A court-martial is a military court or a trial conducted in such a court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of members of the armed forces subject to military law, and, if the defendant is found guilty, to decide upon punishment. In addition, courts-martial may be used to try prisoners of war for war crimes. The Geneva Conventions require that POWs who are on trial for war crimes be subject to the same procedures as would be the holding military's own forces. Finally, courts-martial can be convened for other purposes, such as dealing with violations of martial law, and can involve civilian defendants.
Edward Donald Slovik was a United States Army soldier during World War II and the only American soldier to be court-martialled and executed for desertion since the American Civil War. Although over 21,000 American soldiers were given varying sentences for desertion during World War II, including 49 death sentences, Slovik's death sentence was the only one that was carried out.
Execution by firing squad, in the past sometimes called fusillading, is a method of capital punishment, particularly common in the military and in times of war. Some reasons for its use are that firearms are usually readily available and a gunshot to a vital organ, such as the brain or heart, most often will kill relatively quickly.
Desertion is the abandonment of a military duty or post without permission and is done with the intention of not returning. This contrasts with unauthorized absence (UA) or absence without leave, which are temporary forms of absence.
Capital punishment in Canada dates to Canada's earliest history, including its period as first a French then a British colony. From 1867 to the elimination of the death penalty for murder on July 26, 1976, 1,481 people had been sentenced to death, and 710 had been executed. Of those executed, 697 were men and 13 women. The only method used in Canada for capital punishment of civilians after the end of the French regime was hanging. The last execution in Canada was the double hanging of Arthur Lucas and Ronald Turpin on December 11, 1962, at Toronto's Don Jail. The National Defence Act prescribed the death penalty for certain military offences until 1999, although no military executions had been carried out since 1946.
In the military of ancient Rome, decimation was a form of military discipline in which every tenth man in a group was executed by members of his cohort. The discipline was used by senior commanders in the Roman army to punish units or large groups guilty of capital offences, such as cowardice, mutiny, desertion, and insubordination, and for pacification of rebellious legions. The procedure was an attempt to balance the need to punish serious offences with the realities of managing a large group of offenders.
In civil and military jurisprudence, summary execution is the putting to death of a person accused of a crime without the benefit of a free and fair trial. The term results from the legal concept of summary justice to punish a summary offense, as in the case of a drumhead court-martial, but the term usually denotes the summary execution of a sentence of death. Under international law, it is a combatant's refusal to accept an opponent's lawful surrender and the combatant's provision of no quarter, by killing the surrendering opponents.
Eric Skeffington Poole was a British Army soldier who was the first commissioned officer to be executed by British military authority during World War I.
Brigadier General Samuel Lyman Atwood Marshall, also known as SLAM, was a military journalist and historian. He served with the American Expeditionary Forces in World War I, before becoming a journalist, specializing in military affairs.
The use of capital punishment by the United States military is a legal punishment in martial criminal justice. Despite its legality, capital punishment has not been carried out by the U.S. military in over sixty years.
Private Harry T. Farr was a British soldier who was executed by firing squad during World War I for cowardice at the age of 25. Before the war, he lived in Kensington, London and joined the British Army in 1908. He served until 1912 and remained in the reserves until the outbreak of World War I. During the war, Farr served with the West Yorkshire Regiment on the Western Front. In 1915 and 1916 he was hospitalised multiple times for shell shock, the longest period being for five months. On 17 September 1916, Farr did not comply with an order to return to the front line, and was subsequently arrested and charged with cowardice. Unrepresented at his court martial, Farr was found guilty under section 4(7) of the Army Act 1881 and was sentenced to death. He was executed on 18 October 1916.
Private Peaceful is a novel for older children by British author Michael Morpurgo first published in 2003. It is about a fictional young soldier called Thomas "Tommo" Peaceful, who is looking back on his life so far and his going to war. The story focuses on the harsh realities of English rural life and warfare, and highlights the British Army's practice of executing its own soldiers during the First World War. Morpurgo was inspired to write the novel after learning about the around 300 British and Commonwealth soldiers who were shot for crimes like desertion and cowardice. The novel helped further the campaign to grant posthumous pardons to the men, which were agreed and implemented by the UK Government in 2006.
The Shot at Dawn Memorial is a monument at the National Memorial Arboretum near Alrewas, in Staffordshire, UK. It commemorates the 306 British Army and Commonwealth soldiers executed after courts-martial for desertion and other capital offences during World War I.
On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society is a book by Dave Grossman exploring the psychology of the act of killing and the military law enforcement establishments attempt to understand and deal with the consequences of killing. The book is based on S.L.A. Marshall's theory that the majority of soldiers in war do not ever fire their weapons due to an innate resistance to killing.
Private Thomas James Highgate was a British soldier during the First World War and the first British soldier to be convicted of desertion and executed by firing squad on the Western Front. He was born in Shoreham, Kent, and worked as a farm labourer before joining the army in 1913 as a seaman. When the First World War began, he fought with the First Battalion of the Royal West Kents. Highgate was executed 35 days into the war, on 8 September 1914, after being found hiding in a farmhouse wearing civilian clothes. His death was made as public as possible and used as an example to other soldiers. Highgate's name was not included on the war memorial at Shoreham; from the late 1990s onwards, some local residents fought for his name to be added whilst others disagreed. Posthumous pardons for soldiers who had been executed, including Highgate, were announced in 2006.
The Articles of War are a set of regulations drawn up to govern the conduct of a country's military and naval forces. The first known usage of the phrase is in Robert Monro's 1637 work His expedition with the worthy Scot's regiment called Mac-keyes regiment etc. and can be used to refer to military law in general. In Swedish, the equivalent term Krigsartiklar, is first mentioned in 1556. However, the term is usually used more specifically and with the modern spelling and capitalisation to refer to the British regulations drawn up in the wake of the Glorious Revolution and the United States regulations later based on them.
Lance Sergeant Joseph William Stones was a British soldier during the First World War who was executed for cowardice. He later became the first Briton so executed to have his name added to a war memorial.
Capital punishmentin Kuwait is legal. Hanging is the method of choice for civilian executions. However, shooting is a legal form of execution in certain circumstances.
