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THE MEN WHO SAID NO | ROAD TO CONSCRIPTION | CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION | PRISONS | SENTENCED TO DEATH | TRIBUNALS | WIDER CONTEXT | INDEX
ALEXANDER GUTHRIE TULLOCH 1895 -  

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Alexander Guthrie Tulloch was one of the many Conscientious Objectors who reached a morally acceptable compromise with Conscription and the Military. Conscripted at the age of 21, and one of only two Conscientious Objectors from Orkney, Alexander was a student in 1916 when the Military Service Act made him a conscript.

He was called before the Orkney Tribunal on the 25th of August 1916, where he applied for exemption as a Conscientious Objector. It is possible that he requested a non-combatant medical role in the military, stating, as many Conscientious Objectors did, that he could not take life, but would be willing to save it, agreeing provisionally to a place in the Royal Army Medical Corps. His Tribunal hearing granted him this form of exemption, making him eligible for non-combatant service provided that he joined the RAMC.

The record of Alexander’s service with the army shows that he never went to the RAMC, but instead served from 1916-1919 with the Non-Combatant Corps (NCC), a section of the army intended to put Conscientious Objectors to useful labour and logistics work behind the lines. This was not an uncommon situation for COs to find themselves in. The RAMC at the time was small, and was therefore both selective and unwilling to take on a huge influx of untrained Conscientious Objectors as orderlies and medical staff. Though Tribunals often directed COs towards the RAMC, it was comparatively rare that they would be drafted into this vital service. Instead, COs like Alexander that found themselves sent to the Army, usually as combatant soldiers, where a review of their enlistment forms would show their Conscientious Objection to Combatant Service. From there, a usually swift transfer to the NCC would follow.

Alexander seems to have found this an acceptable compromise with military authority. Rather than being forced into a role where he would have to fight and kill, the NCC provided a non-combatant guarantee, and Alexander’s service record shows that he worked with the NCC in Britain from October 1916 to February 1919. Refusing to actively take part in the war, and refusing to take life, was enough - and NCC COs managed to navigate the labyrinthine maze of Conscience by choosing their own morally acceptable path.

 

 

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CO DATA

Born: 1895
Died:
Address: Plainstones, Stromness, Orkney
Tribunal: Orkney
Prison:
HO Scheme: [1]
CO Work: RAMC
Occupation: Student

Motivation:
[2]
NON-COMBATANT

 


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