In May 1863, approximately 125 men of the 2nd Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment initiated a protest against military authorities. Their unit had been disbanded, and those 125 men were ordered to march out to a new unit, the 20th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment. Those men of the 2nd Maine had built a home in the 2nd Maine; their comrades had become like family, and they had built a common identity in the unit with their own traditions, cultures and values. When the order came to move out, the men stood their ground and refused to obey the order. Exactly 55 years later an almost identical incident played out on the Western Front during the First World War.

In September 1918, several battalions of the Australian Imperial Force (aif) initiated a protest against military authorities. As with the 2nd Maine in 1863, their units were ordered to disband, and the men were ordered to march out to new units. As with the 2nd Maine, the men of those Australian battalions had built a home and an identity in their battalion, and their comrades had become like family. And again, as with the 2nd Maine in 1863, when the order came to move out, the men stood their ground and refused to follow the order. Finally, in September 1943, a group of men from the 50th and 51st Divisions of the British Army were ordered to transfer to other units as reinforcements. Those men, as with those of the 2nd Maine and of the aif, had built their home and identity within their units. They had expected the military to honour their wishes to remain with their units, and when their expectations were shattered, they refused to comply with the orders.

These three extraordinary events – which took place in three very different armies in three very different wars, separated across 80 years of history – display a series of remarkable similarities. In each of the situations men of the rank and file had developed clear expectations of how they should behave and how they should be treated within the environment of the military. In each case, when authorities broke those expectations, rank-and-file men felt they could, and should, engage in direct action to return the situation back to the status quo.