100 Years Ago in the papers: Russia and women's suffrage

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/register/100-000-men-at-once-xsgc3zvlr

March 30, 1917

100,000 men at once

Mr Bonar Law made a grave statement on the urgency of the manpower problem in moving the second reading of the new Military Service Bill in the House of Commons today. It was the opinion of the Government, he said, that the Bill, which provides for a new examination of discharged and rejected men, was an absolute necessity in view of the present military situation. He explained that arrangements were made last autumn for the provision of men for the present campaign on a certain scale. That anticipation had not been fulfilled, because the Cabinet found the needs at home so pressing that for a time those in the Army had to give way. He thought it right to tell the House that the recruits obtained since the beginning of the year had fallen short by 100,000.
The House agreed that such a falling-off was serious. Members, however, were glad to hear that the deficiency had been made good to a degree by the taking of fit men formerly behind the lines for the fighting line. Relief had also come from the greater use of the services of women. A deficiency still existed, and the Army felt that unless it could be made good our prospects in the coming campaign would be jeopardized. The Bill to which Mr Bonar Law asked the assent of the House, would enable the military authorities to deal with 1,000,000 men, and their estimate was that at least 100,000 recruits would be forthcoming within the next three months. The Government recognized the hardship which the Bill would impose on individuals, but the war had reached such a point that the only principle that could be recognized was that every man who was found fit to go into the fighting line should be there, unless his services were required for needs of equal importance at home. He was sorry to say a considerable number of men had succeeded in avoiding service by something like fraud.
Mr Bonar Law stated that one reason why the falling off of recruits had not had the disastrous results it might have had was that our casualties so far this year had been less than anticipated. Still, a time of great fighting with terrible casualties was in front of us, and the whole value of this year’s campaign might depend on our being able to drive home any success we might achieve.





http://www.thetimes.co.uk/past-six-days/2017-03-29/register/converts-to-woman-suffrage-hmjbqvglx

March 29, 1917

Converts to woman suffrage

The Electoral Reform debate today showed the House of Commons at its best. Mr Asquith supported his motion for prompt legislation on the lines of the resolutions from the Speaker’s Conference in a weighty speech, and made a great impression by a frank announcement of his full conversion to woman suffrage. He thanked the Speaker for one of the most remarkable concordats in our political history. No member wished to distract attention from the war, but this was a matter which, in one form or another, could not be avoided during the war.
As for woman suffrage, Mr Asquith declared that he and many others no longer regarded the question from the standpoint which they took before the war. The reason for his change of views was perfectly simple. The women had worked out their own salvation during the war, which could not have been carried on without them. What moved him still more was the problem of reconstruction at the end of the war. He felt it impossible to withhold from women the right of making their voice directly heard on a matter which would affect their interests vitally. It was his opinion that the next House of Commons could be made the exponent of the national will in no other way than by legislation on the lines of the Conference recommendations.
Mr Salter moved an amendment designed to limit the demand to an immediate register and the provision of means of voting for absent soldiers and sailors. His fear was that the course proposed by Mr Asquith would lead to domestic controversy, which would perturb our Allies and discourage our fighting men. Woman suffrage, for example, still divided families and individuals. Moreover, the franchise for one House could not be considered without a review of the constitution of the other. He was willing to accept the widest franchise that any civilized country had, if he might have with it the constitutional safeguards which every country but our own possessed.
This line of attack brought the Prime Minister to his feet. It would be a national waste if the result of the Conference were thrown away. The soldier must have a voice in the settlement of the new conditions. And if soldiers and sailors, why not miners and munition workers?


http://www.thetimes.co.uk/past-six-days/2017-03-28/register/drilling-the-land-army-rdpqgfxfz

March 28, 1917

Drilling the Land Army

At the call of National Service about 2,600 women have gone to training farms all over the country. They have not been daunted by the hard, heavy, and dirty work, but have set against this the peace of the country, and the new friendship with dumb animals which it promises. Already some of the women are working on a farm containing the most famous herd of Jersey cows in the country. At a home-farm in Essex some ten girls are in training, and from this centre various farms in the neighbourhood are supplied with women. The owner of the home-farm has been training women for about a year. A woman farm bailiff, neat in gaiters and a long coat of heavy drill, is the leader of the land workers and sees that the women, drawn from varying social grades, work like good comrades. A colonel’s daughter, two maid-servants, a Colonial girl, two munition workers who broke down from too much indoor work, and a young girl from shop-gazing Kensington are among the students and they have somehow thrown nerves and town life aside and, in the clean, sweet air, are improving in physique.
As the girl bailiff swung open the door of the cow-shed where the new hands were milking or doing the very dirty work of cleaning the sheds, one saw the same look of radiant health. It was if anything more pronounced in the girls who, out of their training, were at work in the neighbouring farms. The dummy cows — there are two of them — were ready for practice-milking — square wooden bodies with wooden legs and wide udders. Brown Bess, the favourite, had introduced many novices to the soothing art. “Most of the girls who come,” said the bailiff, “have never even touched a cow, and they cannot be taught on the cow, since the value of a milch cow is now about £50, and wrong handling will ruin them. So they learn on Brown Bess,” and she filled the dummy cow’s udder with water and sat down and showed how the novice gained strength in her wrists. “Girls who play the piano,” she said, “and girls who play hockey learn very quickly. Some get into it at once, and when they have learned they practice for a day or so on goats, and then they take to the cows. The most important thing is to get the girls accustomed to the cows and the cows to the girls.”


http://www.thetimes.co.uk/past-six-days/2017-03-27/register/the-russian-forces-at-riga-sk9br2gpr

March 27, 1917

The Russian forces at Riga

We arrived here last night, M Gutchkoff, Minister of War, and Mme Gutchkoff, who came to watch over her husband’s health. The Minister of War had scarcely slept since the outbreak of the revolution. His wellbeing is essential to the safety and welfare of the Empire.
M Gutchkoff decided to leave Petrograd and his multifarious duties in order to convey the greetings of the new Government to the gallant armies in the field, and to explain to the officers and men the difficulties of the situation at home and the danger of invasion by the enemy. The train which brought us to Pskoff carried a mass of incendiary literature, including the issue of Pravda, with its traitorous proclamations and resolutions of the Social Democratic Committee.
The scenes at all the stations on the way to Riga gave abundant testimony to the triumph of patriotism over anarchy. All the garrisons and local inhabitants turned out to welcome the first representative of the “National Government”. The enthusiasm everywhere was indescribable. M Gutchkoff conveyed to the soldiers and officers the warmest thanks for their services to the common cause, and appealed to them to unite in defence of their new found liberties. It was a strange, novel, and inspiring sight — a short, stoutish civilian, dressed in a plain black overcoat and wearing a black astrakhan cap, who saluted the troops in military fashion and to whom Generals, subalterns, privates, and civilians alike rendered honours. When the parade was over, they flocked around him as children around a father. The soldiers cheered and bore him in their arms to his carriage. At one place where the train was not stopping, soldiers barred the way, cheering, until M Gutchkoff appeared and spoke a few words to them.
During the journey I heard many narratives connected with recent events. The saddest trial for the ex-Emperor and Empress has been the desertion of almost all the few people whom they admitted to their confidence. General Voyeikoff, late Commandant of the Palace and one of the worst of reactionary influences around the Throne, who is now confined in St Peter and St Paul Fortress, on being arrested cynically betrayed his master and accused him of the basest treachery.


http://www.thetimes.co.uk/past-six-days/2017-03-25/register/russia-and-the-war-ddz0hh0sr

March 25, 1917

Russia and the war

Mr Lloyd George’s message to Prince Lvoff and the greetings of the House of Commons to the Duma show how warmly the British democracies hail the promise of ordered liberty amongst the great people who are their Allies. The peoples of the British Empire never regarded the alliance with Russia as a personal pact with the Tsar. Highly as they respected his many amiable qualities and firm as was their trust in his good faith, they looked beyond the person of the Sovereign and considered the alliance as made with the Russian people. Of late some Allies shared the doubts expressed in the remarkable letter which the Grand Duke Nicholas Mikhailovitch addressed him in November, and feared that he might not be “well enough acquainted with affairs within the Empire” to prosecute the war to a victorious end. Could official secrets be disclosed, it might be found that appeals, hardly less direct, were made to him by certain of the Ambassadors in Petrograd.
As the alliance is with the Russian nation, its members cannot have any difficulty in the transfer of their confidence and help to Russia’s new representatives. The difficulties which the Provisional Government and the Duma have to solve are terribly aggravated by the fact that the Russian Revolution has taken place “in the stress and strain of the greatest war in history”. That, as Mr Asquith well said, makes the demand upon the sagacity and the self-restraint of the Government and of all classes in Russia immeasurably more exacting. They have to solve the huge problem of reconstituting this vast Empire without slackening their efforts against the foreign foe.
Quiet prevails, but our Petrograd Correspondent reports that it is a quiet which contains many elements of unrest and anxiety. Everything depends upon the power of the Government to hold the subversive movement in check. The form of the liberal institutions which Russia may adopt is a matter for her alone to determine. All that her Allies and well-wishers can desire is that they may ensure her freedom and tranquillity at home and her strength abroad. But her friends must watch with deep concern any movement which threatens to relax the discipline of her Armies or to weaken the Provisional Government in the conduct of the war.


http://www.thetimes.co.uk/past-six-days/2017-03-24/register/facing-the-food-problem-02xs0530k

March 24, 1917

Facing the food problem

For the first time since the Crimean War the price of bread in this country is to be raised to a shilling for a four-pound loaf. We are not sure that the reasons assigned for the increase are quite convincing, but the higher price will at least make the public more careful about the consumption of bread. Even people who fail to heed Lord Devonport’s grave speech in the House of Lords on Thursday will recognize the plain warning implied by the shilling loaf. It is unfortunate that the Food Controller did not make clear to the nation the relative position of our supplies of bread and of meat the moment his Department was formed. He explained on Thursday that there is relatively less anxiety about meat than about bread, and that “the curtailment of bread consumption is far more important than meat consumption”.
We have repeatedly urged these points, and Lord Devonport might have emphasized them earlier. The country was led to concentrate its attention upon meatless days and potatoless days, and up till now has paid insufficient attention to the even more pressing question of bread. Meatless days are necessary enough, but a great deal more might be done to induce economy in bread consumption. If it is necessary to prescribe the number of ounces of meat which may be consumed at a meal in an hotel, as undoubtedly it is, why not limit the bread also? We hear much about gluttony at meat meals in restaurants, but nothing about the bread and cake and pastry eaten in teashops. The teashop requires scrutiny just as much as the restaurant. One great cause of excessive consumption is that many housewives have not yet understood that Lord Devonport’s ration includes both bread and flour. Households which scrupulously limit their purchases of bread continue to buy flour for cakes and pies and pastry outside the limits of the ration. In many cases this is being done through ignorance. In the houses of the well-to-do, where an evening meat meal is taken, there is also a considerable consumption of bread, or its equivalent, at afternoon tea, which might very well be eliminated. Three meals a day, and nothing between, ought now to be the extreme limit for everybody. We shall be lucky if we do not in the end get down to two meals a day.