 Good evening everybody, my name is Felicity Huntingford and as chair of this session I'd like to welcome you to the second talk in the Royal Philosophical Society of Glasgow series of lectures for 2020-2021. It's a great pleasure to introduce today's speaker, Dr. Mary Fraser. Mary's had a really interesting career. She trained as a nurse in the 1960s and worked full time as a nurse until 1982 when she gained a psychology degree, part time while working full time as a nurse. And with her degree at this point she moved into higher education, setting up one of the first degrees for registered nurses in the UK. She subsequently gained a PhD from Goldsmith College London, also part time, on the work of the French philosopher and social theorist Michel Foucault. Mary has continued working to promote career paths for nurses and promoting good governance and public health in the UK in various roles. And she held a post as senior lecturer in the University of Strathguide's Department of Governance and is currently an associate member of their, I can't remember what it's called, the Center for, Mary, I'm sorry, the Center for Criminology and Social and Criminal Justice. Her research has, for the past 10 years, has focused on the history of policing in the UK, especially in the early 20th century. And last year she published her latest book, which is called Policing the Home Front, The Control of British Population at War. This is a fascinating book, it's really interesting in itself and it's also interesting because it touches on many topics that are of great pertinence to us in today's pandemic induced dilemma that we live in. So at that point I would like to hand over the microphone to Mary and ask her to give her lecture on Britain's police and food supply in World War One. Mary. Thank you very much Felicity, that was really, really interesting and good thank you. Thank you to the RPS for inviting me to undertake this lecture and I'm really pleased to do so. So as Felicity says, for the last 10 to 15 years, I've been developing the history of police work, which is a very underdeveloped area. The work so far on the history of police has been as an institution, and that's been undertaken by Professor Clive Emsley, who did his work through the Open University, and also Professor Heia Speer Makov, an Israeli researcher who's shown the makeup of the Metropolitan Police as a labour force. The majority of work in an academic sense. Historical work by police historians in Britain has also covered things like genealogy. They're very interested in looking at their family members and who was a policeman and where they served. So there's large collections of memorabilia such as uniforms and badges and equipment, such as truncheons and there's wonderful displays of painted truncheons with the symbols of the forces from which they came. And these form the basis of around 16 police museums around Britain, and also around 10 police collections. There's also a few retired chief constables and senior police officers who've written the histories of their own police force, and unfortunately then most of the original documents were destroyed. But none of this shows very much of the detail of police work itself, which has barely been addressed. So my current focus is examining police work, particularly during the First World War because it was a watershed for the police in terms of their work, and also the way in which the service was organised. The primary text I used for this was the popular police journal, as it shows the details of how the ordinary policeman talked about his life and work with the problems and daily struggles that he had. As well as the journal promoting how the good policeman should do his job and current national debates now talking about policemen and his, because the force was all men at that time. It also shows the lives of their incorporated families. In the absence of much other police detailed documentation, much of which has been destroyed. This is one of the best sources, I feel. The most widely read of the police journals in World War One was the journal called the police review and parade gossip, which I think is a wonderful title for a journal. This is the front page of their, their issue on the 15th of November 1918, the first week after the armistice. The journal was set up by the philanthropist John Campster, who wanted the police to develop a more professional image by seeing policing as a career with promotion prospects. He encouraged self education and in fact much of the many of the pages in the journal were to do with basic numeracy and literacy for the police how to write reports and this sort of thing. And he encouraged self education to improve their self image. The journal also had a major role in giving the ordinary policemen on the beat a voice at a time when the home office and individual senior police officers, firstly resisted police unionization. While many chief chief constables ruled their force with strict discipline. In fact, many of them were army personnel, including, which included forbidding them to request increases in pay. There was a period of steep food price inflation, and also restricting time off at a time of severe staff shortages during World War One, where many of the young police officers had been recruited into the war. The journal also developed a campaigning role, for example, in 1915. There was a pressure on police authorities to implement legislation, which gave policemen one day off in seven, which had been agreed in 1910, but many forces had still not implemented it by mid war. And this was often because it was considered that it would be an increase on the rates, if the number of police officers were increased. So about the legislation, the journal surveyed all police authorities, asking about loss of annual leave and time off, and whether payment was made in lieu and whether a war bonus have been granted with the amount. And it named in shame those who hadn't replied by a certain date. And it also published the results in late 1915, which named and shamed individual forces who hadn't implemented the one day off in seven. So the journal also gave voice to police wives, who often wrote about wrote to the journal complaining of hardship, particularly during the war. So my data collection of the police review journal started at the police college library in Tully Island where I was granted access. And then I moved to the National Archives at Q, and included as well or well reviewed published material and other national and private sources. So quite a rounded view of what was happening at the time, although I focus mainly on the police wives. A lot of what I'm going to say was a nationwide issue. The history of the work of the police can't be undertaken without considering their families as well as most police wives, whether living in urban or rural areas, had the role of the incorporated wife. This is how the incorporated wife has been described. The discourse of the incorporated wife shows her being portrayed as in the organization, but not part of it. It was her duty to represent her husband and police values, both inside and outside the organization. In so doing she was a reflection of the public image of her husband's occupation and status. The success in her role of supporting her husband was aligned with his chances of promotion, rather than giving her any recognition in her own right. Her suitability reflected on him. Conversely non conformity in the role affected her husband's promotion prospects, and young shows this with one wife who refused to abandon her job as a teacher. The restrictions placed on policemen by their job and the discipline expected by the police as an organization was said to turn both them and their wives inwards for the wife. This was towards other police wives. Where police families live close together. There was an inward looking self containment amongst the wives. This reflected their husband's role as a policeman in which he sought to control and order the society around him and needed social distance in order not to be seen as fallible. Although their role was unstated the police wives were well aware of their place and what was required of them, particularly what they couldn't couldn't do to be acceptable. The police review and parade gossip which I'll talk about in future as just as the police review exploited this inward looking nature of police wives and its impact on the police families children. By publishing a column for wives in which many made contributions, and it was no not surprisingly as the wives column. And this often occupied to pay two columns in a four column page so it was quite a significant item. The wife's column was published before 1914, but more frequently and more time as food shortages and other matters that affected the police family became more critical. The wife's column included items involving the police home, such as bringing up the children recipes and setting the standard for the policeman and his family to be an example in the community. However, these rates of pay to be able to afford the standard setting were a constant source of worry and discussion with amounts granted to each police force openly disclose disclose through their journal. And at this time, each police force had its own rates of pay. The national rates of pay didn't come in until after 1918 through the desperate report which was published in 1919. So as the breadwinner of the patriarchal police family, rates of pay were an issue that caused disquiet in the police and escalated significantly during the war with a huge inflation in food prices to culminate in one of the major issues in the metropolitan police strike of August 1918, when the war was not yet over and our return to the issues in the metropolitan police strike later on. The wife's struggle to feed their families turned inwards to other police wives as as I mentioned, even before the war budgets in the lower grades were portrayed as tight. And this is about three weeks before the start of the war. So, these were basic items, food items and other items for middle and lower income families at this time. As the slide shows, the family had five children. The police authorities were well aware that police pay in the lower grades was poor. And the implications that a large increase would have on the rate payers. Therefore, they tended to recruit men with smaller families. Therefore, whereas expenditure on rent, fuel and clothing remain relatively unchanged, food prices soared. In 1915, the wives column of the police review asked its readers to provide their costs for standard food and household items from the previous July 1914, compared with July 1915, and this was just 11 months into the war. And the results were printed from London and Bristol. So that in both cities, even 11 months after the end of the war, there were increases of between two and two and a half percent on the cost of basic basic items, acknowledged to be around twice the amount of the war bonus, which was given to all local priority employees, so that diets had already started to change. For example, previous routine items such as eating meat every day had come to be considered as luxurious in the diet and were eaten less often. On a national level, by February 19, 1915 Arthur Henderson, Labour MP for Barnard Castle and President of the Board of Education and a member of the Cabinet, along with other MPs, were pressing Prime Minister Asquith to speed up the commission inquiry, committing inquiry into the price of food and other staple commodities. As price rises had been modest from the turn of the century to the start of the war, these levels of price increases for basic food items caused alarm. The police review encouraged the incorporated wives to submit items for the wives column and promised to increase the frequency of the column if sufficient text was received. They began publishing weekly menus with associated cost of food stuffs in October 1915, as well as recipes. By mid 1915. The column showed that economizing was necessary in all areas. The wires recognize that fruit and vegetables were the only items not to have increased in price. One wife wrote that on 35 shillings a week, which in today's values is around 135 pounds a week. This doesn't leave much over after five or six people have been fed during 1916. The column recommended booklets for housewives advocating cut price menus and these were a couple of the recommendations. Later, it also recommended this when the war cookery book, which was quite a substantial publication it was over 20 pages long. And at the beginning, there were menus with meat. And at the back, it was all about half of it was about vegetarian menus. So some, some people advocated vegetarian menus to cut costs. Unlike today as a lifestyle choice. The meat for the fat for the policeman was seen to be needed to supply his body with the energy required for his active life on the beat. Well, the police review published this about the way in which a woman should consider her own requirements. Happily a woman's interior economy can be kept going on an even more restricted diet than that suggested. And the fact that the journal published this indicates that it was the sort of way in which wives should consider themselves. So portraying the good wife is going without some food items or amounts of food in order to support her husband's work. And this was a well known phenomenon for wives, particularly among working class households where budgets were tight. As almost all policemen at this time came from the working classes. This would be a normal way for them to economize. At the end of April 1916, the wife's column published the Board of Trade Labor Gazette figures showing increases in almost every item. This showed rises in the cost of living since the start of the war. There's more than 40% in small towns and villages and over 50% in large towns. But as potatoes showed the smallest rise of around 10% they became more central to the diet in homes trying to economize. The column compared these increased prices to the average price in the policemen's take home pay of 15 to 25%. And the column gave quite a large number of items and I've just chosen a few to share here with a range of the increases. However, despite this, worse was to come. 1916 saw a poor harvest worldwide. And Prime Minister Lloyd George told of lower serial harvests in America, Canada and Argentina by around 40 million tons compared with the previous year. He told Parliament that this was disastrous for the traditional export of any surplus to overseas countries. At this time Britain was reliant on overseas wheat for around 80% of consumption, as well as relying on imports of concentrated cattle feed and other food commodities. The 1916 wheat harvest in Britain also fell by 400,000 tons. And coupled with this, sowing winter wheat for the following year had become more difficult and had decreased due to the shortage of farm labor, many of whom had been recruited into the war, and also the very poor weather conditions for that winter. The weather conditions during 1916 harvest also affected the British potato crop and we've talked previously about how important potatoes were to the diet. And the potatoes were seen to be said to be small and diseased and rotted in the ground when the camps were undone. Causing a potato famine. Although some accused farmers of withdrawing potatoes from sale due to government price fixing, which left them without any sort of surplus. Not only was there a worldwide shortage of wheat, but around a third of shipping, which brought commodities to Britain, had to be diverted to transport troops munitions and supplies to France, and other troop destinations. While German is unrestricted suddenly warfare from February 1917, some can increasing number of cargo ships, bringing food imports to Britain. And with these factors further increased food shortages, and added to price riders. Lord George restricted imports of some items. And these are just a few that he told Parliament about. He told the House of Commons that the nation must be called upon to make real sacrifices in the production and distribution of food, which must be equally spread across all classes and income groups. And it was particularly the lack of spread between income groups, which was a source of outrage at the time. And this published the lavish diets that were eaten by the rich at places like the Ritz, where the lower classes couldn't even get butter and sugar. The source, the shortage of wheat, let the government's food controller to attempt voluntary restrictions on the consumption of bread. Well, well circulated poster at the time. So bread and potatoes were two of the staples in the diets of the working class families. In some poorer families in Scotland diets consisted almost entirely of bread, potatoes and tea. It was said that the food shortages and inequalities and distribution that led to labor unrest and resulted in the commission of inquiry into industrial unrest, which reported in mid 1917. In 1917, the police review published this for all practical purposes, police wives acknowledged that potatoes in the families diet will be absent until at least the harvest of 1917. And this was a national issue. The potatoes to be found anywhere for from about February to July. The potato famine, as it was called, remove potatoes from the diet. As I say between February and July 1917. So at this time the food supply on the home front in Britain in 1917 was in crisis. In January 1917 saw the publication of further steep price rises published by the Board of Trade Labor. Rises when compared with July 1914 showed 42% increase, with the greatest increase occurring in October 1916 of 10% in that month alone. In each month there were increases of between five and 10% in the prices of a number of items including flour, bread, milk, butter and cheese, and the largest increases coming in eggs and potatoes. The police wives were not allowed to work outside and to supplement the family income, as this would damage their husband's career prospects and his consequential improvement in the family lifestyle. The portrayal of hardship in January 1917 was such that the wife's column began to print ways of supplementing the family income by working from home. Compared with police wives, many women throughout Britain were working outside the home at this time, often earning good money in munitions and other factories and workshops, which helped them to offset some of the price rises. The police journal recommended keeping poultry and selling the eggs as a favorite method and provided advice on how to go about it base. And for those with no outdoor space, needlework was recommended. The need to economize on food continued to dominate the wives column. Mid-February 1917 saw a mention of the effects of the food controller by setting limits on the consumption of bread, meat and sugar. This led the police review to ask its readers to suggest substitutes. The journal again advised booklets for meatless menus, implying a sense of deprivation, and gave a recipe for Irish potato pudding, which would have been before the main family in potatoes, and advice on how to prepare split peas. Further suggestions involved using oats instead of flour for cakes and biscuits and making pancakes without eggs. From the end of March, with the absence of potatoes, recipes contain no sign of either meat or potatoes. Recipes were for such things as rice and pea cake, cabbage stuffed with rice and curried vegetables. At a national level, from late December 1916, Lord George urged an urgent increase in home food production, which he said was essential to avoid starvation at home, which was already being seen in to occur in Germany. He appointed Roland Provaro in late December 1916 as the Minister for Agriculture, and he later became Lord only and his books on agriculture during the war are still important texts. He set up the food production department in January 1917 under Sir Arthur Lee to encourage farmers so that Britain could become more self sufficient, particularly in grain and potatoes. And what the food production department did was to supply farmers with labor and this was particularly important to replace those who'd gone to war, numerous farm laborers who'd gone to war, but also to supply farmers with fertilizers, farm supplements and seed and other things that they needed. The food production department was very effective as by the harvest of 1917. I'll show you the output increase in output in a few minutes. And this was within just seven months. As potatoes by this time were almost unavailable. We're talking now about March, April, drastic measures to feed the nation at home were needed. And this is usually used as cattle feed and is said to be very unpalatable. And this was advocated along with Swedes because it was said to be plentiful and inexpensive. And this is usually used as cattle feed and is said to be very unpalatable. And this was advocated along with Swedes because it was said to be plentiful and inexpensive. And because mango wasles were so unpalatable. The food controllers office experimented with recipes to improve its palatability. And this was one of four recipes that was printed in the wives column on the 20th of April. And this is a list of historical research. I obtained one of these from a farmer in Lothian just recently in the last couple of weeks. And my husband and I had a meal of it last week. And this is what it looked like. In actual fact it wasn't bad. It was a bit fibrous. And we did cheat by having to speak with it. But the taste was not unpleasant. I mean it tasted somewhat sweet. The greater police household also included the children. The children's column encouraged the children of police families to focus on sharing the food, the families food burden. July 1917 saw a competition asking them to submit an essay on how they changed their diet. What was the winning entry? And she said she was eating a third less bread and a little less cake and pastry to help to preserve flour. She'd also signed the food pledge at school so that this was similar to other children around Britain. And of course what this did was to shame other family members to eat likewise as voluntary restrictions were really not very popular. And so mainly ignored where it was possible to obtain supplies. Despite government attempts to increase home food production, distribution was not controlled until very late on in the war, leading to food cues, particularly for bread, sugar, meat, butter and margarine, which started to develop in October 1917. And by November in that year 1917 was such in London that the police had to be brought in to supervise them. By late December, mid to late December, over 500,000 people were reported to be queuing in London on a Saturday morning with daily reports to Metropolitan Police Commissioner in order that the cues could be regulated. And similar cues were seen nationwide, as I've shown here with this cue in writing. The issue was that it wasn't just one member of the family that went to queue. Numerous members of the family who were old enough was sent out to be in different cues for the same item. In case by the time someone got to the front of the queue, the provision had run out that they were queuing for. And this was partly why the cues were so huge. However, by the harvest of 1917, a national transformation was seen in the food supply, said to be due to the policy of home food production and government action through the defense of the realm act regulations to L and to M, and the corn production bill, including increases increased farm mechanization. In fact, in that year, the 1917 harvest was said to increase by this amount. In fact, the harvest of 1917 showed that there was a glut of potatoes, because so many people so many farmers had planted them, and also there were potato planting on allotments which I'll come to in a minute. This was said to give hope to the population for increased home food production in the following year, particularly in grain and potato products, and to ensure the supply of bread stuffs and potatoes were maintained, regardless of shortages and other food. However, by December 1917 food prices were continuing to rise. The police review published a question in the House of Commons, which showed the extent of these rises, and how most of the population had had to change their dietary habits to minimize the increases. So even when dietary changes have been made, increases were around 90% compared to pre war food price rises and shortages for one of the reasons for 1917 being talked about as the year of war weariness. The food rationing of sugar butter and margarine started in December 1917 and became nationwide in early 1918 in a national rationing scheme, which included many of the staple foods. By this time it was essential as the food cues has start had risen dramatically as I've just mentioned. The food rationing made an immediate effect as the food cues disappeared overnight with scarce items were distributed more evenly across Britain, and everybody felt that they could be sure of receiving their fair share of the produce. The food supply also attempted to prevent hoarding, in which the police were involved in searching premises, accompanying food controllers, food inspectors, employed by the local authorities. By the harvest of 1918, home food production showed increased acreage of corn, potatoes and pulses. So this is the following year. Although spring 1918 saw a further increase in the winter wheat crop of 45% over the previous year, production and an increased acreage under corn and potatoes planted in England and Wales was more than 2 million acres, more than in 1916. But the cost of food was still on average 108% dearer than in July 1918 1914. And this was despite the government bread subsidy, because the government were determined that at least bread would be available to everybody. The trail of hope that the nation would not starve was given in spring 1918, when the government made it known that Britain as a whole had one of the highest increased acreages of wheat and barley since 1888. The highest crop of votes ever recorded and the highest acreage of potatoes since 1872. The interim report of the director general of food production for England and Wales showed the results of the 1917 18 food production campaign had been very successful with thousands more acres of wheat, potatoes, oats, rye, corn, pulses and barley planted, compared with previous years, since the start of the war. The figures for 1918 harvest didn't include the considerable part played by more than 20,000 acres turned over to growing vegetables on allotments with nearly one and a half million allotments worked by townspeople. It's also interesting how Lloyd George was publicized as growing potatoes in his front garden, and the king and queen were also seen to turn part of Windsor castle grounds over to growing vegetables. Furthermore, using scientific formulae, the government investigations into calorific values of foodstuffs, compared with the male bodies requirements, showed that despite the hardships, the UK average male calorific intake only diminished by a very small extent. So only by about 3%. Compared to pre war. So by this time the problem was frayed and more as one of distribution than actual shortage. Britain's program of self sufficiently self sufficiency largely prevented the food rights seen in other combatant nations such as Germany, Austria, Hungary, and Italy, although the worse and quite unpleasant scenes in some parts of Britain. So that was the result of food shortages. For example in rexham wagon loaded potatoes arrived in the market, and was seized upon by hordes of people climbing onto the wagon and fighting with each other to get hold of the potatoes. And this increase in food, particularly the male metropolitan police were demoralized exhausted, tired of the autocratic way they were treated with their request being ignored and unmet and desperately poorly paid. They said that he was paid less than band boys and slips of girls, with continuing questions about increases in their pay in the House of Commons during July and early August 1918. So in desperation on the 30th of August, they went on strike and marched on Whitehall, and they received an instant pay increase from Lloyd George. It's interesting how the local population when they marched down Whitehall was seen to support them. They obviously realized that they did have a real issue. So, in conclusion, the discourse of the incorporated police wife saw the pressure on her and her husband to adopt police values. This would determine the lifestyle for the whole family. The advantages must go into the role of the police wife and deviations were strenuously denied dealt with by the institutional threats to her husband's advancement in his chosen career, with the associated improvement in the family standard of living and social advancement. As successful in this role, she strongly aligned herself with other police wives by looking inwards for support and guidance. In this she was supported by the police journal the police review. However, particularly in wartime, there was increased hardships for the family in which the good incorporated wife would go without to enable better food production for her husband and probably children as well. As police pay was not seen to keep pace with the highly inflationary costs of all foods. As many women in Britain were employed and receiving a wage or salary police families portrayed themselves as amongst those that suffered the most police pay was one of the sources of in was the only source of income, unless the family had private means. As the good incorporated wife was not allowed to work outside the home, unlike many other women in Britain. To control these inflationary pressures on the family. Family diets altered dramatically during the war due not only to inflation but also to availability of staple items, such as bread and potatoes. This was a vital support nationally for increases in police pay, as others on the home front were in a similar situation, and an increase would have meant a rise in the rates. These pressures were major factor, which led to the mounting discontent in the police forces, culminating in the metropolitan police strike of the 30th of August, which lasted for two days. I think I'll finish that. And if you have questions, then I'd be very pleased to try and answer them. Mary, thank you very much. That was really interesting. I've got a whole list of questions, and I see that the questions are stacking up in the question and answer. We've got a long list of questions here. So, I'll start asking them. Can you hear me all right. Yes, I can. Okay, I'm there. I'm going to go. They've been organized by the number of people who've done a thumbs up to them. So I'll work down that some of them I think could be linked but we'll see how it goes so. So the first question that a number of people have asked or are interested in is that you mentioned that police chiefs tended to come from the military. And the question is whether the lower ranks were also likely to come from the military. And, and did the composition of the force change much during the war. Thank you. Yes, the higher ranks. As I mentioned the chief constables often came from the military but no the lower ranks there were very few that came from the military. So if you look at one of the main sources that I looked at which I found fascinating within the Mitchell library and the archive. You can find the personnel records of the police from around 1800 mid 1800s. It shows not only their name and date of birth but also what their previous occupation was. Because only one that I found who was working in 1917 actually came directly from school. So almost all the police had previous occupations. And what you can see is that many of them were very lowly. So, you know, farm servants farm laborers road work men, you know, very lowly occupations. And so one of the reasons that they went into the police was to improve their self and their improvement in their social conditions and their pay. And also, they would at that time. Many of them might have well been on temporary work. So the police was, you know, permanent work with a regular regular salary. Being a policeman was very much social advancement. And this was why the police review found it important to teach basic numeracy and literacy skills to to the police force itself. So they could go to court and they could submit reports in ways that were acceptable for those that they were talking to. And then that didn't change much during that since they weren't mostly military people that source of recruitment into the police didn't change very much during the war. It didn't change at all during the war. And apart from the archives in in Glasgow. So the piece of work that was conducted by hair spare mac off shows that this was a similar trend in the metropolitan police. So one might assume that most police forces were composed of similar sort of people. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Now, there are a lot of people have a question about they want to know when were the police allowed to become unionized and able to strike. Oh, right. Well, this unionization arose during the war, because of the hard conditions and because many workers were unionized and strikes were quite prevalent, as I'm sure you know on quite side, and other places. So the police felt that they should have a voice. But those who were known to be members were either dismissed, or were given. I mean, it was one of the reasons that there was disquiet in the police that they were felt sometimes that union members were sent to war, rather than people who weren't union members. At a time when people, the men didn't want to go to war, the novelty of going to war had worn off. This was from 1916 onwards or 1915, when voluntary recruitment was no longer the way in which the army was made up. So, you know, unionization although the police desperately wanted their voices to be heard. They were harshly treated if they were found to be a member of a union. And this was partly why the desperate the desperate report of 1919 set up the police foundation, the police federation and foundation to cater for the input of the policeman on the beat to be a voice for them. Thank you. Thank you very much. And enough people would like to know, given those remarkable figures you showed us about the lack of food, whether there was evidence of adverse health effects. I know those are from poor, poor nutrition, due to the reduction in available foods and the reliance on, on just staples. I would say particularly for the wife. Yes, indeed. I mean, one of the main sources is beverage. Now beverage is written about the war situation from on the population. And he didn't give indications that there were health effects from a poor diet, because the calorific level was maintained. He said that second class protein would have been sufficient through vegetables. Milk, milk was never a problem. Milk wasn't rationed milk wasn't. I mean, there was a decrease in the amount of milk but it wasn't ever got to the level of shortages. So these sorts of things probably would have provided the protein. And carbohydrates would have come from such things as fruit and vegetables and bread. Now bread was very interesting, because the government was determined that bread supply would continue above everything else. And what they did was to increase the extraction rate at the mills of the grain. Before the war, extraction rate was about 95%. And by putting the rollers closer together they gradually got 97% extraction rates. So this helped to offset the shortage of grain. So what they did little by little was to include other products. So you had rye grain and you had other sorts of grain, barley put into the bread. And eventually when potatoes were plentiful, potatoes would be put into it as well. So this although bread was supplied, it changed the consistency of bread. So when one person put it, they became like the consistency of a howitzer shell. But at least they were there. But the other thing that the government did, which also I found really quite interesting was that they prevented the sale of bread for 24 hours after it was baked. So it became less nourish. So people would eat less of it. So all this maintained the supply. And the government eventually put in subsidies to bread to maintain the supply. So on that subject, another question is whether lessons had been learned in time for World War Two about police pay and conditions and also about national self-sufficiency in food productions. Where lessons learned. Yes, absolutely. Yes. Yes. And it was seen that particularly people like women didn't come in to agriculture for quite some time. The women's land army really didn't start to get going until mid to late 1917. And by the Second World War, of course, they were still, you know, the training schools were there and the training for other groups to be involved in agriculture was already learned in the First World War. And yes, by that time, the police had a national pay scale. And they were directly responsible to the home office. So, you know, the police were then nationalised and, you know, had a central point of contact. Okay. Now, a number of people want to know whether the mainstream media picked up on the police review and parade gossips concerns on pay, and whether that was an and if and whether there was sympathy for the police arguments for more pay. In the local communities. Right. Thank you. Well, this was quite a mixed picture. I mean, there was a story in the police review about a question about increase in police pay in Hove. And apparently there were good falls of laughter about requests for police pay because they were finding it really hard to manage. And the many of the councillors said good heavens, you know, everybody's having this problem. It's not just the police. So that was completely undermined in in Hove. Other places. They had more sympathy. But it really it was raised constantly in the House of Commons, particularly in mid to late 1918. Particularly for the Metropolitan Police, as I mentioned, but generally there was there was one notable example of the Chief Constable of Oxford, who regulated and made made contributions to the police authorities on behalf of the police pay. And this was gauged to the increase in the price of bread. So he had a very modern bar and standards comparator to be able to ask for increases in pay, but many of the other chief constables because of their military background and because of course they were paid reasonably didn't see what the problem was. Wouldn't allow the the chief constables to actually put forward their point of view to the police authorities. It's amazing. Now I know there's a question further down the list which I read earlier about. Was it the case that everybody was in that the police were in the same basket with their other workers when it came to hardship during the World War or were they particularly did they have particular problems because their wives couldn't work. I find this difficult to quite know. I think it was because there was the single paycheck coming in that made it worse for them. I hear about a lot of the women working in munitions factories and other workshops and factories who were earning very good money. And you saw them going out and buying extravagant clothes and, you know, new furniture the furniture shops were making a great living because of the amount of money that otherwise we're earning. I quite know there must have been other groups I think where the wives weren't allowed to work, particularly as they were the police for claiming to be middle class. This was one reason why they men wanted to increase their social standing. So they claimed to be middle class. And of course at that time middle class women didn't work. So they encouraged Lloyd George had to encourage women to actually take on work, particularly when it got to 1917 when so many men had gone to war. Okay, can I then ask, on behalf of some of our audience, when were women police officers first employed and where. That's an interesting question. Women were not employed in the police force as such. They had separate organizations in the first world war. And there were two organizations who were voluntarily, most of them women worked on a voluntary basis, and they set up schools for policing for women. They were really considered part of the police force they had their own uniforms, and they were mainly responsible for women and children, the typical woman's role of being in charge responsible for women and children. But the police vehemently refused to accept them on their own terms. So for example, very few of them were sworn in. And if you're not sworn in you can't make an arrest. And this of course is a chief, one of the chief functions of the police is to be able to arrest people. But the women police were very persistent. You know they, they eventually were used in places like the munitions factories where a lot of single girls were put in hostels, working away from home. And they gave them, you know, moral, moral guidance, because of the risk of, you know, these young single women being on their own. So that was a major source of employment for women police. They were also employed largely on the streets, supervising in case of moral corruption. And that was the fear of the spread of venereal disease through the throughout the country, and particularly to the troops, and the women police where they seem to be advising the young girls, who saw that khaki was particularly attractive and would sort of flood around the the the barracks in the hope of attracting a soldier. And this was a major source of concern for the for the male policemen to know quite how to deal with this. So the women police came into their own in that respect as well. But come the end of the war, those who despite the representations by the women police, the ones who were employed looking after the girls in the munitions factories were made redundant so hundreds of them were made redundant. Because there was seen to be no will for them. And in fact, the home office actually said you can see letters in the National Archives at Q saying that because they had such a limited role, which was really all they were allowed to do was to be responsible for women and children, because they had such a limited role. There really was no future for them. Really, from one depressing question to another. So they came into their own much later on between the wars. Okay, so here's another depressing question. Can you hear me. Yes. Yes, sorry. I wonder if people want to know, do you think there any lessons for the current government based on this research on how to manage possible posts, Brexit related disruption to food supply next year. Goodness, that's an interesting question isn't it. Yes, I tell you how I would answer that. And this is something that I've noticed just recently is that the police consider themselves to be a family. The police have done the police as a family in World War One was to do with including the wives and the children. Now that wives and, you know, are frequently working outside the home and have their own careers. The idea of police as a family is very prevalent. And I don't know whether you remember a short while ago when a policeman was killed and press it a dip talked about the police being so upset because he was one of our family. And what this means is that the idea of the family and the police has changed. It means that now that the police are. The police find it very comforting and very reassuring to have other people in the police force as their family. All of them are considered family members and work closely together and, you know, in harmony. On the other hand, you can see that some families are a mechanism for social control. And the police have always been have stated that they have autonomy. And therefore, if one member of the police force is seen to step out of line, if they're members of the family that's quickly picked up. And they can be dealt with accordingly without the intervention of other groups. So, in a way, the monitoring of people, you know, with with COVID has to be seen to be the police have always relied on public support. So I now feel a bit sorry for the policeman in Manchester because I wonder how they will cope with the current situation in Manchester, where clearly they may well be asked to supervise the population and some of them will come from the local population. And so will they lose public support. Well, that's a difficult thing to know they simply can't function without public support. So I think those are the two points I'd make. Thank you. Was this, where was civil unrest seen in during the First World War over food shortages. What, where did it. Well was a civil unrest and what form did it take. What was a very interesting example in Glasgow in George Square. The women from the housing associations gathered in George Square because they wanted to have a deputation to the council to say how difficult it was for them. How are they going to feed their families without potatoes. And the corporation voted down their deputation. And they were furious because what they heard the, I mean you can see this in the Glasgow Herald. The promise said that they'd be better off going home and looking after their children rather than protesting in George Square. Of course they were actually furious. And this created a struggle actually in the council chambers itself where four members of the council, the council were ejected from the meeting. And they went outside and talked to the women in George Square about how they tried to get their deputation heard the following week. But in fact nothing came of this and the women continue to demonstrate. They had a meeting on Glasgow Green. They had a protest march from, I think a short distance from in Glasgow to George Square. And this was seen to be a real issue for them. And their husbands sympathised dramatically with them because they weren't getting potatoes either or being fed appropriately. So this was seen on our doorstep. But also there were strikes of miners when they felt that they were not receiving appropriate pay in Norfolk, for example, which is a grain growing area. And the farm workers, farm labourers went on strike because the price of food rose and their pay didn't increase. You see the shipbuilding, shipbuilders going on strike because of food prices, and also because they had to work such huge increased hours over time to actually combat the food price rises. So it was a very difficult time for the government to cope with all this. Was there evidence as that the population was actually healthier during the war restrictions because of eating, you know, less meat less rich food. That's an interesting question. I really am not entirely sure. One thing that the food food food food production department said was that they were horrified at the lack of skill of the women of being able to cook vegetables. Canteens, national kitchens were set up and the government subsidised local authorities to set up one of these in their local authority and numerous ones were set up. This was 1917. And they experimented with recipes and they were also only set up on condition that they didn't look like soup kitchens. So in other words, they weren't only for working classes, they would encourage the middle class people, those that work for councils and what have you, to actually go and use their facilities during the day. And they were hugely successful. Okay, you told us about one recipe that you tried. I mean, were there any others? Were there any other stuff you tried any others any that you'd particularly recommend. I've still got three quarters of a migral wasle in the fridge. So I've been trying to try another one. That should probably be later in the week. I was about to say if I were you, I'd leave it there. Actually, it looked very nice on your flowery plate, I must say. A very serious question here, saying that not much has changed in terms of the conditions and service of police and policemen slot today. Do you think that privatizing the police force would improve the policemen slot. Since prisons and armed force units and lots of other things and our privatized do you think a privatized police force would be better for policemen and women. I've never really considered that. There is a review of policing going on at the moment, to which I've made a very small contribution. And they are looking at every aspect of police work. What they're particularly doing because like many occupational groups they've moved into higher education so degree courses and higher degrees for police are not unusual these days. They've tended to go for such things as being able to measure this that and the other being able to measure their effectiveness. But I've not heard anything about privatization. Maybe I just haven't been a member of the groups where it's been suggested. Okay, I'm not aware of it. But yes, I should say yes. I mean as I understand it police pay is still a serious concern. You know that they are not particularly the lower grades are not particularly well paid, and also their level of skill of course has had to dramatically increase. Yes, yes. I have a question about what. When did the role of the incorporated wife begin to diminish. Is it still there a little bit or has it disappeared altogether. As I understand it, it's disappeared altogether. I think it was something of its time. I mean, a lot of middle class wives at that time didn't work outside the home and they were there purely for their husbands the home and the family. So, and many middle class jobs were able to support that without too much difficulty I think. When did it diminish. I suppose in the Second World War was that still when women were working. Many at home. I think that's probably likely. I mean I remember my father, who was born in 1912. It was very reluctant to have my mother go out and it was probably a sign of the times. Yes, yes. Did the stuff I was. Another question that's been someone suggested to me is to us whether the suffragettes movement was interested in in the role of police wives in this problem dilemma for the police wife. Yes. Well across the suffragettes abandoned their strategies of protest during the war. And they became much more concerned with feeding the families. So, many of them set up a couple of restaurants in East London, for example. And also had legal advice for the wives on how to claim and get the proper amount of war separation allowance. Because many of them didn't know how to phrase a letter and didn't really know whether they were getting the correct amounts because they changed from time to time. So all these sorts of services, the suffragettes tended to set up rather than actually protest at the time for their rights. But would have been supporting them in their dilemma. Absolutely. Yes, absolutely. I'm really. I wanted to ask, I'm really in this is coming from me. I'm really interested in your in that in the because in the police review as a source of information. Who, who wrote the articles. Who was the editor and who wrote the articles. The editor was this guy called John Campster. He was a philanthropist, and he believed in no alcohol. And he set up this journal at a time when the police really needed the sort of support that they were given through the journal. He was the editor. Now quite where his text came from, I'm really not sure, because what you see is detailed letters sent in and detailed columns from different forces about different aspects of police work during the war. And he must have had people in almost every police force who was sending him copy. Because I can't believe that he would have got it from another source. But the journal was sufficiently influential that if you look at the issues to do with the police in queue in the archives in queue. You see sections of the police review cut out and stuck into the, into the pages showing that you know this is a real issue that government needs to take notice of. But, I mean the wives wrote, and I think he probably didn't add it too much of what they wrote. There was a letters page, and the letters page was very vociferous about various issues and the more vociferous as the war went on, particularly about who was sent to war and who was who remained at home. Because it was seen that there was unfair allocation. It was seen that probably those who were thought not to be behaving appropriately and one way or another was sent to war while the restaurant ended at home. And, you know, this were very vociferous letters about all this. And they often occupied a complete page. Then there was the education page which was in almost every week. And excerpts from the House of Commons, you know about questions about issues that were asked. So it was quite a comprehensive journal. It's, it's feels besides being amazing, somewhat subversive. Was there ever any attempt to shut it down. I mean I know it did, it did support the status quo in some respects but a lot of what you said is quite subversive. Yes, it is. Yes, absolutely. And it does make you wonder whether there was. I mean, there is no evidence of that that I could find. It lasted until 2011. So it lasted since the mid 1800s to 2011. And I don't think even then it was because there was a lack of copy being sold, I think it was probably because other other journals came up which were more, more popular. And you're probably into internet issues. The last things on the list of questions are almost comments. Once one says, this is very interesting. It appears that it's shown the history of food shortages, but using the police historic records that which I agree it's a really amazing that the information is there and the way that you've extracted it is incredible. And there's also a suggestion, sort of to do with the privatization of the police force of commoditization, commoditization of labor, the Uber model, get a policeman when you need one for example. So, so perhaps. Perhaps. Yes. Oh, just one more question and I think we should stop where the contributions anonymous, or where they were that where they were attributed where the consequences for the writers. Right. Now isn't that interesting. Often they were anonymous, but in some cases they did actually say, this is from the Barry police force, for example. So the issue that was raised, probably, if you really wanted to you could identify the person that was raising it. If it was a small police force, if it was a larger one, and I mean Glasgow had nearly 2000 policemen in the force at the time. You probably couldn't identify unless it was very specific who it was that had written that. Okay, but there's no chatter about people getting into trouble because of having written stuff that in in the journal itself. Not that I came across. No. Okay. I think we've probably kept talking for long enough. So, that's been a really interesting discussion and it could go on much longer but I think we'll stop now. And now just before we shut down the cameras and the zoom. I would like to thank you very so much for such an interesting and thought provoking lecture. As, as the coverage was amazing and you can tell by the quest, the range of questions that people were really interested in what you were saying so thank you very much indeed. We can't clap. I'm mentally clapping for everybody. Thank you very much. Thank you. It's been a pleasure.