National Service

[Gef]

A male born in 1928 would have been 17 when WWII ended. Conscription ended (I think) in 1958. Any reasons why he did not do National Service as far as I know? Could it have been to do with his job in the steel industry?

[vehelpfulguy]

Did he go to university ?

I think people who went to university did not have to do national service.

[MustafaTickl]

There was a category called "Reserved Occupations" whose work was deemed more important than joining the services. Someone in a Reserved Occupation could not volunteer to get out of it and join up.

[makemesmile]

'28 was the year my father was born. He would have gone into the family business (plumbers). Do you think this was a Reserved Occupation? I don't ever recall my father saying he'd done his National Service. Funny, never occured to me before I read your posting.

[heathfield]

National Service call-up ended on 31st December 1960.
Maybe he had flat feet - one of the reasons for exemption.

[MustafaTickl]

Yes, mms, it is quite likely. There was also other legislation called the "Essential Works Order" whereby people were drafted to do "civilian" work rather than serve in the forces ie my father was in the Army and then the Flying Corps in WW1, volunteered for either at the outbreak of WWII but being also a Civil Engineer was drafted instead under the EWO to supervise open cast coal mining in the North of England which was deemed more important.

[Peter Pedant]

Not everyone in a reserved occupation was excused call up during the war at least.

A committee went around, or was around, and said if people could go or not. Can anyone remember the name of the committee ?

apparently a common q in the POW camps was:
'were you betrayed by the ......committee?'

Oh and I dont think it was called the reserved occupation committee


PP

[LazyGun]

My dad was born in the same year... he did his national service in Egypt, learning to swim in the Suez canal.. at least, thats what he tells me :)

[dot.hawkes]

My Dad did not do his national service, he was the only son of a farmer and so a reserved occupation, he was born in 1922, he joined the home guard and guarded the shells outside the US Army base at Tatton Hall, Cheshire.

[Peter Pedant]

erm while the girls of Tatton screwed the GIs INSIDE the base, by someaccounts

[reinganum]

I don't know whether any reserved occupations were eventually called up, as Peter says above�I only know that there was never any question of my father, already in the Merchant Navy at the start of WWII, being called up. He was far too important where he was (and he got torpedoed three times).

[reinganum]

I forgot to mention that university (undergraduates) could only apply for deferment, not exemption.

My father-in-law was called up during WWII just as he was about to go to uni. The arrangement was that he was allowed to do his first year, then he had to go (into the RAF as it happened), his place being held open for him to complete his degree when demobbed.

[trakcab]

My uncle was working at Longbridge in 1939 when he tried to enlist he was told he was needed there subsequently the plant started to make fighter planes and tanks, although he tried several times to enlist he was only excepted at the end of wwII when he didn't to go