{"id":46,"date":"2018-11-01T14:56:07","date_gmt":"2018-11-01T14:56:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/?page_id=46"},"modified":"2023-05-04T10:38:47","modified_gmt":"2023-05-04T10:38:47","slug":"recruitment","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/digital-resources\/the-polytechnic-and-world-war-one\/recruitment\/","title":{"rendered":"The Polytechnic and World War One: Recruitment"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Conscription was not introduced until January 1916 and so, unlike in the Second World War, the government relied on volunteers for the first two years of the war. Consequently recruitment of men was vital and the senior management of the Poly was keen help. Given the central London location of Regent Street and the numbers of its young male members it was a natural step for it to become a recruitment centre and to encourage its men to join up. With a Territorial Force regiment already in existence at the Poly many of its members were keen to serve their King and Country. In August 1914 JEK Studd, the President of the Poly, put out the following message in the Polytechnic Magazine.<\/h1>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\"[I] appeal with confidence to every member of the Polytechnic to take his or her share in the heavy burden which has fallen on the nation.\" \n\nJEK Studd, President of the Polytechnic<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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A key feature of early local recruitment drives was the creation of \u2018pals battalions\u2019 promising that men could serve with their friends. By November 1914 the Poly had already filled 2 regiments \u2013 the 12th London and the Kensington. In addition, by this date they had also established the Polytechnic Volunteer Training Corps with 400 new recruits comprising men who couldn\u2019t enlist or were only able to fight on the Home Front. By April 1915 the Poly had over 1,600 men on active service.<\/span><\/p>

The senior management actively publicised recruitment in the Polytechnic Magazine, whether it was for the Territorial Forces regiments, the Voluntary Training Corps, British Red Cross Voluntary Aid Detachment or the Polytechnic Cadet Corps (for boys not old enough to fight). Alfred West\u2019s Our Navy and Army films were shown daily at the Polytechnic\u2019s cinema throughout the war to encourage enlistment, and recruitment marches took place on Regent Street. By the end of the war at least 4,800 Poly members had joined His Majesty\u2019s Forces and at least 858 passed through the Training Corps, many of whom later enlisted.<\/span><\/p>

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\"Advice
Advice for new recruits in the Polytechnic Magazine, February 1915<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/a><\/div>
\"Polytechnic
Polytechnic Cadet Corps while at Cadet Camp at Eastcote, May 1915<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/a><\/div>
\"Recruitment
Recruitment advert from the Polytechnic Magazine, January 1916<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/a><\/div>
\"Recruitment
Recruitment march on Regent Street c.1915<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/a><\/div>
\"New
New recruits for wireless telegraphy training outside 309 Regent Street, c1914-15<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/a><\/div>
\"Polytechnic
Polytechnic Volunteer Training Corps at the Quintin Hogg Memorial Sports Ground Chiswick, 31 October 1914<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/a><\/div>\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Conscription was not introduced until January 1916 and so, unlike in the Second World War, the government relied on volunteers for the first two years of the war. Consequently recruitment of men was vital and the senior management of the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":133,"featured_media":0,"parent":34,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-46","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/46","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/133"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/46\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5388,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/46\/revisions\/5388"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/34"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/recordsandarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}