For young men in the trenches their ears were bombarded with the thundering sounds of grenades, artillery fire, endless shelling, and shrapnel mingled with the screaming of the wounded – likely new-found comrades who had signed up for exotic adventure and excitement.
Life was hell on earth, the oozing mud and monster-size rats, constant companions.
Teenagers, an alarming percentage under age 19, lied to fight for their country enticed by the glamour of battle, and braved horrific trench warfare in Northern France. These days it's called post traumatic stress syndrome. Back then it was simply called “shell shock” thousands of soldiers – “old and blown” for life.
The choice was horrific - die in No Man's Land or die by firing squad for cowardice, disobedience, desertion, even falling asleep at the post.
360 British soldiers were executed for these actions – an effective and chilling method teaching others with the same intention a hard-core lesson. Unconscionably, the names of those disgraced British Empire soldiers remain expunged from national memorials.
Vern Thiessen chronicles the lives of six young soldiers in The Last Dawn, their brutal deaths still felt by the victims’ families, 90 years on.
Through interviews with historians, and family relatives, Thiessen has crafted a gut wrenching docudrama - the re-inactment of these young soldiers shot at dawn for deserting their post by commanding officers “highly unforgiving of their crimes." These “offenders” convicted of cowardice, dersertion, and military insubordination, ( often without proper legal representation) only had 24 hours before these horrific sentences were carried out.
At dawn, these boys were taken outside in front of a firing squad, and tied to a post provided with either white-cloth blindfold or gas mask, eyes to the back so the soldier couldn't see his approaching death.
“For God’s sake, shoot straight…”
Thiessen’s powerful script is an potent eye-opener for those wanting to know more about hurried court martials carried out during WW1 and begs the question – was this military justice or extreme cruelty?
The most haunting half whispered sentiment comes from 108-year-old British veteran Harry Patch who fought the mud and blood bath of Passchendaele.
“The feeling today is that they were cowards. They just had shell shock…. and shell shock takes the power of movement out of ya. They just stood there… shocked. We’d sing songs, all the old songs.. It’s a Long Way to Tipperary, Keep the Home Fires Burning… .. and they bring back ....bitter memories to me.”
