PROMOTION IN THE ARMY.
TUE principle of reverence for vested interests has been too strong to permit a thorough treatment of the system of promotion. The recommendations of the Commissioners will palliate the worst evils—will permit the working of the principle which is vital to the efficiency of the Army ; but will still leave the service encum- bered in some degree by the fruit of the past system. The grand evils are twofold : of the officers in the upper ranks of the Army it may be said without exaggeration that they are beyond the age which is proper for service ; and they so preoccupy the ranks, many deep, that it is impossible for men in the active time of life to be placed in the grade of command suited to their age. Too old for service, the existing officers are obstructions to the appointment of men not too old for service. This is by far the most important incident of the system ; for the mere cost of 2699 officers, to which the half-pay and retired full-pay have been reduced, is a small con- sideration for a country like this. TUE principle of reverence for vested interests has been too strong to permit a thorough treatment of the system of promotion. The recommendations of the Commissioners will palliate the worst evils—will permit the working of the principle which is vital to the efficiency of the Army ; but will still leave the service encum- bered in some degree by the fruit of the past system. The grand evils are twofold : of the officers in the upper ranks of the Army it may be said without exaggeration that they are beyond the age which is proper for service ; and they so preoccupy the ranks, many deep, that it is impossible for men in the active time of life to be placed in the grade of command suited to their age. Too old for service, the existing officers are obstructions to the appointment of men not too old for service. This is by far the most important incident of the system ; for the mere cost of 2699 officers, to which the half-pay and retired full-pay have been reduced, is a small con- sideration for a country like this. It must be remembered, that according to the present system the officer must generally be chosen from his own grade or from that immediately below it. While the gross number of retired officers that oppress the list is diminishing, the evil of age appears to be increasing. While the field-officers on half-pay have di- minished between 1841 and 1851, from 554 to 390, the average age of Colonels promoted to be Major-Generals in 1841 was fifty- nine ; in 1851 it was sixty. In the brevet of 1841 no Colonel in the Royal Artillery promoted to be a Major-General was above seventy ; in the brevet of 1851 there was no Colonel promoted who was under seventy. The comparison is yet more unfavourable when we contrast the present period with that of the last war. The Duke of Wellington, who was a Major-General at thirty-three, was singular only for his abilities, not for his years : it was stated before the Commission of 1840 by Lord Fitzroy Somerset, that "in the last war, with the exception of Lord Lynedoeh and Sir Thomas Picton, they had no General Officers in command above forty years of age • they were all between thirty-five and forty"; and Sir George Murray was the only one out of eight eminent 13enerals contemporary with the Duke of Wellington who had not attained the same rank at the age of forty. Under forty, it may be said that a man is young ; and during that war they had young officers capable of sustaining the fatigues of the field with un- diminished keenness, ardour, and alacrity of sense, body, and faculties. The average age of Major-Generals is now about sixty- five and of Lieutenant-Generals still higher. The age of the officers, however, either as respects themselves or as respects the obstruction offered to the appointment of others, is by no means the only evil. It is a consequence of the system that the number of officers who have acquired a right of promotion extends three or four deep, and that those who might be selected to replace those Generals are either old men or men who have made so little advance towards general command as to be without experience or practice. The threshold of General rank is crowded by Colonels, and not all of them Colonels who have command of a regiment ; for example, there are no fewer than forty "Lieutenant- Colonels" of the Guards, who are so only in rank, and have only had command of a company. These men have a right to their promotion since with their commissions they purchased the rank and paid for their posts accordingly. The consequence is, not only that men of vigorous age are excluded from the higher commands, but that they are positively kept at a distance from those com- mands, and are unable to acquire the practice which may be said to constitute the study for those ranks, until long after they have passed the proper age for performing the duties. We have already explained, in general terms, the nature of the plan recommended by the Commissioners. It may be said to con- sist of three measures combined. The retired list—that is, the list of officers enjoying rank and pay with the condition of not being called upon to serve—is to be augmented ; actual service is to be required as a condition to promotion by seniority above the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel ; and the Crown is to exercise a greater freedom in appointing officers to temporary command for the public service, or to the higher ranks in reward of "brilliant services in the field." This arrangement, however, will still leave a number of officers who may not retire, or who occupy honorary rank, to be
absorbed by degrees—in four years, the cenunissionere hope; bit we susprot that if the subject were laid before an actuary, he could show, that although the average age of officers in the upper ranks would be materially reduced, it would by no means be brought down to the level during the last war, or give us men of that age which is the best for service. At the commencement of a new war, the duration of which cannot be limited beforehand, it is important to relieve ourselves from the encumbrance which the last war left us and which the peace has aggravated; and to prevent the reproduction of the same encumbrance, either to impede us during the war or to op- press us during peace. It is a gross abuse of precedent if it pre- vent us from profiting by the mistake of the past and only compel us to repeat that mistake. The mistake was in treating promotion as a thing to be disposed of for the interest of the servant and not for the interest of the country. This is exaotly inverting the truth. A just promotion, in a service like that of the army, can only be employed for the benefit of the state; any other use of it is equivalent to misappropriation or embezzlement. It is proper that the state should reward its officers to the full measure of their deserts both in justice to them and as a due to its own dignity; but certainly reward in the form either of rank or of profit can be given without placing upon the ranks of the service the encum- brance of honorary pensioners, or upon posterity a needless debt. Brilliant services in the field should be rewarded, but not by lodging upon the ranks of the army at some future period a man past service, or upon the exchequer a permanent drain over which neither the state nor the individual has control. Of all transac- tions, rewards are the worst to distribute on the credit system; especially when they are so distributed as to involve the state in debt, and to encumber its active service with superannuated func- tionaries. A liberal gift of money would tell for more, as a pre, sent reward, than a pension. It would probably enable the recipi- ent to dispose of it for his own permanent advantage, but would not entail upon the state a debt of which it cannot see the end. And, letting the promotion still go strictly by the necessities of ser- vice, an honorary rank might be given independently of militarY command. No doubt, discredit has been attached to mere honorary titles, because they have been lavished upon dishonorable persona or persons of no mark ; but their credit would be restored if they become the rewards of men distinguished by their actions.
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