Show PENSIONS REGULAR AND VOLUNTEER A curious showing has been made public by Pension Commrs510ne Ware of the applications for pensions on account ac-count of the recent war with Spain It Includes only the troops present at the Santiago campaign and indicates that pretty much all of the volunteers present at that place have applied for pensions while comparatively few regulars reg-ulars have done so The table embraces em-braces the records of five volunteer regiments and five regular regiments in this regard and Is as follows 8 g SS g Regiments I S g r Yoluntcers lttDlllrlct ot Columbia 0 0 0 42 9thlmmchusctls 0 0 0 63 mdMichigan 0 ci i mhMlchlll 0 0 0 Ii SthOhlo 0 0 0 02 oll1 0 0 O29i nel uar6 llh U S Innnlr Ii lOG 17 ll 7th U S Infantry 23 93 0 249 lth U S Infantry IS 1 0 R Ijlh P S Infantry 38 10 Ii 13 21h U S Infantry 12 i I 13 Total I 51 10 7G No doubt that table IH as striking n one as the Pension Bureau could furnish and it suggests 0 number of things not carried on the face of it First we may learn from It that the method of Betting volunteers for our wars that has been pursued by this country is the moat wasteful of men and money of any ever devised by man save only the appalling losses In some of the crusades We call for volunteers volun-teers they come from every walk of life having not tlw slightest idea of what is reall the duly they have engaged en-gaged to do nor of how to care for themselves they are officered na a rule by men equally Ignorant in those respects with the rank and file Even if they dont go to the front at all they sicken and die at a rate that Is the despair oC the general commanders who as a Iulc do Know 8omothlng about soldiering as 1 we saw it the camp in ChlukamuBUa Ve ncvor nee such deadly epidemics among the regular regu-lar because the mon know I jsomcthlng of slr1Hot eton and if they lace In this regard their oniccri know what they should dp and make them do It The remedy Is to asHernble the volunteers volun-teers lit onmps of instruction under regular officers organise them in such camps Instruct thorn in their duties and officer them as far as possible from the regular army Second Il must he remembered that the Stintlrigo campaign was one beset with peculiar hardnhlps it was in an unhealthy climate where the maximum maxi-mum of innlarlouu exposure WIH present pres-ent and where the very lack of cnre that voIunteeiH arc prone to show would have the hlghcHt deleterious effect ef-fect And ftupcrvenlng these 111 conditions condi-tions came the scourge of yellow fever fe-ver which practically disabled the whole of the volunteer force and did not heave thc regulars unscathed as time pension record Hhows We all recollect rec-ollect the pitiable condition in which the volunteer regiments returned to Monlnuk Point from that disastrous struggle with Yellow Jack Third the activity of the pension agents In drumming up buslncssffoi thonisclvos In the way of pension fees hUH a good deal to do with the large number of the volunteer cases These agents have no such easy way of getting get-ting at the regulars as at the volunteers volun-teers l To the latter they send per rIstently their dreulars and offers of service assuring the recipient that theri is no doubt of getting thin pension pen-sion the case Is perfect and getting on the pension roll a t cerlalnLy the agents make up the case tho volunteer merely has to sign and the shark will do he rest robbing both the candidate for pension and the Government Is it any wonder all these things considered that life Pension IJurcau IB able to make such n showing as it bus made against the volunteers At the same time we do not consider that it wusa kind or magnanimous thing to do unless It Is to be uucd to effect a change In the method of calling for and mustering in the volunteer forces In time of war when they are needed The change suggested above wVmld of course deprive the Stales and the politicians pol-iticians of large patronage 11 i the way of gelling commissions for friends andS and-S constituents but when We see how cruelly wasteful of human life and health and or war material the old system has always proved no one with a grain of consideration SIn S his breast for the good of his country and of his fellow men can for a moment hesitate to make the needed change And the time to malce It Is In a period of profound pro-found peace when there Is no patronage patron-age In sight for when the stress Is on there Is neither time nor disposition to make the change But the Pension Bureau expects to protect Itself against many of these claims by volunteers through a plan adopted at the mustering out of the troops at the close of the Spanish war This plan was devised by Gen F C Alnsworth of the pension office and is thus described by the Army and Navy Register I Each soldier of volunteers before being i mustered out of service In the war with Simln was required to make a statement of his physical condition lie was asked to declare himself on the qlclJt lOll Jluvo you any reason to helluvo that at the present time yon are suffering from tho effects of any wound Injuiy or dlscasf or that you have ammy disability or Impairment Im-pairment of health whether Incurred In the military service or otherwise And he wan further 1t1ltecl to describe the I disability If I Il existed and to state when and where and how It WHS incurred This statement was supplemented by h that of tho company commander along the same lines and I sustained by h the certificate of the examining curgcon If there appeared a discrepancy between the soldiers etatc incnt and the surgeons coitllcatc the woldler went before a boaid of three medical medi-cal officer whose report was added to tho soldiers history which was sent to the record and pension otllce These records are now provingof immense im-mense value to the Pension office In connection con-nection with the claims which have been I rondo and which are being rnndo for pensions i pen-sions by volunteer soldiers who assert disability dis-ability by renuon of service In the volunteer volun-teer army The comparison of claims with those records of musterout examinations have many times provon their value lo the Government They have protected the public treasury from such an Invasion HIs H-Is Illustrated In the table we have reproduced repro-duced when one out of every two men who served In five volunteer rcKlniunls in Cuba imagined themselves justified In isklnr a pension from this Government dotsilo the 1 fact that no one in that volunteer vol-unteer force of COW men was reported as killed i wounded or missing then the Pension oftlce receives a claim from a man who served in the war with Spain It has but to obtain from the Record and Pension office tin record of the examination examina-tion of the claimant nirrdb preliminary to his musterout or discharge and It docs not take tom to ascertain whether the claim la a hdtlinaic one or has been induced In-duced by the percunulons of ho claim agent In one notable case recently It was found that the application for pension was dated on the very day upon which the cialmant signed his statement of phy nlcal condition on being immured out At that time he found himself without wound Injury or disease yet his claim for pension pen-sion made out on the same day was rendered ren-dered notable even In the Pension office for the I category of complaints with which he found himself beset for the purpose of revenue The scheme looks more like a trap for the unwary volunteer a belated effort ef-fort on the part of the Government to protect Iteslf from the consequences of its own evil system of getting and dealing deal-Ing with the volunteers than a fair protection to the treasury For the fact Is that the volunteers on being mustered out will sign pretty much any kind of a paper that the authorities present to them supposing it lo be nil In the routine and being so anxious to get out and away to their homes that they neither notice nor care what it Is about Besides as baa been abundantly abun-dantly proved a man at the time of his discharge may not Ihink that he has suffered c any disability by l reason of his service and may disregard the slight symptoms of It when later It is liable to develop Into a serious mutter mut-ter and in fact disable him Vc do not believe that this alleged shrewd plan will he much In the way of gut tins pensions or that I it t should he for It looks altogether too much like an effort by the Government to take advantage oC Its I own wrong f I |