To be Exempted

The farming programme on radio 4 last Sunday dealt with the situation of some agricultural workers who were not called up to compulsory military service during the first world war.

It was explained that apparently all the records dealing with the tribunals had been deliberately destroyed in 1922. There was one exception with the records of the Swindon area tribunals. Some of these had survived. From these surviving records the radio programme had attempted to trace the workers back to the original farms where they had been employed and with mixed results.

Three of my great uncles were called up to the army in 1914-18 but as it happens my grand-father was not called up because he was in a reserved occupation and as can be seen from the letter from his employer. The tribunal papers relating to my grand-father have come down to me and I can now see the need for them to be kept safely.

I have begun to ask myself why, after the war was over, the Government felt that all these papers should be destroyed.