THE MEN WHO SAID NO | ROAD TO CONSCRIPTION | CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION | PRISONS | SENTENCED TO DEATH | TRIBUNALS | WIDER CONTEXT | INDEX
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THE MEN WHO SAID NO | ROAD TO CONSCRIPTION | CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION | PRISONS | SENTENCED TO DEATH | TRIBUNALS | WIDER CONTEXT | INDEX |
| GREGORY WELSH |
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| Gregory Welch was one of many Conscientious Objectors who were granted Exemption from Combatant Service provided they secured positions with Quaker organisations. Prior to the introduction of conscription, Gregory had worked with the Friends Ambulance Unit, but applied for a Tribunal hearing regardless, perhaps, like many others, to prove that he was willing to defend his right to exemption as a CO. He applied to the Hammersmith Tribunal and was heard on the 29th of September 1916. While claiming absolute exemption, he was only granted Exempt from Combatant Service but with the important provision that he would not be called up to the Non-Combatant Corps if he took up work under the Friends War Victims Relief Service (FWVRS). The FWVRS was set up early in the war to provide medical services, food and shelter to many of the millions of refugees displaced by the conflict and other victims of the war. Gregory worked in Poland and Russia from October 1916 to July 1921. The group of FWVRS volunteers working in Russia at this time endured great hardship and lived through a savage Civil War, but worked to provide essential medical and educational support to thousands of Russians who would otherwise have been without. Their work stands as a confirmation that it is better to work constructively for a better world than to destroy life in futile conflict.
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