Military Conscription in WWII: A Student’s Comparison to Job

In a 1939 edition of the Aberystwyth University student magazine, The Dragon, there is a letter of criticism regarding the conscription programme of the British military bearing the title ‘The Pill they Forgot to Gild.’ The unnamed author of the letter claims to speak for the university students of Aberystwyth and suggests that the British Government expects conscripted soldiers to have the mindset of Job. To understand the significance of this, we need to analyse the story of Job and what the biblical figure represents regarding the topic of this blog:

“The average student, it is fairly obvious, appreciates this war for nothing more than it is - an economic and political necessity. The hokus-pokus drawing of the curtain of mysticism and senti-mentality over brutal facts he scorns. He does not pretend to be a flag-wagging, drum-thumping, trumpet-major, but he accepts the situation with cold-blooded acquiescence ... he considers Job, and is, or pretends to be, the essence of equanimity”

Job is a biblical figure whose story is written in the Book of Job. He is severely tested when he loses his family and his land despite being extremely loyal to God and never having sinned. Only when Job loses everything does he sin and wishes he was never born. This is significant to the tone of in the letter for several reasons. 

Firstly, it suggests that the average university student view of the war and the British Government may have been critical and negative. To extend that point, the author suggests that, like Job, conscripted soldiers are supposed to have ‘blind faith’ in the British Government to win the war.  Secondly, the author questions the authority of God and his omni-benevolent nature. The author asks why God has chosen to lead potentially thousands to their deaths without a good reason to offer:

“He has still rheum enough left to spit a venomous curse into the gutters that once passed for the glories of the crusading-spirit...”

Of course, unfortunately we know the author’s terrible predictions were true. The letter has an overly sombre tone to it, as the author seems to question what young men have done to deserve to be conscripted to ‘a coffin-vengeance on life’ courtesy of God. You cannot help but ask if the author was a conscientious objector and wonder at his reasons for writing?  The most probable answer would be to raise awareness amongst young university students, while wishing ‘good luck’ to university students already conscripted or who joined up of their own accord. 

One thing seems clear - the author was against conscription and believed that the war some sort of punishment as the words used are negative emotive words. Could this be because of experiences associated with family members in the First World War?  In my opinion, although the reality of conscription was harsh during the war, without it we might have been invaded. As the First World War left psychological effects and a massive socio-economic toll on British society, it may be that no-one would have joined voluntarily in the early stages of the Second World War.

 

Cover of The Dragon, Michaelmas 1939

Blog by Caitlin Margaret Vivian

Aberystwyth schools during WWII - part two

 Holidays and 'Potato Week'

At Alexandra Road School, older boys normally received instruction in woodwork, but after  the outbreak of the war this was discontinued due to the lack of resources. The handicraft room was given to the Liverpool seniors once they arrived and the senior Aberystwyth boys were taught gardening instead. Two acres of land were put at the disposal of Aberystwyth and Liverpool senior boys, each boy having an individual plot in the school garden. The boys apparently ‘worked hard and with evident enjoyment’ gardening on this land. Each boy kept a record of the work done, classroom talks were given on the theory of gardening, and pupils watched the plants slowly grow in the garden. In addition to its value from a food production point of view, the headmaster stressed its value in keeping their pupils entertained. In this way the teachers and school children successfully adjusted to the new restrictions and priorities imposed by wartime conditions. Teachers even showed the students’ potato plots to His Majesty’s Inspectors when they visited the school.

St. David’s Day

The usual school celebration of St. David’s day before the war involved plays, recitations, songs and lessons on St. David and half-holidays were usually granted in the afternoon. In 1939, a pupil won a special prize in the Western Mail’s St. David’s Day essay competition and his success was reported in the paper and he was loudly acclaimed by fellow classmates. This kind of national competition was made difficult during wartime, but in all other ways St. David’s Day appears to have still been celebrated much the same throughout the war as it had been previously. Songs included ‘Dyfodiad y Gwanwyn’ (The Coming of Spring) performed by older schoolchildren, or ‘Y Gwynt’  (The Wind)  performed by the toddlers. There were also  games like ‘Pop Aiff y Wenci’ (Pop Goes the Weasel) and recitals of the Welsh National Anthem.  

Pupils and staff were always given a half holiday in the afternoon. Even English evacuees who probably did not understand St. David or any of the St. David’s Day traditions could hopefully still appreciate being granted the day off. A whole day’s holiday was granted on 1st March 1943 by the Director of Education to Alexandra Road School, North Road School and all schools in the county. Many of the celebrations must have seemed strange to Liverpool children when they first arrived, for example, the log book recalls that on St. David’s Day 1940,Welsh children all wore leeks and daffodils and a few in 1939 were fully dressed in Welsh costume. However, the log book noted that unfortunately on St. David’s Day 1941, only one child was dressed in Welsh costume, presumably due to growing restrictions on clothing. It could not have been easy to be the odd one out on that day.

 

Page from the Alexandra Road School Book, courtesy of Archifdy Ceredigion Archives

Christmas

Typically at Christmastime, concerts were held on Thursday in the school’s main hall, carols were sung and three small Christmas plays were performed entitled ‘At Christmas Time’, ‘The Xmas message’ and ‘Christmas Joys’. There were also recitations and games for the children to enjoy. For their first wartime Christmas, Children received crackers and cards they made themselves, as well as an apple, an orange and one chocolate novelty each. However, there is no mention of this for the rest of the war in the logbook, presumably because food was more restricted. After this the children were dismissed and spent Christmas holidays with their billet families.

Victory celebrations

Schools were closed all day on Tuesday 8th May and Wednesday 9th May following the announcement of Victory in Europe. As stated in the North Road School log book, the government ‘declared May 8th and the following day as a General Holiday as days of rejoicing for victory’. Because the country was still at war with Japan, the civic authorities did not organize any official celebrations or treats for the children during this holiday but several districts in the town held small local tea parties for the children. Pupils of Alexandra Road and North Road Schools were released early at 3pm on 13 June to attend a parade of the First Battalion Welsh Guards through the town on their tour around Wales. A half-holiday was also granted at the end of July for the Victory Fete in aid of the Welcome Home fund for soldiers returning home to Britain.

 

VE day street party, image courtesy of Archifdy Ceredigon Archives

 

On Wednesday 10 October at 1pm, Alexandra Road children assembled and marched with teachers to the Pier Cinema. North Road children also went to the pictures and then all the children of the town were invited to the Pier Café for a Victory Tea, which was given by the mayor Griffith Davies (who happened to be the first Primary school teacher to occupy the position of Aberystwyth mayor).

 

Victory tea in the Pier Cafe (?), image courtesy of Archifdy Ceredigion Archives

Researching into the everyday lives of the pupils at Alexandra Road and North Road schools during the war has been informative and intriguing. Before starting I had not anticipated how much of the log books would be dedicated to recording the various ailments of the children. I had expected that, like in my own school, any illnesses recorded would be colds and coughs and would not necessarily entail missing significant amounts of term time. I also had not anticipated the phenomena of ‘Potato Week’ for the schoolchildren or how much money they would help to raise for the war effort. 

One naturally assumes that children took a more passive role during the conflict and expected to investigate only how things happened to them and the world around them. Hearing how they took such active roles was therefore extremely interesting. Reading a description of how the older children enjoyed gardening and seeing how invested they were in helping the war effort through ‘Potato Week’ and reading about the large amounts of money they raised for various wartime causes was also helpful in building a picture of how the children responded to the war. 

The format of the log books did not lend itself to personal touches or the viewpoints of the children themselves, so this kind of practical evidence was even more significant. Learning that the children were shown films from government ministries about the importance of salvage and gardening further indicated to me how engaged the children would have felt with these tasks, and how connected they would have felt to the war effort. Their passion leaves the impression that although they could not fight for their country, they might still have felt they were truly making a difference.

Blog by Tom Buswell

Sources: 

Alexandra Road Council School log book, Infants department (Archifdy Ceredigion Archives)
Alexandra Road Council School log book, Boys department (Archifdy Ceredigion Archives)
Alexandra Road Council School log book, Girls department (Archifdy Ceredigion Archives)
Alexandra Road Council School log book (Liverpool Archives)
North Road (“National”) School log book (Archifdy Ceredigion Archive)
http://liverpool-schools.co.uk