Ernest Thurtle

Ernest Thurtle (born November 11, 1884 in the US state of New York, † August 22, 1954 ) was a British politician ( Labor Party ). He is best known today for his part in the abolition of the death penalty in British military criminal law.

Life and activity

After leaving school, Thurtle worked as an accountant and salesman. In 1908 he joined the Labor Party. From around 1915 to 1918 he took part in the First World War, in which he was wounded in the Battle of Cambrai .

In the British general election of 1923, Thurtle was elected as a candidate for the Labor Party in the Shoreditch constituency for the first time as a member of the House of Commons , the British Parliament, of which he initially belonged until 1931. Previously, he had unsuccessfully applied for a seat in the House of Commons in the elections in 1918 and 1922. In the 1931 election, Thurtle lost to Conservative Charles Harold Summersby . After a four-year absence from Parliament, Thurtle was able to recapture his seat in the 1935 election. He represented the Shoreditch constituency in the following period - re-elected in 1945 - without interruption until its abolition in 1950 in Parliament, and then until 1954 for another four years the newly created Shoreditch and Finsbury constituency. He was a member of Parliament for a period of thirty-one years for twenty-seven years (1923-1931 and 1935-1954).

Thurtle's most important legislative achievement is usually the bill that he introduced to the British Parliament in the 1920s and finally adopted in 1930 after several unsuccessful attempts to abolish the death penalty within the British Army as a sanction to punish offenses such as desertion or cowardice before the enemy . The background to his efforts in this area was the execution of more than 300 British soldiers during the First World War by firing squads because of these practices on the basis of judgments by military courts. Thurtle first introduced a corresponding bill for the abolition of the death penalty to the House of Commons in 1924: in 1925 the Labor Party adopted Thurtle's draft, i. that is, from then on it represented his position as the official position of the entire party. In 1930, Thurtle's bill finally found a majority in parliament and was passed by it as a reform.

In the 1920s, Thurtle also stood out for his support for efforts to transform Britain from a monarchy into a republic.

In addition to his parliamentary activities, Thurtle held various special posts in parliament over the years: in 1924 he served as the private parliamentary secretary of the then pension minister and from 1930 to 1931 as whip in the Labor group.

During the Second World War, Thurtle served as parliamentary state secretary in the information ministry from 1941 to 1945 in addition to his parliamentary activities.

At the end of the 1930s, Thurtle was classified by the National Socialist police as an important target: In the spring of 1940, the Reich Main Security Office in Berlin put him on the special wanted list GB , a directory of people who the Nazi surveillance apparatus considered particularly dangerous or important, which is why they should be in the case a successful invasion and occupation of the British Isles by the Wehrmacht should be located and arrested by the special SS commandos following the occupation forces with special priority.

family

Thurtle had been married to Dorothy Lansbury, daughter of Labor Party leader George Lansbury , since 1912 .

Fonts

• Times Winged Chariot Chaterson , London 1945.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Entry on Ernest Thurtle on the special wanted list GB (reproduction on the website of the Imperial War Museum in London) .