"HULLO! AMERICA"
"A world where nothing is had for nothing."
CLOUGH.
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--
"Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an'
Chuck him out, the brute,"
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--
"Please to step in front, Sir,
When the guns began to shoot."
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.
[7] The total number of employés in all departments of the L. & N.W.R.
who joined the colours during the war was 37,742, or 34 per cent. of
the entire staff. Of these, three won the V.C., and numerous others
were awarded various British and foreign decorations.
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.