In the summer of 1917, at the urgent request of the Railway Executive Committee, Mr. Cooke, in conjunction with Sir Francis Dent and Mr. A. J. Hill, chief mechanical engineer G.E.R., undertook, personally, a "mission" to the Government of the U.S. of America, as representing the unprecedented straits to which the leading railway companies of Great Britain had become reduced, and for the purpose of enlisting the practical sympathy of the great republic of the Western hemisphere, at that time but recently united to the allied cause.

Doubts were indeed entertained originally as to whether America could in fact supply material to England in view of her own entry into the arena of European conflict, and so in view of her own requirements; consequently, as will be seen from the following briefly stated remarks, the outcome of the "mission" proved to be eminently satisfactory, and this in no small measure due to the friendly intervention of the U.S. Advisory Committee, acting throughout, primarily, in the interests of the British as opposed to those of individual American railway companies. A few cogent reasons may plausibly be advanced to account for the impasse to which the British railways had been brought.

One cannot fail, for instance, to recall the stigma which, in the pre-war and piping times of peace, invariably attached to the despised 1s. a day man of the British fighting forces; but although, as in Kipling's immortal stanza, it was—

all this sort of antiquated "flap-doodle" very shortly underwent a complete "right-about-turn," when the great ordeal came to be faced, and very speedily it became a case of—

Consequently it is eminently satisfactory to remember that within the first 365 days of the outbreak of hostilities, British railways had contributed more men to the fighting forces of the Empire than either French or German railways had done in their respective spheres. Further, prior to the introduction of universal compulsory service in Great Britain, employÉs of the L. & N. W. R. locomotive department had voluntarily enrolled to the number of 4,002; Crewe Works being responsible for 1,142 names on the Roll of Honour.7 Depletion of staff, plus a steadily increasing volume of traffic, could only spell "maintenance un-maintained." In addition, it was found necessary to adapt rolling stock for use overseas, and prior to the inauguration of the Ministry of Munitions British locomotive works and plant had been depended upon very largely for supplementing the undeniable shortage of munitions of war, which may literally be described as "legion" in quantity as well as in variety.

Worse was to follow, for upon the tardy inauguration of munition factories throughout the country, the long-suffering railway companies of the United Kingdom not only found their own supplies of material very considerably curtailed, but they were called upon to perform the seemingly impossible, viz. that of maintaining a regular and ever-increasing supply of munitions in addition to contributing a novel "expeditionary force" in the shape of locomotives and tenders, wagons, and complete up-to-date workshop machinery for overseas service.

In response to the call "Hullo! America," castings, forgings, steel, and copper plates, tubes, blooms, billets, springs, etc., were spontaneously forthcoming, in all a grand total of some 15,000 tons (tyres alone accounting for 2,848 tons), involving an approximate expenditure of 3,847,042 dollars, or £800,000.

It was admitted that the prices ruling the contracts for this material were abnormally high, but at the same time it was conceded that the national urgency of British claims far outweighed in the then existing circumstances those of American railway companies, who, it should be added in fairness, would have found themselves "up against" identical prices, had they been purchasing the same material themselves.

Finally, it only remains to be noted that no sooner had the financial details of this truly vast transaction been determined (a transaction that may frankly be said to have saved the situation in so far as British railways were concerned in contributing towards the winning of the war), than Mr. Cooke promptly evolved and set in motion a system of delivery at Liverpool, or any other port of discharge, whereby consignments of material on arrival were distributed carriage free by the various railway companies to their respective works.

The subsequent success of this intricate scheme of distribution may fairly be attributed to the unfailing measure of tact and resource available in the person of Mrs. Harris, M.B.E., (nÉe Miss Faith Bowen-Cooke), a lady on whom devolved the exceptional and delicate task of receiving and allotting these 15,000 tons of railway equipment, and who previously, as secretary to the "mission," as much by her business acumen and practical ability as by her own personal charm, won a sure place for herself in the admiration and esteem of many of the leading personalities in the railway world of the United States of America.