Stories from the Beds & Herts Saturday Telegraph: April 22nd, 1916.

The War Office regulations for the recognition of the Volunteers as part of the military forces of the Crown were issued on Thursday. In the official communication it is pointed out that in the opinion of the Army Council the controlling body in each county should be the County Territorial Force Association.

No alien may be enrolled. The age limit for enrolment is from 17 years upwards. No medical examination will be held. Liability for service in the Regular or Territorial Forces is in no way affected by enrolment in the Volunteer Force.

As to actual military service, the Volunteer Force will be mobilised only if and when it become necessary for the purpose of repelling an enemy in the event of an invasion being imminent. At other times voluntary offers of service may be accepted for military purposes by general officers.

Volunteer battalions will be named after the Lieutenancy in which they are raised. Thus in Bedfordshire the title will be 1st and 2nd Battalion Bedfordshire Volunteer Regiment.

• The Vicar and warden of St Mary's Church propose to apply for a faculty for the insertion of a memorial tablet [illustrated above] in the parish church in memory of the late Capt Brian Cumberland. The cost of the tablet will be borne by his father, Mr Hugh Cumberland JP, and it will be erected in the north aisle between the two windows just before entering the north transept. The tablet, which Messrs Gibbs and Dandy are supplying, is of white marble on a black marble base.

• Mr Stanley Bennett, organist and choirmaster at Christ Church, has donned khaki and started his training at the Biscot Camp.

• This week the Luton News loses its chief reporter. Mr Pope has been on the staff for some years and has rendered excellent service. We hope he will get into a branch of the military service which will be to his liking, and we are sure that he will be found always ready at the call of duty. His successor as chief reporter is Mr C. P. Stevens, a man of wide experience who comes from Tonbridge.

• A "very horrible" case was heard at Luton Borough Sessions on Wednesday when a young mother from Luton was sentenced to two months hard labour for child neglect and causing unnecessary suffering to babies aged two months and one year. The first child was fathered by a man later sent to prison for highway robbery, the second child by a man whom she married but he then left her. She was then living with a married man separated from his own wife, who was jailed for a month for his part in the neglect. In the case brought by the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, it was said the babies had been left for hours at a time, sometimes for a whole day, with only a bottle of milk. Neither was old enough to feed itself, they were dirty and the little clothing they had was in a dreadful state.

• Yesterday morning Mr J. Denton, of the First and Last, Stopsley, was bringing a horse and cart loaded with coal, and owned by Mr A. Godfrey of Stopsley, up Hitchin Road when, opposite York Street, a shaft broke. The horse bolted up York Street and collided with two hawkers' barrows standing in the street. The barrows were damaged and the horse badly cut but the driver was allowed to take the animal home.

• Mayor of Luton, Alderman J. H. Staddon, asked if going to picture palaces was an influence on six boys who appeared before the Borough Sessions on Wednesday accused of shoplifting and theft from shops in Castle Street and Stuart Street. The boys did not respond to his question and no other mention was made in the case to cinemas.

• The Mayoress of Luton, Mrs Staddon, had been planning to spend Easter in Brighton with her second son, Lieut Charles Staddon, who was home on sick leave. However, Lieut Staddon had now been ordered to return to his regiment.

• Nineteen players to choose from but none of them full-backs was the position Luton Town found themselves in for their London Combination Good Friday visit to Watford yesterday. With some of the team playing in unfamiliar positions, the match went in Luton's favour in the first half with Cpl J. A. Ellis giving them the lead, only for it to be cancelled by a shot rebounding into the goal off the face of a Watford forward. A mistimed clearance by full-back Rogers allowed Watford to score a winning goal ten minutes from time. The old rivals were to meet again at Luton on Easter Monday.