1916: Joining Up
Teenager Ben Matthews, working on the family farm, sees his neighbour come back on leave from fighting in World War I. Ben speaks to him enthusiastically about a soldier's life, but the soldier warns him off it.
Ben sees policemen approaching and runs to warn his sister, Sarah, and her husband, Philip. The couple oppose the war and Philip has not enlisted. The police fail to find Philip, but he and Sarah decide it is time to go to London. At their last family meal there is a heated debate over the war and class issues. Philip refuses to kill the working classes of another country, while his father-in-law believes it is his duty to enlist.
In the local town, Philip and Sarah attend a Quaker anti-war meeting, which is being held at the same time as a public recruitment event. The police burst in to the meeting and Philip is arrested.
Despite being under age, Ben enlists. Meanwhile, Philip appears in court and the judge sends him to France on active service. While on army training, Philip refuses to accept the authority of the officers and disobeys orders.
Ben visits Sarah in London before going to serve in Ireland. She is working with the Quakers and has had no news of Philip.
In France, an officer tells Philip and other non-combatants that they will be shot if they disobey orders. Philip is tied to a post on the front line as an open target for the Germans.
Sarah is told by George Lansbury, a friend and MP, that Philip has been court-martialled and sentenced to death. The matter has been raised in Parliament, but Sarah has little hope that action will be taken.
On the front line, Philip and other non-combatants are told that their death sentences have been commuted to ten years' penal servitude.
In Ireland, Ben is involved in army searches of houses for IRA activists. One evening, in a pub where the soldiers are billeted, they taunt a local girl to sing rebel songs. The soldiers are moved by the songs.
The next day a young Irish boy taunts one of Ben's fellow soldiers and in the ensuing chase the soldier runs across a mined area and is killed. Ben shoots at the boy, then captures him and decides not to kill him.
