Transcript 04-02-2014 - Deans Community High School

The effects of the war on life in Scotland
ISSUE 2.1
To cover the syllabus you should
know about the following:
What DORA was and why some Scots
objected to it.
What conscription was and why
some Scots objected to it
• What conscientious objectors were and why
they were against conscription.
• How the war affected women in Scotland.
• How Scotland coped with the size of its losses
in the war.
DORA, censorship and government
control of the Home Front
• What was DORA?
• DORA was the short name for the Defence of
the Realm Act that became law on 8 August
1914.
• It was a law that allowed the government to
pass many new measures to protect the
country during the war.
One of the first security worries
when war broke out was the risk of
spies
• The government needed to secure all
transport networks from acts of sabotage,
such as blowing up railway tracks or setting
fire in timber yards.
• Spy stories in newspapers warned the public
to watch out for any suspicious looking
people.
Also increased censorship in
newspapers.
• At that time there were no public radio or
television broadcasts to worry about.
• Reports about the war in newspapers were
written to give a very positive slant or bias in
favour of British forces
• Reports about Germans were intended to
make people hate them.
In other words most war reporting
was propaganda and was seldom
allowed to tell the truth.
• Even letters home from front line soldiers
were censored so as not to worry the folks at
home or give help to the enemy.
• It was always possible spies could intercept
letters and gain valuable information.
Why did opposition to DORA
increase during the war
• At first the public accepted the need for
increased security and control over things that
were seen to be vital for the war effort.
• However as the war went on, the public
became tired of restrictions that seemed only
to have a slight connection to the war effort.
DORA..........
• When DORA was used to help war production
by limiting the opening times of pubs and
reducing the alcoholic strength of beer, many
people objected.
• Some people even had to give up their
homing pigeons when the authorities feared
the birds might be used to send messages to
the Germans.
DORA..
• Police were on the watch for anyone whistling
at night in case they were signalling to low
flying zeppelin air ships overhead.
More seriously, people objected to the way
DORA was undermining civil liberties
• Critics of DORA felt the government was
abusing its powers and silencing legitimate
political debate, including anti-war opinion.
• DORA also gave the government the right to
imprison people without trial, and that was
directly against the freedoms that British
expected.
One example of how the government used
DORA to turn legitimate protest into an
unpatriotic act was in the reporting of strikes on
Clydeside in 1915.
• The government shut down anti-government
newspapers such as Forward for a short time
while pro-government reporting tried to show
the strikers as undermining the war effort and
threaten the lives of soldiers on the front line.
Criticism of DORA increased when
conscription started.
• Under the conscription laws, men could be
conscripted (or forced) to serve in the armed
forces or do jobs of national importance.
• For civilians on the Home Front, conscription
meant that conscripted workers were no
longer civilians.
• They were under military authority and
discipline and as such were denied the right to
strike.
Conscription had not been used in Britain
before and its introduction was seen by
some as yet another increase in the power
of the state at the cost of individual liberty.
Did most people object to DORA?
• No, they did not. The public believed
government action was necessary to win the
war.
• In 1914 Prime minister Asquith had been
criticised for saying life in Britain during the
war was ‘business as usual’.
By 1915 everyone knew that was
nonsense!
• The war required a huge effort from everyone
to win it.
• So DORA was seen as the way the government
could direct and control the war effort
necessary for victory.