Shot at Dawn

Containing details of all World War I executions carried out under the authority of the British Army Act, this book includes the names, ranks and regiments of those shot by firing squad, together with their offences, trials, execution details and burial places, where known. The text is illustrated with photographs and unit badges to aid the researcher. The authors set out to demonstrate what they consider to be the ineptitude, ignorance and unfairness of the British court martial system at the time, and how frequently condemned men were proved to have been formerly brave soldiers who had simply cracked under the pressure of trench warfare. Contending that they were judicially killed as a lesson to other soldiers in order to discourage acts of gross insubordination, desertion and cowardice, the authors present eye-witness accounts which show how, in many cases, the condemned men went to their deaths with great courage and dignity. Evidence is also provided of instances in which next-of-kin were hoodwinked into believing that their men had died in action - a system of cover-up which, it is claimed, still exists today. Some men, the murderers and rapists, even by today's standards probably deserved their end, but the accounts of others, who were unrepresented - and in some cases in their late teens and early twenties - make harrowing reading.