HMS Captain 1870         

"Yesterday at a final meeting the Managing Committee of the Captain Relief Fund presented a report of their proceedings, with a general statement which they had drawn up, for the information of the General Committee, setting forth the mode of distribution of the funds at their disposal.

It stated that the total amount of the subscriptions received was £56,666 13s 4d, which with interest on deposit account, £1157 18s 7d, gives, as the total of the receipts, £57,824 11s 11d.

In addition to the above, gratuities granted by the Admiralty to the widows and relatives of seamen, Marines &c., amounting to £5601 7s 10d have been placed in the hands of the Managing Committee for disbursement, and the modes of distribution will be mentioned in their respective places.

The disposal of the £57, 824 11s 11d which constitutes the Captain Relief Fund is divided under the following heads:-

to widows, children, and other relatives of officers £11,278 1s 0d;;

to widows and children of seamen, &c., £35,578 10s 0d;

to relatives of seamen, Marines, &c. (the unmarried men) £8146 2s 2d;

advertising and working expenses, £1832 13s 4d;

balance in hand, £989 5s 1d.

The amount awarded to widows, children, and other relatives of officers has been £11,278 1s, and the Committee explain that this sum has been apportioned as follows:-

to 15 widows of officers, £8250;

to 18 children of officers £1743 1s

to four widowed mothers of unmarried officers, £1000;

to four other relatives of unmarried officers, £285.

The payment to the 15 widows was subdivided as follows:- two received £800, one £700, three £600, four £550, three £450, and two £300, the two last named sums being for the widows of the two warrant officers.

The payment to the 18 children does not include any award to the children of the late Captain Cowper Coles, C.B. as their claims are recognised by the Patriotic Fund, Captain Coles having served in the Russian War.

These payments, as well as those to the widows, were based upon Admiralty regulations. The payment awarded to the four widowed mothers was in each case the monetary value of a pension of £20 a year for life. The payments awarded to four relatives of unmarried officers were special grants to meet cases deserving of some assistance. The amounts awarded to the widows and children of seamen, Marines &c., is as follows:-

£1578 10s 4d expended by Committee to this date;

£34.000 paid over to Patriotic Fund for their benefit.

Besides this, the Admiralty have recently awarded them six month’s pay of their late husbands from the Royal Bounty Fund, in addition to the previous grant of a year’s pay from Greenwich Hospital. This further award has been granted to all widows recommended by this Committee as deserving, and who had not remarried by the 9^th August 1871. The number recommended is 165 (? – not clear), and the Commissioners of the Patriotic Fund have undertaken to distribute this gratuity to them in quarterly instalments extending over a period of from one to two years, according to the circumstances of each widow, and this payment will be in addition to the widow’s regular allowances from the Relief Fund. The total amount of this grant is £1891 7s 8d.

The number of widows left by the men of the Captain was 120, but six cases have been adjudged forfeited, on account of misconduct; in one case relief has been suspended for the present, and one widow has died, so that the number at present in receipt of allowances is 112.

The financial statement which is added to the report of the proceedings is brought down to the 31^st ult., and shows a balance in hand of £989 5s 1d."

___________________