ADJUTANT-GENERAL--_Continued_
Misunderstanding of Military matters--Forecast of change of Staff
by a Charwoman--Antiquated Military Exercises abandoned--A
change in Inspections at Sandhurst--Funeral of Her Majesty
Queen Victoria--Offer to go to South Africa--Accepted, but not
carried out--Lord Roberts approves certain reforms initiated by
me--I leave Pall Mall, after eight years’ work.
All through the war I was asked by my friends, “Why ever did you
send out so-and-so; see how badly he is doing?” And again, “Why did
you not make better plans?” The ignorance of the Public is the more
comprehensible when we consider that in February the Under-Secretary of
State stated, in the House of Commons, that the Divisional and Brigade
Commanders were appointed on the recommendation of the Army Board. He
had been misinformed, and his informant, on my remonstrance, admitted
the error. I was never able, however, to tell my friends the truth,
until asked to give evidence before Lord Elgin’s Royal Commission of
Inquiry into the War. I then stated, in reply to questions, the facts.
The Order in Council under which the War Office was administered at
the time, had placed the Heads of the great Departments in a position
of quasi-independence of the Commander-in-Chief, by allowing them the
privilege of dealing directly with the Secretary of State for War, at
his option. The Commander-in-Chief, however, ordered me to address
him on any matters which I desired to place before the Secretary
of State, and therefore, although Lord Lansdowne minuted papers to
me, he received them back through Lord Wolseley; I therefore had no
independent position. In regard to plans, as Adjutant-General I never
knew of one plan of Military operations. The expression frequently
used by the Secretary of State in the House, “My Military Advisers,”
implied only the Commander-in-Chief and the Director-General of
Military Intelligence.
Throughout the year I was asking for an increase in the Establishment
of officers, showing we had in one case, one officer to pay 850 men, of
whom half were at Hounslow and half at Aldershot. I was urging that the
Establishments of Rank and File were insufficient to enable us to train
our soldiers, for when we had taken out the best educated and most
intelligent men in each company for Mounted Infantry, as signallers,
for Regimental Transport, and servants, there were few left capable of
acting as section or group leaders; there were too few officers and too
few men.
In one of the papers I submitted to the Secretary of State I wrote: “I
am certain that all officers who have been fighting in South Africa
will agree that the want of training has been the direct cause of
many of our heavy losses, and of some of our reverses.” I explained
that the Rank and File were as untrained as they were brave, and this
from no fault of their own or of their officers, but because the
British soldier was never given sufficient opportunity of practising
his profession in the United Kingdom. I was engaged in another long
correspondence with Cavalry Colonels, endeavouring to reduce the
obligatory expenses of officers.
Lord Lansdowne went to the Foreign Office in November. I had worked
under his direction for five years, and regarding him with genuine
affection, shall always gratefully remember his sympathy in my
disappointment in not being allowed to proceed to South Africa. If it
were not so sad, the animadversion of the Press on his want of vigour
as War Minister would have been comical. He added ten Line Battalions,
one of Irish Guards, and 330 field guns to the Army.
When it was foreseen that Lord Lansdowne would leave the War Office
there were many speculations as to his successor, and we were under the
impression that Mr. George Wyndham was on the point of being nominated,
before it was decided to send him to Ireland; and I got him to agree
in anticipation to support my proposition that any pensioned private
soldiers of good character should receive an increase at the age of
sixty-five to make up a living income.
In the office it was universally believed that when Lord Wolseley’s
Command terminated, some of the Senior officers who had shared his
many years of work in trying to render the Army fit for War would be
removed, and this feeling was amusingly indicated by the conversation
of two women who, when scrubbing the floors of the War Office, were
overheard talking by General Laye, the Deputy Adjutant-General, as he
went into his room one busy morning at nine o’clock. During the War a
Restaurant had been started in the basement of the building, and I,
finding the smell intolerable, had a glass air-shaft carried from the
basement above the level of the Adjutant-General’s room. One woman,
looking up from her scrubbing and pointing to the carpenter’s poles,
asked, “Sally, what ‘as they put up that ere scaffolding for?” The
other replied, “Don’t yer know? That’s where the new lot’s going to
’ang the old lot.”
When it became evident that the class of Yeomanry who for patriotic
reasons, went to South Africa at Army rates of pay was exhausted, the
Secretary of State enlisted men at five shillings, many of whom, in the
opinion of the General Officer Commanding at Aldershot, were no better
in education or class than the average Cavalry recruit.
The General Commanding in South Africa telegraphed for more Mounted
Infantry, and I then suggested that, the Boers having no longer any
Artillery, it would be simpler to train our Artillery in South Africa
to shoot with a rifle. I was not certain how the Gunners would like the
idea, but the sense of duty is very high in the Corps, and the result
was very satisfactory.
In the Autumn I addressed the Commander-in-Chief, pointing out that
our drill-book contained many obsolete movements, and asking leave to
curtail as useless for war our Manual Exercise, containing in slow
time nearly fifty motions, which most of our Generals and many of our
Commanding officers still cherished, as their predecessors had, since
it was instituted in 1780. I stated the Chinese was the only other
nation which had any exercise like it; that Germany and Austria were
content with teaching the men three motions; and also that we continued
to practise the bayonet exercise, all of which was more suitable for
a Music Hall than for training men to fight. The Commander-in-Chief
approved, and on the 1st December an order was issued forbidding the
Manual and Bayonet exercises being performed at Inspections or at any
other time, as Regimental or Battalion parade practices. The order was
actually signed by myself as Adjutant-General, although it was issued
on the day I became acting Commander-in-Chief, for Lord Wolseley gave
up his office on the last day of November.
In my one month of command I was able to carry out one reform. It
became part of my duty to inspect the academies at Woolwich and
Sandhurst. At the former I endeavoured, with only slight success, to
render the inspection more practical, but at Sandhurst the reform was
drastic. For eighty years, since the College was established, the
young officers had been inspected in marching past, and in performing
the Manual and Bayonet exercises as a preparation for war. When I
ordered an inspection of the cadets in a practical Outpost scheme, one
officer Instructor intimated privately his intention of resigning, as
he considered my demands on him were outside his duty. I sent back a
message that his resignation would be accepted; heard nothing more of
it, and saw an attack on a line of Outposts, for which I had set the
scheme, very well carried out.
At the end of 1900 and the beginning of the new year, I was occupied in
preparing papers for a Committee of Inquiry into the War Office system,
of which Mr. Clinton Dawkins was Chairman. I advocated strongly before
the Committee the transfer to General officers commanding Districts,
the greater part of the Administrative and Financial part of the
business then transacted at the War Office, in two carefully prepared
memoranda, and supplemented my arguments by giving evidence at length
before the Committee.
I was much impressed by Mr. Clinton Dawkins’ quick apprehension of
points in administration; but his manner was so quiet that, as I told
him months later, when he asked me what I thought of his report, “Oh, I
am delighted; but I was astonished when it came out, for I thought when
I left your committee room that I had failed to make much impression on
you, and you have practically endorsed nearly all my suggestions.”
Lord Roberts returned to London on the 3rd of January, when my
brief command of the Army ceased. He took up at once the question of
officers, by Lord Wolseley’s directions, wearing uniform[335] at the
War Office, on which an order I had drafted two years previously was
and is still in print, but it has not yet been issued.
In the evening of the 22nd January Her Imperial Majesty the Queen died,
and besides my personal grief, I realised I had lost a Patroness who
since the Zulu war had treated me with the most gracious kindness.
The hours in the office for the next week were longer than ever, much
unnecessary work being occasioned by different departments overlapping
in their desire to have everything according to the King’s Commands.
On the 2nd February, the day of the funeral, the morning was bitterly
cold, and the Commander-in Chief, being doubtless anxious, left his
hotel ten minutes before the Head Quarters Staff were ordered to
be present to accompany him. There was then a wait of over an hour
and a half at Victoria Station, and when at last the procession
moved, on a wave of the Chief’s baton, it was difficult to start
immediately the head of the column, which was already to the north of
Buckingham Palace. When we moved, it was nearly impossible to make the
cream-coloured horses walk at the pace of Infantry marching “in Slow
time,” and I apprehend the Procession could not have satisfied His
Majesty the King.
When the team, being hooked in to the made-up gun carriage, moved from
Windsor Station the bands, which were immediately under the overhead
passage then recently erected, clashed with such a reverberating noise
that some of the horses threw themselves into the collar violently, and
the carriage rocked ominously. Fortunately the off wheeler broke the
swingletree, and as there was no other at hand the sailors drew the
coffin up to St. George’s Chapel,--perhaps a more appropriate manner of
haulage than horses for a Naval monarch.
Some people assumed it was the fault of the Adjutant-General that there
was no spare swingletree as there is on every gun service carriage, but
I had no difficulty in producing correspondence showing that I had been
instructed from Windsor Castle that the War Office need not interfere
in the matter of the made-up gun carriage, which was to be supplied by
the Carriage factory at Woolwich on requisition by the Lord Chamberlain.
On the 1st February the Military Secretary came into my office and
asked if I was willing to go to South Africa and serve under Lord
Kitchener. I took two hours for consideration, and then assented,
mentioning verbally, I thought that for Service there was no question
of dignity involved, although Kitchener was a Lieutenant when I had
been some years a Major-General.[336]
On the 7th February I was informed it had been settled I was not to go
to South Africa, and although I was not allowed officially to see the
telegram on which the decision was based, it came into my hands, and
was to the effect (telegram from Lord Kitchener), “While he would be
delighted to serve under Sir Evelyn Wood, if he were sent out, he felt
he ought not to have him under his command.” I could not thank him at
the time, but did so eight months later.[337]
All through January we were discussing the organisation of Ammunition
columns, and to my regret I failed to make my Superiors realise that
such could not be formed, unless the officers were available. I was
asked, “But surely you can get them somewhere?” So far as I know, the
matter is “still under consideration.”
In the second week in February His Majesty intimated his intention of
presenting medals to a Colonial Corps which was about to arrive in the
Thames. The matter was not definitely settled, so I was unable to let
the Commanding officer know the reason why I sent him a written request
couched in polite terms for a nominal roll of all Ranks: I received
back for answer a verbal message, “he had no time for such Red-tape
nonsense.” Eventually, however, I obtained the names from a courteous
subordinate, and by keeping Colonel Crutchley and non-commissioned
officers of the Guards sorting up to a late hour, the medals wanted
for the parade next day were arranged by Squadrons on trays. When the
decorated men had passed, there were a dozen or so who were indignant
at not receiving medals, but I elicited from them that they had been on
sick leave in England, and only joined the Corps as it marched into the
garden of Buckingham Palace!
On the 22nd March the Secretary of State informed me that it had been
decided to reduce the status of the Adjutant-General, and asked for
my views. I had worked for many years with Mr. Brodrick, and being on
terms of personal friendship I offered to resign at once, if it would
render his position less troublesome. This offer he declined to accept,
and eventually it was settled I should go to Salisbury when the Army
Corps system, which had been explained in his speech in the House of
Commons on the 9th March, was brought into operation. He stated that
his object was to centralise responsibility in the districts, but
decentralise administration, and he fulfilled his object eventually to
a great extent.
On the 15th May the Commander-in-Chief motored round a part of Essex
from the Thames to Epping, in order to study the tactical features of
the country. As we passed three miles to the east of Ongar I stopped
the car at Stondon Place, in order that Lord Roberts might leave a card
on my young friend Maurice White,[338] Rifle Brigade, who after showing
marked courage, and being slightly wounded on the 22nd December 1900,
was shot through the spine four days later. He chanced to be at the
gate in an invalid carriage wheeled by his elder brother, one of the
hardest riders in the Essex Hunt, as we passed, and I presented the
wounded lad to his Lordship, who spoke very kindly to him.
I had arranged with Lord Roberts, who was dining with the Speaker, that
he should go up by train from Epping; but when he saw I meant to drive
through the Forest for pleasure, he elected to accompany me. Between
Woodford and Walthamstow we passed a light grocer’s van; the man was
not driving carefully, and after we had passed, the noise of the motor
frightened the horse, which, swerving, collided with a lamp-post. The
shafts parted, the horse broke away, and the man was pitched into the
road, where he lay insensible, till running back I picked him up. While
Lord Roberts with General Nicholson proceeded to London, I put the man,
whose thigh was broken, into the car, and drove to a Hospital about a
mile off. The Matron and nurses were sympathetic and anxious to help,
but they assured me that every bed was occupied. A Committee of doctors
was sitting at the time, and one of them coming out to see who was
talking, I offering money, used Lord Roberts’ name; but all in vain,
the Doctor saying, “It is not a question of money; our sole objection
is that there is absolutely no spare bed.” Handing him my card, I asked
where I could take the man, on which he said, “You are Essex, I see;
we must try and do something for you. If you will have the man lifted
out, I will clear a bed.” This he did by taking one of the patients who
could best bear moving up to a nurse’s room, and putting the injured
man in his place.
I was now seeing more of the Commander-in-Chief daily, for we had been
strangers until he took over Command. Travelling about with him we
interchanged ideas, and I realised the charm of the personality which
has so agreeably affected most of those with whom he has worked in his
long career. On the 21st May he wrote to the Secretary of State that
he had intended to take up the revision of Confidential Reports on
assuming Command, but found it had already been done.[339]
I accompanied him to the Aldershot Central Gymnasium in July, and he
was so impressed with the training that he wrote to me next day urging
we should do all in our power to develop the individual intelligence of
the men, and no longer train them like machines. I had the satisfaction
of informing him we had taken up the matter in October 1900, and what
he saw at Aldershot was being carried out at every Infantry Depot, and
that the Commanding officers were all in favour of the new system.
In July the Commander-in-Chief, impressed by the difficulty of training
officers with small companies, considered whether it would not be
better to have four companies instead of eight in a battalion. I was
able at once to give him the history of the proposals which had been
made during the last forty years. I did not mention, as was the case,
that General Blumenthal, when he attended our Manœuvres in 1872, told
a friend of mine that he envied us our small companies, and that the
large companies in Germany were due only to the impossibility of
finding adequate numbers of gentlemen to officer the Army. I pointed
out that most of the advantages were obtainable from two companies
being worked together for five months in the spring and summer. This
arrangement has, moreover, the advantage of enabling Commanding
officers to so associate them that the most capable officers are
responsible for the two companies. Lord Roberts wrote to me next day:
“Your note on four versus eight companies is unanswerable; I shall not
move in the matter.”
Somewhat later he was not able to agree with me at first in my views
about Volunteer Field Artillery. He had seen the excellent work done
by high-class mechanics sent out by the Vickers Company, and wished
to create batteries of Volunteers. I had frequently put on paper that
it was impracticable for Volunteers to give sufficient time to become
efficient Field Artillery men, but the Secretary of State formed a
Committee composed of the Financial Secretary, a Militia officer, and
a civilian, to report on the subject, and they soon came to the same
conclusion as I had done. Indeed, although a limited number of Infantry
brigades have trained in camp for fifteen days, to their enhanced
efficiency, yet as three months’ initial, and a month’s annual training
is essential for Field Artillery, the proposition was not feasible.
Before I left the Office I got a grant from the Treasury, the mere idea
of which was received with ridicule when I first mentioned it in the
War Office. I pointed out that the Staff College graduates in 1899–1900
had fed the Drag Hounds and paid the wages of the kennel huntsman,
although on duty in South Africa, the period for which they would have
remained at the College had the war not arisen. When the Establishment
was closed, no more funds were available, and so at the conclusion of
the War, or when it was in sight, and we were arranging to re-open the
College, there were no Drag Hounds. Now the most gifted Staff officer
is useless in the Field unless he is at home in the saddle, and there
are many who go to the College who have never had an opportunity of
riding across country and over fences until they follow the Drag
Hounds. I put this clearly, and to the astonishment of the Secretary
of State the £200 was granted, and handed over to an officer who was
rejoining on the Tutorial staff. I had met him when I was looking at
some tactical operations near Tidworth, and heard the story, which
interested me much, as I knew the educational value of the Drag Hounds.
In July I heard the name of my successor, and I then asked if I might
be told officially that I was to leave the War Office at the end of
September, and eventually got a month’s notice.
I was the more anxious to make certain because I had received a
tempting offer from the Chairman and Directors of a property in South
America to go over, and make a report on it, receiving an honorarium
of £1000, and all expenses for myself and a secretary. I informed the
Commander-in-Chief and the Secretary of State of the offer, bearing in
mind the apprehensions of the War Office in 1880, who had deprived me
of all pay, even half-pay of 11s. per diem, for the six months I was
in South Africa with Her Imperial Majesty the Empress Eugénie. Anxious
to avoid the Secretary of State being inconvenienced by any questions
in Parliament, I suggested I should go on half-pay for two months, and
take up my new work on the 1st January. Neither of my Superiors raised
any objection, but on reflection I thought that any delay in initiating
the working of the Army Corps Districts might weaken the arguments of
the Secretary of State, in favour of what I still regard as being a
sound system, so I reluctantly abandoned the idea, going straight from
Pall Mall to Salisbury.
On the 3rd September my comrades in the Adjutant-General branch, both
Civil and Military, gave me a Farewell Dinner, which induced a touching
outburst of regret from those who knew how I had tried to do my duty
during the War.
The Commander-in-Chief, who was away from London, wrote in kind terms
thanking me for the help I had afforded him during the nine months of
our association. He dwelt especially on the use I had been to him from
my knowledge of War Office details, and intimate acquaintance with
the various localities to which I had accompanied him on his tours of
Inspection.