Recruitment of women London 1915

[robbie]

The attached leaflet says it all!

Only the "leisured classes" need apply.

An interesting example of the class system in operation at this time..

Robbie

[marina]

I suppose they would have to ask for moneyed volunteers because working class women could not undertake the work without pay.

Did you see any information on how many ladies took them up on this offer, Robbie?

Marina

[robbie]

No I didn't Marina. But perhaps someone else knows more.

Robbie

[BeppoSapone]

Reminds me of the "I'm Backing Britain" Campaign of the 1960s.

These volunteers must have been very popular with the factory owners - working for nothing. But how popular with the "ordinary" workers? - doing them out of their overtime.

I wonder if Vickers passed on the savings to the tax payer, in the form of reduced prices charged for munitions?

Somehow I doubt it.

[robbie]

I wonder if Vickers passed on the savings to the tax payer, in the form of reduced prices charged for munitions?

Somehow I doubt it.

Beppo,

I doubt it very much.

I wonder if any of these big business people ever donated some of the cash they made to those people and services who facilitated these profits.

Robbie

[Myrtle]

There are some interesting photographs on the Science and Society Picture Library site, showing women working in munitions during WW1.

www.scienceandsociety.co.uk

Myrtle

[robbie]

Many thanks, Myrtle.

Robbie

PS. If you haven't check out this website do so; well worth it.

Thanks again. Myrtle.

[marina]

So it is!

Marina

[Ed Matthews]

I wonder if any of these big business people ever donated some of the cash they made to those people and services who facilitated these profits.

Actually, the Munitions of War Act of July 1915 sought to restrict the profits made by companies engaged in armaments production by placing them under government "control". Similarly, the Finance Act (No.2), November 1915, introduced an "excess profits" tax (nominally 50%) on all profits in excess of those for the same taxation period prior to the outbreak of the war.

I believe the makers of the Lewis machine gun made a claim against the Exchequer for the recovery of a proportion of monies paid in this respect after the war in 1920/21.

These volunteers must have been very popular with the factory owners - working for nothing. But how popular with the "ordinary" workers? - doing them out of their overtime.

Many employers were reluctant to take up this apparently "free labour"; of the 80,000 women who had signed up to the Register of Women for War Service during the second quarter of 1915, only 1,800 were actually called into employment by companies involved in war work. Dilution, as it was termed, had already led to a considerable amount of industrial unrest, most notably on the Clyde in February 1915.

Ed

[robbie]

Thanks for this, Ed.

Robbie