WORK OF THE UNION
work fell properly within the sphere of activities of the Zemstvo
Union. Zemstvo committees for the supply of the army were thereupon
 established by all provincial and district zemstvos. Their first
task was to “mobilize the industry, large and small, and to organize,
with the aid of the zemstvos, the scattered technical resources of the
country.”
As early as July, 1915, the Zemstvo Union received from the War
Department millions of rubles’ worth of orders for various articles
of military equipment and munitions. Among these we find not only
the usual articles of supply issued by the Army Supply Department,
 such as wagons, harness; field kitchens, horseshoes, tarpaulins,
knapsacks, saddles, etc., but likewise shells for the artillery and other
highly technical articles, such as mortars, hand grenades, trench
tools, field telephones. All such orders were immediately distributed
among the local organs of the Zemstvo Union, and, in addition to
these, the Central Committee established its own plants, including
one for the manufacture of three- and six-inch shells, and factories
to produce sulphuric acid, telephones, tarpaulins, and so on.
Representatives of the Union of Zemstvos and the Union of
Towns had expressed a strong desire that the two unions should cooperate
 more closely in equipping and supplying the army. The result
 was that representatives of both unions met in J uly, 1915, and
formed a separate executive committee for the supply of the army,
known as the Zemgor, which hereafter took charge of these responsible
 tasks.

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