Shot at Dawn

[Treetotal]

I have just found out that one of my Ancestors, Albert Parry b. 1874, Hull of the East and West Yorkshire Regiments  was "Shot at Dawn" in August 1917 for desertion and would like to know if he would have been Court Marshalled before his execution. Also how would I find out if he had been pardoned as I believe some of them were.
Carol

[trystan]

Carol,

I can't help you with your question, but it must be a very difficult thing to learn of, and to get to grips of. It would be very interesting to hear of his circumstances and how this came about.

Trystan

[Treetotal]

Thanks Trystan....Yes I feel the same and would like to understand more about how the decision was made 
Carol

[dowdstree]

Carol there is a site which you might find interesting   www.ww1cemeteries.com/shot-at-dawn

It gives you the cemetery Albert Parry is buried in and a photograph of his gravestone.

Sorry, I don't know much more about this subject except to say that it horrifies me. We have visited  the National Arboretum at Alrewas and the memorial to those poor souls shot at dawn is extremely haunting.

Dorrie

[Treetotal]

Thanks for that Dorrie, I have CWGC cert. and medal card where I got the information from, but I hadn't seen that. I can't believe we were in the area when we visited the Cemeteries on a visit to the war graves in Ypres three years ago. I wish I had that information then
Very sad, also for the soldiers who were tasked to make up the firing squad, although they wouldn't know which bullet delivered the fatal shot. 🌺🌺
Carol

[crisane]

This is The National Archives research guide on the subject.
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/search/results?_q=shot+at+dawn

I haven't read it yet so don't know if it will help.

[majm]

It can be a very confronting topic.  I hope the following may be of interest from an historic perspective.

Breaker Morant was born in England, and migrated to the British Colonies that became Australia.  He married Daisy Bates, in Queensland in 1884.  The marriage failed.  The six British Colonies were federated into one British Colony, Australia in 1901.   'Breaker' refers to his skills breaking in horses in regional New South Wales and Queensland.  My Great Grandfather and the family knew him out in the far western districts of NSW in the late 1880s and early 1890s. 

Various Australian colonies sent volunteers to South Africa to support the British military during the Boer Wars. 

Queen Victoria had signed off on the Australian constitution in July 1900. 

Breaker Morant served in the Military in South Africa during the Boer War, and faced a court martial under the British Army regulations.  He was found guilty and shot at dawn. 

The newly formed government of Australia made its own laws and in 1903, as a direct consequence to the population’s reaction to the shooting at dawn of Breaker and one other, they passed laws that in effect banned the military courts from order the shooting dead of Australian military personnel at dawn or at any other time; and so, during WWI no members of the Australian Imperial Force were subject to such action.   

Then in the 1930s the Statute of Westminster and gave further independence to Britain's colonies, particularly to the ones known, by then, as Dominions.   But the Dominion parliaments needed to formally legislate to adopt that Statute.  So, Australia chose not to.  It had entered WWI automatically as a colony of Britain.  WWII, again automatically at war, as the Statute of Westminster was not yet adopted. 

Then it was discovered that Britain had proceedings to court martial two Australian navy chaps... and the charges had the penalty for death. (the Royal Australian Navy completed its formal separation from the RN as recently as the 1960s but that's another history story)   So, Australia rushed through laws adopting the Statute of Westminster and backdating their commencement date to 3 September 1939, to in effect stop the courts from imposing the shoot at dawn prospects.  It is not often that retrospective legislation actually becomes law in Australia.

Here's so websites that will likely have a much better way with words than me. Daisy Bates would likely be an interesting person to study too.

https://www.awm.gov.au/visit/exhibitions/fiftyaustralians/33
https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/encyclopedia/desertion
https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2007/june/1290560118/shane-maloney/daisy-bates-harry-breaker-morant 
https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/P10676773
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_of_Westminster_Adoption_Act_1942

JM

[Treetotal]

Thank you Crisane and MJ for your helpful responses...I will take the time to sift through the information that you have both given me. It's a very emotive subject and will take some time to digest and understand.
Carol

[Mowsehowse]

I can imagine that was a huge and disturbing shock to find during your research Treetotal.

Some of my discoveries have made me weep, even where I might have been half expecting them.

What I try to do is think myself into their situation...... in the case of the young conscripts of WW1, it does not take much imagination to start feeling a their awful circumstances a little.

Filthy, freezing, soaking, homesick, probably perpetually hungry and desperately fearful.  Those that had the courage to try and get away were branded, and executed simply to deter their comrades from doing the same.