Shot at Dawn

The Fifteen Welshmen Executed by the British Army in the First World War

Amid the carnage of the battles of World War I, a small number of Welsh soldiers made the fateful decision to abscond from their units: under the Army Act, if found guilty of the offenses they were charged with, they could suffer the ultimate penalty, to be shot at dawn. A handful of men serving in Welsh regiments absconded and, despite mitigating circumstances and with derisory field trials, usually without representation or a "soldier's friend" to speak on their behalf, they were found guilty and sentenced to death by firing squad. This book documents the cases. In 2006 a motion was put forward to pardon those men, except in cases of murder. This was successful, and 305 men, albeit nearly a hundred years later, were exonerated.