§ SIR HENRY STRACEY, in rising to bring forward a Resolution in favour of Sailors' Homes, said, he felt he owed an apology to the naval Members of the House for taking up this question. But he represented a large maritime constituency, and it appeared to him doubtful whether any naval Member was likely to take up the subject, while it was a question on which he had himself taken strong convictions, as not only tending to the benefit of the sailor but also to the manning of the navy. It had now been satisfactorily proved that sailors' homes had improved the physical and the moral condition of the sailors, and consequently had rendered them more fit for their duty, and it was his wish to show that in manning the navy they afforded material aid. The House might recollect that last year he moved for a Return of all the sailors' homes in the country, with a view to ascertain their constitution and how they were supported. By the Return he found that there were thirty-one homes in all, and that five or six of them received a portion of the grant of £1,600 annually made by that House; but these were all, as the terms of the grant required, in the neighbourhood of the dockyards. He thought that the founders of these sailors' homes had every reason to be proud of the success which had attended their experiment. They were under different systems of management; though all of them had the common character of asylums for seamen, but some of them were also refuges for shipwrecked mariners. Some added infirmaries to their other institutions; some had schools for navigation; most of them had shipping offices, and some had attached to them the excellent and useful feature of a savings bank. Out of the whole Returns which he held in his hand, he would select two or three, which would sufficiently explain their varying constitution, and he hoped the House would receive them non numero sed pondere. The first of the sailors' homes was established in Well Street, in this Metropolis, in 1830, and in 1835 it was opened for the reception of 300 boarders. That home owed its establishment to a very benevolent and energetic officer, Commander Elliott, who de-voted the greater part of his life to this 326 object. He believed the idea first suggested itself to Captain Elliott and Captain Gambier, on their discovering knots of sailors one night standing at the corners of the streets in a state of the most abject wretchedness, and that, too, only a short time after having been paid off from ships in the navy, while they had either spent their money in dissipation or been robbed. Soon after the establishment of these homes the greatest improvement was observable in the boarders. They were not only cleanly and orderly in their appearance, but a new phase was developed in their character by the establishment of a savings bank—the phase of thrift. As a proof he might mention that in 1842 there had been paid into the savings bank in that home the sum of £23,261, a sum which had increased as confidence increased until it amounted last year to £69,104. That, he thought, was a strong proof of the efficacy of these savings banks. But there was another point in the sailor's character equally developed, and that was generosity. For that character, indeed, sailors had always been remarkable, but it was only since the establishment of savings banks it had taken the form of remitting money to their friends. In the year 1842 the sum of £3,029 had been remitted from the home in question, while last year the amount remitted was £30,000, and in some years it had been still higher. He might next be permitted to refer to the sailors' home at Great Yarmouth. That home was established by Mr. Harcourt, a gentleman who had formerly held a seat in that House, and which constituency was now so honourably represented by the right hon. Gentleman the leader of the party of which he was a humble Member. He had on other subjects shown his zeal and ability; he had established a code of signals by which 4,000 vessels were reported; and he was also in the habit of transmitting information to Admiral Fitzroy, at the Admiralty, as to the weather. The sailors' home he established differed from others in its character in this respect, that it was a refuge for shipwrecked mariners. Those who knew Yarmouth, and the dangerous sands which lay in front of the coast, would readily agree that there was no place in the kingdom where such a refuge was more necessary. It had been ascertained from Parliamentary Returns that one half of all the shipwrecks taking place on the coast of England, occurred on the Eastern coast. Last year 71 vessels were 327 wrecked at Yarmouth, and the crews of those vessels, to the number of 706, were received there. As many as 41 had been received in one day, and in the course of two years, no fewer than 37,320 persons had in different ways availed themselves of the advantages it presented. He would next refer to the sailors' home at Falmouth, which had an infirmary attached to it. The home had received 700 sailors, and the infirmary had received 130 sick, and 136 shipwrecked sailors, and the Report complained that they were much in want of a permanent nurse, but had not the means to provide one. Now, it appeared that there were on the average from 10 to 20 sick persons always in the infirmary, many totally helpless, among whom one nurse could not be sufficient, and yet even one nurse could not be obtained. He would not further allude to sailors' homes, but he might mention that sailors' homes, and the sailor himself, had one terrible enemy to contend with, and that was the crimp, whose great object was to obtain in some way or other the means which the sailor possessed. No sooner was a ship paid off than the hand of the crimp was felt on the sailor's shoulders. He appeared in the most enticing form; his countenance beaming with hospitality, with a bottle of drugged spirits under one arm, and generally a female accomplice on the other, and it was no wonder that the sailor, fresh from the sea, full of health and flush of money, should fall, not only a willing but an easy victim. Although the sailor was gallant and enduring at sea he was soft and yielding on land, and the great object of homes was to save him from temptation ashore. No sooner did he yield to temptation than he was at once taken to a crimping house, and there drugged and plundered. The great object of sailors' homes was to save the sailor from the temptations to which he was exposed. Captain Hall, so well known from his connection with the Nemesis, who had established more homes than perhaps any other man, had graphically described the crimping houses, and he had done so from personal observation; and he had shown that in them were enacted scenes of debauchery and drunkenness fearful to contemplate. After describing a visit of his to the sailors' home in Well Street, he mentioned that on the evening of the same day he took a walk in the direction of Ratcliffe Highway, Shadwell. There he found groups of half-intoxicated women and drunken men.
328 Accompanied by a policeman he entered several of the long rooms of the crimping houses, which were removed from the street. The attempt to describe the scenes he there witnessed, he said, would be as difficult as it would be painful. Sailors, blind with drink, were accompanied by women who induced them to part with everything they possessed. Could they not find some remedy for that state of things? He believed they could, and that the best remedy was the establishment of sailors' homes. It was a gratifying fact that where homes existed crimping houses were on the decline. No doubt the sailor suffered most on shore, but a great deal might be done for him before he landed. It was the opinion of experienced captains that, if the commanding officer of any vessel approaching the shore were liable to be heavily fined for allowing unauthorized persons to come on board his ship, in all probability the crimp would be prevented from exercising his noxious influence over sailors before they landed. But he was anxious to prove that homes, besides affording a comfortable and safe refuge for seamen, were of considerable importance in the manning of the navy. Since the establishment of the Naval Reserve in January, 1860, the Home in Well Street alone had supplied no fewer than 458 volunteers, and since January last 111. During the Russian war an office was opened in the Home, at which officers of the navy attended, and where many seamen were enrolled. The same thing took place in other Homes. Upon one occasion the hon. Baronet the Member for Portsmouth (Sir James Elphin-stone), having received orders to sail on a certain day, and having already obtained his full complement of men, found to his surprise that a large proportion of his crew had fallen into the hands of the crimps. While considering how he should fill up the vacant places he received a communication from the crimps to the effect that he should have all his men back again for £5 a piece. The hon. Baronet, of course, indiguantly spurned the offer; he went to the Home, and there he found not only a sufficient number of men, but men so good that he sailed with them for a considerable time after. It appeared from a recent report that the Dover Home especially had proved highly serviceable in the manning of the navy. That fact was known and acknowledged at the Admiralty, for "their Lordships," to quote the lan- 329 guage of a public document, "recognize the value and importance of these admirable institutions, and are sensible of the assistance rendered by many, and the Dover Home in particular, in manning the navy." All would agree that large bounties and indiscriminate recruiting could not produce an adequate supply of good seamen. There was a great difference between a sailor and a seaman, but there were times when sailors were most acceptable, and when we were only too anxious to have them and to make seamen of them. Those were the times when war stared us in the face, and at the present moment he would be a bold man who would guarantee the continuance of peace even for six months. The want of good seamen was urgent as well as great; but to acquire the services of good seamen they must gain their confidence and good will, and that could be done chiefly, if not only, by encouraging and supporting the Homes which sailors prized so much. The noble Lord the Secretary to the Admiralty, on a former occasion, said the sailors were a suspicious class. They were, however, clearly not suspicious of sailors' homes; for it was a remarkable fact that there was hardly an instance in which a sailor who had once enjoyed the comforts of a Home did not return to it when on shore. The Homes, indeed, were liked so well that it was sometimes impossible to take in all the men who applied for admission. It was no uncommon thing now for men to join their ships from these homes with £10, £15, or even £20 in their pockets, whereas formerly they did so in a state of almost beggary. To show the moral improvement of which these institutions had been the instruments he might mention that at the Tyne Sailors' Homo there had been actually sold no less than 1,653 Bibles and Testaments, and 55 Prayerbooks. Perhaps he might be told that the ultimate object of his Motion was money, and he was glad to observe that the right hon. Gentleman, the President of the Board of Trade, did not wince when money was mentioned. But, although the wording of his Motion did not bear on money, there was plenty of money available; and, although there was only a small amount required, it would do an infinity of good. There was such a fund as the Merchant Seaman's Fund, with a balance remaining unclaimed of £60,662 18s. 5d. in the hands of the Paymaster General. That fund was made up to a certain degree by the voluntary contributions of masters 330 and seamen; the amount of such voluntary contributions being £3,306 1s.6d. If a small proportion only of that amount—or say one half—were distributed among the twenty-five or twenty-six sailors' homes now in existence, some of which were in extremely destitute circumstances, and were anticipating actual dissolution—if a few drops only from this great river of wealth were scattered amongst them it would ensure not only the vigour but the actual life of these institutions. It was impossible that such institutions could be self-supporting, when they gave men their subsistence at prime cost, besides lodging, firing, in many instances clothing and washing, with the benefit of reading rooms. The North Shields Sailors' Home was said to be self-supporting, but what were the facts? The Duke of Northumberland had built and furnished the institution at his own expense, and the £3,000 intended for the building had been invested and was yielding handsome interest, of which the home got the benefit, together with a considerable amount of annual subscriptions. It could not, therefore, be fairly considered self-supporting. The noble Lord, the Prime Minister, had recently become president of a kindred institution at Southampton; and, having acknowledged the advantages of sailors' homes out of the House, it was to be hoped he would not refuse his testimony in their favour in the House, if a Vote should be required in their favour; and, therefore, he was sorry not to see the noble Lord in his place that evening. He had seen the Chancellor of the Exchequer a short time since. The right hon. Gentleman had said there was a favourable time and moment for everything. He (Sir Henry Stracey) thought the present was a favourable opportunity for dealing with this subject. He thought he might venture to assert that sailors' homes bad conferred a national benefit on the country. No florid speech on his part was necessary on behalf of the merits of the sailor. They had conferred great national benefits on the country, which Parliament ought not to be slow to recognize. But for them what would have been the state of our colonies? Without our sailors we never could have reached our present commercial prosperity. What was our naval supremacy—what the safety and security of our Channel and our shores without them? He did not, then, ask too much of the House when he called upon them to acknowledge that sailors' 331 homes, which had so entirely won the confidence of seamen, were worthy of the favourable consideration of Parliament.
§ ADMIRAL WALCOTTobserved, at a time when every benevolent purpose meets a ready response from the nation, it would not be necessary he should hope to recommend at any length the claims of naval homes upon the generosity and consideration of the House. The easy thoughtless habits of the common sailors were attributable to the sudden revulsion from the salutary discipline of a man-of-war and its restraints to the independence, free liberty, and licence of shore. He is in a moment transplanted from a position where every necessary, home, food, and clothing, is provided for him, to scenes of temptation where the most reckless, designing, and abandoned persons prey upon his ignorance. To save him from these dangers naval homes have been established. The Admiralty gave support to those at Portsmouth and Devonport, but all the other sailors' homes were maintained by voluntary contributions, and happily with signal success; and he might be permitted to do justice to a meritorious officer, Captain W. B. Hall, of the Royal Navy, he having devoted much valuable time as well as unceasing exertions in the good cause, and had spared neither his money nor his influence in bringing these institutions into notice and support. The seaman gladly availed himself of the comfort and security afforded him in those institutions, and deposited his money in them. At the Portsmouth sailors' homes during the last three years the number of boarders (at a small daily cost in contribution upon their part) was £1,703. The sum of money taken care of was £7,859, the amount placed in the savings banks £772, and the sum remitted to the seamen's families £248. These institutions were not only useful to the sailor in good diet, healthy and well-ventilated rooms, but other consequences too obvious to require any comment from him which conspired to promote the value of the sailor to the service and the country in connection with the manning of the navy. Sailors, he could assure the House, fully appreciated kindness and consideration; they were peculiarly open to generous influences, and never forgot any act of kindness that was done them. A remarkable instance of that occurred not long ago, when having lost a stanch friend and advocate in that House by the death of the lamented Sir Charles Napier, the sea- 332 men of the navy immediately came forward of their own accord with the offer of one day's pay to raise a memorial in testimony of their gratitude to that gallant Admiral. He trusted that the Government would not refuse its support to other sailors' homes as well as those at Portsmouth and Devonport; and sure he was that if the country was, unhappily, ever again involved in any danger, its seamen would make it a return of more than a hundredfold for any consideration that might now be shown them.
§ MR. MILNER GIBSON—Sir, the House will, I think, have concurred in a great measure in the speech of the hon. Baronet who has moved this Resolution. They will have agreed with him in the description which he has given of these sailors' homes to which he has alluded, and also I am certain that he will receive the general assent of the House in the praise he has given to those philanthropic individuals who by their voluntary contributions have established sailors' homes in many parts of this country. I entirely agree for myself in the remarks of the hon. Baronet; but I am afraid that, although the House may be willing to concur in the praise he has given to sailors' homes, and those who have supported them by their subscriptions, they will hesitate before they pledge themselves by this Resolution to subsidise those institutions generally throughout the country. And although the hon. Baronet has indicated not very clearly where the funds are out of which sailors' homes may be established and maintained, I am afraid, if he wishes to obtain money for that purpose through the instrumentality of this House, it must come out of the Consolidated Fund. The practical question, therefore, before us is whether we are to pledge ourselves by a Resolution to give an annual subsidy, under some sort of regulation to sailors' homes. I confess for myself—and others will agree with me—that it would be more satisfactory that institutions of this kind should be either self-supporting or supported by voluntary contribution, and placed under local and independent management, rather than that they should be maintained by Government aid and subjected to Government inspection. Therefore, I cannot concur, and I think the House will not concur, in this Resolution. There was one passage in the speech of the hon. and gallant Gentleman who seconded the Motion, if I understood him correctly, from which I must dissent.
333 I do not think the whole sailor class are so reckless as he represented.
§ ADMIRAL WALCOTTrose to explain. What he had said was that the reckless habits of the sailor were mainly attributable to his being suddenly thrown upon the free liberty and independence of a life on shore. He denied having described all sailors as reckless.
§ MR. MILNER GIBSONI believe that sailors are as capable of taking care of their own interests as any other class of labourers. More than that, I think that no class of labourers in this country have so weak a claim to general charity, for the simple reason that no class are better paid, or if they please, may be so constantly employed. I therefore think that there is no need that the State should find board and lodging, for it comes to board and lodging, for the whole class of sailors. With regard to shipwrecked mariners—I allude to those who may be thrown upon our shores, in a condition to require relief—I think the relief very properly afforded under such calamitous circumstances is supplied, and will continue to be supplied, from the voluntary subscriptions of the public, who were always ready to support such philanthropic objects. The grant of subsidies from the State will only deaden the zeal of private benevolence. It may be said we have already broken in upon the principle 1 am advocating by making grants to certain sailors' homes. But it should be observed that the grants now given to a few institutions of that kind existing in our naval ports are not given as general charity to sailors, but as contributions from the State, as a large employer of sailors and specially interested in their welfare, just in the same way as Mr. Green, of Blackwall, having a great many seamen in his service, has established a sailors' home, and thrown it open to all others besides his own men. The institutions which the Government thus assist are in immediate contiguity to their own dockyards. Since the hon. Baronet gave notice of his Motion I have caused inquiry to be made in the various ports of this country as to the means the sailor has of obtaining board and lodging in common with other independent labourers. I am informed that, although to some extent sailors are open to the seductions of profligate characters to whom the hon. Baronet alluded, and although there are disreputable houses in London, and in the other chief ports, there are many 334 respectable lodging houses where sailors can find all the necessaries and comforts; they may require. I do not of course include those shipwrecked sailors who may be thrown ashore without any means of providing themselves with board and lodging, I must ask the House not to pledge themselves by this Resolution to a general system of subsidising of sailors' homes, but; at the same time I am anxious to express my approbation of those institutions and my gratitude to the benevolent individuals who have established them in various parts of the country.
MR. HENLEYsaid, he entirely agreed with the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade that no surer mode could be adopted of destroying these sailors homes than to make them dependent in any considerable degree or, indeed, in any degree whatever on Government grants. He believed that under such a system they would in a very few years be completely knocked up. But he could not agree in the statement of the right hon. Gentleman that sailors were the best paid class of labourers in the country. On the contrary he was prepared to maintain that the merchant seamen were worse paid than any class of skilled labourers that could be named.
§ MR. MILNER GIBSONsaid, he had only meant to state that seamen were well-paid labourers.
MR. HENLEYsaid, he could not admit that they were even well paid. He believed that they were worse paid than any other skilled labourer who had to serve an apprenticeship to learn his business. Every sailor had to serve a long apprenticeship, during which he had to undergo greater hardships and incur more dangers than attended most other pursuits. If the earnings of seamen were compared with those of other skilled labourers, it would be found that the sailor was the worst off. Then, again, few seamen could go to sea before the mast after forty-five. A few old sailors might become cooks, but as a rule after forty-five seamen became unfit for the more active duties of a seafaring life. But a carpenter or a bricklayer could go on working at his trade until sixty or sixty-five, and obtain the same wages as at first. It was only the hope of becoming a mate or master of a vessel that induced lads to enter the merchant service, and without the stimulus of that hope few boys would be tempted to seek a hard life with indifferent wages. He wished to take that 335 opportunity of stating that he believed a great deal of the good which had been ascribed to sailors' homes was to be attributed to the shipping offices. He had only to add that he hoped the House would not pledge itself to make any grant to those establishments.
MR. LINDSAYsaid, he did not think the comparison between the mechanic and the sailor was so much to the disadvantage of the latter as the right hon. Gentleman had stated it to be. Seamen were usually constantly employed, and in the navy the wages were from £2 10s. to £2 12s. 6d. a month, with a provision in old age and in sickness. Mechanics, upon an average, earned 25s. a week, and were not constantly employed. In the merchant service a sailor got £2 15s. a month, or about 12s. 6d. a week, out of which he had to find his clothes. But the mechanic had to find house, fuel, food, and other necessaries, which were provided for the sailor without charge. The sailors' home was his ship, and his food was found for him. Though a seaman's life certainly was a hard life, it had its advantages and enjoyments, which were attractive to a great many of the rising generation, and he hoped would continue to be so. He believed that if the sailors' homes were subsidized, instead of doing any good it would do harm to the cause it was meant to advance. Those who now subscribed would think that they were released from the necessity of doing so when the matter had been taken up by Government. He hoped the hon. Baronet would not press the matter to a division, and for this reason. It would then go forth that the homes had refused a vote of approval of the sailors' homes. Now the feeling of the House was that the homes had done and continued to do a great deal of good; and it was not that there was any objection to the words of the Motion, but that it would be injudicious to pledge themselves to a subsidy. He hoped the hon. Baronet would be satisfied with the discussion, which was likely to do a great deal of good by calling attention to the excellence of these institutions, and which, therefore, would promote the objects in view, and that he would not press the Motion to a division, which would really injure the cause he had at heart.
§ MR. KINNAIRDsaid, he also hoped the hon. Baronet would not divide the House on his Motion, as it was the first time the subject had come before the 336 House. He believed the value of the sailors' homes was immense, and had not been at all exaggerated. But it would rather be retarding the object now to excite expectations which, in the present state of the finances, could not be realised, and which might induce persons to withdraw the support they now gave.
CAPTAIN JERVISsaid, that the comparison which had been drawn between the wages of artisans and those of sailors was not very accurate. The wages of artisans in large towns averaged 36s. a week, and first-class men even got as much as £2 10s., and those wages were spent under his immediate control, he himself living with his family; but in the case of sailors it was very different. Their wages were not nearly so large, and they had not the same opportunity of sharing their earnings with their families. In his opinion the question was entirely one for the Admiralty, and not one in which the Board of Trade were interested. The Board of Admiralty knew perfectly well that they could not get the Naval Reserve and Naval Volunteers to come forward readily, and simply for this reason—that the men had no feeling whatever in common with the Admiralty. All they knew of the Admiralty was in connection with line of battle ships' drill and flogging. He did not want the Government to subsidize the institutions. All he wanted was that some common feeling of fellowship should be created between the Admiralty and our commercial marine. Unless they held out the hand of good fellowship to the seamen by encouraging such institutions as these, something in the same way as they did in the dockyards, they could not expect the seafaring part of our population to show any great amount of enthusiasm in coming forward to join the service. It is true that when actually entered on board they did their duty manfully, and if asked to fight were always ready to do so, but still there was very little feeling in favour of the Royal Navy on the part of the commercial marine. He should be glad to hear a few words on the subject from the noble Lord the Secretary of the Admiralty, who had always shown a disposition to do what he could to promote the welfare of our sailors.
§ LORD CLARENCE PAGETsaid, the gallant Officer who had just sat down had stated that the question had more reference to the Admiralty than to the Board of Trade. That might be true to the extent that the Admiralty made certain allow- 337 ances to the sailors' homes at Portsmouth, Devonport, Cork, and Dover. But if the gallant Officer imagined that the Admiralty subscribed to them as a matter of charity he was very much mistaken. The fact was, when the sailors of the Royal Navy were on shore at these places they made use of the homes, and the grants made by the Admiralty was a return for the services rendered to the sailors of the Royal fleet. The gallant Officer had also said that it would make the Admiralty more popular if they were to assist sailors' homes throughout the country.
§ LORD CLARENCE PAGETsaid, that would be tantamount to building them everywhere, as there were Naval Reserves and Volunteers all round the coast. With regard to the reserve he was glad to inform the House that there was no doubt that by the end of this year there would be a good body of Naval Reserve men. All he (Lord Clarence Paget) could say was that he looked with great sympathy on the sailors' homes throughout the country; but he entirely concurred with the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Henley), that it would be a disadvantage to sailors' homes to subsidize them. The result of such a course would be to alienate from the homes much of the charity of individuals, and he thought it much better for seamen that they should know that the homes provided for them were maintained by individual benevolence rather than by the nation at large.
§ SIR HENRY STRACEY, in reply, said, that he could not understand the argument that Government help would be disadvantageous to these institutions. The noble Lord knew that there were £1,600 voted by the Admiralty for Sailors' Homes at Portsmouth, Plymouth, and elsewhere, but the directors of these homes would be very much surprised to hear that they were in consequence subsidized. He (Sir Henry Stracey) never mentioned the word subsidized; he only asked the House to acknowledge that the sailors' homes were worthy of encouragement and support. There was no parallel between the cases of the labourer and the sailor, who was subject to night as well as day work, and to every kind of trial of the constitution, from which the labourer was free. The labourer was generally in a healthy condition, but the sailor's health was so severely tried that the average life was forty years.
338 He thought the subject had now been sufficiently ventilated. The feeling in the House had certainly shown that sailors' homes were worthy of encouragement, and he would not press the Motion to a division, but would take an opportunity on a future occasion of bringing it forward in some other shape.
§
Motion made, and Question,
That, in the opinion of this House, the establishment of Sailors' Homes has been so conducive to the benefit of Seamen, and, consequently, of so great National importance, as to be deserving of the support and encouragement of the Legislature.
§ Put, and negatived.