Part 2

The effect of this skilful violence seems miraculous to the layman. Boots which for months have been taking a heavy list to port or starboard emerge from the ordeal, to all appearance, absolutely upright, although anyone who has worn a boot down to one side until the lower part of the upper is in contact on one side with the ground knows how incorrigible the deformity seems.

Return of the Renewed Boots.

The end of it all is that the boots, completely mended and re-shod with iron heels, go to a woman who bathes them in oil till the leather has drunk its fill. Thus they are both softened and re-armed against the wet. They are now ready for reissue to troops. They go again into a sack, are carried back to the railway siding and make the return journey to the Front, where the sack will be opened by some quartermaster-sergeant, and an order will go round some company for any men in need of new boots to report at the quartermaster’s stores.

The Employees.

Of the 2,400 persons employed in this huge cobbler’s shop, 1,500 are women and girls, all French. It thus helps to absorb the labour displaced in France by the derangement of the cotton, linen and woollen industries at and near the seat of war in the North. The women and girls earn higher wages than they did before the war. They are extremely cheerful workers, sing most of the time, and look up at the occasional British visitors to the place with amused curiosity. To each group of them there is assigned as a friend and adviser some educated and motherly Englishwoman, a volunteer.

A Model Organisation.

The workmen are all British and shoemakers by trade. They have either enlisted specially for the work or been combed out of ordinary battalions on account of their special usefulness here. The officers were experts in boot trade management before joining the New Army. The whole place is a model of industrial organisation. There is nowhere in it any trace of the makeshift and rough-and-ready methods for which the difficulties of war are sometimes made an excuse elsewhere. The minute economies that are practised in all the processes of repair are enough to put to shame any visitor who has not done his very utmost to save his country money.

The place described is not the only one of its kind at the British bases in France. Great as it is, it could not mend all the boots of more than two million men. But in each of the Army’s giant cobbler’s shops the same methods prevail.

TRAINING IN FRANCE

AMIDST DEADLY FUMES OF GAS—ON THE TRAINING GROUND

GOING THROUGH THE LACHRYMATORY DUG-OUT

NIGHT DRILL UNDER FIRST LINE CONDITIONS

AN INSTRUCTION CLASS AT THE LANDSCAPE TARGET

INDIAN TROOPS AT BAYONET EXERCISE

A LESSON IN SANDBAG-FILLING

AT MUSKETRY PRACTICE—PRONE POSITION

PREPARING FOR PHYSICAL EXERCISE

PHYSICAL EXERCISE

TROOPS DISEMBARKING

THE CARE OF THE WOUNDED

THE OVERHEAD TROLLEY FOR BRINGING WOUNDED THROUGH THE TRENCHES

CARRYING WOUNDED IN A TRENCH: A DIFFICULT TURN

OUTSIDE AN ADVANCED DRESSING-STATION

THE VENTILATING TUNNELS OF AN ADVANCED DRESSING-STATION

SPECIAL WARD OF A HOSPITAL FOR FRACTURES OF THE THIGH

A WARD OF ST. JOHN’S AMBULANCE BRIGADE HOSPITAL

A WHEELED STRETCHER

A WHEELED STRETCHER WITH PNEUMATIC TYRES

AMBULANCE TROLLEYS USED IN THE OPEN

AN AMBULANCE BARGE FOR CONVEYANCE OF VERY BADLY WOUNDED TO THE COAST

INTERIOR OF A HOSPITAL BARGE

AN AMBULANCE WITH HEATING-PIPE UNDER SEAT

THE ARMY’S PETROL SUPPLY

CUTTING SHEET TIN FOR MAKING CONTAINERS

MAKING THE ROUGH TIN INTO CANS

ROLLING-ON THE EDGES

SOLDERING TINS BY MACHINERY

BUSY AT THE STAMPING MACHINES

TESTING THE CANS BY AIR

INTERIOR OF A FILLING-HOUSE

AN ENDLESS BELT CONVEYING THE FILLED TINS

FRENCH WORKPEOPLE PACKING THE PETROL TINS INTO BOXES

SOME FRENCH EMPLOYEES OUTSIDE THE FILLING-HOUSE

MAKING BOXES BY MACHINERY

IN THE BOX-MAKING DEPARTMENT

A GIANT COBBLER’S SHOP

SORTING THE BOOTS

CUTTING OFF TOPS OF OLD BOOTS TO MAKE INTO LACES

NAILING SOLES BY MACHINERY

REPAIRING RUBBER BOOTS

GIRLS IN THE RUBBER-BOOT REPAIRING SHOP

ROLLING-BOILERS FOR WASHING WATERPROOF SHEETS

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

● Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained. ● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.