During the summer months also the Company lent their tender, the _Skirmisher_, for river cruises; and more than 6,400 wounded men were thus provided with yet another means of recreation. A similar trip was organised in 1918 by the Cunard Company’s Bristol Staff, while the Liverpool Office Concert Party was indefatigable in attending at various hospitals, munition works, and camps in order to provide additional entertainment to their wounded brothers. The Britannia Rooms were also used for dances and receptions for American Officers and American Red Cross Units, and when on Independence Day, July 4th, 1918, the Lord Mayor of Liverpool entertained 4,000 American Troops, the whole of the catering arrangements were carried out by the Cunard line. Now to have initiated, organised, and won success in departments of service so various and vital would not, of course, have been possible without the unanimous and unremitting personal devotion of every Director and member of this great Company; and it cannot be denied that the Government paid them the compliment of using their activities to the very highest degree. The Chairman, Sir Alfred Booth, in addition to the enormous responsibilities resting upon him in virtue of his executive position, acted also as Chairman of the North Atlantic Committee, appointed under the Liner Requisitioning Scheme, while he also served on several Royal Commissions dealing with questions of urgent national importance in relation to reconstruction and other post-war problems; and, at the same time, he had many calls upon him owing to his connexion with the Employers’ Federation, the War Risks, and Liverpool Steam Ship Owners’ Associations. The Deputy Chairman, Sir Thomas Royden, acted as Deputy Shipping Controller, where his wide experience of shipping affairs was invaluable, Sir Thomas being frequently entrusted with foreign missions requiring the greatest tact and ability. Early in the war he went to Mudros in order to organise the transport arrangements in connexion with the Gallipoli campaign, and at a later date he was in Washington discussing the international shipping problems that arose when the United States cast her lot with the Allies. He organised the shipment of American and Colonial troops to the various theatres of war, and was selected to represent the Shipping Controller on the Peace Conference.