ROAD TO RUIN.

Wanganui Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 160731, 18 August 1920, Page 5

ROAD TO RUIN.

MUNITION WORKS SCANDAL VALUABLE STORES ROTTING, No more palpable example of the waste of pablie money conld be found anywhere at the present time than that offered by the Army Ordnance Depot at Chilwell, near Nottingham (says the Times). During the war Chilwell became known as “the V.C. factory.” Here were filled 191- million shells used by the British Army, a task which cost 134 of the employees their lives in the terrible explosion ox July, 1918. Presumably it was the great size of the works that led the Government to convert this finely-equipped munition establishment into a dump. The term “factory” conveys no idea of the immensity of Chilwell. The site comprises 182 acres, and some of the larger buildings actually cover 10 acres under a single roof. Soon after the million or so of fnll shells lying here when the armistice was declared were removed, the Government began to bring trainloads of war material from the various theatres of war, until to-day millions of pounds’ worth of stores lie rotting and rusting. Vast as the buildings are, they cannot accommodate more than a portion of the stuff that has been accumulated and is being piled up. Much of the material has been lying in the open for months, soaked by rain and now exposed to the even more disintegrating effect of the sun, while in the buildings the rats are playing havoc. It is impossible to give exact figures of the quantity of material now lying at Chilwell, and it is doubtful whether even the military authorities who are in control of the place know just what they have under their charge. Entrance ia guarded almost as jealously as during the war, and from the hills that overlook the wards only a vague notion can he obtained of the colossal amount of stuff that has been dumped down. It ia stated that if war broke out again tomorrow there are enough stores at Chilwell to equip an army almost as large as that which wc had in the field when hostilities ceased. As an illustration, the clothing stacked here includes 10.000. pairs of socks, 6,000,000 army shirts, thousands of bales of Cardigan jackets, trousers, blankets, Scotch tweed (much of which has never been unpacked) thousands of pounds’ worth of cord fox' breeches, and miles of cloth in khaki, blue, and Scotch plaid. ® WHEELS AND CARTS. The most wanton form of waste, however, concerns the vehicles. In serried rows are ranged thousands upon thousands of wheels for use, not merely on gun carriages, but on vehicles of all descriptions. Soaked by spring rains, they are suffering even more damage from.tho sun, and arc deteriorating at an alarming rate. Yet, farmers and tradesmen and wheelwrights would gladly pay a fair price for some of those spare wheels. In the “vehicle park,” as this part of the site is called, are tens of thousands of four-wheeled waggons and two-wheel carts, which will be mined if they ara not soon rescued. To look at the horseshoes, one would think that the whole British army waA mounted. There are something like 6.000. horseshoes rusting ax Chilwell. and this at a time when, owing to the scarcity and high price of iron, blacksmiths arc using old pieces of scrap irou to make horseshoes. There are vast quantities of saddles, too, but these would be of little use for anything but cavalry. Great care is being taken of the guns, of which there are large numbers ox all calibres, from Lewis guns t<s the biggest siege artillery. These are receiving proper attention, and a considerable ,amount of repair work is in progress. The “A.N.” (ammonia nitrate) mill is full of scientific instruments for wireless and other installations, and the laboratory is a gigantic museum oi watches ami clocks. Bicycles are also to be found by the thousand, many of them quite new. The quantity of barbed wire is incredible. There is more than enough to fence the whole coast of England. Why this should he retained at a time when barbed wire is fetching .£3 3s per 1001b and is so badly needed on the land passes comm chonsion. The Government, if thev sold to-day at the market price, would stand to make a big profit, but they wii have to move quickly, or the stuff will be ’useless. • The electric wire, of which there are 100,000 reels, or drums, each containing anything tip to two miles of wire, is in a similar plight There are al.-o about 100 reels of leadcased electric cable. Much of the wire is lying ia the open. There are huge stores of entrenching tools, such as shovels and picks, and building materials are to be seen in immense quantities, including thousands of drain pipes, which are badly needed at the present time by builders. Recently 100 tons of cement has gone bad. The builders are needing 10 tons, but, owing to a clerical error, 10 trucks were sent. The bulk of it lies there still, though builders in the district experience the greatest difficulty in getting cement at all. Thousands upon thousands of texits, camp kitchens (many uncovered), and hose pipes, and miles upon miles of rope, hemp, and other stores are also to be seen. LASTED POWER. The worst aspect of the affair, however, is not the actual deterioration of material, but the extravagance of using such a place at all as a mere “tip.” For Chilwell was a model of industrial efficiency, and to-day is probably unrivalled in its equipment for heavy engineering work. In the No. 1 power-house are 18 Galloway boilers, five pumps, two turbines for driving fans, and four steam economisers. In the other power-house are six boilers and three large turbines, each of 750 h.p. Of the three engines, the biggest has an indicated horse-power of 1080, and each of the others 650. The dynamos that generate the electric light are powerful enough to light up not only all the immense buildings—in some of which the Albert Hall could be lost—but all the roads and railway tracks. The switchboard is 90ft long. Of the 24 boilers only four are in use. Chilwell lies within a stone’s throw of the Midland Railway Company’s important junction at Trent, and yet, fitted as it is for productive enterprise, the whole of the magnificent site, with all its machinery, and railways running into every building, is merely a dump. The staff has recently been much reduced, but about 1000 men and women are still employed. Complaint has been made that there is a good deal of loafing, although the number of “supervisors” is out of all pi’oportion to the rank and file. Complaint is also made that a number of the girl clerks, who turn up in the morning dressed ready for tennis, have not been asked to make way for unemployed soldiers, of whom there are many hundreds in Nottingham. Many disabled soldiers are employed at Chilwell, but the proportion might be still larger.