When the war began in August 1914, the minimum height for a soldier in the British Army was 5ft 3in (160cm). Men who did not meet the criteria were turned away from the recruitment offices in large numbers. An unsubstantiated story from the war describes the multiple attempts by a Durham miner to volunteer but was turned down for being too short. In exasperation, he refused to leave the recruitment office and offered to fight anyone to prove his fitness and suitability to be a soldier. It was reported that it took six men to remove him from the building. On hearing the story, Alfred Bigland, the MP for Birkenhead took up their case in Parliament and persuaded the War Office to set up special battalions for short, able-bodied men who wished to fight for their country. The first were raised in Birkenhead, Cheshire. Eventually, there were 29 Bantam Battalions raised during the war.