Prepared for war?

Though those in power were perfectly aware that Germany had been building it's military capabilities for some time, to my mind, Great Britain and it's Empire seemed remarkably unprepared for War in 1914. 
The exception to this lax attitude was the Navy - it had been built up in response to the huge fleet that the Germans had constructed. Indeed there had been a very public competition going on between Britain and Germany for several years before the War. The Kaiser wanted to have an Empire to rival Britain's, and presumably, that would necessitate ruling the waves too, which up till the end of the 19th century had been Britain's boast.

It's when you look at the Army and the fledgling Royal Flying Corps (then a part of the Army) that you realize that somewhere along the way, someone was not thinking ahead. It seems hard to believe now that Britain's vast Empire was kept in it's place by a relatively small Army. It managed to do this by setting up small Garrisons in its Colonies (manned largely by local recruits), which really acted as a local police force. 

When you consider the million plus conscript armies of both France and Germany, the ninety odd thousand of the British Army seems a bit inadequate, by comparison. The Kaiser even had the effrontery to call it 'A contemptible little Army' (hence the phrase The Old Contemptibles, a phrase adopted by the rump of the Regular Army, which survived the slaughter of those first few months of war). The politicians and army chiefs, of course, were perfectly aware of these numeric imbalances - presumably they believed that the quality of the British soldier was sufficient to address this deficit. They must have done so, because we had not only guaranteed Belgian neutrality in the early nineteenth century, but also given guarantees to the French about defending their ports, just prior to the declaration of War.

Royal Field Artillery Cap Badge

Not everyone had been quite so confident, of course. After the Boer Wars, some had pressed for a reserve home Army to be formed. This became the Territorial Army, which had been set up in 1908. Trained and equipped as the Regular Army, this part-time force was to become vital to Britain's war effort once the War started. Though Territorials were raised to be there to protect the country at home, on the outbreak of War, the Territorial Divisions all volunteered to serve abroad.

The 55th West Lancashire Division was a Territorial Division, of which the 277th Brigade RFA (Henry's Brigade) was a part. They had been on annual manoeuvres at the outbreak of war, and it's various parts started to prepare for active duty almost immediately.
To be continued