ABSTRACT
In arguing for his revision of the Fees recommendations against the objections of the Comptroller of the Navy, Samuel Bentham premised his case on the difference in experience of the Comptroller and himself. The Comptroller of the Navy was a sea captain named Sir Andrew Hamond. Bentham's proposals came at an opportune moment, when the old order based on perquisites was dissolved and a new order had to be created to replace it. By the 1830s, Benthamism, derived from the writings of Jeremy Bentham, was affecting government too, reinforcing the influence of Samuel's ideas. Samuel Bentham's original outline of his plan for dockyard reform was printed for circulation among senior naval officials for the purpose of collecting their opinions. The ideological struggle between the Navy Board and St Vincent's Board of Admiralty backed by the Commission of Naval Enquiry quickly brought relations between the two Boards to a crisis.
