In dealing with Lord Cardwell’s attitude in respect to army reform, Lord Wolseley says:  “Never was Minister in my time more generally hated by the army.”  He points out how this hatred was extended to all who supported Lord Cardwell’s views.  His own conduct was “looked upon as a species of high treason.”  I was at the time employed in a subordinate position at the War Office.  I can testify that this language is by no means exaggerated.  Nevertheless, after events showed clearly enough that, in resisting the abolition of purchase, the formation of a reserve, and the other admirable reforms with which Lord Cardwell’s name, equally with that of Lord Wolseley, is now honourably associated, the bulk of army opinion was wholly in the wrong.  I believe such army opinion as now objects to a civilian being Secretary of State for War to be equally in the wrong.

There would appear, indeed, to be some inconsistency between Lord Wolseley’s unstinted praise of Lord Cardwell—­that “greatest” of War Ministers, who, “though absolutely ignorant of our army and of war,” responded so “readily to the demands made on him by his military advisers,” and “gave new life to our old army”—­and his depreciation of the system which gave official birth to Lord Cardwell.  There would be no contradiction in the two positions if the civilian Minister, in 1871, had been obliged to use his position in Parliament and his influence on public opinion to force on an unwilling nation reforms which were generally advocated by the army.  But the very contrary of this was the case.  What Lord Cardwell had principally to encounter was “the fierce hatred” of the old school of soldiers, and Lord Wolseley tells us clearly enough what would have happened to the small band of army reformers within the army, if they had been unable to rely on civilian support.

“Had it not been,” he says, “for Mr. Cardwell’s and Lord Northbrook’s constant support and encouragement, those of us who were bold enough to advocate a thorough reorganisation of our military system, would have been ‘provided for’ in distant quarters of the British world, ’where no mention of us more should be heard.’”

There can be no such thing as finality in army reform.  There will be reformers in the future, as there have been in the past.  There will, without doubt, be vested interests and conservative instincts to be overcome in the future, as there were at the time when Lord Wolseley so gallantly fought the battle of army reform.  What guarantee can Lord Wolseley afford that a soldier at the head of the army will always be a reformer, and that he will not “provide for” those of his subordinates who have the courage to raise their voices in favour of reform, even as Lord Wolseley thinks he would himself have been “provided for” had it not been for the sturdy support he received from his civilian superiors?  I greatly doubt the possibility of giving any such guarantee.