Thursday, August 17, 2006

Pardon me?

War is … hard when you're being shot at by both sides. It seems that 306 British soldiers were shot for cowardice, desertion and other offences in the 1914-1918 war. One of them was Private Harry Farr - and for years now, his family has been fighting to have him awarded a posthumous pardon and to have his name cleared. Why? Because they believe he was suffering from shell-shock and should not have been returned to the front-lines. The same seems to be true of others - although there may not be full and accurate records to satisfactorily show this - which is why a review of the cases has not gone quickly - and why, in 1998 the Government decided that it could not issue a blanket pardon because: it could not "distinguish between those who deliberately let down their country and their comrades and those who were not guilty of desertion of cowardice".

But that's changed now - and Defence Secretary Des Browne has announced that a group pardon would be presented to Parliament for their approval. After the announcement, Pte Farr's daughter Gertrude Harris, now 93, said: "Well to be truthful, I'm overwhelmed. I prayed that it would happen in my lifetime but I never realised really that it would. It's come really as a shock today. "We were determined for my mother' sake because she always said he was no coward, he was a very brave soldier and he fought for his country and he died fighting for his country." For more on this, see the BBC report.

Of course, the question is - what kind of civilised country executes its own people?

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