This Day in History

[besilarius]

218   BC   Hannibal completed the crossing of the Alps into Gallia Cisalpina [est - “around the setting of the Pleiades”.
During the early part of the Second Punic War the Carthaginian Hannibal was literally unbeatable, defeating every army the Romans could throw at him in the battles of the Ticinus and the Trebbia (218 BC) and Lake Trasimenus (217 BC).  Following the disaster at Trasimenus, the Roman Senate appointed Quintus Fabius Maximus as Dictator for a six month term.  Fabius, an old campaigner and several times consul, was aware that his tactical skills were no match for Hannibal's.  So he avoided open battle, relying instead upon ambushes, night attacks, guerrilla operations, sieges, and similar techniques to wear down the enemy, thereby earning the nickname “Cunctator” (the Delayer). 
This led to a series of operations that demonstrated  both generals’ extraordinary skill at deception and trickery, as each tried to outsmart the other.
On one occasion Hannibal had been forced to retreat by some clever maneuvering on Fabius's part.  Outnumbered, with supplies running low, and night approaching, the Carthaginian found himself confronted by some difficult terrain, which would impede his movement so much that Fabius might be able to pick off part of his rear guard. To keep Fabius at arm's length, Hannibal had torches tied to the horns of cattle and turned the terrified animals loose in the direction of the Roman army.  As the cattle fled through the countryside, the torches spread the flames to the surrounding brush.  When the Romans saw the moving flames, they at first thought they were witnessing a supernatural apparition, but were soon disabused of this notion by their scouts.  Learning of the trick, Fabius decided that it might well be a ruse on Hannibal's part to set him up for an ambush, and pulled his troops back to their camp.
Later that same year, Hannibal was confronted by two Roman armies, one under Fabius and the other under his chief subordinate, Marcus Minucius Rufus.  Fabius was wary and clever, while Minucius was unthinking and impulsive. Aware that his opponents were of very different character, Hannibal decided to separate them and then defeat Minucius.  Boldly advancing the bulk of his army to a position between his opponents, Hannibal concealed a portion of his troops in ambush.  He then sent a small force to seize a hill near Minucius' camp.  Minucius took the bait, and led his army out to crush these troops, only to fall into Hannibal's ambush.  Things would have gone badly for Minucius, but the wily Fabius, taking advantage of the fact that Hannibal believed he was unwilling to move boldly on the battlefield, spotted the trap, intervened, and forced Hannibal to retreat, or be caught between two foes.
The “Fabian” approach to warfare was, however, unpopular with most Romans.  Shortly after Fabius laid down his command, they once more decided to confront Hannibal in a head-on battle, which led to the Roman disaster at Cannae.

1307         Hermann Gessler, Hapsburg Bailiff of Altdorf, shot by William Tell.

1559         the “Peace of the Pyrenees” between France & Spain, finally ended the protracted Italian Wars (1494-1559)  Eighth Italian War (1551–1559):  Francis was succeeded by Henry II (r. 1547-1559), who decided to try for control of Italy once again.  He didn’t do very well on any front (though a brief English attempt to enter the war on Charles’ side did lead to the French capturing Calais after several centuries of English rule).  Meanwhile, in 1556, tired of war, Charles abdicated his thrones, leaving Spain to his son Philip II (r. 1556-1598) and the Hapsburg lands to his brother, who shortly became Emperor Ferdinand II (r. 1558-1564), and retired to a monastery.  The war dragged on a couple of years more, but by then even the remarkably slow learning Valois family could see that Italy belonged to Spain.
Arguably, these wars were really only manifestations of a struggle that began in the mid-13th century between the House of Hohenstaufen and its heirs, ultimately the Crown of Spain, and the House of Anjou and its heirs, the Crown of France, which did not end until 1815.

[besilarius]

392         Roman Emperor Theodosius bans pagan worship and ends the Olympic Games

1382. Legend has it that one day a strapping 13-year old lad known as Giacomuzzo was working for a farmer, hoeing vegetables in a field near his home town, Coltignola in the mountainous Romagna district of eastern Italy.
By chance, a troop of mercenaries passed down the road that ran alongside the field in which Giacomuzzo was working. Some of the soldiers, seeing the sturdy young man at work, approached him. One of them asked him the medieval Italian equivalent of “Hey kid, do you really want to tell your grandchildren that during the wars you were shoveling shit in Louisiana?”
Realizing that they have a point, but unable to make up his mind, Giacomuzzo said, “I’ll throw this mattock at that tree. If it hangs in the branches, I’ll join you.” It did, and he did. Giacomuzzo promptly left the field, stole his father’s horse, and joined what turned out to be the company of Boldrino da Panicale (1331-1390), a moderately successful condottiero.
This, at least according to an old tradition, marked the beginning of the military career of one of the most notable of the condottieri, Giacomo Attendolo, known as Muzio Attendolo Sforza (1369-1424).

The real story isn’t much less interesting
The Attendolo family were actually prominent local landowners with a history of military service. When Giacomuzzo was 13 he enlisted as a page in Boldrino’s service, and two years later re-enlisted as a man-at-arms, a testimony to his large size, great strength, and aggressive manner. It was a busy life. In Giacomuzzo’s very first year with Boldrino, he saw action serving the Church against Gentile da Varano of Camerino, a rather recalcitrant papal vassal, fought for Perugia against some exiles, and helped run the protection racket against Siena. Boldrino offered an excellent education in the mercenary’s trade, having himself studied at the feet of the great John Hawkwood, learning not only how to fight and manage troops, but to negotiate contracts, betray employers, and divide up the loot properly. And Giacomuzzo proved an apt pupil. By 1386, the young man, then about 17, was already commanding a squad of nine lances – each a combat team of 3-5 mounted troops headed by a heavy cavalryman. But soon after he had an altercation with another squad leader that left the latter dead. For reasons of health, Giacomuzzo left Boldrino’s service for that of Alberico da Barbiano (1349-1409), one of the greatest of contemporary condottieri, who nicknamed him "Sforza" ("Strong") for his great physical strength. A few years later Giacomuzzo formed his own independent company, drawing upon kinsmen and family retainers.  For several years he served as a sub-contractor to Alberico and others, slowly building his company and his reputation.
By 1398 Sforza was commanding 100 lances and taking on independent contracts. A decade later he commanded 600 lances, an enormous force, in the service of the Angevine King of Naples against his Aragonese rival, fighting in the centuries-long dynastic dispute between the two royal lines over the throne of Naples. He remained thereafter largely in the service of the Neapolitan Angevines, who named him Grand Constable of the Kingdom in 1416, while his “company” came to number some 7,000 men, horse and foot together.
Muzio Attendolo Sforza drowned while on campaign at the age of 54.
His son married the only daughter of the last Visconti Duke of Milan, and founded a line of princes that reigned there, with occasional interruptions, from 1450 to 1535, while marrying into the most noble houses in Europe, so that almost every modern European royal is his descendant.
Not bad for a kid who reportedly started out hoeing vegetables.

1813. HMS Atalante, Frederick Hickey, wrecked off Halifax by running on the Sisters Rocks, or the eastern ledge, off Sambro Is. having mistaken guns fired by HMS Barrosa (36) for the fog-signal guns at the lighthouse on the same island.

1923  Hitler's "Munich Beer Hall Putsch"
 

[besilarius]

479 BC 
During the “Golden Age” of Athens, cock fights were staged annually at state expense in the city’s theatre. The source of this custom was an incident that occurred as the Athenians were on the march in Central Greece to join the Hellenic Army that would defeat the Persians invaders in the Battle of Plataea . As told by the Romano-Greek scholar Claudius Aelianus (fl., c. AD 175- c. 235), in his collection of Historical Miscellany,

When Themistocles went forth with an army of the citizens against the Persians he saw some cocks fighting; neither did he behold it slightly, but turning to the whole army said, "These undertake this danger, neither for their country, nor for their country’s gods, nor for the monuments of their ancestors, nor for fame, liberty, or their children; but that they may not be worsted, or yield one to the other."

Apparently the Athenians took these words to heart, and helped win the battle, which decisively crushed the Persian threat to Greece. To commemorate the incident, Themistocles arranged for the city to hold the annual cock fights.

63   BC   Catiline fled Rome, his conspiracy against the Republic having been revealed.

1916  Munitions disaster at Bakaritsa, near Arkhangel, Russia -- 30,000 tons explode, thousands die

1921. USS Olympia (C 6) arrives at the Washington Navy Yard from France carrying the body of the Unknown Soldier of World War I for internment at Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Va.

1938  Marshal of the Soviet Union Vasily Konstantinovich Blyukher, 48, executed by Stalin for 'espionage'

[besilarius]

1801. Kentucky outlaws dueling, which continues anyway

1850 Death of sir Phinea's Riall.
July of 1814 an American Army under Maj. Gen. Jacob Brown, invaded Canada across the Niagara River. Seizing Ft. Erie by a coup de main on July 3rd, Brown pressed on to win a hard fought victory at the Battle of Chippewa two days later (traditionally the occasion of the famous cry “Those are regulars, by God!”). The British and Canadians, under Maj. Gen. Gordon Drummond fell back toward Lundy’s Lane. Brown delayed following up for several days, to gather reinforcements and supplies. Late on July 25th, Brown made his move; the resulting Battle of Lundy’s Lane was a hard six hour fight that remains the bloodiest battle ever on Canadian soil.
In the course of the battle, the principal American attack, a frontal assault by Brig. Gen. Winfield Scott against the British-Canadian line, was actually a holding action; while Scott was pinning their attention to their front, Maj. Thomas Jesup’s 25th Infantry traversed a fairly dense woods to fall on the British left.
As the 25th Infantry emerged from the woods and began rolling up British and Canadian units, British Brig. Gen. Phineas Riall was severely wounded in the arm. One of his aides attempted to get the general to the rear, only to find that their way blocked by a group of soldiers. The aide shouted, “Make room there men, for General Riall.”
An officer replied, “Aye, aye, sir!,” and made way for the two men to pass. But as they did so, he suddenly grabbed the general.
“But I am General Riall!”
“There is no doubt on that point,” replied the officer, and I, Sir, am Captain Ketchum of the United States Army.”
“Ketchum!” echoed the shocked Riall, adding, “Well, you have caught us sure enough!”

1938. Kate Smith introduced Irving Berlin's "God Bless America" on radio.

[besilarius]

1675         Tegh Bahadur, 54, Sixth Sikh Guru (1665-1675), murdered by the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb, after five days of torture to encourage him to convert to Islam

1918. an Armistice at 11:00 a.m. ended the Great War.

1923. An Eternal Flame is lit at the Tomb of the "Soldat Inconnu" at the Arc de Triomphe

1940. Thousands of French students silently lay wreaths at the Tomb of the "Soldat Inconnu" to protest the German occupation

1942. During World War II, Japanese Emperor Hirohito honored three Germans by awarding them fine samurai swords. What is interesting about these awards is who received them.
One sword went to Reichsmarshal Herman Goring. This would seem appropriate. After all, Goring was the head of the German Air Force, not to mention the fact that he had been Hitler’s right-hand-man for many years.
A second sword went to Field Marshal Erwin Rommel. Once again, certainly a approriate award. After all, Rommel was one of the most distinguished field commanders in the war, with many spectacular victories to his credit.
The third sword went to Bernhard Rogge. Who was Bernhard Rogge? Well, he was the skipper of the famous surface raider Atlantis, which terrorised the shipping lanes for some time early in the war. A distinguished enough record. Still, what had he done to deserve such personal recognition from the Japanese emperor? The short answer is, that he had greatly facilitated the capture of Singapore.
It seems that on November 11, 1940, Rogge’s Atlantis catpured the Blue Funnel Liner Automedon, near the Nicobar Islands, in the northeastern part of the Indian Ocean. Bound from Britain to Singapore, the ship carried a varied cargo. It also carried some interesting documents.
Captured aboard Automedon were the minutes of a meeting of the British War Cabinet held on August 8, 1940, plus an 87-page secret report by the Chief of the Imperial General Staff. Both documents dealt with British defensive arrangements for Malaya and Singapore.
Recognizing the enormous importance of these documents, Rogge passed them on to his superiors. And they very thoughtfully passed them on to Japanese intelligence, who found them of graet interest. Thus, Rogge contributed materially to the Japanese capture of Malaya and Singapore, which they overran in only about 60 days in Decemebr and January of 1941-1942. And thus did Rogge merit his samurai sword.

1971. The mayor of Paris endorses an addition to the Arc de Triomphe.  In honor of Charles Degaulle, the Eternal Siren is to be emplaced.
 

[besilarius]

1658 the Spanish Army established a new garrison at Badajoz, northwest of Madrid, one result of which was that over the next year the illegitimacy rate in the city tripled.

1870. Shortly after the Prussians invested Paris on September 20, 1871, during the Franco-Prussian War, the French resorted to the use of balloons to carry passengers, mail, and some specialized cargoes from the besieged city to the provinces. At least 66 balloons were lofted, including one that brought Leon Gambetta out on October 8, so that he could help organize new armies in the provinces that attempted to liberate the “City of Light.” Attempts to make return trips to Paris by balloon proved uniformly unsuccessful, but pigeons were used to carry correspondence into the city, using a special photographic process that reduced the documents to microscopic size.
The Prussian Army considered the balloons a very serious problem. Not only were they being used to reconnoiter the siege lines, but they enabled the besieged to coordinate their break-out efforts with the French armies still in the field. In addition, the balloons had caught the imagination of many people in neutral countries, raising sympathy for the French.
So the Prussians decided they needed a way to destroy the balloons. Now there had been earlier efforts at creating anti-balloon weapons. After all, the French had introduced the use of balloons in warfare during the 1790s. Hot air balloons, and later hydrogen balloons, had seen considerable use over the following decades, as recently as during the Lombardy-Venetia War (1859), the American Civil War (1861-1865), and even the Paraguayan War (1866-1869). Nor had efforts to develop weapons that could destroy aerostats (i.e., “balloons”) lagged long behind their introduction. But these had been improvised weapons, usually light artillery pieces mounted on special carriages. That would not do for the Prussian Army. In typical Prussian fashion, what the they wanted was a proper anti-balloon gun. So specifications were issued, bids received, and in a surprisingly short time, a contract was granted to the Krupp Works.
In an equally surprisingly short time, within weeks in fact, Krupp came up with a workable weapon, the Ballonabwehrkanone. The Ballonabwehrkanone was a rifled 36-mm (1.4-inch) breech loading gun. Mounted on a special carriage that made moving it easier than a normal artillery piece, it had a 360-degree traverse, and could be elevated to 85-degrees. The Ballonabwehrkanone, the first purpose-built anti-aircraft weapon in history, achieved only one “kill,” when it brought down the balloon Daguerre just west of Paris on November 12, 1870.

1912  Medal of Honor winner Major General Henry Clay Merrian dies.
During the Spanish-American War the “Merriam Pack” was the standard U.S. Army knapsack. Invented by Maj. Gen. Henry Clay Merriam (1837-1912), who earned a Medal of Honor during the Civil War, the pack consisted of a canvas box with hickory rods that held it square, while at the bottom end there were fasteners to fit it into a belt that fell just below one’s kidneys. One’s blanket roll would then be fitted horse-shoe fashion over the pack, to which it was fastened with straps, while additional straps permitted one to fasten one’s rolled up overcoat beneath the pack. Needless to say, the Merrian Pack was very uncomfortable. But that did not necessarily make the Merrian Pack unpopular, at least with new troops.
It seems that the Merrian Pack could easily hold a full quart of whiskey, “with some space left for socks, shaving materials, and a deck of cards or so,” in the words of Pvt. Charles Johnson Post of the 71st New York. In addition, the blanket roll could hold three more quarts, one on top and one to each side, snuggly secured and well padded. Moreover, that rolled-up overcoat could hold another quart – indeed Pvt. Post swore a buddy managed to secrete a demijohn – nearly a gallon! – in his . Thus, a properly equipped soldier could easily manage to go to war with at least four quarts of whiskey, and even more if he’d replaced the water in his canteen with the “more precious fluid.”
Of course, once the troops became a little more seasoned, they quickly discarded the Merriam Pack for an old fashioned Civil War style blanket roll – it may not have permitted a man to carry as much “soldier’s friend” as the Merrian Pack, but it was a heck of a lot lighter and more comfortable.

[besilarius]

36 BC   Ovation for Octavian for the defeat of Sextus Pompeius in Sicily by Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa (who only got the corona rostrata)

1002. St. Brice's Day Massacre: King Ethelred II initiates the slaughter of all Danes in England


1942. Cmdr. Herbert E. Schonland, Rear Adm. Norman Scott, Boatswains Mate First Class Reinhardt J. Keppler, and Capt. Daniel J. Callaghan courageously fight enemy forces during the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal. Schonland later receives the Medal of Honor for his actions, while Scott, Keppler, and Callaghan posthumously receive the Medal of Honor for their actions.
Gunners Mate Third Class Kenneth J. Spangenberg is killed on board USS San Francisco in the Battle of Savo Island and posthumously awarded the Navy Cross.
All five Sullivan brothers are lost when the USS Juneau (CL 52) is destroyed during the naval Battle of Guadalcanal.

1970  Felix Unger is asked to remove himself from his residence, at the request of his wife.

[Staggerwing]

1970  Felix Unger is asked to remove himself from his residence, at the request of his wife.

At least he got to keep the fry pan...

[Sir Slash]

You two are quite the...Odd Couple. 

[besilarius]

1809   HMS Chiffonne (36), Commodore John Wainwright, HMS Caroline (36), Cptn. Charles Gordon, HEICS Mornington (22), HEICS Ternate (16), HEICS Aurora (14), HEICS Mercury (14), HEICS Nautilus (14), HEICS Prince of Wales (14), HEICS Vestal (10), HEICS Ariel (10), HEICS Fury ( and HEICS Stromboli bomb-ketch destroyed more than fifty Joasmi pirate vessels at Ras-al-Khaimah in the Persian Gulf.

1823 war threatened between the Kingdom of Burma and Britain.  Fearing the worst, the government of Lord Liverpool consulted the Duke of Wellington as to who would be the best man to command in a campaign to capture Rangoon and impose a favorable settlement on Burma.
Wellington promptly replied, "Send Lord Combermere."
"But," protested the Cabinet, "We have always understood that your Grace considered Lord Combermere a fool?"

"So he is a fool, and a damned fool; but he can take Rangoon!" replied the Duke.

Lord Combermere began life as Stapleton Stapleton-Cotton (1773-1865).  The son of the Baronet of Combermere Abbey, Stapleton-Cotton joined the British army through purchase in the early 1790s, and over the next 25 years had a career rather typical of a British aristocrat of his times, serving variously in India, Africa, Ireland, and on the continent, and, from1808 in Spain and Portugal, rising to command Wellington's cavalry.  In the Peninsula he earned the nickname "Golden Lion" from the French, both for his battlefield prowess and his rather spectacular taste in uniforms -- reportedly he could compete with Joachim Murat in sartorial splendor. 
Despite Wellington's curious endorsement, the Cabinet decided not to place Combermere in command of the Burmese expedition. 
Note: Combermere was the father of Wellington Henry Stapleton-Cotton, the Second Viscount (1818-1891), who had an honorable if unspectacular career in the British Army, rising to colonel in the Guards and followed by many years of service in the House of Lords, who is nevertheless today more famous than his father, his ghost having allegedly been photographed sitting in the family home.

1917 the U.S. Navy issued a new model cutlass, with a blade nearly 25 inches long, perhaps in the hope that Uncle Sam’s bluejackets might find it useful for boarding German dreadnoughts.

1933  Hitler’s private sleeping carriage, which bore the number 10222, is still in service today, reserved for the use of the President of the German Federal Republic, though its designation has been changed to 8940322.
1956. Hungarian Revolution finally crushed by overwhelming Soviet forces

[besilarius]

353BC.   The first use of "artillery" on the battlefield, as opposed to during sieges, seems to have occurred during the Greek "Third Sacred War," when the Phocian commander Onomarchus deployed catapults to deliver converging fire from his flanks during the ambush of a Macedonian army under the great King Philip II, who was forced to retire in some disorder.
1818. the end of the Napoleonic Wars, King George III of England was sunk deep in madness, and the royal authority was being exercised by his son the Prince of Wales (or as Beau Brummel was wont to call him, “The Prince of Whales”). The Prince-Regent himself had only one child, Princess Charlotte, a bright young women who, in contrast to her father was widely admired. Alas, Princes Charlotte died in childbirth 1817, thus altering the line of succession. When George III died, he was, naturally succeeded by the Prince-Regent, who duly became George IV in 1820. Since the Prince-Regent lacked a legal heir of his body (there were a number of illegitimate offspring), the succession would pass to a sibling. Now the Prince-Regent had a flock of brothers and sisters, but in 1817 none of them had any legitimate children of their own either. Next in line after George IV’s siblings, were two German cousins, who also lacked heirs. The next in line after them was thus Princess Friederike Catherine Sophie Dorothea von Württemberg, the grand-daughter of Augusta of Hanover, the Princess Royal of England, elder sister to George III. If this came to pass even the staunchest Tories might have abandoned their devotion to legitimacy, for Princess Catherina, as she was commonly, known, was married to one Jerome Bonaparte, sometime King of Westphalia, and she, or her heirs, would only have had to join the Church of England to be able to claim the throne.
England was spared the indignity of a Bonaparte on the throne because, in 1818, George IV’s bachelor brother Prince Edward Augustus, Duke of Kent, aged 50, married the 31-year old Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, who, the following year produced a daughter, Princess Alexandrina Victoria of Kent, who although only fifth in line to the throne, inherited it when her Uncle William IV died in 1837, as Queen Victoria, to reign until 1901.

1918. French casualties in World War I – whether killed, wounded, or missing – averaged 37,000 for each of the 51 months of the war, though for August and September of 1914 casualties actually averaged 164,000 a month.
 

[besilarius]

202 BC. The personality of Hannibal so dominates the Second Punic War (218-202 B.C.) that the Roman victory in the titanic struggle is often overlooked. One reason for that victory was the prodigious effort made by the Republic to maintain strong armies in the field at whatever cost. As a result, despite repeated devastating losses blows – Lake Trasimenus, Cannae, and others – the Romans never lost heart, tapping the enormous resources and energies of the Republic to eventually attain a nearly total victory.
It is estimated that in the course of the long war nearly 100 percent of eligible male Roman citizens served at some time or other. For many periods as much as half of the eligible men were under arms. Out of a pool of available male citizens which never exceed about 340,000, fully 120,000 died in the war, by one estimate as many as 80,000 of them as a result of combat.
Altogether 55 legions were raised during the war. This figure includes four legions raised from the discharged veterans of the 30 legions that were disbanded in the course of the conflict, plus four more from the remnants of the 15 that were destroyed in combat, and two composed of slave who volunteered in exchange for eventual freedom. Although the average term of enlistment for the 55 legions that served was about five years, several were under arms for much longer periods.

Legionary Service 218-202 B.C.
Years   Legions
15   2
11   2
10   1
8   11
7   2
6   5
5   6
4   4
3   7
2   10
1   5
The two legions which remained under arms for 15 years were composed of survivors of the disaster at Cannae in 216 B.C., when four legions were destroyed, two of which had been recruited in 218 and two in 217. Thus, upon their discharge in 20 B.C., a year after the end of the war, some of the veterans of the two Legiones cannaneses had been in the service for more than 18 years

1788  By carefully parlaying all his perquisites, plus taking a little off the top now and again, Lt. Col. Sir Mark Wood, the Chief Engineer of the Bengal Army in the late, managed to salt away some £200,000, an impressive piece of change in any era.

1940. The first attack by New York City's "Mad Bomber," George Metesky: Over 16 years until he was caught, he planted 33 bombs, of which 22 exploded, injuring 15 people

1961. Franz Halder, who had been Chief of the General Staff of Hitler's Army from 1938 until September of 1942, worked for many years as an advisor to the U.S. Army's Historical Division, and upon retirement in 1961 was awarded the Meritorious Civilian Service Medal.

[besilarius]

375         Roman Emperor Valentinian I (364-375), c. 54 dies, of apoplexy when visited by some arrogant barbarians.

1796    Death of  Empress Catherine II "the Great" of Russia (1762-1796), 67, in bed, alone, without a horse

1878   Anarchist Giovanni Passannante stabs King Umberto I of Italy, who wounds his attacker in return, using his dress sword, in the last case of a royal engaging in hand-to-hand combat

1885   Battle of the Slivnitza begins: by the 19th King Milan Obrenovic's Serbs are defeated by Prince Alexander Battenberg's Bulgarians, in the last battle commanded by sovereigns in the field

[bayonetbrant]

So where was Catherine's horse if it wasn't in the bed with her?

[bob48]

This day in history - 1948, and a new wargamer is born