Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1914-10-24
ENGLISH SOLDIERS ARE
UNDERPAID BY JOHN
BULL FOR Their
SERVICE

(By Associated Press.)

LONDON, Oct. 24-Five shillings a
week to the soldiers wife who has lost
her husband in fighting his country S
battles!
With this exclamation, one of the
leading London papers attacks editor
tally the governments pension system
which, it says, is due to the old tradi-
ton summed up in Wellingtons as
sertion that his troops in the Spanish
campaign, were only "the scum of
the earth" The war office, according
to the writer, fails to realize that times
are different now and the vast majority
of volunteers are men who in civil life
earned good wages in factory, field
office and shop
Indignation has also been expressed
in parliament, so that it is not unlike
ly some reform in pensions may fol-
low.
In the British army the pay of off
GERS and men is dependent on the reg
iment. There is no standard scale of
pay as in America. Commissioned Of
fcers, as a rule, receive a sum impos-
sible to live on-about $35 a month.
They must have independent means.
and in the crack regiments, such as
the Scots Greys or the Grenadier
Guards they must be wealthy, with
polo ponies, Wallets and expensive uni
forms. But in certain of the colonial
troops doing police duty in lands bor-
dered by savages,, they get as good pay
as American officers and do not have
to keep up expensive establishments.
The ordinary infantrymen in the
new volunteer army of million men,
pledged to foreign service, are started
off at $1.65 week, clear of expenses.
Married men are allowed in addition
separation pay for their families at
the rate of $3.50 a week for the wife
and two pence day-or % cents a
week-for each child. In the county
of London they are given a further
sum of so cents a week, owing to the
higher cost of living.
All married soldiers serving abroad
are obliged to allot at least IS cents
a week to their families out of their
own pay. Worked out on this scale.
the lowest sum a soldiers wife, with
out children, can receive is % shiIlings
week in the case of a warrant Off
Ger; % for regimental quartermaster
sergeant; 16 shillings, six pence for
corporal or private. If the wife has
four children to support, she will re-
ceive, on the same scale, a sum rang
ing from "a to AZ shillings.
Widows of those who die in active
service receive from five to ten shill-
ings a week, according to the rank
and pay OF the husband. But the mass
of them will not get over FIVE shillings.
An extra allowance varying from forty
to fifty cents a week for each child is
given, however.
While there are no government
homes for old soldiers in Great Britain,
as in the United States, there are GER
tain homes maintained by private
charity. OF these, the largest and
most famous is in Chelsea, London.
The garden party given at the Chelsea
home for its benefit is one Of the big
social events of London's spring sea-
son.
Much suffering was caused by the
government deferring the payment of
separation allowance to soldiers wives
during the first two months of the war.
Not until October was this money put
into the hands of the destitute women.
War office red tape also held up pay
allottments.