The Lake Plav Executions, Dec. 25, 1915

For a fascinating and disturbing account of the trial and immediate execution of 21 Serbian soldiers during World War I, see Danilo Šarenac, Capital Punishment in the Serbian Army: The Case of Execution at Lake Plav in 1915, Currents of Hist. No. 3/23, at 40-61 (Nov. 15, 2023). The article, which is available through the Central and Eastern European Online Library, tells the shocking tale of how one Serbian commander, Col. (later General) Aleksandar K. Stojšić (1874-1937), saw to it that deserters were shot en masse after the briefest of trials and a threat to shoot every tenth soldier in the regiment. The author notes that the commander directed that all 21 accused be shot even though the court-martial had convicted only six. The commander even ordered that those sentenced to death be "slaughtered like cattle," rather than shot, but this was foiled when the regimental butcher failed to show up.

Under Serbia's 1901 Law on the Procedure of Military Courts in Criminal Offences, the court-martial would have consisted of four officers and one noncommissioned officer. Four votes were required for a death sentence, and the proceedings were to be completed within 24 hours or three days at most.