This arrangement lasted only a few months, and in Nov., at the instigation of Lady Londonderry, the army abandoned the scheme for centralizing the administration of women working in the army in one corps, and it was decided that overseas drivers should enrol in the W.A.A.C., but that drivers for home service should again belong to the Motor Transport Section of the Women's Legion. They were enrolled for a year only, instead of for the duration of the war, as in the W.A.A.C., and came under the Q.M.G.'s Depart- ment; 647 Flying Corps drivers were transferred to the W.R.A.F. in 1918. Ultimately about 2,000 women were attached to areas and battalions throughout Great Britain, and after the Armistice several hundred drivers were sent to France to replace the demobilized mechanical transport men.
Women's Forage Corps, R.A.S.C. In July 1915, women super- visors were enrolled under the War Office for the duration of the war to arrange for the transit of hay from the farm to the station and to forward it to its ultimate destination. The urgent need for in- creased substitution caused a special women's branch of the Forage Department, known as the Women's Forage Corps, to be inaugu- rated in March 1917 under Brig.-Gen. Morgan. Mrs. Athole Stewart was appointed superintendent and 4,200 women were en- rolled as 1st. and snd.-grade officers and industrial members, for a year or the duration of the war. They were distributed throughout Great Britain and Ireland and wore khaki uniform. The industrial members took the place of privates in the R.A.S.C. and worked as hay balers, sack makers and menders, sheet repairers, thatchers, chaffing hands, transport drivers and clerks. The substitution of women did not depreciate the quality of the work.
Queen Mary's Army Auxiliary Corps. In Dec. 1916 the War Office ordered Gen. Lawson to enquire into the number and physical categories of men employed out of the fighting area in France. On Jan. 1 6 he reported that in his opinion 12,100 men might be re- placed by women to begin with. He added: " In the last year or more in England the employment of women has developed to an immense extent through lack of men, and has been attended with remarkable success. Women have taken up various forms of male employment, which, by many, had been deemed impossible for the sex. They have found their way into work in all branches of life and have proved their capacity for it. In the army at home the success has been conspicuous and women are to be found working in numerous offices and cooking in many of the home military estab- lishments. Results have shown that the sex difficulty has not been anything like what some have predicted. The women have been hard at work and felt they were out for the job and the men have respected them, and their experience at home has been, I under- stand, almost unanimous in this respect."
On Jan. 24 1917 the suggestion was put forward by Sir Nevil Macready, adjutant-general, that women employed in the army should be part of the army, entirely distinct from any outside or- ganization and established in the War Office under his Department. This scheme materialized under the name of the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, known popularly as "W.A.A.C.'s." Mrs. Chalmers Watson took up her duties as Chief Controller at Headquarters on Feb. 18 and Dame Helen Gwynne Vaughan as Chief Controller in France. Below the Chief Controllers were a staff of controllers and administrators, all women. A special branch of the War Office, known as A.G. II, was formed to assist in getting the Corps into working order so that it could fit into the army machinery. A Wom- en's Auxiliary Corps of the R.A.M.C. organized the medical boards in England and France, of which Dr. Jane Turnbull was president at home, and Dr. Laura Sandeman in France. At the end of a year Mrs. Chalmers Watson resigned for urgent family reasons, having accomplished the pioneer work of the Corps and won a recognized position in the army for her women in the face of many difficulties. She was succeeded by Dame Florence Leach, then known as " Controller in Chief." When Dame Helen Gwynne Vaughan was made Commandant of the W.R.A.F. in Sept. 1918, Miss L. Davy became Chief Controller in France. The full charter for the organization of the Corps was finally completed at the end of June 1917.
The women were enrolled as mobiles for home service only, or for home or foreign service, and for the duration of the war; they received a special rate of pay, not civilian or military, and were not enlisted under the Army Act. At first substitution overseas only had been contemplated:, but by March the number of women recruited by the Department of National Service was so great that Home Commands were included in the scheme. Recruiting was afterwards carried on through the Employment Department of the Ministry of Labour. In Dec. 1917, owing to the shrinkage of avail- able woman-power, an immobile branch was formed. Women em- ployed in the Ordnance Army Pay Department and Record offices at home were not made to join the Corps. A khaki uniform with distinguishing badges was worn. In all there were 1,200 officials and 56,000 women, of whom 9,500 were the outside number employed in France at any one time. This figure was made up of women work- ing in the Calais, Boulogne, Etaples, St. Omer, Abbeville, Dieppe, Rouen and Havre areas and on the lines of communication, chiefly at army schools, and in certain offices at G.H.Q. A number were em- ployed with the Expeditionary Force canteens, mostly at officers' clubs. They were drafted to every type of office and domestic employment, and to bakeries, ordnance and motor transport depots. In the spring of 1918, when the R.A.F. was formed, 7,000 women, including nearly the whole of the immobile branch of 1800 transferred to the W.R.A.F.
When the American Expeditionary Force arrived in France and was prevented by shortage of transport from bringing over American women clerks, 500 members of the Corps under a Chief Controller, Miss Horniblow, who was succeeded by Miss Gordon and finally by Mrs. Vernon Lloyd as Deputy Controller, were transferred to the American camps at Bourges and Tours. Mrs. Vernon Lloyd was subsequently made Deputy Controller in Cologne, where over 100 Q.M.A.A.C. officials were employed with the army of the Rhine in the Censor's Department, under the provost marshal, and in ordnance. A small contingent was attached to the British military mission in Berlin for over a year. Queen Mary assumed the title of Commandant-in-Chief of the Corps in the spring of 1918.
A Q.M.A.A.C. unit attached to the Director-General of Graves Registration at St. Pol was in being in 1921.
Women's Royal Naval Service. The W.R.N.S. was instituted as part of the navy at the end of Nov. 1917 when Sir Eric Geddes, the First Lord of the Admiralty, outlined what was required. The Director, Dame Katharine Furse, was asked to put up a scheme for the organization of the service, which was accepted with small amendments giving her more powers than she had set out. She had the opportunity of starting with a staff of women of considerable experience in organization and asked for Miss Edith Crowdy to be appointed as her deputy. The Director was the executive head, responsible only to the Second Sea Lord. No naval officer was available to assist her, and from the first the navy encouraged the greatest possible independence in the organization of the service. The formation of another service of women under the Air Board was already in contemplation, so that the W.R.N.S. (or Wrens) was from the first organized with a view to handing over all the members working in Royal Naval Air stations; 2,033 ratings were transferred to the administration of the W.R.A.F.
For the purpose of calculating allowances the following relative ranks were agreed to :
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There were 12 Divisions: Devonport, Portsmouth, The Nore, Harwich, London, Humber, Tyneside, Scotland, Ireland, Liverpool, Cardiff and the Mediterranean. After the Armistice, stations were set up at Ostend and Zeebrugge under the Nore Division.
The ratings were enrolled for the duration of the war and paid on a civilian basis. Cooperation with the Employment Department of the Ministry of Labour on similar lines to that already set up in connexion with the Q.M.A.A.C. was arranged for the purpose of recruitment. As it is estimated that at the time when the W.R.N.S. was being formed over a million and a half additional women had already been drawn into industrial and commercial occupations, as munition workers and substitutes for men in the Forces, the recruiting up to the high standard required was made more difficult; but in spite of this excellent results were obtained. The service consisted of women living in hostels (mobiles) and of women living in their own homes (immobiles) in almost equal proportions. The women were largely recruited from naval families, and this contributed to the keen service spirit shown.
A total of 608 officers were appointed; 6,880 women were enrolled and 785 absorbed from women already employed in naval establishments, before the formation of the Wrens. On Nov. 21 1918, the date of maximum strength, there were 6,392 ranks and ratings.
The officers, other than those engaged in the organization, welfare and discipline of the women, replaced naval officers for the following work: coding and decoding, intelligence work, confidential books, secretaries, telephone exchange, paymasters, accountants, gas mask work, and observation station. The ratings were employed as ledger clerks, clerks, shorthand typists, victualling store assistants, telephone operators, postal sorters, stewards, cooks, general domestic workers, orderlies and messengers, porters and storewomen, bakers, tailoresses, gas mask workers, gardeners, fitters, turners, boiler cleaners, boot cleaners and painters, wiring hands, net mine workers,
