7:00 pm, 10th August 1914, London.
By this stage the management of Rules had set aside a permanent room for the use of Senior officers and Government Ministers. Winston Churchill was sitting with Percy Girouard, currently managing director of the Elswick Works of Sir W. G. Armstrong, Whitworth and Company Limited. Winston Churchill had requested his presence for two reasons, he remembered his service in South Africa where he had unfankled the chaos of the railways at the start of the Boer War.
He had additionally served as High Commissioner for Northern Nigeria during which he had railways built. He was also a French Canadian and a Catholic, thus he was outside of the usual circles of advisers to the Government, his successful management of the Elswick Works was icing on the cake as far as Churchill was concerned.
They began by discussing the Boer war and the work on the railways, Girouard reminisced about the changes he had wrought to get a grip on railway supply. Churchill then asked for his opinion on France and Belgium, Girouard then said, “it is the railways, Belgium’s network is dense and if they can capture the key points, Liege is one of them, they don’t need Antwerp but Liege and Namur are the key.” Churchill noted this saying “The man in Liege has already got people smashing everything, I think when it falls the Germans will get an ash heap and little else”, Girouard looked thoughtful and said, “if the Germans are smart, they will get the most important thing.” “Really” Replied Churchill, “yes, we can replace trains, track and bridges, but trained personnel are invaluable, it takes years to train men to run a complex rail network, those people will still be available if they live, and the Germans will use them to run the railways in Belgium.”
“On that note, we shall have to preserve our railway men, we can’t have them getting sucked into the army as foot soldiers, you will want them for our military railroads”, Churchills only reply was a kind of non-committal grunt, “You think you will be able to rely on the French railways?” to which Churchill said “yes, they have committed to supporting our efforts, they will run them from the docks to the front line. We just have to supply French speaking liaison officers.” Girouard’s reply was just a laugh.
The two men continued to eat, each lost in their thoughts, suddenly Girouard said “I shall have to resign, I can’t be seen to work for Armstrong-Whitworth and be your railway adviser, the owners would never stand for it.” “Who said I want you for that role, we have a committee for railway management here in Britain,” “Oh not that committee, you need me in France. You need me in France to organise the transport, from the pier to the frontlines one man needs to be in charge and that man should be me. At least that fool French is safely here in Britain” Churchill bristled at this but said nothing. Continuing Girouard said “Smith-Dorien will do a good job, he doesn’t dream of glory, and he values his men’s lives. He understands that in this war, we will win it, by crushing the Germans with Russian soldiers, French guns and British money. In any case our army shall have to grow as well, we will have to be seen to shedding blood as well, lest our allies think we just want to win on the backs of their dead”
At this point Churchill looked pensive, “I had not considered this at all, I wanted your advice, Lloyd George has Geddes working on his commission, I wanted you in the War Office to help liaise with the Commission to help filter the requests before we sent them across to the manufacturers.”
Girouard replied again, “that is important, but the army should supply the men for that role and make sure they don’t stay in post for too long, send them back to the front regularly. To make sure they actually know what the army needs, otherwise we will have some dammed fool ordering equipment because that’s what they wanted at Omdurman.” Warming to his task he continued “you need to make sure that the men doing the work know their business. Perhaps you should make sure you have junior officers involved, those who have been wounded and need a convalescent role, they would bring a bit of clarity as well, hell you might as well be shot for a sheep as a lamb and include some NCO’s at least they will be cynical about what they are testing. They can’t all be Guardsmen either, make sure you get men from the Artillery and the Engineers, all the Corps come to think of it”
Whilst you are at it the army needs to stop recruiting mathematicians and engineers and chemists into the fighting arms, we will need all of them doing research. You need to have men who can look at a page of numbers and make sense of it. My transport commission will be looking for statisticians and transport specialists, the big grocers’ companies will have some of what I want” by this stage Girouard had assumed that he would be writing his own command so he might as well push for everything he wanted. Churchill was struggling to keep up with the vision, but he knew that if they could implement half of what Girouard demanded then at least some of the chaos which seemed to happen whenever the British empire went to war would abate. He thought back to South Africa, where the start of the war had been a series of bloody defeats, he would make sure that in this war he did everything he could to replace blood and tears with sweat.
Girouard finished saying “I will need suitable rank, I think I shall need to be a Lieutenant General, that will match me with the Corps Commanders, I imagine if the war is as long and bloody as I expect you will make me a General before it is over”
With that he turned back to his meal, a rather delicious saddle of venison, he knew Churchill would agree to his ambit claim. It would just take a couple of days whilst the Secretary of State for War convinced himself that it was his idea.