on the shortest and most defensible N. Atlantic route. To perform this function it applied (1) a great food production campaign, (2) a campaign for voluntary food saving in order to leave a surplus for the Allies. It had then to face the administrative problems of getting these supplies along the railways and through the ports in competition with munitions, and with its own army. (W. H. B.)
Feeding of the British Army During the War
The feeding of any army is a feature of the Supply Department, the term “supplies,” from a military point of view, being applied to all stores and articles required for the maintenance of an army in the way of food or fuel for men, forage for beasts, or fuel, petrol and oil for aircraft or mechanical transport, hospital requirements in the way of food, medical comforts, etc., with the exception of medicines, drugs or surgical appliances (see generally Supply and Transport).
For a proper understanding of the problem of feeding a modern army, and of what was done in this connexion by Great Britain during the World War, it is necessary to recall how armies were fed in the past. In primitive times, when one nation or tribe invaded another, the subsistence of an invading army depended upon indiscriminate individual plunder. The process was so wasteful that this individual plunder was soon supplanted by a more economical system of gathering the spoil into heaps or magazines; but accumulation is but a means to the end of distribution, and in return for such distribution of victuals a deduction or stoppage was soon made from the pay of the soldier. This was the beginning of the financial control of the department of supply. The third stage was to organize plunder more thoroughly by compelling inhabitants to form magazines, or in other words, by recourse to requisition. The fourth stage was speedily reached by its being discovered that such magazines were more readily and effectively created if the inhabitants were paid instead of compelled to fill them; thus for robbery was substituted purchase, and instead of the military hand was substituted the financial hand, and the hold of the Treasury over the province of supply was strengthened. As the means of communication improved, the mobility of armies called for a better organization of supply. It became imperative to import foodstuffs from a distance, as, owing to the growth of armies, the theatre of war was no longer able to maintain them from its local resources. To bring food from a distance requires transport, and consequently the Treasury or civil side were gradually obliged to organize a transport as well as a supply system. In military operations, the maintenance of order on roads, and means of communication, are of first importance, and order cannot be maintained without discipline. Transport therefore very early passed under the military or semi-military control, whereas supplies remained much longer under civilian or Treasury control, with the result that there was constant friction.
For two long centuries in Great Britain the Treasury struggled against the concession of any financial powers to any military department, and as a consequence, untold millions of money were wasted; only in 1888 the two Departments of Transport and Supplies were blended into one and placed upon a military footing by the creation of the Army Service Corps, thus bringing these two important services completely and entirely under the commander-in-chief, or as it is to-day under the Army Council.
What might be described as the first systematized endeavour to feed British troops in the field was introduced during the wars in the Low Countries. The Treasury appointed a commissary, who was invested with supreme financial control, and was responsible for the maintenance of the army. His system of going to work was to make a contract with some individual to supply the army with bread and bread waggons, and with the supply of this article his responsibility for the feeding of the army came to an end; all other provisions were a regimental matter and were furnished by private speculators, namely, vintners, sutlers and butchers. This system of contracting practically continued, with slight if any modification, right down to the outbreak of the World War, with considerable modifications, of course, as the centuries and years passed, so far as the soldier's ration was concerned; meat was added first, and bread and meat formed the sole ration issued free to the troops in England up till towards the end of the 19th century, when during peace-times a soldier got a money allowance in addition, for the purpose of buying the remaining portion of his rations.
During the ordinary peace-times, and before the outbreak of the World War in 1914, the system in force in Great Britain as regards the feeding of the army was by means of contracts. The General Officers holding the chief commands made arrangements by periodical contracts, varying in duration from anything to 3, 6 or 12 months, for the supply of commodities required.
The soldier was supplied with his bread ration 1 lb., his meat ration ¾ of a lb. He was credited personally with 3d. per diem. This sum was supplemented in a well-run unit by an additional grant of ½d. or so from the canteen funds; the money was expended in the Regimental Institute on the remaining portion of the soldier's food, i.e. groceries, vegetables, extra dishes, etc.
In war-time the entire maintenance of the soldier became the duty of the State, so that from providing only two articles, bread and meat, the State was faced with the problem of providing a complete and full diet, consisting of a very large number of articles and other requirements.
In order to fulfil these duties, the system in the past had been for the War Office to enter into a number of contracts with numerous army contractors for the supply of the various goods required. The contractors would undertake to supply so much biscuit, cheese, jam or any other of the many and various articles, either delivered at the base of operations abroad, or more frequently on board ship at a port of departure in this country. In order to insure that the requisite quality of the goods was kept up, a number of (generally speaking, retired) officers were appointed to carry out periodic inspections at the factories or other places of production. It will be readily seen that such a system was bound to lead to grave abuses, and at the termination of every war up to that of 1914-8, there had always been either grave complaints or scandals, necessitating an enquiry as to why the troops were supplied with bad food, and frequently as to why the State was swindled.
In the event of a general mobilization, the laid-down scheme or plan was that so far as the Expeditionary Force was concerned, the War Office would enter into contracts for the supply of the necessary articles required; the supply of meat being insured by employing contractors to drive live cattle behind our army in the field, and all other supplies to be obtained as explained above For the feeding of the troops mobilizing or being trained at home, general officers and commanders-in-chief were to make their own arrangements in the way of entering into contracts to meet the requirements of their troops, and this system was practically the same as had been approved and agreed on ever since any proposal for general national defence had ever been considered.
Early in 1909, the British War Office, having received information as to the rapid mobilization plans for the German army, decided that it would be necessary to increase the rapidity of British mobilization, and with this end in view, instructions were issued for considerable acceleration. Up to that time it had always been considered that it would be quite impossible for any Expeditionary Force to leave Great Britain in under three weeks, whereas under the new proposed scheme it was suggested that the larger portion could be in a position to depart almost in as many days. In order to carry out these proposals, it was of course necessary to accelerate considerably the supply mobilization machinery. There was at Woolwich Dockyard an accumulation of preserved meat, biscuit, tea, coffee, sugar, jam, salt, medical comforts, etc., sufficient for the requirements of the Expeditionary Force for a few days. The proposal then was that, by means of urgent priority telegrams, army contractors would be got into touch with, and arrangements made for all supply requirements at the earliest possible moment.
In July 1909, Col. (later Maj.-Gen.) S. S. Long (b. 1863), on vacating the position of Commdt. of the A.S.C. Training Establishment at Aldershot, was posted as Assistant-Director of
