Wars and Military Conflicts – Page 23 – Historical Easter Eggs

July 3, 1947 The May Incident

History is replete with examples of what power concentrated in the hands of a few, leads to.

Two hundred and forty-two years ago, our founding fathers bequeathed to us a nation unique in all history. A nation founded on an idea, that all men are created equal, and government derives its powers from the just consent of the governed. A Federal, Constitutional Republic in which our politicians are not our ‘leaders’ but rather our Representatives, operating within a system of diffuse powers with checks and balances, periodically accountable through democratic processes to their bosses – the people who put them there.

In modern times, it has become fashionable to point to the flaws in such a system. Howard Zinn and others present a victim’s-eye narrative of American history. Smug, faculty iconoclasts and a pop culture Commentariat, decrying the ‘sugar coated fairy tales’, of our past. Yet, the Great Winston Churchill may have had the final word, describing ‘Democracy” as the worst form of government there is…except for all the others.

For many among us, most I should think, some form of that Constitutional, self-governing Republic envisioned by our founders, remains preferable to all other forms of government. Warts and all.

History is replete with examples of what power concentrated in the hands of a few, leads to.

Indeed, such a system has imperfections, not least among them those who would ascend to political office.

Hearst columnist Ambrose Bierce, a social satirist of his day and my favorite curmudgeon, once defined politics as ‘A strife of interests, masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.

In the late 19th century, Democrat William “Boss” Tweed owned New York politics, fleecing city taxpayers at the head of the Tammany Hall political machine. New York debt levels soared by over $100 million between 1868 and 1870 alone, a figure equivalent to over a Billion dollars, today.

As Governor of Tennessee, Democrat Ray Blanton ran a ‘pay for play’ operation selling pardons, paroles and commutations, until drawing the attention of the eye of Sauron, at the FBI. Blanton’s corruption was extensive enough to spawn a book and a later movie, and launched the political career of prosecutor and sometime actor, Fred Thompson.

And, lest I be accused of picking on Democrats, Pennsylvania Republican and Representative in Congress R. Budd Dwyer faced up to 55 years in prison and a $300,000 fine for racketeering and mail fraud, when he took a .357 Magnum revolver out of a manila envelope and blew his brains out. On live television, no less.

There are so many more and we all have our ‘favorites’, in this parade of horribles. Yet, for insensate cupidity and pure boneheadedness, it would be hard to outdo the attorney, circuit court judge and member of the United States House of Representatives, Andrew Jackson May.

The Kentucky Democrat was a staunch supporter of the ‘New Deal’ policies of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, serving in seven succeeding Congresses between 1931 and 1947. As Chairman of the powerful Committee on Military Affairs, May became involved with New York businessmen Murray and Henry Garsson, a relationship which would lead to war profiteering allegations.

Congressman-Andrew-May — Congressman Andrew Jackson May

After the war, a Senate investigating committee discovered evidence of substantial kickbacks from the Garsson brothers. Making matters worse, their munition business took excessive profits, while producing shoddy product. May’s bribery scandal revealed evidence that the Garsson factory produced defective fuses for their 4.2-inch mortar shells, detonating prematurely and leading to the death of no fewer than 38 American soldiers.

Andrew May would serve nine months in Federal prison for accepting bribes in exchange for securing munitions contracts during WW2.

Yet, even that pales in comparison with the ‘May incident’, for which the man has earned eternal infamy. As an influential member of an important committee, Andrew May was necessarily entrusted with highly confidential information, among them deficiencies in Imperial Japanese Navy anti-submarine depth-charge tactics.

For some time, the American submarine service had enjoyed considerable success in its war on Japanese shipping. Imperial Japanese naval planners held some bad assumptions about American submarine specifications, among them maximum depth capabilities.

Japanese depth charges were set to detonate at too shallow a depth, leading to a high survival rate for American subs. Congressman May took care of that problem, in 1943.

Returning home from a junket, the Congressman revealed this highly sensitive information, before a press conference. Various press associations ran with the story and some were bright enough to ‘sit on it’, but not all. Several newspapers published the information, including one in Hololulu.

Japanese naval ASW (Antisubmarine Warfare) forces were quick to adjust depth charge settings. Vice Admiral Charles A. Lockwood, commander of the U.S. submarine fleet in the Pacific, estimated that May’s indiscretion killed as many as 800 American crewman, with the loss of ten submarines. “I hear Congressman May said the Jap depth charges are not set deep enough”, he said. “He would be pleased to know that the Japs set them deeper now.”

Andrew Jackson May was convicted by a federal jury on this day in 1947, for accepting cash bribes from Murray and Henry Garsson, to use his position as Chairman of the Military Affairs Committee to secure munitions contracts for the Garsson firm. The Garsson brothers also received prison terms.

President Harry Truman granted May a full pardon in 1952, though his political career was finished. Andrew May returned home to Kentucky to resume the practice of law, until his death in 1959. We are left only to contemplate, what the man or the press could be thinking, to divulge information more safely left in the hands of a stupid child. That, and the horrifying realization that the democratic process might actually work, and the government we elect is just…like…Us.

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June 29, 1944 Chameleon

A liar, a chameleon, a man of 1,000 aliases, Fritz Duquesne once feigned paralysis for seven months in prison, just so he could fool his jailers long enough to escape. Frederick Burnham, a real-life Indiana Jones and the inspiration for the Boy Scouts of America, described Duquesne as “the last man I should choose to meet in a dark room for a finish fight armed only with knives.“

As the 19th century gave way to the 20th, massive immigration into the United States put increasing strain on the nation’s food supply. The meat shortage became particularly acute, to the point where policy makers considered importing exotic species of animals, to augment the nation’s food supply.

hippo-ranch — Hippo Ranching, in America

In 1910, the United States Congress defeated by one vote, a measure to introduce African hippopotami into the American food supply. Supporters of the measure envisioned great herds of free-range hippos, filling swamps, rivers and bayous from the Atchafalaya basin to the Okefenokee Swamp, to the Florida Everglades.

As the “American Hippo” bill wended its way through Congress, the measure picked up steam with the enthusiastic support of two mortal enemies who’d spent years in the African bush, trying to kill each other.

Major Frederick Russell Burnham was a freelance scout and American adventurer. The “King of Scouts’, Burnham was a “man totally without fear,” a real-life Indiana Jones and the inspiration for the Boy Scouts of America. This is the guy who should have been in the Dos Equis beer commercials. One contemporary described the man as the “most complete human being who ever lived“.

Burnham’s fellow hippo salesman and would-be murderer was Frederick “Fritz” Joubert Duquesne. A Boer of French Huguenot ancestry, Duquesne was a smooth talking guerrilla fighter, an adrenaline junkie and self-styled “Black Panther”, who once described himself as every bit the wild African animal, as any creature of the veld. A liar, a chameleon, a man of 1,000 aliases, Duquesne once feigned paralysis for seven months in prison, just so he could fool his jailers long enough to escape. Burnham himself described him as “the last man I should choose to meet in a dark room for a finish fight armed only with knives.“

During the second Anglo-Boer war of 1899 – 1902, several large shipments of gold totaling 1.5 million pounds were removed from the central bank in Pretoria, and sent to the Netherlands for the use of exiled president Paul Kruger and other Boer exiles fleeing the Transvaal.

Fritz Duquesne was in charge of moving one of those shipments across the bushveld of Portuguese East Africa, when some kind of argument broke out. When it was over, only two wounded Boers were left alive, along with Duquesne himself and a few tottys (native porters). Duquesne ordered the tottys to hide the gold, burn the wagons and kill the survivors. He then rode off on an ox, having given the rest to the porters.

Duquesne was captured and escaped several times during this period, before infiltrating the British army as an officer, in 1901. It was in this capacity that he found his parents’ farm in Nylstroom, destroyed under Marshall Horatio Kitchener’s ‘scorched earth’ policy. His sister had been raped and killed, he learned, and his mother was dying in a British concentration camp. Historian Art Ronnie remarked that, “the fate of his country and of his family would breed in him an all-consuming hatred of England.” Biographer Clement Wood echoed the sentiment, calling Duquesne: “a walking living breathing searing killing destroying torch of hate.”

Duquesne was found out during a plot to assassinate Kitchener, narrowly avoiding execution by swimming away from the “impossible, hopeless, and impregnable prison” of Bermuda. A week later, the Black Panther was stowed away on a boat to Baltimore.

posteruk — British recruiting poster of WW1, featuring Field Marshal Horatio Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener

During this period, Duquesne became involved with the Hippo program, becoming safari guide and personal shooting instructor to President Theodore Roosevelt, himself.

Naturalized an American citizen in 1913, Duquesne became a German spy the following year, as war broke out in Europe. “Captain Frederick Fredericks”, was sent to Brazil under the guise of “doing scientific research on rubber plants,” but the real-life German agent for Naval Intelligence’ real job was to disrupt the shipping, of countries at war with Germany. That twenty-two British merchant ships randomly exploded during this period, is no coincidence.

British MI5 discovered the German agent, using the aliases George Fordam and Piet Niacud (‘Duquesne’, pronounced backward). ‘Niacud” disappeared once again, placing an article in an Argentine newspaper reporting his own murder at the hands of Amazon natives.

Fritz Duquesne in German uniform

The “Man with 1,000 aliases” picture (l) as himself ( during 2nd Boer War, ca 1901), in German uniform sometime around 1914-’16, and (r), as Australian “Captain Claude Stoughton”, from a WW1 war bond drive.

Reappearing once more in New York and using the aliases George Fordam and Frederick Fredericks, Duquesne filed insurance claims for the loss of “films” and “mineral samples” lost in the vessels which he himself sank, off the coast of Brazil. The insurance companies were reluctant to pay and launched their own investigations, while “Fredericks” disappeared once again, re-emerging as the Russian Duke ‘Boris Zakrevsky’ and joining Lord Kitchener on HMS Hampshire in Scotland.

HMS Hampshire sank on June 5, 1916 with heavy loss of life, including that of Kitchener himself. History records the Devonshire-class armored cruiser as having struck a mine. Some believe the spy had succeeded after all those years, calling in the submarine strike and sinking the Hampshire, killing the Field Marshall before rowing away in a life boat. There were only twelve survivors.

Young-Duquesne — Fritz Duquesne, in younger days

A former-day Forrest Gump with a knack for always being in all the right places, Fritz emerged in 1916 as “Captain Claude Stoughton” of the Western Australian Light Horse regiment, a man who claimed to have been “bayoneted three times, gassed four times, and stuck once with a hook”. As Captain Stoughton, Duquesne would regale New York audiences with hair-raising tales of his war exploits, promoting the sale of Liberty Bonds and making patriotic speeches on behalf of the Red Cross and other organizations.

The insurance fraud caught up with him November 1917, when letters in his possession implicated him in the earlier sabotage, in Brazil. American authorities agreed to extradite Duquesne to Great Britain for “murder on the high seas, arson, faking Admiralty documents and conspiring against the Crown.”

Keeping this guy in prison, though, was like nailing an eel to a jello tree. This was when he faked his paralysis, enduring the needle pokes and prods of skeptical doctors until even they became convinced of his infirmity.

As the Nazi party came to power in the early 1930s, this “Destroying Torch of Hate” for all things British, once again took up the German cause.

Six months before the United States entered World War 2, a large pro-Nazi spy ring was discovered, operating in America. Thirty-three German agents were placed in key jobs around the United States, one opening a restaurant, another working at an airline and others working as delivery men and messengers. The FBI struck on June 29, 1941, arresting all thirty three spies on charges of espionage. At the center of it all, was none other than Frederick “Fritz” J. Duquesne.

tumblr_nhknj4ZvcD1rrmirso1_1280 — Duquesne Spy Ring

To this day, the Duquesne Spy Ring remains the largest espionage case in United States history, which ended in convictions. Six days after the Imperial Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, three women and thirty men were convicted of sending secret information on U.S. weapons and shipping movements, to Nazi Germany. Less than a month later, the group was sentenced to a combined total of over 300 years in prison.

Duquesne himself was sentenced to 18 years. This time, he didn’t get out. The “Man who killed Kitchener” was released fourteen years later, due to failing physical and mental health. Fritz Duquesne died on May 24, 1956, at the City Hospital on Welfare Island. His last known speech took place two years earlier, at the Adventurers’ Club of New York. The title of the lecture, was “My Life – in and out of Prison”.

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June 26, 1948 Berlin Airlift

At the height of the operation, an aircraft landed every thirty seconds in West Berlin. The USAF delivered 1,783,573 tons altogether and the RAF 541,937, on a total of 278,228 flights. The Royal Australian Air Force delivered 7,968 tons of freight in over 2,000 sorties. Added together, the Berlin Airlift covered nearly the distance from the Earth, to the Sun.

Following the end of World War II in Europe, the three major allied powers (United States, United Kingdom and the Soviet Union) met at Potsdam, capital of the German federal state of Brandenburg. The series of agreements signed at Cecilienhof Castle and known as the Potsdam agreement built on earlier accords reached at conferences at Tehran, Casablanca and Yalta, addressing issues of German demilitarization, reparations, de-nazification and the prosecution of war criminals.

Among the provisions of the Potsdam agreement was the division of defeated Germany into four zones of occupation, rougly coinciding with the then-current locations of allied armies. The former capital city of Berlin was itself partitioned into four zones of occupation. A virtual island located 100 miles inside Soviet-controlled eastern Germany.

“The red area of Germany (above) is Soviet controlled East Germany. German territory east of the Oder-Neisse line (light beige) was ceded to Poland, while a portion of the easternmost section of Germany East Prussia, Königsberg, was annexed by the USSR, as the Kaliningrad Oblast”. H/T Wikipedia

During the war, ideological fault lines were suppressed in the mutual desire to destroy the Nazi war machine. These were quick to reassert themselves, in the wake of German defeat. In Soviet-occupied east Germany, factories and equipment were disassembled and transported to the Soviet union, along with technicians, managers and skilled personnel.

Soviet leader Josef Stalin informed German communist leaders in June 1945, of his belief that the United States would withdraw within a year or two. He had his reasons. At that time, the Truman Administration had yet to decide whether American forces would remain in West Berlin past 1949, when an independent West German government was expected to be established.

Stalin would do everything he could to undermine the British position within its zone of occupation, and appears unconcerned about that of the French. He and other Soviet leaders assured visiting Bulgarian and Yugoslavian delegations. In time, all of Germany would be Soviet, and Communist.

The former German capital became the focus of diametrically opposing governing philosophies, and leaders on both sides believed all Europe to be at stake. Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov put it succinctly, “What happens to Berlin, happens to Germany; what happens to Germany, happens to Europe.”

There never was any formal agreement, concerning road and rail access to Berlin through the 100-mile Soviet zone. Western leaders were forced to rely on the “good will” of a regime which had deliberately starved millions of its own citizens to death, in consolidating power.

With 2.8 million Berliners to feed, clothe and shelter from the elements, Soviet leaders permitted cargo access on only ten trains per day over a single rail line.

Western allies believed the restriction to be only be temporary, but this belief would prove to be sadly mistaken.

Only three corridors were permitted through Soviet-controlled air space. With millions to feed, the Soviets stopped delivering agricultural products from their zone in eastern Germany, in 1946. The American commander, General Lucius Clay, retaliated by stopping shipments of dismantled industries from western Germany into the Soviet Union. The Soviets responded with obstructionist policies, doing everything it could to throw sand in the gears of all four occupied zones.

US and UK zones of occupation combined into a single “bizone” in January 1947, joining with that of France and becoming the “trizone” on June 1, 1948. Representatives of these governments and that of the Benelux nations of Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg met twice in London to discuss the future of Germany, while Soviet leaders threatened to ignore any decisions coming out of such conferences.

The four-power solution was unworkable throughout the postwar period. For the city of Berlin, 1948 would reach the point of crisis.

That March, Soviet authorities slowed cargo to a crawl, individually searching every truck and train. General Clay ordered a halt to train traffic on April 2, ordering that supplies to the military garrison in Berlin be transported by air. Soviets eased their restrictions a week later, but still interrupted road and rail traffic. Meanwhile, Soviet military aircraft began to harass and “buzz” allied flights in and out of West Berlin. On April 5, a Soviet Air Force Yakovlev Yak-3 fighter collided with a British European Airways Vickers Viking 1B airliner near RAF Gatow airfield. Everyone onboard both aircraft, were killed.

The final straw came with the currency crisis of early 1948, when the Deutsche Mark was introduced. The former Reichsmark was severely devalued by this time, with calamitous economic repercussions. The new currency went into use in all four sectors of occupied Berlin, against the wishes of the Soviets. This new currency combined with the Marshall Pan had the potential to revitalize the German economy, and that wouldn’t do. Not for Soviet policy makers, for whom a prostrate German economy remained the objective.

Soviet guards halted all traffic on the autobahn to Berlin on June 19, the day after the new currency was introduced.

woman-burning-cash-for-heat — German woman burning cash, for heat

At the time, West Berlin had 36 days’ food supplies, and 45 days’ supply of coal. The western nations had scaled military operations down in the wake of the war, to the point where the western sectors of the city had only 8,973 Americans, 7,606 British and 6,100 French. Soviet military forces numbered some 1.5 million. Believing that Allied powers had no choice but to cave to their demands, Soviet authorities cut off the electricity.

While ground routes were never negotiated in and out of occupied Berlin, the same was not true of the air. Three air routes had been agreed upon back in 1945. These went into use on this day in 1948, beginning the largest humanitarian airlift, in history.

Of all the malignant governing ideologies of history, Josef Stalin’s Soviet Union has to be counted among the worst. These people had no qualms about using genocide by starvation as a political tool. They had proven as much during the Holodomor of 1932 – ’33, during which this evil empire had murdered millions of its own citizens, by deliberate starvation. Two million German civilians would be nothing more than a means to an end.

Sunderland_201_Sqn_on_Havel_during_Berlin_Airlift_1948 — RAF Sunderland flying Boat moored on the Havel near Berlin unloading salt

With that many lives at stake, allied authorities calculated that a daily ration of only 1,990 kilocalories would require 646 tons of flour and wheat, 125 tons of cereal, 64 tons of fat, 109 tons of meat and fish, 180 tons of dehydrated potatoes, 180 tons of sugar, 11 tons of coffee, 19 tons of powdered milk, 5 tons of whole milk for children, 3 tons of fresh yeast for baking, 144 tons of dehydrated vegetables, 38 tons of salt and 10 tons of cheese.

Every. Single. Day.

Heat and power for such a population would require 3,475 tons of coal, diesel and gasoline, every day.

United States Air force General Curtis LeMay was asked “Can you haul coal?” LeMay replied “We can haul anything.”

Berlin_Blockade_Milk — Loading milk, bound for Berlin

The obstacles were daunting. Postwar demobilization had diminished US cargo capabilities in Europe to a nominal 96 aircraft, theoretically capable of transporting 300 tons per day. Great Britain’s RAF was somewhat better with a capacity of 400 tons, according to General Sir Brian Robertson.

700 tons were nowhere near the 5,000 per day that was needed, but it was a start. With additional aircraft mobilizing all over the United States, the United Kingdom and France, the people of occupied Berlin had to buy into the program.

General Clay went to Ernst Reuter, Berlin’s mayor-elect. “Look, I am ready to try an airlift. I can’t guarantee it will work. I am sure that even at its best, people are going to be cold and people are going to be hungry. And if the people of Berlin won’t stand that, it will fail. And I don’t want to go into this unless I have your assurance that the people will be heavily in approval.”

Luckily, General Albert Wedemeyer was in Europe on an inspection tour, when the crisis broke out. Wedemeyer had been in charge of the previously-largest airlift in history, the China-Burma-India theater route over the Himalayas, known as “The Hump”. Reuter was skeptical but assured the authorities that the people of Berlin were behind the plan. Wedemeyer’s endorsement gave the plan a major boost. The Berlin Airlift began seventy years ago today, June 26, 1948.

Germans-airlift-1948 — German civilians awaiting inbound aircraft, at Templehof

The Australian Air force joined in the largest humanitarian effort in history that September. The Canadians never did, believing the operation to be a provocation which would lead to war with the Soviet Union.

Through the Fall and Winter of 1948 – ’49 the airlift carried on. Soviet authorities maintained their stranglehold but, preoccupied with rebuilding their own war-ravaged economy and fearful of the United States’ nuclear capabilities, Stalin had little choice but to look on. On April 15, 1949, the Soviet news agency TASS announced that the Soviets were willing to lift the blockade.

C-54_dropping_candy_during_Berlin_Airlift_c1949 — C-54 drops candy over berlin, 1948 – ’49

Negotiations were begun almost at once but now, the Allies held the stronger hand. An agreement was announced on May 4 that the blockade would be ended, in eight days’ time. A British convoy drove through the gates at a minute after midnight on May 12, though the airlift would continue, to build up a comfortable surplus.

39 British and 31 American airmen lost their lives during the operation.

In 1961, Communist leaders would erect a wall around their sector of the city. Not to keep foreigners out, but to keep their own unfortunate citizens, in. The Berlin Wall would not come down, for twenty-eight years.

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June 25, 1876 Little Big Horn

No whites were to be permitted onto these territories but for Federal Government officials, but the rich resources of the Black Hills, first in timber and then in gold, made the provision near-impossible to enforce.

During the late summer of 1854, 4,000 natives of the Brulé and Oglala Sioux were camped in the future Wyoming territory, near the modern city of Torrington, WY. On August 17, visiting Miniconjou High Forehead killed a wandering cow, belonging to a Mormon traveling the nearby Oregon trail. The native camp accorded with the terms of the treaty of 1851 and the cow episode could have been amicably handled, but events quickly spun out of control.

Chief Conquering Bear attempted to negotiate recompense, offering a horse or cow from the tribe’s herd. The owner refused, demanding $25. That same treaty of 1851 specified that such matters would be handled by the local Indian agent, in this case John Whitfield, scheduled to arrive within days with tribal annuities more than sufficient to settle the matter to everyone’s satisfaction.

Ignorant of this provision or deliberately choosing to ignore it, senior officer Lieutenant Hugh Fleming from nearby Ft. Laramie requested that the Sioux Chief arrest High Forehead, and hand him over to the fort. Conquering Bear refused, not wanting to violate rules of hospitality. Besides, the Oglala Chief had no authority over a Miniconjou.

6th Infantry Regiment Second Lieutenant John Grattan arrived with a force of twenty-nine and a bad attitude, intent on arresting the cow’s killer. One Ft. Laramie commander later remarked, “There is no doubt that Lt. Grattan left this post with a desire to have a fight with the Indians, and that he had determined to take the man at all hazards.” French-Native interpreter Lucienne Auguste was contemptuous, taunting Sioux warriors as “women” and threatening that the soldiers had come not to talk, but to kill.

What followed was all but inevitable. Angry warriors took up flanking positions around the soldiers, one of whom panicked and fired, mortally wounding Conquering Bear. When it was over, all thirty soldiers were dead, their bodies ritually mutilated.

The Federal government was quick to respond to the “Gratton Massacre”, Secretary of War Jefferson Davis characterizing the incident as “the result of a deliberately formed plan.”

The first Sioux War of 1854 – ’56 became the first of seven major wars and countless skirmishes between the United States and various sub-groups of the Sioux people, culminating in the Ghost Dance War of 1890.

Diametrically opposite cultures steeped in mutual distrust engaged in savage cruelty each upon the other, often at the expense of innocents. There was even one major massacre of natives by other natives, when a war band of some 1,500 Oglala/Brulé Sioux attacked a much smaller group of Pawnee, during their summer buffalo hunt. Seventy-one Pawnee warriors were killed along with 102 of their women and children, their bodies horribly mutilated and scalped, some even set on fire.

Today, a 35-foot obelisk stands in mute witness, to the horrors of “Massacre Canyon”.

Massacre_Canyon_monument_from_SW_1 — Massacre Canyon Monument

In the early eighteenth century, peoples of the Suhtai and Tsitsista tribes migrated across the northern Mississippi River, pushing the Kiowa to the southern plains and in turn being pushed westward, by the more numerous Lakota, or “Teton” Sioux. These were the first to adopt the horse culture of the northern plains, the two tribes merging in the early 19th century to become the northern Cheyenne.

The ten bands comprising the northern Cheyenne spread from the black hills of South Dakota, to the Platte Rivers of Colorado, at times antagonistic to and at others allied with all or part of the seven nations of the Sioux.

In 1866, the Lakota people went to war behind Chief Red Cloud, over Army encroachment onto the Powder River basin area, in northeastern Wyoming. The war ended two years later with the Treaty of Fort Laramie, granting a Great Sioux Reservation to include the western half of South Dakota including the Black Hills, as well as large, “unceded territory” in Wyoming and Montana and the Powder River Country, as Cheyenne and Lakota hunting grounds.

The Army attempted for a time to keep settlers out of Indian territories, while political pressure mounted on the Grant administration to take back the Black Hills from the Lakota. Delegations of Sioux Chieftains traveled to Washington, D.C. in an effort to persuade the President to honor existing treaties, and to stem the flow of miners into their territories. Congress offered $25,000 for the land, and for the tribes to relocate south to Indian Territory, in modern-day Oklahoma. Chief Spotted Tail spoke for the whole delegation: “You speak of another country, but it is not my country; it does not concern me, and I want nothing to do with it. I was not born there … If it is such a good country, you ought to send the white men now in our country there and let us alone.”

The government now determined to force the issue, and imposed a deadline of January 31. That many of the tribes even knew of such a time limit seems unlikely. The government’s response was unworthy of a Great Nation. On February 8, 1876, Major General Philip Sheridan ordered the commencement of military operations against those deemed “hostiles”.

The Great Sioux War of 1876-’77 began with a ham-fisted assault on the frigid morning of March 17, when Colonel Joseph Reynolds and six companies of cavalry attacked a village believed to that of the renegade Crazy Horse, but turned out to be a village of Northern Cheyenne.

800px-Little_Big_Horn — Cheyenne Artist’s Depiction of the Battle of Little bighorn

A second, far larger campaign was launched that Spring, when three columns were sent to converge on the Lakota hunting grounds. Brigadier General George Crook’s column was the first to make contact, resulting in the Battle of Rosebud Creek on June 17. While Crook claimed victory afterward, the native camp was vastly larger than expected, and Crook withdrew to camp and wait for reinforcements. He had just taken his force out of what was to come.

General Alfred Terry dispatched the 7th Cavalry, 31 officers and 566 enlisted men led by Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer, to begin a reconnaissance in force along the Rosebud. Custer was given the option of departing from his orders and going on the offence, should there be “sufficient reason”. For a man possessed of physical bravery bordering on recklessness – Custer had proven that thirteen years earlier at Gettysburg – there was bound to be sufficient reason.

Custer divided his force into three detachments, more concerned about preventing the escape of the “hostiles”, than with fighting them. It was a big mistake.

The tale of those other two columns is worth a “Today in History” essay of their own if not an entire book, but this is a story about Little Big Horn. Suffice it to say that Major Marcus Reno‘s experience of this day was as grizzly and as shocking, as that moment when the brains and face of his Arikara scout Bloody Knife spattered across his own. Reno’s detachment had entered a buzz saw and would have been annihilated altogether, had it not met up with that of captain Frederick Benteen.

To describe what followed as “Custer’s last stand“ is to conjure images of soldiers fighting back to back, or crouched behind dead and dying horses amidst a swirling tide of warriors. Later archaeological evidence reveals not piles of spent casings marking the site of each man’s last desperate stand, but rather a scattering of brass across the hillside. Like a handful of rice, tossed across a hardwood floor.

2,500 warriors swept down on 268. There were no survivors.

CaptureTheFlag_LittleBighorn — Capture The Flag, at Little Bighorn

The Battle of Little Big Horn, the Natives called it the “Battle of the Greasy Grass”, may be more properly regarded as the Indian’s last stand. Custer’s detachment was destroyed, to a man. Within hours, an enormous encampment of 10,000 natives or more were returning to their reservations, leaving no more than 600 in their place.

Crook and Terry awaited reinforcements for nearly two months after the battle. Neither cared to venture out again, until there were at least 2,000 men.

June 22, 1807 Impressed

British envoys delivered proclamations reaffirming the practice of impressment, amounting to the kidnapping of sailors and forcing their labor aboard British ships. In total, the Royal Navy impressed over 9,000 sailors claiming to be American citizens, becoming the driving force behind the United States going to war with England, in 1812.

The Napoleonic Wars took place between 1799 and 1815, pitting a series of seven international coalitions against the forces of Napoleon Bonaparte and his Grande Armée. The former American colonies benefited from the European conflict, remaining on the sidelines and doing business with both sides. Within a ten-year period, the fledgling United States had become one of the world’s largest neutral shippers.

In 1807, two third-rate French warships were penned up in Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay, blockaded by a number of English warships outside of the harbor.

4467229436_5635b36a0a — The American frigate, USS Chesapeake

London born Jenkin Ratford was an English sailor who deserted the British Navy and defected to the neutral United States. This story might have ended better for him had he not run his mouth, but that wasn’t this guy. Ratford couldn’t resist taunting British officers, boasting of his escape to the “land of liberty”

The USS Chesapeake was preparing for a Mediterranean cruise with Ratford aboard, when she emerged from Norfolk, Virginia. Her decks were laden with supplies and stores of every kind, and her guns unwisely stored. Chesapeake was nowhere near combat ready when she was approached by the HMS Leopard on June 22.

The Chesapeake’s commander, Commodore James Barron, was unconcerned when the Leopard, under the command of Captain Salusbury Pryce Humphreys, asked permission to board. Lieutenant John Meade of Her Majesty’s Navy presented Barron with a search warrant. Barron declined to submit, and the officer returned to the Leopard.

Humphreys then used a hailing trumpet and ordered the American ship to comply, to which Barron responded “I don’t hear what you say”. Humphreys fired two rounds across Chesapeake’s bow, followed immediately by four broadsides.

Chesapeake fired a single shot before striking colors and surrendering. Humphreys refused the surrender and boarded, taking Ratford and three American born sailors with them when they left.

There was little resistance, yet the “Chesapeake-Leopard Affair” had left three American crewmembers dead, and 18 wounded.

American public opinion was outraged over the humiliation, as the four men were transported to Halifax for trial. Federalists and Democratic-Republicans were united as never before. President Thomas Jefferson remarked “Never since the Battle of Lexington have I seen this country in such a state of exasperation as at present, and even that did not produce such unanimity.”

The English court found all four guilty of desertion and hanged Ratford by the fore yardarm of his former vessel, HMS Halifax. The three Americans, David Martin, John Strachan, and William Ware, were sentenced to 500 lashes.

With the puny American navy deployed to the Mediterranean to check the Barbary pirates, President Jefferson’s options were limited to economic retaliation. The Embargo Act of 1807 intended to extract concessions from France and Great Britain, instead had the effect of imposing crippling setbacks on some industries, while others railed against government interference in the private economy. Many came to the conclusion that the only solution, lay in violence.

2661E817-FD9D-331B-F65F29408EE37509 — Political cartoon depicting merchants harassed cursing the “Ograbme”—“embargo” spelled backwards.

Despite being wounded, Barron was blamed for the “Chesapeake-Leopard Affair”. A court-martial suspended him from service for five years, without pay. Commodore Stephen Decatur was one of the presiding officers at the court-martial. In 1820, Barron challenged Decatur to a duel, killing his fellow Commodore over comments concerning the 1807 incident.

Undergoing a refit in Boston Harbor in 1813, USS Chesapeake was challenged to single combat by Captain Philip Broke, commanding the British frigate HMS Shannon.

United States Naval Captain James Lawrence was eager to comply, confident in the wake of a number of American victories in single-ship actions.

It was a Big mistake.

All of Boston turned out that June day, to watch the fight. Cheers went out across the docks and from scores of private vessels across Boston Harbor, as Chesapeake slipped her moorings and glided out of the harbor.

Boston authorities reserved dock space in expectation of a guest. The arrival of a captured British frigate, so it was thought, was a foregone conclusion. Rooftops, hills and trees from Lynn to Malden and Cohasset to Scituate were crowded with spectators, come to watch the show.

The tale of the Battle of Boston Harbor must be a story for another day. Suffice it to say that USS Chesapeake ended her career as the British frigate HMS Chesapeake, before being sold for scrap, in 1819. Two-hundred years later, the ship’s timbers live on. Part of the Chesapeake Mill in the historic village of Wickham, in Hampshire, England.

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June 19, 1864 Single Combat

USS Kearsarge steamed further to sea as the Confederate vessel approached. There would be no one returning to port until the issue was decided.

Hull #290 was launched from the John Laird & Sons shipyard in Birkenhead, Cheshire, England as the screw sloop HMS Enrica on May 15, 1862. She sailed in secret to the Terceira Island in the Azores, where she was met by Raphael Semmes, her new captain. Three days, 8 cannon and 350 tons of coal later, the Enrica was transformed into the 220′, 1,500-ton sloop of war and Confederate States of America commerce raider, CSS Alabama.

Alabama’s mission was to wage economic war on the Union, attacking commercial shipping from the Pacific to the Indian Ocean, from Newfoundland to Brazil. In her two-year career as commerce raider, Alabama claimed 65 prizes valued at nearly $123 million in today’s dollars. She was the most successful, and most notorious, commerce raider of the Civil War.

portsmouth nh-uss kearsarge-civil war steam sloop — Civil War Steam Sloop USS Kearsarge

Alabama was in sore need of a refit when she put into Cherbourg France, on the 11th of June, 1864. The Mohican-class Union steam sloop-of-war USS Kearsarge, then on patrol near Gibralter, hurried to Cherbourg, arriving on the 14th.

Captain_Raphael_Semmes_and_First_Lieutenant_John_Kell_aboard_CSS_Alabama_1863 — Captain Raphael Semmes and 1st Lieutenant John Kell aboard CSS Alabama 1863

Seeing himself blockaded, Alabama’s Captain challenged Kearsarge Captain John Winslow to a ship-to-ship duel, saying “my intention is to fight the Kearsarge as soon as I can make the necessary arrangements. I hope these will not detain me more than until to-morrow or the morrow morning at farthest. I beg she will not depart until I am ready to go out. I have the honor to be your obedient servant, R. Semmes, Captain“. That suited Winslow just fine, who took up station in international waters, and waited for Alabama to come out.

CSS Alabama steamed out of Cherbourg harbor on the morning of June 19, 1864, escorted by the French ironclad Couronne, which remained nearby to ensure that the combat remained in international waters. Kearsarge steamed further to sea as the Confederate vessel approached. There would be no one returning to port until the issue was decided.

Captain Winslow put his ship around and headed for his adversary at 10:50am. Alabama fired first from a distance of a mile, and continued to fire as the range decreased.

Sinking_of_the_CSS_Alabama, by Andy Thomas — Sinking of the CSS Alabama, by Andy Thomas

The engagement followed a circular course at a range of a half mile; the ships steaming in opposite directions and firing at will. One ball from Alabama lodged in Kearsarge’s sternpost, but failed to explode. Within an hour, Kearsarge’s 11″ Dahlgren smooth bore pivot cannons reduced the most successful commerce raider in history to a sinking wreck. Alabama turned and tried to run back to port, but Kearsarge headed her off as rising water stopped her engines.

Kearsarge Stern Post — USS Kearsarge Sternpost

Semmes struck his colors and sent a boat to Kearsarge with a message of surrender and an appeal for help.

For those rescued by Kearsarge, the Civil War was over. These would spend the rest of the war as prisoners of the Federal government. Captain Semmes escaped along with 41 others, being plucked from the water and taken to neutral ports by the British steam yacht Deerhound, and the private sail yacht Hornet.

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June 18, 1815 A Handful of Nails

For want of a nail the battle was lost…

The Napoleonic Wars began in 1799, pitting the Grand Armée of Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte against a succession of international coalitions. The first five such coalitions formed to oppose him would go down to defeat.

The empire of Czar Alexander I had long traded with Napoleon’s British adversary. Napoleon invaded Russia in 1812 intending to cut off that trade, but made the same mistake which Adolf Hitler would make, 130 years later. He failed to account for Russia’s greatest military asset – General Winter.

Night_Bivouac_of_Great_Army — The Night Bivouac of the Great Army, by Vasily Vereshchagin

For months, Napoleon’s army pressed ever deeper into Russian territory, as Cossack cavalry burned out villages and fields to deny food or shelter to the advancing French army. Napoleon entered the Russian capital of Moscow that September, with expectations of capitulation. Instead, he got more scorched earth.

French_invasion_of_Russia_collage — French invasion of Russia

With the dread Russian winter coming fast, there was no choice but to turn about. Starving and exhausted with no winter clothing, stragglers were frozen in place or picked off by villagers or pursuing Cossacks. From Moscow to the frontiers you could follow their retreat, by the bodies they left in the snow. 685,000 had crossed the Neman river on June 24. By mid-December, barely 27,000 straggled home from Russian soil.

The War of the 6th Coalition ended in 1814 with Bonaparte’s defeat and exile to the Mediterranean island of Elba, and the restoration to the throne of the Bourbon King Louis VXIII. The Emperor returned at the head of another army, in 111 days.

The Congress of Vienna declared Napoleon an outlaw on March 13, 1815, when Austria, Prussia, Russia and the United Kingsom bound themselves to put 150,000 men apiece into the field to end his reign.

Napoleon struck first, taking 124,000 men of l’Armee du Nord on a pre-emptive strike against the Allies in Belgium. Intending to attack Coalition armies before they combined, he struck and defeated the Prussian forces of Gebhard von Blücher near the town of Ligny.

Napoleon then turned his attention to the coalition forces under Lord Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, who fell back to a carefully selected position on a long east-west ridge at Mont St Jean, a few miles south of the village of Waterloo.

It rained all day and night, that Saturday. Napoleon waited for the ground to dry on the morning of June 18, launching his first attack before noon. Wellington’s Prussian allies were still five hours away. The 80 guns of the Grande batterie opened fire at 11:50, while Wellington’s reserves sheltered out of sight on the reverse slope of the Mont St. Jean ridge. French infantry swarmed the stone buildings of the Château Hougomont on Wellington’s right, and La Haye Sainte on his left.

Most French infantry reserves were committed by 4:00pm, when Marshall Ney ordered the massed cavalry assault. Colonel Cornelius Frazer watched the mass of riders and thought to himself: “They are going to roll over us.” In a flash, Frazer ordered: “Form squares!” 9,000 cuirassiers charged up the hill as Wellington’s artillery responded with canister and shot, turning their cannon into giant shotguns tearing holes in the French ranks.

It was common practice of the time to “spike” enemy cannon, driving a nail into the touchhole and disabling the weapon. Marshal Ney’s aide Colonel Pierre-Agathe Heymès, frantically cried out “Les clous!” “Nails! Spike the guns!”

Not one rider had thought to bring them.

Eleven times French cavalry gained the hill and surrounded those guns. Eleven times the gunners retreated into defensive infantry squares, bristling with spears. Eleven times they returned to their pieces, to fire into French cavalry as it withdrew.

Newly arrived Prussians were pouring in from the right at 7:30 when Napoleon committed his 3,000 man Imperial Guard. These were Napoleon’s elite soldiers, almost seven feet tall in their high bearskin hats. Never defeated in battle, they came up the hill intending to roll up Wellington’s center, away from their Prussian allies. 1,500 British Foot Guards were lying down to shelter from French artillery. As the French lines neared the top of the ridge, the English stood up, appearing to rise from the ground and firing point blank into the French line.

The furious counter assault which followed caused the Imperial Guard to waver, and then retreat. Someone shouted “La Garde recule. Sauve qui peut!” (“The Guard retreats. Save yourself if you can!”), as the Allied army rushed forward and threw themselves on the retreating French.

There is a story, possibly apocryphal, concerning Henry Paget, 2nd Earl of Uxbridge. One of the last cannon balls fired that day hit Uxbridge just above the knee, all but severing the limb. Lord Uxbridge was close to Wellington at the time, exclaiming “By God, sir, I’ve lost my leg!”. Wellington replied “By God, sir, so you have!” There’s another version in which Wellington says “By God, sir, you’ve lost your leg!”. Looking down, Uxbridge replied “By God, sir, so I have!”

As night fell, hundreds of locals emerged with hammers, pliers and chisels, combing the battlefield to remove the teeth of tens of thousands of dead and dying soldiers. Demand for human teeth was high and looters sold them by the tens of thousands, to dentists, who formed them into dentures. According to England’s National Army Museum, British dentists did nothing to conceal where they came from, advertising their appliances as “Waterloo teeth.” As late as the American Civil War, English dentists continued to do a brisk trade in “Waterloo ivory.”

Estimates of the total killed and wounded in the Napoleonic wars range from 3.5 to 6 million. Until Waterloo, Napoleon Bonaparte participated in, and won, more battles than Julius Caesar, Hannibal, Frederick the Great, and Alexander the Great. Combined.

Austrian military history professor Erik Durschmied wrote in his excellent book`The Hinge Factor‘, of the times when serendipity, ‘chance and stupidity have changed history.’ According to Wellington, the Battle of Waterloo was “the nearest-run thing you ever saw in your life.” The French defeat was comprehensive. Bonaparte was captured and exiled, this time to a speck in the North Atlantic called Saint Helena. All, for a handful of nails.

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June 17, 1462 Son of the Dragon

In a time and place remembered for near-cartoonish levels of violence, Vlad Țepeș stands out for extraordinary cruelty.

Count Dracula, favorite of Halloween costume shoppers from time immemorial, has been with us since the 1897 publication of Bram Stoker’s novel, of the same name. Stoker’s working titles for the manuscript were “The Un-dead”, and “Count Wampyr”. He nearly kept one of them too, until stumbling into the real-life story of Vlad Țepeș (TSE·pesh), a Wallachian Prince and front-line warrior, against the Jihad of his day.

In modern Romanian, “Dracul” means “the Devil”. In the old language, it meant “the Dragon”, the word “Dracula” (Drăculea) translating as “Son of the Dragon”.

Stoker wrote in his notes, “in Wallachian language means DEVIL”. In a time and place remembered for near-cartoonish levels of violence, Vlad Țepeș stands out for his extraordinary cruelty. There are tales of Țepeș disemboweling his own mistress. That he collected the noses of vanquished adversaries. Some 24,000 of them. That he dined among forests of victims, spitted on poles. That he even impaled the donkeys they rode in on.

In 1436, Vlad II became voivode (prince) of Wallachia, a region in modern-day Romania situated between the Lower Danube river and the Carpathian Mountains. The sobriquet “Dracul” came from membership in the “Order of the Dragon” (literally “Society of the Dragonists”), a monarchical chivalric order founded by Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund in 1408, and dedicated to stopping the Ottoman advance into Europe.

A crossroads between East and West, the region was scene to frequent bloodshed, as Ottoman forces pushed westward into Europe, and Christian forces pushed back..

A weakened political position left Vlad II no choice but to pay homage to Ottoman Sultan Murad II, in the form of an annual Jizya (tax on non-Muslims) and a contribution of 500 Wallachian boys to serve as Janissaries in the elite slave army of the Ottoman Empire.

Vlad was taken hostage by the Sultan in 1442, along with his two younger sons, Vlad III and Radu. The terms of the boys’ captivity were relatively mild by the standards of the time and both became skilled horsemen and warriors. Radu went over to the Turkish side, but Vlad hated captivity, developing an incandescent hate for his captors which would last all his life.

Following the fall of Constantinople in 1453, Sultan Mehmed II set his sights on the invasion of all Europe.

The younger Vlad gained the Wallachian throne three years later and immediately stopped all tribute to Sultan Mehmed II, by now risen to 10,000 ducats per year, and 1,000 boys. When a group of visiting Ottoman envoys declined to remove their turbans in Vlad’s court, the Prince ordered the turbans nailed to their skulls.

Vlad now consolidated power as his reputation for savagery, grew. According to stories circulated after his death, hundreds of disloyal boyars (nobles) and their allies met their end, impaled on spikes.

Mehmed II, conqueror of Constantinople, now amassed power of his own, setting his sights on campaigns against Anatolia, the Greek Empire of Trebizond and the White Sheep Turkomans of Uzun Hasan. Throughout this period, Romanian control of the Danube remained a thorn in his side.

Pope Pius II declared a new Crusade against the Ottoman in 1460, but Vlad Țepeș was the only European leader to show any enthusiasm. The Hungarian General and Ţepeş’ only ally Mihály Szilágyi was captured by the Turks, his men tortured to death and Szilágyi himself sawed in half.

Țepeș invaded the Ottoman Empire the following year. In a letter to Hungarian king Matthias Corvinus dated February 11, 1462, Țepeș wrote: I have killed peasants men and women, old and young, who lived at Oblucitza and Novoselo, where the Danube flows into the sea, up to Rahova, which is located near Chilia, from the lower Danube up to such places as Samovit and Ghighen. We killed 23,884 Turks without counting those whom we burned in homes or the Turks whose heads were cut by our soldiers…Thus, your highness, you must know that I have broken the peace with him (Sultan Mehmed II).

The Sultan invaded Wallachia at the head of a massive army, only to find a “forest of the impaled”. The Byzantine Greek historian Laonikos Chalkokondyles writes: “The sultan’s army entered into the area of the impalements, which was seventeen long and seven stades wide”.

To give a sense of scale to such a horror, a “stade” derives from the Greek “stadeon” – the dimensions of an ancient sports arena.

Outnumbered five-to-one, Ţepeş employed a scorched earth policy, poisoning the waters, diverting small rivers to create marshes and digging traps covered with timber and leaves. He would send sick people among the Turks, suffering lethal diseases such as leprosy, tuberculosis and bubonic plague.

From his years in captivity, Ţepeş understood Ottoman language and customs as well as the Turks themselves. Fearless, he would disguise himself as a Turk and freely walk about their encampments, gaining valuable intelligence on the Sultan’s organization.

On this day in 1462, the Son of the Dragon launched a night attack on the Ottoman camp near the capital city of Târgoviște, in an effort to assassinate Mehmed himself. Knowing that the Sultan forbade his men from leaving their tents at night, a force of some 7,000 to 10,000 horsemen fell on Mehmed’s camp three hours after sunset. The skirmish lasted all that night until 4 the next morning, killing untold numbers of Turks, their horses and camels. Ţepeş himself aimed for the Sultan’s tent, but mistook it for that of two grand viziers, Ishak Pasha and Mahmud Pasha.

800px-AtaculdeNoapte — The Battle With Torches by Romanian painter Theodor Aman. It depicts the The Night Attack of Târgovişte,

Mehmed II “The Conqueror” survived the Night Attack at Târgovişte. In the end, the Romanian principalities had little with which to oppose the overwhelming force of the Ottoman Empire. Vlad III Țepeș would twice be deposed only to regain the throne but never able to defeat his vastly more powerful adversary.

“Vlad the Impaler” was exiled to Hungary where he spent much of his time, in prison. He died fighting against the Ottomans in December 1476 or January 1477, his body cut into pieces and his head delivered to the Sultan. Drăculea is buried in an unknown grave, stories of his cruelty told and retold in Russian, German and a hundred other languages. Five hundred years later, the Son of the Dragon is remembered as the un-dead vampire, Count Dracula.

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June 16, 1775 Act Worthy of Yourselves

“You are to decide the important question, on which rest the happiness and liberty of millions yet unborn. Act worthy of yourselves.”

The city of Charlestown, Massachusetts occupies a hilly peninsula to the north of Boston, at the point where the Mystic River meets the Charles. Like Boston itself, much of what is now Charlestown was once Boston Harbor. In 1775 the town was a virtual island, joined to the mainland only by a thin “neck” of land.

Thousands of Patriot Militia poured into the area following the April battles of Lexington and Concord, blocking British forces in control of Boston and its surrounding waterways.

The Massachusetts Provincial Congress received word on June 13 that a massive assault was planned for the 18th, intending to take the high ground at Dorchester Heights to the south, and Charlestown to the north. Major General Israel Putnam was directed to set up defenses on Bunker Hill, on the northwest end of Charlestown.

Col. William Prescott led 1,200 men onto the peninsula on the night of the 16th, with orders to construct fortifications on Bunker Hill. Some work was performed on the hill which gives the battle its name, but it was farmer Ephraim Breed’s land 1/3rd of a mile closer to Boston, which offered the more tenable hill from which to defend the peninsula.

Shovels could be heard throughout the night. The sun rose on the morning of June 17 to reveal a six-foot-high defensive earthwork running the length of Breed’s hill. Peering through the early morning fog, General Howe was astonished at what he saw. “The rebels,” he said, “have done more work in one night than my whole army would have done in one month.”

The warship HMS Lively opened fire on the redoubt shortly after 4am, with little effect, as Prescott’s men continued work on the entrenchment. 128 guns joined in as the morning bore on, including incendiary shot, setting fire to the town.

Ten miles to the south, a 7-year-old future President of the United States stood atop a hill with his mother Abigail, listening to the thunder of the guns and watching the smoke rise above Charlestown. John Quincy Adams would later write that he “witnessed the tears of my mother and mingled with them my own.”

Militia continued to reinforce the high ground throughout the morning hours, as Regulars commanded by Major General William Howe and Brigadier General Robert Pigot crossed the Charles River and assembled for the assault.

The British line advanced up Breed’s Hill twice that afternoon, Patriot fire decimating their number and driving the survivors back down the hill to reform and try again.

Militia supplies of powder and shot began to give out as the Redcoats advanced up the hill for the third assault. “Don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes”. The quote is attributed to Prescott, but the order seems to have originated with General Putnam and passed along by Prescott, Seth Pomeroy, John Stark and others, in a desperate attempt to conserve ammunition.

Finally, there was nothing left with which to oppose the British bayonets. In desperate hand to hand fighting, the Militia was forced to retreat.

Most of the colonists’ casualties occurred at this time, including Boston physician and President of Massachusetts’ Provincial Congress, Dr. Joseph Warren. Warren had been appointed Major General on June 14, but declined command, believing Putnam and Prescott to be more experienced soldiers. On this day, Dr. Warren fought as a private soldier.

Two months before the battle, Joseph Warren had spoken to his men. “On you depend the fortunes of America”, he said. “You are to decide the important question, on which rest the happiness and liberty of millions yet unborn. Act worthy of yourselves.”

That they did. The Americans had gone toe-to-toe with the most powerful military of its time, suffering 452 killed and wounded. Lieutenant Lord Rawdon recognized Dr. Warren on the third assault, and killed him with a musket ball to the head. Warren’s body was bayoneted beyond recognition and thrown into a ditch.

Dr. Warren’s body was exhumed some ten months later after the British evacuation of Boston, and identified by a false tooth made for him by the amateur dentist, Paul Revere. It may be the first instance of forensic dentistry, in American history.

800px-The_Death_of_General_Warren_at_the_Battle_of_Bunker's_Hill — The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker Hill, by John Trumbull

The Battle of Bunker Hill was a military victory for the British side, but it was a Pyrrhic victory. Howe lost 226 men killed and 828 wounded, over a third of his number and over twice that of the Militia. One-eighth of all the British officers killed and one-sixth of those injured during the entire Revolution, occurred on Breed’s Hill.

General Thomas Gage wrote after battle, “The loss we have sustained is greater than we can bear.” Private Nathanael Greene, destined to become one of the Continental Army’s most important Generals, quipped “I wish [we] could sell them another hill at the same price.”

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June 14, 1775 Army Strong

The “olive branch petition” adopted by the 2nd Continental Congress three months after the “shot heard ’round the world’ was a last-ditch attempt to prevent full-on war, but too late. The die was cast.

This “Today in History” is dedicated to United States Army Lieutenant Colonel (retired) Richard B. “Rick” Long, Sr., the man for whom this writer is namesake. Rest in Peace, Dad. You left us too soon.

February 25, 1937 – March 31, 2018

—————

When Caesar crossed the Rubicon River at the head of an army, everyone understood what it meant. A strife of interests would no longer be carried out by civil or legal means. Caesar had crossed the military threshold and there was no turning back. There would be civil war. Republic would give way to Empire. Two thousand years later, to “Cross the Rubicon” still means to take a step which cannot be reversed.

Johnadamsvp.flipped — Future President John Adams defended the British soldiers accused in the “Boston Massacre”. Six of the eight were acquitted, the other two sentenced to branding, on the hand.

The British colonies in North America crossed a Rubicon of their own in April, 1775. Before Lexington & Concord, there had always been a benefit of the doubt. The ‘Boston Massacre‘ of five years earlier resulted not in insurrection but in trial, with Boston attorney John Adams acting for the defense.

The “olive branch petition” adopted by the 2nd Continental Congress three months after the ‘shot heard ’round the world’ was a last-ditch attempt to prevent full-on war, but too late. The die was cast.

The first Continental Congress of 1774 convened in response to the ‘Coercive Acts”, imposed by the English Parliament to bring the colonists into line with Crown tax policy. The 2nd Continental Congress gathered in Philadelphia the following year, had come for the conduct of war.

The fledgling United States had no Army at this time, relying instead on ad hoc militia units organized by the colonies themselves. At this time there were approximately 22,000 armed colonials surrounding some 4,000 British troops occupying Boston, and another 5,000 or so in New York.

The Continental Congress established the ‘American Continental Army’ on this day in 1775, authorizing 10 companies of ‘expert riflemen,’ to serve as light infantry in the siege of Boston. The next day the Congress unanimously chose George Washington to be General and Commander-in-Chief of all continental forces.

During those first years of the war, American ground forces more closely resembled a ragtag assemblage of state militias, than a professional army.

Following the 1779 Battle of Stony Point, Brigadier General Anthony Wayne was able to write to Washington, “Dear Gen’l: The fort and Garrison with Col. Johnston are ours. Our officers and men behaved like men who are determined to be free.”

Most of the Continental Army was disbanded following the Treaty of Paris, formally ending the war in 1783. The 1st and 2nd Regiments remained, becoming the basis of the Legion of the United States in 1792 and forming the foundation of the United States Army in 1796, an organization since evolved into the premier fighting force, of all the world.

Battle-Streamers — United States Army flag, with campaign streamers

The Army’s official banner features the original War Office Seal in blue on a white field over a scarlet banner displaying the words “United States Army” and the year, ‘1775’. The flag was adopted by President Dwight Eisenhower on June 12, 1956, officially dedicated and unfurled before the general public on June 14, 1956, the 181st birthday of the United States Army.

The concept of individual campaign streamers first came about during the Civil War. When on full display, the US Army flag currently includes 190 such streamers.

The Navy came about in October of 1775, the Marine Corps a month later. 18^th century revenue cutter and rescue operations led to the formation of the United States Coast Guard in January, 1915.

According to the website www.usmma.edu, the federal government first began training its citizens for naval service during the Grant administration. Congress passed the landmark Merchant Marine Act in 1936. The Air Force spun off of the Army Air Corps, eleven years later.

On August 31, 1949, Defense Secretary Louis Johnson announced the creation of Armed Forces Day, the 3rd Saturday in May, to recognize the contributions of the United States military and its constituent branches. Speaking at an Armed Forces Day event in 1953, President Dwight David Eisenhower remarked that: “It is fitting and proper that we devote one day each year to paying special tribute to those whose constancy and courage constitute one of the bulwarks guarding the freedom of this nation and the peace of the free world.”

From the dawn of the 20th century, the Nobel Peace prize was awarded to individuals and organizations which have “done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.”

After two World Wars, is it possible that the United States military has done more to promote peace than all of those individuals and organizations, combined?

If you are so inclined, it would be proper to pay tribute and thank a teacher, that you are able read this essay. On this, the birthday of the United States Army, you might thank a soldier that you can read it, in English.

—————

A Personal Note:

While I never served my country in uniform, on this day I pay a personal debt of gratitude, to those of my family circle, who have.

I remember my ancestor, the farmer who left to fight the most powerful military of his time, that this nation might gain its independence.

The Tyner brothers: my twice-great grandfather James and his brothers, Nicholas, Benjamin and William, who fought for what each considered to be their country, in the war between the states. Nicholas alone would survive, laying down his arms under General Lee’s orders at Appomattox and walking home to the Sand hills of North Carolina, there to help his wife and three widowed sisters-in-law raise their 28 kids.

Great Uncle Jacob Deppin was also there at Appomattox, wearing Blue. He served for the duration, save for the year and one-half spent in captivity.

Twice-great Grandfather Wilhelm Christian was the first to change the family surname from “Lang” to “Long”. Blacksmith to the 17th PA Cavalry, his name may be found with those of fifty-six other ‘Langs’, ‘Langens’ and ‘Longs’, on the Pennsylvania monument at Gettysburg. How many are relations, is anyone’s guess.

I honor my grandfather Norman. Wounded in the Great War, he’s earned his final rest in our most hallowed ground, at Arlington.

I honor my Uncle Woodrow, killed in Anzio. Uncle Gary, who helped to fight the explosions and the fires that day in 1967, as the USS Forrestal burned. I honor my father-in-law Ken, the Airman who served with honor, in time of peace.

I honor my brothers’, Norm and Dave, with over 50 years service between them. Even now in retirement, both maintain themselves in a state of fitness and readiness, in case that call comes in one more time.

I honor my son in law Nate and his ‘battle buddy ‘Zino’, the four-year-old German Shepherd turned Tactical Explosives Detection Dog, trained to detect up to 64 explosive compounds. Theirs was to protect a Forward Operating base in Soltan Kheyl, in the Wardak Province of Afghanistan. Together the pair found and neutralized more improvised explosive devices than any other team in their sector. There can be no knowing how many lives were saved by this pair.

And I honor the family members, most often the wives and mothers. It is they who are left to run the family unit and the household alone, never knowing if it will be for a time, or forever.

Category: Wars and Military Conflicts

July 3, 1947 The May Incident

June 29, 1944 Chameleon

The “Man with 1,000 aliases” picture (l) as himself ( during 2nd Boer War, ca 1901), in German uniform sometime around 1914-’16, and (r), as Australian “Captain Claude Stoughton”, from a WW1 war bond drive.

June 26, 1948 Berlin Airlift

June 25, 1876 Little Big Horn

June 22, 1807 Impressed

June 19, 1864 Single Combat

June 18, 1815 A Handful of Nails

June 17, 1462 Son of the Dragon

June 16, 1775 Act Worthy of Yourselves

June 14, 1775 Army Strong

A Personal Note:

While I never served my country in uniform, on this day I pay a personal debt of gratitude, to those of my family circle, who have.

I remember my ancestor, the farmer who left to fight the most powerful military of his time, that this nation might gain its independence.

Great Uncle Jacob Deppin was also there at Appomattox, wearing Blue. He served for the duration, save for the year and one-half spent in captivity.

I honor my grandfather Norman. Wounded in the Great War, he’s earned his final rest in our most hallowed ground, at Arlington.

I honor my Uncle Woodrow, killed in Anzio. Uncle Gary, who helped to fight the explosions and the fires that day in 1967, as the USS Forrestal burned. I honor my father-in-law Ken, the Airman who served with honor, in time of peace.

I honor my brothers’, Norm and Dave, with over 50 years service between them. Even now in retirement, both maintain themselves in a state of fitness and readiness, in case that call comes in one more time.

And I honor the family members, most often the wives and mothers. It is they who are left to run the family unit and the household alone, never knowing if it will be for a time, or forever.

Rick Long

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The “Man with 1,000 aliases” picture (l) as himself ( during 2nd Boer War, ca 1901), in German uniform sometime around 1914-’16, and (r), as Australian “Captain Claude Stoughton”, from a WW1 war bond drive.

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A Personal Note:

While I never served my country in uniform, on this day I pay a personal debt of gratitude, to those of my family circle, who have.

I remember my ancestor, the farmer who left to fight the most powerful military of his time, that this nation might gain its independence.

Great Uncle Jacob Deppin was also there at Appomattox, wearing Blue. He served for the duration, save for the year and one-half spent in captivity.

I honor my grandfather Norman. Wounded in the Great War, he’s earned his final rest in our most hallowed ground, at Arlington.

I honor my Uncle Woodrow, killed in Anzio. Uncle Gary, who helped to fight the explosions and the fires that day in 1967, as the USS Forrestal burned. I honor my father-in-law Ken, the Airman who served with honor, in time of peace.

I honor my brothers’, Norm and Dave, with over 50 years service between them. Even now in retirement, both maintain themselves in a state of fitness and readiness, in case that call comes in one more time.

And I honor the family members, most often the wives and mothers. It is they who are left to run the family unit and the household alone, never knowing if it will be for a time, or forever.

Rick Long

Sharing Today in History: