the information they were able to give us, relative to their respective departments *. We obtained from the Treafury the lifts of warrants granted by the Commanders in Chief in North America upon the Deputy Paymasters General there, and tranfmitted to the Lords Commiffioners of his Majesty's Treasury, from the 1st of January 1776 to the 31ft of December laft. The total fum contained in thefe lifts is 7,725,8281. 128. 1d.-Of which there appears to have been iffued during that period, by the Commander in Chief at New York, to the officers or deputies in thefe four departments +, the fums following: to the Quarter Mafters General, 1,688,3791, 158. 3 d. to the Barrack Mafters General, 662,4191. os. 5d. to the Commiffaries General, 1,521,0761. 95. 8d. to the Chief Engineers, 322,3081. 1os. 2 d. amounting together to the fum of 4,194,1831. 158. 7d. and to have been iffued by the Commanders in Chief of his Majefty's Forces in Canada ‡, for the extraordinnry services of the army in general in that province, from the 1ft of June 1776 to the 23d of October 1781, the fum of 2,236,0291. 118. 7d. As the Deputy Paymaflers General of the forces abroad tranfmit, from time to time, to the Pay Office of the army in England, the warrants of the Commanders in Chief which has been paid by them that we might omit no means of information of the fums iffued, we procured from the Pay Office of the army a lift of thefe warrants; in which we find other fums, iffued during the fame period, to officers in the department of the Commiffary General, not included in the quarterly lifts received from the treasury, amounting together to the fum of 193,000l. which being added to the fum of 1,521,0761. 9s. 8d. make the total fum, iffued to the Commiffaries at New York, 1,714,0761. gs. 8d. and total fum iffued to thefe four departments there, 4,387,1831. 15s. 7d. We required from the office of the Auditors of the Irpret § a list of all thofe perfons who have been employe in the expenditur: of the public money for the army fervices in North America, and had either passed or delivered in their accounts to that office fince the 1ft of January 1776. We examined the officers whofe names we found inferted in thefe lifts, and who were within the reach of our application; (that is to hy) Robert Mackenzie, Efq. ** Secretary and Paymafter to the Lieutenant General Sir William Howe; Major General Sir William Erskine, and William Lord Cathcart, Quarter Masters General; Licutenant Colonel William Shirreff, and Major Richard England, Deputy Quarter Mafters General. We examined Lieutenant Colonel George Clerk, †† Barrack Master General; and John Montrotor, Eiq. Chief Engineer, whofe names are not in this lift, their accounts not being as yet delivered in. Daniel Chamier and Daniel Wier, Efqs. two Commiffaries General during that period, are both dead: nor none of the accounts of either, and a few only of the vouchers of the latter, are in the Auditors office; and therefore the article of provifions, though a very important and expenfive branch of this expenditure, and many other articles of expence in that department, were not within our reach in this inquiry. We examined alfo Captain David Laird ‡‡, the Agent for victuallers store ships and small craft; and Mr. William Butler, an Afliftant Commissary, Appendix, No. VII, VIII, IX. † Appendix, No. X. From Appendix, No. XI. From the information given by these several officers, and from the vouchers. and papers they have fupplied us with, we have been able to acquire fome knowledge of the rules by which thefe departments have been governed; and to trace, in fome measure, the manner in which thefe branches of the public expenditure have been conducted in North America. The fubjects of expence, which thefe officers are employed about, may be distinguished under two general heads; the purchase of articles wanted for the ufe of the army, and the payment for the fervices performed. The prefiding officers in thefe departments, though they are the perfons who muft render the account, yet, from the extent and multiplicity of their business, can very seldom tumflves attend either to the purchase or the payment, they have their deputies, auitants, fuperintendants, agents, infpectors, conductors clerks, and other oficers under them, who are the acting perfons entrusted with the conduct of different parts of the tranfaction, and upon whofe knowledge and and fidelity they rely for the due execution of that trust. Some of these inferior officers make the bargains, fome attend to and certify the execution, others are employed in the payments, and take the receipts: each department has its office where the payments are made. The perfon who receives, must be either the perfon himself who is entitled, or his affignee or agent; and he must produce an order, ticket, or certificate of the proper officer, either directing the payment, or authenticating the material circumftances of the purchafe, or fervice. The receipts are generally taken in the name of the principal, whoever the officer may be that pays them; becaufe, the warrants of the Commander in Chief being made payable to the principal, he, by receiving the fums, becomes the only perfon accountable; and he cannot discharge himfelf but by vouchers, which upon the face of them appear to be for payments made by him: but there are inftances, where the Auditors of the Impreft have, in particular cafes, allowed receipts, taken in the name of the Deputy, to be vouchers for the principal. The payments are, for the most part, made in dollars, at 4s. 8d. each fterling, but computed in New York currency, which is to fterling in the proportion of twelve to feven; the fums we fhall have occafion to mention hereafter are all in fterling. The price paid for the purchase or the articles wanted varied according to the demands of the army, and the means of fupply; but the price of many of the fervices was regulated and fixed. It was not practicable for us to examine into the circumftances attending the purchase of the ftores, materials, and variety of articles ufed in the feveral departments: we could form no judgment of the neceffity there was for procuring them, or of the value, or of the price; the means of information were not within our reach; and therefore we directed our attention to the other branch of expence, the fervices, as a fubject that bore the appearance at least of a more fuccefsful inveftigation. The movements and various occafions of the army rendered it necessary to employ a great number of veffels of different kinds, with pilots and feamen, and many waggons, horfes, drivers, artificers, and labourers. Of the veffels, waggons, and horfes, very few were purchased by government for the use of the army; by far the greatest part of them were hired by the month, or the day, and very many of them kept in continual pay: the hire of all thefe, which conftitutes conftitutes a very confiderable part of the expenditure, was, in fome cafes, uncertain, and depended upon circumftanecs; but in many it was regulated, and fettled at a certain price. The hire of a veffel under thirty tons was 32d. a day per tou; the wages of cach feaman was 2s. 4d. a day, with a foldier's ration, and one fixth of a quart of rum. The hire of a veffel of thirty tons and upwards was 10s. a month per ton, until May 1777, when, the rate of wages, and the price of provifions, and of naval ftores, being increased, it was raifed to 135. the owner was engaged to find the proportion of fix men to every hundred tons, to victual them, and to keep the veffel in repair. The hire, by the day, of a small waggon, with one driver and two horfes, was 75. of a large waggon, with one driver and four horfes, 128. of a fingle horse, is. 9d. of a driver alone, from 7d. to is. 9d. of a common labourer, for 7d. to 25. 4d. All the veffels and fmall craft (except thofe in the Engineer's department) were at first procured by and under the inspection and management of the Quarter Mafter General; but, the business of that office increafing, the Commander in Chief, by warrant, dated 1ft of January 1777 *, created an officer to be agent for victuallers, store fhips and fmall craft: he was called the Superintendant of Veffels; and to his charge were committed all the veffels and fmall craft, with their appendages, employed in the fervice of the army (except those attached to the Chief Engineer, which were left still to remain under his care: he was enjoined to fee that they were properly manned and equipped, and justly rated as to their tonnage; he was authorized to charter or hire vellels for inland navigation, when neceffary, and to appropriate to the feveral departments the number they wanted, and fuch as were beft conftructed for the respective services. Though the Quarter Mafter General was thus relieved from the trouble of providing and fuperintending the veffels, pilot, and feamen, yet the payment of the hire of them was ftill left to his office, and continued there until the beginning of the year 1776; when the Commander in Chief iffued orders, that the hire fhould be paid in the office of that department where they were employed. The mode of payment was this: the Superintendant granted, fometimes upon his own knowledge, fometimes upon the information of perfons under him, to the perfon entitled, a ticket of pay, figned by himself or his deputy, and directed to the proper officer, fpecifying the fervice, the time, and the fum. This ticket was, upon payment, left at the office; and at the end of every quarter the Superintendant took up all thefe tickets from the feveral offices, and, after examination with his chek book, gave to cach principal officer one general voucher, figned by himself, for the total fum contained in all thofe tickets, and paid by him during that quarter. Much the greatest number of the waggons, horfes, and drivers, employed in the fervice of the army, were procured by the Quarter Mafter General. The Commander in Chief ordered the establishment, that is, the number which he judged to be neceffary for the eccafions of the army, and in what proportion they fhould be diftributed amongst the feveral corps, and for the different fervices. This eftablishment was permanent, and kept conftantly, as far as it could be, complete. The Quarter Maker General made a return of them every quarter to the Commander in Chief; which return was called the diftribution, and contained an account of all the waggons, horfts, and drivers at that time under his direction, Appendix, No. XXV. direction, and in what fervice employed; for all thefe he was refponfible, and paid the hire and contingent expences. The other departments had likewife waggons, horfes, and drivers in their fervice; which were procured by themfelves, and paid by their respective principal officers. All thefe department's had artificers and labourers, procured by the overfeers in the feveral branches, hired by the day, and paid in cach refpective office. The receipts given for these services were of two kinds; either feparate receipts, given by individuals in the common form; or one receipt, prefixed to a lift comprehending the fignatures of many perfons: of the latter kind, one uniform mode was adopted in all these offices; two fpecimens of which, the one taken from the inftance of waggons, horfes, and drivers, and the other from that of labourers, in the office of the Quarter-mafter-general, are inferted in the Appendix. The first column contains the names of the perfons entitled, or fuppofed to be entitled; the fum he is entitled to receive is wrote in the last column but one; and in the last are the fignatures of the fame perfons, wrote or made either by themselves or by perfons deputed by them. In pursuing this inquiry into the methods and forms by which this expenditure has been carried on, we have had in view two principal objects; one is, to difcover whether any fraud has in fact been committed upon the public in the course of these money tranfactions; the other is, to obferve whether the public has been fufficiently guarded against fraud and impofition, in the modes adopted for carrying on this expenditure. Could a fingie inftance of fraud be discovered in any of the accounts of these officers, fuch a discovery would fo corrupt and vitiate that account, as to subject the whole of it to a revifron and unravelment, though adjusted and paffed with all the folemnities of the Exchequer. Thefe accountants are charged with all the fums they have received of the Pay mafter-general of the forces, by the warrants of the Commander in Chief. They cannot difcharge themselves, but by the receipts of the perfons to whom they or their officers have paid thefe fums. The receipts are fair upon the face of them; each contains all the effentials of a true voucher; a date, the fubject matter, the fum paid, the perfon of whom received, and the perfon receiving. If the tranfaction has not been a fair one, and government has been defrauded of any part of the money, the voucher, which is the evidence of that tranfac tion, muit, in fóme part of it, be falfe or fraudulent to difcover whether it be fo or not, the perfon, who appears to have figned it, is always a material, and, in fome cafes, the only witnefs, who can tell whether the fum fpecified in the receipt to have been received, was in fact the fun bona fide paid; but persons under this defeription are not amenable to us, fitting in this kingdom; they are in North America. Numberlefs, and in a variety of ways, may have been the frauds and impofitions committed upon government, without the knowledge even of the officer who paffes the accounts, being himself not privy to the pay ments, but relying, for the truth of the vouchers he produces in his discharge, upon the integrity and fidelity of his inferior officers. Rumours of impofition, and of much wealth acquired during a short service upon flender appointments, may create a fufpicion of fome concealed management, and be a ground for inquiry by proper authority; but they are not pro fs upon Appendix, No. XXVI. XXVII, upon which can be fupported, against any perfon whatever, the heavy charge of defrauding the public. Having therefore no hopes of pursuing this subject with effect, we turned our attention to the fecond object we propofed: that is, to thofe openings for fraud, and that poffibility of abufe, which the modes of conducting these money tranfactions have left without fence or guard and we are of opinion that the public have not been fufficiently protected in two material points: first, the officers intrufted with the expenditure of the public money have been permitted to have an intereft themselves in the fubject matter of expence: fecondly, the vouchers, by which the accountants difcharge themselves of the fums intrufted to them, are allowed without having undergone fufficient examination. It is a branch of the bufinefs of the Quarter- mafter-general to provide waggons and horfes, with their neceffary attendants and appendages, for the ufe of the army, either when in quarters, or in motion; and when there is occafion to tranfport them, or to fupply their wants by water, the Superintendant furnishes them with veffels, and whatever is neceffary for carriage by water. It is the duty of thefe officers to make the contracts for the articles, and to fee thofe contracts honeftly and fubftantially performed; to take care that each article is properly equipped, and adequate to the fervice it is intended for; and that the fervice, for which payment is claimed, has been, in fact, performed. Thefe officers are placed, on the part of government, as a check and control upon the Contractors, to protect the public from lofs or impofition. The Barrackmafter-general and Chief Engineer ftand upon the fame ground, in refpect to the waggons and horfes made use of in their departments, and not provided by the quarter-mafter-general. But it has been the ufage, as far back as our enquiry has gone, for the officers in thefe departments to be themselves the propri etors of, or to have shares or interests in, a great number of the vessels and small craft, and in almoft all the waggons and horfes, employed in these services: these officers have purchased or procured them upon their own account, and let them out to government at the fixed prices of hire; the fame perfon, employed by and acting for the public, contracts, on the part of the public, with himself, for the hire of his own property, controls his own actions, and pays himself with the public money intrufted to his charge; his truft and intereft draw oppofite ways his truft obliges him to be frugal for the public; to hire at the lower price (lower, if he can, than the price allowed by government;) to take care that what he hires is complete and fit for service, to employ as few vessels and carriages, and for as fhort a time, as poffible: but his intereft leads him not to fpare the public purfe; to let to government, at the fame fixed price, all the veffels, carriages, and horfes, he can collect, by whatever means procured, or at however low a price he may have purchafed them, and whatever may be their condition or difference in point of goodnei; to keep them continually in pay, whether wanted, or employed, or not, and for as long a time as he can contrive; and his laft advantage may be, the fuffering them to be taken or deftroyed by the enemy, to entitle him to the value from the public. In fuch a conteft between duty and intereft, it is not uncharitable to fuppofe the public intereft will frequently be facrificed to private emolument. But this is not the only mifchief: this practice has a manifet tendency to corrupt and endanger the fervice of the army: it weakens the military difcipline; it infufes into the foldier the thirft for gain, and diverts his attention from ་ས། ། 2. |