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Publisher Elias and Editor Dunbar fashioned a newspaper precisely to the taste of MacDonald, Philip Snowden and countless middle-readers like them. Moreover, they were quick to learn the tricks of circulation come-ons such as lotteries, crossword puzzle contests with cash prizes. In one year the Laborite Herald jumped from 350,000 to over a million. Last year, it passed the News-Chronicle with more than 1,400,000. The battle was so expensive to all concerned that the Newspaper Proprietors Association called a truce. Free gifts were outlawed. Expenditures on canvassing were limited. Fleet Street settled down to a supercharged neutrality, with Mail, Express and Herald circulations bunched between 1,735,000 and 1,650,000. The peace lasted 15 months.
Outbreak, Last May the bloodthirsty Herald hurled a bombshell. In violation of all treaties it offered readers a complete set of Dickens (worth $20) for eleven, shillings plus coupons from the Herald. Flabbergasted, the other publishers called a meeting of N. P. A. Blandly Publisher Elias told them no "gift" was involved since his paper could supply the 16 volumes of Dickens and still make a profit. Not even bothering to argue, the other publishers clapped on their bowlers, marched from the meeting. The war was on.
In the next few months Fleet Street newspapers "sold" some 5,000,000 volumes of Dickens, in a mad scramble for new readers. Dickens was only a starter. Washing machines came next. Then sets" of china, electric irons, cricket bats & balls, cameras. Dictionaries, encyclopedias, sets of "modern classics." Fountain pens, fancy pencils, stockings, underwear, wrist watches, pillow cases, pyjamas. Lord Beaverbrook outfitted his canvassers with samples of boots, coats, pants and shoes, sent them west to show Welsh miners how they might clothe a whole family by reading the Express for eight weeks.
Victory? In July the smoke of battle lifted enough to permit a survey of positions won and lost. Bull-dogged little Lord Beaverbrook, having forged into the lead, triumphantly shouted that his Express had 2,054,000 daily for the month of June—hugest daily circulation ever recorded! The Herald, which started it all, had clawed past the Mail to a mark of 2,000,000. The Mail in third place had 1,850,000, the News-Chronicle 1,315,000.
But it was difficult even for a winning publisher to be genuinely jubilant. Everyone knew that the war was costing all combatants £2,500,000 a year—nearly double their combined earnings. Worse, everyone knew that the new circulation, so dearly bought, meant nothing; that bribed readers could not be depended on to stick; that many were subscribing to more papers than they could possibly read. Advertisers knew all this too.
Few weeks ago Esmond Harmsworth (of the Mail) cabled Lord Beaverbrook, then returning from Africa, that the battle of gifts had broken all bounds of sanity; the Mail would welcome peace negotiations. Lord Beaverbrook promptly cabled one of his Express managers to represent him. The conferences started hopefully. The Herald proposed a modification of the free gift schemes, the Express and Mail assented. But not Sir Walter Layton of the News-Chronicle, tag-ender of the fight. He would accept no truce that did not end the gift business completely. The war went on again. Next day the Mail offered twelve volumes of Ff. G. Wells.