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Show GREAT LOSS OF GLNSISMADELP LONDON, April 26- Winston Spencer Spen-cer Churchill, introducing in the house of commons yesterday ihr estimates esti-mates for the ministry -of munitions, of which he is the head, said that dur ing the five weeks since the battle in France had opened they had been passing through the greatest - .strain regarding the supph of war material mat nau occurred m im- experience of the ministry. Not only had the consumption and , destruction of munitions of all kinds i been proceeding at the greatest rate.) but there also were very heavy losses by capture by the enemy "We lost," the minister said, "near-ly "near-ly a thousand guns by shell fire or capture, between 4,000 and 5,000 ma-C;l ma-C;l - chine guns have been lost or destroyed de-stroyed and the quantity of ammunition, ammuni-tion, apart from that which has been fired and that which bat been lost in the dumps, amounted ' something between one and three weeks' totai of manufacture. "Other war materials have been used or lost in a great variety of classes and on a similar scale, but by the end of last week all the losses-had losses-had been made good and in many cases more than made good. "Vast quantities of small arm ammunition am-munition have been lost or let! behind, be-hind, but great as the demand has been the expenditure in the last month did not exceed the maximum potential capacity of the British factories, fac-tories, WithOUl touching enormous reserves; re-serves; which had accumulated against such a contingency "Our preparations had contemplai ed a period of supreme battle intensity inten-sity from the liiird week of February instead of from the third week of' March, so we are at present from one to three weeks to the good. ' In fact, barring unforeseen circum- j stances, our supply of munitions would enable us to carry on a battle at the' supreme pitch of .ntensity until win j ter without ((unpromising our re-; qulremenl for 1919, This is despite the fact that a hundred thousand men Were taken from the munition factories fac-tories for service in the army." |