Charles Fryatt.

This is coolbert:

Here with a new one on me. Thanks to Larry for the tip.

Outrage and indignity. From that era of the Great War [WW1] the controversial case of Charles Fryatt.

A merchant vessel captain deemed as a franc tireur and executed by the German. AND all for obeying orders considered to be legal.

"Charles Algernon Fryatt . . . was a British mariner who was executed by the Germans for attempting to ram a U-boat in 1915. When his ship, the SS Brussels, was captured off the Netherlands in 1916, he was court-martialled and sentenced to death although he was a civilian non-combatant."

 

Charles categorized by the German military as an irregular and unlawful enemy combatant. NOT in the manner of the single partisan/guerrilla fighter, the sniper engaging individual soldiers at land, but the captain of a British merchant ship attempting to ram and sink a German U-Boat.

That attack [ram and sink] unsuccessful nonetheless the German military considering this action of Charles Fryatt as an unlawful crime worthy of the death penalty. A sentence carried out.

"Seeing the U-boat had surfaced in order to torpedo his ship, Fryatt ordered full steam ahead and proceeded to try to ram U-33, which was forced to crash dive. This action was in compliance with orders issued by Winston Churchill to captains of merchant ships."

The execution by firing squad. A form of the death penalty as normally reserved for the military man and not for the civilian.

Some application of Admiralty Law applies here? The niceties and formalities of war as fought at sea for centuries were violated during this incident? I do not know.

coolbert.