Interesting Facts and Stories

The Bixby letter

You all remember when General George Marshall (Harve Presnell) in the film "Saving Private Ryan" reads the letter to his officers before giving the order to find to James Ryan, and return him home.-

This letter have your history,,,

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The Bixby letter is a letter sent from the United States President Abraham Lincoln to a bereaved mother of five sons who were thought to have died while fighting for the Union in the American Civil War. The brief, consoling message was written in November 1864 to Lydia Bixby, a widow living in Boston, following a request from Massachusetts Governor John Albion Andrew.

The text has been widely praised as one of Lincoln's finest works of writing alongside the Gettysburg Address and his second inaugural address.

Some controversy surrounds the recipient, subject, and authorship of the letter. Although her sons died fighting for the Union, Mrs. Bixby seems to have personally supported the Confederacy. Not all five sons died in battle, with records showing that three of them were still alive years after the war. Historians have long debated whether the text was penned by Lincoln himself or by his assistant private secretary, John Hay.

The following is the text of the letter as it appeared in the Transcript:

Executive Mansion, Washington, Nov. 21, 1864.

Dear Madam,

I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.

Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,

A. Lincoln

The War Department incorrectly informed Lincoln about the fate of Mrs. Bixby's sons: Two had died in battle, the others eventually survived the war. It is unclear whether the errors in Mrs. Bixby's story were intentional, and why the War Department had failed to correct the report based on their own records.

en.wiki
 
In ancient Rome, the peppermint was regarded as a great aphrodisiac.
In wartime was banned cultivation and infusions of this plant, not to weaken the soldiers.
We swallow every day with chewing gum and we were okay ....
 
Smoking in the war

An "urban legend" of the First War was saying that they brought bad luck to be the third in a cigarette.
This came from the fact that at the beginning of the war, when the trenches were not yet permanent and were not as wide, approaching enemy snipers at night peering parapets.
When soldiers were put to smoke, the sniper saw the match when he lit the first, pointed when the second shot turned it on and when he had crossed the phosphorus to the third.
 
Hollywood actress Norma Talmadge silent film (1897-1957) began the tradition of recording the footprints at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood city in the state of California in the United States, when he accidentally stumbled into fresh cement the sidewalk outside the theater in 1927.
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Mo Gwyther, prisoner of war in Korea.
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When the Korean war started Mo was 23 years of age and one of the first to enlist. Mo was too young to take part in the Second World War but he was eager to do his bit in the Korean War. Mo's family had a proud military background: his father Captain L. T. Gwyther, was awarded the MC (Military Cross) and Bar for bravery during the Second World War.

He saw action almost immediately upon arriving in Korea in September 1950. During October he was wounded in the shoulder. After a full recovery he returned to combat duties. During the Chinese offensive of April 1951, Mo's Company, positioned at Kapyong, came under heavy fire and he was one of three Australians captured by the Chinese.

Mo takes up the story of his time as a POW:

‘I saw four planes coming in at eye level towards our slope, their big napalm containers beginning to fall ... I wasn't burnt but I was concussed by the bombing and was unconscious. When I came to I was surrounded by Chinese.

Bob Parker and Don Buck had spent six months in Camp Twelve, an Indoctrination School. Their schools took in many UN prisoners and attempted to convert them to communism ... Not one Australian fell for this stuff ... We were the first Australians in any war to stand up to brain washing.’

Like Bob Parker and Don Buck, Mo attempted to escape but he was eventually caught and severely punished.

‘(They) put us in a little cell with us all crowded in, called the Sweat Box. We had to stand, or sit with our legs out stretched, at attention, not speak, no sound, from 4.30 in the morning until 11.00 pm. Sometimes, Tang, the Provost-Marshall, and his larrikins beat us with their rifle butts ... until we were unconscious. We were starved, could only go to the lavatory once a day, even then the guards decided the time and that was bad because we all had dysentery ... upon release from the box we were ordered to write a confession, ‘a self-criticism’ for attempting to escape. If it wasn't good enough it was back in the Sweat Box ... Now we knew it was just a matter of keeping cool, never get hot under the collar, never give them an excuse to shoot you or beat you up too badly and things would work out.’

Of the twenty-nine Australian soldiers taken prisoner, only one, Madden, was posthumously awarded the George Cross, died. The rest were repatriated home. Those of No 77 Squadron RAAF who were posted missing, 31 in all, were not so lucky. Only seven were repatriated. Their treatment was as violent as that handed out to prisoners of the Japanese in World War Two.

anzacday.org.au
 
Wall Street

The street name derives from the fact that during the seventeenth century, was the northern boundary of New Amsterdam.
There, in 1652 Dutch colonists built a wall of wood and mud.
The wall meant a defense against possible attack by the Lenape Indians, settlers of New England and the British.
The wall was demolished by the British in 1699. Although the wall disappeared the name of the street is remembering.
In the late eighteenth century, there was a tree right at the foot of the wall, where the financial intermediaries and speculators would gather to trade informally. This was the origin of the Stock Exchange in New York.
 
Blaze, the son of the president's dog.

Elliott Roosevelt (September 23, 1910 – October 27, 1990) was a United States Army Air Forces officer and an author. Roosevelt was a son of U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) and First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.

Elliot Roosevelt at first tried to become a fighter pilot before the war, but was rejected by not overcoming the physical tests.
Still, in 1941, he joined the USAAF flight as an observer on missions over Greenland and northern Africa.

Due to the influence of his father he ascended quickly through the ranks ... but an incident would come to halt his career.

It happened that Colonel Roosevelt was preparing to travel on a military plane from NY to LA in the company of his dog (whom he professed genuine devotion). But the narrowness of the airplane meant there was not enough room for ''Blaze' '(name of the dog) so he could not think of anything but to order 2 soldiers to stay behind and ignored their protests. The dog in question took a trip thanks to the surname of his master.

As often happens at times when something is wrong, the incident transcended public opinion, which immediately empathized with the tremendous injustice to the soldiers-
This was because one of the soldiers called Leon Leroy needed to make the trip to attend the funeral of his father.

Because of this action E. Roosevelt lost an opportunity of being promoted to the rank of general of a star, but finally would be granted the honor of wearing the star of 5 points in 1945, but of course not without controversy as it was considered that did not meet enough merit to deserve it.

books.google.com.ar
 
Isabella of France (9 November 1389 – 13 September 1409) was a Princess of France, daughter of King Charles VI and Isabella of Bavaria-Ingolstadt.
On 31 October 1396, when Isabella was six, she married the widower King Richard II of England, in a move for peace with France.

Wiki
 
Oscar, the cat.

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The story of the Bismarck's cat 'Oscar' is really interesting and outstanding one. This pretty black cat was the mascot of Bismarck, but interestingly, 'Oscar' never brought any 'luck' for the ships aboard. But, the cat itself was amazingly lucky, that survived many times.

After the final battle of Bismarck, the British destroyer HMS Cossack (the destroyer of Philip Vian) found a black, pretty cat among the floating debris of Bismarck. The sailors rescued the cat and brought it aboard Cossack. But it seems as this pretty cat never brought any luck to the destroyer. About five months later, Cossack was hit and destroyed by a German submarine, and Oscar was again among the survivors.

The cat was then brought aboard the famous aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal, which played a very important role during the chase and destruction of Bismarck. But, only three weeks later, carrier HMS Ark Royal was sunk too, due to a torpedo attack of another German submarine at Gibraltar.

Oscar survived during this adventure again. But after this event, the British sailors never allowed the cat to be a mascot for any other ship again and the lucky cat Oscar began to live in a place called 'The Home for Sailors' at Belfast.

According to the Royal Navy records; Oscar, the Bismarck's cat, finished his days at the Home for Sailors in Belfast in 1955.

battleshipbismarck.info
 
The Niihau incident

On Dec 7th, 1941, the Japanese bombarded Pearl Harbor. A lot Japanese pilots were able to return to aircraft carriers, but a few had been shot down, or had crashed on the island of Oahu. Japanese pilots were told that if they were to crash land, they should do so on the island of Ni’ihau, which they thought was uninhabited.

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Shigenori Nishikaichi was a pilot whose plane had been damaged. He crash landed on Ni’ihau, which he soon found out was inhabited. He was treated as a guest, but soon they found out about the attack on Pearl Harbor. Three Japanese on the island tried to help Nishikaichi to escape, but eventually they were stopped, and Nishikaichi as well as one of the Japanese who tried to aid him were killed.
This became known as the Niihau incident


urbantitan.com
 
You know that when the Carnegie Foundation worked to assess the costs of the WW1, valued, even the price of the fallen?

While the death of an American soldier was equivalent to a loss of U$ 4,720 at the time, the life of a dead Bulgarian, Serbian, Romanian, Turkish, Greek or Japanese equivalent to U$ 2,010 ...

granguerra.crearforo.com
 
One story of Will "Killy" Kilpatrick (193 Squadron)

On August 7, 1944, flying from B3 at Ste. Croix S.Mer, 193 Squadron joined the tank-busting Squadron 245 in the battle of Mortain. Killy, in the Typhoon marked DP-A, was bombing German transport when he was hit by flak. He managed to fly some distance towards allied lines, but the engine siezed and he had to force-land in a French field at Le Mesnil Tove [50 miles SW of Caen].

This field is 14km SW of Vire, but Killy reported his location as 4km from Vire because the townspeople had changed the local signposts to confuse the Germans! As he hid under the tank he could see out between the tracks. At the top of the lane was a signpost, which said "Vire 4 km". He subsequently reported this in his debriefing and was congratulated on his accurate navigation, so he was mortified to learn, 50 years later, that he had been wrong!

He landed under fire from both sides, as the village was under attack by American forces. Killy saw another Typhoon, marked MN-R, on its back in the same field. This was Bob Lee of 245 Squadron. Bob had been badly injured at St. Barthelemy and his aircraft had managed to land itself on the upward slope of the field; however, it had turned over, trapping him in the cockpit. All the official accounts say that its tail collapsed trapping Bob Lee. Killy reported that when he saw the plane, it was standing upside down on the tip of its tail-fin. The tail must have collapsed later possibly due to gunfire.

Bob Lee spent several days inside the cockpit before being dug out by American troops. Killy ran for a hedge where he found a German tank under which he hid for some hours. He was spotted there and arrested at gunpoint.

This began an epic adventure, as he travelled through the Falaise Gap battle [near Chambois where the Allied forces encircled the retreating German Army at the end of the Battle of Normandy], meeting an American pilot (later discoverd to be Emil Birza, a Thunderbolt P47 pilot). The two of them managed to persuade their captors that life was much better on the Allied side and so they travelled north with their captors while aiming to escape.

Killy and Emil Birza were resting with their German escort, who had been persuaded to defect, when a party of 24 fully armed soldiers marched towards them. Naturally, it was feared that the game was up. These soldiers were Austrian, and had shiny buttons on their uniforms. Killy, mostly in sign language, drew attention to a fighter-bomber formation rapidly approaching and convinced the soldiers that their buttons could be clearly seen by the pilots, and things were about to get very nasty (air-ground attacks were almost incessant at that time). The soldiers threw down their weapons and ran for a nearby barn. Killy and Emil picked up a couple of rifles, headed for the barn, and captured the whole group!

So the two pilots eventually handed the 30 Germans and Austrians, now their prisoners, over to Free French forces near Le Mans! Here Killy met "Major Neave", actually Airey Neave [who was responsible for locating and repatriating Allied personnel, many of whom were in hiding near Paris] and hitched a ride back to B3 on American transport. He had been missing for many days and his colleagues had assumed the worst. It was evening, and the mess-tent bar was about to close. As Killy walked in, the CO saw him and yelled "keep the bar open!". Killy remembered little after that until he woke up in a local bedroom that had been commandeered for use as a hospital.

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"Killy" Kilpatrick, George Langille and Jimmy Simpson of 193 Squadron

amnesta.net
 
Qin Shi Huang (259 BC - 210 BC) was the first emperor of Chine

Your name, Qin, who says: "Chin ", evolved over time and that is what is currently known as Chine.

The emperor was obsessed with immortality and drank mercury to prolong his life, although it led him to madness and probably hastened his death.

Having survived several assassination attempts, never slept in the same bed more than twice.
 
Churchill's anecdote...

After the British deliverance at Dunkirk, Churchill, in the House of Commons, rallied Britain with his most memorable speech.

"We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills. We shall never surrender," he declared.

Then, as the House of Commons thundered in an uproar at his stirring rhetoric, Churchill muttered in a whispered aside to a colleague, "And we’ll fight them with the butt ends of broken beer bottles because that’s bloody well all we’ve got!"

waranecdotes.blogspot.com
 
Accident flight

On July 23, 1983, a Boeing 767 of Air Canada, which made ​​the Montreal-Ottawa route, was forced to make an emergency landing after running out of fuel in flight.
Canada was in the process of adaptation of weights and measures in the international metric system and a number of gallons refueled when the calculations had been made ​​in gallons.
Thanks to the skill of the pilot only two passengers suffered minor injuries.
 
Catherine Howard, the fifth wife of Henry VIII of England, was beheaded on February 13, 1542.

The night before her execution, Catherine is said to have spent many hours practising how to lay her head upon the block.-
 
PoorOldSpike said:
If the Republicans had played their cards right she'd be in the White House as Vice-President, but they made two mistakes-
1- They fielded Gramps McCain, a nice guy and he was 72 which is not too old, but he was a bit too doddery.
2- They failed to woo women voters by not having an ad campaign showing how American suffragettes were bullied and imprisoned, then capping the ads with the heartrending words- "It's a long way for women from a cold prison cell to the White House; vote for Sarah"
Click to expand...

Sorry mate, your opinion of the American voter falls far short of the mark. Most voters recognized her for the vacuous, airhead she is. And after a couple of years, that perception has only been reinforced. As for bedding her, I must state that she does not have the intellect to even begin to appeal to my largest erogenous organ, my brain. Tell you what POS, I'll trade her for Thatcher.
 
Facman said:
Sorry mate, your opinion of the American voter falls far short of the mark. Most voters recognized her for the vacuous, airhead she is. And after a couple of years, that perception has only been reinforced. As for bedding her, I must state that she does not have the intellect to even begin to appeal to my largest erogenous organ, my brain. Tell you what POS, I'll trade her for Thatcher.
Click to expand...

With all due respect to your oldness, I fully understand that the geriatric population don't want to bang her like a screen door but there are some of us who stand ready to stop, drop and refudiate at a moment's notice. We "Real Merkins" are keeping an eye on those red, yellow, commie pinko liberals and embrace our North Korean allies while understanding our history of Paul Revere warning us against "That One".

Yes, you can disregard my opinion because I live back in the woods you see with the woman and kids and dogs and me. Sadly, the Trump/Palin ticket just wasn't meant to be.

In closing, please let me know if you need me to add even more profundity to this logical discourse on American politics.
 
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