CAB9-1_PT2 — Page 16

(For record)

Printed for the use of the Colonial Office. February 9, 1897.

Page 16

SECRET.

No. 154 R.

f.

ST. HELENA.

Report of Local Defence Committee on Defence Scheme, September 1896.

я

1

Remarks by the Colonial Defence Committee.

THE Governor suggests in his covering letter that he should be supplied with an interleaved copy of the Defence Scheme, and that the Report of the Local Committee should take the form of notes opposite those parts of the Scheme to which reference is made, their covering letter being reserved for representations upon general questions relating to the defence.

An interleaved copy will in future be sent to the station of each succes- sive revision of the Scheme. The procedure proposed by the Governor is considered generally convenient. In cases, however, where the corrections involved in the Scheme are small, it is better that they should be embodied in a Report, as has been done in the present instance, so that they may be considered without it being necessary to reprint the whole Scheme.

2. In paragraph 8 of the covering letter the Governor again strongly urges that the telegraph line be at once extended to the south-west of the island.

The Committee understand that the War Office is now arranging for this extension.

3. The Governor further reports (paragraph 9) that no suitable steam- launch is available in the Colony for examination purposes in war.

A launch appears to the Colonial Defence Committee to be essential for carrying out the traffic regulations, and they would submit the matter for the consideration of the Admiralty.

4. In paragraph 6 of their Remarks No. 137 R, dated the 10th March, 1896, the Colonial Defence Committee recommended, for the consideration of the War Office, that the existing machine-gun mountings should be adapted to enable these guns to be employed with the movable infantry force, and the Local Committee now call attention to the fact that the G.O.C. South Africa has recommended the supply of tripod mountings for these guns.

The Committee are informed that instructions have been sent (57/St. Helena/1872) to the station to alter the mountings of the machine- guns, in accordance with a plan that has been proposed and tried locally.

5. In paragraph 14 of their Remarks No. 137 R, dated the 10th March, 1896, the Colonial Defence Committee suggested, for the consideration of the War Office, that au arrangement should be made with the Government of

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