It was a huge undertaking, and needed much care and labour to start it well, and naturally we were all keen to help. It was a great day when we took over the place. Our seconds-in-command took command manfully for a fortnight of all our old courts, and fourteen of us met on Monday, October 5th, to take over the estate and collect from five hundred to six hundred tenants wholly unknown to us. We organized it all thoughtfully; we had fifteen collecting books and all the tenants’ books prepared, opened a bank account, found a room as an office, and divided the area among the workers. Our first duty was to get the tenants to recognize our authority and pay us. I think we were very successful; we got every tenant on the estate to pay us without any legal process, except one who was a regular scamp. We collected some £250, most of it in silver, and got it safely to the bank. Then came the question of repairs; there were written in the first few weeks one thousand orders for these, although, as the whole area is to be rebuilt, we were only doing actually urgent and no substantial ones. All these had to be overlooked and reported on and paid for. Next came pouring in the claims for borough and water rates. We had to ascertain the assessments of every house, the facts as to whether landlord or tenant was responsible, whether the rates were compounded for or not, what allowance was to be claimed for empty houses or rooms. There were two Water Companies supplying the area, and we had to learn which supplied each house. The whole place was to be rebuilt, and even the streets rearranged and widened, and I had promised the Commissioners I would advise them as to the future plans. These had to be prepared at the earliest date possible, the more so as the sanitary authorities were pressing, and sent in one hundred orders in the first few days we were there. It is needless to say with what speed, capacity and zeal the representatives of the Commissioners carried on their part of these preparations, and they rapidly decided on which streets should be first rebuilt. But this only implied more to be done, for we had to empty the streets swiftly, and that meant patching up all possible empty houses in other streets and moving the tenants into them. Fortunately, there were several houses empty, the falling in of the leases having scared some people away. The Commissioners had decided to close all the public-houses on the estate, and we let one to a girls’ club, and had to put repairs in hand to fit it for its changed destination.