No. 6, Financial

Adverting to your Despatches of the numbers and dates as
per margin,
*
I have the honor to report to Your Grace the
course I have followed during the year just closed, with the
earnest desire of conforming to the fullest extent practicable
to the arrangements made by Your Grace with the Lords of the
Treasury relative to the financial matters existing between
Her Majesty's Government and the Colony of British Columbia.

2. The sum available to the Colony towards the maintenance
of the Royal Engineers out of the Parliamentary vote of 1862
is £6000 only. Of this £4000 was drawn in April 1862, prior
to the receipt of Your Grace's Despatch No 123 of 13 May.
Since April no further Drafts upon the Imperial Treasury have
been made.

3. The sum to be repaid by the Colony during 1862,
according to the Treasury Despatch of the 16 June are as
follows

£6,900. 0.0 for Silver specie

152. 3.8 Overpayment Assay Office

34. 6.0 Passage of the Bishop

 35. 7.0 " " "

£7,121.16.8.

With respect to those items I cannot refrain from appealing
against the two latter being charged against the Colony, for
they really have no connection with it. In the first place
the passages were between places in Vancouver's Island, from
Victoria to Nanaimo, and from Victoria to Barclay Sound—and
in the second place they were not obtained at the intervention
of this Government, but were sought directly by the Bishop
from the Admiral commanding in the Station. British Columbia
cannot therefore under any circumstances be justly chargeable
with the expense. As the amounts were paid by Her Majesty's
Government, I sought to recover them from the Bishop. He
however declined repayment on the plea that the charge was
excessive. The deduction of these two sums reduces the amount
to £7052.3.8.

4. In 1863, the Colony is required to repay £10,704,
represented in Your Grace's and the Treasury Despatch aforesaid
as an expenditure for Roads, Bridges and Surveys, and therefore
one improperly defrayed from Imperial Funds. I must beg Your
Grace's attention to the items composing this sum, and I venture
to submit that they are as justly chargeable to Imperial Funds,
as any other expenses in connection with the Military. The
details are as follows:

A. Erecting Military Barracks at New Westminster £8758. 6.7

B. Erecting Military Barracks at Langley 320. 0.7

C. Military trail to Burrards Inlet 92. 7.8

D. Reconaissance Fort Hope to Fort Colvile 40.19.6

E. Erecting Hospital & Officers Quarters

New Westminster 1392. 6.1

F. Temporary Buildings & Fittings for Royal

Marines at Esquimalt  100.16.1

10,704.16.7

The works marked A. B. & E. were undertaken by Colonel Moody who
represented them to be an indispensable necessity. They are
entirely of a Military character, not required by the Colony, but
arising out of the compact entered into with the soldier. The
only control I could have exercised in the matter would have been
to forbid the expenditure. That course would have left the Troops
with their wives and families homeless.

The work marked C was considered requisite by Colonel Moody
to open a communication from his Camp to Burrard Inlet in the
event of Naval support being required.

The exploration marked D was ordered by Colonel Moody solely
on Military considerations during the period of the San Juan occupation.

The expenditure at F was caused by the sudden arrival of the
Marines from China in Her Majesty's Ship Tribune, and the urgent
necessity of immediately relieving an overcrowded Ship after a
long voyage.

Your Grace considers that for a sum expended in the pay,
sustenance and movement of the Engineers, application may be made
to Parliament: I trust what I have herein stated may induce Your
Grace also to consider that this sum of £10,704.16.7 is not
more justly chargeable to the Colony than the other, and that,
therefore, for that likewise application may be made to Parliament.

5. Bowing to Your Grace's decision that British Columbia must
bear a moiety of the expenses of the Royal Engineers, I would
yet submit that at this period of her existence she should be
relieved from contributing a moiety of the Regimental Pay. For
instance in 1862-63 the whole estimated expense of the Corps is
£22,000 including Regimental Pay. The Colony is required to
contribute £11,000, while the vote by Parliament specially
for the Colony is only £7200, the remaining sum of £3800 being
borne on the Army Estimates, and so borne whether the Troops be
at home or abroad. I am merely dealing with the financial
question, I do not desire to touch the abstract one of how far
a Colony should assist the Mother Country to support Troops
detained in the Colony for Imperial purposes. To old and
settled Colonies such a question may have an intimate relation,
but to a young Colony struggling for development against
extra-ordinary difficulties it can have but little application. In
proportion as its revenues are applied so will it progress: the
more rapid its progression, the sooner will it be in a position
to require the least amount of Imperial assistance.

6. I trust the weighty reasons I have laid before Your
Grace in my Despatch No 58 of the 15 Decr last, will induce
Yr Grace to obtain the sanction of the Lords of the Treasury
to another loan of £50,000. With that sum I believe I can so
arrange my financial scheme for the current year as to carry
on without check the reproductive works that have been set
afoot, and at the same time to place the Colony at the close
of the year in the most satisfactory relation towards Her
Majesty's Government in all matters of account.

7. I have carefully abstained during the past year since
the receipt of Your Grace's Despatches herein referred to,
from drawing upon the Imperial Treasury, but to meet our
liabilities both on Military and Civil account I now find
myself much pressed for funds; I have therefore drawn upon
the Paymaster General for the sum of £5000, on Colonial Pay
account, as specially reported in my Despatch of this date
No 4, and I trust Your Grace will not object to this measure,
viewing the amount as on account of the Parliamentary vote in
aid of the Colony for 1863-64.