• Advert for a new innovation in wartime catering in Luton.

Digest of stories from the Beds & Herts Saturday Telegraph: February 9th, 1918.

In the wake of the munition workers' strike for fairer meat supplies, the Saturday Telegraph posed the question: "If butchers downed tools, what would Luton do?" Such a wild contingency, said the newspaper, had never invaded readers' imagination, had it? Nor ours, for that matter, but we were brought into collision with it this morning with such a jerk that we almost saw stars.

Butchers on strike! Why should they strike anything except bargains, bones and blocks? But that does not mean the knights of the cleaver are lost to all sense of their importance.

The gentleman who administered this salutary castigation upon our altogether unsuspicious imagination smiled grimly while we got over the first effects of the shock. We could only sit and try to blink away the vision of a procession of butchers to the Town Hall, with a sort of Fat Boy of the Dickens creation acting as drum-major and bearing a marrow-bone as the sceptre of their renewed strength. And it is not a fallacious strength. They have shown most of us this week that they can, if they choose, make things decidedly uncomfortable.

Like most people with a grievance in these days we sought the Food Office to unload it on the Executive Officer and his staff. There we found all sort of conditions of men and women asking for certificates and permits for meat supplies to invalids and nursing mothers.

The Town Clerk was enigmatical. We knew that the butchers had sought his advice and that of the Chairman of the Food Committee at a meeting on Wednesday night, and so we timidly enquired: "Could you tell us what arrangements were made at the meeting of the butchers?" - "Private meeting," was the terse reply.

"Are the butchers coming out on strike?" It was a bow drawn at a venture, but the answer came: "I do not know that it would surprise me, for I am almost impervious to surprises in these days, but I think the butchers are too sensible. They wear their worry very well."

"Is it true that the butchers may deliver?" - "Not so far as I know. We made an honourable agreement with the butchers, and we are going to stand by it."

This week there was more meat in the market than last, but there appears to have been more customers. Where there have not been queues there have been mobs, unless the door were barred as well as the shutters, and there has been more bickering and grumbling than ever before. No wonder the popular street vocalists have ceased to sing "Pack Up Your Troubles in You Old Kit-bag" for a pantechnicon would be overcrowded.

The cure for all these troubles does not exist at the Food Office in Luton, but at the Food Ministry, and not until we get an extension of the rationing scheme as authorised for London and the Home Counties shall we get the practical accomplishment of that desirable dictum laid down by the Labour deputation to the Food Committee the other week - "We want everybody to share alike". So be it.

• This morning, while working at Mr Garrett's carpenter's shop in Cowper Street, William Brandham, aged 17, met with a severe mishap. He was sawing wood on a circular saw when the wood slipped. the saw cut his left hand badly. He went to Dr Bone, who dressed the wounds, and afterwards to the Bute Hospital.

• The Rev P. Thompson, pastor of Bury Park Congregational Church, will goto FRance at the end of this month to undertake four months service with the Y.M.C.A. In the meantime, the members of the local Free Church ministers have come to the rescue and will take turns during the absence of the pastor in filling the pulpit.

• The death had occurred at the advanced age of 92 of Mr James Wheeler, who was a prominent figure in Luton some 20 to 30 years since. In his younger days he was engaged with Mr Jordan, a manufacturer who then occupied premises at the corner of George Street and Cheapside, at the corner opposite to that of Messrs Blundell Bros. He later for many years bought straws for Messrs Spencer, Turner & Boldero Ltd. The late Mr Wheeler retired about 25 years ago, and for the last 20 years has been residing at Worthing [Sussex], where his death took place.

• Although not awarded a medal, Gunner Charles D. S. Hawkes (Royal Field Artillery), of 116 Maple Road, Luton, had received from the Major-General commanding the division to which he is attached, a gilt-edged card indicating the good report received of his conduct and devotion to duty, and congratulating him on his fine behaviour. Writing home, he said: "When my sergeant got wounded I took charge of my gun, working it for two days in a big attack. The officer in charge of my battery told me he would report all my good work...I did not get a medal, but the card will do for me all right." Gunner Hawkes asked his mother to have the card framed - "it will be something to look at in years to come."

• We are pleased to learn that another Lutonian who has been a prisoner in Germany for upwards of three years has been transferred to a neutral country. Cpl W. J. Smart, of the Rifle Brigade, has been a prisoner of war in Germany since 1914. He has experienced the hardships of several camps, and a couple of years ago he managed to get through a most pathetic plea for bread. He is for the time being billeted at Hotel de Galeries, Scheveningen, Holland, and he hopes very shortly to come home. The son of Mrs Smart, of 12 Wenlock Street, Luton, he wrote: "It hardly seems real for me to be on the beach for a Sunday morning stroll. Tonight I am going to the Scala Theatre to see 'Miss Hook of Holland'.

• It will be remembered that Rifleman G. T. Hepworth (Rifle Brigade), whose wife lives at 100 Langley Street, Luton, was in the same unit as Cpl Smart and was captured at the same time. Possibly he may also be transferred in due course. He wrote home: "This was my fourth Christmas in Germany. I hope it will be the last, and we are not downhearted yet. We shall be happy ever more after this lot."

• At the Spittlegate Petty Sessions, lady Zia Wernher was fined £1 for driving a motor car without being licensed, and £5 for a breach of the Petrol Order. Lady Zia had driven it to a shooting party - which was a case of pleasure and not business.

• There was a very unfamiliar look about the Luton Town team which turned out this afternoon for the postponed game with Davis Athletic. Illness and non-appearances meant several substitutes for Luton, including a soldier on leave, being picked up on the ground. The game started 25 minutes late as a result and was more in the nature of a farce than football, with the visitors the first to score four goals against the Town this season, thanks to questionable penalty decisions. The final score was 5-4 to Luton Town.