A 93-YEAR-OLD woman who fought to have her father cleared of wartime cowardice has spoken of her joy at having his name cleared.

Gertrude Harris, of Blackwell Close, Harrow Weald, and her daughter, Janet Booth, 64, campaigned for 14 years to win a posthumous pardon for Private Harry Farr, who was executed during the First World War.

On Tuesday last week, the defence minister Des Browne said that Harry and the other 305 soldiers shot for cowardice and other military offences by the British Army would be granted pardons.

The Government would add an amendment to the Armed Forces Bill to achieve this.

"I am conscious of how the families of these men feel today," Mr Browne said.

"They have had to endure a stigma for decades."

Harry was drafted in November 1914 and the following year spent five months in hospital being treated for shell-shock.

As soon as he was discharged, he was ordered to fight on the front line at the Battle of the Somme.

He refused, was court martialed and faced a firing squad. He refused a blindfold, choosing to look his executioners in the eye.

Gertrude, who never knew her father, said: "The Army wouldn't have kept someone is hospital for five months if he hadn't really been ill.

"The last word my mother had of him was a card from a nurse who wrote it for him because he was shaking so much he couldn't hold a pen.

"He reported sick because he couldn't stand the noise of the guns as it brought it all back.

"But because he didn't have any visible injuries the sergeant major said he had to go back."

Harry's trial lasted 20 minutes.

No account was taken of his previous illness, and he was not allowed a "soldier's friend" who could vouch for his previous good conduct.

His death at the hands of his comrades in arms left Gertrude's mother a widow at 21.

Gertrude, a mother-of-three, grandmother-of-eight and great-grandmother-of-18, said: "My mother didn't tell me how Harry died until I was 40..

"I never told anyone after that.

"During the war, the stigma just stuck.

"Even his own father wouldn't acknowledge him and that was awful.

"It must have broken his heart to know Harry had been shot as a coward."

In those days, shell-shock, which today would be diagnosed as post-traumatic shock syndrome, was not a recognised mental illness.

Thousands of soldiers suffering from severe stress were forced to keep fighting or face a firing squad.

Gertrude, who has lived in Harrow for over 60 years, said: "When I found out that Harry was going to be pardoned i couldn't believe it.

"We have been to the High Court so many times and had so much hope that when this news came out of the blue it was wonderful.

"I am so pleased that I have lived this long to see the end result."