Cowards
J Douglas Harvey
The Subject of cowardice is one that has largely been ignored in the annals of British military history. In fact, to unearth evidence pointing in that direction takes considerable effort and would in the end prove inconclusive, for so many of the pertinent records have vanished or have been deliberately destroyed. Cowardice and its reasons will probably always remain a deeply obscured subject.
There are, however, sufficient statistical facts available to give some depth to the problem with which the Royal Air Force and Commonwealth Air forces were faced in the Second World War. Cowardice was not a new phenomena in that war: indeed the problem of cowardice—the inability to master fear has been inherent in every military force ever assembled.
Only the severity of the punishment which the accused received for his inability to master fear has changed over the years. While the death sentence has now been abolished for civilian crimes in many countries, it remains for some strange reason on the military books.
In the First World War some 300 Canadian soldiers were given the death sentence. While most of those sentences were eventually commuted to penal servitude of from five to fifteen years, 25 Canadian soldiers were executed by firing squads. The British Army charged 7361 men with desertion and cowardice and executed 307 of them by firing squads. Often the charges were for trivial reasons and one British soldier was executed for overstaying his seven day marriage leave.
One method of execution was to strap the accused in a chair, blindfolded, as the firing squad, often in drunken disarray, assembled in the first light of dawn. Subsequently, many of the firing squad members were driven mad over the shame and guilt of their actions and were hospitalized for psychiatric care. They suffered a guilt that would haunt them for the rest of their lives. Had they refused to take part in the firing squad, they too, would have been blindfolded at another dawn. Indeed, a certain number were executed as examples to the rest of the troops by commanders who considered that the death penalty acted as a deterrent.
In the Second World War only one Canadian was executed. This was a soldier serving in Italy with the Canadian Army. He was apparently involved in murder and the black market. Little more is known about his execution.
No one was executed in the airforce or the navy, but the airforce had a unique system which was given the term Lack of Moral Fibre. More familiarly known among aircrew as LMF. This horrendous label was applied to aircrew who, although all volunteers, could no longer face the agonies of flying, which they had come to dread. In the First World War there had been no such stigma placed on aircrew. They were simply sent home with no disgrace attached.
Initially those aircrew who chose to stop flying or were taken off flying by medical officers or commanding officers, were branded with the more discreet term of Waverer. In official correspondence the man was referred to as a W case. There was usually no other reference or amplification. If he was repatriated to Canada his file was stamped with the letter K. When he was discharged from the RCAF a corner of his discharge certificate was snipped off. It was a discreet way of informing the personnel branch of the true nature of his discharge.
The number of LMF cases increased as the war grew in intensity and the Air Ministry was pressed to issue an order that would assist squadron and station commanders in effectively dealing with failing aircrew. First issued in simplified form in April 1940, a subsequent, more detailed order was issued in 1941. Secret order. A.M.O. S.1141/S.7.C (1) was to be revised twice as the war progressed.
The secret memorandum dealt with the disposal of members of aircrew whose conduct may cause them to forfeit the confidence of the Commanding Officer in their determination and reliability in the face of danger in the air.
The order separated the subject aircrew into four categories. Lack of Moral Fibre, Inefficiency, Misconduct and Medical. It was the last category that caused the most agonizing by the Special Cases Committee which had to judge in which category the man should be place.
Was the man wilfully trying to escape his duty? Or did a mental or nervous illness prevent him from carrying out his flying duties? Had the strain of flying brought on a medical problem? Or had a previously unrecognized medical problem now made flying unbearable? Was the man simply inefficient and perhaps should never have been allowed to fly? Or was it a case of outright misconduct?
There were many shades to the problem and sharp divisions of opinion on how to handle the cases. Strongly held opinions among commanders in the field clashed with headquarters views throughout the war. Two extremes prevailing: the harsh, get that coward off my squadron to the medical specialist calmer, more introspective view. Although many times these positions were reversed.
Since aircrew were both officer and non-commissioned officer rank, the disciplinary approach to their final disposal was strikingly different. The authorities were never anxious to court martial a officer if it could possibly be avoided. But a sergeant could be summarily treated and stripped of his rank.
In fact a sergeant had no friend in court, since he did not, like the officer, mix socially with his masters. With officers the old boy network came into play and urgent telephone calls and discreet private visits replaced the austere, one dimensional submission which was the only recourse of sergeant aircrew.
A further complication was the position of the Royal Canadian Air Force and other Commonwealth Airforces, as subordinate to the Royal Air Force. While the RCAF fielded 40 operational squadrons and many training and administrative units in Britain, plus many squadrons in other theatres of war, they were effectively under the control of the British Air Ministry.
Initially the Royal Air Force processed all Canadian aircrew classified as Waverers through their own disposal units, principally the infamous Uxbridge Re-Selection Centre. The RCAF resented this lack o control and was determined to have its own Special Cases Committee, which it eventually set up at Warrington, outside Liverpool, much to the disgust of the RAF.
Lack of moral Fibre was never a major threat to the conduct of the air war, although there is evidence that the Air Council considered that LMF could severely undermine the determination to attack the enemy. Aircrew displayed the same amazing fortitude in the Second World War as their fathers had so nobly demonstrated in the trenches in the First World War. Taking off on an operational sorties was a close equivalent of soldiers going over the top and the same amount of guts was required.
It is difficult to accurately document the number of LMF cases, since so many of the records have disappeared. It would appear however, that some 4,000 cases were finally classified by the Royal Air Force. However, the figure of 4,000 does not represent the total number of aircrew who were banished from their units stigmatised forever in the eyes of their comrades with the LMF label. Added to the actual 4,000 cases was far greater number who were judged as inefficient flyers, medical cases, or outright disciplinary cases when they finally faced the Special Cases Committee. Their ultimate fate, of course, was never known to their friends and squadron mates since the man was forbidden to contract them once he had left the unit.
RCAF statistics except for an eight month period, September 1944 to May 1945, cannot be found. This was the period when the war in the air was virtually won and the Allies held air superiority in every theatre. Yet 627 suspected cases of LMF appeared before the RCAF Special Cases Committee. Some 40 of these were confirmed as LMF. The majority were finally assessed as cases of inefficiency or misconduct. Some 40 of the medical cases were categorized as suffering extreme nervous ailments.
Interestingly and of some significance was the fact that over 500 of the 627 cases initially classified Lack of Moral Fibre, had not flown on operations against the enemy. They had declared themselves incapable or had been declared incapable while at various levels of training in Britain.
It didn’t, of course, matter at what point a young man (and most were still teenagers) was charged with LMF but it was of extreme and lifelong importance when he was suddenly branded a coward and immediately banished from his squadron, his crew, his friends and his peer group. Banishment that would last a lifetime.
In Bomber Command, which suffered the most casualties, the strain on aircrew was particularly high. Some 47,000 aircrew were killed and many additional thousands wounded or shot down and taken prisoner. In the five major months of the Battle of Berlin, which raged from November 1943 until March 1944, the heavy bombers made 14 night attacks. Some 500 bombers were shot down, with many more damaged or wrecked in crashes as they tried to land back in Britain. Close to 2,700 aircrew were killed in the Berlin raids.
When an aircrew member had gone to the limit of his courage and had, after much internal agonizing, forced himself to go to his Commanding Officer to declare I will not fly again no matter what you do to me he was immediately confined and separated from his crew and squadron members. He had effectively disappeared from their lives forever. There were no farewells, no explanations offered to his bewildered crew. Just a simple announcement You’ll be getting a new air gunner (or pilot or navigator or bomb aimer or wireless operator or flight engineer).
As the was progressed the LMF rules were re-written and procedures, at least on paper, became more humane. The man was to be interviewed by his Squadron Commander, by his Station Commander and if he so wished he could have an interview with the Air Officer Commanding the Group. After making a written statement he was supposed to be seen by a Medical Officer, but often wasn’t. He was offered the privilege of initialling the report submitted by his Squadron Commander. He was then given 24 hours in isolation to re-think his actions and if he had not changed his mind he was immediately shipped off to a Re-Selection Centre for final disposal.
In the early years of the war, however, if he were a sergeant or flight sergeant he was immediately reduced to the lowest rank, his coveted wings stripped off and he was put to work shovelling coal, peeling potatoes or in many cases sent to work underground in the coal mines. In contrast an officer was usually asked to resign his commission or was transferred to staff and administrative duties.
The same for the individual charged with LMF did not diminish with his sentence. It continued to eat silently at his insides like a cancer and did not fade as the war years receded. For men who had completed 18 or 25 raids, or those who were on their second tour of operations, or those who had been decorated for bravery by the King, the suffering was harshest. It was an unjust system with little change of redress and none of rehabilitation.
It is incredible to think that aircrew who had flown many hazardous missions, engaging in fierce air battles and suffering crashes in burning aircraft, including those airmen decorated for bravery, could then be accused of Lack of moral Fibre and forever branded cowards.
Aside from those who chose to use the system to escape operational flying, and there is some evidence of that, what would make members of an entirely volunteer force, decide to be stigmatized for the rest of their lives?
The easy answer is stress, created by overwhelming, paralysing, soul destroying fear. A fear endured by all aircrew but which not all aircrew suffered to the last degree. But in the final analysis perhaps it’s an unanswerable question.
The most courageous of all airmen were those who fought constantly against their own dreadful fears and yet somehow, continued to force themselves to climb into the aircraft.
One aircrew officer reported to his Medical Officer with the classis symptoms of LMF but unlike so many of his peers he was given continuing encouragement from the Medical Officer and his Squadron Commander. Each time he faltered he was encouraged and counselled and each time he decided to keep flying.
The last comment in his squadron file noted that he would complete his tour of operations, although the experience of great stress could create a complete breakdown. Thus sustained he was killed with the rest of his crew on his seventeenth mission.
He was described as a sensitive man.
The author of this article is J Douglas Harvey. He was a veteran Lancaster bomber pilot in the RCAF during World War Two.
