'History of the Indian Navy. (1613-1863).' [‎423] (442/622)

HISTORY OF THE INDIAN NAVY.
423
When we regard the good work done by Messrs. Marshall,
Dawes Girdlestone, Chapman, and other young officers, it will
not be gainsaid that they had in them the stuff from which
are made surveyors and explorers of the type of McCluer, Ross,
Moresby, Wood, and others of a later generation, whose names
figure in these pages, and it is certain that, had not the
Service been abolished, they would have rivalled the achieve-
ments of those officers, and maintained the reputation of the
Indian Navy as an alma mater of scientific talent.
In 1861, the charts, with the copper-plates, original drawings,
and sailing directions, were transferred from the India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors. to
the Admiralty, and, on the 30th of August, in this year, a
despatch from the Marine Department of the India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors. to the
Government of India, announced that " the surveys then
incomplete should be furnished by the Indian Navy, and all
future surveys and charts would proceed from the Eoyal Navy
at Imperial expense* „ . , , , . , , ,
We will close this final notice of the hydrographic labours of
the officers of the Indian Navy, by a few observations on the
general system adopted in the Service for carrying on, and
registering the results of, the surveys, and the successive steps
by which their control was, at length, placed under an officer of
the late Indian NaVy.
In his " Memorandum on the Marine Surveys of India," sub
mitted to the Indian Government, on the 10th of March, 1871,
Commander A. Dundas Taylor says " There was no Marine
Surveyor-General to give a systematic organization to the
work, or to know the merits of the surveyors and the time they
should be allowed for each particular duty. It was a common
practice for each new Commodore to stop the surveys begun
under his predecessor. Thus Captain Moresby was drawn off
General, and Medical Departments, with labour afloat and ashore, besides the
continual work of providing stone for piers and for the fore-shore, and landing stores
of all descriptions. Mine was the most economically worked of all the Depart
ments, as I had no interpreters or staff of clerks, all my office and pay work being
done by one clerk and myself. You may imagine it was not very light, as when
I paid up the men's arrears on board the ' Sir John Lawrence,' after the rest of
the Expedition had left the Bay, I paid away I believe Rs. 225,000, a good deal of
which went, I fear, into the pockets of the Egyptian officials, who seized the place as
our forces left, for they looted my men dreadfully, and I of course had no power
to stop them. It would I have no doubt been much better for me if the original
arrangement with Morland as Principal Transport officer had been adhered to ;
as it was, the Koyal Navy got the kudos, besides a substantial addition to their
pay, and I never even got the batta An extra allowance of pay granted to soldiers involved in special field service or to public servants on special duty. which the rest of the Bombay Marine The navy of the East India Company. re
ceived. Between two stools, naval and military, I came rather to grief, though
Captain Try on behaved very kindly in recommending me to the Admiralty, and
Lord Napier also, in trying to get the batta An extra allowance of pay granted to soldiers involved in special field service or to public servants on special duty. allowed subsequently, but without
avail."
* See Report of Mr. Trelawney Saunders, Assistant Geographer to the India
Office, dated January, 1871. The number of charts and plans handed over to
the Admiralty was two hundred and sixty-four, of which fifty-four were of
value, the remainder being obsolete.
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