{"id":325,"date":"2015-07-27T14:57:41","date_gmt":"2015-07-27T14:57:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/ten-surprizing-laws-passed-in-ww1\/"},"modified":"2022-04-30T11:49:14","modified_gmt":"2022-04-30T11:49:14","slug":"ten-surprizing-laws-passed-in-ww1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/?p=325","title":{"rendered":"Ten surprizing Laws passed in WW1"},"content":{"rendered":"

The outbreak of war in 1914 brought many new rules and regulations to Britain. The most important of these was the Defence of the Realm Act (DORA), passed on 8 August 1914 \u2018for securing public safety\u2019.\u00a0<\/span>DORA gave the government the power to prosecute anybody whose actions were deemed to \u2018jeopardise the success of the operations of His Majesty\u2019s forces or to assist the enemy\u2019. This gave the act a very wide interpretation. It regulated virtually every aspect of the British home front and was expanded as the war went on.\u00a0<\/span>Here are a few of the surprising measures introduced by DORA – some of which still affect life in Britain today.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

1.\u00a0Whistling<\/strong>.\u00a0Whistling for London taxis was banned in case it should be mistaken for an air raid warning.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

2.\u00a0Loitering.<\/strong>\u00a0People were forbidden to loiter near bridges and tunnels or to light bonfires.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

3.\u00a0Clocks Go Forward<\/strong>.\u00a0British Summer Time was instituted in May 1916 to maximise working hours in the day, particularly in agriculture.<\/span><\/p>\n

4.\u00a0Drinking<\/strong>.\u00a0Claims that war production was being hampered by drunkenness led to pub opening times and alcohol strength being reduced. The \u2018No treating order\u2019 also made it an offence to buy drinks for others.<\/span><\/p>\n

5.\u00a0Drugs<\/strong>.\u00a0Possession of cocaine or opium, other than by authorised professionals such as doctors, became a criminal offence.<\/span><\/p>\n

6\u00a0Blackouts<\/strong>.\u00a0A blackout was introduced in certain towns and cities to protect against air raids.<\/span><\/p>\n

7.\u00a0Press Censorship<\/strong>.\u00a0Press censorship was introduced, severely limiting the reporting of war news. Many publications were also banned.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

8.\u00a0Postal Censorship<\/strong>.\u00a0Private correspondence was also censored. Military censors examined 300,000 private telegrams in 1916 alone.<\/span><\/p>\n

9.\u00a0White Flour.<\/strong>\u00a0Fines were issued for making white flour instead of wholewheat and for allowing rats to invade wheat stores. Further restrictions on food production eventually led to the introduction of rationing in 1918.<\/span><\/p>\n

10.\u00a0Foreign Nationals.<\/strong>\u00a0DORA put restrictions on the movement of foreign nationals from enemy countries. The freedom of such \u2018aliens\u2019 was severely restricted, with many interned.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The outbreak of war in 1914 brought many new rules and regulations to Britain. The most important of these was the Defence of the Realm Act (DORA), passed on 8 August 1914 \u2018for securing public safety\u2019.\u00a0DORA gave the government the power to prosecute anybody whose actions were deemed to \u2018jeopardise the success of the operations … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,10031],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-325","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-statistics","category-stats"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=325"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33842,"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325\/revisions\/33842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=325"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=325"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ww1hull.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=325"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}