Touched by a tragic first world war tale | Brief letters

Shot at dawn | Emergency alerts at evensong | A message to Airstrip One | Ofsted’s ‘inadequate’ | Jack Nicholson in RedsAlexandra Pearce-Broomhead’s piece (Country diary, 24 April) is probably the most emotionally charged article I’ve seen in over 40 years of reading the Guardian. I have sons the same age as these young men who were shot for supposed crimes such as “desertion” and “cowardice” in the first world war. May my children never have