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1 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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those disposed to shrink from the hardships of colonial service at the expense of their comrades. The last point to which I have to advert on this question, is the statement, that it was by means of the depot system that "the sudden, unexpected, and extensive demands for reinforcements in British North America, have been rapidly and most effectively met Upon looking back at the arrangements which were adopted for the purpose of effecting the late reinforcement of the troops in North America, it will be found that the above statement is by no means accurate. Two battalions of the Guards were sent to this part of Her Majesty's dominious, and also nine additional battalions of infantry of the line, drawn partly from other colonies, partly from the amount of force at home; this being the largest part of the reinforcement to North America, it is true that the remainder was furnished by increasing the service companies of the But even this part of regiments employed on this service from 479 to 800 men. the reinforcement, amounting only to 2,178 rank and file, cannot justly be The increased regarded as having been obtained by means of the depot system. drafts made from the depôts were a deduction from the force that it had previously been thought necessary to keep at home, and if that force had consisted of a greater number of regiments in place of depots there would have been no reason whatever to have prevented the sending of so many of those regiments to America, as would have afforded a force equal to that obtained from the depôts. The only actual increase of force which took place upon that occasion was accomplished by adding 80 rank and file to the establishment of all the regiments employed in North America, and this was an increase which was rendered practicable not by the division of the Regiments into service and depôt Companies (for it was accomplished with equal facility in the Regi- ments at home which were not so divided) but by the circumstance that with a view to the possibility of such an exigency arising, the establishment of officers and non-com- missioned officers in all the regiments of the service had been kept sufficient for the increased number of privates it was found expedient to raise.

For these reasons, it appears to me that there is no sufficient ground for attributing to the depot system those practical advantages which have been said to result from it, while on the other hand, it has, I have shown, greatly protracted the periods of foreign service which it has been necessary to require from the troops, and has also been attended with an expense which has certainly exceeded £30,000, a-year, a sum more than equal to the annual cost of a complete regiment of infantry.

I have been compelled to trouble your Lordship with these details respecting the system of depôts, because Lord Hill's proposition is entirely founded upon the assump tion of the great advantages of this systein, and of its being consequently expedient, in order to keep it up effectively, to make the large addition to the Army which be has suggested. "If I am right in considering these alleged advantages as more than doubtful, it would naturally follow that it would not be advisable for the purpose of preserving that system to make an auginention of the Army, which I have shown cannot be supported upon the ground of the increased demand upon its services abroad. At the same time I am far from proposing to your Lordship that the system of depots should be at once abolished, such a change should only, I think, be adopted after further inquiry and deliberation than could at this moment be given to it; all I would suggest to your Lordship would be to meet the difficulty which has been pointed out with respect to those regiments of which the service Companies have been raised to 600 men, not by increasing the strength of these depôts, but by a change in their organization, which, if it should be found successful, might hereafter be extended to other regiments.

According to the present arrangement, the depots of these regiments, consisting of only 130 rank and file, are divided into four Companies with their proper officers, and a sort of regimental staff in miniature, the effect of which is that, an expense is incurred altogether disproportionate to its intended object, and that in these Companies there are less than eleven privates to every officer, while in the service Companies of the same regiments, there are upwards of twenty-seven. I would propose to your Lordship that instead of this arrangement, those regiments serving abroad, of which the service Companies are meant to be of 600 rank and file, should be divided into ten nearly equal Companies, those abroad being seventy-five, those at home seventy-three rank and file, that eight of these Companies giving the same number of rank and file as at present should serve abroad, and that the two left at home, instead of being formed into separate corps, should form part of a battalion to be composed of the reserves of five or six regiments, somewhat in the manner of the provisional battalion at Chatham. The reserves of six regiments would form a battalion of twelve Companies, of which the command should be taken by the Lieutenant-Colonel of one of the regiments, and one, or perhaps two Majors might also do duty with the battalion instead of with their regi- ments abroad.

By this arrangement, each Lieutenant-Colonel of a regiment would have an opportunity of occasionally having a tour of duty at home, the same advantage would also accrue to the Majors and Officers of other ranks; thus maintaining the principle of the present depôt system to such an extent as would suffice for affording some relief, in cases of sickness, to the officers of regiments serving abroad.

The proposed provisional battalions would have the same establishment of rank and file, as six of the present depôts of 139, but as they would have to furnish a much smaller number of men for officers' servants, for orderlies, and for other duties arising out of the organization of thesedepôts as separate corps, they would afford a far more effective

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force for any duties required at home, while their sufficiency for the purpose of keeping the regiments abroad complete, can scarcely be questioned, when it is considered with how much smaller a reserve this is accomplished in the case of the regiments serving in India and in Australia.

To the advantages of this plan which I have now mentioned, must be added the very considerable saving which would be effected by it.

I find, upon examination, that after allowing for the appointment of a permanent paymaster surgeon and assistant surgeon to each battalion, and for the other necessary expenses of its formation, the direct saving to the public (independently of the contingent diminution of expense in passages, &c. of which it is difficult to form an estimate) would be not less than £1,908, if the reserves of six regiments were to be consolidated, or of £1,440, if those of five only were to be included in each battalion.

As I have already said, I would propose to your Lordship to confine this change for the present to regiments of which the service Companies were, according to the arrange- ment recently decided upon, to have been upon the establishment of 600 rank and file.

These regiments are the eighteen in North America, and the four which will remain at Gibraltar. The latter are reckoned by Lord Hill, as among those of which the establishment is to be 559, but if I am not mistaken, it was your Lordship's intention when one of the five regiments, now forming the garrison of this fortress, is withdrawn, to place the four which will remain, upon the establishment of 600 rank and file. Assuming this to be the case, there will be twenty-two regiments of which the reserve Companies, if the suggestion I have made should be approved, might be formed into four provisional battalions, two of which would consist of twelve and two of ten Companies each. The result I believe would be to remove the inconvenience which Lord Hill states to be occasioned by the smallness of the depôts of 189 rank and file, without the augmentation of the army, which his Lordship proposes, and which, for the reasons I have already stated, I cannot consider necessary for the purposes for which it is recommended. The reduction of expense which would result from the adoption of this plan, would be certainly not less than £6,696 a-yeur.

The depôts of those regiments of which the service companies are to consist of 559, are also stated by Lord Hill to be too small for the purposes which were contem- plated when the division of regiments into service and reserve companies originally took place. I un much disposed to concur with his Lordship in this opinion, and I certainly should regard it as a considerable improvement upon the existing system, if these regiments were also to be divided in the same manner as those to which I have I do not, however, adverted above, and their reserves consolidated in a similar manner. propose this change at present, both because I think it will probably appear to your Lordship to be expedient to try in the first instance upon a more limited scale, the effect of the proposed consolidation of the reserves of different regiments into provi- sional battalions, and also because as regards the depôts of 180 rank and file, the fucon- venience of their present organization is not so striking as in the smaller reserves of only 189. I find that the depôts of regiments upon foreign service were first reduced to the establishment of 180, when Sir H. Hardinge was Secretary at War in the year 1890, and since that period, they have been more generally upon this than upon a larger establishment without any complaint of inconvenience of which I am aware.

It is true, that these depots will be exposed to heavier annual demands for the supply of vacancies from the service companies, now that the latter are to consist of 559, than could be the case, when they were only 479 rook and file, but upon examining the data furnished by Lord Hill, as to the amount of the drafts required by regiments apon foreign service, I find that even taking the average demand of Jamaica and the West Indies (which is, of course, by far the heaviest) the number of men required to be sent out, in order to keep the service companies complete, when the latter are 559 rank and file, will be somewhat less than eleven annually beyond the number that would be required for service companies of 479. Two regiments of the latter strength, one in the West Indies, and the other in Jamaica, would, according to Lord Hill's statement, require annual drafts to the extent of about 130 men; if, therefore, the same proportion should continue with larger numbers (which there is no reason to doubt) two regiments of 550 each, upon the same stations would together require annual drafts to the extent of somewhat less than 152 men. This is not a difference in the demand upon the depôts which can make any material alteration in the efficiency of the latter, more particularly when it is considered how much the facility of supplying these demands has been increased by the adoption, during the last year, of the practice, I have already adverted to, of recruiting not merely to supply actual vacancies, but in anticipation of those that are expected.

I have thus stated to your Lordship, in great detail, the considerations by which I have been led to the conclusion that the augmentation of the establishment of the infantry regiments of the line, which has been proposed by the General Commanding-in- Chief, is not necessary, and I have explained the change in the existing arrangements by which I conceive, that without that augmentation, the inconvenience upon which his Lordship's proposal was founded may be removed; it only now remains for me to advert to some minor points connected with the question of what is to be the military establishment of the ensuing year.

The first of these points is the proposed increase of the establishment of the Seats Fusilier Guards. This measure would certainly be one of no very considerable expense, The statement I but on the other hand it is one for which I see no suflicient reason.