cases remitted by the department and the men given the detention punishment, which is not a confinement in prison. They do not wear a prison suit; they wear their ordinary clothes; and they drill and do small jobs of useful work connected with the station. They stay there various periods, from 6 months to 18 months, and that period can be shortened by their good behavior. After they have been there a short time, and have shown good behavior, they are transferred into a separate building and are called "probationists"; they have very much more latitude; they are not watched so carefully and are given more privileges; and at the end of that probationary period, if they have behaved themselves, they are sent back to duty; and a very large proportion of the men that are thus punished-or disciplined, rather; the term "disciplined" is the better one-do go back to duty; and as the system extends we will get more men to return, instead of, as under the old way, simply confining them for 6 months, or a year, or 18 months, and then dishonorably discharging them.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, does that have a tendency to reduce desertions?

Admiral ANDREWS. I think it will; yes.

The CHAIRMAN. Does it have also a tendency to inspire the men with more confidence in the service and a better degree of satisfaction?

Admiral ANDREWS. I think the feeling among the men is—or it should be, at least that if they have committed an act like desertion, or have had a long absence without leave, without premeditation; that is, on the impulse of the moment, they will receive less punishment. But, of course, there are some men who desert because they are not satisfied with the conditions on a particular ship that they may be on; it may be that the discipline or treatment is a little different from that on another ship; or, in many cases, they have conditions arising at home, and then, if they find it difficult to get out of the service, they will perhaps desert. We try to take up all cases of that kind and assist the man to get out as quickly as possible, if we are satisfied at all that there is a real home condition that needs him. In other words, my idea is not to make it so difficult, if there is any reason at all-any good reason, I mean-for him to go; I approve his discharge.

Mr. BROWNING. Admiral, may I ask you a question? Where a man is guilty of desertion and is given 18 months' imprisonment with loss of pay and a dishonorable discharge, does this act that you spoke of a few moments ago permit that man, after he has served his term of imprisonment with good behavior, to be reinstated; or, in other words, do you reinstate them under those circumstances?

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, we do: that is a distinct feature

Mr. BROWNING (interrupting). I have in mind at the present time the case of a man that enlisted in the Navy; I think I received a letter from you about that this morning.

Admiral ANDREWS. That is a distinct part of the system. If they express a desire to make amends for their act and want to go back and retrieve themselves, we do receive them.

Mr. BROWNING. You take them back?

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir; unless

Mr. BROWNING (interrupting). The case I am speaking of is this: I got a letter from you this morning about a man whose fine has

been remitted so that his mother can get that money. What I wanted to get at was, whether that man could, when his time was out, reenter the service; whether you will take him back into the service? Admiral ANDREWS. I will have to know the circumstances of the particular case before replying definitely; but I think it would be so. Mr. TALBOTT. The point is, Mr. Browning, that if he gets a sentence and is confined in prison at hard labor until his time expires, he gets his dishonorable discharge.

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir.

Mr. BROWNING. Well, this man deserted-I know nothing of the circumstances but he was sentenced to imprisonment with loss of pay and a dishonorable discharge. Now, the department has remitted the fine so that his mother, who is an invalid, and his sisters can get this money. Now, from what little I know of the case, I believe that man would go back into the Navy if he were given a chance.

Admiral ANDREWS. He will be given a chance, undoubtedly, if he means to do right.

Mr. BROWNING. I was wondering if he would be given a chance after his time expired.

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, the admiral stated a moment ago that it was the policy of the department that if a man while in prison manifested a proper disposition, they would even shorten the time and permit him to go back into the service and remove the dishonorable discharge. Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir.

Mr. BROWNING. I did not know whether it covered the courtmartial cases in which a man was sentenced to dishonorable discharge. Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir; it covers those.

Mr. BROWNING. I want to ask you another question: What is the percentage of the people that you arrest after they have deserted? Admiral ANDREWS. I do not know.

Mr. BROWNING. Can you tell me how many you catch again?

Admiral ANDREWS. I think I can find that out; it will take me a minute. [Examining papers.]

Mr. BROWNING. You need not look it up now; you can put it in the record of the hearing.

Admiral ANDREWS. Well, I thought perhaps I could find it in a moment.

The CHAIRMAN. Does not your report give it? You usually do give it in your annual report.

Admiral ANDREWS. It does give it; it gives the number of men that are deserters that are caught. Desertions, for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1912, the men absenting themselves from their ship or station without authority, 3,055; the men apprehended, 485.

Mr. BROWNING. Four hundred and eighty-five out of three thousand and fifty-five desertions?

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. How many returned?

Admiral ANDREWS. Men voluntarily returning, 503. Of course they are not deserters if they voluntarily return.

The CHAIRMAN. But which is deducted from the 3,055?

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir; that is deducted so the total absentees on June 30, 1912, was 2,067. Of the total number apprehended or

surrendered only 211 were convicted of desertion; the others were convicted of something else; probably of absence without leave.

Mr. TRIBBLE. Are the punishments inflicted by court-martial more or less severe than in civil life?

Admiral ANDREWS. For military offenses I do not think there is anything comparable in civil life, but for all other offenses, like larceny, or other crimes, they are almost exactly similar to the punishments in civil life.

Mr. WITHERSPOON. Does that policy of taking the men back who have deserted apply to officers as well as to privates?

Admiral ANDREWS. I do not think it would; no, sir. We have so few desertions among the officers and more is expected of them. We have had two in the last year or so, I am sorry to say, but I do not think it would apply.

Mr. TRIBBLE. You do not mean those two boys that got lost over in Sweden, do you?

Admiral ANDREWS. No, sir.

Mr. WITHERSPOON. Those two cases, and then a case where a midshipman, I believe, was discharged because he got married. Is there any policy of the Navy that will prevent men like that from being reinstated? If so, why should you make a distinction between receiving them back and yet have a policy of taking deserters back?

Admiral ANDREWS. The cases you refer to are not the ones I had in mind when I said two officers had deserted. Of course the men are younger and not so much is expected of them; I mean that they do not realize as an officer should, who is very much older and has more responsibility and more education. I do not think they should be held quite so strictly to account as an officer.

Mr. WITHERSPOON. But a man is not an officer when he is in the Naval Academy, before he is in actual service, is he?

Admiral ANDREWS. No, sir; but this case you speak of, if I understand the case, occurred when he was on his two years' cruise, and when on that cruise they were forbidden by the regulations to marry, and there were other circumstances, I think, connected with that which had a part in determining his separation from the service, and I do not know that I have heard of any proposition that he even wishes to come back.

The CHAIRMAN. Yes, he has a bill pending to have him reinstated. Mr. BROWNING. Do you not think in that case that it was the officers' duty to admonish him instead of giving him encouragement and everything to get off the ship?

Admiral ANDREWS. I believe he was so informed.

Mr. BROWNING. Not according to the evidence before the committee he was not.

Admiral ANDREWS. I think the evidence is in the department that he was. I have forgotten his name.

Mr. TRIBBLE. What is that, Mr. Browning?

Mr. BROWNING. When he went to report that he was going to be married they congratulated him and sent an escort-sent people to attend the wedding.

Admiral ANDREWS. I think that was true, but I believe I have seen a letter stating that he was warned as to the regulations and the possible consequences. I am sure that is on file in the department.

The CHAIRMAN. If you have a letter of that kind on file, will you send a copy of it to this committee?

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir.

Mr. ESTOPINAL. I understand a warning was given him in some

way.

Admiral ANDREWS. That is my recollection. I have rather a hazy recollection of the whole thing. My recollection is there is a letter on file in which the executive officer warned him. I believe the captain did not remember the regulation that he should not marry.

Mr. LOUD. The captain thought this new order had already been put in force, I believe. It was put in force a few days afterwards, and the captain thought it had already gone in force, and the boy was laboring under the same misapprehension.

Admiral ANDREWS. He, too, was?

Mr. LOUD. Yes; it seems to me so, and the committee agreed that the boy ought to be reinstated without any further trouble about it. There was no willful violation of the rules; only a technical violation. Admiral ANDREWS. Yes; it would seem so, if there were no other circumstances connected with it and his statements are correct.

Mr. BROWNING. This midshipman's name was Austin.

Admiral ANDREWS. I will look that up and see what the correspondence is and send up whatever there is that you have not got.

The CHAIRMAN. If there are no further questions on that we will turn to page 19, Bureau of Navigation, "Transportation travel allowance of enlisted men," etc. The language is the same until we get to the amount $850,000, instead of $800,000 last year. Why the increase of $50,000?

Admiral ANDREWS. The $50,000 which is shown here was asked for last year, but was not allowed, and it is included in the 1914 estimate because of the additional number of men and additional number of discharges. It is estimated the expenses under this appropriation will be: "Travel allowance of men-discharge and expirations of enlistment, $369,583," which is the same as the estimate for 1913; "Transportation of men on duty," the same as our estimate for last year, but is $50,000 more than was appropriated; "Transportation of men-discharge in medical survey, with subsistence," the same as last year; "Transportation and subsistence of sick," the same; "Apprehension and delivery of deserters," the same; and "Railroad guide and other incidental expenditures," the same. The appropriation for transportation for 1912 was $999.400; for the year there was a balance of $90,079.80. The returns for the current year, for which only $800,000 was appropriated, are not complete enough to be of any value, but we had a large reduction between 1912 and 1913, almost $200,000, and we are asking this year on a very close estimate for transportation, due to the number of extra men; then taking into account this large balance, we believe we can get along on $850,000, which is only $50,000 more than the appropriation for 1913.

The CHAIRMAN. Does the enlarged enlistment of 4,000 enter into that as an estimate of increase?

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir; it does, because we have frequent transfers of men. The larger the force we have the larger the incidental transportation charges are. For instance, when the Montana and the Tennessee went to Turkey we took men from a battleship at

Boston and from a battleship at Norfolk, and from the training station at Norfolk, from the training station at Newport, and then picked up odds and ends of men at the different stations along the coast. All that meant transportation costs, which were very high. I remember it cost something like $5,000 to bring the men from Norfolk to that battleship. That all comes out of this appropriation. The CHAIRMAN. I wish to ask a question there. I have never investigated the matter, but I have heard it stated generally that in another service, not in the Navy, that when they wish to transship men from the Pacific coast to the Philippines they would send them from New York or other places in the East, and then when they would want to send them by way of the canal, the Suez Canal, that they would transport them from Seattle or from San Francisco and ship them from New York. Is anything of that kind resorted to in the Navy?

Admiral ANDREWS. No, sir; we scrutinize that very carefully indeed. The men who are enlisted in the Middle West and the West go to the west coast stations, as far as we can get them. It is all a question of which is the cheapest. If we can send them cheaper east, we sent them east; if we can send them cheaper west, we send them west; then those that go west serve on the Pacific coast or on the Pacific Fleet, and perhaps eventually go out to China. We do, however, often have to send men west from this coast; but it is because the enlistments from that side are not sufficient.

The CHAIRMAN. Are not sufficient for the purpose?

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. But you have in mind using the nearest available supply, have you not?

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes, sir; not only that, but I hope, for the balance of this year, if we have to send any from the east coast, to be able to secure the occasional services of a transport like the Prairie to send them down to the Isthmus and have the Buffalo meet them there and save the transportation across the continent. This would be a comparatively cheap way. It costs about $46 a man to send them across the continent.

Mr. ESTOPINAL. By which way?

Admiral ANDREWS. By rail across the country.

The CHAIRMAN. They get reduced rates?

Admiral ANDREWS. They get very good rates. Then another thing we have taken up very vigorously is the extension of the rates we get on the land-grant roads. By a very complete search of the law we have found a good many roads and pieces of roads that had been overlooked, and by working through the Interstate Commerce Commission we have been able to take advantage of that and get very advantageous rates, both for the men and the freight.

Mr. BROWNING. The law you speak of contains conditions for this purpose?

Admiral ANDREWS. Yes; but they naturally do not bring that up unless we find it.

The CHAIRMAN. The next is "Recruiting stations." I see the appropriation is reduced from $145,000 to $130,000. What is the occasion for the reduction?

Admiral ANDREWS. The estimate is $15,000 less for the current fiscal year. I reduced that simply because we had the balance, and I