Fresh call to pardon war 'cowards'

DEFENCE chiefs were last night under renewed pressure to pardon hundreds of soldiers executed for cowardice during the First World War after it emerged that several officers were spared the firing squad for the same offence.

New research into the sentences meted out during the 1914-18 conflict has established that at least 15 officers, including one Scot, escaped execution. There is, however, no documented case of an ordinary soldier being spared, and more than 300 were executed.

The research also shows that, as well as avoiding the firing squad, the officers were granted retrospective clemency by King George V, both during and after the war. The King conferred revised sentences - notably four full pardons and a reinstatement - on the group, which included three majors and two lieutenant colonels.

The revelations, in a forthcoming book by the historians Gerard Oram and Julian Putkowski, reinforce long-standing claims that the lower ranks were treated more brutally than their superiors during the war. Only three officers are known to have been executed for similar offences during the campaign.

But the new development also blows a hole in the government’s long-term insistence that they could not justify retrospective pardons because such a dramatic judgment would be unprecedented.

Campaigners, who claim many of the executed men were suffering from crippling conditions such as shellshock, which was not recognised as an illness by army commanders, maintain the disclosures would bolster their demands for justice on the eve of the 90th anniversary of the outbreak of the war.

"There is no logical basis for the British government to claim its hands are tied on this issue," said Peter Mulvany, of the Irish section of the Shot at Dawn (SAD) campaign, which has waged a lengthy battle to clear the names of more than 300 soldiers, including 39 Scots.

"This evidence proves beyond doubt that there is a precedent for retrospective pardons, and they should follow it. These poor boys did not get the same treatment as their superiors in life, so the least they deserve from us now is some justice almost a century later."

Some 306 British troops were court-martialled and shot by their own comrades for ‘offences’ including cowardice, desertion and falling asleep at their posts in the trenches during the war. Most were led out at dawn to face firing squads blindfolded.

The latest development in the furious row over the heavy-handed treatment of ordinary soldiers in the First World War emerged a month after Scotland on Sunday revealed that the government was preparing to grant official pardons to 26 Irish soldiers serving in the British Army who were executed for desertion during the conflict.

Sources at the Ministry of Defence insisted then that ministers wanted the concession to remain a "one-off" and did not want it to spark a wider review of the outstanding cases.

Senior Scottish MP John Reid originally ruled out pardons in 1998 when, as armed forces minister, he said the government could do little more than express its regret at the draconian punishments passed on men who had been mentally scarred by the stress of a war of unprecedented ferocity.

Leaders of the SAD campaign claim that many of the men were victims of what is now known as post-traumatic stress disorder, and deserved help rather than punishment. At least four were aged under 18, and several were condemned to death as an "example" to the rest of the forces.

General Routine Order Number 585, which stated that the traditional assumption of innocence would not apply in cases where a soldier was adjudged to have deserted his unit, meant the men, who lacked any recognised legal representation, were virtually condemned to death even before they entered the court-martial tribunals.

But an extensive investigation of military records by Oram and Putkowski has confirmed that the officer class were not required to suffer the brutal example the tribunals set for the rest of the ranks.

In a forthcoming book, Officers Court-martialled by the British Army, 1913-1924, they lay bare the preferential treatment handed out to officers. Files at the Public Records Office reveal that, during the war itself, 12 of the men were convicted of offences ranging from absence and drunkenness to cowardice, but were later reprieved.

Major Lincoln Sandwith, of the 8th Hussars/APM Indian Army Cavalry Corps, was convicted of unlawful sex with a girl aged under 16 at the height of the fighting in August 1915. But, barely three months later, the King stepped in - he was found not guilty of the offence and his sentence for other misdemeanours was commuted.

The records show that GDC Tracey, a lieutenant in the 1/7 Gordon Highlanders, a unit deeply involved in the Somme campaign, was convicted of cowardice in June 1915 and subsequently "cashiered" - military terminology for a dishonourable dismissal. But his case was revisited eight years later, and he was granted a conditional pardon in December 1923.

Campaigners have sent the new details to a string of senior politicians, including Prime Minister Tony Blair and his Tory predecessor John Major, in a bid to persuade them to lend their support to the demands for clemency.

But an MoD spokeswoman last night maintained the department’s line against a review of the government’s position. "I am not aware of this information being considered within the department," the spokeswoman told Scotland on Sunday.

"But our position on this has been quite clear and there is no suggestion of any change. There is at present no justification for revisiting these cases."

No mercy for runaways

EXECUTION of deserters has been employed throughout military history. One of the most bitter incidents of the American Civil War occurred in February 1864, when Confederate Generals executed 22 Union prisoners of war because they were from North Carolina - deserters in the generals’ eyes.

It is said Russian troops in the Second World War fought with such stoicism because they feared the punishment of Stalin (right) more than the Germans. During the war, the dictator ordered everyone fleeing the enemy to be shot on sight. Hitler also ordered the mass execution of deserters as it became apparent his army was crumbling.

In contrast with the First World War, when Britain was the most enthusiastic about executions, the UK imprisoned those fleeing the battlefield.

Military justice has its basis in maintaining the cohesion of forces. Some less final, but highly curious methods have been used in the past to this pragmatic end. The British seem to have been particularly creative in devising reprimands.

During the 18th century, British servicemen were subjected to punishments bordering on the bizarre. These included ‘riding the wooden horse’, where the offending soldier would sit on a sharp frame with weights attached to his feet.

Flogging remained in use until 1881. Although it was rare for more than 10 lashes to be ordered, some sentences demanded 1,000.