The Sun.
London, England, 1855-07-31 00:00:00

yet after he had attained that rank, he was eligible for
the honour for services previously performed. He ob-
served that in the recent distribution of the honours of I
the Bath many officers received the decoration whose
services were not confined to the late war. He made no
complaint of that, but as some of the older officers had
now received the honour, it struck him that many I
others who were equally entitled to the honour had
been forgotten. He knew one admiral who had been
mentioned in nine despatches who had not received
the honour, while younger officers had received it who
had been mentioned only in one despatch. There
were many officers in the army similarly situated who
had rendered good services in former times, and who
were aggrieved at being, omitted. He had no desire to
coerce the Admiralty and the Secretary for War, but he
did suggest that if any revision was made by the two
heads of the departments of the system of rewards for
past services, the services of old officers, although they
had been performed 30 years, might be considered.
Lord PALMERSTON would ask the house to con-
sider the bearing of this motion, which was nothing but
an appeal to the house from the executive with regard
to the distribution of honours which flowed from the
Crown. Motions of this kind were very taking, espe-
cially when the subjects of them were officers distin-
guished fer their services whom every one would be glad
to see receive honours and distinctions, in addition to
those which they had gained already. But it would be
impossible to carry on the Government of the navy and
army if it was not left to the Crown, under the advice
of its Ministers, to decide who were and who were
not to receive honours. What would that . come
to ? There might be many instances in which
officers might wish to bring their cases forward,
and if it was, understood that the decision rested with
the House of Commons instead of the Crown, there
would be a canvassing of members, and proceedings of
that kind which would be fatal to the interests of the
service, and opposed to the proper functions of the
House of Commons. He hoped, with regard to the mo-
..

tion, the hon. and gallant member, especially as it ap-
peared that the statutes of the Order of the Bath were
opposed to its object, would be content with the acknow-
ledgment he obtained of his own and that of other offi-
cers, which indeed in his case was unnecessary, for his
services were already highly esteemed, and withdraw
he motion.
Lord HOTHAM agreed that this was a subject of
great delicacy and importance, and he was not one of
those who wished to give that house a function which
belonged to the crown and its advisers. His object
in addressing the house was to draw attention to a
matter in connection with the proposed new order of
merit, and to impress on the Government the necessity
of making some new arrangement with regard to
the services which were to be rewarded with honours,
and to see that the regulations wers intelligible,
and such as to insure the distinction being properly
awarded. With regard to the honour of the Order of the
Bath, there was an idea that any one who was mentioned
in a Gazette was entitled to receive it, and he wished to
urge that at present rewards of that kind were distributed
to officers on totally different grounds, generally depend-
ing on the particular notions of each general of division
to which officers belonged. He was anxious that care
should be taken in any future order of merit that the
system and regulations should be so devised as to make
the distribution uniform and consonant with justice in
all cases. ,