HL Deb 03 May 1872 vol 211 cc173-80
THE EARL OF LAUDERDALE

said, he was about to put a Question which was one of considerable importance to naval officers and had direct reference to the efficiency of the Navy generally. It was, whether in the Navy they were to have a high-class scientific and philosophical education at the expense of personal experience? Now, he had a great idea of the importance of imparting a high-class and scientific education to our naval officers; but he did not hesitate to say that if it could only be given at the expense of a practical knowledge of seamanship he would have nothing to do with it. High-class education of that kind never yet made an officer or a sailor; nor would it ever prevent a ship from going on shore. It was commonly said that the status of education among naval officers was low; but he begged to dispute that assertion. They came into the Navy very young, and from his experience as Superintendent of the College of Portsmouth for five years he could say that not more than one boy out of eight who came into the Navy from the large schools could pass in the common examinations of reading, writing, and arithmetic if they went up direct. None of them could pass without a "cram." But it frequently occurred in the case of young men who had served in the Navy for a few years and then left it, that they were next heard of as taking high honours at the University. He did not know how that was done; but he thought it, too, must be done by cramming. He had never known an instance of a high-class University man becoming a naval officer; but he had known many instances of young men who, after having entered the Navy, took high-class honours at the University and attained to the most exalted positions in the Church and the State, and even becoming Members of their Lordships' House. He might point to his noble and learned Friend on the front bench as an example.

LORD CHELMSFORD

I am sure my noble and gallant Friend will forgive me for interrupting him to say that I went into the Navy before examinations were instituted. I underwent no examination.

THE EARL OF LAUDERDALE

However that might be, his noble and learned Friend was an example of a man who had attained a high position in the State after having been in the Navy. The Naval College at Portsmouth was an extremely useful institution if it was desirable that naval officers should have an opportunity of keeping up and improving their professional knowledge. The Government, it was understood, were about to remove the College for the education of Naval Officers from Portsmouth, where it had been established for very many years, and which might be called the very centre of the Navy, to Greenwich, which was now totally unconnected with the Navy; and he wanted very much to know the reasons which had induced the Government to form that determination. One of those reasons was said to be that at Portsmouth there was no school of naval architecture; but there had been, although it had been removed. In Portsmouth could be seen everything connected with the Navy; they might see the drawings of ships as sent down from the Admiralty—ships in mould—the first plate of their bottom laid—ships launched, rigged, manned, armed, and made ready for sea. Instruction could be got in gunnery; he could witness the manœuvring of ships, taking them in and out of harbour in bad weather; he might see a squadron getting under weigh, and taking up position; he might observe the foreign men-of-war that visited the port—in short, he might obtain practical insight into every point that a naval officer ought to be acquainted with. At Greenwich all these opportunities would be taken away. It was, as he had said, totally unconnected with the Navy. There had been dockyards there—one on either side—but the Government had sold them, one of them being converted into an immense slaughterhouse for foreign cattle. He thought the removal of the College from Portsmouth to Greenwich would be highly detrimental to the efficiency of naval officers. He therefore wished to ask the noble Earl opposite (the Earl of Camperdown), Upon what grounds the Government have or intend to remove the College for the instruction of naval officers from Portsmouth (where they have every opportunity of improving and keeping up their professional knowledge) to Greenwich, where they will be entirely separated from the Navy?

THE DUKE OF SOMERSET

said, he wished to put another Question in connection with the same subject, so that the noble Earl (the Earl of Camperdown) might answer both at the same time. There were three systems of education in the Navy which, so far as he understood, were now to be interfered with. One was for the education of the naval cadets. He believed that was to be materially altered. That system of education was carried on at Dartmouth, and it would be very undesirable to bring it into a large town such as either Greenwich or Portsmouth. Young lads should not be exposed to contamination in large towns; they had, therefore, been placed in a port where their education was going on with much satisfaction; but that, it appeared, was to be altered. Greenwich was so close to London as to be almost part of it. The next Question was, what was to be done with the School of Naval Architecture which had been established at Kensington—the object of which was to admit shipwrights from the dockyards, and to enable young men to be instructed for the general shipbuilding service of the country. When removed to Greenwich would it be open to the private trade as well as to the Royal Navy? The third Question had reference to the officers who were at present studying at Portsmouth. They had now the great advantage not only of studying under scientific professors, but of seeing the practical application of their studies in the dockyard. He did not mean to say that the removal of the College to Greenwich might not be justified on some grounds; but he wanted to know the scheme of Her Majesty's Government with regard to these three departments of naval education.

LORD DUNSANY

said, he was not surprised that the Government, finding themselves in possession of a large unoccupied palace, conceived the idea of applying it to naval purposes, and determined to establish a Naval College. But if it were a mere question of economy, he very much doubted whether it would not, after all, be less expensive to enlarge the present building in Portsmouth Dockyard than to adapt Greenwich Hospital to the purposes of a Naval College. Greenwich was too near London to be a suitable place for the College. True it was also near the Admiralty; but that was, perhaps, the greatest of all objections to it. The Admiralty was fast becoming a Department of the House of Commons, and he could not imagine a greater misfortune for the country than that it should have a House of Commons navy out of which the true naval element should have been almost obliterated. It was exceedingly important, when they were constantly building new ships, that fresh experience of them should be obtained by the officers of the Navy, and it was by being on the spot and going out on trial trips that they could ascertain how these monsters were to be handled. Another new department of naval science had recently sprung up—he alluded to the torpedo department; and young men being educated for the Navy would have no good opportunity of gaining practical knowledge in that department, or in seeing how the present large guns were put on board of the ships. As for Greenwich Hospital, it did not follow that if it were not made use of for purposes connected with the Navy, it might not be devoted to some other national purpose.

THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN

said, that the apprehension felt by the noble Earl (the Earl of Lauderdale) as to the removal of the Naval College to Greenwich, must have been caused by his non-acquaintance with the details of the proposed arrangement, and with the extent to which it was proposed to move the College to Greenwich; and he trusted that the explanation he had to give would have the effect of diminishing some of the noble Earl's objections to the change. During the last 20 years two views as to the proper method of naval instruction had undergone much discussion. One view was that it was absolutely necessary that a naval officer should throughout his career remain in connection with his profession, and be as much as possible surrounded by his brother officers. On the other hand, it was contended that the general education to be obtained during the period when an officer was not employed was not of less value than the advantage to be gained by his being surrounded during his whole career by naval officers and naval associations. The career of education might be conveniently divided into three periods. The first was that when the cadet, having passed the examination for entering the Navy, was obliged to prepare for active duty. The second period was when having attained the rank of acting sub-lieutenant, he was obliged to prepare himself again for examination in gunnery and navigation; and the third period embraced the remainder of his career, and included his going to College and obtaining the instruction provided by the authorities. The question as to the best means and best place for the education of naval cadets had been considered by the Admiralty for a long time, and although he was not in a position to state what measures would be adopted, he might state that one measure which would not be adopted would be sending the cadets to Greenwich. The second portion of a naval officer's education was also a period of compulsory education; because it was not possible that a young naval officer out with the Fleet at sea could come home prepared to pass his examinations without further instruction, and in this part of the education the practical course of study of gunnery would not in any way be interfered with. Those of their Lordships who had been brought up to a naval career would admit that the Excellent constituted the finest school of gunnery in the world, and no persons were less disposed than the present Board of Admiralty to interfere with the practical course of that instruction. The number of the pupils now studying at the College was, on the average, from 25 to 30 young sub-lieutenants, four or five lieutenants studying for commissions in the Royal Marine Artillery, from five to eight lieutenants preparing themselves for gunnery lieutenants, two commanders, and two captains. The Staff connected with the College, though not numerous, had been most active in promoting the education of the young men and officers; but he was perfectly willing to allow that at the present time the provision for the higher education of naval officers was not sufficient, considering the importance of the Navy to England; and without new instruction and additional lectures the desired result could not be properly attained. The noble Earl said that it would be easy to increase the accommodation in the College. However, as the College was situated in a corner of the Dockyard, there would be great difficulty in increasing the accommodation to any extent, and at present it was insufficient for the purpose for which it was wanted. He would not deny that Portsmouth had considerable advantages over other sites for a Naval College, in affording a facility for officers to witness the sea trials of new ships, and in having the Dockyard close at hand; but he did not think that any attendance in the Dockyard was absolutely enjoined. With regard to obtaining the attendance of superior Professors, Greenwich would possess considerable advantages over Portsmouth; and if the expectations of the Government were fulfilled, it was probable that a larger number of officers of various classes would attend the College than had hitherto been the case. Even granting that they were cut off from association with Portsmouth—which would not be entirely the case, because by far the greater number of sub-lieutenants would have to go to Portsmouth to go through their course in the Excellent—the number of persons associated together could not be said to be removed from the influence of their profession. If at Greenwich they would not have the advantage of a dockyard, they would, at all events, have the great advantage of being near Shoeburyness. Officers, therefore, educating at Greenwich would have the advantage of seeing the trials of heavy gunnery—an advantage not obtainable at Greenwich or elsewhere. It was urged in opposition to fixing upon Greenwich as the site of a Naval College that it was too near London, and that the allurements of the metropolis would be too much for the younger naval officers. There was, however, the security that the younger naval officers would be under the necessity of attending lectures; while, in the next place, it had been found by experience that at Woolwich, which was almost equally near London, the officers who went there to be educated were not unwilling to avail themselves of the advantages which had been offered to them. Even granting the justice of all that had been said by the noble Earl on that point, would he, he would ask, undertake to say that there were none of those allurements at Portsmouth to which he objected in the case of Greenwich? He had spoken hitherto only of the executive officers of the Navy; but there was a most important class of officers who were being educated in our Dockyards, and very few of whom had an opportunity of obtaining any higher education, whom it was essential that we should have educated in the most effective manner. He alluded to the engineer officers. As matters at present stood, after open competition at the Dockyards, and after passing a few years there, about eight annually out of about 40 were sent to South Kensington for a period of three years. The probability was that, instead of a small number of those officers being sent to South Kensington in future, they would all in some form or other have the advantage of a higher education at the Naval College at Greenwich. As regarded the School of Naval Architecture, the students were educated at the Dockyards in very much the same manner as the engineers, and only two of the most promising, selected by examination, were sent up to South Kensington. For those persons also it was proposed to provide in the new Naval College at Greenwich. The naval models at South Kensington, which were of the highest interest and value, had been referred to, and that collection it was intended to remove to Greenwich. In that way, by the concentration of officers, lectures, and models, that improvement might be obtained which he thought it was most desirable in the interest of the service should, if possible, be effected. It had been asked whether it was proposed to proceed in the same manner as hitherto with respect to the architects in private trades? He had no doubt the First Lord of the Admiralty would seriously consider the proposal which had been made to him by the committee which had been charged with preparing the new arrangements for the College at Greenwich. He did not, he might add, think it improbable that his right hon. Friend (Mr. Goschen) would accede to the proposition that the same advantages should be held out to those in private trades as to others. The whole subject, he might add, had been most seriously canvassed, both in the naval Press and by the country generally, for the last two years, and it could not, he thought, be denied that on the whole there was a growing opinion that Greenwich was the most eligible site for the establishment of a new Naval College. He wished to repeat that there was no desire on the part of the Admiralty to substitute theoretical for practical education in the Navy. The First Lord of the Admiralty was fully alive to the necessity of promoting in the highest degree the qualities of seamanship and physical superiority among the officers of the service, and he could assure the noble Earl that in any arrangement which might be made the continuance of the connection of a sailor with the sea and with the active duties of his profession would be duly looked after and provided for.

THE EARL OF LAUDERDALE

reminded the noble Earl that the trials at Shoeburyness to which he had referred were simply the trials of new guns; while at Portsmouth an officer would have the opportunity of seeing the actual practice from the forts, as well as of going out to sea in ships which carried large guns. As to the enlargement of the College at Portsmouth, it was a matter about which there was no difficulty. It might be carried out for a less sum than that which would have to be expended at Greenwich. It had been stated that the general opinion was, that Greenwich was the best place for a naval University. He could only say that he had spoken to a great many naval officers with respect to it, and that he had not heard one of them express an opinion that Greenwich was a better site than Portsmouth.

THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN

repeated that it was not intended in any way to interfere with the practical education of naval officers. He would, however, add, that in the statement which he had made he had perhaps gone further in some respects than he ought to have done, inasmuch as the subject was still under the consideration of the First Lord of the Admiralty. He believed, at the same time, that all that he had stated would be found to be perfectly correct.