LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
THE VOLUNTEERS AT DIDCOT.
[TO TIM EDITOR 07 TUB SPEOTATOR,"] Sun—Much has been written in the Press about V.T.C. work at Didoot; not all has been accurate. I venture to supply a "Footnote to History," in the hope that it may interest some of your readers. Most people, I suppose, have passed Didcot on the G.W.R. It was once just an old, lost, little village between the Thames and the Downs. Then the railway came that way and made it a junction ; and there grew up a new and extremely ugly suburb, to supply the needs of the railway people—a sort of Piraeus, one might say, separate from the " .Astu," where lived the aborigines and the First Families. But it was the upstart railway part which really counted. And when anything happened, it happened there. So presently came the war—and the junction became famous. For it really was, as Americans say, " some " junction. The place became a sort of Parcels Office for war-stores of all kinds—such as bicycles, soap, field kitchens, teacups, stretchers, street-lamps, iron trestles—everything, in short, that could make a modern army happy. These and many other things have to be unpacked and stored in oorrugated- iron sheds of colossal size, extending over many acres of Berkshire mud, and are eventually transmitted to various parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa.
As the autumn of this year went on, the Army Ordnance force (it is difficult for a mere civilian to say precisely why soap is in the province of the Army Ordnance, but I only chronicle facts) which wrestled with this systole-and-diastole business of unloading and storing, receiving and transmitting—the A.O. officers, then, began to realize that all the men whom the Government could spare them must be unequal to the task. They could not keep level with the work. Help must be obtained from—where ? It occurred to the C.O. that there was a Volunteer Training Corps in the neighbouring city of Oxford. He visited that city, and interviewed the Headquarters of the Oxfordshire Volunteer Regiment. That was on a Thursday : Headquarters promised that fifty men of the First Battalion should come on the Saturday, and a hundred on the Sunday. So a hundred men went on Saturday and nearly three hundred on Sunday, asking for no pay or rations, but travelling by arrangement on a free railway warrant. All, so far, were Oxford men, citizens for the most part, with a sprinkling of University graduates and others, members of the V.T.C. (It is hardly necessary to say that it was this handful of Dons, good men all and sterling workers, which was from the first in the limelight. Once " Oxford " was men- tioned, the perfervid imagination of the daily Press conjured up a vision of academic dignitaries in their thousands—the Chan- cellor, the Vice-Chancellor, the Doctors and Proctors, and what not. It was a pretty picture : but as a matter of fact it was the County Volunteer Regiment, and not academic Oxford, which was responsible for the whole business.) This was only a beginning. By means of the existing regimental organization, the various companies or parts of companies scattered about Oxfordshire were drawn in : and first Henley and Theme, then Banbury, Chipping Norton, Witney, Burford, and Eynsham, sent men to join in the work. Berke and Bucks presently followed the example set by Oxfoleishire. A few Sundays ago there
were about thirteen hundred V.T.C. men at Didcot. At present a regular scheme of Sunday work has been framed. Oxfordshire sends about four hundred and fifty men every week, and Reading about two hundred : then, on alternate Sundays, the two South Bucks battalions supply three hundred, and less strong but still considerable contingents are to come from the battalions at Wallingford, Newbury, and Maidenhead, which with Reading compose the Berkshire Regiment, By this moans the Didoot staff knows what it has to expect, and can arrange accordingly. Besides this, Volunteer help is available often on weekdays : Oxford sends men on Saturday afternoons. Some undergraduates who have joined the V.T.C. ad hoc go whenever they can, not of course as individuals but as a body under military discipline ; and various school corps have done good service. The Eton boys, I believe, have come on two occasions In great force. As the several contingents arrive they are met by the permanent staff and detailed for duty in their platoons Or sections according to a prearranged plan. There is always work enough : work suited to every variety of age and strength —from handling light crockery to detraining heavy field kitchens and pushing them into position through incredible mud. The
latter seems to be the most generally popular amusement. And the workers are equally miscellaneous. So heterogeneous a multitude on "fatigue duty" has never, I venture to say, been seen in this or any other country. One common cause has brought together representatives of every sort and condition of men, and the work is all the better done for that.
All this proves several things. One is that V.T.C. men are ready and anxious to do hard work. Speaking from the experience of one county, we have never had the smallest difficulty in getting them to come—they are not only willing but eager. For many months they have been asking, not for rights (though rights would be welcome too), but for duties. Now they feel that they have got duties of a military nature. From the first the C.O. at Didoot stipulated that he did not want a mere mob, but organized bodies ; "special constables" who offered to come were politely told that this was a job for trained and disciplined men—men accustomed to work together, and therefore more efficiently, in military units. Volunteers, then, feel that their laborious training of the past twelve menthe is now recognized as definitely useful. The result is that many men who long held back are now joining our ranks.
Secondly, Lord Desborough (who has from the first taken a keen and practical interest in the work) and the Central Associa- tion now see their policy justified. From the first they insisted on the advisability of linking up Volunteer units in county organizations. The wisdom of that is clear. Were the V.T.C. detachments of Berke, Bucks, and Oxon isolated, unrelated, and independent, it would have been very difficult to utilize them. Military authorities could not without endless trouble have got into touch with all the units in the district, or secured co-operation. But with a county organization, and Headquarters in communication with local detachments, Volunteers are an accessible and mobile force; given the will to serve, which they all have, they can be assembled by the existing machinery at short notice. And it is gratifying to note that the War Office seems disposed to give facilities for transport. —I am, Sir, &c., A. D. GODLEY.
[Mr. C odley, with his accustomed point and wit, tells us how the Volunteers have proved that their so-called playing at soldiers has been abundantly justified. At the very begin- ning of the movement—in August, 1914, to be exact—when many people regarded it as equivalent to treason to mention the word " Volunteers " even for men over military age, we ventured to predict that if at a moment of strain a Regular officer wanted help from "the resident population," he would, if the men ineligible for oversee soldiering had been drilled and organized in battalions or platoons, get help promptly and efficiently,
and that the soldier would bless the Volunteer. If, however, the Volunteer movement were suppressed, then the call for men to meet an emergency would, or rather could, receive no response worth having. This is exactly what has happened. The response to the Didcot call was "eminently satisfactory" because it was met by bodies of drilled and organ'zed men, and not by a fortuitous concourse of puzzled and perspiring, if patriotic, atoms.—En, Spectator.]
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