In a notification issued by the Executive Committee, of which the official chairman was the President of the Board of Trade and the acting chairman was Mr. (now Sir Herbert A.) Walker, general manager of the London and South Western Railway, it was further stated:-- The control of the railways has been taken over by the Government for the purpose of ensuring that the railways, locomotives, rolling stock and staff shall be used as one complete unit in the best interests of the State for the movement of troops, stores and food supplies.... The staff on each railway will remain under the same control as heretofore, and will receive their instructions through the same channels as in the past. As eventually constituted, the Committee consisted of the following general managers:--Mr. D. A. Matheson, Caledonian Railway; Sir Sam Fay, Great Central Railway; Mr. C. H. Dent, Great Northern Railway; Mr. F. Potter, Great Western Railway; Mr. Guy Calthrop, London and North Western Railway; Mr. J. A. F. Aspinall, Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway; Sir Herbert A. Walker, London and South Western Railway; Sir William Forbes, London, Brighton and South Coast Railway; Sir Guy Granet, Midland Railway; Sir A. K. Butterworth, North Eastern Railway, and Mr. F. H. Dent, South Eastern and Chatham Railway, with Mr. Gilbert S. Szlumper as secretary. 1860 AND 1914 Such, then, was the final outcome of a movement which, started in 1860, by individual effort, as the result of an expected invasion of England by France, was, in 1914, and after undergoing gradual though continuous development, to play an important part on behalf of the nation in helping France herself, now England's cherished Ally, to resist the invader of her own fair territory. With what smoothness the transport of our troops was conducted cannot yet be told in detail; but the facts here narrated will show that the success attained was mainly due to three all-important factors,--(1) the efficiency of the railway organisation; (2) the willingness of the Government, on assuming control of the railways under the Act of 1871, to leave their management in the hands of railway men; and (3) the ready adoption, alike by the railway interests and by State departments, of the fundamental principle enforced by a succession of wars from the American Civil War of 1861-65 downwards,--that in the conduct of military rail transport there should be, in each of its various stages, intermediaries between the military and the railway technical elements, co-ordinating their mutual requirements, constituting the recognised and only channel for orders and instructions, and ensuring, as far as prudence, foresight and human skill can devise, the perfect working of so delicate and complicated an instrument as the railway machine. RAILWAY TROOPS