Pte. Albert Rickman

Of the 1st Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers, he went missing on 1 July 1916, the day his battalion attacked the Hawthorn Ridge. He was an Englishman, the son of a peasant farmer from Hampshire, Charles and Anne Rickman, of 4, Carrington Terrace, Milford-on-Sea, Hants. Private Rickman had served with his Battalion in Gallipoli from April 1915 until January 1916, the Battalion eventually landing in France on the 19th March 1916. On the 1st July 1916 the Fusiliers advanced at 0800 in the second wave attacking near Beaumont-Hamel. Heavy German machine-gun fire cut them down before they could pass through the British barbed wire. Casualties were 11 officers and 300 other ranks. On the 2nd July the survivors held the British front line near Auchonvillers, gathering up the dead and wounded and repairing the trenches. 27 years old Private Rickman deserted and was not arrested until the 20th July on the lines of communication in the rear. By the time of the Court Martial the 29th Division had left the Somme and moved up to the Ypres Salient and on the 7th September 1916 the death sentence was confirmed and on the 15th September 1916 Private Rickman, aged 27, was shot at 0600 for desertion. Grave in Vlamertinghe Military Cemetery.

The mass pardon of 306 British Empire soldiers executed for certain offences during the Great War was enacted in section 359 of the Armed Forces Act 2006, which came into effect on royal assent on 8 November 2006.

https://www.dublin-fusiliers.com/courts-martial/executed/rickman.html

https://www.military-history.org/articles/your-mh-the-case-of-alber...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoKrKg7ZCQ0

https://books.google.co.nz/books?id=-_X4AwAAQBAJ&pg=PT81&lpg=PT81&d...