David Lloyd George access to the Cabinet so as to bypass Kitchener. However, he did succeed in securing the appointment of Sir Eric Geddes to take charge of military railways behind British lines in France, with the honorary rank of major-general. Lloyd George told a journalist, Roy W. Howard, in late September that "the fight must be to a finish – to a knockout", a rejection of President Wilson's offer to mediate. Lloyd George was increasingly frustrated at the limited gains of the Somme Offensive, criticising General Haig to Ferdinand Foch on a visit to the Western Front in September (British casualty ratios
Frances Lloyd George secretary. Stevenson chose the location and supervised the construction of Lloyd George's country house in Churt, Surrey. She also arranged and collated Lloyd George's extensive archive of personal and political papers so that he could write his "War Memoirs". After having been persuaded by Lloyd George to have two abortions, Stevenson gave birth to a daughter, Jennifer, in 1929. Although Stevenson had been having an affair with Thomas Frederic Tweed, a novelist who was one of Lloyd George's political advisers, Lloyd George was probably the father of Stevenson's child. Two years after the death of Lloyd George's wife Margaret, Stevenson