Military figure and casualty of the Great War,Private Highgate, of the 1st Battalion, The Queen's Own (Royal West Kent Regiment)Service No:L/10061, was the first British soldier to be executed by firing squad for desertion during the Great War - a little over a month into the conflict.He was one of 306 British and Commonwealth soldiers executed after courts-martial for cowardice and desertion during the Great War. In most cases, the real cause for their offences has been re-attributed in modern times to post-traumatic stress disorder, recognized at the time, but not justified, as shell shock.Soldiers accused of cowardice were often not given fair trials nor were they properly defended.Another perspective is that the decisions to execute were taken in the heat of war when the commander's aim was to keep the army together and fighting. The families of these victims often carried the stigma of the label of "coward". Another side to this form of "justice" is the lasting emotional pain caused to those who were in the firing squads.Britain was one of the last countries to still dishonour these victims but in 2007, the Armed Forces Act 2006 was passed allowing the soldiers to be pardoned, although section 359(4) of the act states that the pardon "does not affect any conviction or sentence." He was one of 51 men from Shoreham who left to fight in the Great War, only two of whom returned. He survived the Battle of Mons, in which almost 8,000 men were killed,after which, he had fled and hidden in a barn where he was found wearing the clothes taken from a scarecrow. He had to defend himself at his trial because all his comrades from the Regiment had been killed, injured or captured.He claimed that he accidentally became separated from his regiment. He was a son of a farm labourer at Oxbourne Farm in Shoreham and he was himself a farm labourer.He enlisted as a regular soldier prior to the Great War in Guildford, Surrey on 4th October 1912 having served on the Training Ship "Exmouth" moored off Grays, Essex and he appears as a Deck-Boy on the 1911 census in Liverpool.He had deserted from the army in February 1914 and it appears that he was only caught because he attempted a fraudulent enlistment at Woolwich which he did confess to.Prior to mobilisation his battalion was based in Dublin's Richmond Barracks and it crossed to France on 15 August 1914. On 5 September, as his battalion moved forward to take part in the First Battle of the Marne,he was apprehended in a barn on the estate of Baron de Rothschild at Tournan-en-Brie by the gamekeeper. He reportedly informed the latter, 'I have had enough of it, I want to get out of it and this is how I am going to do it.' He was tried by court martial,convened at Chateau Combreaux, near Tournan in northern France, convicted of desertion and the death sentence was confirmed on 6 September 1914. His execution was almost as hasty as his trial, as senior officers insisted that he be executed "At once, as publicly as possible." He was informed of his fate at 6.22am on 8 September in the presence of a Church of England clergyman. An officer then ordered a burial party and a firing squad to prepare, and Highgate was shot at 7.07am witnessed by men from the 1st Dorset Regiment and 1st Cheshire Regiment. "Soldiers Died in the Great War, 1914-1919" shows that he was a resident of Catford, South-East London and that his cause of death was ‘Died of Wounds' though his service records state "Died Gun Shot wounds".In 2000,the parish council in his native village of Shoreham, Kent, voted not to include his name on its war memorial. It is said that his parents, John and Alice Highgate [nee Nuttley],left the village in shame, and when the memorial was erected in 1922 no thought was given to including his name.However,the family had moved from the village in 1900, as he is recorded as having been educated at Hither Green School, Lewisham in South London.He is honoured on the Sidcup War Memorial in Kent,along with his two brothers who were later killed in action.
Private Joseph Highgate
and Lance Corporal Robert Highgate
His AB64 (paybook) has in it the words 'If I get killed all I have to come from the Government for my services I leave to Miss Mary MacNutly, 3 Leinster Street, Phibsborough, Dublin'. He has no known grave-the Official Point of Commemoration is the La Ferte-sous-Jouarre Memorial but he is also commemorated on the Shot at Dawn Memorial