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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

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The answers of Captains Watson and Barnes (forwarded herewith) the officers who have been commanding the Regiment during the absence of Lieutenant-Colonel Bower and Major Bruce, are a complete refutation of the charges made, and I can personally vouch for their correctness. I would call special attention to that portion of Captain Watson's Report, headed "General Remarks."

Many of the allegations made are so palpably false to anyone having any knowledge of the Regiment, that it would almost appear as if they were made with a view to pre- judicing it in the eyes of the authorities at home, on the principle that if mud is thrown, some is sure to stick, and thereby leading possibly to the reduction or even disbandment

of it.

Should the latter action be taken now, at a time when the Empire stands in need of every soldier she can obtain, it would, in my humble opinion, be most suicidal policy, and. I am certain that Major-General Sir A. Dorward, under whom the Regiment fought most gallantly at Tientsin, and who knows more about the Regiment than any other Commander in China, would concur in this.

To the officers, who have worked hard to bring the Regiment to its present state of efficiency, and many of whom by so doing have lost the chances of distinction and promotion they would otherwise have had in South Africa, such a course would certainly be heart-breaking.

As regards the men even if compensation were paid them for terminating their engagements, I doubt if that would satisfy them, and it would certainly shake their confidence and trust in the English nation, for which at present they still have some respect.

I humbly venture to submit that the accompanying correspondence may for the information of the Under Secretary of State for War.

I have, &c.,

J. H. COWAN,

be passed

Major, Royal Engineers, Acting Commissioner, Wei-Hai-Wei.

Enclosure 1 in No. 85.

THE CHIEF STAFF OFFICER, China Field Force, to OFFICER COMMANDING THE 1ST CHINESE REGIMENT OF INFANTRY, Wei-Hai-Wei.-Through the Officer Commanding at Wei-Hai-Wei.

Subject-1st Chinese Regiment.

Headquarters, Intelligence Branch, China Field Force,

Tientsin, December 1901.

(No. 857 I.C. Confidential.)

Reference. Previous correspondence through the General Officer Commanding, Wei-Hai-Wei.

Memorandum. I forward extracts from reports received on the above named subjects for your information.

Please inform me whether there is any foundation for the allegations contained in the extracts.

In this connection can you throw any light on another statement, viz., that some men are serving under the Chinese as Officers who were formerly in the 1st Chinese Regiment?

By Order,

G. H. W. O'SULLIVAN,

Colonel, Chief Staff Officer,

China Field Force.

(2.)

Captain WATSON, 1st Chinese Regiment,

Forwarded for report, please, as early as possible.

J. H. COWAN, Major, Royal Engineers,

December 23, 1901.

Officer Commanding Troops.

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EXTRACT from the Diary of the Railway Staff Officer, Peking, dated November 26, 1901.

"I have been informed that the very large number of desertions in the W.H.W. Regiment is due to the amount of beating, the length of service (3 years), and some system of squeezing which is going on. My men (B.R.P.) are very much afraid of being transferred there. They say, owing to above causes only low-class Chinese enlist, with whom they would not consort."

A European Interpreter employed with the China Field Force writes as follows:- "The other day, during the course of conversation with three of Ma's (Ma-Yu-Kun) non-commissioned officers, I asked about the W.H.W. Regiment, and why were these desertions? They said:

1st. Three years is a long time to serve.

2nd. The English Officers beat and ill-treat their men.

3rd. If they are killed in action you do not bury the men, and the compensation

is not enough. (They said it was $100 in case of death.)

There is also, no doubt, that men joining Yuan-Shih-Kai's and Ma-Yu-Kun's troops, who have served in the W.H.W. Regiment get bigger pay than the ordinary sepoy as he can do a good bit of instructing. There are old soldiers of the W.H.W. Regiment in both these Generals' camps."

Enclosure 2 in No. 85.

Officer Commanding Troops, Wei-Hai-Wei,

Length of Service. (1.) I do not think that having to serve for three years is likely to affect the question of desertion to any appreciable extent. As far as I am aware in the Chinese Army they are enlisted for an indefinite period.

Burial of men killed in action. (2) This is absolutely false. Not only were all the men killed or died on service buried (with one exception, whose body could not be recovered), but the coffins containing the bodies of those killed at Tientsin have. been brought to Wei-Hai-Wei, where they now are. As the graves of these men at Tientsin wereall carefully and legibly marked with the deceaseds names both in English and Chinese, and also registered in the Municipal Office, there is no possible excuse for this statement. Moreover, it is only within the last three weeks that the coffins have been removed from Tientsin.

Compensation. The amount of compensation was decided by a Board, which was assembled for the purpose. The suggestions have been approved by the Commander- in-Chief. There is also compensation for men disabled by wounds. The amounte range from $300 downwards. Details can be ascertained by reference to the Allow- ance Regulations. It is on a very liberal scale. As to the best of my knowledge relations of soldiers of the Chinese Army killed on service receive nothing, and disabled men are left to look after themselves, why then should it occur to these non-commis- sioned officers of Ma's to think of speaking of compensation unless the idea was sug- gested to them by this "European Interpreter ?"

Class. There are no caste prejudices in China; the bulk of the men of the Chinese Regiment are peasants from the country villages, and about five-sixths are Shantung men; there are some 400 men enlisted in Tientsin and the vicinity as an experiment, they have not been found as good as the Shantung men.

Ill-treatment. (4.) The statement that the officers beat and ill-treat the men is a lie pure and simple.

Squeeze. (5.) The men are paid twice a month. They are invariably paid personally by an officer according to the customs of the British service. No native ever handles any man's pay. Who then can "squeeze?" Have these Police been allowed to imply that the officers follow the customs of the Chinese, and pocket the mens' pay?

Deserters serving in Chinese Army. (6.) I should think it was probable that a few deserters may be serving with the Chinese Army, but for reasons set forth in another report, I should think not many. Since the "European Interpreter" knows for fact, he should be able to state whether the men he speaks of are Shantung or Chih-li men, and I should be glad of the information. I do not see the object of comparing the pay with that of a sepoy, the conditions are not similar. The pay was purposely fixed at a higher rate than the ordinary scale of pay in the Chinese Army, otherwise

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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

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men could hardly be expected to serve under an alien flag. I cannot think that deser- ters from the Regiment are likely to be serving as Officers in the Chinese Army, for, as I have stated, they are mostly peasants by birth, and are not educated sufficiently to be likely to be much use as officers.

General Remarks. I desire to enter a very strong protest against these allega- tions, and the manner in which they have been made. They bear strong internal evidence of being answers to questions, It is a commonly known and generally accepted characteristic of the Chinese to give such answers as may seem acceptable to the questioner. Still little or no effort appears to have been made to test the accuracy of these statements. Take for instance the statement re the non burial of men killed in action. As I have shown, a visit to the native cemetery at Tientsin, or to the Municipal Office would have proved its inaccuracy. Moreover, when the coffins were removed from Tientsin to be shipped to. Wei-Hai-Wei, the local papers at Tientsin commented on the fact; nevertheless, the statement is allowed to pass. The other alle- gations are on a par with this astounding falsehood, and I maintain it is neither just nor right to make use of the idle statements of irresponsible Chinese as a framework for charges against a body of Officers. I regret that I am unwillingly forced to the conclusion that there is a growing tendency to make use of any gossip against the Chinese Regiment. Since the Boxer riots a prejudice has arisen against the Regiment, solely because they are Chinese, in spite of the loyal service rendered by them at that time. It is noteworthy, morcover, that the unfavourable rumours that are circulated generally appear to have come from the North, that is to say, from places several hundred miles distant from the station where the Regiment is quartered, and, appar- ently, emanating from people who cannot, at any rate, have seen the Regiment for many months. The quite recent report* by the General Officer lately commanding at Wei-Hai-Wei, in which, among other things, the good feeling existing between the Officers and men was commented on, should, of itself, be sufficient to disprove any charge of ill-treatment.

It will not be possible to maintain the high state of efficiency at which the Chinese Regiment is now acknowledged to have arrived if the Officers are to be exposed to in- sults of this description. The first period of engagement of several Officers and British non-commissioned officers is drawing to a close, and if the experiment of training Chinese as soldiers is to be continued it is highly desirable that these Officers and non-commissioned officers, who have all some knowledge of the language, and gained a certain insight into the characteristics of the Chinese, should be encouraged to remain. They have laboured loyally and indefatigably to gain the confidence of the men they have been sent out to train. I am well aware that from the outset of the career of the Chinese Regiment certain people have held that it was not sound policy that such a Regiment should be raised. The prejudice that existed was strengthened by the Boxer riots, and has become more violent since the Chinese Regiment has proved its capa- bilities in the field. Fair and open criticism is to be expected and desired in a new undertaking, but this spreading of false reports is not in accordance with British tra- ditions of fair play. I hold that the Officers entrusted with the task of training the Chinese Regiment are entitled to the support of Government Officials, civil or military, in the furtherance of the scheme.

As the Commanding Officer of the Regiment is at present in England for the main purpose of reporting on matters connected with the Chinese Regiment, I have forwarded a copy of this correspondence and my report to him, for such action as he may think necessary.

Shanghai, December 31, 1901.

M. WATSON,

Captain, Commanding Chinese Regiment.

N.B. While on the subject of desertions, is the percentage of desertions in the Chinese Regiment as large as that of the Beluchi Regiments when they were first raised?

• General Dorward's confidential Report on Chinese Regiment was forwarded on December 24, 1, to Major-General Creagh, for transmission to the Under Secretary of State for War. J.H.C.

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Enclosure 3 in No. 85,

The OFFICER COMMANDING TROOPS, Wei-Hai-Wei,

I HAVE little to add to the remarks of Captain Watson. I can only record my amazement that such statements as those of the Railway Staff Officer, Peking, con- taining, as they do, charges of a nature happily quite unknown, and, hitherto, I trust, never hinted at, in the dealings of British Officers with the men under them, should have been placed on record in an official document and that, too, of the permanent and public nature of a Diary-by one British Officer with reference to the performance of the official duties of a body of his fellow Officers. It is true that the statements are those of Chinese, but I venture to think, that by thus placing them on record, the Railway Staff Officer at Peking has accepted a very grave responsibility.

may add, further, that had one of the men of this Regiment made statements of this nature re- garding the treatment, either of the men of the B.R.P., or of any non-European soldiers, by their British Officers, the only official notice taken would be the punishment of the offender for making a false accusation, as it would, undoubtedly, be. Were I, to-day, to follow the example of the Railway Staff Officer at Peking, which I earnestly trust will never be the case, and to enquire of any of our Tientsin men why they had en- listed in this Regiment instead of joining the B.R.P., I have little doubt I should receive some reply which, if brought officially to the notice of the Railway Staff Officer at Peking, would cause him the same amazement as the answers he has placed on official record have caused me.

2. With regard to the "good bit of instructing" said to be done by our deserters in the camps of Yuan and Ma, this statement, to anyone in the least degree acquainted with these camps, is its own refutation.

These armies are instructed on German lines, with German Drill and Chinese words of command, and it is, therefore, a manifest impossibility that the best in- structor in the British Army, to say nothing of a partly trained deserter from this Regiment, could do any "bit of instructing" at all. On the contrary, he would have to begin heavily handicapped, for he would need to first unlearn all his English Drill and ideas, as anyone who has compared the two systems will readily realise.

Wei-Hai-Wei, January 12, 1902.

3754

SIR,

A. A. S. BARNES, Captain,

Off in Command, 1st Chinese Regiment.

No. 86.

COLONIAL OFFICE to TREASURY. [Answered by No. 101.]

Downing Street, March 11, 1902. WITH reference to the letter from this Office of the 3rd October last,* I am directed by Mr. Secretary Chamberlain to transmit to you, for the consideration of the Lords Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury, a copy of a despatcht from the Acting Commissioner of Wei-bai-wei, on the subject of the proposal to make the British dollar legal tender in that dependency.

2. I am to observe that, in writing this despatch, Major Cowan has apparently overlooked the suggestion made in paragraph three of the letter from this Office of the 9th May last, that no special preference should be shown to the British dollar. More- over, it is clearly indicated in the correspondence between the Treasury and this Depart- ment that it is in no way intended to enforce the circulation of the British dollar in Wei-hai-wei to the exclusion of the Mexican dollar.

3. Mr. Chamberlain would suggest that as the proposal to make the British tiollar legal tender at Wei-hai-wei was originally made by the Hong-Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, their Lordships may perhaps think it advisable to consult that bank in regard to the prospects of obtaining from the foreign banks at Chifu such a promise of recognition and assistance as is contemplated in paragraph 4 of the enclosed despatch.

4. In the meantime, Mr. Chamberlain proposes to request the new Commissioner of Wei-hai-wei to report further on the matter, and to instruct him to defer issuing

L.F. transmitting copy of No. 56.

‡ No. 18.

† No. 74.