The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1851-07-29 00:00:00

DOCK COMMITTEE.

A special meeting of the Dock Committee was held
yesterday, at one o'clock, for the purpose of considering
the report of the sub-committee of works, appointed for
the purpose of investigating the charges which had been
preferred against Mr. Hartley, the Dock Surveyor,
Present :—Mr. Thomas Littledale (in the chair), Messrs.
Molyneux, Tobin, Holt, Bold, Turner, Sandbach, Ken-
dall, Tuckett, Langsdale, Jones, Fisher, Robinson,
Steele, Gregson, and Rankin.
The SECRETARY (Mr. Mason) read the report of the com-
mittee, and also the questions put to Mr. Hartley, and
his replies thereto, referred to 'in the report. The charges
were reduced to twenty-seven specific items, which were
referred to the surveyor for explanation. They comprised
payment of wages to old and infirm men,—to men absent
from work during illness, and to widows of men who had
died in the service of the dock estate, and which had arisen
from a discretionary power given to the surveyor by the
committee. There were also other charges relating to the
ship Earl St. Vincent. and over-payment of wages to
the surveyors and the clerks appointed to measure the
work. The committee having gone into the evidence
upon which the charges were supported, were of opinion
that their confidence in the integrity and ability of Mr.
Hartley was unshaken.
Mr. SANDBACH moved the adoption of the report, and
its insertion upon the minutes. It was ten years ago
since such an investigation had been made. A special
sub-committee was then appointed, and that report would
be found to be an exceedingly favourable one to the system
upon which the dock works were carried on. He wished
that their present inquiry had been one of the same nature,
—(hear,)—as it was rather an inquiry into specific charges
against the surveyor, all of which had been satisfactorily
explained. There was no doubt that cases of payment of
wages were not made as they would have been made if
they had been singly brought under the notice of the Sick
Committee ; and they had within the last twelve
months ten instances of accidents brought before
them, and relief had been granted. The surveyor had,
some years ago, brought the subject before the Sick Com-
mittee, and his instructions were to use his own discretion,
—(hear)—and upon that he had acted ever since. The
other charges arose out of the opinion of one of the
labourers, that certain works had been done unnecessarily
and expensively. Many of them had arisen in consequence
of the variations in the plans, and the expenses incurred
in altering those plans. With regard to the charge rela-
tive to the sawyers, for the discovery of the fraud the
committee was much indebted to Mr. Langsdale (hear).
It was through his perseverance that it had been disco-
vered. That was the only matter discovered in the course
of the enquiry which he thought showed anything wrong.
He concluded with moving the adoption of the report.
Mr. BOLD, without desiring to oppose the motion of
Mr. Sandbach, moved the following resolution :—" That
the report of the sub-committee be received and recorded ;
and that in the opinion of the committee the recent inves-
tigation has in no degree whatever diminished their confi-
dence in the surveyor, or their high opinion of the integrity
and ab litv with which he has uniformly discharged the
duties of his office." His !Mr. Bold's) confidence in the
honesty and integrity of Mr. Hartley was not at all shaken.
Mr. FISHER said he was prepared to take the responsi-
bility of a sub-committee having allowed a discretionary
power to the surveyor. He would second Mr. Sandbach's
motion. _ _ _

Mr. LANGSDALE warmly defended his conduct in refe-
rence to the investigation of the charges preferred against
the surveyor, enumerating them as he proceeded. He
said it was not with Mr. Hartley he found fault, or cast
imputations, but upon the system itself, opening a door
to favouritism and partiality, which in many cases had
been exercised.

Several members of the committee bore testimony to
the integrity and business capabilities of Mr. Hartley.
Mr. FISHER approved of Mr. Langsdale's conduct in
bringing forward the charges, and considered that the
committee was greatly indebted to his exertions.
Mr. JONES passed a high eu!ogium on Mr. Hartley and
his management of the dock works. He was confident
that the charges when investigated would turn out ground-
less, and referred to his experience in corroboration of his
opinion.
Mr. FISHER considered that as the committee had the
highest confidence in Mr. Hartley, it ought to pass Mr.
Bold's resolution. He thought Mr. Bold had shown great
reason for not allowing the resolutions to be mixed up
with the report.
Mr. JoNgs hoped Mr. Bold would withdraw the reso-
lution, for, if it were carried, he should move a vote of
thanks to Mr. Langsdale.
After some further discussion, it was agreed that the
motion should he withdrawn, and that a copy of the
concluding paragraph in the report of the sub-committee,
stating that nothing had arisen upon their investigation
to impugn either Mr. Hartley's integrity or ability, or to
shake the confidence that bad been hitherto reposed in
him, should be forwarded to Mr. Hartley.
The committee then broke up.

The Earl Fitzwilliam appears as a petitioner in the En-
cumbered Estates Court for the purpose of selling a pro-
perty in the King's County.
Archdeacon Manning is to be appointed to the church
at Gravesend, which was lately purchased from Mr. Blew
by Dr. Wiseman.
The Bishop of Durham has given the sum of £3OO
towards the erection of a church at Pantasa. The church
is to take the place of the one which was erected at Pan-
tasa, by Lord Fielding.
Some one asking Mr. Curran why a countryman of his
walked about London with his tongue out of his mouth,
he said that he " supposed he did so in hope to catch tLe
English accent."
At Posen, a schoolboy, seventeen years of age, who
lately shot another boy of thirteen in a duel, has been
condemned to eighteen months' imprisonment. Three
other boys, between thirteen and fifteen, who had acted
as seconds and umpire, were acquitted.
Mr. Silk Buckingham has at length succeeded in his
long contest with the East India Company for indemnifi-
cation for his losses as an Oriental journalist. The bill
before parliament for restitution has been withdrawn, the
court of directors and the government having agreed to
settle upon him a pension of £4OO per annum.
Great numbers of English and Scotch farmers are travel-
ling through Connaught, selecting and bargaining for
farms and residences, where they propose planting them-
selves, or members of their families. Within the last week
several large tracts on the Roscommon estate of Lord Dil-
lon have been taken by Scotch farmers.
It is rather a curious coincidence that Miss Talbot was
married and the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill read a second time
in the Lords on the same day. On the morning of that
day the following advertisement occupied a prominent
place in the columns of the daily organ of the Romanist
and Romanising priesthoods :—" No. 35, Golden-square.
—This evening there will be the usual Tuesday's conver-
sazione." It can hardly have been a " merry meeting."
MR. W. E. GLADSTONE ON THE GOVERNMENT OF
NAPLES.—Mr. Gladstone's second letter to Lord Aber-
deen has just appeared; and, though less startling and
shocking in its details than the first. it fills up the picture
of the most abandoned wickedness which has ever been
deliberately perpetrated by an established government.
Few readers will refuse to accept Mr. Gladstone's authority
for the allegations to which he pledges his credit.—Morn-
ing Chronicle,
SEIZURE OF COUNTERFEIT COIN.—For some time past
there has been a considerable circulation of spurious crown
and half-crown pieces and shillings in the city of Bristol
and the surrounding district, and the police have been
actively engaged in endeavouring to discover the offenders,
but without success, till one day,this week some informa-
tion reached the ears of Police-sergeant Hazle, of the
Gloucester constabulary, which induced him to search a
house at St. George's, near Bristol, inhabited by two men
named Joshua and John Jarrett, who had for 'some time
been suspected of being concerned in passing the bad
money. In a box which was locked and concealed in a
private place, he found counterfeit crown and half-crown
pieces to the value of £lO. They were of a very superior
manufacture, and contained a large portion of what is
termed " pin metal," which causes them to ring like good
coin. The two men were subsequently apprehended, taken
before Mr. Hughes, magistrate of Downed, and remanded
for further inquiry, as the police believe they have a clue
to a manufactory of bad coin in the north of England, from
which they have no doubt this and mapy preview parcels
of spurious mac), were sent,