money, her very self; the soul of Britain and her Empire is in this
conflict, a soul that grows but the more steadfast and determined as
the struggle waxes more deadly and grim. Faint hearts and fanatics
there are, of course, who, regardless of the future, would fain make
peace with the foe unbeaten, a foe lost to all shame and honourable
dealing, but the heart of the Empire beats true to the old war-cry of
"Freedom or Death." In proof of which, if proof be needed, let us to
our figures and facts.
Take first her fighting men; in three short years her little army has
grown until to-day seven million of her sons are under arms, and of
these (most glorious fact!) nearly five million were _volunteers_.
Surely since first this world was cursed by war, surely never did such
a host march forth voluntarily to face its blasting horrors. They are
fighting on many battle fronts, these citizen-soldiers, in France,
Macedonia, Mesopotamia, Palestine, Western Egypt and German East
Africa, and behind them, here in the homeland, are the women, working
as their men fight, with a grim and tireless determination. To-day
the land hums with munition factories and huge works whose countless
wheels whirr day and night, factories that have sprung up where the
grass grew so lately. The terrible, yet glorious, days of Mons and the
retreat, when her little army, out-gunned and out-manned, held up the
rushing might of the German advance so long as life and ammunition
lasted, that black time is past, for now in France and Flanders our
countless guns crash in ceaseless concert, so that here in England one
may hear their ominous muttering all day long and through the hush of
night; and hearkening to that continuous stammering murmur one thanks
God for the women of Britain.
Two years ago, in June, 1915, the Ministry of Munitions was formed
under Mr. David Lloyd George; as to its achievements, here are figures
shall speak plainer than any words.
In the time of Mons the army was equipped and supplied by three
Government factories and a very few auxiliary firms; to-day gigantic
national factories, with miles of railroads to serve them, are in full
swing, beside which, thousands of private factories are controlled by
the Government. As a result the output of explosives in March, 1917,
was over _four times_ that of March, 1916, and _twenty-eight times_
that of March, 1915, and so enormous has been the production of shells
that in the first nine weeks of the summer offensive of 1917 the stock
decreased by only 7 per cent. despite the appalling quantity used.
The making of machine guns to-day as compared with 1915 has increased
_twenty-fold_, while the supply of small-arm ammunition has become so
abundant that the necessity for importation has ceased altogether.
In one Government factory alone the making of rifles has increased
_ten-fold_, and the employees at Woolwich Arsenal have increased from a
little less than 11,000 to nearly 74,000, of whom 25,000 are women.
Production of steel, before the war, was roughly 7 million tons, it
is now 10 million tons and still increasing, so much so that it is
expected the pre-war output will be doubled by the end of 1918; while
the cost of steel plates here is now less than half the cost in the
U.S.A. Since May, 1917, the output of aeroplanes has been quadrupled
and is rapidly increasing; an enormous programme of construction has
been laid down and plans drawn up for its complete realisation.
With this vast increase in the production of munitions the cost of
each article has been substantially reduced by systematic examination
of actual cost, resulting in a saving of £43,000,000 over the previous
year's prices.
Figures are a dry subject in themselves, and yet such figures as these
are, I venture to think, of interest, among other reasons for the
difficulty the human brain has to appreciate their full meaning. Thus:
the number of articles handled weekly by the Stores Departments is
several hundreds of thousands above 50 million: or again, I read that
the munition workers themselves have contributed £40,187,381 towards
various war loans. It is all very easy to write, but who can form any
just idea of such uncountable numbers?
And now, writing of the sums of money Britain has already expended, I
for one am immediately lost, out of my depth and plunged ten thousand
fathoms deep, for now I come upon the following:
"The total national expenditure for the three years to August 4th,
1917, is approximately £5,150,000,000, of which £1,250,000,000 is
already provided for by taxation and £1,171,000,000 has been lent to
our colonies and allies, which may be regarded as an investment."
Having written which I lay down my pen to think, and, giving it up,
hasten to record the next fact.
"The normal pre-war taxation amounted to approximately £200,000,000,
but for the current financial year (1917/18) a revenue of £638,000,000
has been budgeted for, but this is expected to produce between
£650,000,000 and £700,000,000." Now, remembering that the cost of
necessaries has risen to an unprecedented extent, these figures of
the extra taxation and the amounts raised by the various war loans
speak louder and more eloquently than any words how manfully Britain
has shouldered her burden and of her determination to see this great
struggle through to the only possible conclusion--the end, for all
time, of autocratic government.
I have before me so many documents and so much data bearing on this
vast subject that I might set down very much more; I might descant
on marvels of enterprise and organisation and of almost insuperable
difficulties overcome. But, lest I weary the reader, and since I would
have these lines read, I will hasten on to the last of my facts and
figures.
As regards ships, Britain has already placed 600 vessels at the
disposal of France and 400 have been lent to Italy, the combined
tonnage of these thousand ships being estimated at 2,000,000.
Then, despite her drafts to Army and Navy she has still a million men
employed in her coal mines and is supplying coal to Italy, France, and
Russia. Moreover, she is sending to France one quarter of her total
production of steel, munitions of all kinds to Russia and guns and
gunners to Italy.
As for her Navy--the German battle squadrons lie inactive, while in one
single month the vessels of the British Navy steamed over one million
miles; German trading ships have been swept from the seas and the U
boat menace is but a menace still. Meantime, British shipyards are busy
night and day; 1,000,000 tons of craft for the Navy alone were launched
during the first year of the war, and the programme of new naval
construction for 1917 runs into hundreds of thousands of tons. In
peace time the building of new merchant ships was just under 2,000,000
tons yearly, and despite the shortage of labour and difficulty of
obtaining materials, 1,100,000 tons will be built by the end of 1917,
and 4,000,000 tons in 1918.
The British Mercantile Marine (to whom be all honour!) has transported
during the war, the following:--
13,000,000 men,
25,000,000 tons of war material,
1,000,000 sick and wounded,
51,000,000 tons of coal and oil fuel,
2,000,000 horses and mules,
100,000,000 hundredweights of wheat,
7,000,000 tons of iron ore,
and, beyond this, has exported goods to the value of £500,000,000.
Here ends my list of figures and here this chapter should end also;
but, before I close, I would give, very briefly and in plain language,
three examples of the spirit animating this Empire that to-day is
greater and more worthy by reason of these last three blood-smirched
years.
No. I.
There came from Australia at his own expense, one Thomas Harper,
an old man of seventy-four, to help in a British munition
factory. He laboured hard, doing the work of two men, and more
than once fainted with fatigue, but refused to go home because he
"couldn't rest while he thought his country needed shells."
No. II.
There is a certain small fishing village whose men were nearly
all employed in fishing for mines. But there dawned a black day
when news came that forty of their number had perished together
and in the same hour. Now surely one would think that this little
village, plunged in grief for the loss of its young manhood, had
done its duty to the uttermost for Britain and their fellows!
But these heroic fisher-folk thought otherwise, for immediately
fifty of the remaining seventy-five men (all over military age)
volunteered and sailed away to fill the places of their dead sons
and brothers.
No. III.
Glancing idly through a local magazine some days since, my eye was
arrested by this:
"In proud and loving memory of our loved and loving son ... who
fell in France ... with his only brother, 'On Higher Service.'
There is no death."
Thus then I conclude my list of facts and figures, a record of
achievement such as this world has never known before, a record to
be proud of, because it is the outward and visible sign of a people,
strong, virile, abounding in energy, but above all, a people clean of
soul to whom Right and Justice are worth fighting for, suffering for,
labouring for. It is the sign of a people which is willing to endure
much for its ideals that the world may be a better world, wherein
those who shall come hereafter may reap, in peace and contentment, the
harvest this generation has sowed in sorrow, anguish, and great travail.
PIKE'S FINE ART PRESS, 47-8, Gloster Road, Brighton.