9 replies to this topic

[Matt94]

Hello,

My great-grandfather, Harry Charles Clements, apparently worked at the County Lunatic Asylum at Devizes, Wiltshire, during the First World War and was therefore exempt from joining up or from Conscription.

I would like to know whether he would he have had to face a Military Tribunal to assess whether he did, in fact, work in a reserved occupation, or not.

Any help gratefully received,
Matt94

[headgardener]

There wasn't such a thing as 'reserved occupations' in those days.  He will have had to attend a tribunal which may have granted an exemption for various reasons (mostly centred on the principle of whether the man in question could be easily 'replaced' or not).  Examples of this might include family circumstances (perhaps a widower with a young family) or a man who had a particular role in civilian life that was essential to the country, or for whom a suitable replacement would not easily be found.

The idea of him being exempt because he worked at the asylum may be because of his role (i.e. he had a particular type of training), or it may be a misunderstanding.

[JulesW]

I've passed many an interesting ,fascinating, often humorous hour reading tribunal reports in the local press of that time.

Check your local archive they may exist for your area so you man may be there.



Good Luck

[Magnumbellum]

Some clarification is required:

"Reserved occupation" is WW2 terminology and usage in relation to WW1 is bound to confuse.

There were, however, "protected" occupations, whose personnel were exempt without application to a Tribunal. Whether any or all staff of lunatic asylums were protected I cannot say offhand, but I would doubt whether junior staff were. Teachers in schools, for example, were not protected.

Alongside protected occupations, it was possible for an employer to apply for exemption for a particular employer, effectively as a key worker, provided the category of employment was deemed "Work of National Importance".

When made, applications were to the local Military Service Tribunal, appointed by the borough or district council. In WW1 there were no "Military Tribunals", which, as in the USA currently, are creatures of  the army.

[Terry_Reeves]

I would point out that the phrase "reserved occupation" was used quite considerably in WW1. Evidence of this can be found in the files of the Ministry of Munitions.

TR

[MichaelBully]

Hello Matt, I have found local newspapers a great source of help in looking at Military Tribunals. In Sussex the local newspapers did not name those men who were arguing for exemption or who stated that they were objecting to fighting, so an account would read 'Art teacher aged 23 from Brighton.......'

It would be a help if you could explain how you have found out what you know already. Was it from talking to relatives? Have you found a diary or correspondence?
Any dates? Do you know Harry's date of birth?


I started a general thread about Military Tribunals at the start of last year

http://1914-1918.inv...1

Regards

Michael Bully

[Matt94]

Hi All,

Thanks for the replies. As he worked for the Wilts County Lunatic Asylum in Devizes (as found out through talking to my aunts and uncles, to whom he told stories about what he saw when working there) the records will be at Chippenham, I think, if they still exist. I have seen a tribunal before from 1916 from a Farmer stating that if his son went to war, the farm would collapse and go bust. The boy was sent to war anyway.

Harry was born illegitimately in London in 1887, and was sent to Aldbourne, Wilts, as a baby. Long story short he apparently ended up at Devizes. I am going to Chippenham to the Record Office there to see the Staff Engagement Books at the Devizes Asylum in a couple of weeks time so whilst I am there I can ask the question about whether they have the records of Tribunals held at Hungerford Rural District (he was living in Lambourne Berks - I am off to Berks RO tomorrow, so it might be there. I will check) and go from there. If I find him, I can then check newspaper articles at Chippenham when I go.

Thanks for all the help

Matt94

[Magnumbellum]

Matt94, on 23 June 2011 - 08:55 PM, said:

Thanks for the replies. As he worked for the Wilts County Lunatic Asylum in Devizes (as found out through talking to my aunts and uncles, to whom he told stories about what he saw when working there) the records will be at Chippenham, I think, if they still exist. I have seen a tribunal before from 1916 from a Farmer stating that if his son went to war, the farm would collapse and go bust. The boy was sent to war anyway.

Harry was born illegitimately in London in 1887, and was sent to Aldbourne, Wilts, as a baby. Long story short he apparently ended up at Devizes. I am going to Chippenham to the Record Office there to see the Staff Engagement Books at the Devizes Asylum in a couple of weeks time so whilst I am there I can ask the question about whether they have the records of Tribunals held at Hungerford Rural District (he was living in Lambourne Berks - I am off to Berks RO tomorrow, so it might be there. I will check) and go from there. If I find him, I can then check newspaper articles at Chippenham when I go.

Thanks for all the help

Matt94

The farmer's son tribunal from before 1916 would have been held under the Derby Scheme in the second half of 1915. The farmer's son must necessarily have volunteered, as that was the sole basis of the Scheme, so he had no real grounds for complaint if his original volunteering was implemented. It is possible that it was his father who made the application, not wishing to lose a good and useful worker.

With regard to the Hungerford RDC local tribunal records, these came under the purview of the Local Government Board (the ministry responsible for local government), which was subsumed into the new Ministry of Health in 1920. In 1921 the MoH, evidently deeming that the masses of paperwork accumulated by local tribunals served no further useful purpose, conscription having been abolished, ordered that all records be destroyed, saving only the Middesex and Lothian & Peebles records, to be placed in the respective national archives as samples of the way the system worked. No thought was given to genealogical research, not then very common. Despite the order, some records did survive at the county level. There would be no harm in asking about the Hungerford records, but the chances of survival are slim. The case might have been reported in the local press, but some local papers adopted a policy of not mentioning applicants' names in their press reports. Other papers regularly published names. There was no general pattern, and the reasons not publishing names can only be guessed at.

I am saddened to see Michael Bully repeating the expression "Military Tribunal", despite my earlier posting on this thread. I repeat, the tribunals were not run by the army, but by local authorities, and the statutory name was Military Service Tribunals.

[MichaelBully]

Point taken MB, should have written 'Military Service Tribunal', sorry.
Hope that you will let us know how you get on Matt. Good luck with the research.

Michael Bully.

Magnumbellum, on 24 June 2011 - 03:22 PM, said:

I am saddened to see Michael Bully repeating the expression "Military Tribunal", despite my earlier posting on this thread. I repeat, the tribunals were not run by the army, but by local authorities, and the statutory name was Military Service Tribunals.

[centurion]

Matt94, on 22 June 2011 - 06:45 PM, said:

Hello,

My great-grandfather, Harry Charles Clements, apparently worked at the County Lunatic Asylum at Devizes, Wiltshire, during the First World War and was therefore exempt from joining up or from Conscription.

I would like to know whether he would he have had to face a Military Tribunal to assess whether he did, in fact, work in a reserved occupation, or not.

Any help gratefully received,
Matt94

Its something of a nonsense to talk about being exempt from joining up and one of the problems before conscription was the numbers of people with vital skills for the war effort who joined up. The railways, the mines and the farms were all short of staff as a result. I believe there were various official exhortations for men with certain skills not to be accepted if they volunteered but these were oft ignored. Given the limited nature of government paper records there was no real mechanism for identifying men in protected occupations in advance and not sending them conscription papers (when they could then claim exemption from a tribunal)