As part of this I was recently tasked with giving a paper/presentation on the following:
Discipline and morale were always closely related in the pre-war Army, in which discipline was invariably strict, instant and impartial. Recent debates about discipline have been dominated by the issue of the death penalty, often at the expense of a wider consideration of ‘normal’ discipline and its relationship to morale. What other factors sustained (or eroded) morale, other than discipline?
The only problem being that the presentation was to Professor Gary Sheffield who, well let say has written widely on the subject!
Reading rather than seeing this does mean that you miss out on my range of facial expressions and wild gestures- which probably helps.
Morale is a constantly changing value.
Defined by Irvin L Child (Professor of Psychology, Yale Uni) as:
“pertain[ing] to the efforts [of the individual] to enhance the effectiveness of the group in accomplishing the task in hand”.
Morale of the individual is therefore linked to the group.
Clausewitz in On War divided morale into two components- “mood” and “spirit”.
Mood is transient, changing minute to minute, cold, hungry etc. Not always a reliable gauge of the efficiency.
Napoleon’s elite Imperial Guards called “grognard”= grumbler, it’s still said that when a soldier stops whinging that’s when you need to worry.
Spirit- allows troops to keep cohesion in adversity. It is developed both by victory but by the testing of an army to its limits of its strengths.
Many factors can erode or maintain this mood or spirit including but not limited too:
Discipline
Espirit De Corps
Welfare considerations
Home front
Each of these can be divided down into further subsections
Discipline
The Oxford Companion to Military History defines discipline as:
“the training, indoctrination and encouragement through reward and example of certain practices consistent with the purposes for which a soldier may be employed, such that the desired response may become self or small unit imposed, although ultimately failure to abide by this training and the rules laid out by the authorities will result in some form of military punishment.”
In the case of the BEF the rules mentioned above come for the Annually approved Army Act 1881 which covered all aspects of army life.
Discipline was enforced both formally and informally, in both cases there was an emphasis on keeping it in house. An army in the field has a wealth of rubbish jobs for the defaulter to compete, many NCOs and officers were not above a more physical application of justice:
Captain Gerald Burgoyne 1914
“ I could not be bothered with petty crime, they must make the men obey them, how I did not care; and that I would back them up in all they did.”
He later encountered a fatigue party:
“ the men all over the place, no discipline , and the corporal in charge, useless.. I ran out and gave him two under the jaw.”
An army is a product of society, which at the time in question was more accepting of a hierarchy and a formal framework of deference.
The first steps along the formal route of discipline again kept it in house, the soldier going before his Coy/Sqn or Bty commander. This officer would have received some training on military law but was able to turn to the unit’s copy of The Manual of Military Law 1914, the handbook on what was and wasn’t a crime (everything!), how to run proceedings and what punishments could be awarded.
If the man was found guilty the Coy commander could award:
- Stoppages to pay
- Confinement to barracks- normally accompanied with parades/fatigues etc.
Or remand the case up the chain of command to the Commanding officer who had a wider range of punishments:
- 28 days detention
- Deductions from pay for losses or damage
- Fines for drunkenness
- Deprivation of pay to max. 28 days
- Remove acting or lance rank
- Deduct NCO’s pay
- Upto 28 days field punishment
It is this last which would prove to be most controversial, but as with any military activity there were firm rules:
Field Punishment No 1
- Could be kept in irons
- Made to undergo labouring tasks
- Could be attached to a fixed object
- for a period not exceeding two hours in any one day
- not more than 3 days out of four
- maximum of 21 days
Field Punishment No 2- not allowed to be fixed
On 22nd October 1916 an article was published in the Illustrated Sunday Herald (p. 371 CTA) describing the death of a soldier during punishment, this lead to an outcry and a review of the punishments, The War office asked the C in C’s of the various theatres for their opinion, India + Mesopotamia wanted abolition, Egypt + Salonika to be kept. Haig canvassed his army commanders and all but one (Allenby) supported FP. Haig sent a comprehensive reply much of which was heeded.
Field Punishment could be used as a harsh form of punishment particularly for its deterrent value but still keeping it in house.
The Guardsman in the picture, Fred is a good example of the flexibility of military discipline. The photo taken in 1919 shows him with two good conduct stripes, awarded for a few years of good service or “undetected crime”. However, a look at Fred’s conduct sheet suggests something different. Amongst a number of crimes and misdemeanours his is “charged” with.
Sleeping in the trenches- (this charge lead to 449 Field General Court Martials resulting in 2 executions). Fred was awarded FP no 1.
Further punishments were awarded for not saluting the OC of the Irish Guards, but as all charges were kept within the regimental family he was still able to earn his good conduct stripes.
A number of prisons at home were taken over:
Kilmainham, Dublin
Wandsworth- one wing then whole place
Wakefield-
Stafford-
Hereford
Brecon
Chelmsford
Barlinnie, D Hall
St Pauls school Hartlepool
St Davids convent , mold
But for the troops on active service a more local solution was needed. Reviewing the South African war the army was concerned that some soldiers had seen prison as a way out of frontline service and a new system was drawn up by a committee in 1907, rules being last issued in 1913.
- Not corrective in nature
- Harsh conditions
- No extra privileges or awards (except remand)
- To be given a “hard days work” of a “useful character”
- Diet not to better that troops in the field
Initially two prisons on ships at Le Havre Rouen
The possibility that soldiers might see imprisonment as an alternative to the trenches lead to the introduction of suspended sentences:
Rowland Fielding: War letters to a wife p. 175-6
“ the bad soldier had a sort of sword of Damocles ever poised over his head, and secondly, the better man, whose trouble had come from some momentary lapse (as ever-present a possibility in war as in peace0, had the chance of atoning for his delinquency, and often, by good behaviour or gallant act on the battlefield, he earned a complete reprieve.”
This was to lead some to see Venereal Disease as the way out of the frontline much as some report the recent rise in drug use in the army as a ploy of a quick discharge.
A flaw in this regimental level of justice is the general assumption that the man was guilty. Innocent till proven guilty is a tenet of justice, but if innocent then the man wouldn’t have been charged?
The CO could pass the case on for Field General Court Martial (FCGM), or the soldier could refuse the Co’s award and elect to face the FCGM.
A tool for judgement of collective morale via the prism of discipline is mutiny. Between August 1914 and March 1920 there were 1807 convictions of which 2/3 were abroad. Without looking at the Etaples there were a number of cases.
On home service it was often due to poor living conditions or welfare factors.
Typical was an incident at 152 Fd Coy RE in March 1915 at Tidworth. A growing dissatisfaction with the standard of sausages provided led to the troops taking their breakfast back to the accommodation and laying it out with their kit for inspection. The unit’s officers left the NCOs to deal with the problem which seems to have fizzled out once
In September 1918 1st Battalion AIF mutinied in the frontline. After an attack with heavy casualties, a planned relief was cancelled and another attack scheduled. The battalion war diary only admit that men became “detached” but as shown in the COs report over 100 men mostly from D coy left the trenches and headed rearward. The CO wrote:
“I consider the lightness and suspension of sentences in the post… greatly responsible”. In total 122 JNCO and ORs were courtmartialled receiving sentences of penal servitude and hard labour
Discipline was aimed at maintaining unit morale, often at the expense of the individual’s, but discipline was often prone to inconsistencies in its application especially at regimental level due to unit pride.
Espirit de Corps
The glue which holds the army together. From enlistment a deliberate attempt is made towards the tribal instincts of man and the soldier is taught to be proud of his regiment or corps. To consider it to be his family. In some cases this process starts before enlistment:
A O Pollard – Fire eater p. 23
“My choice of regiment was influenced by the fact that my only brother… had been a member of the HAC [Honourable Artillery Company] for 7 years.”
Pollard was to later be commissioned and end the war as a Captain with the VC, MC and DCM so may not be a typical example, but many memoirs touch upon the pride of the unit or regiment.
A. Stuart Dolden- Cannon Fodder
“I also had to pay one pound for the privilege of joining the London
Further evidence can be seen in the number of old comrades organisations and re-unions seen after the war. This process has continued with more modern day wars, but even the descendants of veterans can display this tribal pride.
Regimental mottos, cap badges and history all focus on events and images all designed to keep the soldier going when everything else suggests stopping.
As mentioned earlier Clauswitz’s fighting spirit was enhanced by victories or glorious deeds, these could be experience vicariously from predecessors at Waterloo
In training pamphlets such as SS 143 the officer, here at platoon level, is reminded of the value of, and need to foster EDC.
The officer shouldn’t have need too much of a reminder, as maintaining EDC was an essential part of the officers role.
If the regiment was his home and extended family then the man’s officer was to fill the father role. Whilst this was tried by variable means from unit to unit, an officer’s key concern was expected to be towards his men, the pre-war paternalistic nature of officer/men relations continued. An officer would be expected to put his men’s needs before his own. There are many examples in the memoirs from the period of benevolent officers providing luxuries and treats for their men.
The shared dangers and discomforts of active service would bind together the officers and men of units. It is notable that the most despised officers, staff officers were not in day to day contact and continually shared experiences and surroundings.
Looking at the screen walls of memorials in CWGC cemeteries it is unusual to see an officer for field rank to be “missing”, many accounts relay the efforts of the men to recover the bodies of fallen officers, a testimony to the bond between leaders and the lead.
Welfare considerations
Organised leisure- Sports- Aussie sport day images
Rations- Reading any account of the front line experience will confirm the daily toil of carrying parties, many of which would be ration parties. The link between food and morale was accepted from pre-war. A Governmental department calculated the calorific need for manual labour on a daily basis, the answer being 3574 cal a day. This was increased to 4193 for front line troops (German figure- 4028, American 4714!). The food was repetitive but generally available, so much so excesses were used to line trenches. Whether cooked individually or communally, food gave an order to the day and came as a welcome distraction.
Canteens/estaminets
When out of the line rations could be supplemented as the local canteen of estaminet. Estaminets were restricted on their opening hours and product range- no spirits for other ranks, but a number of estaminets offered a wide range of services for the men.
Official canteens began to appear, by November 1914 Lady Angela Forbes was running a canteen at Boulogne
In June 1917 Rowland Fielding found a YMCA canteen in a pillbox on Wyschaete Ridge.
Some units set up their own canteens, recycling the profits into free goods or prizes for sports days whilst out of the line.
Mail- the BEF deployed to France
Gerald Burgoyne in the trenches on 30th December 1914 received letters posted on 26th in Ireland England
By April 1917 the Post office system was handling 125, 000 parcels a day- this number was to start dropping drastically, probably due to the impact of rationing at home but also the rise of the force canteen.
Medical care- expectation of prompt care if injured or ill. System introduced many soldiers to medical and particularly dental care for the first time.
Leave- officially no leave was granted till after the first battle of Ypres France
In December 1917 Haig requested more leave for his men and the Army council began issuing edicts to this effect. In 1917 a policy was introduced that Officers and WOs who had been overseas could be posted home for 6 months, but January 1918 this had been extended to ORs.
By mid 1918 it was more likely to have been 6 months since the last home leave.
For the colonial forces this was a bit more of a problem, a scheme was developed to allow a long leave or furlough for troops who had served outside of Australia
Home front
This was an area covered by one of my colleagues, but we considered the effects of topics such as:
Support of family and community
Concerns of family and community
Absence from family etc
Risks to home front- zeppllins etc-
Propaganda- edith cavell, fyatt, little mother, recruitment posters
Ali
How did it go then? Must have been a bit daunting.
Ross
Posted by: Ross Mahoney | February 13, 2008 at 09:55 AM
A bit, but he was quite fair. The post above (which has mangled itself) is missing my colleague's bits on the death penalty and the home front. With these back in place we were critised for being a bit long!
Worse was last term- I had to give a presentation on the 18th (Eastern) Division and it's training and battle prep to some guy called Peter Simkins!
Posted by: Alistair Hollington | February 13, 2008 at 01:05 PM