Editing Breaker Morant (section)

==Petition==
{{main|Pardon for Morant, Handcock and Witton}}
During 2002, a group of Australians travelled to South Africa and held a service at the Pretoria graveside to commemorate the execution on the morning of its hundredth anniversary.  The service was also attended by the Australian [[High Commissioner]] to South Africa.  The group left a new marker on the grave.

A petition to pardon Morant and Handcock was sent to [[Queen Elizabeth II]] during February 2010.  The petition has been severely criticised in South Africa, specifically by descendants of the Viljoen brothers who were killed in the skirmish with Hunt and Eland and by the descendants of the family of Rev. Heese.

Hamish Paterson states:  "I don’t think they [the Australian supporters of a Morant pardon] have actually considered what Morant was convicted of. Let's start off with the laws of war. If for example, we have a surrender. You want to surrender and I don’t accept your surrender, so I choose not to accept it, that I’m entitled to do. [...] However, the situation changes dramatically once I accept your surrender, then I must remove you from the battlefield to a POW camp and keep you safe. If, for example, Kitchener said, "take no prisoners", that was very different from "shoot prisoners!" So Morant and Handcock made two very basic errors: Once you've accepted the surrender, you take them to the railway line and get them shipped off to Bermuda, or wherever. At that point, the sensible thing to do was to ship them off to a POW camp. The next error was to shoot these guys in front of a neutral witness, and then you kill the witness. These are a series of terrible errors of judgement. Because they killed a German missionary, the Kaiser (became) involved. [...] Technically, the two "Aussies" were British officers. The problem was you were dealing with an unstable set-up in the BVC. It had just been formed. I don't see a regular Australian unit behaving that way. I rather suspect why no British guys were shot was that they were either regular army or militia, or yeomanry, all of which are very unlikely to actually shoot prisoners. I think no British were shot because they hadn't made the mistake of shooting prisoners who'd already surrendered."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/287483|title=South African Historian Against Royal Pardon For 'Breaker' Morant|author=Szabo, Christopher|website=www.digitaljournal.com|date=12 February 2010|access-date=2010-12-24}}</ref>

Jim Unkles, an Australian lawyer, submitted two petitions during October 2009, one to Queen Elizabeth II and the other to the House of Representatives Petitions Committee, to review the convictions and sentences of Morant, Handcock, and Witton.  The petitions were referred to the British Crown by the Australian Attorney General.  On Monday, 27 February 2012, in a speech delivered to the House of Representatives on the hundred-and-tenth anniversary of the sentencing of the three men, [[Alex Hawke]], the Member for [[Division of Mitchell|Mitchell]] (NSW), described the case for the pardons as "strong and compelling".<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/genpdf/chamber/hansardr/dfa1725a-aa28-48db-ba56-7995bad31f8c/0195/hansard_frag.pdf;fileType=application%2Fpdf|title=House of Representatives: Constituency Statement: Alex Hawke: Speech: Lieutenants Morant, Handcock and Witton (Monday, 27 February 2012)|website=parlinfo.aph.gov.au|access-date=3 September 2019}}</ref>

During November 2010, the British Ministry of Defence stated that the appeal had been rejected:  "After detailed historical and legal consideration, the Secretary of State has concluded that no new primary evidence has come to light which supports the petition to overturn the original courts-martial verdicts and sentences."<ref>{{cite web|title=Britain rejects pardon for executed soldier Breaker Morant|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/australiaandthepacific/australia/8129261/Britain-rejects-pardon-for-executed-solider-Breaker-Morant.html|author=Malkin, Bonnie|date=12 November 2010|work=The Telegraph|access-date=2010-12-24}}</ref> The decision was supported by Australian military historian Craig Wilcox<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/uk-right-to-reject-breaker-morant-review-20101214-18we0.html|title=UK right to reject Breaker Morant review|last=Wilcox|first=Craig|work=The Sydney Morning Herald|date=14 December 2010|access-date=2010-12-31}}</ref> and by South African local historian Charles Leach,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.zoutnet.co.za/articles/news/8728/2010-11-26/british-government-says-flaws-donat-warrant-pardon|title=British government says flaws don´t warrant pardon|author=Linda van der Westhuizen|date=26 November 2010|access-date=2011-01-01|work=Zoutnet}}</ref> but Jim Unkles continues to campaign for a judicial inquiry.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nationaltimes.com.au/opinion/politics/justice-has-been-denied-the-breaker-for-too-long-20101217-1902t.html|title=Justice has been denied the Breaker for too long|first=Jim|last=Unkles|date=17 December 2010|work=National Times|publisher=Fairfax Media|access-date=2010-12-31}}</ref>

During October 2011, then [[Attorney-General for Australia|Australian Attorney General]] [[Robert McClelland (Australian politician)|Robert McClelland]] incorrectly claimed by ABC radio that the executed men did not have legal representation at the Courts Martial. In fact, Major J. F. Thomas represented the men.

[[Nicola Roxon]] replaced Robert McClelland as attorney general on 12 December 2011. On 9 May 2012, she indicated that the Australian government would not pursue the issue further with the British, as there was no doubt that the three men had committed the killings for which they were convicted, and the Australian government's position is that pardons are appropriate only when an offender is both "morally and technically innocent" of the offence.  Roxon also noted the seriousness of the offences involved, explaining that "I consider that seeking a pardon for these men could be rightly perceived as 'glossing over' very grave criminal acts."<ref>{{cite web|last1=Keane|first1=Bernard|title=No pardon for Breaker Morant|url=http://blogs.crikey.com.au/thestump/2012/05/09/no-pardon-for-breaker-morant/|website=Crikey|access-date=2017-07-02|date=2012-05-09|archive-date=21 December 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161221161851/https://blogs.crikey.com.au/thestump/2012/05/09/no-pardon-for-breaker-morant/|url-status=live}}</ref> After Roxon's announcement, McClelland said he would write to the British government expressing his concern about the lack of procedural fairness for the three accused.<ref>{{cite news|last1=Berkovic|first1=Nicola|title=McClelland defies Attorney-General on Breaker Morant|url=http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/mcclelland-defies-attorney-general-on-breaker-morant/news-story/f711bc8e6f818e23bc131acedc748b55|access-date=2017-07-02|work=The Australian|date=2012-05-11}}</ref>