WAR STORES SCANDAL

Evening Post, Volume LXXII, Issue 93, 17 October 1906, Page 7

WAR STORES SCANDAL

DECISION OF THE ARMY COUNCIL. OFFICERS CENSURED, RETIRED, OR DISMISSED. Ifress associations LONDON, 16th October. The Army Council has considered the report, published last August, of the Royal Commission which investigated the allegations made by Sir William Butler's Committee after enquiry into the question of sales and refunds to contractors in South Africa at the close of the war against the Boers. The council has decided that no action is necessary in the cases of the genera's commanding in South Africa after the close of the war. In respect to others the sentence of the council is to the following effect: — Seven officers, including Colonels Dewar and Swire, are censured. Four others are censured, and in addition lose vaTying numbers of steps in seniority. , Colonel Morgan, formerly Director of Army Supplies, but who was placed in charge of the Bales Department, and four others, are called; upon to retire upon such retired pay aa their services entitle .them to receive. Colonel Hdpwdl, who succeeded Colonel Morgan as Director of Supplies when the latter was given charge of the Sales' Department, is called upon to T etire, losing additional retired pay which he would otherwise have received for specially good service. Colonel Hamnett is removed from the army without retiring allowance. Nine warrant officers and non-com-missioned officers are discharged for misconduct. ' — — The War Stores CommiEsion, consisting ol Mr. Justice FaTwell, Sir George Taubman-GoiQie. Field-Marshal Sir Geocge White, Sdr Francis Mowatt, and Mr. Samuel Morley, was appointed in accordance with a special Act passed last year. It was ordered to investigate the allegations mode by the Butler _ Committee, to report upon all the circumstances connected with contracts,' sales, and refunds, and upon the responsibility of the persons concerned, whether in Britain or South Africa. In its a-eport, issued two months ago, the commission stated that it found no evidence of actual corruption on tho narfc of officers, with three or four exceptions affecting , officers in ' very subordinate positions, and involving trifling sums of money. Nevertheless, the office of the Director of Supplies was conducted with inexcusable caTelessness and extraordinary ineptitude, and the administration) of the office of the Pay x>epartmenb showed a deplorable want of intelligence. The commissioners reported in high terms as to the capacity aadi knowledge of tho South African situation possessed by Colonel Morgan, Director of Supplies at Pretoria, but dealing with the genesis of Meyer and Company and Colonel Morgan's pant in its inception and in its securing apparently overwhelming influence with the Supplies Department, the commissioned* severely censqred Colonel Morgan, and declared that hut arrangement with Meyer for the employment of Morgan (Colonel Morgan's brother)' woo contrary to the spirit and letter of the King's regulations. • As a result of maladministration in South Africa, the commissioners estimated that th.o Home taxpayers' prevenable loss during twenty-two months after peace was proclaimed amounted to between three-quarters of a million and a million and a quarter.