32D CONG.....2D SESS.

Report of the Secretary of the Navy.

Congress might hereafter think fit to authorize. I have accordingly directed a preliminary investiwhom I have attached to the African squadron, with orders to devote the months of the coming winter to an examination of necessary conditions which this undertaking may require.

The commander of the expedition is made fully aware of the necessity and value of an accurate survey of the various lines of navigation between California and China, and will bestow upon this undertaking an attention commensurate with its importance. He is directed to make frequent reports of his work, in order that no time may be lost in communicating to the country the results, together with descriptive charts, of his survey, for the benefit of commerce and navigation. These will be duly published as often as they are received by the Department.

Being persuaded that this Department cannot better contribute to the fulfillment of the high expectations which the country has ever entertained as to the value of the Navy, nor perform a more acceptable duty to the Navy itself, than by imparting to this arm of the national power the highest spirit of enterprise, as well as the greatest efficiency of action, I have sought every opportunity to put in requisition for useful service the various talent, skill, and ambition of honorable adventure, which equally distinguish and embellish the professional character of the officers under the control of the Department. Constant employment of ships and men in the promotion of valuable public interests, whether in the defense of the honor of our flag, or in the exploration of the field of discovery and the opening of new channels of trade, or in the enlarging of the boundaries of science, I am convinced will be recognized both by the Government and the people as the true and proper vocation of the Navy, and as the means best calculated to nurse and strengthen that prompt and gallant devotion to duty which is so essential to the character of accomplished officers, and so indispensable to the effectiveness of the naval organization.

Acting in conformity with this opinion, I have availed myself of events that favored the object to set on foot two other expeditions, which may be classed with those which I have just presented to your notice, and from which I have every reason to hope much good is to be derived hereafter. My attention has been invited by the Colonization Society of Pennsylvania to the necessity of prosecuting some researches into the character of the Continent of Africa, and especially that portion of it lying eastward of the settlements of Liberia. It is supposed that an exploration of this region would lead to the discovery of a broad tract of fertile and healthy country, well adapted to the extension of that system of colonization which for some years past has greatly interested the public attention, and more recently attracted the favorable consideration of Congress.

The proposition submitted to my view by the society, and referred to your approval, I regard as one which may be rendered productive of great public advantage, and in regard to which you might confidently bespeak and anticipate the approbation of the country. I have, therefore, not hesitated, with your concurrence, to give it the aid which it was in the power of the Department to bestow. As I could not, however, without some special appropriation to the object, organize a full and effective expedition for the prosecution of this enterprise, I have thought that, by the employment of such means as have been provided for the ordinary exigencies of the service, I might profitably prepare the way for such an expedition as

In Commander Lynch, to whom the country is already indebted for important service in another field, I have found a prompt and ardent volunteer for this employment. He is now on his way to the African coast. He will land at Liberia, Cape Palmas, and other points, and will pursue his inquiries as far as the river Gaboon, with a view to the ascertainment of such localities on the margin of the African continent as may present the greatest facilities, whether by the river courses or by inland routes, for penetrating, with least hazard, to the interior. He will collect information touching the geographical character of the country, its means of affording the necessary supplies of men and provisions, the temper of the inhabitants, whether hostile or friendly, the proper precautions to be observed to secure the health of the party employed, and all other items of knowledge upon which it may be proper hereafter to prepare and combine the forces essential to the success of a complete and useful exploration of the interior. In the performance of this duty, under the most favorable circumstances, he will encounter the perils of a climate famed for its unwholesome influence upon the white man, and may hardly hope to escape the exhibition of hostility from the natives. The spirit which has prompted him to court this perilous adventure, so honorable to his courage and philanthropy, I trust will enable him to brave every hazard with success, to overcome every obstacle in his progress, and to reserve himself for the accomplishment of the great object to which these preparations are directed. In the mean time, I most earnestly commend the subject of the exploration to the early and favorable attention of Congress, with the expression of my own conviction that there is no enterprise of the present day that deserves a higher degree of favor, or that will more honorably signalize the enlightened policy of this Government in the estimation of the present or of future generations. It will require a liberal appropriation of money, and an enlarged discretion to be confided to the Navy Department for the organization and arrangement of a plan of operations which must embrace the employment of a number of men, the supply of boats, armaments and tools, and the enlistment of such scientific aid as a long and laborious inland exploration, beset with many dangers and difficulties, will suggest.

With a view to the preparatory operations of Commander Lynch, and also in consideration of the need which the African squadron has at all times for such an auxiliary, I have directed the small steamer Vixen to be prepared without delay and sent to that coast, to constitute a part of the force under the command of Commodore Mayo, who is about to take charge of the squadron. He will be instructed to furnish Commander Lynch with every facility which his position may allow. A small sum of money has also been placed at the disposal of Commander Lynch for the contingencies of his present service.

The second expedition to which I have referred has grown out of the recent decree of the Provisional Director of the Argentine Confederation, which has very lately reached this country, and which now throws open to navigation that longsealed and excluded country lying upon the tributaries of the river La Plata. The Uraguay and the Parana are at last opened by this decree to the access of all nations who may choose to seek the new associations which they offer to the spirit of adventure. A vast territory of boundless resource, proverbial for its treasures of vegetable and mineral wealth, extending, like the Mississippi, from south to north, and reaching through twenty-four parallels of latitude, with every climate between the temperate and torrid zones, and with every variety of product which may be gathered from the alluvial plains of the ocean border to the heights of the Andes-this is the field into which the liberal decree of President Urguiza has invited the enterprise of our country, as well as of other nations, who will be equally prompt to pursue it. We

SENATE & HO. OF REPS.

have waited with anxiety for the occasion to add this new resource to the industry of our people; and I am sure it will gratify the commercial pride and please the emulous ambition of the nation, not less than it will secure great and permanent advantages to its trade, to have the American flag and a national vessel the first to receive the greetings of the population who, at the foot of the Andes, and along the navigable waters of inland Brazil, Bolivia, and Paraguay, are ready to welcome the first messenger of commerce and throw their treasures into his hand.

Anticipating the near approach of this opportunity, with your approval I admonished Lieutenant Page, before it arrived, to hold himself in readiness for an exploration of these rivers, and directed the steamer Water Witch to be put in condition for the service. She is now nearly equipped, and Lieutenant Page will be ready to take his departure at the first moment that the steamer may be fit to receive him. He is provided with an able crew, well adapted to the nature of his expedition, and seconded by officers chosen for their efficiency both in the sphere of seamanship and scientific labor. A few boats are provided, adapted to the navigation of the upper streams above their falls; and the equipment, though of simple and unexpensive kind, will be, in all respects, such as may enable Lieutenant Page to accomplish the duty assigned to him.

These four expeditions, each of them of a highly interesting character, and likely to be productive of results which will be beneficially felt and acknowledged long after the men who may procure them shall have passed away, constitute, in great part, the chief and most important topics which have engrossed the care of the Navy Department during the past year.

It gives me pleasure to report, in connection with these, the return of Lieutenant Herndon, to whom was consigned, in conjunction with Passed Midshipman (now Lieutenant) Gibbon, an exploration of the valley of the river Amazon and its tributaries. These officers were directed to cross the Cordilleras in Peru and Bolivia, and by a selection of the most judicious routes of travel, with a small company of men, for the employment of whom means were furnished by this Department, to explore the valley of the Amazon, and to descend that river to the sea. More than a year has been spent in the active prosecution of this duty. Lieutenant Herndon reached the United States in July last, bringing with him a large amount of interesting and useful facts, industriously collected by him in the course of his long and hazardous journey, embracing many valuable statistics of the country, and adding most important contributions to the hitherto unknown geographical character of the country. He is now engaged in preparing a full report of the incidents and discoveries of his travel, which will be communicated to you as soon as it is placed in possession of this Department. I beg to commend Lieutenant Herndon to your special approbation and thanks for the intelligence and ability, and yet more for the high professional zeal he has exhibited in the performance of his difficult and honorable duty.

Lieutenant Gibbon, having taken a different route from that of Lieutenant Herndon, has not yet arrived, but may be expected in the course of the winter. When he returns to this city, the result of his work will be submitted to your notice.

The brig Dolphin, which was employed during the last year, under the command of Lieutenant Lee, in a survey of portions of the Atlantic, for the purpose of ascertaining the position of some dangerous rocks and shoals which were known to exist in the routes of navigation between the United States and Europe, has performed useful service, of which the results will be communicated to Congress. This work being yet incomplete, the Dolphin has again been dispatched on a second cruise of the same character, under the command of Lieutenant Berryman, and may be expected to accomplish a work which will tend, in no small degree, to lessen the hazards which have heretofore embarrassed the voyages of our merchant marine.

Lady Franklin, whose devotion to the cause of her unfortunate husband has excited so large a sympathy in the United States, has been encouraged to make another effort to determine the fate of

32D CONG.....2D SESS.

the gallant navigator of the Arctic sea, and is now intent upon the organization of a new expedition under the auspices of our countryman, Mr. Henry Grinnell, and Mr. George Peabody, of London. Their endeavor will be directed to an exploration of the upper coasts of Greenland, by land as well as sea, and will furnish occasion for valuable scientific observation tending to the ascertainment of the magnetic poles and the intensity and dip of the needle, and interesting also to geological questions connected with the supposed existence of an open polar sea, and other subjects of much importance in the natural history of our globe. Apart, therefore, from its main object, there is much in the projected expedition to excite a high degree of in- || terest in its results, both in Europe and America. The distinguished lady whose sorrows have inspired this zeal of adventure, and whose energy has given it an intelligent and hopeful direction, has done no more than justice to a meritorious young officer of our Navy, Passed Assistant Surgeon Kane, in asking his coöperation in this hazardous exploit. Dr. Kane has already won a high praise from his countrymen by his intrepid perseverance in facing the extraordinary dangers of the last expedition on the same errand to the Arctic sea, and still more by the diligence which, guided by scientific accomplishment, has enabled him to contribute a valuable fund towards the illus. tration of a subject that now engrosses an unusual share of learned investigation.

The request of Lady Franklin to enlist Dr. Kane in the new expedition has been communicated to me, and I have not delayed to give him the necessary permission, and to confer upon him all the benefit he may derive from his position in the Navy, by an order which puts him upon special service. If it should become requisite in the field of operations to which he is destined to provide him with means for the prosecution of scientific discovery, beyond those which may be afforded by the Department and the liberality of the distinguished gentlemen who have assumed the charge of this expedition, I would commend it to the enlightened regard of Congress, with the most confident hope that that body will respond to the suggestions of this necessity with a prompt appreciation and generous support of an undertaking so honorable to humanity and so useful to the enlargement of liberal science.

THE NAVAL ACADEMY.

The Naval Academy at Annapolis presents to the regard of Congress an institution worthy of the highest encouragement.

Under a judicious and energetic administration, it has now reached a stage in its progress which may enable the Government to form a satisfactory estimate of its influence in promoting and sustaining the future efficiency of the Navy.

The school has grown up to its present stage in the progressive expansion and improvement of a design which, in its origin, forbade the adoption of a comprehensive and permanent system of naval education. It was at first contrived to supply nothing more than the opportunity of prosecuting a few useful studies to a class of occasional students, who were subject to all the interruptions of details for service at sea, and who were therefore not in a condition to conform to the requirements necessary to a regular course of professional instruction. The obvious insufficiency of this mode of study soon suggested the necessity for a more methodical arrangement. A plan was accordingly devised in 1850, to take effect at the commencement of the next term of October, 1851, by which all the acting midshipmen of the date of that and subsequent years should be inducted into the school in its lowest class, and proceed in due order through a prescribed course of naval education, which is specifically adapted to a term of four years. The series of studies appropriate to each year was defined, the practice of gunnery and seamanship established, and the whole organization, as it now exists, completed. The classes were so contrived also as to receive, according to an appointed succession, the acting midshipmen of dates prior to 1851, who by this provision will, in the space of the next three years, have had the opportunity of graduating in the school.

The admissions of acting midshipmen to the Navy, and consequently to the Academy, have

Report of the Secretary of the Navy.

been regulated and limited by several laws, of which the combined import now is to give to each State and Territory its relative proportion of appointments, determined by the ratio of representation in Congress and its relation to the whole number of acting and passed midshipmen allowed to the Navy. To this determination of the quota of appointments appropriated to each State and Territory there has been added an allotment of a fractional share to each Congressional district, and the nomination for each district has been conferred upon the member representing it.

The whole number of midshipmen, including passed midshipmen, allowed to the Navy is four hundred and sixty-four. The number of Representatives and Delegates, according to the last census, is two hundred and thirty-nine. Each Representative, therefore, is entitled by the existing law to the nomination of one candidate and a fraction equal to 225-239.

No provision has been made for the disposition of these fractions, and I have therefore thought myself bound, in the absence of any other regulation, to consult the wishes of at least a majority of the Representatives entitled to the fractional part in receiving a nomination to supply the

vacancy.

As the school does not contain more than a fourth of the midshipmen belonging to the Navy, and as the vacancies in the number of students are dependent aitogether upon the promotions to the grade of lieutenants and upon the resignations, dismissals, and deaths in each year in the corps of midshipmen, the annual nominations to the school must, when the entire complement of midshipmen is regularly filled, be comparatively but few in number. The present condition of the service supplies but a small ratio of promotions; and if it were not for the operation of the resigna- || tions, dismissals, and deaths, it is manifest that the yearly recruits to be added to the school would be so inconsiderable in numbers as to forbid any hope of extensive usefulness; whilst the fluctuating character of these causes which produce the vacancies tends to a result scarcely less injurious.

It is, indeed, the most obvious defect in the present organization of the Academy that its supply of students is liable to these contingencies; for while the classes are advancing by regular steps, through the course of four years' study, to the term at which they must leave the school and enter into the field of active service, the vacancies which they create are dependent upon such a limited fund of supply as must ultimately reduce the number of pupils below the quota which is essential to the administration of the system.

That this defect has not already been visible in the career of the Academy is to be ascribed only to the fact, that up to the present time the members of the institution have been recruited from the grade of midshipmen who have been employed at sea previous to the new arrangements, adopted and commenced with the class of 1851. The classes heretofore have been furnished out of this corps, in addition to the annual nominations. When this resource is exhausted and the school is dependent on the yearly nominations alone, the defect to which I have referred will be fully seen and felt. It will then be manifest that the whole number at the school cannot exceed, at any time, the number of promotions added to the occasional vacancies occurring in the corps of midshipmen and passed midshipmen in four years.

It is to remedy this defect, and to give the school an inherent power necessary to its own perpetuation, and to make it what I am sure the country desires to see it, a vigorous and healthful institution, completely adapted to the useful ends for which it was ordained, that I propose, with your approbation, to submit to Congress the following change in its fundamental structure.

The Academy should be composed exclusively of cadets, or young men who are received as candidates for admission to the Navy, Its design should be that of a preparatory school to qualify || these candidates for appointments, and they should only be in condition to be selected for midshipmen when they had successfully passed through this probation.

If this principle be adopted as the ground-work of the plan, then the whole number of cadets to be

SENATE & HO. OF REPS.

nominated for the school may be established by law. For the present, I suggest that this number may be fixed at two hundred and forty-eight. It may be altered as future experience may require. Of this number of two hundred and forty-eight who are to be furnished to the Academy every four years, one fourth, or sixty-two, should be nominated for admission at the commencement of each yearly term, to constitute the first or lowest class of the school. Of this whole number of two hundred and forty-eight, two hundred and twenty-eight might be allotted to the nomination of members of Congress, apportioning them to each State according to the ratio of representation and requiring the nomination to the vacancies to be made, not by the representatives singly, but by the united counsel and action of the whole representation of each State, including Senators and Representatives. The remaining twenty of the two hundred and forty-eight may be given with advantage to the President.

By this arrangement Congress would be called on to nominate fifty-seven cadets every year, and the President five.

The classes would thus commence their career with sixty-two members, and this number, or so many of them as are not dropped in the progress of the four years, would represent the annual number of graduates. Provision, of course, should be made for the gradual absorption of all those acting midshipmen who, under the present system, are not yet disposed of. In a few years they must disappear, after which the organization of the cadets would be undisturbed.

In addition to this number of sixty-two nominations to be made in each year, Congress and the President would also have the appointment to such vacancies in the new class as might arise out of the failure of the first candidates to pass the preliminary examinations required at their admission. The vacancies occasioned by subsequent examinations, and by the other causes operating during the progress of the classes through the term of the four years, I propose should not be filled; but the classes, after their commencement, should advance to the end of the term of study, subject to all the incidents of their career which may reduce their numbers. The propriety of this provision will be recognized when it is observed that a vacancy occurring in any class after it has become advanced in its studies could not be supplied, at that advanced stage, by a new appointment to the school. The class would still go on in its reduced state, whilst the supply of a vacancy occurring in it could only operate to the undue increase of the lowest class of beginners, and would thus produce a periodical and inconvenient increase of graduates for whom no allotment could be made in the Navy.

Assuming sixty-two as the number which shall always be supplied to the lowest class or beginners of the school, we have reason to believe, from the data afforded by the experience of West Point, that the annual number of graduates would not exceed some twenty-five or thirty, it being found, in the general operation of the system, that the graduates do not bear a greater average proportion to the admissions than forty per cent. Upon this basis it may be estimated that these twenty-five or thirty may be looked to as the ordinary yearly resource for the supply of young officers to the Navy.

I propose, in the next place, that the law should establish the corps of midshipmen for the service at two hundred and fifty. These should be recognized as midshipmen only, and be subject to all the understood and appropriate duties of that class of officers. They should then be consigned to service on board of ships-of-war, and, after six months' employment at sea, should, upon examination and approval by a competent board, be entitled to the midshipman's warrant, bearing the date of the graduation of the school; and after three years' service at sea and another examination, they should be noted for promotion to a higher grade, which I propose should be created by law and denominated masters. The grade of passed midshipman should be abolished as soon as the gradual promotion of the corps may allow. It is an anomaly in the naval service, presenting a class of officers to whom no duty is specifically assigned, and constantly engendering discontent

32D CONG.....2D SESS.

ment to the proper grade; it being mainly important to provide at present that each yearly class of ⚫ new admissions should be constituted of the appointed number of sixty-two, and in no event to exceed that number. The future organization of the school will necessarily follow upon the observance of this provision.

Report of the Secretary of the Navy.

it is due to Commander Stribling, who has charge of the institution, and to the officers, professors, and assistants under his command, to say that the assiduity and intelligence with which they have performed the laborious and complicated duties assigned to them, merit the highest approbation; and that the prosperous condition of the school, and admirable arrangement of its details, particularly manifested in the deportment and proficiency of the young men confided to their care, eminently entitle it to the favorable opinion and encouragement of the Government.

I particularly commend to the notice of Congress the consideration of the appropriations asked for by the Bureau of Ordnance and Hydrography, for the improvements necessary to purchase the grounds and complete the buildings required by the Academy.

ORGANIZATION AND DISCIPLINE OF SEAMEN.

In proper connection with this subject of the Academy, it is my duty to apprise you that I have recently adopted regulations for the government of apprentices to be admitted at the several navyyards and workshops under the control of this Department. The propriety of these regulations has been suggested by the Bureau of Yards and Docks, and I am indebted to the intelligent labors of three distinguished officers of the department, Commodores Morris, Shubrick, and Smith, to whom I referred the subject for a report, which I have received, and which will be found amongst the documents accompanying this communication. The report presents the regulations which I have approved. The number of apprentices as estab-perity lished, for the present, by this system, is eightythree. They are required to undergo an examination twice in each year, and, after the first year, those most distinguished in the previous trials are to be subjected to another of a still more extensive and rigorous character, upon which such as shall be reported as worthy of the highest approbation and reward, and as demonstrating talent adapted to eminence in the public service, are to be commended to the Secretary of the Navy for such further advantages of instruction as he may have it in his power to confer.

I regard it as a most salutary power to be invested in the Secretary of the Navy, for the beneficial performance of the duty thus assigned to him, that he should have authority to admit into the Naval Academy those apprentices whose good conduct and capabilities shall have earned this distinction; and to provide that they should there be conducted through a course of study appropriate to their intended future vocations, and calculated to advance them in mathematical and mechanical science, under such regulations in regard to the term of their application, their duties and deportment, as the Navy Department might think it expedient to adopt. Having completed this course of study, they should be returned to the yards from which they may have been received, or allotted to suitable employments in the service.

It would be a useful provision in this scheme to give to the young men so educated a preference in the admissions to the corps of engineers for steamships, for which appointments their education would particularly qualify them; their admission into that corps, nevertheless, to be dependent upon successful examination and a favorable certificate to moral and intellectual character.

In the operation of this scheme the Navy would derive the benefit of the best talents and acquirement for the supply of engineers, naval architects, and constructors and superintendents in the various departments of mechanical employment connected with the service.

I take great pleasure in presenting this subject to your approval and to the attention of Congress.

There is no subject connected with the prosof the Navy that, in my estimate, better deserves the attention of Congress than that relating to the condition of the corps of mariners, which constitutes the great working force in the navigation and management of the public vessels. In obedience to a sentiment which is prevalent throughout the country, and which is naturally suggested by those impulses that distinctively characterize the opinions and habits of our people, Congress has been recently led to the consideration of the ordinary mode of punishment, which it had heretofore been supposed was necessary to the preservation of the discipline of the Navy. The result of this consideration has been the passage of a law for the entire abolition of corporal punishment on board of our ships, both public and private. This punishment-which, for a long time, has been practised in the Navy and commercial marine, not only without question as to its efficacy in maintaining the proper observance of duty on ship-board, but which, indeed, had become so incorporated in the sober conviction of both officers and men, as an indispensable necessity of the service, that it had grown to be the most unquestioned usage and generally received incident of naval discipline-many judicious persons believed might be dispensed with, not only most acceptably to the feelings of the nation, but also without disadvantage to the service. The adoption of this opinion by Congress, in the passage of the act of September, 1850, which forbade the accustomed penalty, without providing a substitute for it, has afforded the Navy the opportunity to make the experiment. sincerely regret to say that the records of this Department, as well as the almost entire concurrence of facts and opinions, brought to my notice from authentic sources, and vouched by intelligent and experienced observers, all tend to indicate a most unsatisfactory result. The omission of Congress to provide for the punishment of what may be called minor offenses against discipline and good order on ship-board may, perhaps, account in part for the failure; but the fact of the most serious detriment to the efficiency of our service is so unhappily forced upon my attention, as the effect of the recent change, that it becomes the gravest of

In view of this reorganization of the Academy, I submit, also, as a question worthy of consideramy tion, whether it would not be a salutary provision to require that the officers of the Marine Corps should be prepared for that service by an education at the school? My own opinion is, that it would be attended by manifest advantage, both as respects the necessary accomplishment for naval service in that corps, and the personal character and deportment of the officers belonging to it. It is amongst the incidents of their employment that they are sometimes required to perform important military duties on shore in which a necessity is found for that species of knowledge only to be gained in the military or naval school; and in every service to which they are called it is quite apparent that this knowledge, and the spirit to appreciate the duties of command that is inseparable from it,|| must increase the efficiency of the officer and ele. vate the character of the corps to which he is attached. If these considerations should influence the opinion of Congress as they do my own, they will suggest the expediency of making the provision to which I have invited their attention.

In concluding this notice of the Naval Academy,

||

I very

duties at this time to lay the subject once more before Congress, and to ask its attention to the consideration of such a corrective to the present condition of the service as I am confident it must find to be indispensable to the proper government of the Navy. We have evidence furnished to this Department, in the history of almost every cruise, of acts of insubordination that not only impair the usefulness of our ships, but which tend also to the gradual development of habits amongst the seamen that threaten to lead to extensive and uncontrollable mutinies. The multiplication of courtsmartial, and all the consequences of an increase of disorder and crime, are amongst the least of the apparent and growing evils of the new system. The demoralization of both men and officers is a yet more observable consequence. The absence or prohibition of the usual punishments known to seamen has led to the invention of new penalties of the most revolting kind, in the application of which full scope has been given, and the strongest provocations administered, to that exhibition of temper and passion which, however natural it may be to men of hasty and excitable natures, is sel

SENATE & HO. OF REPS.

dom indulged without leading to cruelties that must disgrace those who practice them; and, what is more to be feared, raise a sentiment in the public mind hostile to the Navy itself. The seaman, be lieving himself exempt from the speedy penalty of disobedience or neglect of duty, and looking with indifference to the remote and uncertain proceeding of a court-martial upon his delinquency, grows habitually contumacious to his superiors, and infuses the same sentiment into his comrades; and in the very fact of the diffusion of this spirit of insubordination finds ground to hope for immunity from punishment-naturally enough believing that what has grown to be common and frequent will also come to be more lightly considered when he is summoned to a trial at the end of his cruise. It may excite some surprise in the statement of what I learn to be true, that the most frequent complaints against the abolition of corporal punishment are made, in great part, by the seamen themselves. The difficulties arising out of its abrogation, and the absence of any substitute for it, now constitute the most prominent obstacles to the ready supply of our squadrons with seamen. This Department is familiar with complaints from the recruiting stations of the difficulty of enlisting the better class of seamen. Of that large number of men who have heretofore constituted the pride of our Navy, by their good seamanship and highly respectable personal deportment, comprising, I rejoice to say, the great body of the mariners who have sustained the honor and glory of our flag in its most perilous, as well as in its most useful career—of these men, it is a fact which invites the deepest concern of Congress, we are daily deprived, by their refusal to enter again into the service until, as they ask, they shall have some assurance that a better system of discipline may be restored. They reasonably complain, that whilst the worst portions of the crew are placed under arrest, and are exempt, in consequence, from the severe duties of the deck, they find their toil increased by the constantly-recurring exigencies which compel them, for weeks and months, during a cruise, to perform the extra work which the reduction of the force of the ship inevitably throws upon them. So oppressively is this evil felt, that I have reason to believe, if the best seamen, who have heretofore been accustomed to man our ships, could find an occasion to express their wishes to Congress, a majority of the whole number would be seen to prefer a restoration of that form of punishment which has been forbidden, rather than be subject to the severities imposed upon them by the present condition of disorder in the naval discipline.

Looking at this state of things in the Navy, I think the occasion propitious to the adoption of a new system for the organization and government of the whole material constituting the crews of our ships; and I take advantage of the present time to submit to your consideration the outline of a plan, which I trust will engage your attention, and receive the approbation of Congress.

The supply of our Navy with seamen has heretofore been obtained by a system of enlistment, modeled, in its principal elements, upon the plan adopted in Great Britain, from which nation we have derived, by old habit and national descent, the general features of our marine. Like England, we have looked to our commercial navigation for the reinforcement of the men of the Navy. We enlist the mercantile seamen for the national cruise, discharging and paying them off when it is finished, and returning them to the merchant service. The Navy, in general, has been sufficiently attractive to the sailor to be able to secure his service when needed; and this mode of enlistment being an easy and accessible resource, but little consideration has heretofore been bestowed upon its effect either on the Navy itself or upon the seamen. To the Navy it has given a large and meritorious class of mariners, not unmixed, however, with many of a different character, and from that mixture itself requiring a prompt and effective system of punishment adapted to secure a ready discharge of duty in every emergency. The effect of the system upon the men of the Navy has been overlooked, or, if regarded at all, it has not attracted the attention of the public authorities. The sailor is, in general, upon shore a helpless being. Between himself and all around him there is a palpable incongruity. He has come off a long cruise

32D CONG.....2D SESS.

Report of the Secretary of the Navy.

commanding officer of a squadron, or of a single ship when not with a squadron, shall, on his return from a regular cruise, report to the Navy Department, in the muster-roll of the men under his command, a statement of the good or bad general deportment of each man, with a special designation of those whose conduct has merited that degree of approbation which shail entitle them to be admitted into the Navy.

service.

I think it cannot be doubted that the successful application of the Navy to the purposes for which it is designed would be better assured by the services of a well-disciplined and carefully-maintained body of seamen permanently attached to the public naval establishment and incorporated with it, than it ever has been, or is ever likely to be by the fluctuating and variable resource of frequent enlistment and discharge. The constant changes which this corps undergoes is unfavorable to the growth of that sentiment, so essential to the service, which makes a sailor proud of his flag. It is still more unfavorable to the acquirement of that peculiar adaptation of habit and training to the duties belonging to the employment of a manof-war, which all officers regard as the test and indispensable element of an efficient seaman in the Navy. In a large Navy like that of England, where all the seamen of the mercantile marine, in a certain sense, belong to the Government, the difference between the man-of-war's man and the seaman of civil employment is not so apparent or significant as it is in our service, in which the seamen bear so small a proportion to the whole body of mariners of the nation. Every English sailor has generally more or less service in the Navy, and passes so frequently from the private to the public employment as to give him to a great degree an actual incorporation in the national marine: the one service is so connected with the other that the seamen of both assimilate more in their training and education than the correspondent classes in this country. Our Navy, for obvious reasons connected with these considerations, is much more dependent upon a body of men nurtured by the Government and attached to the service than that of England. It is, therefore, a fundamental purpose in the plan which I submit to Congress to provide for the ultimate establishment of a permanent and recognized body of seamen, connected with the Navy by the strongest and most durable bonds of attachment and interest

Whilst providing for the gradual and eventual organization of such a body, my attention has been directed also to the procurement of men of the highest character in personal and professional quality, in whose good deportment and faithful service will be found the most satisfactory reasons for protecting by legal enactment their whole class against the form of punishment which has of late so much excited the sensibility of the nation. The successful accomplishment of such an object, I trust, will commend the plan to the regard of all who desire to preserve that exemption, and who have hoped to find it in practice not incompatible with the highest efficiency of service on shipboard. The general outline of the plan may be exhibited in the following regulations:

With a view to the commencement of this system, and to organize a body of efficient seamen of the most meritorious class, I propose that every

That this report be submitted by the Department to the President, who shall thereupon issue a general order to admit into the Navy the seamen who have been distinguished in the report for good conduct. And the President shall transmit with this order to the commanding officer of the squadron or ship a certificate to each seaman, written on parchment and stamped with the signature of the President himself, expressing his approbation of his conduct and his permission to admit the subof it into the Navy; which certificates shall be delivered by the commanding officer of the squadron or ship to the men entitled to them before they are discharged from the ship. This delivery to be made in the presence of the crews and with suitable formality to attract public notice.

SENATE & HO. OF REPS.

3. No registered seaman of the Navy to he subject to any corporal or other punishment of a degrading character, and to such only as may be ordered by a court-martial on charges duly preferred and tried. This prohibition not to prevent the punishment without a court-martial of such minor delinquencies in conduct and discipline as may be corrected by withholding the usual indulgences of the service, stopping portions of the ration, or increasing ordinary duty.

4. Every registered seaman to be entitled after any term of three years' service to a furlough of such reasonable length as may enable him to make one or more voyages in the merchant marine, not extending, without special permission, to more than six months; such furlough to be granted by the commanding officer of the squadron, or the commandant of the navy-yard nearest to the port at which his cruise may terminate, and only to be granted in any case with an expressed reservation and notice that the seaman to whom it is given shall report for duty in the Navy when any public emergency shall render it necessary so to order him, the order for his return to duty to be issued by the Navy Department or by such officer as That each seaman to whom this certificate shall may be authorized by the Department to do so. be awarded shall, if he accept it, register his name A failure to report in accordance with this provisin a book to be provided for that purpose and kept ion to render him liable to be struck off the regison board of the ship, by which registry he shall try by the Secretary of the Navy. Every regisbecome a registered seaman of the Navy of the tered seaman reporting for duty within three United States, and be entitled to all the privileges months of his last cruise, and being thereupon and be bound to all the obligations of that charac-ordered to duty, to be entitled to pay from the ter. This registry book shall be transmitted to date of termination of his last cruise. the Navy Department, where it shall be preserved; All furloughs to be regularly reported and noted and the entries made in it copied into a general at the Navy Department. registry, alphabetically arranged, and kept in the Department.

The obligations incurred by every seaman who signs the register shall be those of faithful service and due performance of all seamanlike duty under the flag of the United States, good moral deportment, and prompt obedience to all orders that may be issued by his lawful superiors so long as he shall continue to be a member of the Navy. The privileges attached to this registry shall be:

1. For every five years of actual duty on board a public vessel an increase of one dollar a month over and above the established rates of ordinary pay; that is to say, for the first five years of such service one dollar per month; for a second term of five years of such service an additional dollar per month; for a third term of five years another dollar; and for a fourth term of five years-making a total of twenty years service-another dollar; amounting in all for such twenty years service to four dollars a month; after which no further increase to be made. This additional monthly pay, so earned by service, to be paid to each man so long as he may continue to be a registered seaman of the Navy; and, after twenty years of service, to be paid whether he continues a registered sea

man or not.

The right to this additional pay to be liable to forfeiture at any time within the twenty years actual service by the resignation of any seaman on the registry, or by his being struck off the list of registered seamen; which may be done at any time; and shall only be done by the order of the Secretary of the Navy, or by the sentence of a naval court-martial, upon charges of misconduct; in either of which events-resignation or discharge by sentence of the Secretary of the Navy or of a court-martial-he shall cease to belong to the Navy, and shall lose all the privileges of such a character.

2. Every registered seaman to be entitled to resign his post in the Navy at any time after three years' service, if not engaged on a cruise. When engaged on a cruise and absent from the ports of the United States, he shall not resign without the consent of the commanding officer of his ship. A record of all resignations to be duly kept and reported to the Department.

5. Every registered seaman to be entitled to wear on his dress some appropriate badge by which he may be distinguished and known in the Navy, which badge will be designated and provided by the Navy Department.

.6. The petty officers of each ship to be selected, as far as convenient, from the class of registered seamen, and the appointment always to be regarded as dependent upon the merit and good character of the person selected, to be held on good behavior, during the term of a cruise.

7. A record to be kept, under the direction of every commanding officer of a squadron or ship, of the actual amount of sea service performed by each registered seaman whilst under his command. This record to be returned to the Department at the end of every cruise, and to be transferred to the general registry of seamen. Upon the evidence of this general registry the additional pay to be granted.

8. Every seaman to be admonished to give his true name, age, and place of birth, upon signing the registry, and to be required to engage not to ship in merchant or other vessels, whilst on furlough, by any other name. His being convicted of violating this engagement to render him liable to be struck from the list of registered seamen upon the order of the Secretary of the Navy.

9. In every case of dismissal from the service, as a registered seaman, the party so dismissed to receive whatever moneys may be due to him, unless the same shall have been forfeited by the sentence of a court-martial imposed as a punishment for an offense committed by him. A seaman dismissed from the registry not to be entitled to be restored but upon the permission of the head of the Navy Department, granted in consideration of the meritorious character of the applicant.

10. Seamen, ordinary seamen, and landsmen in the service, not belonging to the registry, to be subject to such discipline, duty, and penalties as Congress may provide in a code of regulations adapted to their government, under such restrictions or modifications as the Department may think proper to make.

11. A printed book or circular to be made by the Department, containing all the regulations and conditions relating to the establishment of registered seamen, giving a full description of the obliA registered seaman of more than twenty years'gations to be contracted by them, and of the priviservice continuing in the Navy, only to forfeit his leges to which they may be entitled. Copies of additional pay when such forfeiture shall be ad- this book or circulars to be furnished to every judged by a court-martial as a punishment for squadron or single vessel in commission, of which grossly immoral or insubordinate conduct. By copies, one shall be given to every seaman, in such sentence also for such offenses, his additional order that he may be fully informed of the nature pay may be suspended by a court for such time of the engagements to be incurred by him on enas they may adjudge. tering the service of the United States. These