Forces Entertainment in Britain

The mobilization of hundreds of thousands of young men and their subsequent collection into training camps posed a considerable difficulty for the military authorities. This was by far the largest potential fighting force the country had ever assembled. The immediate concerns were necessarily to do with billeting, feeding, kitting-out and training. The military mind did not foresee the additional problem of what to do with the assembled multitudes in their time-off. Military training was strenuous and could, in its repetitiveness, be tedious. Fit young men tired from the routine of military drill, exertion of route marches, cleaning weapons and performing the essential fatigues of communal military life, to say nothing of the trauma of separation from home — most for the first time — and the total absence of female company, required an outlet for their surplus energy and emotions. The local pub, assuming there was one near the encampment, provided the focal point for off-duty relaxation, but this form of recreation not unnaturally resulted in disciplinary problems concerning drunkenness and public disorder. Clearly another method of distraction was required, and here theatrical entertainment was partly to fulfill a need, although the military authorities did not formally address the problem until 1917.