Pardon for 306 WWI Soldiers
Thursday August 17, 2006
During World War I, the British executed 306 of their own soldiers because these soldiers refused to continue fighting. Many of these soldiers had already served several years on the front and suffered from acute cases of "shell shock." For decades, family members of these executed soldiers have lived not only with the hurt and pain of losing a family member but also with the stigma of having a relative thought a coward. The British Minister of Defense, Des Browne, announced this month that these 306 soldiers would be posthumously pardoned.
Comments
Ah yes. Revisionism at work. We pardon those who should have been pardoned in life. What happens now? They’ll forgive us? They can’t. They’re dead–still as dead as they were when we murdered them. Who are we really forgiving here? Ourselves. Now we can go forward, insisting we’re the “good guys” for forgiveness and understanding that came nearly 90 years too late. The fact that these men were willing to face execution rather than return to the front says there was something very courageous and noble in their nature–something much more courageous and noble than the “patriots” who executed them.
that is the problem with this world we forgive too late. I admire the daughter of Private Farr RIP who fought to clear his name and one thing that is painful is that she will never know where he is buried or the others. I just pray that whereverthey are they will realise that Justice was done.
It took them long enough. what is it ?? 88 years!
and it was a stupid war ro begin with .. and all it got us was communism in russia and hitler in germany!
World War one was a nightmare. It was a seperate world, something that became for all the participants a totally consuming passion. On Novemeber 11, 1918 the English knew the fighting would end at 11 AM. But the bastard leadership launched an assault against an already beaten Germany. Eleven thousand men died.
The shell shocked men who were shot are now forgiven so the current crop of generals don’t have to acknowledge this other larger brutal decision.
The fact is we are as consumed with our war on terror as they were caught up in fighting in 1918. Nothing has changed.