What does enlistment for general service mean?

[bigjarofwasps]

I came across the below paragraph whilst researching something else and am curious as to what enlistment for general service mean? Does it suggest that a man enlisting could be sent to any arm of the army, unless they requested enlistment in a specific regiment/corps?

 

 

The men of the AHC had been initially recruited from soldiers in infantry regiments. This was in accordance with the Royal Warrant of 22 February 1875, which specified that the ranks of the Corps will be filled by Non-commissioned officers or soldiers volunteering from the ranks of the army, or by recruits whose enlistment for General Service may be authorized by the Secretary of State, with a view to their undergoing a course of probation at the Royal Victoria Hospital Netley, (later replaced by the Depôt and Training School Aldershot), preparatory to their being transferred to the Army hospital Corps, if deemed eligible for service therein.

[peter monahan]

It means these men agreed to and were eligible for foreign service, as opposed to home service or limited service with the territorials. This was a hang over from the Napoleonic period when Volunteers and Fencible units were recruited who only agreed to serve withing they United Kingdom.  Those units then became a source of recruits for the regualr army but the new recruits had to agree to 'general' service.  I suspect it became the cutom to include the phrase as a legal safe guard, even when the recruiots were clearly regulars and hence expected to go where sent.

[paul wood]

I believe it was used in India somewhat later as some Indian troops had deep religious problems about travelling overseas.

Pal

[bigjarofwasps]

Cheers guys that's great!!!

[peter monahan]

Paul, you are correct about the Indian units too.  High caste Hindus did not cross the Kala Pani [black water] if they could avoid it and had to pay a priest for an expensive ritual cleansing afterwards if they did.

In fact the Indian Mutiny, now referred to by some as 'The First Indian War of Independence', was at least partly an industrial dispute, with strong cultural overtones!  The HEIC had cancelled the field allowance - 'batta' - for service in Burma, as it was no longer considered 'foreign service' but Brahmins, who already saw their caste priviliges under attack, still had to pay to be purified.  That, some prosletyizing by English missionaries and the better known 'cow fat/pork fat on cartridges' rumour were the proximate causes on the outbreak.