Tuesday April 3, 1894

M^r Cass brought down a letter from Account. Gen. instructing me to draw the cheques. I replied next morning to Sec^y of Adm^y pointing out that this was not within my duties.The Crown lens of 28ⁱⁿ O.G. (Photogr. Posⁿ) was brought nearer to flint lens by taking off the separating ring 0.4ⁱⁿ thick on face of flint cell.

William Christie, Astronomer Royal

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RH says..... The financial issues highlighted in the previous post were clearly not solved. To confuse the issue, the Astronomer Royal was a Crown appointment, meaning that although the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, was answerable to the Admiralty, Christie, in theory, was not. The terms of his Royal Warrant, unsurprisingly, said nothing about drawing cheques.

Monday April 2, 1894

M^r C. Cass from the Admiralty (Account. Gen’s Depart^t) came to take over temporarily M^r Le Brun’s duties. M^r Dyson (to whom M^r Criswick had handed over the cash balance placed in his hands by M^r Le Brun on March 20) transferred the cash balance (which I counted over) to M^r Cass.

William Christie, Astronomer Royal

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M^r Cass took charge of the accounts.

Frank Dyson, Chief Assistant

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RH says..... Now we know why Criswick forgot to draw the cheques to pay the computers: this was not normally part of his job. Since Le Brun left, there had been no clerk at the Observatory - although before his arrival in 1893 there had been an even longer hiatus. Clerks and financial responsibility had been a bit of a sore point since 1892, when W.J. Wickison, a clerical assistant at the ROG since 1887, stole £188 and was dismissed. The Admiralty's correspondence at the National Archives records that "there is no doubt that Mr Christie’s superintendence was lax in the extreme", but also that, perhaps rightly, "his scientific duties required his more particular attention" and that he should therefore be provided with proper support in the form of an ex-Admiralty "Retired Assistant Paymaster". As a stop-gap, Le Brun and Cass were loaned out to the ROG while the Admiralty thrashed out "the broader question [of] whether the Observatory and its cost might not very fairly be transferred to the Treasury and to the Civil Service Estimates".

Saturday March 31, 1894

M^r Criswick having gone away on leave without having drawn cheques for payment of Computers, Workmen &c I saw the Bank Manager, who arranged that cheques drawn by me on the Public a/c at London & County Bank (Greenwich) would be cashed & accordingly drew the necessary cheques.

William Christie, Astronomer Royal