THE CASE OF LIEUTENANT WOODS.
THE recent inquiry by a Special Board into the charges made by Lieutenant H. C. Woods, of the Grenadier Guards, against some of his superior officers for writing prejudicial reports about him was of an unusual kind ; but the circumstances, we are inclined to think, prove Mr. Haldane to have been wise in instituting it. We hope that such inquiries will never be considered as the regular method of testing the grievances of regimental officers, which are better examined and adjudicated on in the course of routine; but it is profitable occasionally to have 'a case which clarifies some' of the principles upon which alone an efficient Army can be conducted laid before the country. The Woods Inquiry raised precisely 'those questions upon which laymen are apt to 'judge the Army, and often- condemn' it severely, without appreciating the peculiar basis upon which military authority has to be exercised. Mr. Woods's -case was of the sort which interests people ; it was bound to draw a good deal of attention outside the Army sooner or later. M. Woods himself said, and we dare say quite sincerely believed, 'that he was reported on unfavourably by his superiors because his habits were studious. Now the country has made up its mind that it wants the Army to be more competent in its work, more serious, more truly._ professional—in fine, more studio-us—and if - the-re- -is One thing which it will not tolerate, it is that the serious-minded soldier should be drummed out of his commission by triflers who find his industry in- vidious to themselves. If the Woods Inquiry had been private, and rumours had spread afterwards that the kind of soldier we need was being sacrificed to empty and• fashionable conventions, there might have been a long and harmful agitation supported on mistaken information and inspired by false issues. It seems, then, that Mr. Haldane's' course is justified, because the public now knows the facts' as clearly as the Grenadier Guards themselves know them ;. and it can see for itself that Mr. Woods was not con- demned because he was a student, but because by some natural defect which is difficult to define, but is imme- diately recognisable in those who have to command others,.
he had not the art of being an officer. It is impossible not to sympathise with those officers who were called upon to defend themselves in public, when their only fault was that they had discharged* their duties according to their lights, and were put to great expense in conducting their defence. We are not sure that in the circumstances they should be allowed to bear those expenses.
Colonel Woods, Mr. Woods's father, has begun an agita- tion for the rehearing of his son's case, and apparently hopes to have the matter laid before Parliament. That is exactly the kind of public wrangle which the choice of a Court of Inquiry sitting in public was designed to forestall, and which, we feel sure, that it will be found in the end to have forestalled successfully, and without injustice to any one. Mr. Woods does not appear before us as a man witha grievauce,—one whose case has been suppressed. Colonel Woods' writes a spirited letter in his son's defence, and the devotion Of a father to his son will, let us hope, never fail to attract sympathy and respect. For Colonel Woods's courage and resolution we Can have nothing but those feelings. Perhaps • we use words which are not strongeuough to express the power of such a spectacle to tOueh us. Indeed, the case of Mr. Woods is a tragedy. That is the only word. We believe after reading the evidence that lie was anxious to do well in the Army, that he had enterprise (because he volunteered at least twice for foreign service), and that he was " keen " enough, for example, to learn Turkish as it 'night be useful to him as a soldier. Against his intentions there is not a word to say. One can only be deeply sorry for him. But sympathy must not for a moment make us forget that Mr. Woods did by common consent fail utterly at being an officer. The decision of the Army Council that his retention in the Army was not desirable was, in our opinion, the only One that could have been come to on the evidence. It may be said that there is work in the Army even for officers who cannot command men, and to a small extent we dare say there is. But it is quite another question whether Mr. Wpods has such conspicuous ability at book-work that he ought to be retained in one of those rare positions in which the embarrassments of preserving. working relations with one's fellow-men are absent. The power to command is almost a mystery. Some men have it, others have not. It is virtually indispensable in an Army officer, and Mr. Woods was condemned because he had it not, and for that reason alone.
The main principle which emerges from the Inquiry is this, and we hope that the public will grasp it clearly. The.Army to be managed efficiently must be commanded right through by efficient officers. It must be run without respect of persons as a business firm is run. A business grm dismisses its manager, let us say, not because he is a ermine.l or because he is not so charming a person as the directors might like, but because he is a bad manager. There is no question of making charges to his moral dis- credit. The same rule applies, or ought to apply, to the Army. The enforcement of the rule means a severe impartiality which is diffieult to obtain under the intimate conditions in 'which. officers live; but it is the ideal which should never be allowed for a moment to disappear. After some of the comments which have been .made on the Woods case, what we are going to say may seem to some of our readers paradoxical or perverse. But we think that the fault of Mr. Woods's superiors was an excess of kindness. The business firm an similar circumstances might have replaced him by a more capable manager of his particular department much sooner. The officer, as experience has proved again and again, and as the evidence at the Inquiry showed, hopes against hope that his subordinate will improve. He is nearly always unwilling to write hard things of him in a confidential report. If he cannot go so far as to say that 'he is good when he knows very well that he is bad, he at all events glosses over his faults, and even refrains from answering certain questions put to him with cruel baldness by the War Office. Many of us have had a similar experience in writing testimonials for persons who have been in our employment. We cannot bring ourselves to spoil their career, and the temptation is very strong to insist on the satisfactory qualities and evade the unsatis- factory. Let us suppose an officer who has written too indulgent reports about a particular junior for years ; the time comes at last when he loses hope of his improvement and faces the duty of saying that he is useless to the Army. The announcement seems inexplicably abrupt and unreasonable to any one who has read the previous reports, but the explanation is really very simple and human and not in the least discreditable. The public may safely set aside any misgiving that the sudden change _after six years of not unfavourable reports on Mr. Wooda. to a decided condemnation was an instance of personal bias or persecution. The condemnation was not the opinion, of one man, but of many. The lesson which may be extracted from this is that superior officers who have the writing of confidential reports should be morally fertified in their ungrateful but necessary task in every possible way. They need the encouragement of the public, and also, we believe, not unfrequently of the War Office itself. The Army Council finds that Colonel Gordon-Gilmour .should have made "more searching inquiry" into Mr. Woods's capacity as an officer long ago ; but we suspect that Colonel Gordon- Gilmour's failure was indistinguishable from the kindly process we have described. The comparatively sudden strictures of Lieutenant-Colonel Cavendish, Major COrkran, and Major Gathorne-Hardy are capable of the same planation. If If the writers of reports said just what they thought, there would be no room for the "pressure "which some of Mr. Woods's younger brother-officers placed on him to leave the regiment. It is inevitable thathigh officers within the Army should have what amounts to wide powers of dis- missal, and it would be preposterous if they were commonly brought to trial for expressing a candid opinion. We are speaking here only of opinions on an officer's capacity as an officer. Deliberate derelictions of duty or other definite offences would not be dealt with in confiden- tial reports at all, but would be exposed by the ordinary judicial machinery. We have said nothing of the accusation, so familiar in cases of this nature, that Mr. Woods was unpopular because he did not join in the amusements of his brother-officers. This amounts, we fancy, to very much less than appears on the surface. It would be outrageous that an 'officer who preferred work to play should be ostracised on that account. But within reason the ability of an officer to fuse his interests with those of the regiment is a symptom of his powers of friendly co-operation. If officers do not "pull together," their regiment deteriorates in proportion. Therefore the ability of an officer to et on with others is a definite military accomplish- ment which cannot fairly be spoken of as though it were an "extra," without relation to the professional work of the Army.
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