REISENLETIER, Gordon

Family Name:

Reisenletier

Given Names:

Gordon

Gender:

Male

Birth-date:

Unknown

Death-date:

Unknown

Marital Status:

Unknown, probably single

Age Range:

Early 20s

Location:

QLD, Townsville

Occupation:

Bricklayers Labourer

Primary Motivation:

Pacifism, Religious

Reason for Court Appearance:

[1] Application for exemption from full military duties

[2] Appeal against not being registered as a conscientious objector.

[3] Failed to obey a call-up notice and refused to enter into a recognizance to obey a future call-up notice

Court Name and Location:

[1] Magistrates Court, Ipswich

[2] District Court, Brisbane

Court Hearing Date:

[1] 17 August 1967

[2] January 1968

[3] 25 November 1969

Court Outcome:

[1] Refused application to be registered as a conscientious objector

[2] Exemption from combatant military duties only

[3] Sentenced and jailed for the mandatory two years

Military Event:

Vietnam War and National Service 1964-1972

Further Information:

Gordon Reisenleiter was a 21-year-old from Wulguru Caravan Park in Townsville, Queensland. He was a Jehovah’s Witness and a brick layers labourer. He registered for National Service in January 1967. On 17 August 1967, the Stipendiary Magistrate at the Ipswich Court refused his application to be fully exempt from all military duties as a conscientious objector. It was common to exempt Jehovah’s Witnesses as they belong to an ’historic peace church’. Gordon was motivated in his application as a pacifist to all forms of military service. He appealed the decision, and it was heard before a judge of the District Court in Brisbane during January 1968. The Judge granted Gordon exemption from combatant military duties only. Non-combatant military service was against the teaching of his church.

Gordon failed to comply with a call-up notice on 1 October 1968. After he refused to enter into a recognizance to obey a future call-up notice. He was convicted and sentenced to two years jail in Stuart Prison, Townsville. Magistrate FJ Henderson stated that he did not have any discretion in the sentencing, but that he must impose two years jail. Before being sentenced Gordon had informed the court, he wanted nothing to do with the army. He said, I would be fighting against God’s laws and principles. It is a Christian’s duty to maintain peace.

Malcolm Dickson a Sydney Schoolteacher, who visited Gordon in prison during January 1969, reported that, he appears to be well cared for by his friends and relatives and is treated w ell by the prison authorities. Whilst in prison Gordon was employed in the gardens outside the prison compound and was permitted to write one letter per week and received unlimited inward mail. He was also allowed five visitors a week. Dickson wrote that Gordon, …seems content to accept the two-year sentence as God’s will, and has pledged himself to spread God’s work in gaol…Being a Jehovah’s Witness, he does not recognise the ‘National Service Act’ and was anxious that I should not involve his name in any political campaign or in any newspaper. He was released on 27 February 1970, having served 15 months of his two-year sentence. He again stated that he had been treated well in prison and that he would do the same thing again if he was forced to Prison had not changed his beliefs that killing was wrong.

Confirmatory Sources:

Peacemaker, November/ December 1968, p.1; November/ December 1969, p.8; January/ February 1970, p.1; March/ April 1970. P6; March/ April 1971, p.11; May/ June/ July/ August 1971.p.11.

Bobbie Oliver, Hell No! We Wont Go: Resistance to Conscription in Post War Australia, Interventions, Melbourne, 2022.