firing squad protocol

From: linden@positive.eng.sun.com (Peter van der Linden)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Firing Squad Protocol
Date: 23 Jul 1994 21:19:03 GMT

Here is a description of an execution by firing squad.  The
description comes from a soldier who was part of the squad.

    "A member of one of the battalions of the 30th Division was court-
    martialled for cowardice.  The man was only a recently-arrive
    reinforcement, but had not been able to explain how he got lost in the
    attack.  He was found guilty.  The battalion was paraded; the accused man
    brought forward and the sentence announced: execution by firing squad.

    His comrades were quite convinced that, after the abortive attack, someone
    in authority had decided to make an example of one man, and that this poor
    wretch had been chosen.

    Six privates had already been given a day's rations and sent to a remote
    village; they were the firing party.  That night the condemned man and his
    escort of military policemen joined them.  Early next morning, the firing
    party went out to a nearby quarry.  Their rifles were taken away and later
    returned, loaded: one with a blank round, the others with live ones. No one
    knew who had the blank round.

    The condemned man refused to walk to the quarry and had to be dragged 
    there.  He was then tied to a chair, blindfolded, and a white hankerchief
    pinned over his heart.  The officer gave the firing party their orders:
    "Aim straight.  I don't want to have to finish him off."

    After the crash of the volley, the prisoner was found to be alive, though
    badly hurt.  I watched, sickened as the oficer drew his revolver, put it to
    the man's head and pulled the trigger.
    Military justice, 1916 style, had been done."

                     --  Private Paddy Kennedy, 3rd Manchester Pals, 30th Div.

    From "The First Day on the Somme", Martin Middlebrook, publ.WW Norton,
                                       ISBN 393 05442-X, 1972.

I agree with Bill Nelson's appraisal that anyone firing a rifle (let alone
an experienced soldier) would at once be able to distinguish between a blank
round and a live one.  However, from this eyewitness account, a blank round
seems to be part of the protocol.

I surmise that it is to allow the firing party some peace of mind after they
have been ordered to murder a comrade: any one of them can persuade himself
retrospectively that he drew the blank round.  In practice, there probably
was no blank round at all.

The book from which this account comes is an excellent read; one of the
best war history books that I have ever read. I thoroughly recommend it to
every Englishman.

January 25, 1995