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MEN WHO SAID NO | ROAD TO CONSCRIPTION | OBJECTION | PRISONS | SENTENCED TO DEATH | TRIBUNALS | WIDER CONTEXT |
ALEXANDER MAIR 1885 -  

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George and Alexander Mair were part of the extensive Plymouth Brethren community living around the Moray Firth in Scotland. Living and working in Cullen, the brothers were involved in the fishing industry, which delayed their call-up as conscripts until 1917. Working in a nationally important, and food-producing industry gave them some measure of protection from the early rounds of conscription, until, in 1917, the Government began the “combing out” process, scouring the nation for ever more men to send to the Army, regardless or the nature or importance of their work.

Alexander was 32 when conscripted in 1917, and as a member of the Plymouth Brethren, his faith determined that he could and would not participate in the war. While for many Plymouth Brethren accepted alternative service as a morally acceptable compromise with military authority, Alexander could not and he decided to resist any and all compromise.

This brave and principled stance against war, militarism and the machinery of conscription put Alexander at odds with both the Tribunal system and the Army. Rejected in his application for absolute exemption, by May he was in the hands of the military at Aberdeen barracks, and faced a court martial on the 29th for disobedience. The court martial sentenced him to 112 days hard labour, to be served in Wormwood Scrubs prison, London. This short sentence and distant incarceration were a formality designed to funnel Alexander through the Central Tribunal process, allowing him the opportunity to apply for the Home Office Scheme if deemed eligible.

The Central Tribunal sat to hear Alexander’s case on the 20th of July 1917, and judged him, as it did most religious COs, a “Class A” or “genuine” objector, one with a long-standing and deeply held opposition to war. Instead of securing him the absolute exemption he was entitled to under the Military Service Act, the Central Tribunal passed his case to the Brace Committee for what became known as the Home Office Scheme. Fundamentally a compromise decision by the government, the scheme allowed COs a reprieve from the punishing and brutal conditions of Edwardian prisons provided that they agreed to take on nominally useful labour. George would have been put to work in construction, agricultural and manual labour tasks alongside other COs on the scheme.

Alexander was one of few COs to be put to work in Kew Gardens, where it is likely he remained until 1919, when COs on the scheme were released and officially demobilised from the Army.

 

 

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CO DATA

Born: 1885
Died:
Address: Cullen, Banff, Scotland
Tribunal: Cullen
Prison: Wormwood Scrubs
HO Scheme: Kew Gardens [1]
CO Work:
Occupation:

Motivation: Plymouth Brethren
[2]
ABSOLUTIST

 


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WIDER CONTEXT | more
ROAD TO CONSCRIPTION
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CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION
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