ROBERT JAMES BEESTON

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Robert James BEESTON. 

(Brother of Alfred George Beeston – qv)

Robert was a good deal younger than his brother Alfred.  He was born in 1897 and so only 19 in 1916.He worked for the Great Northern Railway as a Clerk in the Accounts Department.  He, too, lived with his birth family at 391 Wightman Road, Hornsey.

His motivation for becoming a Conscientious Objector was his Christian belief.  When he put forward these beliefs as he claimed absolute exemption at Hornsey Tribunal on 4^th March 1916 (the same day as his brother’s hearing), the panel responded – rather bizarrely – that “the applicant, had he really possessed conscientious objections, would have given up his berth on the GNR which is largely occupied with the carriage of troops and war material.”

However, Robert’s appeal to the Middlesex Appeal Tribunal was rather more successful and he was granted exemption from combatant service and sent to join the Non-Combatant Corps.  He joined the NCC 3^rd Eastern at Mill Hill Barracks on 16^th May and served until the end of that month in England.  Then he was sent to France, where, presumably he remained.

Robert died in Shepway, Kent in 1985 aged 88.

National Archives/MH47           Pearce/IWM