NAVAL PRIZE MONEY.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXX, Issue 47, 12 October 1914, Page 4

NAVAL PRIZE MONEY.

Prize-money in the British Navy has been abolished by an Act hurriedly passed by Parliament. Thus effect lias been given after the actual outbreak of war to the decision which the Admiralty reached at the end of last year. The First Lord declared last spring that there was a strong feeling among naval officers that the private enrichment of individuals by acts of warfare was not compatible with, the highest conception of the naval and military profession. Thus a very old custom, dating back to the earliest days of sea power, has (writes Mr Archibald Herd in the Daily Telegraph) gone its way. The change means a heavy loss to naml officers and men. In the Great T7ar the substantial douceurs distributed by the Admiralty gilded many victories. In 1761, when the British frigates Actaeon and Fav-

ourite captured a Spanish vessel, a fortune was distributed. The two captains received £65,000, the, lieutenants £3OOO, the warrant officers £4338, the petty officers £IBOO, and the seamen and marines £485. In E 99, to quote another famous case, four British frigates seized two Spanish vessels, and the booty was so great that 64 artillery wagons had to be employed to convoy the treasure from the waterside to the famous citadel that rises majestically on Plymouth Hoe. As a result of this action the four captains received over £IO,OOO each, and their officers and men were paid nearly £9OOO in all. The many prizes which the navy, it may be expected, will capture during the" present war will be individually of even greater value than those which were seized in the old days. In the past 100 years ocean commerce has greatly developed. Only a few days ago the cruiser Essex, when it overhauled the German liner Cap Ortegal in the Atlantic, sent a wireless message stating that a “rich prize” .had been secured. The officers and men of the British ship did not know that at the very moment when they were so busy the House of Commons in Loudon was depriving the navy of its old privileges. There was a good deal to be said for a change in the administration of prize-money. It fell mostly to the officers in command of cruising vessels, and the crews of ships of the line, which here the brunt of great battles, got nothing.. Bufc it is quite another matter when it comes to the entire abolition, of prize-money. The First Lord admitted as much when he spoke in the spring. “The question of issuing some grant or bounty to sailors during the course of a war is under consideration, and it is one which should receive the attention of the Treasury.” The Act abolishing prizemoney has been passed without any clause to protect the navy. The At-torney-General, however, declared that the Bill did not preclude the grant of bounties. It may be hoped that, now that the navy is engaged in its stern work, the Government will encoui'age it by announcing that it will receive some reward for the effective measures which it is taking to arrest Germany’s valuable ocean-borne commerce.