210

ORDER OF THE BATH.

[INSTALLATION.

nor Plate of Arms and Style of a Knight Commander, nor Plate of the Style ofany Companion, has been placed in Westminster Abbey, is to be attributed toany other cause than the difficulty of finding room for them, has not been ascer-tained; but is due to the Officer of Arms to state, that the Plates of suchKnights Commanders and Companions, as paid their fees, are engraved, 9 andthat readiness is expressed to furnish the Banners of the former whenever theymay be required. Be the causes of the omission, however, what they may, theKnights Commanders and Companions have been seriously aggrieved. Itwas promised by the Sovereign, that their Names should be placed in the GreatTemple of British Fame, as a perpetual and public record of their services andmerits; and though they might fairly have expected that the Country wouldhave defrayed the expense, they themselves actually paid the cost of thoseMemorials, in many cases, more than twenty years ago. This reward wasgiven to them by the gratitude of their Prince; it was guaranteed by his respon-sible Ministers, and was announced by an official notification; and that nothingmight be wanting to prove their claim to it, they have paid the expense withtheir own money. Common justice, no less than common honesty, therefore,requires that the Knights Commanders and Companions of the Bath shouldno longer be deprived of what has ceased to be a matter of favour, by havingbecome a positive right. Hundreds of these Veterans have died in the longinterval since 1815; but the families of many survive, to whom the fulfilmentof the engagement would be highly gratifying; for in too many instances, theyhave little other inheritance than the memory of their fathers’ services andhonours.

The Knights Grand Cross created since June 1812, have equal reason to bedissatisfied, for no Memorial of them whatever is to be found in WestminsterAbbey; and though the Banners and Plates of all the Knights, whose Installa-tions were Dispensed with by Royal Warrant, in July 1821, were prepared,and are still ready, they have not been placed in the Chapel of the Order,possibly for the reason just assigned; and the Stalls remain as at the Installa-tion in that year.

9 Copies of the Inscriptions on some of those Plates are given in the Appendix.