ABSTRACT
Press complaints about the Bureau continued, albeit at a reducing rate as the system settled down. Robbins continued to be a pivotal figure in attempting to improve relationships between the two sides, and in handling representations from the Government side and from public figures. In early December 1914, for example, he received a request from Admiral of the Fleet Lord Fisher to discourage the press from mentioning the repatriation by the Germans of British invalids in occupied Europe, for fear of retaliation by the Germans against those still to be returned if press reports were adverse (Fisher’s daughter and invalid son-in-law had just been so returned). Robbins received fulsome thanks from Buckmaster for the visit he organised for the latter to talk to the PA Committee. Buckmaster was also Solicitor General, 72 but he had found time too to visit the GPO, to resolve another complaint from the evening papers about the ‘archaic’ arrangements there for sending out official French and British communiqués (the GPO’s afternoon transmission was often delayed until 5.15 p.m., too late for the evening papers’ deadline).
