THE VOLUNTEERS. T HE London Volunteers—and let us remember it was
only the London Corps—gave on Saturday last capital proof, not only of what good material they are composed, but also of the soundness of their training. Ten thousand Volun- teers passed before the critical though kindly eyes of Lord French, and won from him an approval which cannot be obliterated by those who still seek to discourage and disparage the movement. Before we deal with Lord French's remarks we may point out two outstanding facts in regard to the Volunteers of which London provided so fine a sample—a sample which the rest of the country would be able to match to the full, except perhaps in the matter of equipment. The first thing to remem- ber about the force is that they. are essentially a by-product of the Army—military raw material not immediately required by the War Office, which, instead of being cast aside as useless, has been worked up into a very useful article. All the men and officers who paraded last Saturday were either above military age, or else had been rejected by the military authorities on the ground of health or eyesight, or because they were engaged in indispensable civil work. By far the greater number, however, were men above forty-one years of age. Though it must be admitted that they would not be able to endure the hardships of a campaign overseas, especially long marches, we are confident that for home work, such as guarding vulnerable points and lines of communication, for all sorts of military odd jobs, and finally for digging and holding trench-lines in an emergency, the men of the Volunteer Training Corps would prove most capable. With most of them the standard of marksmanship is as high as, and in many cases a great deal higher than, that of the Regular soldier. They are of a high order of intelligence, and, further, they have steadiness and a sense of responsibility—or shall we say an absence of the young private's chief characteristic, " happy- go-luckiness " ? That quality, though very valuable in a charge or when exceptional moral or physical elasticity is required, sometimes has its inconveniences. Cromwell dwelt upon the advantage of having 'men who make a conscience of what they do,' and this is a quality which is very con- spicuous is the Volunteer Corps. They are conscientious projectors.
The other memorable fact about the Volunteers is that they are the direct outcome of private effort. The military authorities, as far as they are concerned, may be likened to a man who determined to have no flowers in a particular part of his garden because he had not time to attend to them. But, behold! one June morning he discovered that the flowers had come up by themselves, and, strange to say, had come up in orderly and decent beds unchoked by weeds. Just imagine what the feelings of a German or Austrian Staff officer would have been if he could have looked on at the Hyde Park review. He would have seen masses of what he would have called the London Landsturm marching by with firm step and in good military order, with officers beside them who under- stood what orders to give and how they should be carried out. Both officers and men, he would have noted, were dressed in smart and practical uniforms, and half of them were armed with useful, if old-fashioned, rifles. On inquiry he would have learnt that not one penny had been spent by the_Government in providing either uniforms, arms, or training, and that the men had " found " themselves—sometimes individually, and sometimes out of corps funds provided by the subscriptions of those who, though not able to be in the ranks themselves, were willing to help others to do their part. Finally, he would have seen gathered round Lord French a General Officer who without pay, and, what is more, without official position, had become responsible for the military training, not only of the London Volunteers, but of the Volunteers throughout the country ; a Peer who had presided over the organization as a whole—i.e., over the Volunteer War Office ; and a member of the House of Commons who had devoted his days and nights for over a year to the work of raising and equipping the corps. But that was not all that our enemy spectator would have learnt at the London review. He would have been told that, though the military authorities were now so friendly and sym- pathetic, this gratuitous offering thrown into the lap of the War Office at first filled them with embarrassment, and had two or three times been thrown back marked "Not wanted," and this in spite of the fact that the force had been equipped and trained without imposing any burden on the taxpayer. That, however, is not a matter which any friend of the Volunteers• will now grumble at. We are inclined, indeed, to add a word of defence for the War Office. There are a great many plants in a garden which will never really do well unless they are ruthlessly cut back. The Volunteers appear to be plants of that nature. They were out down to the roots at the beginning of the war, but they flourished under the treatment, and we are by no means sure that, if they had been pampered at the early stages, they would have proved so hardy and so fruitful as they have now become.
Lord French's just and eloquent speech to the principal officers of the battalions which paraded before him is as worthy of the close attention of the nation as of the Volunteers. He began by communicating to the men a very significant message from the King. The King was most anxious" to take the review himself," but his numerous engagements unfor- tunately prevented him. He, however, had charged Lord French to state how highly he appreciated the devoted loyalty shown by the Volunteers to His Majesty's Government, and how much those services were appreciated by the War Office. Lord French went on to deal with the ridiculous notion that had got abroad that the Volunteers were not wanted. "I want you," he said to the assembled officers, "to turn that idea out of the minds of your men completely" :— " You are regarded by the Government as a most valuable force, one that can be put to the very best uses. For myself, I can say that it has been a deep pleasure to come here to-day and see so fine a parade. I congratulate you most heartily on your splendid turn-out, at the shortest possible notice, in such numbers and in so soldierlike a manner. When I first came home from France, towards the end of last year, the thing that struck me more than anything else as I wandered about the country, on Saturdays and Sundays, was to see smaller or larger bodies of smart-looking men, of very soldierly appearance and full of earnestness, marching and drilling. I inquired who they were, and was told they were the Volunteer Training Corps. It struck me then that if that was what they were like they were a corps that might be of invaluable service to the Empire, and since I was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Home Forces I have done my very beat to help the corps and cultivate it."
Lord French ended his speech with a fine panegyric of the Territorials—who, as he pointed out, were the successors of the old Volunteers—on their splendid record, and on that of the rest of our voluntary soldiers. "It is," he concluded, "the most glorious evidence of patriotism to be found in the world. Now their mantle has fallen on you, and I am quite certain that when you are called upon you will live up to that fine record."
Though Lord French did not deal explicitly with the question of numbers, the need for an increase was implied in his speech. We may be perfectly sure that so sincere and plain-spoken a soldier, if he had thought that we had already got all the Volunteers we wanted, would have said so without preface or demur. But Lord French said nothing of the kind. We may, then, feel morally certain that he did not say so because he did not think so, and, further, that he holds what we have always held in these columns, and, more important, what has always been held by those who best understand the Volunteer movement—that large numbers are essential to the efficiency and usefulness of the force. If the Volun- teers in any particular place are to retain their essential characteristics and yet to do work for the Government, their numbers must be large. Practically all the Volunteers are men engaged in work which is now indispensable—work which must be carried on if the nation is not to be crippled com- mercially or in its internal organization. All of them, how- ever, though they carry on this work, have a certain amount of leisure time, and this leisure time they can devote, and are more than willing to devote, to military duties rather than to golf, motoring, or other forms of pleasure and idleness. Put statistically, this means, on a rough computation, that the average Volunteer cannot give up more than, say, ten or twelve hours in all in each week to military duties. He is not a hall-timer, but, approximately, a one-seventh-timer. But this, again, means that a Volunteer unit of, say, fourteen hundred men would only be able to produce two hundred men for continuous military duty—i.e., could only do the work of a company. A piece of guard-work which could be done by two hundred Regulars or Territorials would want fourteen hundred Volunteers for its accomplishment, unless and until embodiment took place, when of course the Volunteer would cease to be a Volunteer and would become in all respects a Regular soldier.
The fact that the Volunteer previous to embodiment could only be reckoned as one-seventh of a soldier must never be forgotten in dealing with the force. It means that if the Government want, as we expect it will be found they do want, the services of a hundred and fifty thousand men to take over the guarding of vulnerable points, lines of coin- mtmication, prisoners' camps, internment camps, and muni- tion areas, at least a million men will be required in the ranks of the Volunteers. If we are right in this, aud. we are sup we are; the Government should make the fact blown, and should further ask those whom we may describe as the natural leaders of the country, the men of light and leading in our cities and shires, to call upon all patriotic men sound in health and over military age to come forward and join their nearest Volunteer Corps and make themselves efficient. The only objection we have heard suggested to such a course being pursued, is that it might involve the Government in great expense. The Treasury aide of the case is this. "The Voltmteers, if they are employed on the work described above, are certain sooner or later to ask for Government money both for extra equipment and for organization purposes. That is no doubt reasonable enough per se, for the Govern- ment have recognized the corps and put specific duties upon them. But there must obviously be a limit to the amount of such Government expenditure. Again, if there is Govern- ment expenditure, it must be by way of capitation grants, for that is the only form in which it can be administered in practice. It is impossible, therefore, to make vague general appeals to everybody to join the Volunteers. The result might be to land the Government in the paying out of millions." That is, from the Treasury point of view, an entirely sound argument, and we do not combat it at all. What we do combat, however, is the suggestion that it bars any but a very small increase in the Volunteer Corps, or at any rate bars a general appeal to the patriotism of the men over military age.
Our desire to see the Volunteers strong in numbers and the Treasury desire to keep the expenditure within fixed bounds can, we believe, be perfectly well reconciled. Why should not the Government say that they will pay a capitation grant of, say, £2 per head, not to individuals but to the corps, in respect of one-seventh of the efficient members of any particular unit, the money to be spent upon organization, the provision of equipment, and so forth I Further, the Government might lay it down that in no case should the establishment of what might be called "the allocated men "—the men allocated to special duties by the Government—be more than two hundred thousand. On the principle of one-seventh, this would mean that the total Volunteer Force must never be more than one million four hundred thousand. Let us take the specific instance of a London or country battalion which was able to raise itself to fourteen hundred strong. In that case, divided by seven, it would have a right, so to speak, to two hundred allocated men— men in respect of whom the corps could claim 12 each. Here the corps would obtain a grant of £400. This, supplemented by local subscriptions, and we .hope also by a grant from a Central Fund, the raising of which should accom- pany the raising of extra numbers, should prove ample for all purposes of equipment and organization. No wise friend of the Volunteers wishes to see them pampered by the Govern- ment. They ought to continue as they have begun, as a Volunteer Force in name and nature, a force which, though paid for actual work accomplished, does in the main carry out its duties on a self-supporting basis.
Let the Government adopt the principle we have here sketched out, or some principle analogous thereto, and they will find that their outlay of not more than £300,000 a year will save far more than that sum, and will set free a large body of men for service abroad.
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