German prisoners of war labour was under the Labour Directorate, and in the organisation of it some very good work was done. Prisoners were very plentiful from 1916 onwards, and the Labour Directorate, when a new push was mooted, made its plans to have skeleton prisoners-of-war companies ready to be filled by the new prisoners as they arrived. I think the record was in one case when three days after some Germans arrived at our "cages," they were at work on the roads at the rear of the Army. It was the law that prisoners of war should not be employed anywhere near the firing line, and on the British side this law was very strictly observed.
My impression of the Germans as road labourers was not very favourable. They seemed to loaf as much as they could. But some of the German prisoners of the artisan class did excellent work in our various shops and factories at Base. In tailoring shops, motor repair shops, etc., there were many German prisoners who seemed to take a delight in intelligent industry. German prisoners were very well treated and got on very well with their guards.
Now to the various classes of coloured labour. The Chinese I have already dealt with. They were quite the most satisfactory on the whole. The Indian labour was willing enough but did not stand the climate so well. Kaffir labour proved on the whole unsatisfactory, and so did Egyptian labour. A West Indian contingent did fairly good work. A model lot were the Fijians, all volunteers (and all Christians, by the way), and wonderfully good stevedores. Unfortunately there were very few of them and they did not stand the climate well. One of the Fijian Labour Corps left his studies at Oxford University to join up.
The Labour organisation had two main objects:
(a) To release the fighting soldier for his legitimate work.
(b) To assist the Services and Departments to carry out their tasks.
Nine hours was the normal working day, exclusive of the time occupied for meals and for going to and from the place of work. If the distance from the place of parade to the work was more than 1½ miles, the time taken to march the excess distance was deducted from the hours of work. For labour of low medical category the normal working day was eight hours.
Excellent work was done by the Labour Corps. Its morale was carefully studied and it was part of the instructions to officers that:
All ranks should have briefly explained to them the object of the work, for what, and by whom, it will be used, what purpose it will serve, and, especially, that all the work is being done for the prosecution of the war and is not merely a "fatigue." A few minutes spent in rousing the men's interest in their work is usually time well spent. A healthy spirit of emulation should be created by pointing out the quantity of work of any kind which should be done per day, and the amount done by other and better Companies. Above all the men must be made to understand that whether they are working on time, or on task work, no slacking can be allowed. The men in the fighting line depend on the men of the Labour Corps to keep them supplied with all they require.
Our Allies are just as anxious for victory as we are. The French and the Belgians have suffered more than we have, but, in spite of it, never complain. Hence they should receive every consideration at our hands. As we are in their countries we should respect their customs and wishes as much as we can. In all our relations with any of our Allies, it is obviously desirable for us to be polite and courteous in our dealings with them. It must be borne in mind that every misunderstanding or unpleasantness tends to weaken our alliance and to help the enemy.
The Labour Directorate, with many different races to manage, their religions and food habits to study, had one of the difficult tasks of the war; and carried it out on the whole very well. The chiefs of the directorate in my time at G.H.Q. were Colonel (now General) E. G. Wace, Lieut.-Col. S. G. L. Bradley, and Lieut.-Col. H. A. H. Newington, with Colonel Fairfax as Adviser, Chinese Labour, and Colonel Pritchard as Adviser, South African Labour. The staff was about equally divided between big business men and typical Oxford men. It was always a pleasure at dinner to sit at the same table with the "Labour" people. They hunted, or rather dined, in couples as a rule, a leading light of the commercial world pairing off with one of the "Oxford group." So one could always reckon on good talk and argument from opposite points of view.
At the summit of its strength the Labour Corps mustered 387,000, a great Army in itself, and it had representatives of almost every European nationality, Chinese, West Indians, Pacific Islanders, Kaffirs, Zulus, Burmese, Egyptians, Maltese and almost every Indian race including Nagas, Pathans, Chins, Manipuris, Bengalis and Santals. And the Labour Corps' patriotism cost it dear at times; for sometimes it had over a thousand casualties in a month.