British Executions
Julian Putkowski
Families were usually emotionally traumatised and unable to discover details about the military trials that sentenced their men to death and wartime press censorship successfully limited public knowledge of executions. Even after the war, when the death sentence was abolished for all offences except murder and mutiny, official secrecy was maintained, thereby postponing independent scrutiny of individual cases for three-quarters of a century.
At least half of the 306 men executed for military offences by the British Army during the First World War served in what was called the “Ypres Salient”. Of those who were court-martialled and executed I wish to dwell on three cases whose stories draw attention to issues which deserve to be better acknowledged by the British Government, military historians and the authors who write much of the literature sold to those who visit the battlefields and cemeteries in the Westhoek and on the Western Front.
As the stories of Private's Nelson, Gore and McColl demonstrate, courts martial did not regard stress, whether from battle or personal problems, brutality or bullying, as a mitigating factor and that medical appraisal of defendants was either minimal or non-existent.
Furthermore, courts typically only took twenty minutes to find 90% of defendants guilty as charged. This activity was made easier by the fact that the overwhelming majority of the accused was ill educated, inarticulate and inexperienced in self-advocacy and invariably under great stress.
The opinions of confirming officers were invariably critical, even when unsupported by evidence; there was no way in which a condemned man could challenge their fatal prejudices.
The story of Gunner Casey demonstrates that occasionally deserters benefited from the good humour of a senior commander.
What was achieved by these killings? If it was to halt the remorseless rise in the number of desertions, then there is little sign it had any demonstrable effect. Did the executions improve morale or at least halt a decline in morale? Not to any statistically discernible extent. Was the practice in any military sense, necessary? That depends on whom you consult. Conservative historians, militarists and men from the Ministry of Defence fearing claims for financial compensation regularly conjure up justifications for these killings.
But if you ask the grief stricken families what they feel about the matter, then or now, you might be told about what I suppose may be called the human “collateral damage” which is largely ignored by Britain’s military establishment. These families endured years of hardship and emotional torment, sometimes for decades withholding the cause of their grief from brothers and sisters.
The families of soldiers who were never sentenced to death may able to draw a comfort from the unsullied reputations and display campaign medals awarded to those who died an “honourable” death on a battlefield, even if it was really an unreported suicide, alcohol poisoning, drowning in mud, or the outcome of some general’s tactical blunder.
There is no similarly comforting cloak of ambiguity about the deaths of the executed men.
Pte. William Nelson
When soldiers charged with capital offences made reference to their nerves being poor they generally attributed their overwrought condition to the effects of shellfire or battle stress. However, domestic stress was no less difficult to bear and even if officers believed what they were told by an anguished defendant, the complainant ran the danger of being regarded as innately weak and unmanly.
In July of 1916, Private William Nelson, 14 Battalion Durham Light Infantry was arrested in Poperinge for being absent without leave. Facing a possible death sentence without legal assistance or the support of a prisoner's friend, Nelson had pleaded not guilty to the charge.
Nelson's defence consisted of a brief statement:
“I have had a lot of trouble at home, and my nerves are badly upset. My father is a prisoner in Germany and is losing his eyesight there through bad treatment. My mother died while I was still in England, leaving my sister aged 13 and my brother aged 10. I am the only one left. I had to leave them in charge of a neighbour. I had no intention of deserting. I did not realise what I was doing when I left the camp. When I did so I went and gave myself up. When I went to the store my object was to get a night's sleep and then go and surrender in the morning. I thought it was too late to do so that night. I did not know when the battalion was coming out of the trenches.”
The court was unimpressed by his physical and emotional woes. After they had found him guilty, details of Nelson’s service and his disciplinary record were recounted. During 1916 he had twice previously faced courts-martial. Nelson’s case was complicated by the fact that he was wounded in the hand during the Battle of Loos on 26 September 1915. Although there was no evidence to support the inference that his wound had been self-inflicted, the accusation severely damaged his character in the eyes of the court.
Nelson’s battalion commander, Lieutenant Colonel Menzies, declared that the convicted man's character was "Bad from a fighting point of view," but that he did not feel that an example needed to be made of Nelson in order to act as a deterrent to other soldiers in 14 Durham Light Infantry because the performance and morale of the unit was "Very Good.”
Ignoring Nelson’s explanations for his nervous distress, Haig confirmed that Nelson had no further military value. The Assistant Provost Marshal, 6 Division was ordered to arrange for the twenty year-old soldier to be executed by firing squad at 4 a.m. on 11 August. For reasons which remain unclear, the fatal volley was not discharged until 5.15 a.m. Nelson’s remains were later buried in the British military cemetery at Acheux.
Pte. Frederick Gore
Pte. Frederick Gore enlisted in East Kent Regiment on 9 December 1914 and was drafted overseas to join 7 Battalion in mid-1916. On 31 July 1917, as part of 18 Division 7 battalion, East Kents took part in the in the Battle of Pilckem Ridge. Amongst the reinforcements ordered to replace those killed, wounded and maddened by the bloody attack on Glencorse Copse was Pte. Gore. On the morning of 10 August, Gore and his party of his comrades were ordered to leave Dickebusch Huts Camp to join B Company, 7 East Kent Regiment at Railway Dugouts. Instead, Gore went absent without leave and was arrested in Boulogne for desertion.
Gore was undefended and pleaded not guilty to desertion. He had never previously been arraigned before a court martial and appears to have intervened very little in the proceedings until the final part of the trial. He then submitted an uncertainly written statement to the court. It read:
"The reason why I deserted my Battalion because I cannot stand the strain of the shellfire owning to the very bad state of my nerves. I have been to the Medical Officer and he said nothing could be done for me and I have always tryed my best to carry out my duty: Before I came to France, where I have been for 15 months, I was rejected for service abroad owing to my nerves. I am sorry to think this has happened after my 3 years in the service."
The court found Gore guilty and sentenced him to death. Before the proceedings were forwarded for confirmation, Gore's disciplinary record was attached. It noted that there had been four occasions on which his battalion commander had punished the soldier for minor offenses, including 12 July for "Leaving his Coy. trench without permission until found on step of a dugout of another trench." For this offence, on 18 July Gore was sentenced to 28 days' Field Punishment No.1. So, unlike most of his comrades, Gore had not enjoyed a rest after a spell in the trenches at the end of July.
On 10 October Sir Douglas Haig examined Gore's case and confirmed the death sentence upon the soldier. Captain P. Cazenove, the Assistant Provost Marshal of 18 Division, supervised the soldier’s execution in Poperinge on 16 October. Gore’s corpse was later buried in the town's New Military Cemetery
Pte. Charles McColl
Charles McColl was a shipyard plater and therefore exempt from military service but he joined the army voluntarily on 7 September 1914. He was tried by Field General Court Martial on a number of occasions but the final, fatal proceedings took place at Brandhoek on 21 December 1917 for being absent without leave.
McColl explained to the court:
”I was brought out of the guard room before going up to the line & was in a weak condition. This was about 26.10.17. We marched up to Marsoin Farm. I had complaints brought on by shellfire. I have heart failure & nervousness. I have been with this Bn. 6 months but only reported sick once. I always shake from head to foot when we go into the trenches . . Since coming to this bn. I have tried to do my best.”
Unfortunately, while he had been stationed in Britain, McColl’s best efforts had not been very good. During 1915 he had been found guilty of a series of offences which included: stealing eggs, missing parades, being drunk, failing to buy a railway ticket and three minor absences without leave. Furthermore, McColl had been convicted for going AWOL twice in 1917, the second time resulting in 90 days Field Punishment No. 1.
A more severe punishment for the absence he had committed in December was inevitable and the court sentenced McColl to death. Field Marshal Haig did not confirm McColl’s sentence until 21 December, but preparations to shoot the soldier were set in motion well before hand and McColl was collected and transported to Ieper Prison.
Of the doomed man himself, Sergeant Len Cavinder later concluded:
“He was subnormal actually. He was unstable. There was something wrong with him… I realised that you couldn’t get him to slope arms correctly, and all that sort of thing. He wasn’t simple but he was slow.”
Cavinder also witnessed McColl’s execution and carried out his burial:
“They took him round the corner of the cell to the wall… They strapped him on a chair, that was it, with his hands behind the back of the chair. And there he sat until one of our officers gave the order ‘Fire’, and that was it…”
On McColl’s burial, Cavinder recalled:
“It was December and the yard was frost hard, icy, frosty, and… I could only get lumps of clay… we covered him, and I mimicked the parson, saying ‘Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.’ Where was the parson?”
Gunner William Casey
On 19 August 1917, 19-year old Gunner William Casey, aged 19 married Margaret Connor, a 21-year old spinster at St. Mary’s Catholic, Newcastle upon Tyne. The bride was eight months’ pregnant with their child and Gunner William Casey had overstayed his leave in order to ensure that the baby would be born legitimate.
On returning to his Royal Field Artillery unit, which was attached to 8 Army Corps, Casey was tried by Field General Court Martial. His punishment for what was a capital offence remains unknown but his illiterate wife persuaded her mother to write a letter to Casey’s commanding officer, pleading for clemency. The letter was read out to the court and when the proceedings were drawn to the attention of General Sir Aylmer Hunter Weston, the Corps commander, he found the whole business absolutely hilarious.
He wrote to Margaret Casey:
“Allow me as the commander of the ArmyCorps in which your husband is serving to send you a cheque with which to buy a wedding present… In my official capacity, your husband’s Court-Martial happened to come to my notice, & though of course his commanding officer had no option but to try him for the very heinous offence of being absent without leave & the Court Martial on the evidence had no other course but to condemn him and sentence him to severe punishment, yet, I am glad to say, it has been possible to commute the sentence and suspend its execution. So your Husband will not be punished. I rejoice that when he was forced with the necessity of committing a fault, your Husband had no hesitation in choosing that fault which would bring punishment to him and not to you. You fully realise, I hope, that in coming home thus to marry you he ran a very great risk of being found guilty of desertion & being shot; so he faced death for your sake . . .”
Julian Putkowski
Julian Putkowski is a historian and works as a researcher and university lecturer. He is the author, with Julian Sykes, of "Shot at Dawn", the standard reference work about soldiers executed under the British Army Act in the First World War (1989). With Douglas Gill he wrote "Le Camp britannique d'Etaples" (The British Camp at Etaples, 1997). Other books include "The Kinmel Park Camp Riots 1919" (1989) and "British Army Mutineers 1914-1922" (1998). The award winning BBC series "The Monocled Mutineer" was based on his research. With Piet Chielens he wrote the bilingual guide to the Unquiet Graves tour and together they will publish later this year "Unquiet Graves. Executions during the First World War in Flanders" (Francis Boutle Publishers).
This is a summary of an address given at the "Unquiet Graves" International Conference on Executions held in Flanders in May 2000.
