Pte Highgate's case shows the difficulties of judging past decisions by current standards. His trial, hasty and one sided by civilian standards, was conducted in line with emergency wartime military procedures.
Death sentences had to be approved by the commander-in-chief, who was expected - required even - to take the prevailing military situation into account. And that situation was, by 5 September, that the British Expeditionary Force had lost 20, men - nearly a quarter of its strength - killed, wounded, missing and unaccounted for.
Orders from the top said "stragglers" without a good story would face "severe punishment". On a personal level for Pte Highgate, it is rather more complex. The year-old, who joined the army in early , had a poor military record, including previous absences. He had even served 42 days imprisonment for desertion - but was only caught when he tried to join a different army unit closer to one of his brothers. A medical report just weeks before war began found he suffered from confusion and memory lapses, possibly related to contracting yellow fever while serving on a ship.
The family, which lived in extreme poverty, moved between Shoreham and the fringes of London. Thomas, and two of his brothers who also died at the front, are included on a memorial in Sidcup. But Terence Highgate insists he should also be remembered in Shoreham. Call to rewrite France WWI records. Campaign for soldiers shot at dawn. Shot at dawn, pardoned 90 years on. Shoreham And District Historical Society. While approximately soldiers, including several Canadians, were executed by the British Army during the First World War, this sentence was not carried out by the Australian Army.
After the dreadful bombardments of Pozieres in , absence without leave increased alarmingly and some senior Australian officers argued that Australian soldiers should face the same penalties that applied in the British Army. However, the general feeling, both at home in Australia as well as of those serving, was against inflicting the death penalty on men who had volunteered to fight in a cause not primarily their own.
The Australian Imperial Force AIF instead had to rely on the leadership and example of its officers, the tone and esprit de corps of its men, and alternative penalties, including the publication of lists of offenders in Australian newspapers. The death penalty was abolished in by the Death Penalty Abolition Act ; however the Commonwealth Defence Act clause allowing for the death penalty was only officially superseded two years later by the Defence Force Re-organization Act The padre mumbled some words and then went off to eat.
Two six-strong platoons appeared, lined up with their backs to the firing posts. The guns lay on the ground. When the condemned had been attached, the men of the platoon who had not been able to see events, responding to a silent gesture,. The men marched right passed them, without inspecting their weapons, without turning a head.
No military compliments, no parade, no music, no march past; a hideous death without drums or trumpets. Whether these men will ever receive a posthumous pardon is open to speculation. It is said by the government that the evidence required to go down this route simply does not exist after all these years.
It may well be that a blanket pardon for all men is not justified as some of. The actual legal status of court martials has also been questioned. The accused did not have access to a formal legal representative who could defend him. The night before an execution, a condemned man had the right to petition the King for clemency but none ever did which suggests that none were aware that they had this right. On January 13th , General Routine Order was issued which basically reversed the belief of being innocent until found guilty.
Under , a soldier was guilty until sufficient evidence could be provided to prove his innocence. Immediately after the war, there were claims that the executions of soldiers was a class issue.
James Crozier was found guilty of deserting his post and was shot. In the duration of the war, fifteen officers, sentenced to death, received a royal pardon.
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