The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1899-11-11
CLOTHING AN ARMY.
THE GREAT Glory At PPM
LEO
Where British Uniforms Are Made by
the Thousand.

at Pimlico, which to the casual observ-
err always looks to be scene Of intense
activity, is gradually speeding up. 1t
is ian establishment that does not very
promptly catch anything in the nature
of war fever from the outside. There
Is no fuss or excitement, not the slight
est indication of scare. 1t is from this
vast depot that Tommy Atkins draws
his supply of clothing, and the many
odds and ends that go to make up his
! kit" From a stroll through the be-
Wildering place it would hardly be
supposed that there has been any depe-
tion going on. The vast storage floors
look choke full of goods, the factory
department is all album with activity.
and on the packing floors the thirty
powerful presses are all day long busily
engaged in squeezing bales of goods into
the smallest possible compass for pack
ing into canvas covers 1t requires a
keen lookout to- find in the vast piles Of
goods on these enormous floors any
thing suggestive of South African pre-
| partitions, though they are to be found
her and there. At one point one makes
way for a braWny Scots Guardsman--
one of a score or SO temporarily brought
in from Chelsea Notwithstanding
along a heavy box of boots marked for
Natal. At another is a great pile of
drab colored "puttees," about to be
packed and dispatched to the Cape for
winding around the legs as a sort of
gaiter, and in looking down from one
of the galleries of the great hall that
| o "a ta fcn
part of the establishment there may
perhaps be deserted a patch Of drab
khaki rather large than usual
This hall is a miniature Crystal Pal
ace 1t is an immense building, with
glazed roof, supported on iron columns,
and with two galleries, one above the
other, running all around it. 1t is light
ed by electricity, and on dark after
noon the sudden blazing out of the
lamps over the machines and tables and
their seven hundred or eight HUNDRED
workers, with their scarlet and black
yellow material, and their piles of gilt
tering buttons and badges and gold
braiding, and so on, affords one of the
most striking sights of the kind in the
Kingdom OF late years they have had
to provide a supplementary hall. and
they are just now making still further
extensions. In the two big rooms to-
gether there are somewhere about
thousand workers, and from a gallery
above some seven hundred or eight
hundred may be looked down upon in
one coup doeil, swarming like bees over
the extensive floor. At each table is
sewing machine, driven by steam power,
and worked by machinist, who is sup
ported by six or eight hand workers.
The machine, of course does the long
seams, and the hand workers do the
preliminary Blasting" and afterward
the sewing on of buttons and other
items that machinery cannot touch.
The twinklng of the machines, the
glitter of the metal the glow and kalei-
doscope shifting Of the heaps of color
and the movements of the workers pre-
sent scene hardly to be recognized by
the unfamiliar eye as one Of hard toll
and drudgery. They can turn out some
five thousand tunics week here, and
the enormous floor keeps up pretty
much the same roar OF activity all the
year round, and the only thing that hap
pens if war breaks out or is threatened
is that the day grows longer--they are
working now day and a quarter-or
they may be some little change in the
color of the material creeping over a
certain proportion of the tables. A
in some tropical region may
demand suits made of khaki drill, or
BLACK pads or "cholera Belts as GER
tain items of clothing were called when
. L.. 4
curious reason it became necessary to
alter the name to FLANNEL belts" which
is what they really are. They are mere
ly broad bands Of flannel worn around
the body, as some little safeguard
against maladies tending to develop into
cholera. 1t was found that the mere
serving out or order to wear these "chol-
era belts" set up in good many of the
men condition of nervous funk that
actually resulted in illness.
OF course, when there Ia any probab- |
lity of exceptional demand on the army
factory the immense supplies
they always have in stock are carefully
Overhauled and here and there stores
are strengthened a little according to
what may seem likely to be required
l ne OilItldl at lHe Hedu vi iHp SNOI IS |
department may make requisition on
the factory department, or may deem |
It advisable to hurry up contracts in
The hands of outside contractors. |
Large as this place is-vastly larger |
would be imagined from it's external |
ppearance-only about one-third of the |
clothing of the British Army is made |
Vt Pimlico. So that the hustle Of pre-
for any serious campaign, so
or as clothing is concerned, would not |
be found in the factories
If contractors in various parts of the
tingdonl, and the actual dealing out of |
stores to the men goes on from tie Dis
riot Reserve Stores. The drab, cotton
lrill khaki will be supplemented by gar
nents of nice warm wooden material
-drab colored serge, in fact.
The khaki suits are not made to any !
,reat extent at the Pimico factory and
he needleWOmen are rather glad of it.
t is hard, intractible material, with
ather an unpleasant smell, and they
ay it makes their machine needles
nearly red hot. But of late years this
,hal1i is very largely used by troops on
ervice. 1t is strong and durable and
light, and, especially out on the verdure-
'lains of tropical or sub-tropical coun-
ries, it is not such a good mark for
itiemen as the British scarlet. They