For the Sake of Example: Capital Courts Martial 1914-18 - The Truth - Hardcover

Anthony Babington

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9780850523843: For the Sake of Example: Capital Courts Martial 1914-18 - The Truth

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0850523842 ISBN 13: 9780850523843

Publisher: Leo Cooper, 1993

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According to the official records of the British Army a total of 346 officers and men were summarily executed at dawn following their convictions by courts martial in the field between the outbreak of the First World War and the end of March, 1920. Anthony Babington is the only writer who has been allowed access to all the files relating to these cases by the Ministry of Defence. He found that, although the majority of the executed men were guilty, or technically guilty, of the charges that had been laid against them, many of them were treated with considerable injustice and considerable inhumanity. They were usually tried by comparatively junior officers; their defences, such as they were, were seldom adequately presented; after the trials had finished the papers were passed for review to a succession of senior commanders who were kept in total ignorance of the mitigating factors which should have influenced their decisions; the condemned were informed of their impending executions either on the evening before, or on the actual morning that they were to be taken out and shot; and there was no proper procedure by which they could appeal. There can be little doubt that a not insubstantial proportion of them had been suffering from emotional shock or nervous exhaustion at the time they had committed their 'offences'.This book revealed for the first time the grim and sometimes horrific details of these trials and executions.

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Synopsis:

Between the outbreak of World War I and the end of March 1920, 346 officers and men of the British Army were convicted of capital offences by military courts martial, and were executed by shooting at dawn. The details of their trials and their executions were closed to the public until 1981, when Anthony Babington was granted access to the relevant documents in order to research for this book. The result is a chronological account of the various courts martial against the background of the military situation at the time, and the parliamentary disquiet in regard to the sentences. It is an account which reflects little or no credit on most of those who shared responsibility for the executions, whether senior officers, doctors or cabinet ministers. In the foreword to this revised edition, the author reveals several new matters which have been brought to his notice since the book was originally published, including the shooting at dawn of British servicemen as recently as 1946. Anthony Babington, a retired circuit judge, also wrote "No Memorial" and "The Devil to Pay".

About the Author:

Anthony Babington was born in 1920. He went to Reading School and served with the Royal Ulster Rifles and Dorset Regiment from 1939-45. During the war he was wounded twice and received the Croix de Guerre with Gold Star. He was called to the bar in 1948 and has been a Circuit judge since 1972. His other books include: The Power of Silence (1968), A House in Bow Street (1969), The English Bastille (1971), and The Rule of Law in Britain (1975). In 1983 Leo Cooper publishes Judge Babington's fascinating account of the truth behind the Capital Courts Martial in the Great War, entitles For the Sake of Example.

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