The Daily Mail has apparently been running a thread in its 'Answers to Correspondents' column about whether large numbers of deserters were shot in WWI. I missed the earlier parts of this but in Saturday's edition (which I picked up buckshee in a Little Chef in Northamptonshire) a chap called Terry Cunningham was weighing in with his opinion that there were lots of 'unofficial' executions. We've heard all this before of course but this fellow is apparently the author of a book '14-18 The Final Word' where he presents reasearch on this. It seems to be based on interviews with veterans. Has anyone read this tome? Sorry if this has escaped my notice on previous SAD-related threads.

Mark...

Any chance you can dig out any of the other previous repsonses in the paper.. would like to see how it developed etc

John

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14 - 18. The Final Word
Terry Cunningham
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Paperback 200 pages (1 March, 2003)
ISBN: 0952162040


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Reviews

Book Description
Their side of the story- Face to face interviews with soldiers who survived the horror, the brutality, the firing squads, rats ,lice, starvation.. the trenches of the first world war.
From the Publisher
We published this book because the content is totally different to any other account of the 1914-18 war. In fact
the story is told by those who took part you can't get more
real than that.



John

Quite a claim, considering we already have Middlebrook, MacDonald et al?

Cost you £16.95 to find out



John

'14-18 The Final Word' was the subject of the thread started by Chris on 14th July - 'Zoism Books - Why hasn't someone told us before?'

Andrew

I shall keep my hand firmly on my wallet. 'Blindfold and alone' is the grown-up book on the subject in my humble opinion.

Whats the general forum opinion of 'Unofficial Executions' - Whilst I have seen a number of articles or quotes in books mentioning unofficial executions, I have never really considered them to be true. Also are we talking about executions carried out in a formal setting (ie executions by firing squad) or are these cases more spur of the moment things (officer shoots a soldier for refusing to advance)

Will

Sorry to be Captain Dumbo, but I never seem to be able to use the 'Search' facility properly-under which category did Chris Baker's thread appear? I missed it because I've spent the last few days courtesy of the British Army in darkest Norfolk.

Mark - it's under Chit-Chat.

Andrew

Mark,

I thumbed the pages of 'The Final Word' some years ago and immediately took against it. For a start, the title; 'The Final Word' sounds arrogant in the extreme. I think the final word to emerge from the conflict is a long long way off. More particularly, its contents were appalling. I think there were 6/8 individual interviews with old soldiers. One in particular ran something like this:

interviewer: Which unit were you with?

Old soldier; I don't know, I can't remember...

but then went on to recount his memories and opinions.

To my mind (and I have been heavily involved in oral history) if this old soldier could not even remember his unit, his other contributions were hardly worth publishing.

As soon as I saw the cover of this book on the Zoism site, I thought it looked familiar. Presumably, the author has been rumbled by sound historians and now has to peddle his trash with Weirdos-R-Us.

In my humble opinion a book where authors choose to comment only on a selection of the total cases, followed by personal and inaccurate attacks upon individuals cannot be regarded as 'grown up'.

I don't think that there were any 'unofficial executions' in the sense of them being the outcome of undocumented drum-head court-martials of the sort said to be common in the French Army in the aftermath of the Spring 1917 mutinies. But there were on-the-spot executions administered by officers when they thought that discipline was threatened or their authority was questioned. Examples can be found on earlier threads relating to the perceived need to stem a retreat during the Gallipoli campaign; and in the Forgotten Voices book which relates an account of an officer shooting two men through the head because they failed to stop when he ordered them. There was no panic or threat at the time other than to the officer's ego.

I suppose this also goes for the 'Shot at Dawn' documentary shown the other night on the History Channel, which looked at the cases of just 4 men.

The truth or otherwise of "unofficial executions" will always be in dispute because by their very nature there will not be any objective documents. The only record will usually be personal reminiscences which come to light long after the fact.

Most of these reminiscences are probably similar to one I can remeber hearing from an old soldier when I was a youngster. Why the fellow would tell a young lad such things is beyond me. The story went roughly like this: The soldier remember vividly during a spell behind the lines talking to one of his best friends who served in a different unit. The friend had had a rough time and was very down. He told the soldier words to the effect that "I can't take this again. If they order me up the line again, I will just start walking in the opposite direction at the first opportunity". The soldier tried to talk the friend out of it, but to no avail. A couple of weeks later he saw his friend's name on the casualty list as "Killed". The soldier was very clear in his mind that his friend was determined and capable of walking away, and also certain that he was shot doing so.

The points here are these:

1. There is no direct evidence that anyone was summarily shot without any official record.

2. There is no way to be sure that such things did not happen in the difficult situations that often prevailed.

3. The men certainly believed that they could be shot in this manner.

For my part, I suppose that , like the case of unpopular officers being accidently shot during an advance, unofficial executions probably did occur; but not very many of them.

Second Lieutenant George Raymond Dallas Moor V.C. M.C and Bar 2nd Battalion Hampshire Regiment Gallipoli.


'For most conspicuous bravery and resource on June 5th 1915, during operations south of Krithia, Dardanelles. When a detachment of a battalion on his left, which had lost most of its officers, was rapidly retiring before a heavy Turkish attack, he immediately grasping the danger to the remainder of the line, dashed back some two hundred yards, stemmed the retirement, led back the men and recaptured the lost trench. He died of influenza at Mouveaux on November 3rd, 1918.

I have read a couple of times that in the course of winning his V.C. he shot a couple of his own men who were wavering.

BLINDFOLD AND ALONE according to the jacket is........"a complete history of this extremely emotive subject. Using a wealth of new material that has only now become available, Cathryn Corns and John Hughes-Wilson have brought together all the facts of these executions for the very first time..."

From memory I think they covered about a third of the cases. Having read the book I can only echo Rosemary's comments.

For a review of the book from the "other side of the coin" try following this Blinfold and Alone review link and then click on "The New Contemptibles" on the bottom left hand of the page.

Unfortunately I don't have the previous editions of the Daily Mail featuring earlier parts of this correspondence. I try not to admit buying it! (Seriously they have had some quite good military articles from time to time and the WFA president is an occasional contributor).

The War Diary of R L M MacKay of the Argyles, which is on the web also gives:

'OPERATIONS

31st. July, 1917. Zero hour 3.50 a.m. when a terrific thunderclap of fire broke out. The sky was lit by dozens of flashes at the same time so that it seemed light. Our Division, the 15th., attacked just north of the Ypres-Roulers Railway on a two Brigade front. 44th. Highland on left, 46th. on right, and our 45th. in support behind Ypres. Our brigade, 45th. moved off at zero by the corduroy track south of Ypres and formed up in "No Man's Land" at zero hour. They then advanced through the 44th. and 46th. Brigades to attack the Green Line. The 44th. and 46th. were consolidating on the Blue Line.

The 45th. did their work well and in good style, but the division on our right (8th. Divn.) could not get level with us. When some of them did get up, they fell back again and one of our captains had to go over and use his revolver against one, as an example. Still, our right flank remained hanging in the air. The Argylls and Fusiliers did quite well. Poor MacCallum was killed, shot by a sniper. Captain Leitch, a splendid, frank, and popular officer and D.R. Cameron were both killed. Miller (A.S.) and Sinclair were wounded.

The Battalion was relieved that night by Gordons who had to fall back a little. The Argylls were brought back to the old British front line, but they had to go up next night (the 1st/2nd) for a counter attack. They advanced in utter and complete darkness - no moon or stars - and took the position allotted to them correctly, being the only battalion in the Brigade to do so, so we must confess there may have been a certain amount of luck in their move. They dug in, in front, without losing any men, while the other three battalions were a little unfortunate in losing some men.

Our losses from 31st. were 4 officers killed and 5 wounded, and 140 - 150 other ranks.

Aye
Malcolm

There can be no doubt that examples of men being shot without CM exist... how many.. probably no one will know..

I read the article mentioned and agree that the title Final word is somewhat pretentious seems that that is the last word on the matter... hmmm I wonder

John