Canada v Australia?
Two colonial military perspectives are contrasted here. The research of Andrew Godefroy, a Canadian army officer, who closely studied the 25 Canadian execution is given prominence. This is critically examined. We then contrast this with the independent view of Rob Ruggenberg, a professional Dutch journalist. He takes an anecdotal look at the Australian experience where the death penalty was forbidden. This, despite the fact 113 Australians were sentenced to death. To what extent did discipline suffer in the absence of the death penalty?
"Before them were the German shells, the machine guns and the floods of gas. Behind them, if their courage failed, was the court martial… a grim and hideous sentence of death." [Cannon Frederick George Scott. Anglican Padre 1st Canadian Division]
Two hundred and sixteen Canadian soldiers were sentenced to death by the British Military Authorities and of these; twenty-five finally resulted in execution. On four occasions, the Canadian High Command wasn’t even informed until after the executions. The records of these twenty-five cases, mostly for desertion, have inexplicably disappeared. What information that has been made public is suspect. One is thus left to speculate that the authorities never wanted the truth to come out at all.
Indeed, the British War Office, at least were warned as early as 1919 by Brigadier General Sir Wyndham Childs, who was mindful of British public and parliamentary hostility to the death penalty, that, “…it can confidently be stated that the effect on this country of a death penalty might lead to an agitation which might be difficult to control and in all probability would jeopardise the prospects of maintaining the death penalty for military offences in time of peace…”
We now know, of course, that the official records then contained sensitive information that could have damaged more than just any prospect of continuing with the death penalty. The legitimacy of the courts martial system and ultimately the High Command, would have been open to severe question. Little wonder that the records were classified as “secret” and were intended to be covered-up for one hundred years!
The lack of Canadian records has lead to an historical dilemma best exemplified in the research of Andrew Godefroy. His book, “For Freedom and Honour”, is a study of the sparse detail of the execution of Canadian volunteers. Because of this deficiency of evidence he concludes that we will never know what really happened. Importantly, this negative conclusion does not exclude the possibility that justice may have been denied to those who were shot. Two were executed for inexplicably murdering a fellow soldier. There was no proof of malice. In the case of Trooper Alexander Butler, a veteran of good character, he was clearly deranged. The court picked this up and recommended mercy even though the doctors failed to diagnose anything wrong. Haig would have none of it and had Butler promptly shot.
But Godefroy can bridge this historical dilemma when he defends the Canadian government reports as being reliable. He rejects any claim that these records might be tainted because his cross-references agree. These, however, are of a fairly mundane nature like personal facts and military career. What he cannot square is the actual court record – what was said, by whom, about exactly what had happened? He agrees this is open to speculation yet rejects any possibility by concluding the government reports, “…are among the best documents concerning… the twenty-five men.” This is somewhat different from saying they are largely the only documents available.
An important clue as to the origin of the government report might give cause for concern and lead one the believe it is far less reliable than Godefroy would have us think.
What were the circumstances? Apparently, in 1922 an opposition member of the Canadian House of Commons was going to “stir up” the issue of the high percentage of French Canadian executions. Sir Arthur Currie, Principal of McGill University, had got wind of this and sent a “private and confidential” letter warning the Chief of the General Staff in Ottawa advising him to prepare brief details of each execution.
The purpose for this was two-fold. First, it was to enable “some members of Parliament” to speak with conviction and knowledge. Second, and more important, “The point must be stressed is this: that no man was shot without a fair trial…” Currie wanted a confidential memorandum to back his claim of fairness. Thus, critics would be at a distinct disadvantage.
This is the same Lieutenant General Sir Arthur Currie, who was formerly the Commander-in-Chief of the Canadian Corps when twelve men were shot under his command. The government report is nothing more than a clever piece of political propaganda to defeat potential criticism. It is clear from this that the report would have been a partial interpretation of events and that was achieved by omitting details from the courts martial proceedings. Unsurprisingly, when Currie’s own involvement is mentioned in the report, it is mostly humanitarian. According to Godefroy, Currie was known for his personal integrity. But why should he act so defensively suggesting another side to his character?
In the case of Russian-born Dimitro Sinizki of the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division, we find the author expressing concern. Yet, according to the government, this case is, “…one of the worst cases occurring in the Canadian Corps.”, Godefroy rejects this view, as well as the need for an execution, and concludes Sinizki (variously spelt) was shot for a narrower military but wider political purpose. The Russian Revolution had just taken place. Russian troops in the French Army had mutinied. The Canadian Corps had faced a potentially similar problem and transferred many of its Russian-born troops away from the front line and into labour and railway battalions. Sinizki’s execution, the only one for cowardice, could serve as both and example and warning. It mattered not one jot that he had no influence over these other external matters.
Another example where, “Arguably, an otherwise decent man was shot.”, is that concerning Lance-Bombardier Frederick S. Arnold, who, "unfortunately ...was tried by the British. ...who showed no leniency." An American citizen and seasoned soldier of good conduct, Arnold had served in the US 4th Cavalry, US Navy and US Marine Corps before joining the 1st Brigade, Canadian Field Artillery in 1914. He was one of the first to go overseas and once in France fought at Festubert and Givenchy. He was admitted to hospital three times. On the third occasion he spent four months in hospital suffering from shell-shock. Within two weeks of his discharge, he went missing on 5 June 1916 for a few days before being arrested in civilian clothes. For this, his first offence, he was tried and shot for desertion and only then were the Canadian High Command told. Godefroy concludes, "Arnold did not deserve a death sentence by any means, especially if he was only absent for a few days." Quite apart from any sense of justice, one might wonder where was Haig's sense of mercy for the sick?
In Godefroy' opinion, a perfect case to support the question of "pardons" is that of Company Quarter Master Sergeant William Alexander. He was born in England in 1880. After eight years with the British Army he emigrated to Canada and managed the Auto Tire & Vulcanizing Co, in Calgary. With the outbreak of war he joined the 10th (Alberta) Battalion at Valcartier Camp. As a consequence of his military experience he was made a Colour-Sergeant but on the reorganisation of the battalion reverted to that of Sergeant. Another of the first to go overseas, he reached France in February 1915. He was heavily involved in the Second Battle of Ypres. Canadian losses were extremely high. He went on to fight at Festubert and Mount Sorrel and the Somme. The 10th, or the "Old Red Patch", were considered "elite assault troops". The 1st. Division had never been beaten which held true at Vimy and Arleux. The attack on Hill 70 in August 1917, however, was to prove fatal for Alexander. Not at the hands of the enemy, but his comrades.
During the course of these battles, Alexander, had behaved "exceptionally well". Briefly absent through sickness a couple of times he was eventually hospitalised with a swollen knee. On discharge he joined his comrades for the attack on the well-fortified Hill 70. Previously, two British Divisions had been annihilated on its slopes. Although successful in taking the Hill, three hundred men, almost half the unit, were down. They were then ordered to attack the Quarry the following day. By then they were down to less than 130 men. Next, Alexander, as a platoon sergeant in D Company, was ordered to lead an attack on Chalk Quarry. When zero hour came he was missing and a corporal led instead. After twenty minutes vicious fighting and repeated counter-attacks by the Germans, the position was won. The 10th came out of the line having suffered 400 casualties and won more than 80 awards for bravery, including a posthumous Victoria Cross.
Two days later, Alexander was found in a village where the battalion had previously been billeted before the attack. He said he had been knocked down by a shell but had no visible injuries. He admitted he had not gone sick nor had he reported to a superior officer, but instead had gone back to where his battalion had been billeted. He had fought tenaciously with daring and courage under hellish conditions for thirty-three months, but in the end it counted for nothing. He was placed under arrest and one month later charged with desertion, sentenced to death and shot.
Cannon Frederick George Scott was in a state of shock and the military authorities, probably feeling shamed, informed his kith and kin he had been killed in action. When eventually they did tell the family the truth, his brother in Winnipeg wrote back saying,
"But my lot was even worse than that, to be shot like a spy and a traitor to his country, that was the lot for my brother, even in death. He is still my brother and his noble spirit will live forever with me even in death, and his death was awful to be shot like a dog. ...May the Lord have mercy on the man who judged him, if he was wrong."
It should be noted that Godefroy has inhibitions in only one or two cases. Otherwise, he accepts the inevitability of the death penalty which is conditioned by its own peculiar circumstances of battle. At only one time, near the end of the war, does he suggest the executions resulted in fewer cases of desertion, but this is confined to just one battalion. He further argues that "leniency" in the Canadian courts even allowed the worst soldiers to escape execution and that those that did die at dawn were, "...victims of timing, place and circumstance." Is there not a contradiction here? Wouldn't this element of leniency have worked in the opposite direction of setting an example resulting in more desertions?
As a career soldier it should come as no surprise that Godefroy backs the Generals who have been “unfairly” blamed. They are merely the tools that carry out government policies. After all, wasn’t Lloyd George in charge? He is, nonetheless, torn in another direction and wishes to see the Canadians pardoned. This, in part, results from his open antipathy to the British officer class who were largely insensitive to the circumstances of Canadian soldiers. The British may have had an execution quota, but not the Canadians.
He also concedes that there was a general lack of standardised procedures or supervision and that unauthorised decisions of the court officers contributed to the shooting of many servicemen, "...who might otherwise have been spared." Little wonder, that he should conclude that some volunteers were, "...bad eggs, some were in the wrong place at the wrong time and others were just plain unlucky." This was a justice plucked from the belly of hell!
This leads one to conclude, quite independently, that Haig had much to answer for. Was he not in a position to remedy many of the inherent faults in the system? Evidence suggests he was content with indifferent doctors, who, if called upon, could see nothing wrong with many prisoners facing death. Equally, he was satisfied with a diffident system of supervision of military courts. Each of which, silently connived within a reprehensive system characterised by very real injustice.
If the central issue of Godefroy’s research was to test the proposition that the death penalty was efficacious for discipline - he has failed. And he admits it! This should come as no surprise in view of the fact that so few Canadian records remain, and his study is confined within the Anglo-Canadian context. Had he gone further afield and looked at the Australian experience, for instance, he might have discovered evidence of a different kind.
His study is, nevertheless, a positive contribution to our knowledge of military executions. More important, it strikingly reveals the callous and brutal character of the British High Command whose decisions bordered on a black nightmare.
Unruly Aussies?
By Rob Ruggenberg
Until this very day military strategists impress on officers the value of discipline among the troops. Almost unanimously is the thought that only disciplined soldiers are ready for war. Undisciplined men won't fight well. They are nothing but disobedient troublemakers.
It seems that one of the great experiences of the First World War - and a true heritage of that Great War - is going to be forgotten. The Australian lesson is worth remembering - not only in Australia, and not only in military circuits.
The Australian lesson teaches that discipline has nothing to do with dedication, and very little with training. The keywords here are: collective discipline and individualism - words that sound like curses in the ears of many a commanding officer.
Reputation
In the First World War the Australian soldiers earned an outstanding reputation. They fought in many of the great theatres of war - Gallipoli, Damascus, Gaza, Somme (Pozières), Fromelles, Péronne, St. Eloi, and Ypres.
Right from the beginning, English officers complained about the undisciplined way the Australians behaved. Their officers and soldiers did not keep the necessary distance, they dressed improperly, even with nonchalance - some didn't even shave everyday. And some soldiers even dared to object if they had to carry out a task they did not like.
The rumours very soon reached the War Cabinet and the Prime Minister in London. It seemed obvious: with such slovenly troops you cannot win a war! So the War Cabinet sent Secretary, Sir Maurice Hankey to Gallipoli to investigate what was going on. Sir Maurice visited every corner of the peninsula and spent a good deal of time in the Australian trenches, even in the front line. He was deeply impressed and wrote to the Prime Minister:
"I do hope that we shall hear no more of the 'indiscipline' of these extraordinary Corps, for I don't believe that for military qualities of every kind their equal exists. Their physique is wonderful and their intelligence of a high order."
In France
At Gallipoli the Aussies landed on the wrong beach and suffered terrible casualties in a rugged and confined war theatre. But it was worse in France where, in hellish conditions, young men were led to pure slaughter. But there too, they fought like no one had ever seen before.
The Australians began to arrive in France from the Middle East in March 1916. At the end of that month Commander-in-Chief Field-Marshall Douglas Haig inspected the 2nd Division. Afterwards he wrote in his diary, ,
"The men were looking splendid, fine physique, very hard and determined-looking. The Australians are mad keen to kill Germans and to start doing it at once!"
The Australians had their first European battle experience on July 20th, in the Battle of the Somme. They took the village of Pozières. However, their claim to reach the Windmill proved untrue. Prompt German counter- attacks made their position very delicate. Haig wrote,
"The situation seems all very new and strange to Australian HQ. The fighting here and the shell-fire is much more severe than anything experienced at Gallipoli. The German, too, is a very different enemy from the Turk!"
The Australians, like their British comrades, were learning the art of war the hard way. They learned amazingly fast - and their morale stayed terrific. More than once Haig intervened personally when he thought the Aussies were going too fast.
Haig wrote in his diary,
"The Australians had said at the last moment that they would attack the Windmill again without artillery support and that ,'they did not believe machine-gun fire could do them much harm'. We arranged that the original artillery programme should be carried out. The Australians are splendid fellows but very ignorant."
Behaviour
But in the trenches their ignorance and innocence soon disappeared. An Australian soldier wrote home:
"There, dead lay everywhere. The deeper one dug the more bodies one exhumed. Hands and faces protruded from the slimy toppling walls of trenches. Knees, shoulders and buttocks poked from the foul morass..."
And the German learned to fear Australians, because they were reckless, ruthless - and revengeful. During Third Ypres, on October 3rd 1917, the Anzac's (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) met the Germans on high ground, in front of Polygoon Wood. That evening the official communiqué read,
"One Anzac Corps obtained all its objectives and took 3,900 prisoners. The other Anzac Corps took all its objectives and met the Prussian Guards who they had met before at Pozières on the Somme. This Corps took no prisoners."
But there are also accounts of downright cruelty - of even war crimes committed by Australians against the enemy. The British officer Robert Graves quotes (in Goodbye to all that, 1929) an anonymous Australian who told him,
"Well, the best joke I ever made was in Morlancourt, when we took it for the first time. There were a lot of Boches in a cellar, and I said to them: 'Come out lads!' So out they came, about twelve of them, with their hands up. 'Turn out your pockets!', I said to them. They turned out their pockets. Watches, gold, all 18 carat stuff. Then I said: 'And now back into that cellar, you bunch of scum!' Because I didn't need anything else with them. When they were all safe and well downstairs I threw six or so handgrenades after them. I had my capture and we took no prisoners that day.'
It is uncertain whether stories like this ever reached the staff. But they certainly contributed to the reputation of the Australian soldier.
Admiration
As the war continued Field-Marshall Haig's admiration for these notable soldiers grew, though they never ceased to puzzle him, as they did most British officers - and ordinary Tommies too.
During Third Ypres, Lieutenant P. King of the 2/5th Btn. East Lancashire Regiment, was stuck with a small left-over of his company in the mud near Poelcapelle. The men were exhausted, had been under constant fire for two days and desperate for relief. But no one seemed even to know that they were there.
LT. King already began to wonder whether his company had been secretly chosen to be a suicide force. King remarked.
"Suddenly, to my great surprise, I heard voices behind me and I looked back and there were three very tall figures, and one was actually smoking. I could hardly speak for astonishment. I said, 'Who the hell are you? And put that cigarette out, you'll draw fire!' He just looked back at me. 'Well, come to that, who are you?' I said, 'I'm Lieutenant King of the 2/5th East Lancashire Regiment.' At which he said: 'Well, we're the Aussies, chum, and we've come to relieve you.' And they jumped down into the shell- hole.
Well, naturally, we were delighted, but of course there are certain formalities you've always got to carry out when you hand over, and I was a bit worried about that. So I explained, 'There are no trenches to hand over, no rations, no ammunition, but I have got a map. Do you need any map references?' He said, 'Never mind about that, chum. Just fuck off.'
They didn't seem to be a bit bothered. The last I saw of them they were squatting down, rifles over their shoulders, and they were smoking, all three of them. Just didn't care!"
So much trouble
Behind the lines, the Australians had modes of behaviour which conflicted totally with their British counterparts. In February 1918 Haig wrote a letter to his wife,
"We have had to separate the Australians into Convalescent Camps of their own, because they were giving so much trouble when along with our men and put such revolutionary ideas into their heads."
Haig was convinced that far too many problems were caused by General Birdwood's relaxed disciplinary methods. Sir William Birdwood was an "Imperial" (English officer who commanded the Anzac Corps and later the Australian Corps), and he never found great favour in Haig's eyes.
The truth is that Birdwood was one of the very few senior British officers who possessed the rare "touch" to command Australians, and he was able to exploit their best qualities. One of the differences between Australian and other troops was that Aussie officers always explained the objectives before engaging in battle. Even ordinary soldiers knew the strategy that was behind it. If they became cut-off they still knew what the goal was and what to do. Unlike their British colleagues, common Australian soldiers were not treated like ignorant fools, but like individuals who will function better in a team when they know their collective aim.
The Australian lieutenant-General Sir John Monash, the successor of Birdwood, said,
"Very much and very stupid comment has been made upon the discipline of the Australian soldier. That was because the very conception and purpose of discipline have been misunderstood. It is, after all, only a means to an end, and that end is the power to secure co-ordinated action among a large number of individuals for the achievement of a definite purpose. It does not mean lip service, nor obsequious homage to superiors, nor servile observance of forms and customs, nor a suppression of individuality... the Australian Army is a proof that individualism is the best and not the worst foundation upon which to build up collective discipline."
Strazeele
An example of the clashes between the two conceptions is what happened at the camp in Strazeele (Belgium), where the Australians were encamped on the other side of the road from the 10th Royal Fusiliers. The Tommies were shocked and impressed by the Aussies' casual attitude to war - or at least to the Army. Tommies thought it hardly right for privates to address their commanding officer as 'Jack', but the Fusiliers heard them do so with their own ears.
For their part, the Australian 'Diggers' as they were often called, were equally disapproving of certain rites observed by the Fusiliers. As Private C. Miles of the 10th Btn. Royal Fusiliers recalled,
"The Colonel decided that he would have a full dress parade of the guard mounting. Well, the Aussies looked over at us amazed. The band was playing, we were all smartened up, spit and polish, on parade, and that happened every morning. We marched up and down, up and down.
The Aussies couldn't get over it, and when we were off duty we naturally used to talk to them, go over and have a smoke with them, or meet them when we were hanging about the road or having a stroll. They kept asking us: 'Do you like this sort of thing? All these parades, do you want to do it?' Of course we said, 'No, of course we don't. We're supposed to be on rest, and all the time we've got goes to posh up and turn out on parade.' So they looked at us a bit strangely and said, 'OK, cobbers, we'll soon alter that for you'.
The Australians didn't approve of it because they never polished or did anything. They had a band, but their brass instruments were all filthy. Still, they knew ho to play them.
The next evening, our Sergeant- Major was taking the parade. Sergeant- Major Rowbotham, a nice man, but a stickler for discipline. He was just getting ready to bawl us all out when the Australians started with their band. They marched up and down the road outside the field, playing any old thing. There was no tune you could recognise, they were just blowing as loud as they could on their instruments. It sounded like a million cat- calls.
And poor old Sergeant Rowbotham, he couldn't make his voice heard. It was an absolute fiasco. They never tried to mount another parade, because they could see the Aussies watching us from across the road, just ready to step in and sabotage the whole thing. So they decided that parades for mounting the guards should be washed out, and after that they just posted the guards in the ordinary way as if we were in the line."
Wagon wheel
To the Australian troops it seemed that the British Army were obsessed by discipline. They would never stand for it! On several occasions Australian soldiers sabotaged the Field Punishment No.1 that Tommies were sentenced to, for offences as small as being found drunk, or for wearing dirty clothes when off duty.
Field Punishment meant that the soldier had parade in full pack. Then he had to take the pack off and Military Policemen strapped him up against a wagon wheel. It looked like he was crucified. This happened twice a day, an hour in the morning and an hour at night, and for as many days as the soldier was sentenced to.
It happened that Australian troops, incensed by the sight of a man undergoing Field Punishment No 1, cut the man loose again, and again, and threatened the MP's - with loaded rifles, daring them to truss poor Tommy up again.
No executions
The Army Staff did not know what to do with these and other Australian crimes. The mutinies in the French Army made some high-ranking officers nervous. They feared that the casual attitude of these troops would have a deleterious effect on the more docile British troops under their command.
They felt the reputedly high crime rate of the Australians played a significant role. A rather high number of Aussies were put behind bars. In the winter of 1918, for instance, an average of 9 per 1,000 Australian soldiers were imprisoned. Canadians, New Zealanders and South Africans had an average of 1.6 per 1,000 men behind bars.
Some punishments, however, were not carried out on Australian troops. Though liable to be executed for mutiny, desertion to the enemy or treachery, the 129 Australians (including 119 deserters) that were sentenced to death during the war (117 in France) were not shot.
The 1903 Australian Defence Act stipulated that the Governor General of Australia had to confirm the sentences passed by courts martial, and he never did. Although Haig made strong representations for the power to inflict the extreme penalty upon Australian soldiers, that sanction was continually denied him
.
A major consideration was the Australian soldier's status as a volunteer, and that as such, they should not be subject to the extreme penalty. After all, weren't enough men killed already. More than 61,000 Australians died in this war, mostly on the Western Front. Australia's casualty rate was, relatively, the highest of all allied nations.
