Trouble in the Air
The Marconi Scandal. By Frances Donaldson. (Hart-Davis, 30s.) AT five o'clock in the afternoon of August 4, 1914, seven hours before the expiry of the British ultimatum to Germany, a message was passed through the chain of wireless stations set up in all the German colonies and transmitted out to sea : 'War declared upon England; make a; quickly as you can for neutral port.' This message saved the greater part of the German merchant marine. By contrast, on November 9, the cruiser Emden, after a brilliant career in the Indian Ocean, turned aside to attack the British wireless station at Cocos Island; the operators had time for one last message: 'Strange ship off entrance.' Within a matter of hours HMAS Sydney arrived and destroyed the Emden. On December 8, Admiral von Spec's squadron, to which Emden had originally belonged, also made an attempt upon a wireless station—in the Falk- land Islands. There it met with an enormously superior British force, which promptly sank all but one of the German ships.
From the very beginning of the war, the wireless mast on the Admiralty building linked, co-ordinated and commanded British naval ac- tivity in a manner never before known. Wire- less had become a weapon--and a target—of the first magnitude. Yet not until 1927 was the British Empire completely linked by wireless communication, although a plan for creating such a link had been put forward by the managing director of the Marconi Company in 1910. Be- yond doubt, the main reason for this damaging sloth was the Marconi Scandal.
For this reason alone, it is odd that Mrs. Donaldson, in an otherwise almost unblemished, absorbing and brilliantly presented book, should say: The Marconi case was an isolated incident without, it seems to me, much historical sig- nificance.' This remark is indicative of the fine detachment which is one of the chief merits of her book, and which gives to most of her judgments their unusual degree of dignity and weight. It is, nevertheless, an incorrect assess- ment. A great part of the British role in the First World War, and many of the difficulties and controversies which surround it, are incom- prehensible without a full appreciation of two events immediately preceding the war. Both of these had a deeply poisonous and stultifying effect upon the conduct of public affairs, bring- ing into them animosities at all levels which could only produce the most serious effects. The events were the Marconi Scandal of 1912-13 and the Irish Home Rule crisis (culminating in the Curragh incident) of 1913-14. Upon the public figures involved, who included the mem- bers of successive war cabinets, officials and staff officers, these two episodes left marks that were never effaced.
What was it all about? Briefly, this: on March 7, 1912, on the advice of a standing com- mittee. the Post Office signed a tender with the English Marconi Company for the erection- of the first six wireless stations in art imperial chain. these stations then to become govern- ment property. The postmaster-general at the time was Mr. Herbert Samuel. The managing director of the Marconi Company was Mr. God- frey Isaacs. The attorney-general was Sir Rufus Isaacs (Lord Reading), his brother. Subsequently it became known that, some time after the signing of the tender with the English Marconi Com- pany, the attorney-general acquired, at his brother's instigation, at market rates, shares in American Marconi, an independent company.
He then resold some of these shares to the Chan- cellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Lloyd George, and the Government Chief Whip, Lord Murray of Elibank.
Opposition to the Marconi contract itself at once became impregnated with rumour and sus- picion of malpractice. In the heated atmosphere of those times—an atmosphere which it is vir- tually impossible to recapture in the present flaccid condition of politics—outrageous charges of corruption were bandied about, frenzies of rage and indignation were built up, indiscretions mounted. Anti-Semitism naturally flourished. Two bodies of opinion were formed, which seemed to be incapable of communicating with each other, even on the simplest matters. As Mrs. Donaldson remarks: 'When men have upheld one side of an argument at dinner-parties or with their business colleagues, in buses or at the local pub for long enough, it takes more than facts to change their views.'
She herself has been engrossed with facts, and the results of her admirable labours are set out in this admirable book. In and out of Parliament, in the Law Courts, in the press, the battle raged; Mrs. Donaldson inspects each part of it with care. Members of the Liberal Govern- ment, leaders of the Unionist Opposition, journa- lists like Leo Maxse, editor of the National Re- view, such literary figures as Hilaire Belloc, G. K. Chesterton and Rudyard Kipling, such institutions as the Spectator, all appear in un- familiar postures under a searching light. There was something about this case which seemed to bring out the worst in everyone.
Nearly everyone; when the Liberal steam- roller majority finally 'settled' it in the House of Commons on June 19, 1913, three Liberals voted with the Opposition. Among them was a Mr. Munro Ferguson, 'cancelling his pair and travelling a long way to do it.' This is the first and last mention of Mr. Ferguson in the book. Mrs. Donaldson certainly knows how to make a point.
JOHN TERRAINE
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