The Army Service Corps.*
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How They Work and What They Do.
Years ago, when we were certain that the Army would never be used in a great war on the Continent, somebody described the Army Service Corps.as " noncombatants." He was a far-sighted individual, because the phrase has led in these latter days to many volunteering for the corps under the impression that they would have an easy time in it. The officers who, knew better, accepted them With their
• tongues in their cheeks and—put them through it. No unit in the Army has seen so much fighting or has run such risks as the Army Service Corps, and none has done more to put'us in our present advantageous position.
One wonders what an old member of the " Commissariat Train" would say to the corps which has succeeded that organization. "The Kitchen Maids" are the direct descendants of the men who conducted the supplies to the armies in our former wars, but their duties have grown beyond all measure. Like the artillery they have expanded with the demands upon them. There is nothing in which the A.S.C. a-re not concerned*, from cabbages to remounts, and they are in the thick of everything. They feed the men in the forward lines and bring up the guns. They deal out the ammunition and drive. the Generals' motorcars. The Army Service Corps furnishes the utility men of the army, and can fight upon occasion.
Once I lived for ft while with some Army Service Corps officers. They had charge of stores, of an ammunition "dump," of some hundreds of horses, and over a hundred motor wagons. They looked after warehouses of bully beef and Maconochie, were bread bakers, rum dispensers, and had workshops for -repairing motor engines. One was a "Town Major in his spare time, and had to arrange for the billeting of all troops, and another ran a, canteen. They knew all about roads and road making, and to them, and not to thes,gunners, fell the duty of taking heavy guns up. to their position, a job which could only be done at night -when the Hun could not shell the wagons. The man in the am always glad fate did not shove me into it—is kept more variedly busy than most. If he is with horses he has to look after them and put in a hard day besides. If he is with motor transport he has to clean up his vehicles with meticu
lous care; or woe betide him. The motor driver cannot lay up his wagon or his car and idle around as can a, private chauffeur, confident that his employer will not find out that there is nothing the matter. A personage known as a" workshops' officer," with a singularly cute staff of N.C.O.s and . specialists, will investigate, and should it be a case
of malingering that driver is for orderly room at once. Even in the trench period, which is now passing away, the A.S.C. private was not allowed to loaf. He was carted off' in his own wagons to assist the infantry to dig, a,nd he was always busy reducing the size of the slag heaps allOtemaking the roads under the orders of a sharp-tongued sapper sergeant. Though the, times were relatively quiet it was not au uncommon thing. to see a driver drop asleep over his steering wheef whenever he had a chance of a wait, say before reachirigga cross-roads -which the Germans had registered and were shelling. Officers and men who' were through the great retreat from Mons still speak of it as the most frenzied nightmare the mind can conceive. Officers had to use drastic means to waken the worn-ontmen on whom depended the feeding of their comrades, who with rifle and gun were holding back the cl-erman avalanche. There was a while when they also had to supply the French, whose system had broken down.' In fact, it has been entirely remodelled since in consequence. When a depot was reached and the vehicles were being loaded even officers simply rolled into the gram by the roadSide or on to the pavements and slept as they-lay. One major. who had been in the thick 6f it sat down on a pile of loaves, and in a second was sleeping like a dead man. Nor was their work lessened when the . rush for the coast began, for they had then to follow. up their fighting units, find out where they were, and carry up their stores, always under shell and very often under rifle fire. Yet there have been no convoys lost by us. [With one exeeption.—ED. " C.M."1 Now the work has to be done again. Bad roads must not deter those supply wagons. Our men, whether they move fast or slow, get their food with . a regularity which leaves one amazed that anythingso systematic should' exist in the welter of a terrific battle. The infantry receive their . small-arm ammunition and their stores of bombs. To horse, field, and heavy' guns the A.B.C. pour out an endless stream of shells and'eartridges. They replace wornout guns with• new and they carry petrol and explosives to the aeroplanes. They run long goods trains from the bases to the rail-heads, and they look after the enormous warehouses in which are piled the reserve supplies ever diminishing and ever being renewed. They unload ships and reload them with damaged material sent home for repairs. There is nothing the officers and men of the Army Service Corps do not do at the Front—except rest. They even drive the " tanks " I