The Crucified Soldier
Encyclopedia
The Crucified Soldier refers to the widespread story of an Allied
soldier serving in the Canadian Corps
who may have been crucified
with bayonet
s on a barn door or a tree, while fighting on the Western Front
during World War I
. Three witnesses said they saw an unidentified crucified Canadian soldier near the battlefield of Ypres
, Belgium
on or around 24 April 1915, but there was no conclusive proof such a crucifixion actually occurred. The eyewitness accounts were somewhat contradictory, no crucified body was found, and no knowledge was uncovered at the time about the identity of the supposedly crucified soldier. During World War II
the story was used by the Nazis as an example of British propaganda.
Two days later, on 12 May, in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, Sir Robert Houston
asked Harold Tennant
, the Under-Secretary of State for War, "whether he has any information regarding the crucifixion of three Canadian soldiers recently captured by the Germans, who nailed them with bayonets to the side of a wooden structure?" Tennant replied that no information as to such an atrocity having been perpetrated had yet reached the War Office. Houston then asked if Tennant was aware that Canadian officers and Canadian soldiers who were eye-witnesses of the incidents had made affidavits, and whether the officer in command at Boulogne had not called the attention of the War Office to them. It was then stated that inquiries would be made.
On 15 May, The Times published a letter from a member of the army, according to which the crucified soldier was in fact a sergeant, and he had been found transfixed to the wooden fence of a farm building. The letter added that he had been repeatedly stabbed with bayonets and that there were many puncture wounds in his body. The unidentified correspondent had not heard that the crucifixion had been witnessed by any Allied forces and commented that there was room to suppose that the man had been dead when he was crucified.
On 19 May, Sir Robert Houston returned to the subject in the House of Commons, asking Harold Tennant:
Tennant replied that the military authorities in France had standing instructions to send details of any authenticated atrocities committed against British troops, and that no official information had been received. He added that inquiries were being made, and were not yet complete.
Colonel Ernest J. Chambers, the Canadian chief censor, began investigating the story soon after it surfaced. He searched for eyewitnesses, and found a private who swore under affidavit that he had seen three Canadian soldiers bayonetted to a barn door three miles from St. Julien. However, the sworn testimony from the two English soldiers, who claimed to have seen "the corpse of a Canadian soldier fastened with bayonets to a barn door", was subsequently debunked when it was discovered that the part of the front involved had never been occupied by Germans.
The story made headline news around the world and the Allies repeatedly used the supposed incident in their war propaganda
, including the US propaganda film The Prussian Cur
(1918) produced by the Fox Film Corporation, which included scenes of an Allied soldier's crucifixion. It bears relation to other propaganda of the time like the Rape of Belgium
and the Angels of Mons
, and the "German Corpse-Rendering Works" (Kadaververwertungsanstalt
).
s on a wooden cross, while Maple Copse, near Sanctuary Wood in the Ypres
sector, was the favored setting. The victim was not always Canadian: Ian Hay, who dated the incident to spring 1915, maintained that the victim was British, and that he was crucified on a tree by German cavalrymen. A version which appeared in the Los Angeles newspapers kept the Canadian nationality, but made it two soldiers.
A Canadian soldier who allegedly helped take down the soldier's body suggested the crucified soldier appeared to be a sergeant from the medical service and was possibly from Brantford, and at some point the victim was identified as Sergeant Thomas Elliott, of Brantford. Elliott himself later wrote to his local pastor to report that it had not been him.
According to Private George Barrie of the 13th Battalion, he saw a party of Germans in the village of St. Julien on 24 April 1915, which had been in the rear of the 1st Canadian Division
until a gas attack on 22 April, when it became the front line. Barrie reported that he saw what appeared to be a man in British uniform who had been crucified to a post by eight bayonets.
created a 32 inches (812.8 mm) bronze sculpture entitled Canada's Golgotha
which depicted a Canadian soldier crucified on a barn door and surrounded by jeering Germans. It was to be included in the exhibition of the Canadian War Memorial Fund collection, and was widely publicized before the exhibition opened.
The exhibition, at Burlington House
, London, was due to open in January 1919, just before the signing of the Paris Peace Treaty and Canadian Prime Minister Sir Robert Borden requested further investigation into the veracity of the story, while the German government formally requested that the Canadian government publicly acknowledge that the story of the crucified soldier was untrue, or else provide evidence. The official Canadian response to the Germans was that they had sufficient evidence to believe that the account was true, including that the victim was a "Sergeant Brant," but when the Germans demanded a part in the investigation, the sculpture was withdrawn from the exhibition and was not shown again until the 1990s.
The sculpture was also displayed in 2000 at an exhibition entitled "Under the Sign of the Cross: Creative Expressions of Christianity in Canada" at the Canadian Museum of Civilization
in 2000, and again provoked controversy.
investigated the story of the Crucified Soldier as well as other myths of World War I in his doctoral dissertation and developed them into a television documentary, which was transmitted in 2002 as part of UK Channel 4's
Secret History series. Overton uncovered new historical evidence which identified the crucified soldier as Sergeant Harry Band of the Central Ontario Regiment of the Canadian Infantry, who was reported missing in action
on 24 April 1915 near Ypres. Other soldiers in his unit wrote to Band's sister Elizabeth Petrie to express their condolences; a year later, one of them finally confirmed in a letter to her that her suspicions her brother had been "the crucified soldier" were true. Band's body was never recovered, and he is commemorated on the Menin Gate
memorial.
The evidence discovered by Overton included a typewritten note by a British nurse found in the Liddle Collection of war correspondence in Leeds University. The note related comments by a Lance Corporal C.M. Brown to his nurse, Miss Ursula Violet Chaloner, who he told of a Sergeant Harry Band who was "crucified after a battle of Ypres on one of the doors of a barn with five bayonets in him."
Some accounts erroneously name the soldier identified in Overton's documentary as "Harry Banks," thus creating an apparent contradiction in that the only Canadian soldier of that name enlisted into the Over-seas Expeditionary Force on 1 September 1915 in Victoria, British Columbia
, Canada, some five months after the supposed crucifixion. In addition, Banks appears to have survived the War, as he is not commemorated by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission
, the agency responsible for recording the deaths and grave or memorial sites for Commonwealth
soldiers killed in the both World Wars. In fact, the surname of "Banks" is not mentioned in the Overton documentary at all.
Allies of World War I
The Entente Powers were the countries at war with the Central Powers during World War I. The members of the Triple Entente were the United Kingdom, France, and the Russian Empire; Italy entered the war on their side in 1915...
soldier serving in the Canadian Corps
Canadian Corps
The Canadian Corps was a World War I corps formed from the Canadian Expeditionary Force in September 1915 after the arrival of the 2nd Canadian Division in France. The corps was expanded by the addition of the 3rd Canadian Division in December 1915 and the 4th Canadian Division in August 1916...
who may have been crucified
Crucifixion
Crucifixion is an ancient method of painful execution in which the condemned person is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross and left to hang until dead...
with bayonet
Bayonet
A bayonet is a knife, dagger, sword, or spike-shaped weapon designed to fit in, on, over or underneath the muzzle of a rifle, musket or similar weapon, effectively turning the gun into a spear...
s on a barn door or a tree, while fighting on the Western Front
Western Front (World War I)
Following the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the German Army opened the Western Front by first invading Luxembourg and Belgium, then gaining military control of important industrial regions in France. The tide of the advance was dramatically turned with the Battle of the Marne...
during World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
. Three witnesses said they saw an unidentified crucified Canadian soldier near the battlefield of Ypres
Second Battle of Ypres
The Second Battle of Ypres was the first time Germany used poison gas on a large scale on the Western Front in the First World War and the first time a former colonial force pushed back a major European power on European soil, which occurred in the battle of St...
, Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
on or around 24 April 1915, but there was no conclusive proof such a crucifixion actually occurred. The eyewitness accounts were somewhat contradictory, no crucified body was found, and no knowledge was uncovered at the time about the identity of the supposedly crucified soldier. During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
the story was used by the Nazis as an example of British propaganda.
The story
On 10 May 1915, The Times printed a short item titled "Torture of a Canadian Officer" as coming from its Paris correspondent. According to the piece, Canadian soldiers wounded at Ypres had told how one of their officers had been crucified to a wall "by bayonets thrust through his hands and feet" before having another bayonet driven through his throat and, finally, "riddled with bullets". The soldiers said that it had been seen by the Dublin Fusiliers and that they had heard the Fusiliers' officers talking about it.Two days later, on 12 May, in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, Sir Robert Houston
Sir Robert Houston, 1st Baronet
Sir Robert Paterson Houston, 1st Baronet was a British Conservative Party politician and shipowner. He was born to a maritime engineer from Renfrewshire, and after an apprenticeship in Liverpool Houston also became an engineer...
asked Harold Tennant
Harold Tennant
Harold John "Jack" Tennant PC was a Scottish Liberal politician. He served as Secretary for Scotland under his brother-in-law H. H...
, the Under-Secretary of State for War, "whether he has any information regarding the crucifixion of three Canadian soldiers recently captured by the Germans, who nailed them with bayonets to the side of a wooden structure?" Tennant replied that no information as to such an atrocity having been perpetrated had yet reached the War Office. Houston then asked if Tennant was aware that Canadian officers and Canadian soldiers who were eye-witnesses of the incidents had made affidavits, and whether the officer in command at Boulogne had not called the attention of the War Office to them. It was then stated that inquiries would be made.
On 15 May, The Times published a letter from a member of the army, according to which the crucified soldier was in fact a sergeant, and he had been found transfixed to the wooden fence of a farm building. The letter added that he had been repeatedly stabbed with bayonets and that there were many puncture wounds in his body. The unidentified correspondent had not heard that the crucifixion had been witnessed by any Allied forces and commented that there was room to suppose that the man had been dead when he was crucified.
On 19 May, Sir Robert Houston returned to the subject in the House of Commons, asking Harold Tennant:
Tennant replied that the military authorities in France had standing instructions to send details of any authenticated atrocities committed against British troops, and that no official information had been received. He added that inquiries were being made, and were not yet complete.
Colonel Ernest J. Chambers, the Canadian chief censor, began investigating the story soon after it surfaced. He searched for eyewitnesses, and found a private who swore under affidavit that he had seen three Canadian soldiers bayonetted to a barn door three miles from St. Julien. However, the sworn testimony from the two English soldiers, who claimed to have seen "the corpse of a Canadian soldier fastened with bayonets to a barn door", was subsequently debunked when it was discovered that the part of the front involved had never been occupied by Germans.
The story made headline news around the world and the Allies repeatedly used the supposed incident in their war propaganda
Propaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
, including the US propaganda film The Prussian Cur
The Prussian Cur
The Prussian Cur was an American anti-German silent propaganda film produced during World War I. Now considered a lost film, it is notable for perpetuating the story of the Crucified Soldier....
(1918) produced by the Fox Film Corporation, which included scenes of an Allied soldier's crucifixion. It bears relation to other propaganda of the time like the Rape of Belgium
Rape of Belgium
The Rape of Belgium is a wartime propaganda term describing the 1914 German invasion of Belgium. The term initially had a figurative meaning, referring to the violation of Belgian neutrality, but embellished reports of German atrocities soon gave it a literal significance...
and the Angels of Mons
Angels of Mons
The Angels of Mons is a popular legend about a group of angels who supposedly protected members of the British army in the Battle of Mons at the outset of World War I...
, and the "German Corpse-Rendering Works" (Kadaververwertungsanstalt
Kadaververwertungsanstalt
The Kadaververwertungsanstalten , also sometimes called the "German Corpse-Rendering Works" or "Tallow Factory" was one of the most notorious British anti-German propaganda efforts of World War I....
).
Variations
The story often varied, though the most common version told how the Germans had captured a Canadian soldier and crucified him with bayonetBayonet
A bayonet is a knife, dagger, sword, or spike-shaped weapon designed to fit in, on, over or underneath the muzzle of a rifle, musket or similar weapon, effectively turning the gun into a spear...
s on a wooden cross, while Maple Copse, near Sanctuary Wood in the Ypres
Ypres
Ypres is a Belgian municipality located in the Flemish province of West Flanders. The municipality comprises the city of Ypres and the villages of Boezinge, Brielen, Dikkebus, Elverdinge, Hollebeke, Sint-Jan, Vlamertinge, Voormezele, Zillebeke, and Zuidschote...
sector, was the favored setting. The victim was not always Canadian: Ian Hay, who dated the incident to spring 1915, maintained that the victim was British, and that he was crucified on a tree by German cavalrymen. A version which appeared in the Los Angeles newspapers kept the Canadian nationality, but made it two soldiers.
A Canadian soldier who allegedly helped take down the soldier's body suggested the crucified soldier appeared to be a sergeant from the medical service and was possibly from Brantford, and at some point the victim was identified as Sergeant Thomas Elliott, of Brantford. Elliott himself later wrote to his local pastor to report that it had not been him.
According to Private George Barrie of the 13th Battalion, he saw a party of Germans in the village of St. Julien on 24 April 1915, which had been in the rear of the 1st Canadian Division
1st Canadian Division
Formed in August 1914, the 1st Canadian Division was a formation of the Canadian Expeditionary Force. The division was initially made up from provisional battalions that were named after their province of origin but these titles were dropped before the division arrived in Britain on October 14,...
until a gas attack on 22 April, when it became the front line. Barrie reported that he saw what appeared to be a man in British uniform who had been crucified to a post by eight bayonets.
Derwent Wood sculpture
In 1918 British artist Francis Derwent WoodFrancis Derwent Wood
Francis Derwent Wood RA was a sculptor, born in Keswick, Cumberland, in England's Lake District.-Early life:Wood studied in Germany and returned to London in 1887 to work under Edouard Lanteri and Sir Thomas Brock; he taught at the Glasgow School of Art from 1897 through 1905 and was professor of...
created a 32 inches (812.8 mm) bronze sculpture entitled Canada's Golgotha
Canada's Golgotha
Canada's Golgotha is a bronze sculpture by the British sculptor Francis Derwent Wood, produced in 1918. It illustrates the story of the Crucified Soldier from the First World War and depicts a Canadian soldier crucified on a barn door and surrounded by jeering Germans...
which depicted a Canadian soldier crucified on a barn door and surrounded by jeering Germans. It was to be included in the exhibition of the Canadian War Memorial Fund collection, and was widely publicized before the exhibition opened.
The exhibition, at Burlington House
Burlington House
Burlington House is a building on Piccadilly in London. It was originally a private Palladian mansion, and was expanded in the mid 19th century after being purchased by the British government...
, London, was due to open in January 1919, just before the signing of the Paris Peace Treaty and Canadian Prime Minister Sir Robert Borden requested further investigation into the veracity of the story, while the German government formally requested that the Canadian government publicly acknowledge that the story of the crucified soldier was untrue, or else provide evidence. The official Canadian response to the Germans was that they had sufficient evidence to believe that the account was true, including that the victim was a "Sergeant Brant," but when the Germans demanded a part in the investigation, the sculpture was withdrawn from the exhibition and was not shown again until the 1990s.
The sculpture was also displayed in 2000 at an exhibition entitled "Under the Sign of the Cross: Creative Expressions of Christianity in Canada" at the Canadian Museum of Civilization
Canadian Museum of Civilization
The Canadian Museum of Civilization is Canada's national museum of human history and the most popular and most-visited museum in Canada....
in 2000, and again provoked controversy.
Sergeant Harry Band
British documentary film maker Iain OvertonIain Overton
Iain Overton is a British documentary maker born on 3 August, 1973. He has worked for the BBC and ITN and worked in over 85 countries around the world....
investigated the story of the Crucified Soldier as well as other myths of World War I in his doctoral dissertation and developed them into a television documentary, which was transmitted in 2002 as part of UK Channel 4's
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
Secret History series. Overton uncovered new historical evidence which identified the crucified soldier as Sergeant Harry Band of the Central Ontario Regiment of the Canadian Infantry, who was reported missing in action
Missing in action
Missing in action is a casualty Category assigned under the Status of Missing to armed services personnel who are reported missing during active service. They may have been killed, wounded, become a prisoner of war, or deserted. If deceased, neither their remains nor grave can be positively...
on 24 April 1915 near Ypres. Other soldiers in his unit wrote to Band's sister Elizabeth Petrie to express their condolences; a year later, one of them finally confirmed in a letter to her that her suspicions her brother had been "the crucified soldier" were true. Band's body was never recovered, and he is commemorated on the Menin Gate
Menin Gate
The Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing is a war memorial in Ypres, Belgium dedicated to the commemoration of British and Commonwealth soldiers who were killed in the Ypres Salient of the First World War and whose graves are unknown...
memorial.
The evidence discovered by Overton included a typewritten note by a British nurse found in the Liddle Collection of war correspondence in Leeds University. The note related comments by a Lance Corporal C.M. Brown to his nurse, Miss Ursula Violet Chaloner, who he told of a Sergeant Harry Band who was "crucified after a battle of Ypres on one of the doors of a barn with five bayonets in him."
Some accounts erroneously name the soldier identified in Overton's documentary as "Harry Banks," thus creating an apparent contradiction in that the only Canadian soldier of that name enlisted into the Over-seas Expeditionary Force on 1 September 1915 in Victoria, British Columbia
Victoria, British Columbia
Victoria is the capital city of British Columbia, Canada and is located on the southern tip of Vancouver Island off Canada's Pacific coast. The city has a population of about 78,000 within the metropolitan area of Greater Victoria, which has a population of 360,063, the 15th most populous Canadian...
, Canada, some five months after the supposed crucifixion. In addition, Banks appears to have survived the War, as he is not commemorated by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission
Commonwealth War Graves Commission
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission is an intergovernmental organisation of six independent member states whose principal function is to mark, record and maintain the graves, and places of commemoration, of Commonwealth of Nations military service members who died in the two World Wars...
, the agency responsible for recording the deaths and grave or memorial sites for Commonwealth
Commonwealth of Nations
The Commonwealth of Nations, normally referred to as the Commonwealth and formerly known as the British Commonwealth, is an intergovernmental organisation of fifty-four independent member states...
soldiers killed in the both World Wars. In fact, the surname of "Banks" is not mentioned in the Overton documentary at all.
In popular culture
- The story is mentioned by Dalton TrumboDalton TrumboJames Dalton Trumbo was an American screenwriter and novelist, and one of the Hollywood Ten, a group of film professionals who refused to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1947 during the committee's investigation of Communist influences in the motion picture industry...
in his novel Johnny Got His GunJohnny Got His GunJohnny Got His Gun is an anti-war novel written in 1938 by American novelist and screenwriter Dalton Trumboand published by J. B. Lippincott company.-Plot:...
. - The story also is mentioned frequently in Paul GrossPaul GrossPaul Michael Gross is a Canadian actor, producer, director, singer and writer born in Calgary, Alberta. He is known for his lead role as Constable Benton Fraser in the television series Due South as well as his 2008 war film Passchendaele, which he wrote, produced, directed, and starred in...
' film PasschendaelePasschendaele (film)Passchendaele is a 2008 Canadian war film from Alliance Films, written, co-produced, directed by, and starring Paul Gross. The film, which was shot in Calgary, Alberta, Fort Macleod, Alberta, and in Belgium, focuses on the experiences of a Canadian soldier, Michael Dunne, at the Battle of...
, although the main character, Michael Dunne claims that the incident stems from exaggeration and that artillery fire was responsible for the body of a soldier appearing to be nailed to a barn door. Towards the end of the film Pvt. David Mann runs into the German trench, which is then hit with artillery. The shell's explosion causes him to get tangled in barbed wire and the trench's floorboards, which were flung upwards in the explosion. Perhaps in reference to Dunne's earlier claim. - A French zouaveZouaveZouave was the title given to certain light infantry regiments in the French Army, normally serving in French North Africa between 1831 and 1962. The name was also adopted during the 19th century by units in other armies, especially volunteer regiments raised for service in the American Civil War...
is crucified by German uhlanUhlanUhlans were Polish light cavalry armed with lances, sabres and pistols. The title was later used by lancer regiments in the Russian, Prussian, and Austrian armies....
s in the poem "Jean Desprez" (from Rhymes of A Red Cross Man) by Robert W. ServiceRobert W. ServiceRobert William Service was a poet and writer who has often been called "the Bard of the Yukon".Service is best known for his poems "The Shooting of Dan McGrew" and "The Cremation of Sam McGee", from his first book, Songs of a Sourdough...
, published in 1916.
