Billeting

Billeting, a method of providing food and lodging for soldiers by quartering them on the inhabitants of a town, practised on the Continent during the annual military manoeuvres, and (under careful restrictions) occasionally in England. It has always been specially offensive to English sentiment, and is attacked in one of the clauses of the Petition of Right (1628), and was prohibited by statute (if without the consent of the persons on whom the troops were billeted) in 1681. This prohibition, however, was a dead letter, and in 1689 the Mutiny Act (q.v.) transferred the control of the practice to the municipal authorities. The liability is now limited by the Army Act of 1881 to licensed victuallers and (for horses) to livery-stable keepers. The practice, however, is little resorted to since the development of railway communication, and the institution of military districts with barracks at head-quarters in which the militia can be accommodated has rendered it unnecessary during their annual training.