Case Name: JOHN W. WEBB v. THE UNITED STATES
Court: United States Court of Claims
Jurisdiction: United States
Decision Date: 1888-01-30
Citations: 23 Ct. Cl. 58
Docket Number: No. 15282
Parties: JOHN W. WEBB v. THE UNITED STATES.
Judges: 
Reporter: United States Court of Claims Reports
Volume: 23
Pages: 58–60

Head Matter:
JOHN W. WEBB v. THE UNITED STATES.
[No. 15282.
Decided January 30, 1888.]
On the Proofs.
The claimant is enlisted in the Marine Corps for eight years eleven months and twenty-six days, he then being under thirteen years of age and that being the period of his minority. He seeks to recover $2 a month additional pay for the period subsequent to his first five years of service.
I. The additional pay given to soldiers by the Kevised Statutes (§1284) does not depend upon meje length of service, but upon two other conditions: an honorable discharge; a voluntary re-enlistment.
II. The additional provision that the increased pay shall not take effect until the service, past and present, amounts to five years in time, is a limitation upon the grant, not a consideration for it.
The Reporters’ statement of the case:
In the present case the claimant was enlisted in the Marine Corps in 187G for eight years eleven months and twenty-six days; he then being under thirteen years of age, and that being the period of his minority. The authority for such enlistments is found in the Naval Appropriation Act 12th June, 1858 (11 Stat. L., 318):
“ That it shall be lawful to eulist boys for service in the United States Marine Corps, with the consent of their parents or guardians, not being under eleven nor over seventeen years of age, to serve until they shall arrive at the age of twenty-one years; the boys so enlisted to receive the same pay, rations, clothing, etc., now received by boys enlisted in said corps, under the authority of the Secretary of the Navy.”
One section of that appropriation act is incorporated in section 1530 of the Revised Statutes, and relates to steam-ships and the manner in which they shall be classed. There was much discussion at the bar as to whether section 3 of the act was or was not repealed by the repealing section, 5596, of the Revised Statutes.
There was also much discussion as to the character or status of the claimant during his minority enlistment; on his part it being maintained that he was a private, and on the part of the Government that he was an apprentice.
Mr. I/. Oabell Williamson and Mr. Lemuel Fugitt■ for the claimant.
Mr. Heber J. May (with whom was Mr. Assistant Attorney-General Howard) for the defendants.

Opinion:
Nott, J.,
delivered the opinion of the court:
The basis of the present claim is understood bythecourtto be Revised Statutes (§ 1612), which provides that the enlisted men of the Marine Corps " shall be entitled to receive the same pay and bounty for re-enlisting as are and may be provided by or in pursuance of law for the officers and enlisted men of like grades in the infantry of the Army," taken in connection with section 1284, which provides " that every soldier who, having been honorably discharged, enlists within one month thereafter, shall be further entitled, after five years' service, including his first enlistment, to receive for the period of five years next thereafter $2 per month in addition to the ordinary pay of his grade."
That is to say, if a soldier, who enlisted for three years and has been honorably discharged, re-enlists within one month thereafter, he will, at the end of the next two years, be entitled to receive, during the next five years, $2 per month in addition to the ordinary pay of his grade.
The court is of the opinion that if the claimant was, as he contends, an enlisted man in the Marine Corps, and not an apprentice or boy as maintained by the defendants, nevertheless the essential conditions to an increase of pay after five years' service have not been complied with. This addition of $2 per month does not depend upon mere length of service, but upon two other conditions: first, an honorable discharge ; second, a voluntary re-enlistment. It is intended primarily to be an inducement to the prompt re-enlistment of an honorably discharged soldier, and it can be earned in no other way. The additional provision, that it shall not take effect until his service, past and present, amounts to five years in time, is a limitation upon the grant, and not a consideration for it. No matter whether the claimant was legally or illegally enlisted, and no matter whether he should have been graded as a drummer boy and musician, or as a private, it was still necessary for him to be " honorably discharged " and to voluntarily re-enlist " within one month thereafter " before he would become entitled to the additional pay which he seeks to recover.
The judgment of the courtis that the petition be dismissed.