children, I would not go through three more such sights for £1000.
The experience of these men is interesting because it would appear from King’s Regulations (K.R. 482) that:
An offender in arrest or confinement is not to be required to perform any duty beyond handing over any cash, stores, or accounts for which he may be responsible, or fatigue orders on board ship, and he is not to bear arms except by order of his Commanding Officer, in an emergency or on the line of march.
† † †
Private William Holmes of the 12th Battalion, London Regiment, recalled an execution in 1917 of two soldiers where the condemned were to be executed by members of their own company and the composition of the firing squad was decided by the drawing of lots:
Those that were drawn out – four of them – knew what they had to do at 8 o’clock the next morning. They felt as I would have done; terrified, almost sick with the whole thought of it. They were going to go and shoot their own mates. But there you are, we had to have discipline.
There were occasions when the condemned man was viewed by his peers as deserving to be shot and in this situation individuals may have been more willing to take part. Although there might be personal sympathy for the man concerned, as was the case with Private Holmes, such feelings were tempered on occasions by the view that there could be no excuse, as every soldier knew that they were going to fight and what the likely consequences of committing certain offences could be.
The majority, however, like Corporal Alan Bray (Arthur, 2002), had strong feelings that Englishmen should not be shooting other Englishmen, as they were in France to fight Germans. Bray wrote that in this instance he knew that the condemned man had lost his nerve to the extent that he could not have returned to the front line. In these cases personal sympathy was based upon shared service and experiences, friendship, and an understanding of the particular circumstances and issues faced by the individual concerned, leading them to conclude that the sentence was just not justified.
Private Stephen Graham (2009) has given an eye-witness account of the execution of Private Isaac Reid, of the 2nd Scots Guards on 9 April 1915. On this occasion, volunteers from the regiment had been asked to form the firing squad but none had been forthcoming, and so the battalion snipers were ordered to do it. Graham makes the comment that the lack of volunteers reflected the fact that nobody actually believed that Private Reid had disgraced the regiment.
Thurtle, in his letter No.5, includes an extract from an ex-private of the East Kent Regiment, who expressed his view that he should not have been part of the firing squad at the execution of a man whom he referred to as ‘a chum of mine’.
† † †
Sometimes these approaches to raising a firing squad were not always successful, as Captain Stormont-Gibbs of the 4th Suffolks discovered when he received an order to form a firing party for the execution of Private Benjamin Hart of the 1/4th Suffolk Regiment on 6 February 1917, who had been sentenced for the offence of desertion:
I sent a chit to OC companies to supply a few men each – wondering what would happen. As I expected everyone refused to do it and I wasn’t going to press the company commanders on the subject. I rang up Brigade and had a rather heated conversation about it and finally the poor chap was shot by someone else – perhaps a well-fed APM …
It should be noted in passing that Hart had been a habitual deserter, and knowing this, Stormont-Gibbs had made him his servant to keep him out of the front line, but he had deserted again and so this officer was being asked to form a firing squad for someone that he would have known reasonably well.
Captain Slack, MC, of the 1/4th Battalion East Yorkshire Regiment recalled in his memoirs an occasion in 1916 when he had to select a subaltern and ten men to form a firing
The experience of these men is interesting because it would appear from King’s Regulations (K.R. 482) that:
An offender in arrest or confinement is not to be required to perform any duty beyond handing over any cash, stores, or accounts for which he may be responsible, or fatigue orders on board ship, and he is not to bear arms except by order of his Commanding Officer, in an emergency or on the line of march.
† † †
Private William Holmes of the 12th Battalion, London Regiment, recalled an execution in 1917 of two soldiers where the condemned were to be executed by members of their own company and the composition of the firing squad was decided by the drawing of lots:
Those that were drawn out – four of them – knew what they had to do at 8 o’clock the next morning. They felt as I would have done; terrified, almost sick with the whole thought of it. They were going to go and shoot their own mates. But there you are, we had to have discipline.
There were occasions when the condemned man was viewed by his peers as deserving to be shot and in this situation individuals may have been more willing to take part. Although there might be personal sympathy for the man concerned, as was the case with Private Holmes, such feelings were tempered on occasions by the view that there could be no excuse, as every soldier knew that they were going to fight and what the likely consequences of committing certain offences could be.
The majority, however, like Corporal Alan Bray (Arthur, 2002), had strong feelings that Englishmen should not be shooting other Englishmen, as they were in France to fight Germans. Bray wrote that in this instance he knew that the condemned man had lost his nerve to the extent that he could not have returned to the front line. In these cases personal sympathy was based upon shared service and experiences, friendship, and an understanding of the particular circumstances and issues faced by the individual concerned, leading them to conclude that the sentence was just not justified.
Private Stephen Graham (2009) has given an eye-witness account of the execution of Private Isaac Reid, of the 2nd Scots Guards on 9 April 1915. On this occasion, volunteers from the regiment had been asked to form the firing squad but none had been forthcoming, and so the battalion snipers were ordered to do it. Graham makes the comment that the lack of volunteers reflected the fact that nobody actually believed that Private Reid had disgraced the regiment.
Thurtle, in his letter No.5, includes an extract from an ex-private of the East Kent Regiment, who expressed his view that he should not have been part of the firing squad at the execution of a man whom he referred to as ‘a chum of mine’.
† † †
Sometimes these approaches to raising a firing squad were not always successful, as Captain Stormont-Gibbs of the 4th Suffolks discovered when he received an order to form a firing party for the execution of Private Benjamin Hart of the 1/4th Suffolk Regiment on 6 February 1917, who had been sentenced for the offence of desertion:
I sent a chit to OC companies to supply a few men each – wondering what would happen. As I expected everyone refused to do it and I wasn’t going to press the company commanders on the subject. I rang up Brigade and had a rather heated conversation about it and finally the poor chap was shot by someone else – perhaps a well-fed APM …
It should be noted in passing that Hart had been a habitual deserter, and knowing this, Stormont-Gibbs had made him his servant to keep him out of the front line, but he had deserted again and so this officer was being asked to form a firing squad for someone that he would have known reasonably well.
Captain Slack, MC, of the 1/4th Battalion East Yorkshire Regiment recalled in his memoirs an occasion in 1916 when he had to select a subaltern and ten men to form a firing
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