"England woke at last, like a giant, from her slumbers, And she turned to swords her plough-shares, and her pruning hooks to spears, While she called her sons and bade them Be the men that God had made them, Ere they fell away from manhood in the careless idle years." Thus it was that on that fateful morning of August 5th, 1914, England awoke, awoke to find herself involved in a struggle, the magnitude of which even the most well-informed, the most highly placed in the land, failed utterly, in those early days, to conceive or to grasp; in death-grips with the most formidable and long-since-systematically prepared fighting machine ever organised in the history of the world by master-minds, ruthless and cunning, steeped in the science of war. England awoke, dazed, incredulous, unprepared; in fact, to quote the very words of the Premier, who, when Minister of Munitions, was addressing a meeting at Manchester in the summer of 1915, "We were the worst organised nation in the world for this war." The worst organised nation! And this, in spite of repeated public utterances and threats coming direct to us from the world-aggressors, as to the import of which there never should, nor indeed could, have been any shadow of doubt. "Neptune with the trident is a symbol for us that we have new tasks to fulfil ... that trident must be in our fist"; thus the German Emperor at Cologne in 1907. "Germany is strong, and when the hour strikes will know how to draw her sword"; Dr. von Bethmann-Hollweg, in the Reichstag, 1911. Or to burrow further back into the annals of the last century, one recalls a challenge, direct and unmistakable, from the pen of so prominent a leader of German public opinion as Professor Treitshke, "We have reckoned with France and Austria—the reckoning with England has yet to come; it will be the longest and the hardest." The reckoning came, swiftly and with deadly purpose. Necessity knew no law, Belgian territory was violated, Paris was threatened, the Prussian spear pointing straight at the heart of France. Unprepared, taken unawares, and, but for the sure shield of defence afforded by her Fleet, well-nigh negligible, England awoke. Happily, the nation as a whole was sound; though hampered as it was by a Peace-at-any-price section of the Press, and honeycombed though it had become with the burrowings of the "yellow English," that "lecherous crew" who, naturalised or unnaturalised, like snakes in To reiterate all that was written at the time with the one object of keeping England out of the fray, of making her desert her friends, and of causing her, "after centuries of glorious life, to go down to her grave unwept, unhonoured, and unsung," is naturally beyond the scope of this necessarily brief rÉsumÉ of the status quo ante. But, lest we forget, lest we relapse once again to our former and innate characteristics of sublime indifference and of complacent laissez-faire, heedless of that oft-repeated warning, "They will cheat you yet, those Junkers! Having won half the world by bloody murder, they are going to win the other half with tears in their eyes, crying for mercy," LiterÆ scriptÆ manent, and so he who runs may still read the remonstrance of a high dignitary of the Church, to wit, the Bishop of Lincoln, as set forth in the Daily News and Leader, August 3rd, 1914—"For England to join in this hideous war would be treason to civilisation, and It has been said that "each country and each epoch has the Press which it deserves"; but although God may have given us our Press just as He has given us our relations, at least let us thank God that we can choose our Papers just as we can choose our friends. On "Black Saturday" (August 1st, 1914) the position was literally "touch and go," as may be gathered from the following:—"Powerful City financiers, whom it was my duty to interview this Saturday (August 1st) on the financial situation, ended the Conference with an earnest hope that Britain would keep out of it" (Mr. Lloyd George, Chancellor of the Exchequer, in an interview with Mr. Henry Beech Needham, Pearson's Magazine, March, 1915). Clearly, international finance had all but succeeded in winning the day for the Fatherland. S.O.S. must assuredly have been the signal subconsciously sent out by the staunch little minority in the Asquith Cabinet; for when the tide was at its lowest ebb, when England's honour literally hung in the balance, and while Mr. Asquith was The tonic effect of this dose of stimulant was as immediate as it was invigorating, for "on Sunday (August 2nd)," as Sir Edward Grey announced the following day in the House of Commons (cp. the Times, August 4th, 1914), "I gave the French ambassador the assurance that if the German Fleet comes into the Channel or through the North Sea to undertake hostile operations against the French coasts or shipping, the British Fleet will give all the protection in its power." Further, although "we have not yet made an engagement to send the Expeditionary Force out of the country" we were not letting the grass grow under our feet, for "the mobilisation of the Fleet has taken place; that of the Army is taking place." All self-respecting Englishmen were able to breathe again; we were at least to be permitted to do our bare Wednesday, August 6th, is a day that will remain "momentous in the history of all times," for owing to the incursion within Belgian territory of German troops "His Majesty's Government have declared to the German Government that a state of war exists between Great Britain and Germany as from 11 p.m. on August 4th" (cp. the Times, August 5th, 1914). Thenceforth eyes became riveted on the North Sea, thoughts centred on Belgium. Eagerly the newspapers were bought up; every fresh message ticked off on the "tape" was greedily devoured. A French success in Alsace, a German submarine sunk, fighting on the Meuse and in the Vosges, Lorraine invaded by the French—these and other announcements, acting as apperitiffs to whet the appetite, added to the excitement of the hour. Pressure of public opinion had ousted Lord Haldane from the War Office; Kitchener, "with an inflexible will, a heart that never fails at the blackest moments, a spirit that time and again has been proved unconquerable," becoming Secretary of State for War. With the approval of His Majesty the King, Admiral Sir John Jellicoe assumed supreme command of the Home Fleets, Field-Marshal Sir John French was nominated to the command of the British Expeditionary Force. Yet as day succeeded day and little or nothing became visibly apparent, vainly on all hands, but with increasing persistence, was asked the question, "Why did not England move?" Why this inaction, this seeming hesitation? The Fleet had been as if swallowed up by the waters. All was silence everywhere. At midnight on August 12th we were at war with Austria, and although "the general attitude of the nation is what it ever has been in time of trial, sedate, sensible, Only those who had been intimately connected with, or actually concerned in, this the first move in the great drama were aware of the intense amount of activity that had been crowded into the breathless space of those two short weeks. The ordinary man-in-the-street, the strap-hanger, the lady in the stalls, the girl in the taxi, all were purposely kept in the dark; the great British Public knew nothing. Those of us who happily foresaw the historical On August 18th, the Times, habitually dignified, lucid and exemplary, touches on the occasion in a vein deserving as it is decorous: "The veil is at last withdrawn from one of the most extraordinary feats in modern history—the dispatch of a large force of armed men across the sea in absolute secrecy. What the nation at large knew it knew only from scraps of gossip that filtered through the foreign Press. From its own Press, from its own Government, it learned nothing; and patiently, gladly, it maintained, of its own accord, the conspiracy of silence." It was true, in fact inevitable, that "every day for many days now mothers have been saying good-bye to sons, and wives to husbands," but "until Britain knew that her troopships had safely crossed that narrow strip of water that might have been the grave of thousands, Britain held her peace." However, "now that we are at last allowed to refer to the dispatch of a British Army to the seat of war, we may heartily congratulate all concerned upon the smooth and easy working of the machinery. The staffs of England and France who prepared the plan of transport, the railway and steamship companies which carried the men, the officers and men who marched silently off without the Comparisons are odious, and it is obviously without any desire to detract from the laudable performances of others in the accomplishment of this, "one of the most extraordinary feats in modern history," that reference of a special character is here made to the singularly high state of efficiency obtaining on the great British railway companies, which alone rendered possible so remarkable an achievement as that of marshalling at a moment's notice, and dispatching, the many trains necessary for the conveyance to the different ports of embarkation within the United Kingdom of the four Divisions of all arms and one of Cavalry of which the original British Expeditionary Force was composed. It is true that on the outbreak of war, the State, at least in name, assumed control of the railways, and this by virtue of an Act of Parliament passed in 1871 (34 and 35 Victoria, c. 86) "for the Regulation of the Regular and Auxiliary Forces of the Crown," section XVI. of which enacted that "When Her Majesty, by order in Council, declares that an emergency has arisen in which it is expedient for the public service that Her Majesty's Government should have control over the railroads of the United Kingdom, or any of them, the Secretary of State may, by warrant under his hand, empower any person or persons named in such warrant to take possession in the name or on behalf of Her Majesty of any A previous "Act for the better Regulation of Railways, and for the Conveyance of Troops" (5 and 6 Victoriae 30th July, a.d., 1842, cap. LV. section XX.), similarly declares—"Be it enacted, 'That whenever it shall be necessary to move any of the Officers or Soldiers of Her Majesty's Forces of the Line, Ordnance Corps, Marines, Militia, or the Police Force, by any Railway, the Directors thereof shall and are hereby required to permit such Forces respectively with their Baggage, Stores, Arms, Ammunition, and other Necessaries and Things, to be conveyed at the usual Hours of starting, at such Prices or upon such Conditions as may from Time to Time be contracted for between the Secretary at War and such Railway Companies for the Conveyance of such Forces, on the Production of a Route or Order for the Conveyance signed by the proper Authorities." Hence it will be seen that, always subject to the provisions of the National Defence Act of 1888 (51 and 52 Victoriae, c. 31), which simply ensured that naval and military requirements should take precedence over every other form of traffic on the railways whenever an Order for the embodiment of the Militia was in force, the actual working of the various departments of the different railway companies when war was Whilst touching lightly upon the evident and praiseworthy preparedness and consequent ability of the great railway companies to deal with "the emergency" the moment it arose, it will perhaps not be uninteresting to inquire briefly into the circumstances dating back to the "fifties" of the last century from which were evolved and brought gradually to a state as nearly approaching perfection as is humanly possible the organisation necessary for the speedy and safe transport of troops by rail in time of war. History ever repeats itself, and it has invariably been the case that the imminent peril of invasion rather than any grandiose scheme of foreign conquest has been the determining factor in arousing that martial spirit, so prone to lying The three more obviously parallel instances in modern times of the manifestation of this trait so happily characteristic of the nation are to be found, first and foremost perhaps in connection with the present-day world conflict, when in response to the late Lord Kitchener's first appeal for recruits thousands flocked to the colours. Apposite indeed was the following brief insertion to be found in the personal column of the Times, August 26th, 1914: "'Flannelled fools at the wicket and muddied oafs at the goal' have now an opportunity of proving whether Mr. Kipling was wrong." They seized the opportunity in no uncertain manner; incontrovertibly they proved him wrong, "The first hundred thousand," or "Kitchener's mob" as they were affectionately termed, being speedily enrolled, and forming the nucleus of the immense armies which eventually took the field. Analogous to this effort may be taken the crisis occurring in the middle of the last century, when, in the year 1858, out of what may best be described perhaps as a "storm in a tea-cup," there loomed the threat of invasion by our friends from across the Channel, resulting in a scare the immediate outcome of which was the formation of the Volunteer Force, which quickly reached a total of 150,000 men. The average historian of to-day, who mentally is as firmly convinced that the genius of Nelson won the Battle of Trafalgar as he is ocularly certain that the famous admiral's statue dominates Trafalgar Square, will, on the other hand, in all probability deny that the use of steam as "Soon shall thy arm, unconquered steam! afar Drag the slow barge, or drive the rapid car; Or, on wide-waving wings expanded, bear The flying chariot through the field of air!" Evidently the "Jules Verne" of his day, Erasmus Darwin was physician as well as poet; his ideas, so we are told, were indeed "original and contain the germs of important truths," to which may, in some measure, be attributed the It is true the petrol engine has latterly proved its more ready adaptability to the purpose of road locomotion and of aviation, but the fact remains that steam to this day eminently preserves her predominance in the world of ocean and railway travel. Seldom does one find the evolution of any one particular branch of scientific endeavour traced in so alluring as well as instructive a manner as proves to be the case, when, taking down from the nearest bookshelf that delightful little volume "British Locomotives," one pursues the author, Mr. C. J. Bowen-Cooke (now C.B.E. and Chief Mechanical Engineer of the London and North-Western Railway), with never-abating interest through his treatise on the early history of the modern railway engine. He tells us that "the first self-moving locomotive engine of which there is any authenticated record was made by a Frenchman named Nicholas Charles Cugnot, in the year 1769. It was termed a 'land-carriage,' and was designed to run on ordinary roads." Although we learn that "there are no particulars extant of this, the very first locomotive," this same Cugnot designed and constructed two years later, a larger engine, "which is still preserved in the Conservatoire des Arts et Metiers at Paris." The French are a people ever prone to looking further than their noses, hence the fact that the French Government not unnaturally "took some interest in this notion of a steam land-carriage, The Crimean struggle of 1855 had done little enough to enhance England's military prestige, only to be followed, two years later, by the nightmare horrors of the Mutiny. Throughout the first and second Palmerston Commenting on the situation, the writer of a leading article in the Times of April 19th, 1859, openly deplores the fact that "the Englishman of the present day has forgotten the use of arms"; not merely this, but "the practice of football or of vying with the toughest waterman on the Thames is of little service to young men when their country is in danger." Mercifully enough, perhaps, the pernicious sensationalism of the cinema, and the vacant thrills afforded by the scenic railway, were magic lures unknown in those mid-Victorian days, manly and open-air forms of sport already being considered sufficiently derogatory to the inculcation The opinion was further expressed that "there can be only one true defence of a nation like ours—a large and permanent volunteer force supported by the spirit and patriotism of our young men, and gradually indoctrinating the country with military knowledge," the article concluding with this ominous reminder—"We are the only people in the world who have not such a force in one form or another." "Si vis pacem, para bellum" was the obvious corollary drawn by all sober-minded people and seriously inclined members of the community, and on the 13th of May, 1859, the Times had "the high gratification of announcing that this necessity (that of home defence) is now recognised by the Government," for "in another portion of our columns will be found a circular addressed by General Peel to the Queen's Lieutenants of counties sanctioning the formation of Volunteer Rifle Corps." At the same time the war in Italy was made to serve the purpose of bringing out in full relief the importance of steam as a novel factor in strategical operations, for we further read (cp. the Times, May 13th, 1859) that "steam—an agency unknown in former contests—renders all operations infinitely more practicable.... Railroads can bring troops to the frontier from all quarters of the kingdom.... It is in steam transport, in fact, that we discover the chief novelty of the war." Formed in January, 1887, the battalion was recruited entirely from amongst the employÉs of the London and North-Western Railway, comprising firemen, cleaners, boilermakers and riveters, fitters, smiths, platelayers, shunters, and pointsmen. The nominal strength of the establishment was six companies of 100 men each, but in addition 245 men enlisted as a matter of form in the Royal Engineers for one day and were placed in the First Class Army How valuable an asset from the professional point of view were deemed, originally, these Engineer Corps, may be gathered from the Times of November 23rd, 1860, which congratulates the 1st Middlesex, as being the parent corps, on having been "most successful in obtaining skilled workmen of the class from which are drawn the Royal Engineers. Every member of the corps goes through a course of military engineering in field works, pontooning, etc.," with the result that the Volunteer Engineers "will therefore form a valuable adjunct to the Royal Engineers in the event of their being called into the field." The ball once started rolling, it was not unnaturally deemed advisable to form some central and representative body of control, and the Times of January 10th, 1865, gives an account of an "interesting ceremony of presenting prizes to the successful competitors of rifle practice of the Queen's Westminster (22nd Middlesex) Rifle Volunteers," when Colonel Accorded the title of "The Engineer and Railway Volunteer Staff Corps," this select little group, combining some of the best brains and ability to be found in the engineering and managerial departments of the railways, acted in the capacity of consulting engineers to the Government, from the time of its formation until the year 1896, when a smaller body composed on similar lines and known as the "War Railway Council" was introduced for the purpose of supplementing, and to some extent relieving, the original Railway Staff Corps. As has already been seen, although in accordance with the provisions of the Act of 1871 the Government would assume control of the railways in the event of "an emergency" arising, the directors, officers, and servants of the different companies would nevertheless be required to "carry on" as usual, and to maintain, each in their several spheres, the actual working of the lines. The final adjustment of any minor defects that may have been apparent in the rapidly completing chain of organisation was speedily accelerated by the Agadir crisis of 1911, resulting in the inception in the following year of that unique and singularly thorough institution, the Railway Executive Committee, which in turn superseded its immediate predecessor, the War Railway Council. On the outbreak of the world conflict in Indelibly imprinted though the memory of those fateful August days must remain in the minds of every living individual, days brimful of wonderings alternating with doubt, expectancy, ill-foreboding, and occasional delight, coupled with an all-pervading sense of mystery completely enshrouding the movements of our own forces, few indeed were aware of the extent of the task imposed upon the Railway Executive Committee. Yet so swiftly, so silently, was the entire scheme of mobilisation carried through, that it was with a sense bordering on bewilderment So far so good, it will be opined. Certainly "On Friday, August 21st, the British Expeditionary Force," Sir John French tells us, "found itself awaiting its first great trial of strength with the enemy," and the childish display of wrathful indignation evinced by Wilhelm the (would-be) Conqueror, who is credited with having slapped with his gauntlet the face of an all too-zealous staff officer, bearer of so displeasing an item of intelligence, is not devoid of humour. The nursery parallel is complete—"Fe, fi, fo, fum," roared the giant, "I smell the blood of an Englishmen." "Gott im himmel," snarled the Kaiser, "It is my Royal and Imperial command that you concentrate your energies, for the immediate present, upon one single purpose, and that is that you address all your skill and all the valour of my soldiers to exterminate first the treacherous English and walk over General French's contemptible little army." Head-quarters, Aix-la-Chapelle, August 19th, 1914, (cp. the Times, October 1st, 1914). For the moment, as it transpired, "nothing came to hand which led us to foresee the crushing superiority of strength which actually confronted us on Sunday, August 23rd"; neither had "Allenby's bold and searching reconnaissance led me (Sir John French) to believe that we were threatened by forces against which we could not make an effective stand." How completely the strength and disposal of the enemy forces had been veiled, no more than a few brief hours sufficed to disclose; disillusion quickly supervened. "Our intelligence ... thought that at least three German corps (roughly 150,000 men) The following narrative set down by an eye-witness, temporarily en panne during the afternoon and evening of August 27th on the outskirts of the little provincial town of Ham, depicts briefly but with some degree of vividness the tragic nature of the scene that was being enacted. After making some slight preliminary allusion to the pitiable plight of refugees who everywhere helped to block the roads, "there commenced," so the narrative runs, "this other spectacle of which I speak; at first, as it were, a mere trickle, a solitary straggler here, a stray cavalry horseman there, until the trickle grew, grew into a strange and never-ending living stream; for, down the long straight route nationale from Le Cateau, and so away beyond from Mons, they came those 'broken British regiments' that had been 'battling against odds'; men bare-headed, others coatless, gone the very The news in London, heralded by a special Sunday afternoon edition of the Times, came as a bolt from the blue, for not since the announcement of the landing of the Expeditionary Force in France had anything of an authentic nature been received as to its subsequent doings or movements; in fact, as the Times pointed out on August 19th, "the British Expeditionary Force has vanished from sight almost as completely as the British Fleet"; further, as if to complete The British public, however, in spite of occasional qualms and momentary misgivings, ever confident of success and sure in its inflexible belief that the British Army could hold its own against almost any odds (the prevailing logic being that one Britisher was as good as any three dirty Germans), had bidden Dame Rumour take a back seat in the recesses of its mind. Incredible then the news that broke the spell: "This is a pitiful story I have to write," so read the message, dated Amiens, August 29th, "and would to God it did not fall to me to write it. But the time for secrecy is past. I write with the Germans advancing incessantly, while all the rest of France believes they are still held near the frontier." What had happened? How could it be true? Sir John French wastes no time in mincing matters:—"The number of our aeroplanes was limited." "The enormous numerical and artillery superiority of the Germans must be remembered." "It (the machine gun) was an arm in which the Germans were particularly well found. They must have had at least six or seven to our one." "It was, moreover, very clear that the Germans had realised that the war was to be one calling for colossal supplies of munitions, supplies indeed The time for secrecy was past; but how to stem the tide? The situation was, and indeed remained, such that a year later Mr. Lloyd George (then Secretary of State for War) was moved to make this astounding admission in the House of Commons: "The House would be simply appalled to hear of the dangers we had to run last year." And again at a subsequent date when as Minister of Munitions he exclaimed in the House, "I wonder whether it will not be too late. Ah! fatal words on this occasion! Too late in moving here, too late in arriving there, too late in coming to this decision, too late in starting enterprises, too late in preparing. In this war the footsteps of the Allied forces have been dogged by the mocking spectre of 'Too late.'" In this connection it would be amusing, were it not so utterly tragic, to compare a slightly previous and public utterance from the lips of this same "Saviour of his Country":—"This is the most favourable moment for twenty years to overhaul our expenditure on armaments" (Mr. Lloyd George. Daily Chronicle, January 1st, 1914). Happily however, "il n'est jamais trop tard pour bien faire," and this good old adage as to it being never too late to mend was perhaps never better exemplified than when, the Army Ordnance authorities having realised that the Foremost amongst firms of world-wide repute must be mentioned the great London and North-Western Railway Company, whose Chief Mechanical Engineer, Mr. C. J. Bowen-Cooke, C.B.E., realising from the outset the import of the late Lord Kitchener's forecast as to the probable duration and extent of the war, and in spite of ever-increasing demands on locomotive power which he found himself compelled to meet for military as well as for ordinary civilian purposes, threw himself heart and soul into the problem of adapting the then existing conditions and plant in the Company's locomotive works at Crewe to the requirements of the military authorities. Forewarned as it was to some extent by the hurricane advance of the Hun, the Government was also forearmed in that it was empowered by the provisions of the Act of 1871 not merely to take over the railroads of the United Kingdom, but, should it be deemed expedient to do so, the plant thereof as well. The Government might even take possession of the plant without the However that may be, as soon as the really desperate nature of the struggle began to dawn upon the Government, and it was seen to be a case of "all or nothing," the then President of the Board of Trade, Mr. Runciman, M.P., was not slow to espy the latent, yet none the less patent, possibilities which surely existed within the practical domain of railway workshops. In certain circumstances it may be regarded as fortunate that not a few of those happy-go-lucky individuals, whose leaning is towards politics, are gifted with the convenient art of adapting themselves and their views to that particular quarter whence the wind happens to be blowing. "I must honestly confess," as this same Mr. Runciman had expressed himself when in 1907 he was Financial Secretary to the Treasury, "that when I see the armaments expanding it is gall and wormwood to my heart; the huge amount of money spent on the Army is a sore point with every one in the Treasury." Particularly galling, therefore, must have seemed the rate at which expenditure on armaments was increasing by leaps and bounds in 1914; yet so ingenuous is the manner in which Without knowing for the moment what actually were the more immediate and pressing requirements of the Government, Mr. Cooke suggested an interview with the late Sir Frederick Donaldson, then Director of Army Ordnance at Woolwich Arsenal, with whom he was personally acquainted; the result being that Sir Frederick was able to point out in detail the difficulties with which he was faced, handing over to Mr. Cooke a number of drawings of gun-carriage chassis, etc., which he (Mr. Cooke) went through, tabulating them in concise form, so that at a forthcoming meeting which had been called at the Railway Clearing House for Tuesday, October 20th, the Chief Mechanical Engineers of the Midland, Great Western, North-Eastern, Great Northern, and Lancashire and Yorkshire Railways who were present should have every facility for noting and deciding what they could best undertake in their respective railway workshops. Briefly the duties of this sub-committee were to consider, to co-ordinate, and to report upon various requests by or through the War Office to the railway companies, to assist in the manufacture of warlike stores and equipment. All applications for work to be done in the railway workshops, either for the War Department or for War Department contractors, were submitted to this committee by one of the War Office members. On receipt of any request the railway members of the committee decided whether the work was such as could be effectively undertaken by the railway companies, and if their decision was favourable, steps were taken to ascertain which companies could and would participate in the work, the amount of work they could undertake to turn out, and the approximate date of delivery. The War Office members decided as to the priority of the various demands made upon the railway companies. The actual order upon the railway companies to carry out any manufacturing work was given to such companies by the Railway Executive Committee. |