Blackadder Goes Forth the effects on the soldiers who suffered over its course. The idea that the soldiers suffered whilst their commanders remained safely distant from the action was also referenced on many occasions, such as when Melchett says to Baldrick, "Don't you worry my boy, if you should falter, remember that Captain Darling and I are behind you!", to which Blackadder responds, "About 35 miles behind you!". In the episode "Corporal Punishment", Blackadder justifies the shooting for food of a carrier pigeon (which turns out to be Melchett's pet, Speckled Jim) by saying, "With 50,000 men getting killed a week, who's going
Edmund Blackadder IV and Edmund's older brother Harry, he is briefly King of England; a lyric one of the closing credits for "Blackadder II" describes him as "a king / Although for only thirty seconds". Prince Edmund is one of the many Blackadders to be killed on screen: he dies after accidentally drinking poisoned wine, although he had already been severely mutilated by his childhood nemesis, the Duke of Burgundy. He is sometimes called King Edmund because in the last episode of the first series of Blackadder, he was the last of the Royal family to die, making him automatically King for