Top a_joseph_byers
| 1 | Private Joseph Byers was the first Kitchener volunteer to be executed . He was 17 and under_age when he enlisted in the 1st Royal Scots Fusiliers in November 1914 , and was sent to France with two weeks training . By January 1915 , his inexperience and the horrors he witnessed caused him to go absent without leave with another private , Andrew Evans . |
| 2 | Byers pleaded guilty , believing that his candour would save him from the death sentence . Despite being under_age , he was given no representation at his trial , and he and Evans faced a firing squad at Locre on February 6 . According_to rumours , one of them did not die until the third volley , leading to speculation that the firing squad had fired wide to avoid killing the youth . |