The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1887-05-28 00:00:00

THE CHARGES AGAINST ORDNANCE
OFFICIALS,

REPORT OF THE ROYAL COMMISSION.

The report of the Royal Commission to inquire into
the system under which patterns of warlike stores are
adopted, and the stores obtained and passed for her
Majesty's service, was issued with the Parliamentary
papers on Monday. The Commission, which was
appointed on the 27th September last, consisted of
Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Sir Archibald Alison,
Sir Walter Barttelot, M.P., Admiral Nowell Salmon,
and Dr. John Percy. The Commissioners, at the
outset of their report, remark that they experienced
some difficulty in deciding practically upon the limits
of the inquiry. The first difficulty arose upon the
examination of their first witness, the then First
Secretary of State for War, Mr. W. H. Smith. Some
of the questions which he was asked produced
upon his mind the impression that they proposed
to examine the whole administration of the War
Office—so far, at least, as related to the ordnance for
the last five years, and this, he said, was not the pur-
pose for which the Commission was issued. This
matter was arranged at a conversation at the War
Office between the Secretary of State and the Chair-
man of the Commission, part of which was carried on
in the presence of the Lord Chancellor. The ques-
tion discussed was to what extent the Commission
was to inquire, if at all, into the functions of the
Secretary of State and into the manner in which his
duties had been discharged, more particularly for the
last few years. The Chairman strongly expressed his
opinion that the powers of the Secretary of State not
only formed a part of the system under which
patterns of warlike stores were provided for the public
service, but were the leading and most essential parts
of it; and, sad as the fact was, they were unanimous
in that opinion. Mr. Smith did not deny this, and
admitted that their report ought to deal with those
powers in general, but he stated very decidedly
his opinion that it would not be proper
for the Commission to inquire into the general
ad ministration of the Ordnance Department
for the last few years, and more particularly into the
question whether the reserves of stores had been kept
to their proper height. This, he remarked, would in-
volve an inquiry, which was never intended to be
entrusted to the Commission, into questions of imme-
diate policy. The chairman agreed to this, and the
Commissioners have accordingly treated as confiden-
tial such official reports bearing upon this question as
have come to their knowledge in the course of their
inquiries, but they thought that they were not only
entitled, but bound, to ascertain as completely as they
could the general nature of the powers of the
Secretary of State, and to express their opinion upon
them. In regard to the special part of their inquiry,
that into complaints made since July 1, 1881, as to
warlike stores, analogous difficulties arose. The
most important of the complaints was systematic
fraud and corruption took place between the
years 1858 and 1863; that the administration of
ihe Ordnance Department has ever since been
conducted more or less under the influence of
that fraud and corruption; and that the particular
results finally arrived at cannot be fully understood
or fairly criticised unless this is borne in mind. They
thought that the whole object of the Commission
would be defeated if they considered themselves to
be debarred from entering upon this matter because
the incidents referred to occurred many years ago.
They had accordingly gone into such matters con-
nected with the origin of the present system and its
working previous to 1881 as have been referred to as
proofs or indications of its essentially corrupt
character. They had, in their anxiety to probe to the
bottom the complaints of corruption, allowed tho
who came before them, especially Colonel Hope, Major
Arrnit, and Mr. Lynall Thomas, to say what they
thought proper, but they gave the persons whose
primes were mentioned an opportunity of contradict-
ing if they were so disposed, what had been said
against them, and they published both sets of state-
ments. They had regarded their duty in reference
to charges of corruption as judicial, and not inquisi-
torial.

The general result of the inquiry are stated by the
committee as follows:

"1. We think that the system on which patterns
of warlike stores are procured and passed into your
Majesty's service is defective in the following particu-
lars: (a) That the powers of the Secretary of State
are so great that no single person can be expected to
exercise them efficiently, especially when regard is
had to the uncertainty of his tenure of office and his
presumable deficiency in special knowledge. (b) The
same observations apply in a less degree to the Sur-
veyor-General of the Ordnance. (c) The Secretary
of State and the Surveyor-General of the Ordnance
are practically in the hands of their subordinates, and
this destroys all real responsibility and all effective
superintendence. (d) The present system is directed
to no definite object; it is regulated by no definite
rules; it makes no regular stated provisions either
for the proper supply and manufacture of warlike
stores, or for enforcing the responsibility of those who
fail to make them properly, or for ascertaining the
fact that they are made improperly. It is to these
defects in the system that we attribute most of the
matters complained of.
"11. We propose to remedy the above-mentioned
defects as follows: (a) A Commission, composed of
men of the highest eminence and authority, should
be formed to lay down a standard as to the amount
of stores which should be kept in hand for the public
service, and annual tables should be published show-
ing how the existing stores stood in relation to this
standard. (b) The office of Master-General of the
Ordnance should be revived so far as the manage-
ment of the stores and manufacturing departments
is concerned. • The Master-General should be a
soldier of the highest eminence. He should hold
office for a term of, say, seven years certain. He
should prepare and publish annually a statement of
what he regards as necessary for his department
every year. The Secretary of State should con-
tinue to be in all respects responsible for passing
the Estimates laid before Parliament. We are
sensible of the difficulty of arranging his relations
to the Secretary of State and to Parliament. (c)
The Master-General should have a council, the
duty of which should be—(l) to advise on all
technical questions submitted to them ; (2) to cause
warlike stores issued for service to be inspected at
irregular intervals, and to hear and adjudicate upon
all complaints as to their quality; (3) to pass resolu-
tions as to the adoption of different patterns of war-
like stores and new inventions; (4) to hear and deter-
mine upon complaints of inventors.
"111. As to complaints. (1) We think that the
charges of corruption brought against the Ordnance
Department are false and unfounded, and that nearly
all tho particular instances alleged are either wholly
unfrue or distorted versions of innocent facts. One
act of indiscretion has been proved. Some matters
of suspicion as to some of the inferior officers of the
Ordnance Stores have been proved, and ought to be,
in our opinion, independently investigated; (2) we
think that the charge of inefficiency, both generally
and in a variety of instances, has been proved: to a
considerable extent. We attribute this inefficiency
to the defects in the system pointed out above"

Now-A-DAys only well•to-do ladies can afford to
have maids to help them dress, but in the olden times
every housewife had a dresser.
WE are never weary of reading a good epitaph—one
indicatei the work of a lifetime in a few short,
crisp words. Here is one, for instance, which needs nc,
explanation. It was inscribed tr. the 01311) of
cannibal "He loved his fellow men."