Page:Engines and men- the history of the Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen. A survey of organisation of railways and railway locomotive men (IA enginesmenhistor00rayniala).pdf/267

 Commission's Report on all systems, and increased wages. The Railway Executive sympathetically discussed the first three questions, but could only offer the agreement already operating, which turned the war bonus into war wages, with further consideration later on. There was acrimony existing towards the Society at the time, as the N.U.R. was doing its best, subsequent to the libel action, to disprove the claim of the Society to represent the footplate fraternity. Those foolish efforts found an echo in the Trade Union Congress, but as they all proved only hurtful to the N.U.R., and resulted in the rapid growth of the Associated, they need not be argued here.

Brief allusion should be made here, I think, to the tremendous part played by locomotive men in the war. There was a never-ending stream of traffic between England and France for over five years, and it loaded the railways excessively. Drivers and firemen willingly gave themselves to the supreme task, and hundreds of cases were recorded of men working twenty, thirty, forty, and even up to seventy hours continuously. This exhausting toil gave the zest of desperation to the demand for the recognition of an eight hour day, and when it began steadily to operate in 1919, men laughed at the change, and wives were very glad over the marked improvement. Let us look at some figures of the first year of war only. Up to August, 1915, 100,000 officers, 2,586,000 other ranks, and 542,000 horses, were moved from point to point. The supplies sent to France included 288,000 tons of food; 533,000 tons of forage, 59,000 tons of fuel, 29,000 tons of medical stores, seventeen million gallons of petrol, and nearly five million gallons of oil, in addition to 491,000 mail bags, 184,000 tons of engineering stores, and 131,000 tons of ordnance. Rolling stock was shipped in great quantities, and many complete branch lines were taken up entire and relaid in France.

Every company had its specially built ambulance trains, splendidly fitted as complete hospitals of eight wards, including isolation wards, to carry the wounded from Dover, Southampton, and Newhaven to the great military hospitals in all parts of the country.