During the First World War many people served in voluntary medical groups such as the Friends Ambulance Unit.
Four men and women with addresses in Hastings and St Leonards , all of them members of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), served in the Friends Ambulance Unit between 1914 and 1918.
Cousins Percy and Harold Tyler both worked in France tending the wounded; Bessie Carey from Ore served as a Nurse and Frederic Hipsley worked in a hospital in Birmingham. The three men were Conscientious Objectors, as their Quaker religious views precluded them from participating in warfare. They served their country and community as fully as their sincere religious antipathy for war would allow.
Another – very prominent – Quaker in Hastings, Wilson Crewdson, JP, who had been a candidate for MP at the General Election in 1912, went to France to work in a hospital. His two sons joined up and both had long careers as professional soldiers. The courage and contributions of Conscientious Objectors needs acknowledging.
For more information about groups such as the Friends Ambulance Unit and those who served in them, see the Library of the Religious Order of Friends and the Red Cross Archive
