Colonial Despatches

Mr Merivale
Send a Copy of this letter to the Treasury with reference to 11407 3 & 12504, 4 enclosing the Return annexed to 12529 5 (War Office) which will give them the dates at which the several portions of the Detachment embarked? It will also be necessary to call their attention to the advance of 120 days Regimental pay under the Authority of the War Office, the Treasury having made a similar advance?

Mr Merivale
I do not quite understand the circumstances under wh the 120 day's pay has been advanced. Has there been a double payment amounting to 240 days; & if so is there not some great mistake wh must be rectified?

Mr Jadis
Can you explain this?

See annexed minute.

Draft reply, Lytton to Douglas, No. 19, 9 February 1859.

Draft, Merivale to Under-Secretary, War Office, 17 February 1859, explaining details of the advance and requesting the War Office to pay the portion that was for regimental pay.

Draft, Merivale to Secretary to the Treasury, 17 February 1859, explaining details of the advance and stating the War Office would be paying the regimental portion of it.

Mr Merivale
In 9486 6 Col. Moody asks that the usual advance of 120 days pay (Army and Colonial) may be issued to the Royal Engineers. With this request we comply. (See Minutes on 9486 which state the grounds on which the Treasury were asked to advance the Army Pay). In 9723 7 the Treasury inform us that £800 had been advanced on account of the Pay—Colonial & Military—upon which we write to the War Office to know when the extra Military Pay ceased as from that date the Colonial pay would commence, adding that 120 days pay (Regimental & Colonial) had been advanced by the Treasury. (See draft attached to 12529). 8 Hence the present letter from the W.O. 13098 from which it would appear that there had been a double issue. But I find upon enquiry at the War Office that the meaning of their letter is this. No money has been paid by that Dept, but the 120 days pay has been advanced by the Army Agents as a matter of course under the Warrant. So that the Treasury having paid £800 to the Agents in repayment of the advance it is only necessary for us to tell the War Office of the amount thus paid in order to guard against any mistake on double issue.

Very well.

Mr Jadis
If you cannot answer Sir E. Lytton's question within, could you write to Blackwood.

Mr Merivale
A letter was written to the War Department on the 10th of November, 9 conveying the opinion of Sir E. Lytton and the Chancellor of the Exchequer that the army pay of the Royal Engineers should be paid by the War Dept. and their Colonial Allowances by this office. The War Dept. have not answered that letter, but I learn by private inquiry that they acquiesce in the arrangement and have made provision for paying the detachment accordingly. It may however be as well to obtain their concurrence officially, and in writing to the War Dt now about the advance of pay, to ask whether General Peel agrees in the arrangement laid down in our letter of the 10th Novr.

There is nothing in this recent correspondence which will militate against the distribution of the expenses between the War Office & Colonial Office. It has beenexplained explained to the War Dt that the advance of 120 days Regimental pay was made by the Treasury at Sir E. Lytton's desire, because the question, by which Department it was ultimately to be defrayed, was then pending, and the War Department have obtained the sanction of the Treasury for paying the detachment till the next army Estimates are passed, in which the amount will be included, and the addition to the force which the employment of this detachment in B. Columbia has rendered necessary will be inserted.

The practical steps to be taken are:

1. To write to the War Dept, inform them that the advance made on account of the Engineer officers' pay, amounted to £800, that so much of this sum as consists of regimental pay will have to be repaid by the War Office to the Treasury under the arrangement for the distribution of the expenses, in which Sir E. Lytton presumes that General Peel concurs, and explain that the advance was only made in this way because Col. Moody represented that the Officers wd otherwisenot not obtain it before leaving England.

2. Write to the Treasury, sending them the dates at which the officers embarked, tell them that the Colonial allowances of the Officers will commence from that date and that any claim which they may have for these allowances between the dates at which they lost their working pay & their embarkation must be left to be adjusted hereafter, (because the War Dept cannot yet say what the former dates are) and say that so much of the £800 advance as consisted of army pay is to be defrayed from army funds.

3. Write to the Governor for Colonel Moody's infn as to the claim to Colonial allowances before embarkation.

Mr Irving
I am not myself well acquainted with the course which this correspondence has taken; but in reliance on your very clear & categorical minute, I would ask you to draft [a] letter & despatch in the sense which you suggest. Let Mr Elliot see it.

Mr Irvings minute does him much credit. Let Mr Elliott see it. It will require care in writing to W.O. In referring to my letter of 10 Novr, I should assume that its proposals were accepted rather than request a reply. Otherwise we may leave the whole question as settled by that other response.

Very well so far as this goes. But let one fact be borne in mind & kept on record to prevent future misunderstandings—with the W.O.

The W.O. wished to saddle this Office with all the expenses & pay, regimental & Col. of the Sappers & Miners with their Officers, on the plea that this military force was employed for Civil Service, & the W.O. had taken no estimates for it. On this I communicated both with Lord D. 10 & the Ch. of the Exch. 11 & they both approved my proposition vizt that the W.O. should pay all the military pay &c, & the Colonial pay shd be met by Col. Funds. I directed a letter to be sent to W.O. on this head. I suppose it was so but I never remember to have seen the answer. Let me know more on this head. Meanwhile on the matter of the correspondence I can only hope that nothing is here misconstrued which will militate agt the distribution of expenses I proposed & saddle C.O. with what belongs to W.O. Mr Blackwood knows all about the correspondence I refer to.