SOLDIERS SENTENCED.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1741, 16 October 1917, Page 3

SOLDIERS SENTENCED.

THREE GET TWO YEARS’ HARD LABOUR. In Trentham Camp orders it is announced that the following soldiers, having been found guilty by district court-martial of disobeying a lawful command given by their .superior officers, have each been sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour for two years: — 62843 Ptc. H. K. Blundell, Trentham Details. 63524 Pte. W. Pethybridgc, Trentham Details. 66315 Pte. C. W. Doherty, Trentham Details. For absenting himself without leave, one man has been sentenced to 84 days’ detention and stoppages of pay, and another to 42 days’ detention and stoppages of pay. Another man, for desertion, has been sentenced to 72 days’ detention and stoppages of pay, and another, for neglect to the prejudice of good order and military discipline and using insubordinate language to his superior officer, to twenty-eight days’ detention. It is officially stated that practically the whole of the men who have been sentenced at Trentham Camp for months past to 11 months’ and 2 years’ imprisonment with hard labour for “refusing to obey orders given by their superior officers” are religious and conscientious objectors who refuse to undergo training or to do any military work when ordered. The degree of sentence varies according to the behaviour of the offender,