WITH THE NEW ARMIES.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LX, Issue 16824, 1 December 1916, Page 4

WITH THE NEW ARMIES.

"Eighteen Months with the New Armies" is the subject of an article in the "Nineteenth Century" by Briga-dier-General F. G. Stone. It in an Interesting account of what the writer describes as the most remarkable effort which any nation has ever made, in the conversion of its civil population into a military force. Those who havei never seen a new unit- in the making under the conditions which prevailed in the autumn of 1914, he says, can scarcely have any conception of what the earlier phases were like; as time went on these conditions steadily improved, and the divisions which were raised in the following year knew little of the organic troubles in which the earlier formations first saw the light. Incredible difficulties had to "be overcome, lacic of equipment b.eing one of thorn, whilst the voluntary system of recruiting was a great impediment tr» efficiency from start to finish. It was inevitable. under the haphazard methods of voluntary recruitihe.

that many great industries? should be utterly disorganised; but x pa-haps the worst feature showed itself when recruiting was slack, and' units could not be made'up to establishment. As to their work at the front, the New Army divisions have, iirmiy established their reputation., "Few peopla in England realised that we had such magnificent material for a national army, and we shall owe Germany a never-ending debt of gratitude for compelling us not only to discover- it, but ultimately to use it in the right way, and to bring home to every Briton the unalterable truth that the Army is the Nation and the Nation is the Army, one and indivisible without politics or class distinctions,, inspired only by one ideal, which i 4 that to maintain the honour of his country and the security of his hearfch and home is .the highest privilege and essential duty■ of.ev«ry citizen."