At that time the United States were neutral, but were making ammunition for the Allies and others. By methods, which it is not necessary here to refer to, or explain, the General Manager of the Scotia Company was able to obtain a German Mauser Service Rifle, and by an expenditure out of all proportion to the real value, 1,000 rounds of German Mauser Spitzer service ammunition was also secured. An improvised range was set up on the ice on the East River, Nova Scotia, at a point where, protected by steep banks, firing tests could be carried out, when it was demonstrated that .311 Spitzer German ammunition, which, carefully chronographed, gave a muzzle velocity of 2,915 feet per second, easily penetrated the armor plate which resisted Mark Seven British Ammunition fired from either the Lee-Enfield or Ross Rifle.
The effect, of course, was to call a halt to the manufacture of these plates, and at the same time to push forward experiments then under way in the production by the Scotia Company of bullet-resisting alloy armor plates. Within a short time New Glasgow was able to offer the Department of Militia alloy steel, heat-treated plates, not exceeding 3–16th of an inch thick, which successfully withstood point-blank impact at one yard from Mark 7 ammunition fired from the latest model Ross rifle. In one case two shots had struck the plate within less than one-half inch of each other, and they neither penetrated nor cracked the plate.
Plates somewhat thicker were later supplied which withstood German Mauser ammunition at point blank range, and the result given by these plates when tested at the Proving Station in Toronto were so satisfactory that the Artillery Proving Officers, after the tests, placed them on exhibition outside the Camp, and later reported that the men felt the utmost confidence with the protection afforded them by this plating, which later was supplied and fitted to a proportion of the machine-gun trucks then being equipped. Later the British Government asked the Scotia Company to tender for similar protective plating for armored trucks.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
DEMOBILIZATION.
Demobilization, following a war of such length and intensity as that of the Four Years’ War from August, 1914, to November, 1918, is not a mere problem of repatriation, it is a problem of reconstruction—a gigantic one at that—desiderating the undivided efforts of every organization in the nation and the assistance of every citizen.
Consider for a moment what had happened in the industrial world. During the four years of war, Governments were the chief employers of men, the chief purchasers of raw materials, and the chief sources of revenue for an overwhelmingly large portion of the population. To retain the ideals of democracy Governments were given unlimited power—power which was utilized in organizing practically the entire life of the belligerent nations into a vast machine for turning out implements of war. Not only was this war-time industry mobilized under unified control, but the market for which its product was turned out could not be flooded. Indeed, it continually called for greater and greater production regardless of cost. The expansion of business, and the building up of a huge army of war workers, the scarcity of labor and raw materials, the shifting of markets, the meteoric rise of prices, the less rapid rise of wages, Government control of prices, raw materials and exports, the inflation of currency, the huge increase in national debts—these were some of the phenomena which characterized the period. They justify the assertion that a revolution in the economic and industrial life of the nations had occurred. Even in Canada, remote from the scene of actual strife, a generation’s changes were compressed into four short years.
Then suddenly, on November the eleventh, the object for which the vast war machine had been built up was attained. The necessity for its existence vanished over-night, and the world found itself face to face with the task of scrapping the industrial machine which had so effectively served the requirements of war, and of rebuilding one which would serve just as effectively the entirely different requirements of peace. The new task was more difficult than the old, and had to be accomplished in a much shorter period—a few months, instead of four years. Again, the problems themselves were more delicate and intricate; largely problems of human psychology, not of mechanics, requiring for their solution not compulsion, but education, persuasion and co-operation. The world has learned that it is much easier to make war than to make peace.
The early days of 1914 and 1915 were days of mobilization problems, and they were problems indeed. The provision of arms, equipment and food had to be undertaken on a scale unheard of before. It was necessary to provide transportation for vast bodies of troops and great quantities of stores, to say nothing of the construction of training camps, rifle ranges, and all the paraphernalia of war. The human element, fresh and easily responsive to patriotic appeal, presented few difficulties at that time.
There are, however, certain conditions inherent in military life which go far towards unfitting the soldier for civilian occupation. Without entering into a discussion of the reasons for these conditions, two of them at least may be enumerated. In military life individual liberty is impossible, but it is of supreme importance in civil life. Further, in military life ambition or self-interest, which may be considered a fundamental motive in human action, becomes of secondary importance. Self-interest is, in fact, disciplined into complete abeyance. The moment the soldier becomes a civilian the restraints upon his individual liberty are more or less removed, and it is entirely in keeping with the impulses of human nature if he should, for a time, go to the opposite extreme. Then again, he finds it no easy task to awaken the ambition lying dormant within him, and it frequently happens that it is only from bitter experience that he learns it is necessary to rely, in the first instance, upon himself. These two conditions alone emphasize how different are the various problems of demobilization and mobilization. The success or failure of the work of reconstruction depends, not so much on the highly-developed organization as on the amount of personal service, whole-hearted sympathy and understanding brought to the work by those who, together with the soldier, must face the many obstacles confronting him in the first stages of his return to citizenship.
Without the active co-operation of the soldiers themselves the work of reconstruction could not be a success. Undoubtedly our present stability, in comparison with many other parts of Canada is, in a large measure, due to the initiative and strength of purpose with which our soldiers have met, and are meeting, the tasks of a humdrum every-day life. It would, no doubt, be surprising to the average citizen were he to know how many men in Nova Scotia have re-established themselves without assistance from the Government.