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MEN WHO SAID NO | ROAD TO CONSCRIPTION | OBJECTION | PRISONS | SENTENCED TO DEATH | TRIBUNALS | WIDER CONTEXT |
PERCY THOMAS BOULONOIS -1880  

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Brothers Bartholomew and Percy Boulonois worked for the family painting and decorating firm when conscription was first introduced into law in 1916. Despite their similar occupations, their stories as COs could not be more different. Percy, applying to the Hampton Tribunal on the first of March 1916 would have been one of the first COs to appear before it. He applied for exemption as a CO on the simple grounds that he "morally and religiously object to taking life". The Tribunal turned him down, as did the Middlesex Appeal Tribunal two months later. Percy was soon in the hands of the military, and by December 1917 had died in action at the front. Something had caused him to change his mind and give up his objection. It could be that the immense mental and physical pressure the army put on COs took its toll, or perhaps he gave up his objection willingly. The end result is the same - another life callously sacrificed in the hell of the western front.

Percy’s name can be found carved on the massive Theipval memorial amid the 73,367 others whose bodies have never been found.

Bartholomew, the older brother, was 41 when the Military Service Act came into power, escaping, but only just, conscription until it was extended to men between 41 and 51 in mid 1918. His first Tribunal hearing was in June 1918, and subsequent appeal in August, granted him no exemption, but with the war rapidly drawing to a close, a fourteen day postponement of call-up seems to have been enough for his case to be quietly left. Two years marked a significant change in the way CO cases were dealt with, one brother granted exemption by the date of his application, another killed by the zest for punishment and pressure on COs that was widespread in early 1916. War, even in it's administrative workings under the Military Service Act, is arbitrary and cruel.

 

 

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CO DATA

Born: 1880
Died: 29/12/1917
Address: 10 Edward Road, Hampton, Middlesex
Tribunal: Hampton
Prison:
HO Scheme:
CO Work: Soldier CO
Occupation: Painter and decorator

Motivation:


 






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