The Sun.
London, England, 1860-06-18 00:00:00

THE ROYAL ENGINEERS.

A writer in a contemporary says :—The effi-
cieney of our army has been so much promoted by
the attention that has been directed in your
columns to our shortcomings, that 1 beg your as-
sistance now to draw your attention to the Royal
Engineer Establishment at Chatham.
This establishment was formed during the course
of the Peninsular war, in consequence of the im-
mense disadvantage under which our operations
there were carried on, owing to our having no corps
capable of executing the mechanical duties re-
quired in conducting sieges or in the field.
When our army took the field in Portugal, and
commenced that series of campaigns of which the
defence of the lines of Torres Vedras and the cap-
ture of Cuidad Rodrigo and Badajoz were the
most important steps, there was not a man among
them who had ever made a gabion or a fasciae, or
built a battery, until taught to doso then and there
by the officers of engineers ; and sapping was, of
course, out of the question.
The delay, loss of life, and failure that resulted
from this deficiency was so strongly brought be-
fore the Gavernment that the establishment above-
mentioned was created, and nobody would have
supposed that we should take the field under the
same disadvantageous circumstances again—an
opinion that was justified by the great efficiency
it attained under Sir Charles Pasley as a school of
instruction.

But at length evil times came and the result
was that when we sent our army to Turkey and
' the Crimea the men were at first starting so ig-
norant of their duties that, as is shown in the offi-
cial report of the Royal Engineer operations; most
of the Sappers had to be taught on the spot how to
sap, and how to make gabions and fascines, as if
there had never been an Engineer establishment,
and jest as they had been in the Peninsular war.
Since that time matters have grown worse if pos-
sible, as is well known to many connected with the
establishment, who have no power to remedy the
evils they lament, Instead of each man having as
formerly three months or more instruction in field
works, sapping, &c., a month's pontooning, a month
mining, &c., many a man leaves who has never seen
a pontoon bridge formed, a gallery of mine driven,
or had perhaps more than a few days' instruction
in field works, and the men are therefore no more
Sappers and Engineers than they are sailors.
The causes are easily found-1. That the great
purpose of the establishment as a school of instruc-
tion in engineering is nowadays entirely subordi-
nated to the ordinary infantry duties of the garri-
son, which men under instruction should no more
be made to take part in than a recruit is who has
not learnt his drill ; so that out of a year that a man
spends there, during which he should be acquiring
that instruction which he can gain nowhere else, he
probably spends more than half in field days, garri-
son, guardmounting, rifle practice, and other such
duties, which he could learn at any station he might
afterwards be sent to, or at Chatham, either before
or after his instruction in his speciality was finished.
2. That half-taught men are draughted off from the
companies under instruction to fill up vacancies i❑
detachments at other stationA.
If as much care were taken to make the Sappers
good engineers as to make them good rifle shots
there would be nothing to complain of. By the rules
laid down by the Commander-in-Chief, no man in
the army can escape being thoroughly instructed
and practised in the use of the rifle. Each man in
the army, Sappers and all, must pass through a cer-
tain number of days' drill on first entering as a re-
cruit, and must shoot a certain number of rounds at
a mark every year, or his Royal Highness will know
the reason why. The Artillery are cared for in a
similar way, in respect of gun practice ; but the
Engineers, whose specialty requires more careful
instruction, which can scarcely ever be supplied if
omitted at first, are so little a subject of solicitude
that they have arrived at the condition I have at-
tempted to describe.

A BENEVOLENT ANNUITY SOCIETY.

For the last three weeks, Mr. Selfe, one of the
magistrates at the Thames Police Court, Stepney,-
has been prosecuting an extrajudicial inquiry, re-
lating to the affairs of the United Kingdom Benevo-
lent Annuity Fund and the United Kingdom Mu-
tual Annuity Society. The magistrate has acted
with great zeal and discretion in the matter, and
as the names of several persons, both lay and cleri-
cal, appeared to be implicated in a fraud on many
benevolent persons, he did not make the case publio
until it was imperatively necessary, and then only
by addressing the reporters as follows :—" I have
received several letters on the subject of the pro-
ceedings of the United Kingdom Benefit Annuity
Fund or Society. lam pursuing an inquiry into
the matters complained of, and the ends of justice
may, I think, be promoted if those interested in this
fund will promptly communicate to me all facts
relating to it within their knowledge. I have also
to request that my wishes may be made known
through the public journals." • Mr. Selfe's request
was mad© public, and he has since received numer-
ous communications, revealing a great amount of
duplicity and fraud on one side, and misery and
blighted hopes on the other. The most prominent
of the numerous applicants was the daughter of a
Mrs. Johnstone, who was elected an annuitant by
the subscribers to the United Kingdom Benevolent
Annuity Fund.. Lady Charlotte Proby kindly
subscribed upwards of £lOO to the fund for the pur-
pose of securing the election of Mrs. Johnstone, an
aged widow, and obtaining for her an annuity of
£lO. Mrs. Johnstone's daughter said her mother's
annuity had been stopped about two years, that it
was formerly paid through the hands of the Rev.
F. Pearce Pocock, of Church House, Bow, and
Chaplain to the City of London Union, and that
she could obtain no satisfactory explanation from
the rev, gentleman respecting the stoppage of the
annuity, which had been productive of great
misery to her mother, who was in want and ob-
liged to sell her furniture. Mr. Selfe said this
was not the first complaint made to him, though not
publicly, of the proceedings of the United Kingdom
Benevolent Annuity Fund or Society, and he would
immediately write to Mr. Pocock on the subject.
and he did so to this effect :

" Rev. Sir,—The daughter of Mrs. Johnstone has com-
plained to me that an annuity of Ll.O was purchased for her
mother in 1856, in the United Kingdom Benevolent An-
nuity Fund, which was for some time paid to her by your
hands, but that payment was discontinued, and she can get
no explanation from you or e'sewhere why this is the case.
She says the office is shut up. As your name appears in the printed list of the comthittee, and you also was chap-
lain, I shall be glad if you can favour me with some ex-
planation of what has become of the society, and of Mrs.
Johnstone's annuity in particular. I may remark that this
is not the first tme I have had occasion to communicate with you respecting the society. It is essential that any
institution professing to be patronised by influential persons
should give the fullest information of its proceedings, and
I think it right to let you know that unless a satisfactory
explanation is furnished the matter will certainly not rest
where it now is.
"I am,-Rev. Sir, your faithful servant,
S. SEISE.
" The Rev. F. Pearce Pocock, Church House, Bow."
To this communication, the magistrate received
the following reply
. _

"-Alfred House, Bow, May 28, 1860.
condition of the United Kingd
it is om Benevo-
lent Annuity Fund is so complicated that difficult to
understand, and much more so to explain. Before enter-
ing more fully into the ect, I may premise that the
society is not an assurancesubj office for sells ng annuities, but