now speaking of the seamen and naval officers who so highly distinguished themselves both afloat and in the trenches before Sebastopol. He did not charge the authorities with anything but oversight on the occasion, but it was an omission of a grave nature which had inflicted great pain on the members of his profession, and one which he trusted would never be permitted to occur again. If 100 seamen could not have been obtained, it was with case that fifty might have been collected, but if there was any difficulty in the case he would undertake to bring forward 100 officers as the representatives of the navy.
§ SIR CHARLES WOODsaid, there would be on the ground to-morrow the representatives of the navy, past, present, and future—namely, a body of Greenwich pensioners, another body of men who served in the Baltic and in the Black Sea during the late war, and a large number of incipient sailors from the Greenwich school. It was not an easy thing to collect together to take part in the ceremony sailors who had served in the Russian war, many of whom were now paid off, or were dispersed in other parts of the world. There would be present, however, the men he had referred to, in addition to a large body of marines, and those seamen and marines who were to receive decorations.
§ SIR CHARLES NAPIERsaid, there was to be some sort of springling of sailors at the ceremony to-morrow; but he wished to know how many? The Greenwich pensioners would hardly be able to walk, and would want carriages to take them to the Park. Surely, without even sending so far off as Plymouth, 400 or 500 men who had served in the late war might have been found at Portsmouth, Chatham, and Sheerness, wherewith to make a show on the field. He would take that opportunity of asking the right hon. Baronet whether the gratuity for good conduct usually granted to petty officers on being paid off had been discontinued.
§ SIR CHARLES WOODsaid, that some years ago a regulation was adopted which gave the seaman additional pay with a good-conduct badge. That boon was not extended to the petty officers, but, in lieu of it, that which was considered at the time a much smaller boon—namely, a gratuity on their discharge—was given. The whole subject had lately been reconsidered, and in the navy seamen who were promoted to the rank of petty officers, as well as privates who in the army were made non-commissioned officers, were allowed now to carry with them into the higher rank the additional pay consequent on their good conduct. This larger boon having been extended to the petty officers, the gratuity formerly granted to them on being paid off had been necessarily discontinued.
GENERAL CODRINGTONregretted that arrangements had not been made for a rather more complete representation of both the services at the distribution. Probably, on no former occasion had the two services of the navy and army been more identified than at the siege of Sebastopol. 371 There wore between 2,000 and 3,000 seamen who had worked the guns on the shore batteries, and who had been exposed to all the dangers and hardships that the army had experienced, and perhaps even in a greater degree. Their services had been continued throughout the whole of the siege; and there was therefore a more thorough identification of the army and navy upon that occasion than had ever taken place before; and he was sure if there were to be a large preponderance of the army present at the distribution that they would all feel the greatest disappointment at not being accompanied by as many as possible of the sister service. So much for the navy; but he regretted also that several regiments were to be absent which might very easily have been brought up either wholly or in detachments, and which would have added distinction to the proceedings. He knew, for example, that there was one battalion at Alder hot which had lost eight officers at Inkerman. The 88th was at Aldershot yesterday; the 19th was there; the 97th, which headed the storming party at the Redan, was there, and the 3rd battalion of Grenadier Guards, which served throughout the whole campaign, was at Windsor. He thought that these regiments, or, at all events, the medal and clasp men, might have been brought up to share in that magnificent spectacle, which would probably never be repeated in this country. The House, perhaps, might not be aware that by the terms of the Victoria Warrant the Commander in Chief on the spot in future would give the cross on the field where it was won, and consequently it could rarely if ever be given personally by the Sovereign again. This, therefore, was a most peculiar occasion, and if it could possibly have been managed, he should have been very anxious that all the regiments not too far removed from London should have participated in the brilliant spectacle.
ADMIRAL DUNCOMBEexpressed his gratification at the remarks of the gallant General who had just sat down, and his regret that the arrangements on behalf of the navy were so mean.
§ COLONEL FRENCHsaid, he was glad the hon. and gallant Member had taken up the subject. Her Majesty's Government were without excuse, for the hon. and gallant officer had pointed out that the regiments near town could readily have been brought up: he understood that it was proposed to bring up the 79th Highlanders from Shorncliffe 372 to be present—the regiment in which the present Minister for War had served—for, although the noble Lord had not much experience as a soldier, he had, he believed, been a captain in the 79th. The casualties of that regiment in the Crimea, however, had been very small. Of course the gallantry of that regiment was too well known for him to say anything, for a moment, depreciatory of its high character; but it so happened that in the Crimea only one officer and eight rank and file belonging to it had been killed, and two officers, seven sergeants, and fifty-two rank and file wounded; while the 88th Connaught Rangers, which was not to be present at the distribution, had had killed in action six officers, seven sergeants, and sixty-two rank and file; and eighteen officers, twenty-seven sergeants, two drummers, and 332 rank and file severely wounded. That regiment had been suddenly ordered to Portsmouth, but there was no necessity for such a sudden removal of the 88th, and they might very easily, and at a small expense, have been brought to London. As for the 79th, he saw no reason why they should be present at the distribution, unless it were that the attractive nature of their dress entitled them to a prominent place in the spectacle. He thought that this was a piece of favouritism which the House ought to discountenance.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEsaid, it appeared to him that, whenever these great national reviews took place, they seemed to create more jealousy and dissatisfaction than if they were not to occur at all. The naval review of last year gave very little satisfaction, he believed, to the Members of the House of Commons; but he thought that the hon. and gallant Admiral opposite (Admiral Walcott) had been a little hard upon the Admiralty with regard to their arrangements. Having any great body of sailors present at a review would be, in his opinion, as much out of place as an Admiral on horseback, or a body of infantry at a naval review. How were they to manage a large body of sailors there? [Admiral WALCOTT: I did not ask for a large body.] The thing was impossible. One hundred men had been ordered up to represent the navy, and the gallant Admiral must know the serious inconvenience to the fleet of having a large body of sailors in Hyde Park, independently of the difficulty of providing for them in a city like London. The hon. and gallant Member opposite 373 (Colonel French), who was a very old militia officer, but a very young soldier, had drawn the attention of the House to what he called a piece of favouritism shown to the 79th regiment. He was astonished to hear the hon. Gentleman allude to that, for he knew that the 79th had been under orders for some time to proceed to Dublin, and it was owing to their being on their way there, and not on account of their dress—a reason which no one but a militia officer would have dreamt of—that they would be present at the display. The Quartermaster General had had the distribution of the tickets—the Admiralty had been subsidiary to the Horse Guards on this occasion, and he believed that the arrangements would be admirably carried out. The Admiralty would be efficiently represented. The gallant Admiral, the Member for Southwark (Sir C. Napier), would be there on horseback; the Marines would be present, and a fine body of Greenwich pensioners would attend, to represent the past services of that gallant body of which the hon. and gallant Admiral the Member for Christchurch was so distinguished a representative. He thought, therefore, that there was no occasion for the jealousy and irritation of feeling which some hon. Gentlemen had thought proper to exhibit.
§ MR. HENLEYsaid, that the speech of the hon. Member who had just sat down was certainly not calculated to allay any irritation of feeling that might by possibility have been felt by any one upon this subject. Many hon. and gallant Members did, he knew, feel somewhat sore upon it, but he thought that their objections had been very judiciously met by those who had preceded the hon. Member. When, however, the hon. Member gave, as a reason for not bringing up a few sailors, that there would be a difficulty in providing for them in this metropolis with 2,500,000 inhabitants, it appeared to him to be one of the most extraordinary reasons he had ever heard, and it certainly was an admission of administrative incapacity for which he was not prepared. He was, however, glad to hear such a commendation of the Horse Guards from the hon. Gentleman, who, only a few months ago proposed, if he remembered right, to turn the ornamental water from St. James's Park right through that establishment. He could not see what difficulty there could be in placing these gallant men side by side with the troops in Hyde Park. They did land service 374 in the Crimea; and, according to the testimony of the gallant General, performed their part gloriously in the struggle.
§ Question again proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."