The Shell Crisis of 1915 was a shortage of artillery shells on the front lines of World War I, which largely contributed to weakening public appreciation of government of the United Kingdom because it was widely perceived that the production of artillery shells for use by the British Army was inadequate. Along with the failure of the attack on the Dardanelles and Gallipoli, the Shell Crisis was a significant factor in the fall of the Liberal Government, in favour of a coalition, and in the rise to power of the new Minister of Munitions, David Lloyd George, who would replace Asquith as Prime Minister in the political crisis of December 1916.
After the failure of the Battle of Aubers Ridge, May 9, 1915, the British Commander-in-Chief Field Marshal Sir John French mentioned to The Times war correspondent, Colonel Charles à Court Repington, that it failed due to a lack of shells. The "Shell Scandal" was reported to the Home Front by The Times, which described the scandal in graphic detail: 'We had not sufficient high explosives to lower the enemy's parapets to the ground...The want of an unlimited supply of high explosives was a fatal bar to our success' (The Times, May 1915).This clearly pointed the finger of blame at the government.[1] A more sensationalised version of the story was printed in the popular "Daily Mail", blaming the Secretary of State for War Lord Kitchener, under the headline "Lord K's Tragic Blunder".
This led to the Shell Crisis of 1915, which was one of the factors which brought down the Liberal British government under the Premiership of Herbert Henry Asquith. Although Liberal politicians held office in subsequent coalitions (and since 2010), no purely Liberal government has held office in the UK since May 1915. Asquith formed a new coalition government and appointed Lloyd George as Minister of Munitions. Although Lord Kitchener remained in office as Secretary of State for War, he lost control over munitions production and was increasingly sidelined from control of military strategy.
The Munitions of War Act 1915 prevented the resignation of munitions workers without their employer's consent. It was a recognition that the whole economy would have to be geared for war if the Allies were to prevail on the Western Front. Supplies and factories in British Commonwealth countries, particularly Canada, were reorganised under the Imperial Munitions Board, in order to supply adequate shells and other materiels for the remainder of the war. The Health of Munitions Workers Committee, one of the first investigations into occupational safety and health, was set up in 1916 to improve productivity in factories. [2]
A huge munitions factory, HM Factory, Gretna was built on the English-Scottish border to produce Cordite.
An idle part of a factory in Silvertown was pressed into service to manufacture TNT; this exploded in January 1917, killing 73 and injuring 400 in what is known as the Silvertown explosion.