ABSTRACT
The War Council was originally composed only of Asquith, Lloyd George, Grey, Churchill and Fisher, Kitchener and Wolfe Murray and Balfour as secretary. The regular members, however, tended to increase in numbers. On December 1st Crewe was added to the Council, which was joined on January 7th by Haldane and Arthur Wilson. Meetings of the War Council were invariably held in the Cabinet Room at 10 Downing Street, instead of at 2 Whitehall Gardens. The War Council did not work to an Agenda paper, and in this important respect followed the procedure of the Cabinet of that day, instead of the Committees sounder practice. Until Christmas 1914, the War Council concerned itself mainly, though not exclusively, with completing the overhaul of Home Defence that had been begun at the Committee of Imperial Defence.
