Department of the Accountant-General of the Navy

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Department of the Accountant-General of the Navy
Naval Ensign of the United Kingdom.svg
Department overview
Formed1829
Preceding Department
Dissolved1932
Superseding agency
Jurisdiction Government of the United Kingdom
HeadquartersAdmiralty Building
Whitehall
London
Parent Department Department of the Secretary to the Admiralty

The Department of the Accountant-General of the Navy [1] also known as Accountant-General's Department [2] was the department charged by the British Government with reviewing all naval estimates, conducting naval audits and processing payments [3] from 1829 to 1932.

Contents

History

Prior to 1832 the navy did not have a specialist department for accounting purposes there existed only an office for administering naval widows pensions that was the domain of the Paymaster for Widows Pensions. The Accountant-General's Department was established when the Admiralty's civil departments were reorganized and the Navy Board was abolished in 1832, this new department took over the duties of the Navy Boards, Accountants Department and Navy Boards, Payments Department. The Accountant-General of the Navy was initially one of the new Principal Officers of the Board of Admiralty from 1832 until 1869. [4]

In 1866 the accountant and his department became the immediate deputising function to the Parliamentary and Financial Secretary to the Admiralty, it was then given a partial remit over control of naval estimating. [5] The accountants department, however, had no authority to monitor and track expenditure or estimates of other departments.

In January 1869 the department was restructured with new reporting lines – that which made the Parliamentary Secretary, with the Civil Lord of the Admiralty as his assistant, now had overall responsibility for Naval Finance. As a result of the re-structuring, the stores accounts functions, for both naval and victualling, overseen by the Storekeeper-General and the Controller of Victualling, were transferred as part of the new responsibilities of the department. The office of the Accountant-General was thus empowered to both review and critique these departments financially, further enlargement of the department took place in 1876 with traditional responsibilities added. The department continued in this role until 1932 when the office of Accountant-General and his staff were merged into the Department of the Secretary to the Admiralty. [5]

The department consisted of a number of specialist accounting divisions with sub-branches that were administered by the Assistant Accountants-General of the Navy, see each divisions responsibilities in the relevant section below.

Accountant-General's duties

Included: [4]

Accountants-General of the Navy

Included:

Deputy Accountants-General

Incomplete list included:

Assistant Accountants-General

Incomplete list included:

Structure

Estimates division

Included: [4]

Invoice and Claims division

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References

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Attribution

Primary source for this article is by * Lovell, Tony; Harley, Simon. "Accountant-General of the Navy". dreadnoughtproject.org. Dreadnought Project.

Sources