Military corporal punishment

Military corporal punishment is or was allowed in some settings in a few jurisdictions. The military systematically employed physical and psychological violence to train and tame recruits. Humiliation, threats and drastic physical punishments were daily occurrences. For example, the British Army of the early 19th century had a well-earned reputation for deplorable conditions of service and excessively harsh discipline; to a lesser degree, the same could also be said of the U.S. Army in the same period. Reforms in military law—and more importantly, changes in national attitudes toward matters of military discipline and punishment—occurred along similar lines on both sides of the Atlantic.

Describing the culture of military discipline that existed in the U.S. Army during the frontier era, historian Don Rickey has said, “Fear of punishment was the basis of discipline.” This was true of all armies throughout history, just as it has been a factor in human behavior in most civilian societies and cultures. Fear of the punitive and punishing hand of the law, after all, was supposed to hold the criminal element in check, particularly when that punishment was known to be swift, sure, and severe. How well this deterrent worked in practice was always debatable, but for centuries the prevailing belief in militaries the world over insisted that military discipline could only be maintained by the heavy-handed application of harsh punishments.

The British soldier at the beginning of this period was subject to a code of military law that was, in a word, brutal. In 1800, British Army regulations listed no fewer than 222 offenses that could draw the death penalty, and corporal punishment in the form of flogging was taken to such an extreme that sentences of as many as 500 lashes were regularly ordered. That number of lashes was enough to kill a man, a fact which led several contemporaneous observers to question the ultimate intent of such punishment. Even in an era when flogging was firmly established in military law, there were always critics who deplored it as barbaric.

How much the individual British soldier was at risk of a flogging depended to some degree on his own conduct, of course, but the infliction of this punishment could be incredibly capricious. Some British officers were benevolent disciplinarians who resorted to the lash only when the severity of the offense or the immutability of military law required them to do so, but others were infamous for their proclivity for flogging men on almost any pretext. Major General Robert “Black Bob” Craufurd, the tactically brilliant but notoriously mercurial commander of the British army’s Rifles Brigade in the early years of the Peninsular War, was a ferociously strict officer who threatened to flog any man in his brigade who stepped out of the line of march in order to avoid a mud puddle in the road. Coming from a man of Craufurd’s reputation, it was no idle threat. His nickname originated from his moodiness rather than his physical appearance, but it might just as accurately have been applied to his draconian views on military discipline.

The enlisted men in armies on both sides of the Atlantic endured decades of passive neglect and outright condemnation from their civil societies, and the same sort of negative stereotypes were applied to British and American soldiers alike.

The British public celebrated their soldiers when they won victories on the battlefield but reviled them as reprobates and criminals the rest of the time. This attitude persisted for decades, and Wellington himself expressed it on occasion. In 1829 he wrote, “The man who enlists into the British army is, in general, the most drunken and probably the worst man… of the village or town in which he lives… they can be brought to be fit for what is to be called the first class only by discipline.” This belief that most soldiers were utterly deficient in moral character was accompanied by the view that the only way to keep them in check was by harsh discipline enforced by savage forms of corporal punishment.

British commanders down to the company level had authority to sentence soldiers to brutal punishments for the most trivial of offenses. The returns of one regiment in 1811 were not at all unique in the penalties its officers imposed for minor transgressions. The trivial infractions soldiers committed, and the punishments imposed, included: “Deficient of frill, part of his regimental necessaries.”—100 lashes; Deficient of a razor, part of his regimental necessaries.—200 lashes; for making an improper use of the barrack bedding.—400 lashes.”

In the U.S. Army flogging was also a standard punishment at the outset of the 1800s, for a wide range of offenses. When the United States encoded its first version of the Articles of War in 1806, flogging was applied to no less than 30 offenses. The British applied the lash with even greater frequency to many more violations of military regulation, and the rigidly conservative senior ranks of both armies regarded the lash as indispensable to maintaining good order and discipline. As one historian notes, “Traditionalists tended to look on private soldiers as incorrigible reprobates who required stiff doses of punishment to keep their animal instincts in check.”

Reform came slowly in both nations, and changes in military justice reflected changes occurring at the same time in civilian law and societal attitudes toward crime and punishment. The growing civilian repugnance for the spectacle of soldiers tied to the halberds for floggings in view of their assembled regiment arguably had more to do with progressive attitudes about the inhumanity of the punishment itself than with any real concern for the rights of the soldiers themselves, at least at first. The activists who protested against the savagery of military punishments did not express nearly as much indignation about the wretched conditions of soldiers’ lives, even though the two issues were inextricably linked. By 1850, public pressure in the United States had forced a drastic reduction in the number of military offenses for which the lash could be imposed, but the army managed to avoid an outright abolition of flogging by keeping it as an optional punishment under intentionally vague and ambiguously worded regulations.

For British soldiers, the wide degree of interpretation applied to charges such as “insubordination” meant that they were always at risk of severe punishment for minor offenses—almost any action or behavior could be interpreted as insubordination if their officers chose to interpret it as such. In 1849, one soldier was punished on a charge of insubordination for “wearing new trousers outside the barrack gates while drunk.” The charge of “disgraceful conduct” was even more ambiguous, so much so that in that same year the government felt it necessary to warn the army that “the indiscriminate use of the term tends to weaken its moral effect.” Even so, the overuse of the lash as punishment for violating hopelessly vague and ambiguous rules continued. The problem was not as severe in the U.S. army at that time, but American court-martial records from the period show that soldiers were flogged for offenses such as “making a disrespectful gesture to the adjutant,” and “loss of a bridle.”

In both Britain and the United States, the incremental shift away from military flogging happened at nearly the same time—during the Napoleonic Wars in Britain, and after the War of 1812 in America. Humanitarian concerns were only part of the objections raised. Most critics focused on the fact that flogging simply did not seem an effective deterrent to misbehavior. “I have closely watched the career of many of the recipients of this degrading punishment,” one former British soldier wrote, “and I can safely say that I never knew not even one that it made any improvement in, either his moral character or as a soldier.” Over a career of 21 years in the ranks, this soldier estimated that he had witnessed at least 100 floggings, so he held a very well-informed opinion.

The U.S. Army from its creation in 1775 used flogging as a punishment, though with less frequency and certainly for fewer offenses that did other armies of the same era. The lash remained an option of military justice in the American army up until the Civil War, when it was finally stricken from army regulations in 1861.

Maritime discipline and punishment

Discipline

During Cook's time, discipline in the Royal Navy was a matter of training and obedience. Co-operation and competence were required to ensure the ship was in working order for long periods of time and all sailors recognised that disobedience was dangerous. From commander to cabin boy, each man was expected to carry out his role for the good of all. The Admiralty provided 36 Articles of War which detailed crimes and punishments recognised+ by the Navy, mostly for offences by the officers. There was also a large manual, the 'King's Regulations and Admiralty Instructions', which outlined rules for every conceivable event from the time a man entered the Navy to his retirement or death. Punishment was expected by the ordinary seamen and had to be seen to be done. It was carried out in full view of the ship's complement, drama adding to the deterrent quality of the event.

Articles of War

The legal basis for naval discipline was the 36 Articles of War of 1757. These were required to be read out by the captain to the formally mustered crew at least once a month, as part of the 'sermon' at the Sunday service and before punishments. These were the 'laws' they lived by. They defined the major punishments for crimes at sea. Death was mandatory for eight crimes and optional for eleven more. The Crimes can be summarized as; offences against religion and God, the King and government, the duties which men owe to their fellow subjects and withdrawing or keeping back from fight. The last article gave the captain of a ship almost unlimited power. 'All other crimes not capital committed by any person or persons of the fleet shall be punished by the laws and customs in such cases used at sea'. Brutality occurred but most captains realised that hanging and flogging could deprive a ship of much needed labour.

Punishment

A clean and orderly ship was essential for the safety of ship and crew. Most crimes were committed by men not fulfilling their duties or putting the crew or ship in danger. Crimes included falling asleep on duty, disobedience and insolence and unclean practices such as toileting in places other than the toilet. These crimes were often the direct result of drunkenness and boredom.

Flogging

The whip or scourge was known as the cat-o-'nine tails. A thick piece of rope was used as the handle and spliced with nine knotted strands. It was hung in a red baize bag in the mess area as a constant reminder to the sailors. Flogging was the most common type of punishment inflicted at the captain's discretion. Carried out at the gangway, the crime was read out in front of the ship's company. The officers watched from the quarter deck and the marines stood between the prisoner and the crew. The convicted sailor had his shirt removed and his hands were tied to the rigging or grating. Usually a dozen lashes for any one crime was given by the boatswain or his mate with enough force to break the skin. The blood and flesh were cleaned from the 'cat's tail' by the mate running his fingers through them after each stroke. The surgeon's role was to assess the sailor's condition until the flogging was complete and the man was cut down. Boys (under-18s) were flogged on the bare buttocks. For adult men it was normally applied to the bare upper back, but sometimes a sailor seen to have misbehaved in a particularly childish manner, or who was "too big for his boots", would be ordered to be "punished as a boy".

Running the Gauntlet

This was an alternative punishment for thieves until 1806. Stealing from a fellow sailor was stealing from your 'brother-at-arms' and stealing from the 'ship's stores' threatened the survival of the whole ship. After sentencing, the ship's crew mustered in two rows facing each other. The man sentenced was stripped to the waist and given 12 lashes, often with a 'thieves' cat', a thicker version of the cat 'o nine tails with more than one knot per cord. He was then placed between an officer who walked backwards carrying a short sword called a cutlass levelled at his chest and the ship's corporal who prodded him from behind as he walked between the rows. His shipmates were furnished with small twisted cords called 'knittles' or 'nettles' and lashed him as he passed. A sharp eye was kept on the crew, any man not striking and not striking hard, risked the same punishment. Sometimes the punishment ended with another 12 lashes to reinforce the deterrent nature of the spectacle.

Court Martial

These were required before any penalty of death, imprisonment, floggings of more than 3 dozen lashes or a reduction in rank of senior officers. Convicted offices suffered death by shooting until the 1790s. For other crew, the death penalty was by hanging, usually from the cathead or yardarm. Executions were not common while at sea.

The Surgeon's role

The surgeon assessed the physical state of a prisoner during floggings. If he considered the man could not take anymore, the sailor was treated with smelling salts. Raw welts on his back were rubbed with brine (saltwater) or a salve of mercuric oxide, now known to be poisonous. If the man recovered, the remaining sentence was carried out.