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Show AGREEMENT IDE IS TO 11RESS WASHINGTON". Dec 12. Abandonment of the plan to man all merchant vessels engaged in transatlantic service with naval reserves was announced tonight by the shipping board. The proposal was advanced by the navy department and at one time It appeared to have been agreed upon, but the board decided there were too many practical obstacles to attempt it. Under the plan now adopted, naval reserves re-serves will be put aboard only troop ships and vessels carrying whole cargoes of munitions or supplies for the army or navy. AH other ships will be manned as heretofore bv merchant sailors. This arrangement ar-rangement will call for naval operation of many vessels now in the service of the shipping board, since in the past the navy has manned only troop ships and naval supply vessels. "The plan adopted is expected to provide pro-vide a practical solution," said a shipping' ship-ping' board statement, "of a problem that has troubled both the navy department and the shipping board for several weeks. It appears to meet the practical demand de-mand of the navy for naval control of vessels doing1 naval duty, while, in preserving pre-serving the civilian character of crews on all other vessels, it follows the best traditions tra-ditions of the American merchant marine. ma-rine. The plan is in accordance with the practice followed by the British, which is held to have worked out satisfactorily under war conditions." The chief consideration influencing the shipping board in turning down the orig-I orig-I inal project was the navy department's refusal re-fusal to agree' that naval reserves, if put on merchant ships, should draw wages now paid seamen. The navy held that such a practice would upset naval discipline. disci-pline. The shipping board, on the other hand, pointed to an agreement it had made with shipowners and seamen fixing the present wa.ge scale and declared it would be unfair to force merchant seamen into the reserve service without permitting permit-ting them to draw the pay they now get. The navy department then suggested that the service could get along without the seamen if they refused to enter the reserve re-serve service, but shipping board officials declined to view the question that wav. The shipping board will go ahead with its programme for obtaining and training 60,000 officers and, men for the great merchant mer-chant fleet building in American shipyards. ship-yards. Most of the men trained will be put into service on vessels to be completed com-pleted in 191S. The work of enrolling and training is in charge of Henry Howard, the board's director of recruiting, who is stationed at Boston. Schools already have been established in several Atlantic coast ports. As fast as trained, the men will be added to crews whose nucleus comprises trained seamen. |