Before Dad’s Army

From ‘Our Home Guards’, The Spectator, 10 April 1915: There is nothing of the national picnic; or of playing at soldiers about the Home Guards. Those who enter the corps mean business, and not a good time in the open air under a series of military aliases. Some of the special features of the movement are most interesting. Mr Harris in his letter mentions the example of Bradford. In this city the Volunteer movement has created something like a social and moral revolution. It has given the city a corporate military feeling akin to that which existed in the great Flemish towns in the 14th century.