"It says that there are a certain number of guns actually with the units (a blank follows in the official report). Secondly, the thing included the number of guns in store. That gives away (another blank) a very good indication of how the command der intends to man his defences, whether he intends to put them in the north of London or the west of London or the South of London."
Mr. Lees-Smith said later: I am astonished that the Secretary of State told him in advance the central question we were going to gsk him.
Lord Gort: May I say that I would not come here and tell an untruth? Whether or not it is the central question, I would not have varied one iota the evidence.
Later, replying to Mr. Walkden, Lord Gort said that he was not exceptionally concerned just now about espionage. It went on all the time, Capt. H. T. Hogan, adjutant of Mr. Sandys' regiment, told his story to the committee.
"The training of an anti-aircraft brigade, R.A. (T.A.), is exceedingly difficult," he said, "owing to the large numbers of men who should be trained on the small numbers of instruments available. There is no secret about this.
"I have known Mr. Sandys to be particularly interested in this subject since our last practice camp in July 1937, when he first spoke to me on this matte.. The brigade 15 responsible for training more than 660 men with the same amount of fire control equipment as we held in December 1936, when the strength was 330 odd, except that one good menostatic height-finder was issued in November 1937, one dummy loader with twelve drill cartridges in April 1938, and...
"These facts are common knowledge in the unit, which has short of equipment during all the time I have been with it, and I believe for years before that.
"I had imagined that, in the event of an emergency, the situation would be improved by the issue of more equipment.
"When I saw the (blank scheme I was very worried, and wondered whether anything could be done to improve matters by bringing the figures to the personal notice of the Secretary of State for War. I considered that, at any rate, it could do no harm and might do a lot of good. This idea was present in my mind because one of the second lieutenants of this unit, Mr. Sandys, was also a member of Parliament, and in that capacity could get a hearing unobtainable in any other way.
"About the beginning or middle of May (I am very hazy as to the exact time when this took place) Mr. Sandys commented on (blank). He asked me to give him precise figures, for the purpose of showing them to the Secretary of State for War. to see whether anything could be done to improve matters. Feeling very strongly on this subject, I gave him these figures, of the number of guns in particular"
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.