... is shot by Captain Blackadder with a revolver, as he delivers a telegram to the front line (while serving as a carrier pigeon). "Come on George," says Blackadder, "with 50,000 men getting killed a week, who's going to miss a pigeon?"
What Blackadder doesn't know is that Speckled Jim was General Melchett's only childhood friend. Blackadder also discovers too late that the telegram contained the news that the shooting of carrier pigeons is now a courtmartial offence. He promptly decides to "eat the evidence for lunch".
Blackadder is quickly found out by Melchett and Darling, and sent for court martial. He hires a brilliant lawyer, but due to Baldrick's incompetence Lieutenant George (Hugh Laurie) turns up on the day of the trial as Blackadder's defence counsel. Even worse, General Melchett is the judge. Referring to Blackadder as "the Flanders Pigeon Murderer", Melchett summarily imposes a death sentence. But in the nick of time, a telegram comes through that (for reasons far too complicated to enter into here) saves Blackadder from the firing squads.
© Haydn Thompson 2017