GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

A PAIR OF MEAT GRINDERS

The Marine Corps amounts to a pair of relentless meat grinders. One is militaristic and relentlessly transforms enemy combatants into Soylent Green while relentlessly transforming generations of young Americans into Soylent Green Plus. The other is propagandistic and relentlessly manufactures happy-face images of discipline, pride, honor, and sacrifice — Toys-For-Tots drives, flag-draped caskets, Dress Blues parades with military bands, Taps, the Regimental colors, the ribbons and medals, “The Marine Corps builds ... Men,” what have you. These two apparatuses operate simultaneously and in exquisite coordination: don’t even think about getting in the way. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1537

The oldest Marine Corp in the world, the Spanish Marines, originated in this year to take part in the conquest of . HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1775

November 5, Sunday: The Continental Congress appointed of Rhode Island as Commodore of the ,

and as of Marines. CONTINETAL CONGRESS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE , Friday: On about this day, William Bartram departed Baton Rouge.

The Continental Congress authorized the raising of 2 battalions of Marines. GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

That two battalions of Marines be raised consisting of one , two Lieutenant-Colonels, two Majors, and other officers, as usual in other regiments; that they consist of an equal number of Privates with other battalions; that particular care be taken that no persons be appointed to offices, or enlisted into said battalions, but such as are good seamen, or so acquainted with maritime affairs as to be able to serve by sea when required; that they be enlisted and commissioned to serve for and during the present war with Great Britain and the Colonies, unless dismissed by order of Congress; that they be distinguished by the names of the First and Second Battalion of Marines.

November 28, Tuesday: Samuel Nicholas received his written confirmation, that he had been commissioned as Captain of Marines. Soon he would set up the 1st recruiting headquarters, in ’s . HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1776

March 2, Saturday: Esek Hopkins’s fleet seized 2 sloops, and put a landing party of 200 Marines and 50 sailors aboard them (remember, folks, the Ten Commandments only apply during times of peace and prosperity). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE March 3, Sunday: At mid morning, under the cover of the cannons of the Providence and the Wasp, 234 American Marines and sailors made their 1st amphibious landing, going ashore on the eastern end of under the command of Captain Nicholas. This painting is by V. Zveg, who obviously knows a whole lot about painting, or about photographic realism, or about playing with action figures or something:

(It remains unclear how 2 sloops could have put ashore 5 longboats. Perhaps 2 longboats are being portrayed while making multiple trips? Whatever.)

The landing was unopposed and the force advanced toward Fort Montagne. The defenders of the fort took them under fire, then spiked their guns and retreated to Fort Nassau.

GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

Meanwhile, on the coast of the continent, a fleet of 7 British ships and 200 Redcoats had sailed up the Savannah River with the possible intention of retaking Savannah or merely stealing some rice. Lachlan McIntosh ordered the militia to fire upon the British and burn the merchant ships lying in the river. The British escaped with 14 boatloads of rice. The incident would come to be known as the Battle of the Rice Boats.

April 6, Saturday: About 1:00 in the morning Andrew Doria, aboard one of the vessels of the American squadron, sighted HMS Glasgow, a 20-gun sloop carrying dispatches from Newport to Charleston. The American squadron engaged this enemy ship for an hour and a half before it turned back toward the safety of Newport harbor in Rhode Island. After the break of day the American ships needed to give up their chase.

The Continental Congress opened all ports in the 13 colonies to ships of all nations except Great Britain. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 25, Tuesday: The Continental Congress placed Captain Samuel Nicholas “at the head of the Marines with the rank of ,” and instructed Commodore Esek Hopkins to send him to Philadelphia with their dispatches. When he arrived they had him report to their Marine Committee, which detached him from the brigantine USS Alfred and ordered him to remain in Philadelphia “to discipline four companies of Marines and prepare them for service as Marine guards for the on the stocks.” After recruiting and organizing these companies he would request that the Continental Congress provide them with arms and equipment.

Concord budgeted for 6 months of the services at Ticonderoga of 48 local soldiers at £432 each, over and above an incentive advance of £9. 1 TABLE OF REVOLUTIONARY CAMPAIGNS

WHEN REQUIRED MEN TIME WHERE EMPLOYED BOUNTY AMOUNT

June 1776 19 12 months 10 190

June 25, 1776 48 6 months Ticonderoga 9 432

Dr. John Cuming was appointed in this [the above] expedition, but declined. The whole consisted of five thousand men. One company, consisting of ninety-four men, was com- manded by Capt. Charles Miles, of Concord. Edmond Munroe, was Lieutenant; Matthew Hobbs, 2d Lieutenant; and Jonas Brown, Ensign. They were attached to Col. Jonathan Reed’s regiment. His muster-roll give sixty-one from Concord, (differing from the report from which the above is compiled); Weston, twenty-seven; Lexington, four; and two from Tyconterage [?]. Being ready to march, they were paraded on the common in Concord, with several other companies from the adjoining towns, and attended religious services in the meeting-house. Rev. William Emerson preached from Job v. 20, and afterwards went as Chaplain, sacrificed his life to his patriotism, and never returned. Another Company, commanded by Capt. Asahel Wheeler, whose Lieutenant was Samuel Hoar, of Lincoln. Samuel Osburn was 2d Lieutenant, and David Hosmer, Ensign.

September 12, 1776 23 3 months White Plains 8 184

This [the above] embraced one fifth of the Militia under fifty years of age, not in actual service. The drafts from this county formed one regiment, which was commanded by Eleazer Brooks, of Lincoln. Rev. Moses Adams, of Acton, was Chaplain; Dr. Joseph Hunt, Surgeon; and Samuel Hartwell, of Lincoln, Quarter-master. Concord furnished twenty-three men; Lexington, sixteen, Acton, fifteen; and Lincoln, twelve, which formed one company, whose officers were Simon Hunt, of Acton, Captain; Samuel Heald, of Concord, Lieutenant; Ebenezer White, 2d Lieutenant. They were in the battle of White Plains. A return after the battle gives forty-two fit for duty, seven sick, four wounded, two of whom, David Wheeler and Amos Buttrick, belonged to Con- cord. Thomas Darby, of Acton was killed. Col. Brooks’s Regiment behaved bravely on that occa- sion.

September 12, 1776 7 Dorchester

These [the above] were part of a company of eighty-nine men, taken from nearly every town in this county, commanded by John Minott, of Chelmsford, and attached to Col. Dykes’s Regiment. John Hartwell, of Lincoln, was Lieutenant. Acton furnished five; Lincoln, four; and Bedford, three. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

WHEN REQUIRED MEN TIME WHERE EMPLOYED BOUNTY AMOUNT

November 21, 1776 34 3 months New York 10 340

This [the above] was one fourth of the Militia in Middlesex County, and formed one Regiment of six hundred and seventy men, commanded by Col. Samuel Thatcher, of Cambridge. Cyprian How, of Marlborough, was Lieutenant-Colonel; Joseph Bryant, of Stoneham, Major. Concord furnished thirty-four; Weston, eighteen; Lexington, fourteen; Acton, thirteen; Lincoln, thirteen, which composed one company. John Bridge, of Lexington, was Captain; Jacob Brown, of Con- cord, Lieutenant; and Josiah Stearns, of Weston, 2d Lieutenant; William Burrows, Orderly Ser- geant. They marched to New-York and New-Jersey before they returned, and were stationed at Woodbridge. Dissolved March 6th.

December 1, 1776 8

It appears from a roll of this company in the Secretary’s office, that Capt. John Hartwell was commander of it [the above]. Thirteen in this and six in other companies were from Lincoln. They were attached to Col. Dykes’s Regiment.

December 1776 6 Rhode Island

These [the above] were attached to the Artillery.

November 10, Sunday: The United States Marines organized to protect ships and their cargoes (understand it this way: ships are human property and their cargoes human property but people are merely humans; although it is not licit for an individual acting on his or her own behalf to protect his or her property by killing others, but instead you must act in accordance with the 6th Commandment; however, if you happen to represent such a duly established organization as the Marines then there is an implicit escape clause in the 6th Commandment that renders it not merely legitimate, but indeed renders it your sworn duty, to protect the safety of human property by killing others). AMERICAN REVOLUTION THOU SHALT NOT KILL EXC...

1. Lemuel Shattuck’s 1835 A HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF CONCORD;.... Boston: Russell, Odiorne, and Company; Concord MA: John Stacy (On or about November 11, 1837 Henry Thoreau would indicate a familiarity with the contents of at least pages 2-3 and 6-9 of this historical study.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE December 25, Christmas: Late in the night, General George , General Henry Knox, and Continental Army troops crossed the in freezing winter weather to launch a surprise dawn attack on about a thousand British and Hessian mercenaries encamped at Trenton.2 Washington’s irregulars sneaking around was a grand victory for us and showed our bravery and determination, as soldiers who are fighting for a paycheck, such as these Hessian peasants, always fight real hard.3

AMERICAN REVOLUTION

<__ George Washington’s sword (in the above Leutze painting).

Colonel Loammi Baldwin took his 26th Continental regiment of foot soldiers “on the expedition to Trentown.”

2. There was a claim, in our early Republic, that these Hessian mercenaries had brought with them in the straw of their bedding a pesky fly. It was certainly true that during the late 18th Century, a fly in the family Cecidomyiidae, the Mayetiola destructor, began to decimate wheat crops in America. Whether appropriately named or not, this has become more destructive to wheat in the United States than any other insect pest, and has also impacted our rye and barley crops. This fly is also now found in Canada, Europe, northern Africa, western Asia, and New Zealand.

3. In the famous Leutze painting, General Washington is depicted as standing up in a rowboat. This is imaginative, and was chosen by the painter over depicting Washington on horseback (the army ferried over the river not in rowboats, but in entirely unpicturesque high-sided ). You will note a black soldier rowing the boat. The actual black person on the scene would have been Washington’s manservant (slave) who traveled with him, but the myth that has developed is that this is a depiction of an African who had been an African prince and his parents had sent him to America to go to college. This was an actual person who actually was in that army, but it is not known that he was ever close to Washington. Of course, immediately that his ship had anchored in an American port, this actual person had been clapped into chains and sold as a slave. Over the course of the revolution he would regain his freedom but he would never return to Africa with his hard-won education in our School of Hard Knocks. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE In this regiment a company from Woburn MA was under the command of John Wood.

AMERICAN REVOLUTION The Marines under Major Samuel Nicholas lost their chance to participate in this famous Christmas sneak attack, because when they had encountered ice flows on the Delaware River, they had turned back.

Just at this point the conscription practices of the Massachusetts General Court were being amended to exclude Quaker conscientious objectors who had been members of the religious society before April 19, 1775.

! OHNE MICH

Some Quakers, however, terming themselves “Free Quakers,” affiliated themselves with the armed conflict, and there are some records of Friends in the Boston Meeting being accused of an unspecified “misconduct” which was probably the bearing of arms on one side or the other of the insurrection. The sympathies of some Friends lay with the revolutionaries, and the sympathies of others lay with established authority. During HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE the hostilities, for instance, one Boston merchant, Friend Daniel Silsbe or Silsbury, emigrated to .

RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS While General Washington was able to take advantage of the proclivity of these Hessian mercenary soldiers to make full use of alcoholic beverages during these Christmas celebrations, becoming not only dissolute but also unwatchful, a scanning of the ministerial diaries of the Reverend William Emerson of Concord –which he had been keeping since 1764– offers us not one single solitary mention of any Christmas celebration whatever. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1777

GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE January 3, Friday: People were trying to kill each other at Princeton in , with the American irregulars sweeping around the advancing British and attacking their rear guard and thus driving them back towards Trenton, taking nearly a couple of hundred of prisoners (the Marines under Major Samuel Nicholas, who had failed to participate in General Washington’s Trenton Christmas sneak attack because they had been intimidated by the ice flows on the Delaware River, were able to participate in this non-amphibious struggle). AMERICAN REVOLUTION

Hey, looks like it’s gonna be reasonably safe to publish the names of the signatories to our Declaration of Independence! (Although the dates of the signatures ranged from August 2, 1776 to sometime in November of 1776, depending on when each delegate had gotten around to signing it, for safety’s sake the signed version of the document had been being held top secret.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1778

January 27, Tuesday: Captain John Trevett led 26 Marines of the USS Providence as they spiked the guns of the forts overlooking New Providence (Nassau) in of the , in the process discovering military stores including 1,600 pounds of powder, and rescuing 30 American prisoners. They recaptured 5 prize vessels that had been brought in by the British, and seized a 16-gun British vessel.

Roland, a tragédie lyrique by Niccolò Piccinni to words of Marmontel after Quinault, was performed for the initial time, at the Paris Opéra. This was Piccinni’s first French opera. The rehearsals had been so horrendous that Piccinni had made plans to leave for on the following day. As it turned out, the performance, attended by Queen Marie Antoinette, was a success. Reviews would be generally positive. AMERICAN REVOLUTION

ESSENCE IS BLUR. SPECIFICITY, THE OPPOSITE OF ESSENCE, IS OF THE NATURE OF TRUTH.

April 22, Wednesday: Lieutenant Samuel Wallingford led 30 Marines from Captain John Paul Jones’s USS Ranger in a raid on Whitehaven, Cumbria, , spiking the guns of 2 forts and setting 3 ships on fire. AMERICAN REVOLUTION

April 24, Friday evening: Off Carrickfergus, Ireland, Captain John Paul Jones’s USS Ranger captured HMS Drake. AMERICAN REVOLUTION

During this conflict Marine Lieutenant Samuel Wallingford was killed. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1779

July 28, Wednesday dawn: The British had erected a “Fort George” at the mouth of the Penobscot River on Penobscot Bay near what is now Castine, Maine, and the American revolutionaries had dispatched 3 of their warships to deal with this threat. Marine Captain John Welsh was in charge of the 300 effective fighters of the Warren, about half of whom were Marines and the others sailors and Massachusetts militiamen. The American warships had on the 26th forced the British ships to withdraw upriver. Captain Welsh landed his force on Nautilus Island, routed the 20 British Marines there, and mounted a 3-gun battery. At this dawn, the Marines took the right flank of the assault, landing under fire at the foot of a steep cliff and driving back a 300-man guard of British regulars. Captain Welsh and 8 Marines were killed in the assault, and Marine Lieutenant William Hamilton was mortally wounded at the cliff’s base.

September 23, Thursday evening and night: The defeat of HMS Serapis under Captain Person in a 3-hour battle in the North Sea off Flamborough Head, Yorkshire by the USS Bonhomme Richard under Captain John Paul Jones, 4 with the moon almost full (a manly Marine action per LEAVES OF GRASS, “SONG OF MYSELF,” 35-36 pornography): AMERICAN REVOLUTION Would you hear of an old-time sea-fight? Would you learn who won by the light of the moon and stars? List to the yarn, as my grandmother’s father the sailor told it to me. Our foe was no skulk in his ship I tell you, (said he,) His was the surly English pluck, and there is no tougher or truer, and never was, and never will be; Along the lower’d eve he came horribly raking us. We closed with him, the yards entangled, the cannon touch’d, My captain lash’d fast with his own hands. We had receiv’d some eighteen pound shots under the water, On our lower-gun-deck two large pieces had burst at the first fire, killing all around and blowing up overhead. Fighting at sun-down, fighting at dark, Ten o’clock at night, the full moon well up, our leaks on the gain, and five feet of water reported, The master-at-arms loosing the prisoners confined in the afterhold to give them a chance for themselves. The transit to and from the magazine is now stopt by the sentinels, They see so many strange faces they do not know whom to trust. Our frigate takes fire, The other asks if we demand quarter? If our colors are struck and the fighting done? Now I laugh content, for I hear the voice of my little captain, We have not struck, he composedly cries, we have just begun our part of the fighting. Only three guns are in use, One is directed by the captain himself against the enemy’s mainmast, Two well serv’d with grape and canister silence his musketry and clear his decks. The tops alone second the fire of this little battery, especially the main-top, They hold out bravely during the whole of the action. Not a moment’s cease, 4. It seems was exercising a wee bit of poetic license, as the moon would not be completely full until September 25th. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE The leaks gain fast on the pumps, the fire eats toward the powder-magazine. One of the pumps has been shot away, it is generally thought we are sinking. Serene stands the little captain, He is not hurried, his voice is neither high nor low, His eyes give more light to us than our battle-lanterns. Toward twelve there in the beams of the moon they surrender to us. Stretch’d and still lies the midnight, Two great hulls motionless on the breast of the darkness, Our vessel riddled and slowly sinking, preparations to pass to the one we had conquer’d, The captain on the quarter-deck coldly giving his orders through a countenance white as a sheet, Near by the corpse of the child that serv’d in the cabin, The dead face of an old salt with long white hair and carefully curl’d whiskers, The flames spite of all that can be done flickering aloft and below, The husky voices of the two or three officers yet fit for duty, Formless stacks of bodies and bodies by themselves, dabs of flesh upon the masts and spars, Cut of cordage, dangle of rigging, light shock of the soothe of waves, Black and impassive guns, litter of powder-parcels, strong scent, A few large stars overhead, silent and mournful shining, Delicate sniffs of sea-breeze, smells of sedgy grass and fields by the shore, death-messages given in charge to survivors, The hiss of the surgeon’s knife, the gnawing teeth of his saw, Wheeze, cluck, swash of falling blood, short wild scream, and long, dull, tapering groan, These so, these irretrievable. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1798

July 11, Wednesday: The US Congress reactivated the US Marine Corps and the act was signed by President John Adams.

November 3, Saturday: Wolf Tone surrendered to the British at Buncrana, County Donegal.

In the year of the XYZ Affair, so named after 3 anonymous French troublemakers, and of the consequent Alien and Sedition Acts, was born.

During this year, also, the US Marine Corps was beginning its policy of denying enlistment to non-whites, and Ludwig van Beethoven was beginning to be troubled by a ringing in his ears.

YOU HAVE TO ACCEPT EITHER THE REALITY OF TIME OVER THAT OF CHANGE, OR CHANGE OVER TIME — IT’S PARMENIDES, OR HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HERACLITUS. I HAVE GONE WITH HERACLITUS.

The US Marines “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1801

During this year and the following one, the British occupied the Danish in the Virgin Islands of the Caribbean.

From this year into 1805, our First Barbary War included the USS and USS Philadelphia affairs and the Eaton expedition, during which a few US Marines landed with United States Agent William Eaton to raise a force against in an effort to free the crew of the Philadelphia. Although Tripoli declared war, the United States would not. THE BARBARY TREATIES US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS BARBARY PIRATES

ESSENCES ARE FUZZY, GENERIC, CONCEPTUAL; ARISTOTLE WAS RIGHT WHEN HE INSISTED THAT ALL TRUTH IS SPECIFIC AND PARTICULAR (AND WRONG WHEN HE CHARACTERIZED TRUTH AS A GENERALIZATION).

May 10, SundayYusuf Karamanli, Pasha of Tripoli, had his men chop in half the flagpole in front of the US Embassy in Tripoli (this being their traditional way to declare war). The Tripolitan War began, that would conclude in 1805 with US Marines on the shores of Tripoli (from the shores of Tripoli to the halls of Montezuma, la de dah).

The US Marines “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1805

April 27, Saturday: Lieutenant Presley O’Bannon and 7 US Marines led an assault that captured the port of Derna (Darnah) on the Tripoli coast. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1813

March: Sam Houston enlisted in the regular US army, as a private.

On board the Essex, 1st Lieutenant John Marshall Gamble commanded the initial US Marines in the Pacific.

September 10, Friday: Off the island of Put-in-Bay, Ohio, the American fleet on Lake Erie engaged the small British squadron commanded by Captain Robert Barclay, RN. Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry was aboard his flagship USS Lawrence, which came to be heavily damaged by British fire. Perry’s “spaniel dog” had been stowed in the china cabinet in the wardroom of the Lawrence and was howling incessantly. One of the gun captains was torn in half by a 24-pound ball. Lieutenant of Marines John Brooks, struck in the hip by a cannonball, was pleading to be finished off but found no-one willing to pull the trigger on him, and eventually he succumbed. Carrying his battle flag emblazoned with the injunction of Captain “Don’t give up the ship,” Perry, wearing a plain jacket so as not to identify himself, transferred by a small boat with a hole in its side half a mile to the nearby USS Niagara. By great good luck he was able to perform the perfect maneuver known as “crossing the T,” in fact the only nautical maneuver in which a sailing ship may deliver damage to another ship without receiving damage in return, passing the Niagara between the bow of one British vessel and the stern of another in such manner that, while neither of these ships were able to direct a broadside at him, his own broadsides were simultaneously delivering “raking fire” to the full length of those enemy vessels: HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Within fifteen minutes the British surrendered. Perry reboarded the heavily damaged Lawrence to receive Captain Barclay’s surrender and penned the now-famous man’s man sentiment “We have met the enemy and they are ours.”

(Indeed the enemy were ours, for Perry would be able to bring each and every vessel of that British squadron into port as a prize of the US, with the proceeds of sale to go into the pockets of the American participants in the Battle of Lake Erie. Perry would be promoted to Post-Captain.)

(While this battle was taking place on Lake Erie, Senecas of the southern tier assembled to protect Anna Church, who was alone at Angelica while her husband was trapped in Europe by the war.)

Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 6th day 10 of 9 M / My Mind is far from being in an elevated condition on the other hand depression is very much my portion -Oh that in all situations my hope & trust may be Steadfastly HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE on the Lord. — RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1814

August 24, Wednesday: Viscount Castlereagh arrived at Paris, where he would be meeting with King Louis XVIII and Talleyrand before traveling on to Vienna.

As part of a conflict that was essentially a continuation of the American Revolution by way of a dispute over the seas and over the border of Canada, on this day and the following one a British army defeated hastily assembled defenders of Washington DC including 114 US Marines at Bladensburg, Maryland just north of the capital. The British would go on to burn Washington, including the White House and most of the 3,076 books and 53 maps, charts, and plans of the Library of Congress, along with paintings of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette by Madame Vigee Lebruin. They would also put the chambers of the House and the Senate to the torch — but beware, it is sheer mythology that the books were used as kindling for the fire in the legislative chambers.5

Waldo Emerson would reminisce in his journal in about April or May of 1856 about a British-invasion-of- Boston scare that had occurred in about this period of his childhood:6

I have but one military recollection in all my life. In 1813 or 1814, all Boston, young & old, turned out to build the fortifications on Noddle’s Island; and, the Schoolmaster at the Latin School announced to the boys, that, if we wished, we might all go on a certain day to work on the Island. I went with the rest in the ferry boat, & spent a summer day; but I cannot remember that I did any kind of work. I remember only the pains we took to get water in our tin pails, to relieve our intolerable thirst. I am afraid not valuable effect of my labor remains in the existing defences.

5.There is a patriotic or accommodative story in which the invading British army is persuaded not to burn the Library of Congress, by being reminded of the ignominy of the burning of the Library of in antiquity. This story sacrifices historical accuracy to patriotism or to accommodationism. Contrast this with another story which has a much greater likelihood of having been the truth, that the British were retaliating to the 1812 burning of the Canadian congressional library in York (Toronto) by an American expeditionary force. 6. We do not know whether Emerson was referring here to Head Master William Bigelow or to his successor Benjamin Apthorp Gould, a senior at Harvard College, for during 1814 after nine trying years Head Master Bigelow was being replaced in an attempt to restore order and scholarship (many features of the Boston Latin School of today –among them the “misdemeanor mark” and the practice of declamation– would be initiated during this disciplinary period.

I (Austin Meredith) have my own recollections similar to this, from World War II in CA. Have you seen the movie “1943”? –It is exceedingly accurate to the spirit of the times, while the necessary task of routing all Americans of Japanese ancestry into the new concentration camps in the inland desert was still going on, and the utter cooperation of the civilian (white) population, real Americans, was vitally needed by our government authorities. As a 6-year-old my parents had me in a class digging lines of foxholes across a football field, and marching around the parade ground of a religious school where my father was Chaplain, named Brown Military Academy, with a wooden rifle. I lost my first baby tooth when I Left-Ho’d in formation when I should have Right- Ho’d –because the butt of the “rifle” of the boy next to me in formation slapped me up alongside the head– and I sat down on the parade ground and began to cry and was afraid I was going to be courts-martialed. The vicious little yellow Japs were going to invade, the Hearst newspapers were reporting that already they might be lurking offshore in their , just out of sight, and in a port city on the Pacific Ocean we were on the front lines and we needed to be utterly ready to defend our soil with our blood. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Because of the perceived danger that the English navy would besiege Boston, the Emerson family then moved to Concord. Ralph Waldo attended the wooden schoolhouse in Concord square. He recited not only in school but also from the top of the sugar barrel in Deacon John White’s store nearby. Here is a silhouette of the “pilgrim profile” of Emerson’s aunt Mary Moody Emerson, who would loom large in his life though she stood at most 5 feet 0 inches tall, as she appeared in her youth, probably before her return to Malden MA:

THE DEACONS OF CONCORD Joshua Barney was wounded and captured at Bladensburg, Maryland.

THE FALLACY OF MOMENTISM: THIS STARRY UNIVERSE DOES NOT CONSIST OF A SEQUENCE OF MOMENTS. THAT IS A FIGMENT, ONE WE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HAVE RECOURSE TO IN ORDER TO PRIVILEGE TIME OVER CHANGE, APRIVILEGING THAT MAKES CHANGE SEEM UNREAL, DERIVATIVE, A MERE APPEARANCE. IN FACT IT IS CHANGE AND ONLY CHANGE WHICH WE EXPERIENCE AS REALITY, TIME BEING BY WAY OF RADICAL CONTRAST UNEXPERIENCED — A MERE INTELLECTUAL CONSTRUCT. THERE EXISTS NO SUCH THING AS A MOMENT. NO “INSTANT” HAS EVER FOR AN INSTANT EXISTED. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1815

January 8, Sunday: On the northern shore of the , the British army, unaware that a treaty of peace had been signed, made a 3d assault against General Andrew Jackson’s system of ditches around the sea approaches to . Whoever won control over this port and river city supposed they would “win” the war that was already over, because the port was the key to all of the American Inland South facing the Caribbean, a general territory which went under the name “Louisiana,” that is, “Land of Louis XV, King of France,” although whatever paltry “rights of ownership” Louis XV had had to this real estate (which were debatable) had passed to his (erstwhile) heir the Emperor Napoléon subsequent to his having lost his head, and had then been sold to the national government of the United States of America in 1803 for the paltry sum of $0.04 per acre.7 However, Jackson had been reinforced with levies from Kentucky as well as by US Marines under Major Daniel Carmick, and the British troops were being led by a brother-in-law of Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, Packenham, who had achieved his position of military mastery from political connections of rank and privilege rather than from any demonstrated facility in getting other men to die when he told them to. The watchword of the British was “Booty and Beauty.” The troops were chiefly drawn from Wellington’s peninsular army. This relative Packenham did a no-no. He led a manly frontal assault against a fully prepared and alerted defensive position under fine daylight conditions with no thought of surprise or other trickiness. The attackers were cut down in half an hour of concentrated rifle and cannon fire with losses of almost 2,000 dead and injured. Only one of their general officers was still alive. American casualties were 6 killed and 10 wounded (Jackson’s loss in the entire campaign was merely 333 souls). The British withdrew to their original landing-place and re-embarked.

This Battle of New Orleans, the last campaign of the , was being fought subsequent to the signing of the Peace of Ghent on December 24, 1814. There is no merit, however, in the frequent assertion that Jackson’s great victory was won after the war was over, for the Ghent treaty specifically called for continued hostilities until ratification by both governments, and this mutual ratification would be effected only during February 1815. After so many distressing months of failure in a war in which the enemy had burned and sacked the federal capital and which had led disaffected citizens to question the value of the Union itself, Jackson’s victory at New Orleans would seem to wipe away the nation’s memories of incompetent leadership. Overnight, Old Hickory would be transfigured into a symbol of distinctive American strengths and virtues, and his path would turn inevitably toward the freshly painted because scorched “White House.” But for the moment the Dynasty still commanded, and Jackson would retire with his honors to his beloved Hermitage. Some admirers of Jackson would be able to obtain a locket of his hair, which hair, now tested, shows lead poisoning which would fully explain his severe abdominal cramping and constipation during this period. (The lead bullet lodged in his body produced chronic health problems such as irritability, paranoia, severe mood swings, and kidney failure, until it would be surgically removed in 1832 and the dissolved lead burden in his body would be able to decrease. The calomel which he took due to this constipation, since it contained mercury, may explain why his teeth would fall out at such an early age.)

Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 1st day 8th of 1st M 1815 / Our Meetings were silent excepting a short offering in the forenoon — Went with Father Rodman to visit of our friend D Buffum who had for a week or two been confined by indisposition. took tea with him & set most of the 7. When the national government of the United States of America purchased rights to such territories from weaker people, such as the Dakota nation, they weren’t in the habit of paying nearly as much as this per acre, even when the rights to the real estate were far more real than the rights of King Louis. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE evening. — RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS

THE FALLACY OF MOMENTISM: THIS STARRY UNIVERSE DOES NOT CONSIST OF A SEQUENCE OF MOMENTS. THAT IS A FIGMENT, ONE WE HAVE RECOURSE TO IN ORDER TO PRIVILEGE TIME OVER CHANGE, APRIVILEGING THAT MAKES CHANGE SEEM UNREAL, DERIVATIVE, A MERE APPEARANCE. IN FACT IT IS CHANGE AND ONLY CHANGE WHICH WE EXPERIENCE AS REALITY, TIME BEING BY WAY OF RADICAL CONTRAST UNEXPERIENCED — A MERE INTELLECTUAL CONSTRUCT. THERE EXISTS NO SUCH THING AS A MOMENT. NO “INSTANT” HAS EVER FOR AN INSTANT EXISTED.

The US Marines “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE February 20, Monday: At this point during the 1812-1815 war with Great Britain, the USS Constitution, off , captured the British sloops-of-war (or, perhaps, brigs) HMS Cyane and HMS Levant. The engagement took place by moonlight off . Captain led the detachment of US Marines. The loss to the Constitution was only 3 killed and 12 wounded. Meeting subsequently with a fleet of British vessels, our frigate escaped in a fog but lost HMS Levant, which the British warships recaptured.

(After this 1812-1815 war with Great Britain, our big frigate would be laid up for repairs at the US Navy Yard in Boston until 1821.)

Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 2nd day 20 of 2 M 1815 / Our friend J Chase & Daniel Brayton finished their visit in town this Afternoon I believe to their own & friends satisfaction - Jonathon Dennis attended them today. — RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1820

October 8, Sunday: General Jean-Pierre Boyer, who in 1818 had taken control over the southern part of Haiti, was able to take over the whole of that black and creole nation when Henri Christophe, King Henry I, semi- paralyzed and losing control over the Creole forces, shot himself with a silver bullet in order to avoid an approaching army of Congos.

Commandant of the United States Marine Corps Lieutenant-Colonel Anthony Gale was cashiered for drunkenness and patronization of a house of prostitution near the Marine Barracks “in open and disgraceful manner.” Among other charges.

Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 1st day 8th of 10th M / Our meetings were both Silent & to me seasons of Some life. - with my H & John spent the evening at Wm Lee’s. — RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS

October 17, Tuesday: Acting Commandant Archibald Henderson was appointed Commandant of the United States Marine Corps, and would retain this position for 38 years, until his death. His sword was inscribed “From the Halls of Montezuma, to the Shores of Tripoli.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1824

March 12, Friday: Gustav Robert Kirchhoff was born.

Brevet Major Robert Dewar Wainwright led 30 US Marines from the Boston naval yards, armed of course with single-shot pistols and muskets with bayonets and swords, to persuade 300 inmates armed with such items as knives, hammers, and chisels, in the mess hall of the Massachusetts State Prison in Charlestown, that now they needed to go back to their cells. This would be accessed in William Holmes McGuffey’s 5TH ECLECTIC READER for the education and moral edification of America’s little children: XLI. REBELLION IN MASSACHUSETTS STATE PRISON. 1. A more impressive exhibition of moral courage, opposed to the wildest ferocity under the most appalling circumstances, was never seen than that which was witnessed by the officers of our state prison; in the rebellion which occurred some years since. 2. Three convicts had been sentenced, under the rules of the prison, to be whipped in the yard, and, by some effort of one of the other prisoners, a door had been opened at midday communicating with the great dining hall and, through the warden’s lodge, with the street. 3. The dining hall was long, dark, and damp, from its situation near the surface of the ground; and in this all the prisoners assembled, with clubs and such other tools as they could seize in passing through the workshops. 4. Knives, hammers, and chisels, with every variety of such weapons, were in the hands of the ferocious spirits, who are drawn away from their encroachments on society, forming a congregation of strength, vileness, and talent that can hardly be equaled on earth, even among the famed brigands of . 5. Men of all ages and characters, guilty of every variety of infamous crime, dressed in the motley and peculiar garb of the institution, and displaying the wild and demoniac appearance that always pertains to imprisoned wretches, were gathered together for the single purpose of preventing the punishment which was to be inflicted on the morrow upon their comrades. 6. The warden, the surgeon, and some other officers of the prison were there at the time, and were alarmed at the consequences likely to ensue from the conflict necessary to restore order. They huddled together, and could scarcely be said to consult, as the stoutest among them lost all presence of mind in overwhelming fear. The news rapidly spread through the town, and a subordinate , of the most mild and kind disposition, hurried to the scene, and came calm and collected into the midst of the officers. The most equable-tempered and the mildest man in the government was in this hour of peril the firmest. 7. He instantly dispatched a request to Major Wainright, HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE commander of the marines stationed at the Navy Yard, for assistance, and declared his purpose to enter into the hall and try the force of firm demeanor and persuasion upon the enraged multitude. 8. All his brethren exclaimed against an attempt so full of hazard, but in vain. They offered him arms, a sword and pistols, but he refused them, and said that he had no fear, and, in case of danger, arms would do him no service; and alone, with only a little rattan, which was his usual walking stick, he advanced into the hall to hold parley with the selected, congregated, and enraged villains of the whole commonwealth. 9. He demanded their purpose in thus coming together with arms, in violation of the prison laws. They replied that they were determined to obtain the remission of the punishment of their three comrades. He said it was impossible; the rules of the prison must be obeyed, and they must submit. 10. At the hint of submission they drew a little nearer together, prepared their weapons for service, and, as they were dimly seen in the further end of the hall by those who observed from the gratings that opened up to the day, a more appalling sight can not be conceived, nor one of more moral grandeur, than that of the single man standing within their grasp, and exposed to be torn limb from limb instantly if a word or look should add to the already intense excitement. 11. That excitement, too, was of a most dangerous kind. It broke not forth in noise and imprecations, but was seen only in the dark looks and the strained nerves that showed a deep determination. The officer expostulated. He reminded them of the hopelessness of escape; that the town was alarmed, and that the government of the prison would submit to nothing but unconditional surrender. He said that all those who would go quietly away should be forgiven for this offense; but that if every prisoner were killed in the contest, power enough would be obtained to enforce the regulations of the prison. 12. They replied that they expected that some would be killed, — that death would be better than such imprisonment; and, with that look and tone which bespeak an indomitable purpose, they declared that not a man should leave the hall alive till the flogging was remitted. At this period of the discussion their evil passions seemed to be more inflamed, and one or two offered to destroy the officer, who still stood firmer and with a more temperate pulse than did his friends, who saw from above, but could not avert, the danger that threatened him. 13. Just at this moment, and in about fifteen minutes from the commencement of the tumult, the officer saw the steel of the marines, on whose presence alone he relied for succor, filing by the small upper lights. Without any apparent anxiety, he had repeatedly turned his attention to their approach; and now he knew that it was his only time to escape, before the conflict became, as was expected, one of the most dark and dreadful in the world. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 14. He stepped slowly backward, still urging them to depart before the officers were driven to use the last resort of firearms. When within three or four feet of the door, it was opened, and closed instantly again as he sprang through, and was thus unexpectedly restored to his friends. 15. Major Wainright was requested to order his men to fire down upon the convicts through the little windows, first with powder and then with ball, till they were willing to retreat; but he look a wiser as well as a bolder course, relying upon the effect which firm determination would have upon men so critically situated. He ordered the door to be again opened, and marched in at the head of twenty or thirty men, who filed through the passage, and formed at the end of the hall opposite to the crowd of criminals huddled together at the other. 16. He stated that he was empowered to quell the rebellion, that he wished to avoid shedding blood, but that he would not quit that hall alive till every convict had returned to his duly. They seemed balancing the strength of the two parties, and replied that some of them were ready to die, and only waited for an attack to see which was the more powerful; swearing that they would fight to the last, unless the punishment was remitted, for they would not submit to any such punishment in the prison. Major Wainright ordered his marines to load their pieces, and, that they might not be suspected of trifling, each man was made to hold up to view the bullet which he afterward put in his gun. 17. This only caused a growl of determination, and no one blenched or seemed disposed to shrink from the foremost exposure. They knew that their number would enable them to bear down and destroy the handful of marines after the first discharge, and before their pieces could be reloaded. Again they were ordered to retire; but they answered with more ferocity than ever. The marines were ordered to take their aim so as to be sure and kill as many as possible. Their guns were presented, but not a prisoner stirred, except to grasp more firmly his weapon. 18. Still desirous to avoid such a tremendous slaughter as must have followed the discharge of a single gun, Major Wainright advanced a step or two, and spoke even more firmly than before, urging them to depart. Again, and while looking directly into the muzzles of the guns which they had seen loaded with ball, they declared their intention “to fight it out.” This intrepid officer then took out his watch, and told his men to hold their pieces aimed at the convicts, but not to fire till they had orders; then, turning to the prisoners, he said: “You must leave this hall; I give you three minutes to decide; if at the end of that time a man remains, he shall be shot dead.” 19. No situation of greater interest than this can be conceived. At one end of the hall, a fearful multitude of the most desperate and powerful men in existence, waiting for the assault; at the other, a little band of disciplined men, waiting with arms presented, and ready, upon the least motion or sign, to begin HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE the carnage; and their tall and imposing commander, holding up his watch to count the lapse of three minutes, given as the reprieve to the lives of hundreds. No poet or painter can conceive a spectacle of more dark and terrible sublimity; no human heart can conceive a situation of more appalling suspense. 20. For two minutes not a person nor a muscle moved; not a sound was heard in the unwonted stillness of the prison, except the labored breathings of the infuriated wretches, as they began to pant between fear and revenge: at the expiration of two minutes, during which they had faced the ministers of death with unblenching eyes, two or three of those in the rear, and nearest the further entrance, went slowly out; a few more followed the example, dropping out quietly and deliberately: and before half of the last minute was gone, every man was struck by the panic, and crowded for an exit, and the hall was cleared, as if by magic. 21. Thus the steady firmness of moral force and the strong effect of determination, acting deliberately, awed the most savage men, and suppressed a scene of carnage, which would have instantly followed the least precipitancy or exertion of physical force. —J.T. Buckingham. “It may be that more lofty courage dwells In one weak heart which braves all adverse fate Than does in his whose soul indignant swells. Warmed by the fight, or cheered through high debate.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1832

February 8, Wednesday: Captain Alvin Edson led Marines in a vengeance attack upon the port of Quallah Battoo on the island of Sumatra. The town was set ablaze after being looted and pillaged, and as their warship sailed away, it bombarded the smoking ruins with its 32-pounders.

In Providence, Rhode Island, Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 4th day 8th of 2nd M 1832 / My mind on a low key, but some favourd while sitting in Meeting I have of late been looking through & read considerably in the Journal of our Ancient friend Thomas Chalkley. - by which my mind has been replenished with good, & I have been renewedly thankful that it was written & published to the World. I have no doubts that many hundreds & thousands have experienced like benefit from it, who have long since been numbered with the Silent dead. - I know it was a book often read comfortably by my Dear father in his life time & indeed I hardly remember of ever seeing him read in any other excepting Robert Barclays Apology & the Bible. - My Brother David who was a sea faring man & died while young in life in Savannah Georgia, would not go to Sea without Thos Chalkleys journal in his chest & I have heard my Mother say that her Grandmother Mary Clarke who remembered him well & loved him & The Truth sincerely — considered that the house was not destitute of an interesting book while that Journal was in it - that I am well assured it has proved a blessing to many, & I can say of a Truth that I greatly desire, our dear young Men & Women had a greater relish for reading that Book - I have no doubt it would prove as a hedge around their minds, by seasoning them with the same pure & christian spirit which so sweetly shone in his life, conduct & principles. - RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1835

August 31, Monday: Harrison Gray Otis lectured at another pro-slavery rally at Faneuil Hall in beautiful downtown Boston, condemning the abolitionists. The hall was packed with anti-abolitionist Bostonians. Meanwhile, a gallows was being erected in front of the home of the Garrisons.

U.S. Marines again went ashore to protect American interests in Callao and Lima, Peru during an attempted revolution. They would remain until December 7th. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Felix Mendelssohn attended a rehearsal of the Gewandhaus orchestra for the 1st time since becoming its director. At this rehearsal someone introduced him to Robert Schumann.

Penny Magazine:

http://www.history.rochester.edu/pennymag/219.htm

December 10, Thursday: Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 5th day 10th of 12th M / Elisha F Rogers And Elizabeth Mitchell daughter of Jethro F Mitchell were married in our Meeting House HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE -the gathering was much larger than last 5th day, & quite as still & quiet but I did not think there was as much of solid weight as was felt a week ago - short testimonies were deliverd by Father & Hannah Dennis This Afternoon I wrote to my dear friend Thos Thompson of Liverpool. — RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

The Battle of Béxar came to an end as the Texians fought their way into San Antonio de Béxar and General Martín Perfecto de Cos surrendered his Centralist Mexican army. REMEMBERING THE ALAMO

Until January 24, 1836, U.S. Marines would be protecting American interests in Callao and Lima, Peru during an attempted revolution. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Our Perennial Quest to Do Harm So Good Will Come

Extermination of the Pequot Tribe 1634-1637 “King Phillip’s” Race War 1675-1676 Secession from Britain 1776-1783 The War of 1812 1812-1815 The Revolution of the Texians 1835-1836 War on Mejico 1846-1848 Race War in the Wild West 1862-1863 Secession from the Union 1862-1865 War to End War 1916-1919 Stopping Hitler 1940-1945 The Korean Police Action 1950-1953 Helping South Vietnam be Free 1959-1975 1962 yada xxxx yada yada xxxx yada yada yada xxxx HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

“To be active, well, happy, implies rare courage. To be ready to fight in a duel or a battle implies desperation, or that you hold your life cheap.” — Henry Thoreau HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1836

June 23, Thursday: Colonel and Commandant Archibald Henderson and 462 US Marines reported for duty in the 2d Seminole War, the longest and costliest Indian war in United States history.

Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 5th day 23 of 6 M / This PM I called to see my dear Neice Martha Cozzens who was confined the first day of this Month with their first child whose name they have concluded to call James Gould Cozzens - My mind was affected with many considerations while Sitting with her & my desires were hearty & ardent for their welfare. —— Our Meeting today was Smaller than usual - Father preached a little very good but it was not a lively time with me — Edw & Elizabeth Wing were at Meeting & came home with us & Dined RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1837

January 27, Friday: In , a funeral service for John Field was held in the Reformed Church, after which his remains were placed in the presence of a large crowd in Yedensky Cemetery outside the city.

As yet another episode in yet another of America’s race wars, Colonel and US Marine Commandant Archibald Henderson defeated a band of Seminoles:

Black Native Warriors? Where Had That Come From? December 1835 The destruction of sugar plantations along the St. Johns River south of St. Augustine, Florida

December 18, 1835 The battle of Black Point, west of the town of Micanopy in the Florida Territory

December 28, 1835 Massacre of Major Francis Dade’s troops heading for Fort King

December 31, 1835 The 1st battle on the Withlacoochee River of Florida (Clinch’s Battle)

February-March 1836 The siege of Camp Izard

October 12, 1836 The 2d battle on the Withlacoochee River of Florida (Call’s Battle)

November 21, 1836 An action in the Wahoo Swamp on the Withlacoochee River

January 27, 1837 The battle of Hatcheelustee Creek at the head of the Kissimmee River

December 25, 1837 The battle of Lake Okeechobee

January 15, 1838 An action at Jupiter Inlet, on the east coast of Florida

January 24, 1838 The battle of Lockahatchee

SEMINOLES WHITE ON RED, RED ON WHITE SWAMP HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1845

October 30, Thursday: President James Knox Polk sent US Marine 1st Lieutenant Archibald Hamilton Gillespie, who had lots of swash in his buckle, to with secret orders. I held a confidential conversation with Lt Gillespie of the Marine Corps, about 8:00 o’clock p.m. on the subject of a secret mission on which he was about to go to California. His secret instructions and the letter to Mr. Larkin, U.S. Consul at Monterey, in the Department of State, will explain the object of his mission.

Gillespie would memorize his presidential documents and destroy them during his trip through Mexico and upon arrival would relay the memorized instructions, the gist of which was that US Consul Thomas Oliver Larkin in Monterrey, California was to intrigue peaceably to influence the Californian Anglos to secede from Mexico, and then guide these Californian Anglos into asking for annexation to the United States of America, while watching out for British or French efforts to influence the Californian Hispanics to grant them a protectorate. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1846

July 30, Thursday: 1st Lieutenant led a US Marine detachment ashore at Santa Barbara, California.

The librarian of the Massachusetts Historical Society placed on record donations from: • George Heard •David Pulsifer • J.W. Thornton • Richard Frothingham, Jr. • William Newell • The Rhode Island Historical Society • The New York Historical Society • Reverend Joseph Hunter • William Allen • Henry Thoreau • William E. Du Bois • Joseph Blunt • Reverend John Langdon Sibley • Reverend Francis Bowen

August 7, Friday: US Marines landed near Los Angeles, California.

August 14, Friday: Commodore Robert Field Stockton, with 360 US Marines and sailors, marched into Los Angeles, California. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1847

Dr. Elisha Kent Kane served with the US Marines. The Secretary of War sent him to Mexico City to deliver an oral message to General Winfield Scott and, during an encounter with guerrillas, he was severely wounded. WAR ON MEXICO

At about this time the poinsettia plant was brought up from Mexico into the United States. It was introduced by, and named after, a man who like Thoreau was a descendant of French Huguenot religious refugees, Joel Roberts Poinsett. Poinsett was industrious, was frugal, was active in botany, and helped create a precursor organization to the Smithsonian Institution. Unfortunately, the resemblance to Thoreau ends there, for Squire Poinsett was a Charleston plantation slaveholder.8

8. Legally, there was a distinction between a slaveowner and a slaveholder. The owner of a slave might rent the custody and use of that slave out for a year, in which case the distinction would arise and be a meaningful one in law, since the other party to such a transaction would be the holder but not the owner. However, in this Kouroo database, I will ordinarily be deploying the term “slaveholder” as the normative term, as we are no longer all that concerned with the making of such fine economic distinctions but are, rather, concerned almost exclusively with the human issues involved in the enslavement of other human beings. I use the term “slaveholder” in preference to “slaveowner” not only because no human being can really own another human being but also because it is important that slavery never be defined as the legal ownership of one person by another — in fact not only had human slavery existed before the first such legislation but also it has continued long since we abolished all legal deployment of the term “slave.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE March 9, Tuesday: After camping for several weeks on Lobos Island, the 1st New York Volunteer Infantry participated in Major General Winfield Scott’s 1st-ever amphibious landing attempt by the US Army, at Vera Cruz, Mexico. 2d Lieutenant Thomas Mayne Reid, Jr. would use the nom-de-guerre “Ecolier” to prepare “Sketches by a Skirmisher” as a correspondent for the New-York gazette Spirit of the Times.

WAR ON MEXICO HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Captain Alvin Edson led a US Marine battalion ashore.

From this day until the 29th, the siege:

In early April 1847, when the news of this bombardment would arrive in , New Hampshire, the bells of all but one local church would ring out in celebration of the grand American victory. Only the bells of Portsmouth’s South Church would remain silent. This was in protest. In his sermon that Sunday, the Reverend Andrew Preston Peabody, D.D. would have the following to offer: I pity, from the bottom of my heart, the man who can have so much as a momentary feeling of exultation at such horrors. What! rejoice at the explosion of those infernal missiles in those late peaceful homes, — at the scattering of those dissevered limbs and mangled corpses of those hundreds of women and children? It was no unknown thing, that what the United States military had just done was a war atrocity, in that it had chosen to ignore the vital distinction between civilian and military, intentionally destroying the lives of civilian men, women, and children in order to oblige the Mexican military to withdraw from the town’s fortifications. The Reverend Peabody was no pacifist and he was not protesting the invasion of Mexico as such, but rather, he was condemning our atrocity of the bombing of innocent families. Again, the Mexicans are called our enemies. They probably are so. We have done enough to make them so... [but] Those Mexicans have human hearts. There are there, as here, fond parents and loving children. They have the same susceptibilities of suffering and anguish with ourselves.... I confess, my sympathies are with the bereaved, suffering homeless Mexicans – of the multitudes that, without fault of their own, have been made to feel the direst of earthly calamities, and have been given over to the wasting of the war-fiend, whose tender mercies are cruelty. They are our brethren. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE He could not in his own study of the New Testament discover any way in which a Christian might rationalize such systematic killing as in accordance with the fundamentally peaceful teachings of Christ. He would continue in his anti-war-atrocity sermon: Suppose our whole population surrounded by the engines of war — our wives and children forbidden egress — witnessing day after day spectacles of the utmost agony...The groans of the wounded, the wild shrieks of the dying rises from house to house above the roar of the artillery. The Reverend Peabody didn’t stop with protesting the month-long atrocity of American bombardment of the civilian population of Vera Cruz. He also posed the question we have attempted to answer at the Nürnberg Trials — How can a soldier be considered to be under obligation to implement an immoral order, when, if the order is immoral, that soldier’s moral obligation is instead to refuse to obey it? War frees no individual of any moral responsibility, he insisted: When the individual soul stands before the divine tribunal, stained with the wanton butchery of those women and babes, think you that the plea, “I knew that it was wrong and vile, but my country bade me do it?” will be accepted in Heaven’s chancery in mitigation of the crime? Soldiers, Peabody said, should be rewarded for acting on their moral beliefs, rather than punished. After this sermon the Dover NH newspaper would editorialize that “The Rev. Andrew P. Peabody, of Portsmouth, N.H. has made himself particularly ridiculous.”

South Church, in which the Reverend Andrew Preston Peabody delivered this homily, stands yet. It is a dark stone Greek-revival building on State Street, now known as the Unitarian Universalist church.

LIFE IS LIVED FORWARD BUT UNDERSTOOD BACKWARD? — NO, THAT’S GIVING TOO MUCH TO THE HISTORIAN’S STORIES. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE LIFE ISN’T TO BE UNDERSTOOD EITHER FORWARD OR BACKWARD.

The US Marines “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 14, Tuesday: US Marines occupied the Mexican National Palace, which had been constructed atop a hill near Tenochtitlan that in Nahuatl was termed “Chapultepec” meaning “At The Grasshopper Hill” and was next to an ancient systems of tanks, reservoirs, canals and waterfalls that the Mexicans had guessed must have been “Los Baños de Moctezuma.” As the US Army entered Mexico City General Winfield Scott noted that the streets were already being guarded by these Marines.

Brigadier General Franklin Pierce found it was all over, except of course for the necessarily endless rounds of mutual self-congratulation: But the last great battle had been fought. In the morning, it was discovered that the citadel had been abandoned, and that Santa Anna had withdrawn his army from the city.

BAWTHORNE’S BIO OF PIERCE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

WAR ON MEXICO HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

WAR ON MEXICO HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 13, Monday: In Salem, customs inspector Nathaniel Hawthorne approved a shipment:

Brigadier General Franklin Pierce, lucky guy, had an opportunity to vicariously experience one more battle: There remained but one other battle, —that of Chepultepec,— which was fought on the 13th of September. On the preceding day, (although the injuries and the over-exertion, resulting from previous marches and battles, had greatly enfeebled him,) General Pierce had acted with his brigade. In obedience to orders, it had occupied the field of Molino del Rey. Contrary to expectation, it was found that the enemy’s force had been withdrawn from this position. Pierce remained in the field until noon, when, it being certain that the anticipated attack would not take place before the following day, he returned to the quarters of General Worth, which were near at hand. There he became extremely ill, and was unable to leave his bed for the thirty-six hours next ensuing. In the mean time, the Castle of Chepultepec was stormed by the troops under Generals Pillow and Quitman. Pierce’s brigade behaved itself gallantly, and suffered severely; and that accomplished officer, Colonel Ransom, leading the Ninth Regiment to the attack, was shot through the head, and fell, with many other brave men, in that last battle of the war. BAWTHORNE’S BIO OF PIERCE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

WAR ON MEXICO

The American troops, under Quitman and Worth, had established themselves within the limits of the city, having possession of the gates of Belen and of San Cosma, but, up till nightfall, had met with a vigorous resistance from the Mexicans, led on by Santa Anna in person. They had still, apparently, a desperate task before them. It was anticipated, that, with the next morning’s light, our troops would be ordered to storm the citadel, and the city of Mexico itself. When this was told to Pierce, upon his sick bed, he rose, and attempted to dress himself; but Captain Hardcastle, who had brought the intelligence from Worth, prevailed upon him to remain in bed, and not to exhaust his scanty strength, until the imminence of the occasion should require his presence. Pierce acquiesced for the time, but again arose, in the course of the night, and made his way to the trenches, where he reported himself to General Quitman, with whose division was a part of his brigade. Quitman’s share in the anticipated assault, it was supposed, owing to the position which his troops occupied, would be more perilous than that of Worth. WAR ON MEXICO HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

US Marines participated in the seizure of the fortress of Chapultepec.

2d Lieutenant Thomas Mayne Reid, Jr. was wounded in the left leg above the knee by an escopette ball (he would receive a battlefield promotion to 1st Lieutenant and ever afterward would proclaim himself to have been a captain). He would assert later that he had been shot while leading “up the men who received the last volley of the enemy’s fire, and thus left the scaling of the wall [and the political plum, a political plum worth a vice presidency under Polk in the case of the candidate Major General Gideon Johnson Pillow, of being shot in the left leg while in command of the 1st group of soldiers to scale the wall into the fortress of Chapultepec] a mere matter of climbing, as scarcely any one was shot afterwards.”

WHAT I’M WRITING IS TRUE BUT NEVER MIND YOU CAN ALWAYS LIE TO YOURSELF

The US Marines “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 14, Tuesday: US Marines occupied the Mexican National Palace, which had been constructed atop a hill near Tenochtitlan that in Nahuatl was termed “Chapultepec” meaning “At The Grasshopper Hill” and was next to an ancient systems of tanks, reservoirs, canals and waterfalls that the Mexicans had guessed must have been “Los Baños de Moctezuma.” As the US Army entered Mexico City General Winfield Scott noted that the streets were already being guarded by these Marines.

Brigadier General Franklin Pierce found it was all over, except of course for the necessarily endless rounds of mutual self-congratulation: But the last great battle had been fought. In the morning, it was discovered that the citadel had been abandoned, and that Santa Anna had withdrawn his army from the city.

BAWTHORNE’S BIO OF PIERCE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

WAR ON MEXICO HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

WAR ON MEXICO HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE December 13, Monday: A 2-story brick dining hall/town hall had been dismantled brick by brick, 40 miles above Cincinnati on the Ohio River at the former “Excelsior” Phalanx in Utopia, Ohio, and re-erected incautiously upon the very bank of the Ohio River. There was an underground limestone chamber 22 feet by 44 feet, that they would use as their church. John Otis Wattles and his wife Friend Esther Whinery Wattles were at a dance party inside this partly finished building (people were making the best of the situation because their neighboring wooden homes had been flooded) when its foundation disintegrated in the floodwaters and the south wall of the structure collapsed. The mortar of the unfinished building had been too fresh to withstand this soaking. Although there were 32 in the structure and 17 of them were crushed or drowned or succumbed to hypothermia, the Wattles family was able to escape intact.

In Washington DC, the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution adopted Secretary Joseph Henry’s Programme of Organization, a plan which consisted of 14 guiding considerations including a suggestion that their Institution should only undertake programs that could not adequately be carried out by other existing United States institutions. A key feature of the Secretary’s plan would be issuance of periodical reports on scientific progress, such as Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge.

At the age of 28, William Aspinwall Tappan and Caroline “Cary” Sturgis got married in Boston. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE That night a US Marines patrol operating outside Mazatlan surprised and defeated a group of Mexicans at Palos Prietos.

“HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE” BEING A VIEW FROM A PARTICULAR POINT IN TIME (JUST AS THE PERSPECTIVE IN A PAINTING IS A VIEW FROM A PARTICULAR POINT IN SPACE), TO “LOOK AT THE COURSE OF HISTORY MORE GENERALLY” WOULD BE TO SACRIFICE PERSPECTIVE ALTOGETHER. THIS IS FANTASY-LAND, YOU’RE FOOLING YOURSELF. THERE CANNOT BE ANY SUCH THINGIE, AS SUCH A PERSPECTIVE.

The US Marines “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1852

February 3, Tuesday-12, Thursday: US Marines were landed and maintained in Buenos Aires, Argentina to protect American interests during a revolution. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

September 17, Friday-April 1853: U.S. Marines were again landed and maintained in Buenos Aires, Argentina to protect American interests during a revolution. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 1853

March 10, Thursday: A detachment of U.S. Marines disembarked at San Juan del Norte, Nicaragua to prevent Cornelius Vanderbilt’s Accessory Transit Company from being evicted by the local government. This would be the 1st of many such interventions by the United States in Nicaragua. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Having heard crows and cocks in the distance, Henry Thoreau quoted Anacreon’s “the works of men shine” in his journal and amplified the thought as “so the sounds of men and birds are musical.”

In his journal for this day Thoreau is still turning over and over in his mind a conundrum having to do with helicoidal flow in a meandering stream bed, that he had commented upon in his journal entry for April 11, 1852. He fully grasped that he had arrived at an observation, but not at an explanation.9 Here is Professor Robert M. Thorson again: Finally, in the boldest stroke of his inductive genius during the Walden years, Thoreau linked the side-to-side meandering with up-and-down meandering to recognize an even more fundamental type of three-dimensional meandering known as helicoidal flow. This is a corkscrew motion in which the forward-propagating sine curve of momentum rotates around the line of gravitational flow. In this conception, line, wave, and circle become a single entity. This unification took place in Thoreau’s mind on the bank of Nut Meadow Brook on a lovely spring day in 1852 [April 11, 1852 journal entry below] when he noticed the streamlines of flow “meandering as much up and down as from side to side, deepest where narrowest, and ever gullying under this bank or that, its bottom lifted up to one side or the other, the current inclining to one side.” At this point, the only thing Thoreau lacked was the explanation for the helical pattern he was seeing. Still searching a year later, he asks [refer to March 10, 1853 journal entry] “What is the theory of these sudden pitches, or steep shelving places, in the sandy bottom of the brook?” Thoreau’s unwillingness to let go of an observation he does not fully understand brands him as a curiosity-driven scientist, hardly the trope-seeing transcendentalist he had left behind him a few years earlier.

March 10. This is the first really spring day. The sun is brightly reflected from all surfaces, and the north side of the street begins to be a little more passable to foot-travellers. You not think it necessary to button 9. Explanation for the helicoidal flow of meandering streams would need to wait, either for 1876 and Professor James Thomson, LL.D., F.R.S.E.’s “On the Origin of Windings of Rivers in Alluvial Plains, with Remarks on the Flow of Water round Bends in Pipes,” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. From May 4, 1876, to February 22, 1877. Volume XXV, pages 5-8, ON THE ORIGIN OF WINDINGS or for 1926 and Albert Einstein’s “Die Ursache der Mäanderbildung der Flußläufe und des sogenannten Baerschen Gesetzes,” (Die Naturwissenschaften, 1926, 11, S. 223-224) translated as “The cause of the Formation of Meanders in the Courses of Rivers and of the so-called [Karl Ernest von] Baer’s Law,” as pages 249-253 of IDEAS AND OPINIONS (New York: Bonanza Books, 1954). FORMATION OF MEANDERS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE up your coat. P.M. — To Second Division Brook. As I stand looking over the swollen river, looking from the bridge into the flowing, eddying tide, –the almost strange chocolate-colored water,– the sound of distant crows and cocks is full of spring. As Anacreon says “the works of men shine,” so the sounds of inert and birds are musical. Something analogous to the thawing of the ice seems to have taken place in the air. At the end of winter there is a season in which we are daily expecting spring, and finally a day when it arrives. I see many middling-sized black spiders on the edge of the snow, very active. By John Hosmer’s ditch by the riverside I see the skunk-cabbage springing freshly, the points of the spathes just peeping out of the ground, in some other places three inches high even. The radical leaves of innumerable plants (as here a dock in and near the water) are evidently affected by the spring influences. Many plants are to some extent evergreen, like the buttercup now beginning to start. Methinks the first obvious evidence of spring is the pushing out of the swamp willow catkins, then the relaxing of the earlier alder catkins, then the pushing up of skunk-cabbage spathes (and pads at the bottom of water). This is the order I am inclined to, though perhaps any of these may take precedence of all the rest in any particular case. [Vide next page.] What is that dark pickle-green alga (?) at the bottom of this ditch, looking somewhat like a decaying cress, with fruit like a lichen? At Nut Meadow Brook crossing we rest awhile on the rail, gazing into the eddying stream. The ripple-marks on the sandy bottom, where silver spangles shine in the river with black wrecks of caddis-cases lodged under each shelving sand, the shadows of the invisible dimples reflecting prismatic colors on the bottom, the minnows already stemming the current with restless, wiggling tails, ever and anon darting aside, probably to secure some invisible mote in the water, whose shadows we do not at first detect on the sandy bottom, — when detected so much more obvious as well as larger and more interesting than the substance, — in which each fin is distinctly seen, though scarcely to be detected in the substance; these are all very beautiful and exhilarating sights, a sort of diet drink to heal our winter discontent. Have the minnows played thus all winter? The equisetum at the bottom has freshly grown several inches. Then should I not have given the precedence on the last page to this and some other water-plants? I suspect that I should, and the flags appear to be starting. I am surprised to find on the rail a young tortoise, an inch and one sixteenth long in the shell, which has crawled out to sun, or perchance is on its way to the water, which I think must be the Emys guttata, for there is a large and distinct yellow spot on each dorsal and lateral plate, and the third dorsal plate is hexagonal and not quadrangular, as the E. picta is described to be, though in my specimen I can't make it out to be so. Yet the edges of the plates are prominent, as is described in the E. insculpta, which, but for the spots and two yellow spots on each side of the hind head and one fainter on the top of the head, I should take it to be. It is about seven eighths of an inch wide. Very inactive. When was it hatched and where? What is the theory of these sudden pitches, or steep shelving places, in the sandy bottom of the brook? It is very interesting to walk along such a brook as this in the midst of the meadow, which you can better do now before the frost is quite out of the sod, and gaze into the deep holes in its irregular bottom and the dark gulfs under the banks. Where it rushes rapidly over the edge of a steep slope in the bottom,

the shadow of the disturbed surface is like sand hurried forward in the water. The bottom, being of shifting sand, is exceedingly irregular and interesting. What was that sound that came on the softened air? It was the warble of the first bluebird from that scraggy apple orchard yonder. When this is heard, then has spring arrived. It must be that the willow twigs, both the yellow and green, are brighter-colored than before. I cannot be deceived. They shine as if the sap were already flowing under the bark; a certain lively and glossy hue they have. The early poplars are pushing forward their catkins, though they make not so much display as the willows. Still in some parts of the woods it is good sledding. At Second Division Brook, the fragrance of the senecio, which is decidedly evergreen, which I have bruised, is very permanent and brings round the year again. It is a memorable sweet meadowy fragrance. I find a yellow-spotted tortoise (Emys guttata) in the brook. A very few leaves of cowslips, and those wholly under water, show themselves yet. The leaves of the water saxifrage, for the most part frost-bitten, are common enough. Near the caltha was also green frog-spawn, and Channing says he saw pollywogs. [Thoreau’s footnote: “Possibly lizards.” What Thoreau has been interpreted by the 1906 editor to mean in this footnote is newts, or salamanders.] Perhaps it is a particularly warm place. The alder’s catkins –the earliest of them– are very plainly expanding, or, rather, the scales are loose and separated, and the whole catkin relaxed. Minott says that old Sam Nutting, the hunter, –Fox Nutting, Old Fox, he was called,– who died more than forty years ago (he lived in Jacob Baker’s house, Lincoln; came from Weston) and was some seventy years old then, told him that he had killed not only bear about Fair Haven among the walnuts, but moose! HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

“NARRATIVE HISTORY” AMOUNTS TO FABULATION, THE REAL STUFF BEING MERE CHRONOLOGY

March 11, Friday: On this day and the following 2 days additional US forces were landing in Nicaragua, to protect American lives and interests during political disturbances there. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

The town marshal of San Juan del Norte, Nicaragua arrived at the site of the illegally built facilities of Cornelius Vanderbilt’s Accessory Transit Company, to evict them. The town had in fact not only provided an alternate site but also offered to pay moving costs. The recently arrived U.S. Marines prevented this town marshal from performing his duties.

Henry Thoreau wrote to George William Curtis about the whereabouts of the manuscript he had submitted to Putnam’s Monthly Magazine of American Literature, Science and Art: TIMELINE OF CANADA Concord Mar. 11 ’53 Mr Curtis, Together with the MS of my Cape Cod adventures Mr Put- ^ the first (out of 200) nam sends me only 70 or 80 pages of the “Canada”, all which having been printed is of course of no use to me. He states that “the remainder of the MSS seems to have been lost at the printers’.” You will not be surprised if I wish to know if it actually is lost, and if reasonable pains have been taken to recover it. Supposing that Mr P. may not have had an opportunity to consult you respecting its whereabouts –or have thought it of importance enough to inquire after particularly– I write again to you to whom I entrusted it to as- sure you that it is of more value to me than may appear. With your leave I will improve this opportunity to acknowledge the receipt of another cheque from Mr– “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project The US Marines HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Putnam. I trust that if we ever have any intercourse hereafter it may be some-

Page 2 thing more cheering than this curt business kind. Yrs Henry D. Thoreau

Thoreau was being written to by Horace Greeley in New-York. New York, March, 11, 1853. Dear Sir: I have yours of the 9th, enclosing Putnam’s check for $59, making $79 in all you have paid me. I am paid in full, and this letter is your receipt in full. I don’t want any [pay] for my ‘services,’ [whatever] they may have been consider me your friend who wished to serve you, however unsuc- cessfully. Don’t break with Curtis or Putnam. Yours H.D. Thoreau. Horace Greeley.

[THOREAU MADE NO ENTRY IN HIS JOURNAL FOR MARCH 11th]

July 14, Thursday: Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry of the made the Lord of Toda, an offer which he was supposing they couldn’t refuse, “a commercial and friendship treaty” (this would be categorically rejected and Major Jacob Zeilin of the US Marines would have to climb back on board the USS Mississippi and this Commodore would need to sail away emptyhanded). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

President Franklin Pierce opened the World’s Fair at the New-York Crystal Palace Exhibition. Adjacent to this, at the Latting Observatory, Elisha Graves Otis would be demonstrating his steam-powered passenger elevator. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE July 14: Heavy fog. I see a rose, now in its prime, by the river, in the water amid the willows and button-bushes, while others, lower on shore, are nearly out of bloom. Is it not the R. Carolina? Saw something blue, or glaucous, ill Beck Stow’s Swamp to-day; approached and discovered the Andromeda Polifolia, in the midst of [lie swamp at the north end, not long since out of bloom. This is another instance of a common experience. When I am shown from abroad, or hear of, or in any [way] become interested in, some plant or other thing, I am pretty sure to find it soon. Within a week R.W.E. showed me a slip of this in a botany, as a great rarity which George Bradford brought from Watertown. I had long been interested in it by Linnæus’s account. I now find it in abundance. It is a neat and tender-looking plant, with the pearly new shoots now half a dozen inches long and the singular narrow revolute leaves. I suspect the flower does not add much to it. There is an abundance of the buck-bean there also.]lolly berries are beginning to be ripe. The Polygonum Hydropiper, by to-morrow. Spergula arvensis gone to seed and in flower. A very tall ragged orchis by the Heywood Brook, two feet high, almost like a white fringed one. Lower ones I have seen some time. The clematis there (near the water-plantain) will open in a day or two. Mallows gone to seed and in bloom. Erigeron Canadensis, butter-weed. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1854

During the Anthony Burns case, after Transcendentalist poets and preachers had attacked the Boston courthouse, the building had been converted into a sort of armored slavepen, in that it was guarded by a

detachment of U.S. Marines, and 2 artillery companies with loaded cannons and with fixed bayonets on their rifles, as well as by the US Marshall’s guard consisting of “a gang of about one-hundred and twenty men, the lowest villains in the community, keepers of brothels, bullies, blacklegs, convicts....” Not even the judges, let alone the jurors, the witnesses, and the litigant attorneys, were being permitted inside the courthouse without first passing a cordon of men five men deep, and proving their right to be there. Boston abolitionists had offered the slavemaster of Burns the sum of $1,200 in return for a document in manumission, but had been HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE refused.

Nothing in the whole record of the Burns affair is more striking to a modern audience or at first more off- putting than the apparent incapacity of even the most committed of the radicals to express a direct, authentic outrage on Burns’s personal behalf. Phillips’s unelaborated reference to his “suffering” is as close as they come. The evil that Parker undertakes to agitate against is the threat to the civil liberties of Northern white men. There is an oddity about this argument even on the supposition that it consciously appeals to self-interest ... if they are to be made to fight again, it must probably be for the same thing [their own personal liberty] and not ... for ... the right of another man than oneself to be free.

WENDELL PHILLIPS At some point in the year, in regard to the enforcement of the federal Fugitive Slave Act in regard to the Burns case, the Reverend Thomas Wentworth Higginson would deliver a sermon entitled “Massachusetts in Mourning.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 2, “Bad Friday”: Louis D’Entremont Surette was born in Concord to Louis A. Surette and Frances Jane Shattuck Surette.

By 6AM, crowds were already beginning to accumulate outside the Boston courthouse.

At 7:30AM, to maintain order and to make some sort of gesture that this is after all America, a brace of horses dragged a cannon onto the square before the courthouse and a squad of U.S. Marines trained its load of 6 pounds of grapeshot on the crowd.

At 8AM a martial law notice was posted, which someone read aloud to the crowd: TO THE CITIZENS OF BOSTON.

To secure order throughout the city this day, Major- General Edmands and the Chief of Police will make such disposition of the respective forces under their commands as will best promote that important object; and they are clothed with full discretionary power to sustain the laws of the land. All well-disposed citizens and other persons are urgently requested to leave those streets which it may be found necessary to clear temporarily, and under no circumstances to obstruct or molest any officer, civil or military, in the lawful discharge of his duty. J.V.C. SMITH, Mayor. BOSTON, June 2, 1854. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE At 8:45AM the defendant’s attorney, Richard Henry Dana, Jr., entered the courtroom, and was startled to observe his client Anthony Burns attired in a stylish new suit.

At 9AM Judge of Probate Edward Greeley Loring entered the chamber, and the troops outside began to drive the citizenry out of the courthouse square. The Marines began ostentatiously to “train” by going through the motions of loading, firing, and reloading their cannon, while the police began to make arrests. Judge Loring, in regard to the objection that was being raised that his rôle as a Fugitive Slave Bill Commissioner of the United States of America was an unconstitutional one for judges to play, commented mildly that his duties as a Fugitive Slave Commissioner were “ministerial rather than judicial.”

Horace Mann, Sr. and E.G. Loring were old buddies from the Litchfield Law School. It had been just a brief period since Loring, who was an officer of Harvard College, had been rejected as a candidate for a law professorship because of his favoring the Fugitive Slave Law as written by James Murray Mason of Virginia.

To prove to the court what everyone knew to be the fact, the slavemaster and his attorney displayed to the judge a copy of the Revised Code of Virginia. “On the law and facts of the case, I consider the claimant entitled to the certificate from me which he claims.” Judge Loring then signed the certificate and outside upon a signal the bells of Boston’s churches began to toll. In response to the pealing of the bells, the townspeople began to hang black bunting, and women’s black shawls and mantles, out of their windows. The streets of Boston were being patrolled by the National Guard, and by US Army cavalry, and by marines, and by artillery brigades, totaling some 2,000 soldiers –President Pierce having ordered that no expense be spared– but no quantity of mere soldiering could force local citizens to raise their flags above half-mast or take down their drapings of black bunting.

At 2:30PM the procession of troops, each with pistol by his left hand and drawn cutlass in his right, began to move toward the waterfront and, eventually, the government revenue Morris that was being kept at a safe distance in the harbor, out at the mooring at Minot’s Light. Burn was moved along quick-step by the troops “down that sworded street” from the Boston courthouse in the custody of US Marshall Asa O. Butman. The Marine Band attempted to incite the crowds of citizens lining the streets to riot by playing the tune “Carry Me Back to Old Virginny,” so that the army would have an opportunity to do what it does best, but could not get a firefight started. The colored man was heard to comment,

There was a lot of folks to see a colored man walk through the streets.

The New England Woman’s Rights Convention was getting little done, for the delegates were out on State Street watching the colored man in the new suit being marched past. William Lloyd Garrison and the Reverend Moncure Daniel Conway watched together from the window of a law office (this would get Conway in big trouble in his home town in Virginia). On the way down to Dock T, it seems that by coincidence a druggist’s stockboy from Roxbury, William Ela, who had been sent into town that afternoon to procure a bottle of ink, was in the vicinity lugging his bottle — and the troops presumed that the bottle he was carrying contained vitriol which he intended to hurl at them. The bottle of ink was smashed and the boy would be brain-damaged from being assaulted with the butts of muskets (later there would be a lawsuit for his maintenance: Ela v. J.V.C. Smith). The nervous troops also bayoneted a cart horse that happened to get in their way as Anthony Burns was being marched to the dock. There was a dock, and there was a street leading down to it; the cutter was at the end of the dock, and sometimes a cart driver does not mean to get in the way. What to do? Where a human HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE being means nothing, what the hell is a horse supposed to mean? The white soldiers, having gotten all keyed up to bayonet citizens, of course bayoneted the horse. The driver of the cart was lucky they didn’t bayonet him as well.

At 3:20PM, after the troops had loaded their black captive and their brass cannon aboard the steamer John Taylor at Dock T, the steamer pulled away from the dock and began to make its way through the massed small craft in the harbor toward Minot’s Light, where the federal revenue cutter Morris was waiting.

That afternoon Henry Thoreau had taken his mother Cynthia Dunbar Thoreau and sister Sophia Elizabeth Thoreau in his boat up the Assabet River to Castilleja and Annursnack. They wouldn’t return until about 7 PM.

By 8:30PM, Richard Henry Dana, Jr. had finished writing out a version of the closing argument which he had offered, and had sent it off to the Boston Traveller to be published in their next edition. When he met Anson Burlingame, the 9PM omnibus to Cambridge having already departed, Burlingame offered to escort Dana home. As they walked together on Court Street, however, Dana was struck from behind. The lawyer’s glasses flew off and shattered. His eye was blackened and some of his teeth were chipped.10 Friend John Greenleaf Whittier would turn the Anthony Burns episode into one of his occasional poems, but –poetry to the contrary notwithstanding– the man of color’s wrists had not been in handcuffs as he had been quick-stepped “hand-cuffed down that sworded street” of sordid downtown Boston: The Rendition, by John Greenleaf Whittier. I HEARD the train’s shrill whistle call, I saw an earnest look beseech, And rather by that look than speech My neighbor told me all. And, as I thought of Liberty Marched handcuffed down that sworded street, The solid earth beneath my feet Reeled fluid as the sea. I felt a sense of bitter loss, — Shame, tearless grief, and stifling wrath, And loathing fear, as if my path A serpent stretched across. All love of home, all pride of place, All generous confidence and trust, Sank smothering in that deep disgust And anguish of disgrace. Down on my native hills of June, And home’s green quiet, hiding all, Fell sudden darkness like the fall Of midnight upon noon! And Law, an unloosed maniac, strong, Blood-drunken, through the blackness trod, Hoarse-shouting in the ear of God 10. The men were later identified as Luigi Varelli and Henry Huxford, who had been serving that day as part of the marshal's guard and who were celebrating their earnings at Allen’s Saloon when they recognized Richard Henry Dana, Jr. as he passed on the sidewalk. Anthony Burns would turn out to be the last escapee from slavery to be returned from Massachusetts. His owner would not, as was feared at the time, torture him to death. He would be kept in the traders’ jail in Richmond VA until sold to a white man from North Carolina. This man would then retail him to a Massachusetts minister at Barnum’s Hotel in in February 1855 for the sum of $1,325.00. On March 7, 1855 Burns would be feted at Tremont Temple and handed manumission papers. He would attend the School of Divinity at and, bless him, he would become a minister of the gospel. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE The blasphemy of wrong. “O Mother, from thy memories proud, Thy old renown, dear Commonwealth, Lend this dead air a breeze of health, And smite with stars this cloud. “Mother of Freedom, wise and brave, Rise awful in thy strength,” I said; Ah me! I spake but to the dead; I stood upon her grave!

June 2: ... I would fain be present at the birth of shadow. It takes place with the first expansion of the leaves....

The following commentary on Thoreau’s journal entry for this day is from H. Daniel Peck’s THOREAU’S MORNING WORK: MEMORY AND PERCEPTION IN A WEEK ON THE CONCORD AND MERRIMACK RIVERS, THE JOURNAL, AND WALDEN (Yale UP, 1994): To “improve these seasons as much as a farmer his” is to cultivate them richly through perception and to fix them in enduring phenomenological categories. One of the most obvious signs of Thoreau’s ongoing revision of the traditional calendar in the Journal is his unceasing recording of first-observed appearances of seasonal phenomena. These observations cluster in the spring, when their myriad occurrences signify the vigorous rebirth of nature celebrated in the climatic chapter of WALDEN. Yet a close reading of the Journal reveals that Thoreau was closely attentive to “first facts” at all seasons. There are hundreds of such observations in the Journal, recorded at all times of the year and usually without commentary. In part, they are an expression of Thoreau’s deep preoccupation with origins. By searching the world for the first visible appearances of natural growth, he hopes to participate through observation in the creativity of nature — to be there at the moment of genesis. A passage from a Journal entry of June 2, 1854, expresses this desire poignantly: “I would fain be present at the birth of shadow. It takes place with the first expansion of the leaves.” But as this example shows, the concept of beginning as it is usually expressed in the Journal is defined not by pure origination but by repetition. The necessary context for observing the “first” appearance of a seasonal phenomenon is the natural cycle; any “first” in nature is recognizable only because it has happened before. That is, Thoreau has already prepared, or recognized, a category for anticipating it; he is keyed for the observation of first facts. In the spring of 1860, we find him “on the alert for several days to hear the first birds” (March 9, 1860). Reporting the appearance of these “first birds” to his Journal is an act of confirmation as much as an act of origination; the beginning, in Thoreau, always pivots between memory and anticipation. As he puts it in a Journal entry of June 6, 1857, “Each annual phenomenon is a reminiscence and prompting.” But even the most vigilant of nature’s observers cannot “be present at the birth of shadow,” and Thoreau is HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE acutely aware of this, as he shows in an entry of March 17, 1857: “No mortal is alert enough to be present at the first dawn of the spring.”

The new lighthouse on Bird Island in Bay (also known as Alcatraz Island, due to its alcatraces or pelicans), its new lens finally in position, was illuminated for the 1st time. The light could be seen 12 miles at sea. CALIFORNIA

July 13, Thursday: At 2PM Henry Thoreau went along the Fitchburg Railroad tracks and then to Bare or Pine Hill in Lincoln (Gleason J9).

Abbas I, Turkish Viceroy of Egypt, was murdered by 2 of his slaves. He was succeeded by Mohammed Said.

Having been sent by President Franklin Pierce to demand reparations from the town of San Juan del Norte, Nicaragua for an alleged slight of the US Minister to that country, the USS Cyane began bombarding the town. Over the course of 7 hours they fired over 200 rounds into San Juan, which consisted of about 50- 60 thatched huts. At the end of the bombardment, U.S. Marines were sent ashore. They looted what they could find, including a large cache of liquor, and burned the rest. Merchants of 6 countries demand $2,000,000 compensation for their destroyed goods, which of course would never be paid.

In San Francisco, the Lady Washington Engine Company changed its name to Manhattan Engine Company No. 2. CALIFORNIA

November 6, Monday: John Philip Sousa was born in Washington DC, 3d of 10 children (only 6 would survive infancy) of John Antonio Sousa, a Portuguese immigrant and trombonist in the U.S. Marine Band, with Marie Elisabeth Trinkaus, an immigrant from Bavaria where her father was a small town mayor.

Henry Thoreau completed surveying the farm of the old General James Colburn. This farm of approximately 130 acres was near the Lee or Elwell Farm (Gleason E5) bordering on the Assabet River. Thoreau mentioned that there was a “haunted house” in this area.

Thoreau was being written to again by this Asa Fairbanks of Providence, Rhode Island in regard to the proposed lecture of a “reformatory Character”: Providence Nov. 6. 1854 Mr Henry D Thore[a]u Dear Sir I am in receipt of yours of the 4th inst. Your stating explicitly that the 6th December would suit you better than any other time, I altered other arrangements on purpose to accommodate you, and notified you as soon as I was able to accomplish them. had you named the last Wedn[e]sday in Nov. or the second Wednsday in December, I could have replied to you at once–or any time in Janu[a]ry or HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Feb[ruary] it would have been the same[.] I shall regret the disap- pointment very Much but must submit to it if you have Made such overtures as you can not avoid— I hope however you will be able to come at the time appointed[.] Truly A. Fairbanks

The Reverend Daniel Foster was writing Thoreau from his farm in East Princeton MA that he and friends had been reading WALDEN; OR, LIFE IN THE WOODS aloud “with pauses for conversation.” East Princeton Nov. 6. 1854.

Friend Thoreau, On my return from a lecturing tour in the Mystic Valley Dom informed me of your call with your English [c]ompanion on your way to a meeting on the summit of Mt. Wachusett. I am glad you called but sorry that I was not at home. I hope you will come & see us while we are here & get acquainted with our pond “old crow hill,” “redemption rock” “Uncle William” now nearly 90 [years] old, bonnie Charlie & other notables of the place justly considered worthy the notice of a philosopher. I shall not tell you that you will be welcome as long as you can stay with us for if you don't know that fact the usual polite phrase of in- vitation will not assure you. I have read your “Walden” slowly, aloud with constant

Page 2 pauses for conversation thereon, & with very much satisfaction & profit. I like to read aloud of evenings a book which like this one provokes discussion in the circle of [hearers] & reader. I was the more interested in your book from the personal & strong interest felt for you & for your own sake in my soul. My in- tercourse with you when I lived in Con- HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE cord & since at times when I have been in Concord has been uncommonly useful in aiding & strengthening my own best purpose. Most thoroughly do I respect & reverence a manly self-poised mind. My own great aim in life has ever been to act in accordance with my own convictions. To be destitute of bank stock & rail road shares & the influence which wealth & position bestow through the folly of the unthinking multitude is no evil to that one who seeks truth & immortal living as the greatest & the best inheritance. In the scramble for money in which most men engage

Page 3 one may fail but whoever travels the road of patient study & self control reaches the goal & is crowned with the immortal wealth. I would not be understood in this to depreciate the value of wealth. I am working in the hope of being rich in this world's [gear] sometime through the ownership of a piece of land on which shall stand my own illuminated & happy home. But if I do not reach the accomplishment of this hope I will nevertheless bate no jot of my cheer- fulness joy & energy till the end. I will deserve success & thus of course I shall succeed in all my hopes some time or other. I have enjoyed the ponds the hills & the woods of this vicinity very greatly this year. We have nothing quite equal to your Walden or Concord, but aside from these our natural attractions exceed yours. I have been farming & preaching this summer, have reared

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THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE to maturity & harvested 90 bushels of corn one bushel beans, 8 bushels potatoes, 20 bushels squashes & 20 bushels of apples. I cannot tell with the same precision how many thoughts I have called into exercise by my moral husbandry tho I hope my labor herein has not been in vain. Dom wishes to be remembered with sisterly greetings to Sophia & yourself & with filial affection to your father & mother. We enjoyed the visit your mother & sister repaid us very much indeed & only regreeted that Mr. Thoreau & yourself were not with us at the same time[.] I hope your “Walden” will get a wide circulation, as it deserves, & replenish your bank, as it ought to do. I thank you for the book & will hold myself your debtor till opportunity offers for securing a receipt in full Yours truly Daniel Foster

By way of radical contrast, when Moncure Daniel Conway read WALDEN; OR, LIFE IN THE WOODS, he didn’t think much of the book as a guide to life. On this day he was listing his objections for Waldo Emerson’s benefit:

1. That it hasn’t optimism enough ... 2. That one couldn’t pursue his Art of Living and get married. 3. That one hasn’t time to spend or strength to spare from what is his work to take care of such universal rebellion.

It is clear that Conway had not been reading WALDEN “with pauses for thought.” To this minister, whose ideal of Nature was frankly that it should be like a garden where everything is in its place and under control and serving a purpose, Thoreau seemed like the kind of guy who couldn’t live “unless snakes are coiling around his leg or lizzards perching on his shoulders.” (Conway all his life had a morbid fear of and a morbid fascination with snakes: during his childhood he even had a slave walking in front of him to beat the ground with a stick and scare away these snakes. Obviously, if Thoreau wasn’t afraid of snakes, there must be a whole lot of other things that were wrong with him as well!)11 AUTOBIOGRAPHY VOLUME II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

11. Conway’s criticism of Thoreau to Emerson, that Thoreau hadn’t optimism enough, sounds very strange if you bear in mind that later on in life Conway would repudiate Emerson on the grounds that Emerson was so optimistic that he was entirely unable to deal with the dark things in life! HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 1856

November 20, Thursday: In Liverpool, Herman Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne had attempted one last meeting, and then Herman had gone on toward , Greece, Egypt, and Palestine.12 Nathaniel wrote in his journal:

he can neither believe, nor be comfortable in his unbelief: and he is too honest and courageous not to try to do one or the other. If he were a religious man, he would be one of the most truly religious and reverential; he has a very high and noble nature, and better worth immortality than most of us.

It is a little-known fact, but the United States of America participated in the miserably triumphant 2d Opium War between the Western imperialist powers and China! 50 US Marines and sailors were in the landing party under Brevet Captain John D. Simms that in the following few days would temporarily occupy 4 forts guarding the naval path to Canton, China, forts that had been in the insulting habit of discharging a few rounds at Western warships, doing no particular damage. In this land attack, which was pointless as the Westerners were heading away from Canton as this situation developed, something like 250 to 500 Chinese were killed or wounded while the American losses were 7 killed and 22 wounded and the British losses were 1 killed and 6 wounded. As soon as we had made our point we all sailed away.

12. You may consult this in JOURNAL UP THE STRAITS, OCTOBER 1, 1856-MAY 5, 1857, published in 1935. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1857

March 6, Friday: Edwin Coppoc was disowned by the Red Cedar Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends in the West Branch/Springdale area of Iowa outside of Iowa City, on account of his having gone dancing.

President appointed John Buchanan Floyd as Secretary of War and Lewis Cass as Secretary of State. Floyd would soon demonstrate incompetence, and Cass would be sympathetic with American “filibusterers” and would be instrumental in having Commodore Hiram Paulding removed from his command after he landed US Marines in Nicaragua to compel the removal of the filibustering William Walker.

US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

[THOREAU MADE NO ENTRY IN HIS JOURNAL FOR MARCH 6th]

April/May: Late in April, Herman Melville toured Switzerland, Germany, and the .

In Nicaragua, Commander C.H. Davis of the United States Navy, with some marines, received the surrender of William Walker and his gang of filibusters, who had been attempting to get control of the country, thus protecting these Americans from the retaliation of the native allies who had been opposing their intrusion. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

November/December: The USS Saratoga, USS Wabash, and USS Fulton interfered with yet another attempt of the gang of filibusters led by William Walker, to seize control of Nicaragua, Commodore Hiram Paulding using his marines to compel their removal to the United States. This interference with the filibusters would be tacitly disavowed by Secretary of State Lewis Cass — this interfering commodore would be forced into early retirement. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1858

August 6, Friday: The USS Constellation arrived at the : “Hove up the anchor and stood up to the Navy Yard in tow of steam tugs. Ship in charge of pilot. Secured ship to the wharf. At 2:30 transferred to the receiving ship “Ohio” the Seamen, Ord. Sea., Landsmen and boys: Sent the Marines to the Marine Barracks and remainder of crew ashore on liberty.”

August 6, 1858: P.M. –Walk to Boulder Field. The broom is quite out of bloom; probably a week or ten days. It is almost ripe, indeed. I should like to see how rapidly it spreads. The dense roundish masses, side by side, are three or four feet over and fifteen inches high. They have grown from near the ground this year. The whole clump is now about eighteen feet from north to south by twelve wide. Within a foot or two of its edge, I detect many slender little plants springing up in the grass, only three inches high, but, on digging, am surprised to find that they are two years old. They have large roots, running down straight as well as branching, much stouter than the part above ground. Thus it appears to spread slowly by the seed falling from its edge, for I detected no runners. It is associated there with indigo, which is still abundantly in bloom. I then looked for the little groves of barberries which some two months ago I saw in the cow-dung thereabouts, but to my surprise I found some only in one spot after a long search. They appear to have generally died, perhaps dried up. These few were some two inches high; the roots yet longer, having penetrated to the soil beneath. Thus, no doubt, some of those barberry clumps are formed; but I noticed many more small barberry plants standing single, most commonly protected by a rock. BARBERRY HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Cut a couple of those low scrub apple bushes, and found that those a foot high and as wide as high, being clipped by the cows, as a hedge with shears, were about twelve years old, but quite sound and thrifty. If our sluggish river, choked with potamogeton, might seem to have the slow-flying bittern for its peculiar genius, it has also the sprightly and aerial kingbird [Eastern Kingbird Tyrannus tyrannus] to twitter over and lift our thoughts to clouds as white as its own breast. Emerson is gone to the Adirondack country with a hunting party. Eddy says he has carried a double-barrelled gun, one side for shot, the other for ball, for Lowell killed a bear there last year. But the story on the Mill-Dam is that he has taken a gun which throws shot from one end and ball from the other! I think that I speak impartially when I say that I have never met with a stream so suitable for boating and botanizing as the Concord, and fortunately nobody knows it. I know of reaches which a single country seat would spoil beyond remedy, but there has not been any important change here since I can remember. The willows slumber along its shore, piled in light but low masses, even like the cumuli clouds above. We pass haymakers in every meadow, who may think that we are idlers. But Nature takes care that every nook and crevice is explored by some one. While they look after the open meadows, we farm the tract between the river’s brinks and behold the shores from that side. We, too, are harvesting an annual crop with our eyes, and think you Nature is not glad to display her beauty to us? Early in the day we see the dewdrops thickly sprinkled over the broad leaves of the potamogeton. These cover the stream so densely in some places that a web-footed bird can almost walk across on them. Nowadays we hear the squealiny notes of young hawks. The kingfisher is seen hovering steadily over one spot, or hurrying away with a small fish in his mouth, sounding his alarum nevertheless. The note of the wood pewee is now more prominent, while birds generally are silent. This is pure summer; no signs of fall in this, though I have seen some maples, as above the Assabet Spring, already prematurely reddening, owing to the water, and for some time the Cornus sericea has looked brownish red. Every board and chip cast into the river is soon occupied by one or more turtles of various sizes. The sternothaerus oftenest climbs up the black willows, even three or more feet. I hear of pickers ordered out of the huckleberry-fields, and I see stakes set up with written notices forbidding any to pick there. Some let their fields, or allow so much for the picking. Sic transit gloria ruris. We are not grateful enough that we have lived part of our lives before these evil days came. What becomes of the true value of country life? What if you must go to market for it? Shall things come to such a pass that the butcher HANGING commonly brings round huckleberries in his cart? It is as if the hangman were to perform the marriage ceremony, or were to preside at the communion table. Such is the inevitable tendency of our civilization, –to reduce huckleberries to a level with beef-steak. The butcher’s item on the door is now “calf’s head and huckleberries.” I suspect that the inhabitants of England and of the Continent of Europe have thus lost their natural rights with the increase of population and of monopolies. The wild fruits of the earth disappear before civilization, or are only to be found in large markets. The whole country becomes, as it were, a town or beaten common, — & the fruits left are a few hips & haws. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1859

October 16, Sunday-October 18, Tuesday: Henry Thoreau was working on his natural history materials. ROSS/ADAMS COMMENTARY

The raid by the forces on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia involved 5 persons of color and 13 whites. Of the persons of color, 2 were killed during the raid, John Anderson Copeland, Jr. and were captured and would be hanged and one managed to escape. That is to say, back from the West, Captain Brown committed the treason of attempting to free men and women from their rightful masters by seizing the weapons at the federal arsenal, and of course the owners of these men and women, who had a perfect right to resist being deprived of the use of their property, of course resisted being deprived, and therefore of course there were deaths during his raid upon this locale where the government to which he owed loyalty was manufacturing its weapons of slaughter. Although Brown did not effectively free the slaves of the sovereign state of Virginia –except of course that he freed those who listened to him and took up pikes and were gunned down– he was able effectively to sacrifice the lives of other people to his own enthusiasms. That has to count as a personal “win” of sorts! For instance, the 1st to be killed by the raiders at Harpers Ferry was HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Hayward Shepard, a free black who happened to be in harm’s way because he was serving as the baggage handler between the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad terminal and the Winchester & Harpers Ferry Railroad Terminal (the old man failed to respond appropriately to the raiders’ orders). There were 21 fighters with Brown in the raid, and of these 10 were killed outright, 5 were captured for trial and would be hanged, and 7 escaped, of which 2 would later be captured and tried and hanged. Although the US government did effectively save the contents of their arsenal from these bold insurrectionaries, shortly thereafter the weapons of the arsenal would be seized by the insurrectionary Governor Wise of Virginia, who had as perfect a right to them as anyone, and he would distribute these weapons to Confederate troops.

[NOTE: There was every reason to believe that if Governor Wise of Virginia could get his hands on Frederick HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Douglass, the black leader would hang alongside the white leader.

Douglass was at the moment in Philadelphia. The telegraph operator there would seek out Douglass and warn him, so that he would have three full hours in which to effect his escape — before the telegram ordering his arrest needed to be handed over to the local sheriff. Douglass, in fleeing went first to familiar haunts, the Hoboken, New Jersey lodgings of Ottilie Assing, and only from there to Rochester and then to Ontario, and

England. On the dock in Rochester, embarking for Ontario, William Parker would press into Douglass’s hand what was purported to be the pistol dropped by Gorsuch when he had been shot dead in Christiana (actually, it seems that the man had been unarmed with anything more deadly than a curiously foolish moral courage).]

This sort of situation has been described many times, and you will forgive me if I here repeat one of the early HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE descriptions of this sort of situation:

More weapons, more murder. –Lao Tzu HDT WHAT? INDEX

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Harpers Ferry from Brown’s overlook in Maryland

Brown’s Sharps carbine, his “Henry Ward Beecher’s Bible,” was captured with him after the Harpers Ferry HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE skirmish, along with that famous George Washington sword he had just stolen from

<__ George Washington’s sword (in the famous Leutze painting).

a plantation, and to which he had as much right as its current owner (or, for that matter, its original owner).

After they would take Captain John Brown’s Sharps rifle away from him at Harpers Ferry, they would allow this little boy to pose with it. Grow up, son, and be a Christian like us: kill people, own slaves. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Although Charles Plummer Tidd opposed the attack on Harpers Ferry, he nevertheless took part both in the

raid on the planter Washington’s home and on the federal arsenal itself. He and John Brown’s son Owen Brown escaped, and made their way on foot toward the northwestern part of .

(Tidd would visit Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Canada and take part in the planning for the rescue of Aaron D. Stevens and Albert Hazlett while the Mason Commission of the Congress was presuming that he had been killed in the fighting at the arsenal.)

Owen Brown was 35 at the time of the Harpers Ferry raid. He escaped on foot toward the northwestern part of Pennsylvania. It was due largely to his psychological grit, and physical endurance despite a withered arm, that the little group of survivors of which he was the leader did reach safety. He and Charles Plummer Tidd would find work and safety under assumed names, on an oil well crew in Crawford County, Pennsylvania. After the civil war he would grow grapes for some time in Ohio in association with two of his brothers, before migrating to California. He would be the only one of the 5 escaped raiders not to participate in the civil war, and would be the last of the raiders when he died on January 8th, 1889 near Pasadena at his mountain home “Brown’s Peak.” He never married. A marble monument now marks his mountain grave. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Perhaps this white corpse is meant to be Oliver Brown, usefully lying dead in the foreground of a contemporary news illustration? (This wouldn’t have been a depiction of , also shot down at the bridge, since he was a very tall man with a splendid physique and since his mulatto body was abused by the attackers, who among other things snipped off its ears as trophies before they herded some hogs to root on it.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE John E. Cook was sent out by Captain Brown to collect weapons, and instead climbed into a tree and observed the fight.

When John Brown sent his son Watson Brownout to negotiate, he was gunned down by the citizens of Harpers Ferry.

(He would manage to crawl back to the shelter of the engine house and live on, groaning, his head cradled in Edwin Coppoc’s lap, for a considerable period. He would expire on October 18, 1859. His widow Isabella M. Thompson Brown would remarry with his brother Salmon Brown.)

John Henry Kagi became trapped along with John Anderson Copeland, Jr. and in the armory called Hall’s Rifle Works. When the three men made a run for it, heading down to the Shenandoah HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE River, they came under a crossfire and Kagi was the first killed, his body being left to float in the river.

A monument would be erected by the citizens of Oberlin, Ohio in honor of their three free citizens of color who had died in the raid or been hanged, John Anderson Copeland, Jr., Lewis Sheridan Leary, and Shields Green (the 8-foot marble monument would be moved to Vine Street Park in 1971).

Captain John Brown sent William Thompson out from the engine house to negotiate under flag of truce, and the mob of citizens placed him under arrest, took him to the local hotel barroom, discussed what to do, dragged him into the street, executed him by shooting him in the head, and dumped his body into the Potomac River.13

13. An interesting fact about this case is that it just about got a young lady into serious trouble. According to a letter of explanation she would provide to the local paper, Miss C.C. Fouke was the daughter of the tavernkeeper at Harpers Ferry, operating at the local hotel. The story had gone around, after the fact, that on the 2d day of the raid in her father’s saloon in the hotel she had thrown her body in front of this Brown conspirator William Thompson while the mob was debating whether or not to off him. Rather than be classed with Pocahontas or with Florence Nightingale, Miss Fouke attempted to explain the rationale for her conduct to the public at large. She had indeed thrown her body between the mob and the captive, she freely confessed, but she had done so, she needed to point out, “without touching him,” and she insisted also that her action was not motivated by any concern that this man was about to be shot in the head, but rather because her sister-in-law was resting in the next room and should not be disturbed as she was ailing — and/or out of a conviction that the man before being offed should be tried by a court of law. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Thompson’s brother Dauphin Adolphus Thompson also was killed during the raid.

Dauphin

William HDT WHAT? INDEX

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THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Jeremiah Goldsmith Anderson was pinned against the wall by a bayonet-thrust of one of the Marines.

“One of the prisoners described Anderson as turning completely over against the wall in his dying agony. He lived a short time, stretched on the brick walk without, where he was subjected to savage brutalities, being kicked in body and face, while one brute of an armed farmer spat a huge quid of tobacco from his vile jaws into the mouth of the dying man, which he first forced open.” (You see, these people were incorrectly perceiving him to be not a white man but a light mulatto. When opportunistic medical students would go to transport his remains to their college in Winchester, Virginia for use as a dissection specimen, their treatment of this “light mulatto” corpse was so casual as to be recorded by a bystander: “In order to take him away handily they procured a barrel and tried to pack him into it. Head foremost, they rammed him in, but they could not bend his legs so as to get them into the barrel with the rest of the body. In their endeavor to accomplish this feat, they strained so hard that the man’s bones or sinews fairly cracked.”) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE In the engine house at Harpers Ferry, Edwin Coppoc surrendered with Captain John Brown.

(He would be tried by a jury of his white male peers immediately after the conclusion of the trial of Captain Brown. He would be sentenced to death on November 2, 1859. From prison before his hanging, he would write to his adoptive mother, of a nonresistant-abolitionist Quaker farm family, that he was

“sorry to say that I was ever induced to raise a gun.”

He would be hung with John E. Cook on December 16, 1859. The body would be buried in Winona after a funeral attended by the entire town. Later the body would be reburied in Salem OH.)

You will remember that in July 1854, when Moncure Daniel Conway graduated from Harvard Theological School and was ordained, his classmate William H. Leeman had not graduated with him. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE This fellow had drunk some illicit alcohol Conway had smuggled onto campus and then refilled Conway’s illicit bottles with water, and so student Conway had turned him in to the college administration. Leaman had been refused graduation on grounds of moral turpitude, and warned not to make any attempt to preach. At this point he reappears, or his mutilated body reappears — salvaged from the waters after being used for target practice, and thrown into the common pit on the bank of the Shenandoah River upstream from Harpers Ferry.14

14. See pages 87-8 and 240-1 of d’Entremont, where this account of Leaman was put together for the first time. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Barclay Coppoc escaped from Harpers Ferry.

“We were together eight days before [John E. Cook and Albert Hazlett were] captured, which was near Chambersburg, and the next night Meriam [Francis Jackson Meriam] left us and went to Shippensburg, and there took cars for Philadelphia. After that there were but three of us left [John Brown’s son Owen Brown, Barclay Coppoc, and Charles Plummer Tidd], and we kept together, until we got to Centre County, Pennsylvania, where we bought a box and packed up all heavy luggage, such as rifles, blankets, etc., and after being together three or four weeks we separated and I went on through with the box to Ohio on the cars.” (Osborn Perry Anderson, Barclay Coppoc, and Francis Jackson Meriam would travel separately to safe exile in the area of St. Catharines, Canada. Barclay Coppoc would go from there to Iowa, with Virginia agents in close pursuit. He would be back in in 1860, helping to run off some Missouri slaves, and would nearly lose his life in a 2d undertaking of this kind. On July 24, 1861 he would become a 1st Lieutenant in Colonel Montgomery’s regiment, the 3d Kansas Infantry. Eventually he would be killed by the fall of a train into the Platte river from a trestle forty feet high, the supports of which had been burned away by Confederates.)

Francis Jackson Meriam was not killed or captured in the raid on Harpers Ferry because he had been left at the HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Kennedy farmhouse, in one of his fits of despair.

He was a great drag on the other escapees as they hiked through the woods as he needed to stop and rest every HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE mile or so.

To the great relief of the others, Meriam boarded a train in the town of Shippensburg heading for Philadelphia. Eventually Thoreau would put him on a train headed for Canada.

Oliver Brown, the youngest of John Brown’s sons to reach adulthood, had been shot dead at the age of 20 while serving as a sentinel at the river bridge.

His and 9 other corpses left by the Provisional Army were “subjected to every indignity that a wild and madly excited people could heap upon them.” A horrified reporter could only rationalize: “It may be thought that there was cruelty and barbarity in this; but the public mind had been frenzied by the outrages of these men, who, being outlaws, were regarded as food for carrion birds, and not as human creatures.” The corpses the Provisional Army needed burial but Harpers Ferry residents refused to allow their cemetery to be used for HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE these who had sought to create servile insurrection. Two men, hired for $5 from the public purse to dispose of the corpses, heaved the bodies into the bed of a common wagon –witnesses recalled the welter of sprawling limbs– and carted them over the bridge to the opposite bank of the Shenandoah River, where a burial site was selected on the bank half a mile above the town. Without any ceremony the corpses were dumped into a shallow common pit.

By a week after the execution of John Brown, our nation would be teetering on the edge of civil war. The disruption, however, was not directly related to John Brown’s raid upon the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, but had to do instead with Helperism and its attitude of antislavery racism. The struggle was over the Speakership in the new US House of Representatives. Neither of the primary parties had the requisite 119 votes to win this position, and so a decision would be reachable only after there had been some considerable defection on one side or the other, from party discipline. The Republicans had proposed Representative John Sherman for this important position, and the Democrats were countering that no one who had endorsed Helperism, a concoction of recommended murder and treason, could possibly be considered for such a vital and influential role. If Representative Sherman got the job, the Southern states would be forced to withdraw their representatives from the halls of the US federal government. In endorsing Hinton Rowan Helper’s book during the spring of this year, the South’s attitude was, Sherman had endorsed treason and murder.

By the 2d day of the debate over the speakership, a linkage was being suggested between Helper’s ideas and John Brown’s actions. The illegality of the actions was coming to be considered to have been a direct expression of this strange belief system, according to which there was a “higher law” to which humans owed their primary obedience. The idea that there was a law higher than human law was considered an utterly presumptuous and iniquitous doctrine.

October 16. Sunday. P.M.– Paddle to Puffer’s and thence walk to Ledum Swamp and Conant’s Wood. A cold, clear, Novemberish day. The wind goes down and we do not sail. The button-bushes are just bare, and the black willows partly so, and the mikania all fairly gray now. I see the button-bush balls reflected on each side, and each wool-grass head and recurved withered sedge or rush is also doubled by the reflection. The Scirpus lacustris is generally brown, the Juncus militaris greener. It is rather too cool to sit still in the boat unless in a sunny and sheltered place. I have not been on the river for some time, and it is the more novel to me this cool day. When I get to Willow Bay I see the new musquash-houses erected, conspicuous on the now nearly leafless shores. To me this is an important and suggestive sight, as, perchance, in some countries new haystacks in the yards; as to the Esquimaux the erection of winter houses. I remember this phenomenon annually for thirty years. A more constant phenomenon here than the new haystacks in the yard, for they were erected here probably before man dwelt here and may still be erected here when man has departed. For thirty years I have annually observed, about this time or earlier, the freshly erected winter lodges of the musquash along the riverside, reminding us that, if we have no gypsies, we have a more indigenous race of furry, quadrupedal men maintaining their ground in our midst still. This may not be an annual phenomenon to you. It may not be in the Greenwich almanac or ephemeris, but it has an important place in my Kalendar. So surely as the sun appears to be in Libra or Scorpio, I see the conical winter lodges of the musquash rising above the withered pontederia and flags. There will be some reference to it, by way of parable or otherwise, in my New Testament. Surely, it is a defect in our Bible that it is not truly ours, but a Hebrew Bible. The most pertinent illustrations for us are to be drawn, not from Egypt or Babylonia, but from New England. Talk about learning our letters and being literate! Why, the roots of letters are things. Natural objects and phenomena are the original symbols or types which express our thoughts and feelings, and yet American scholars, having little or no root in the soil, commonly strive with all their might to confine themselves to the imported symbols alone. All the true growth and experience, the living speech, they would fain reject as “Americanisms.” It is the old error, which the church, the state, the school ever commit, choosing darkness rather than light, holding fast to the old and to tradition. A more intimate knowledge, a deeper experience, will surely originate a word. When I really know that our river pursues a serpentine course to the Merrimack, shall I continue to describe it by referring to some other river no older than itself which is like it, and call it a HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE meander? It is no more meandering than the Meander is musketaquidding. As well sing of the nightingale here as the Meander. What if there were a tariff on words, on language, for the encouragement of home manufactures? Have we not the genius to coin our own? Let the schoolmaster distinguish the true from the counterfeit. They go on publishing the “chronological cycles” and “movable festivals of the Church” and the like from mere habit, but how insignificant are these compared with the annual phenomena of your life, which fall within your experience! The signs of the zodiac are not nearly of that significance to me that the sight of a dead sucker in the spring is. That is the occasion for an immovable festival in my church. Another kind of Lent then begins in my thoughts than you wot of. I am satisfied then to live on fish alone for a season. Men attach a false importance to celestial phenomena as compared with terrestrial, as if it were more respectable and elevating to watch your neighbors than to mind your own affairs. The nodes of the stars are not the knots we have to untie. The phenomena of our year are one thing, those of the almanac another. For October, for

instance, instead of making the sun enter the sign of the scorpion, I would much sooner make him enter a musquash-house. Astronomy is a fashionable study, patronized by princes, but not fungi. “Royal Astronomer.” The snapping turtle, too, must find a place among the constellations, though it may have to supplant some doubtful characters already there. If there is no place for him overhead, he can serve us bravely underneath, supporting the earth. This clear, cold, Novemberish light is inspiriting. Some twigs which are bare and weeds begin to glitter with hoary light. The very edge or outline of a tawny or russet hill has this hoary light on it. Your thoughts sparkle like the water surface and the downy twigs. From the shore you look back at the silver-plated river. Every rain exposes new arrowheads. We stop at Clamshell and dabble for a moment in the relics of a departed race. Where we landed in front of Puffer’s, found a jug which the haymakers had left in the bushes. Hid our boat there in a clump of willows, and though the ends stuck out, being a pale green and whitish, they were not visible or distinguishable at a little distance. Passed through the sandy potato-field at Witherell’s cellar-hole. Potatoes not dug; looking late and neglected now; the very vines almost vanished on some sandier hills. When we emerged from the pleasant footpath through the birches into Witherell Glade, looking along it toward the westering sun, the glittering white tufts of the Andropogon scoparius, lit up by the sun, were affectingly fair and cheering to behold. It was already a cheerful Novemberish scene. A narrow glade stretching east and west between a dense birch wood, now half bare, and a ruddy oak wood on the upper side, a ground covered with tawny stubble and fine withered grass and cistuses. Looking westward along it, your eye fell on these lit tufts of andropogon [Vide Nov. 8th.], their glowing half raised a foot or more above the ground, a lighter and more HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE brilliant whiteness than the downiest cloud presents (though seen on one side they are grayish) [Vide (by chance) same date, or October 16th, 1858]. Even the lespedezas stand like frost-covered wands, and now hoary goldenrods and some bright-red blackberry vines amid the tawny grass are in harmony with the rest; and if you sharpen and rightly intend your eye you see the gleaming lines of gossamer (stretching from stubble to stubble over the whole surface) which you are breaking. How cheerful these cold but bright white waving tufts! They reflect all the sun’s light without a particle of his heat, or yellow rays. A thousand such tufts now catch up the sun and send to us its light but not heat. His heat is being steadily withdrawn from us. Light without heat is getting to be the prevailing phenomenon of the day now. We economize all the warmth we get now. The frost of the 11th, which stiffened the ground, made new havoc with vegetation, as I perceive. Many plants have ceased to bloom, no doubt. Many Diplopappus linariifolius are gone to seed, and yellowish globes. Such are the stages in the year’s decline. The flowers are at the mercy of the frosts. Places where erechthites grows, more or less bare, in sprout-lands, look quite black and white (black withered leaves and white down) and wintry. At Ledum Swamp, feeling to find the Vaccinium Oxycoccus berries, I am struck with the coldness of the wet sphagnum, as if I put my hands into a moss in Labrador, – a sort of winter lingering the summer through there. To my surprise, now at 3.30 P.M., some of the sphagnum in the shade is still stiff with frost, and when I break it I see the glistening spiculae. This is the most startling evidence of winter as yet. For only on the morning of the 11th was there any stiffening of the ground elsewhere. Also in the high sedgy sprout-land south of this swamp, I see hoary or frost-like patches of sedge amid the rest, where all is dry; as if in such places (the lowest) the frost had completely bleached the grass so that it now looks like frost. I think that that is the case. It is remarkable how, when a wood has been cut (perhaps where the soil was light) and frosts for a long while prevent a new wood from springing up there, that fine sedge (Carex Pennsylvanica?) will densely cover the ground amid the stumps and dead sprouts. It is the most hardy and native of grasses there. This is the grass of the sprout-lands and woods. It wants only the sun and a reasonably dry soil. Then there are the grasses and sedges of the meadows, but the cultivated fields and the pastures are commonly clothed with introduced grasses. The nesaea is all withered, also the woodwardia The ledum and Andromeda Polifolia leaves have fallen. The Kalmia glauca is still falling. The spruce, also, has fallen. The ledum smells like a bee, – that peculiar scent they have. C., too, perceives it. See a hairy woodpecker on a burnt pitch pine. He distinctly rests on his tail constantly. With what vigor he taps and bores the bark, making it fly far and wide, and then darts off with a sharp whistle! I remark how still it is to-day, really Sabbath-like. This day, at least, we do not hear the rattle of cars nor the whistle. I cannot realize that the country was often as still as this twenty years ago. Returning, the river is perfectly still and smooth. The broad, shallow water on each side, bathing the withered grass, looks as if it were ready to put on its veil of ice at any moment. It seems positively to invite the access of frost. I seem to hear already the creaking, shivering sound of ice there, broken by the undulations my boat makes. So near are we to winter. Then, nearer home, I hear two or three song sparrows on the button-bushes sing as in spring, – that memorable tinkle, – as if it would be last as it was first. The few blackish leaves of pontederia rising above the water now resemble ducks at a distance, and so help to conceal them now that they are returning. The weeds are dressed in their frost jackets, naked down to their close-fitting downy or flannel shirts. Like athletes they challenge the winter, these bare twigs. This cold refines and condenses us. Our spirits are strong, like that pint of cider in the middle of a frozen barrel. The cool, placid, silver-plated waters at even coolly await the frost. The musquash is steadily adding to his winter lodge. There is no need of supposing a peculiar instinct telling him how high to build his cabin. He has had a longer experience in this river-valley than we. Evergreens, I should say, fall early, both the coniferous and the broad-leaved. That election-cake fungus which is still growing (as for some months) appears to be a Boletus. I love to get out of cultivated fields where I walk on an imported sod, on English grass, and walk in the fine sedge of woodland hollows, on an American sward. In the former case my thoughts are heavy and lumpish, as if I fed on turnips. In the other I nibble groundnuts. Your hands begin to be cool, rowing, now. At many a place in sprout-lands, where the sedge is peculiarly flat and white or hoary, I put down my hand to feel if there is frost on it. It must be the trace of frost. Since the frost of the 11th, the grass and stubble has received another coat of tawny. That andropogon bright feathery top may be put with the clematis seed and tail. Only this cold, clear sky can light them up thus. The farmer begins to calculate how much longer he can safely leave his potatoes out. Each ball of the button-bush reflected in the silvery water by the riverside appears to me as distinct and important as a star in the heavens viewed through “optic glass.” This, too, deserves its Kepler and Galileo. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE As nature generally, on the advent of frost, puts on a russet and tawny dress, so is not man clad more in harmony with nature in the fall in a tawny suit or the different hues of Vermont gray? I would fain see him glitter like a sweet-fern twig between me and the sun. A few green yellow lily pads lie on the surface waiting to be frozen in. All the Lycopodium complanatum I see to-day has shed its pollen. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 18, Tuesday: At break of day, John Brown surrendered to the 86 US Marines under the command of 1st Lieutenant Israel Green, and Lieutenant-Colonel Robert E. Lee. He had sent his son Watson Brownout to parley under a white flag and the son had been gut-shot by the citizens of Harpers Ferry. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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He had managed to crawl back to the shelter of the engine house and live on, groaning, his head cradled in Edwin Coppoc’s lap, but would soon expire.

(His widow Isabella M. Thompson Brown would remarry with his brother Salmon Brown.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Eventually, the USMC would be putting out an official historical pamphlet about this capture:

The New-York Herald’s article on this day cut straight to the primal white fear, of an “Extensive Negro HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Conspiracy in Virginia and Maryland”:

Lest we suppose this “servile insurrection” thingie to have been a phenomenon confined to the tabloid press, here is the comparison front-page headline of the New-York Times: HDT WHAT? INDEX

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The news of the raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry was in all newspapers by this day’s edition.

Town residents George Mauzy and Mary Mauzy wrote again to their daughter Eugenia Mauzy Burton and son- in-law James H. Burton, who were then living in England (Burton had been a machinist, foreman, and Acting Master Armorer at the between 1844-1854):

To Eugenia Burton, Enfield, England October 18, 1859 This has been one of the saddest days that Harper’s Ferry ever experienced. This morning, when the armorers went to the shops to go to work, lo and behold, the shops had been taken possession of by a set of abolitionists and the doors were guarded by Negroes with rifles. —George Mauzy

At his capture, a document in Captain John Brown’s handwriting was found in his clothing. The document listed the Chatham, Canada signatories to “Provisional Constitution and Ordinances for the People of the United States.”

Henry Thoreau was written a commercial letter: Cambridge Aug 18 Mr Thoreau Dear Sir Inclosed please find $15 00 for which send us 10 #s Blacklead by return of express—directed as usual Yours truly Welch, Bigelow, &Co Aug 18. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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October 18. Rains till 3 P. M., but is warmer. P. M.–To Assabet, front of Tarbell’s. Going by Dennis Swamp on railroad, the sour scent of decaying ferns is now very strong there. Rhus venenata is bare, and maples and some other shrubs, and more are very thin-leaved, as alder and birches, so that the swamp, with so many fallen leaves and migrating sparrows, etc., flitting through it, has a very late look. For falling, put the canoe birch with the small white. The beach plum is almost quite bare. The leaves of a chinquapin oak have not fallen. The long, curved, yellowish buds of the Salix discolor begin to show, the leaves falling; even the down has peeped out from under some. In the ditch along the west side of Dennis Swamp I see half a dozen yellow-spot turtles moving about. Probably they are preparing to go into winter quarters. I see one of the smaller thrushes to-day. Saw a tree-toad on the ground in a sandy wood-path. It did not offer to hop away, may have been chilled by the rain (?). It is marked on the back with black, somewhat in the form of the hylodes. Why can we not oftener refresh one another with original thoughts? If the fragrance of the dicksonia fern is so grateful and suggestive to us, how much more refreshing and encouraging–re-creating–would be fresh and fragrant thoughts communicated to us fresh from a man’s experience and life! I want none of his pity, nor sympathy, in the common sense, but that he should emit and communicate to me his essential fragrance, that he should not be forever repenting and going to church (when not otherwise sinning), but, as it were, going a- huckleberrying in the fields of thought, and enrich all the world with his visions and his joys. Why do you flee so soon, sir, to the theatres, lecture-rooms, and museums of the city? If you will stay here awhile I will promise you strange sights. You shall walk on water; all these brooks and rivers and ponds shall be your highway. You shall see the whole earth covered a foot or more deep with purest white crystals, in which you slump or over which you glide, and all the trees and stubble glittering in icy armor. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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I have primarily concerned myself as a historian with the servile insurrection that the white man “Captain” John Brown (AKA “Nelson Hawkins”) was attempting to instigate at the Harpers Ferry federal arsenal in 1859, a servile insurrection in regard to which he was expecting that he would be able to manipulate and into fronting for him. My contention will be that normal academic history writing is retrospective in nature, done in an awareness of actual outcomes and consumed by an audience driven by presentist concerns, and that as a result of this “ante-knowledge” (to coin a term), normal academic history writing presents an incomplete picture of the alternatives that had beforehand been available. Specifically, the fact that this Harpers Ferry situation resolved itself into a sectional Civil War, and that what our academic historians now know about is this fratricidal sectional struggle that actually did come about, is causing them to overlook the raw fact that the situation might well have resolved itself instead into a racial genocide similar to the one that actually occurred in our northern coastlands in 1675/ 1676, known as “King Phillip’s War” or might well have resolved itself instead into a class struggle similar to the one that almost occurred in the our coastal southlands in 1675/1676, known as “Bacon’s Rebellion” —and that for many of the white Americans who had some advance knowledge of what John Brown was planning, such a racial genocide or such a class struggle would have been much to be preferred over our actual “civil war” brother-against-brother, white-on-white fratricide —this HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE servile insurrection which Captain Brown was attempting to initiate, followed inevitably by a racial genocide, must have been a very acceptable outcome in their contemplation, an outcome that would have solved what they regarded as America’s “negro problem” — resolved it once and for all. America has had a series of race wars, first the war upon the Pequot tribe, then what is termed “King Phillip’s War,” then the attempt at servile insurrection by Nat Turner that was nipped in the bud in Virginia, then the attempt at servile insurrection by that was nipped in the bud in , then the “Sioux Uprising” under Little Crow in Minnesota, then the “Ghost Dancers,” etc. These struggles have always worked out very well for our white people, who always triumph in the end. So why are we so sure –given the unchallenged fact that the Secretary of War had been amply prewarned– that Captain Brown’s plot was one that had been entirely unexpected by the US federal government, sprung as a surprise, a deep dark conspiracy? It seems to me very plausible, given the number of people who had one or another piece of advance knowledge of what Brown was up to, that this thing actually came about not because it was unexpected and unwanted, but because it was very much expected and very much wanted. (You know, and I know, that President George W. Bush was briefed beforehand on the likelihood that Osama bin Laden would strike somewhere somehow soon inside the United States of America, and you know and I know that “W” did nothing whatever with this information, just as Secretary of War John Buchanan Floyd in 1859 did nothing whatever with the information that John Brown was going to attack a federal arsenal in order to seize weapons in order to stage a servile insurrection. You know, and I know, also, that the NeoCons already had an office in the Pentagon, in which they were developing a laundry list of must-do items which they were going to spring on the citizenry the moment we were infuriated by an attack upon our nation — must-get-done items such as our seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time invasion of Iraq. Of what relevance, therefore, is the conceit that the attack on the Twin Towers was a “sneak attack”? — Is this not of the same relevance as the conceit that John Brown’s attack on Harpers Ferry was a “sneak attack”?) HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1861

March 16, Saturday: The Confederate States of America appointed commissioners to Great Britain.

Governor of Sam Houston declined to take the oath of allegiance to the Confederate States of America.

The Confederate States of America inaugurated a Confederate Corps of Marines consisting of 6 companies. Colonel Lloyd J. Beall, formerly of the US Army, would serve as the Commandant of these Confederate Marines. The number of officers of the United States Marine Corps who “went south” was more than enough to fill the officer ranks of this new organization, and therefore a good number would be obliged to accept instead commissions in the Army of the Confederacy.

The Boston & Fitchburg railroad management, including Winthrop Emerson Faulkner,15 had closed the rail spur that led to Harvard College after a customer protest at increased fares, and so on this afternoon his son the college student Winthrop Harrison Faulkner had needed to hike all the way up to Porter’s Station in West HISTORY OF RR Cambridge to retrieve a valise sent from his home in Acton. The lad was crossing the main track to return to his dorm when whacked by an engine being sent into Boston at a high speed.16 The engine, in that era of let- the-pedestrian-beware, was neglecting to ring its bell.17 Waldo Emerson would conduct the funeral service, speaking of the deceased only as a classmate and friend of his student son Eddie Emerson and as therefore a “frequent” visitor at the Emerson home in Concord. Emerson closed his service with the utterly strange remark “We commit him to the Fates.”18 TIMELINE OF ACCIDENTS

March 16. A severe, blocking-up snow-storm.

15. William B. Stearns, President, Boston; Alvah Crocker, Director, Fitchburg; W.E. Faulkner, Director, South Acton; William B. Stearns, P.B. Brigham, and William A. Brigham, Directors, Boston. 16. Although badly injured, the young man survived for an hour. One source alleged that the killing was “instant” but that is false, unless “instant” meant something different in the 19th Century than it does now. 17. Note that had the dead-end spur over to Harvard Common been allowed to remain in service, there would have been a buffer between these high-speed through operations and the public. We don’t know how the father handled his semi-involvement in his son’s accident, although we do know that in that era of no liability, an agenda for pedestrian safety would not have been considered to be any part of the job responsibility of any railroad director. However, imagine how that locomotive engineer must have felt when somebody broke the news that the pedestrian he had struck down while incautiously speeding his engine through West Cambridge had not been some nobody, but had been actually the Boston & Fitchburg Railroad director’s Harvard son! “Oh-oh.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE April 28, Sunday: At the church on Bulfinch Street in Boston, the Reverend William Rounseville Alger delivered a sermon on “Our civil war, as seen from the pulpit.” (This would soon be published in Boston as OUR CIVIL WAR, AS SEEN FROM THE PULPIT: A SERMON, PREACHED IN THE BULFINCH-STREET CHURCH, APRIL 28, 1861).

A request was made to expand the new Confederate Corps of Marines to provide for 3 2d lieutenants per company rather than 2.

Professor Henri-Frédéric Amiel, who would be referred to as the “Swiss Thoreau,” wrote in his JOURNAL INTIME: “In the same way as a dream transforms according to its nature, the incidents of sleep, so the soul converts into psychical phenomena the ill-defined impressions of the organism. An uncomfortable attitude becomes nightmare; an atmosphere charged with storm becomes moral torment. Not mechanically and by direct causality; but imagination and conscience engender, according to their own nature, analogous effects; they translate into their own language, and cast into their own mold, whatever reaches them from outside. Thus dreams may be helpful to medicine and to divination, and states of weather may stir up and set free within the soul vague and hidden evils. The suggestions and solicitations which act upon life come from outside, but life produces nothing but itself after all. Originality consists in rapid and clear reaction against these outside influences, in giving to them our individual stamp. To think is to withdraw, as it were, into one’s impression — to make it clear to one’s self, and then to put it forth in the shape of a personal judgment. In this also consists self-deliverance, self-enfranchisement, self-conquest. All that comes from outside is a question to which we owe an answer — a pressure to be met by counter-pressure, if we are to remain free and living agents. The development of our unconscious nature follows the astronomical laws of Ptolemy; everything in it is change — cycle, epi-cycle, and metamorphosis. Every man then possesses in himself the analogies and rudiments of all things, of all beings, and of all forms of life. He who knows how to divine the small beginnings, the germs and symptoms of things, can retrace in himself the universal mechanism, and divine by intuition the series which he himself will not finish, such as vegetable and animal existences, human passions and crises, the diseases of the soul and those of the body. The mind which is subtle and powerful may penetrate all these potentialities, and make every point flash out the world which it contains. This is to be conscious of and to possess the general life, this is to enter into the divine sanctuary of contemplation.”

[THOREAU MADE NO ENTRY IN HIS JOURNAL FOR APRIL 28th]

18. Faulkner Hospital in Jamaica Plain now has an institutional history on the Internet (http://www.faulknerhospital.org/PDF/ The_History_of_Faulkner_Hospital_31110.pdf), and –rather than confess that their founder had descended from a Salem witch– is trying to tell us that “Colonel Francis Faulkner’s second son Winthrop was Emerson’s grandfather.” This would of course make the deceased, over whose mangled body Waldo was here officiating, out to have been something of a relative. It does seem plausible that the deceased had on occasion visited the Emerson home in Concord in the company of his classmate Eddie. However, in fact the name “Faulkner” nowhere appears in the most extensive Emerson genealogy I have seen, one which in some branches takes the family back into a generation of Great-Great-Great-Great-Great-Great Grandparents living toward the end of the 16th Century.

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THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE May 20, Monday: The Confederate States of America again to some degree expanded its Confederate Corps of Marines.

Large plantations such as Hardscrabble, Cameron, and Leigh had been established in the region surrounding Durham, North Carolina. By this decade, Stagville Plantation lay at the center of one of the largest plantation holdings in the South. Black slaves from Africa labored on the farms and plantations. Due to a disagreement between the plantation owners and the farmers, North Carolina would make itself the last state to secede from the Union. However, on this day the sovereign state of North Carolina, whose plantation masters were unable to sustain the thought that all men were created equal, did actually vote to “undo” the act that had brought it into the federal union centered in Washington DC. White Durhamite sons would fight in several North Carolina regiments. Seventeen days after Lee would surrender his army at Appomattox, it would be at Bennett Place in Durham that General Sherman and General Johnston would negotiate the largest surrender and the end of civil strife. While in Durham, Yankee troops would become users of Brightleaf tobacco — and this would be what would spawn the commercial success of Washington Duke and his family and the firms known as American Tobacco, Liggett & Meyers, R.J. Reynolds, and P. Lorillard. The first mill to produce denim and the world’s largest hosiery maker would eventually establish themselves in Durham.

Well, the above remark about being unable to sustain the thought that all men were created equal is a cold joke, really, a cold joke based on the reputation that North Carolina has acquired — as a state whose chief claim to fame is that at least it is not South Carolina. In fact none of the Southern tier of states were breaking away in order to protect their peculiar institution of human enslavement. That’s merely a modern misapprehension! The president-elect, Abraham Lincoln, had given them assurances that interfering with human enslavement was not an item to be found anywhere on his agenda. None of the Southern politicians had any reason at all to suspect that Lincoln had any affection for people of color, for in fact, as was well understood, he had no such affection. The man was a master of the nigger joke (if you hadn’t known that, it is merely that our historians have been sparing you the agony of hearing them). The primary reason for the breaking away was that the election had indicated to the states of the Southern agricultural tier very clearly that the Northern industrial sector of the nation was increasing in relative influence over the Southern. During the first century of the existence of our nation, the most important political fact was that the primary political division in the federal government was sectional, between the Northern sector and the Southern sector of the country. The Constitution had been drafted in such a manner that the powers of these two sectors were about on a par with one another — it was to achieve this rough parity between the industrial North and the agricultural South that slavemasters had been granted an extra 3/5ths of a vote for every human being they owned. Year after year, shifts in the relative power of the two regions had been being carefully monitored and struggled over. This was a sectional issue, a geographical one, an economic one, Northern sector versus Southern sector, and so, you see, any and all debates as to the morality of race enslavement pro and con amount to a mere “stalking horse.” All of American national politics had for all of the existence of the federal union been a delicate balancing act. When Florida had become available, from , Florida could not be brought into the union as an addition to the Southern sector until the federal politicians had come up with the idea of offering something equivalent to the Northern sector, so that the relative influences of the two sectors could be kept in balance within the corridors of power in Washington DC (so, Massachusetts was split into two states, Massachusetts and Maine, with the addition of Maine to the Northern sector balancing the addition of Florida to the Southern sector). When Texas came in, the whole chunk of territory had been brought in as one humongous state rather than breaking it apart into four reasonably sized new states, simply because the relative power of the two regions, north versus south, was being so carefully monitored and struggled for. For similar reasons, Canada is now an independent nation: Canada retained its independence because nobody could figure out how to add Canada to the Northern sector without adding Mexico to the Southern sector (and nobody wanted the Mexicans because they were thought of as half-breeds). National politics went on and on like this, and it wasn’t ever a struggle over freeing the negroes, but was instead a struggle between two groups of white men over which group of HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE white men was going to achieve dominance over the federal establishment in Washington. Now hear me, the black people were just a pawn, being moved around the white man’s chessboard. So, in the 1860 election, when a northern candidate won rather than the candidate that was in the pocket of the Southern sector, they became fearful that the big bad wolf was knocking on the door, that the Northern sector had finally won out in this long-term contest for dominance over the federal establishment in Washington. It didn’t matter how much Lincoln protested that freeing the slaves was the furthest thing from his mind (“Who, lil’ ol’ me?”).

Thus, at our present juncture, the states of the Southern sector were seceding not because the Republican election victory posed a threat to enslavement practices –such a threat was not presented by the new Republican party platform– but because with the growing industrial power of the North, the agricultural South sensed a permanent diminution of its relative influence. It was willing to be part of a 50% versus 50% nation but feared having to suck hind tit in a 60% versus 40% nation. It had been all right when Franklin Pierce, a Northerner, had been president, because they had all understood that Pierce was a true blue Southerner at heart (besides, he was an ineffectual drunkard with the charisma of a door stop). This time, with a Northerner rather than a Southerner in control of the White House, the Northern bloc was going to start adding a bunch of free states out west, with each free state having two senators to make the Senate ever more and more lopsided — and this long stalemate would be irrevocably shattered.

Ellery Channing had hinted that he might join Henry Thoreau and Horace Mann, Jr. at Niagara Falls. He did not show up, which disappointed Thoreau. After having spent 5 days waiting in the Niagara Falls area, Thoreau and Mann took the train across lower Ontario and spent a night in Detroit.

May 20. Niagara Falls to Detroit... Wild fowl east of Lake St. Clair; of which a long and fine view on each side of the Thames. Crossing, saw about Thamesville a small plump bird, –red head and blackish or bluish back and wings, but with broad white on the rounded wing and tail. Probably the red-headed woodpecker [Red- headed Woodpecker Melanerpes erythrocephalus]. The one dollar houses in Detroit are the Garrison & the Franklin H.

July 21, Sunday: The day of the slaughter at 1st Manassas / 1st Bull Run in northern Virginia had arrived. At 2AM the First Minnesota Volunteer Regiment was ready to march into combat if such be their destiny.

The march was very tiresome, as it was a warm day and very dusty. I could form no idea of the number of soldiers, as I could not see either end of the line. The road seemed like a living river of soldiers.

By 11AM they had forded deep Bull Run creek and taken up a position on the “secesh” side of it. By noon they had passed their first corpses, killed by artillery. In the dust, lack of uniforms on both sides caused considerable confusion, and enemy units came within talking distance of one another without identifying each other as enemy. Then their world fell apart. Immediately in this engagement, Henry Taylor took a musket ball and also a bomb fragment in his left hand and wrist. There being no cover and nor order to fire, the Minnesotans all dropped down. They were so packed together that some were lying on top of others. The regimental colors were saved by a soldier who ripped them off their damaged staff and wrapped them around his body, and by count after the engagement, that piece of significant cloth had received “one cannon ball, two grape shots and sixteen bullets,” in addition to the shot that had shattered the flagstaff. When they received their battle order, it was to “retreat firing.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Then there was a lull, and the men of the First Minnesota assumed that the battle was over and that they had won. They went shopping among the corpses, with Confederate revolvers being very highly prized as souvenirs. The rebel yells took them completely by surprise.

[I]t was then “Skiddoo,” every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost. There was nothing else to do but to get up and git out of the way; we could do nothing; it was an utter impossibility to restore order.

There would be in all about 5,000 casualties among the men who gathered on that day near that creek: 847 were killed, 2,706 injured, 1,325 missing. This would make President Abraham Lincoln aware that the civil war might be a long one. Jefferson Davis took a train to Manassas, arriving after the battle. He toured the grounds, addressed troops, and telegraphed news to Richmond. Joseph E. Davis and family arrived in Richmond, Virginia for a visit. US CIVIL WAR

A battalion of 365 US Marines led by Brevet Major John G. Reynolds took part in this 1st Battle of Manassas / Bull Run.

Kady Southwell Brownell was marching with the troops from Rhode Island and carrying a flag. Her company was deployed along the edge of a pine woods near a schoolhouse that quickly became a hospital after, at about 1:00PM, they came under fire. She became separated from her Robert, but stood on the line of battle in pants and knee-length skirt, holding the flag. About 4:00 PM, when the Confederates began to advance and what had been appearing to be a Union victory was somehow transforming itself into a confused and panic-stricken rout, her company, rather than rallying to the flag, along with the rest began a retreat toward Centreville. Seeing her standing there unarmed on the battlefield clutching her flag standard, a Pennsylvania soldier took her hand to lead her down the slope but he was then struck in the head by a cannonball. Kady herself was struck in the leg by a bullet or piece of shrapnel. Upon this Kady limped toward the woods and tried to hide inside an ambulance. Bullets came whizzing through the canvas of the sides, so Private Wilson of the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry offered her a ride on a horse that he had found wandering loose. He would report that they both rode this horse some 60 miles, into Centreville, and from there into Arlington Heights, where after about 30 hours she came upon Colonel Ambrose E. Burnside, who helped her become reunited with her Robert.

For centuries past, noble minds have regarded the power of oppressors as constituting a usurpation pure and simple, which one had to try to oppose either by simply expressing a radical disapproval of it, or else by armed force placed at the service of justice. In either case, failure has always been complete.

As the bloodied Union troops retreated in disorder from Centreville toward the District of Columbia, HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE the Confederate troops did not follow.

It was the hardest days work I ever expect to do. We marched 12 miles from Centreville to the Battle ground, fought over 2 hours hard fighting & then retreated to Alexandria 42 miles doing all inside 31 hours and only 2 hours sleep during the time & going without food for 24 hours having thrown off our rations before going onto the field of action.

Who should greet the remnants of the First Minnesota, minus 49 killed, 107 wounded, and 34 missing (most of them the abandoned wounded) for total losses of some 1 in 5, as it trudged back into Washington, but their congressman Cyrus Aldrich, again with his welcome troop of colored servants bearing hot coffee and sandwiches. One “Minnesotian” soldier opinioned that the whole episode could have been handled much better than it had been handled:

If we had been properly supported we would have gained the victory.

Another “Minnesotian” opinioned that their defeat was all due to the “unfair way of fighting” employed by sesesh forces:

It is reported or rumored rather that the enemy burnt the Hospital & killed the wounded in the field. I believe it. They are a set of barbarians at the Best.

Another “Minnesotian” opinioned that the whole thing was the fault of their CO, who had caused them to lose confidence:

I have heard as many as one hundred swear they will never go into another battle under him, they say they will desert first.

Colonel Willis Arnold Gorman was having a very bad press, or a bad hair day or something:

There is men in the Reg that hate him to shoot him as quick as looked at him he is an old tyrant … if there is any little thing goes rong he will throw down his cap and curse and sware like a trooper & it is a shame the way such an old man should sware so and when our Reg was coming down the river he got as drunk as a fool and hardly could stand up. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE But about the final word was offered by a man who wrote to his newspaper back home:

I felt very different in battle than I expected. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX

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“Specimen Days” BATTLE OF BULL RUN, JULY, 1861 All this sort of feeling was destin’d to be arrested and revers’d by a terrible shock — the battle of first Bull Run — certainly, as we now know it, one of the most singular fights on record. (All battles, and their results, are far more matters of accident than is generally thought; but this was throughout a casualty, a chance. Each side supposed it had won, till the last moment. One had, in point of fact, just the same right to be routed as the other. By a fiction, or series of fictions, the national forces at the last moment exploded in a panic and fled from the field.) The defeated troops commenced pouring into Washington over the Long Bridge at daylight on Monday, 22d — day drizzling all through with rain. The Saturday and Sunday of the battle (20th, 21st,) had been parch’d and hot to an extreme — the dust, the grime and smoke, in layers, sweated in, follow’d by other layers again sweated in, absorb’d by those excited souls — their clothes all saturated with the clay-powder filling the air — stirr’d up everywhere on the dry roads and trodden fields by the regiments, swarming wagons, artillery, &c. — all the men with this coating of murk and sweat and rain, now recoiling back, pouring over the Long Bridge — a horrible march of twenty miles, returning to Washington baffled, humiliated, panic-struck. Where are the vaunts, and the proud boasts with which you went forth? Where are your banners, and your bands of music, and your ropes to bring back your prisoners? Well, there isn’t a band playing — and there isn’t a flag but clings ashamed and lank to its staff. The sun rises, but shines not. The men appear, at first sparsely and shame-faced enough, then thicker, in the streets of Washington — appear in Pennsylvania avenue, and on the steps and basement entrances. They come along in disorderly mobs, some in squads, stragglers, companies. Occasionally, a [Page 709] rare regiment, in perfect order, with its officers (some gaps, dead, the true braves,) marching in silence, with lowering faces, stern, weary to sinking, all black and dirty, but every man with his musket, and stepping alive; but these are the exceptions. Sidewalks of Pennsylvania avenue, Fourteenth street, &c., crowded, jamm’d with citizens, darkies, clerks, everybody, lookers-on; women in the windows, curious expressions from faces, as those swarms of dirt-cover’d return’d soldiers there (will they never end?) move by; but nothing said, no comments; (half our lookers- on secesh of the most venomous kind — they say nothing; but the devil snickers in their faces.) During the forenoon Washington gets all over motley with these defeated soldiers — queer-looking objects, strange eyes and faces, drench’d (the steady rain drizzles on all day) and fearfully worn, hungry, haggard, blister’d in the feet. Good people (but not over-many of them either,) hurry up something for their grub. They put wash-kettles on the fire, for soup, for coffee. They set tables on the side-walks — wag-on-loads of bread are purchas’d, swiftly cut in stout chunks. Here are two aged ladies, beautiful, the first in the city for culture and charm, they stand with store of eating and drink at an improvis’d table of rough plank, and give food, and have the store replenish’d from their house every half- hour all that day; and there in the rain they stand, active, silent, white-hair’d, and give food, though the tears stream down their cheeks, almost without intermission, the whole time. Amid the deep excitement, crowds and motion, and desperate eagerness, it seems strange to see many, very many, of the soldiers sleeping — in the midst of all, sleeping sound. They drop down anywhere, on the steps of houses, up close by the basements or fences, on the sidewalk, aside on some vacant lot, and deeply sleep. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

“Specimen Days”

BATTLE OF BULL RUN, JULY, 1861 [CONCLUDED] A poor seventeen or eighteen year old boy lies there, on the stoop of a grand house; he sleeps so calmly, so profoundly. Some clutch their muskets firmly even in sleep. Some in squads; comrades, brothers, close together — and on them, as they lay, sulkily drips the rain. As afternoon pass’d, and evening came, the streets, the bar-rooms, knots everywhere, listeners, questioners, terrible yarns, bugaboo, mask’d batteries, our regiment all cut up, &c. — stories and story-tellers, windy, bragging, vain centres of street-crowds. [Page 710] Resolution, manliness, seem to have abandon’d Washington. The principal hotel, Willard’s, is full of shoulder-straps — thick, crush’d, creeping with shoulder-straps. (I see them, and must have a word with them. There you are, shoulder-straps! — but where are your companies? where are your men? Incompetents! never tell me of chances of battle, of getting stray’d, and the like. I think this is your work, this retreat, after all. Sneak, blow, put on airs there in Willard’s sumptuous parlors and bar-rooms, or anywhere — no explanation shall save you. Bull Run is your work; had you been half or one-tenth worthy your men, this would never have happen’d.) Meantime, in Washington, among the great persons and their entourage, a mixture of awful consternation, uncertainty, rage, shame, helplessness, and stupefying disappointment. The worst is not only imminent, but already here. In a few hours — perhaps before the next meal — the secesh generals, with their victorious hordes, will be upon us. The dream of humanity, the vaunted Union we thought so strong, so impregnable — lo! it seems already smash’d like a china plate. One bitter, bitter hour — perhaps proud America will never again know such an hour. She must pack and fly — no time to spare. Those white palaces — the dome-crown’d capitol there on the hill, so stately over the trees — shall they be left — or destroy’d first? For it is certain that the talk among certain of the magnates and officers and clerks and officials everywhere, for twenty-four hours in and around Washington after Bull Run, was loud and undisguised for yielding out and out, and substituting the southern rule, and Lincoln promptly abdicating and departing. If the secesh officers and forces had immediately follow’d, and by a bold Napoleonic movement had enter’d Washington the first day, (or even the second,) they could have had things their own way, and a powerful faction north to back them. One of our returning colonels express’d in public that night, amid a swarm of officers and gentlemen in a crowded room, the opinion that it was useless to fight, that the southerners had made their title clear, and that the best course for the national government to pursue was to desist from any further attempt at stopping them, and admit them again to the lead, on the best terms they were willing to [Page 711] grant. Not a voice was rais’d against this judgment, amid that large crowd of officers and gentlemen. (The fact is, the hour was one of the three or four of those crises we had then and afterward, during the fluctuations of four years, when human eyes appear’d at least just as likely to see the last breath of the Union as to see it continue.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Maria Mason Tabb Hubard wrote in her diary:

God grant them strength to utterly rout and drive the vile hordes of the tyrants Lincoln & Scott from our soil forever.

US CIVIL WAR HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1862

May 15, Friday: Confederate President Jefferson Davis rode out to Drewry’s Bluff / Fort Darling / Fort Drewry, Virginia to observe the battle.

Despite official British neutrality, the Confederate ship Alabama was allowed to be launched from the Liverpool shipyard in which it had been fabricated. US CIVIL WAR

US Marine Corporal John F. Mackie, on board the ironclad Galena, distinguished himself on this day and would be the 1st Marine recipient of the Congressional Medals of Honor.

Union Grounds, the 1st fenced-in baseball park, opened in Brooklyn. SPORTS NEW-YORK HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1863

April 26, Sunday: There was fighting at Cape Girardeau, Missouri. US CIVIL WAR

250 US Marines under Brevet Major John Lloyd Broome seized the New Orleans custom house and city hall, raising a US flag above the mint. 4 of the sailors of the USS Pensacola would receive the Congressional Medals of Honor: Boy Thomas Flood, Seaman Thomas Lyons, Captain of the Foretop James McLeod, and Quartermaster Louis Richards. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1865

January 15, Sunday: In Concord, Moses Prichard died at the age of 60.

Edward Everett died in Boston at the age of 71 (the body would be placed in the Mount Auburn Cemetery of Cambridge).

365 US Marines participated in a 2,000-man assault force under Lieutenant-Commander Kidder Breese at Fort Fisher on the Cape Fear River south of Wilmington, North Carolina. 51 soldiers, sailors, and Marines would receive the Congressional Medals of Honor. US CIVIL WAR

Thomas Carlyle took the last ms leaves of his THE HISTORY OF FRIEDRICH II OF PRUSSIA, CALLED FREDERICK THE GREAT to the post-office. He would comment that his labors on this history had nearly killed him:19 Evening still vivid to me. I was not joyful of mood; sad rather, mournfully thankful, but indeed half-killed, and utterly wearing 19. William Allingham would characterize this work as “the reductio ad absurdum of Carlyleism.” Simon Heffer would say: The book is shot through with Carlyle’s fundamental prejudices. It is a pursuit of a hero, one made all the more special by his self-reclamation from a degenerate, effete youth. It is a celebration of Germanism, more particularly Prussianism, and the resolute process of Germanisation. Above all, it is the text adduced, quite fairly, by Carlyle’s critics to prove his belief in the “might is right” thesis. Carlyle paints Frederick as a man of peace who, in his desire for peace, had frequently to go to war, because of the provocations of his rivals. “He is a very demon for fighting,” says his biographer. He is also “the stoutest King walking the Earth just now, may well be a universal one. A man better not to be meddled with, if he will be at peace, as he professes to wish being.” ...The need to fight to maintain peace was an excuse used by Adolf Hitler for his conquests, with less cause than in the case of Frederick. But the real example for Hitler was in Frederick’s power of recovery when all seemed lost, in the penultimate winter of the Seven Years’ War. That was why Goebbels read the book to his Führer in the bunker, to cheer him up; and it is the philosophical smell of the book, as much as its style and structure, that alienates modern readers.... Carlyle never quite gives a naked message of “might is right”; but endorses might being right when might is backed by veracity. One then has to argue with Carlyle’s judgment of what constitutes veracity, a quality often concomitant with inhumanity. PROTO-NAZISM HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE out and sinking into stupefied collapse after my “comatose” efforts to continue the long fight of thirteen years to finis. On her [Jane’s] face, too, when I went out, there was a silent, faint, and pathetic smile, which I well felt at the moment, and better now! HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1867

In Nicaragua, U.S. Marines occupied Managua and Leon. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1868

June 9, Tuesday: The initial meeting of the Board of Regents of the University of California.

In Washington DC, John Philip Sousa’s father enlisted him as an apprentice in the U.S. Marine Corps band. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1870

September 21, Wednesday: US Marines took the initiative to lower the flag to half mast above the American consulate in Honolulu upon the death of Queen Dowager Kalama “The Torch” Hazelelponi, because our consul to the Hawaiian Islands had declined to accept responsibility for such a gesture (he being uncertain that the report of her death was accurate). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1871

June 10, Saturday-12, Monday: Captain McLane Tilton led 109 US Marines in a naval attack on 5 forts along the Han River. This was retribution for the Koreans having attacked and destroyed the armed merchant marine side- wheeler General Sherman that had attempted to steam up the river without permission, and for having fired upon American small boats as they took soundings up the Salee River. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1875

May 18, Tuesday: The Radiant Dark op.1/8 for voice and piano by Charles Villiers Stanford was performed for the initial time, at Cambridge University.

In Washington DC, John Philip Sousa was discharged from the United States Marine Corps. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1876

At this point was no longer editing and writing for the newspaper that had hired him in 1870, in part because it had merged with another newspaper, in part because the heroism of the Civil War was long over, in part because his newspaper poetry was unreadable, and in part because his patron had deceased.

The United States Marine Corps began at this point to carry the Stars-and-Stripes into battle rather than a regimental colors (11 years later the United States cavalry would follow suit). This was done because they considered the national flag necessary, to remind all the recent immigrants who made up the bulk of the rank and file of the United States military, what it was supposedly that they were fighting for. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1876

At this point Richard Realf was no longer editing and writing for the Pittsburgh newspaper that had hired him in 1870, in part because it had merged with another newspaper, in part because the heroism of the Civil War was long over, in part because his newspaper poetry was unreadable, and in part because his patron had deceased.

The United States Marine Corps began at this point to carry the Stars-and-Stripes into battle rather than a regimental colors (11 years later the United States cavalry would follow suit). This was done because they considered the national flag necessary, to remind all the recent immigrants who made up the bulk of the rank and file of the United States military, what it was supposedly that they were fighting for. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Through his father Professor Benjamin Peirce’s influence peddling, the new federal administration granted Charles Sanders Peirce a position with the US Coast Survey which would for the duration of the war exempt him from the draft.

Let it be the sons of unimportant men who get their leg chopped off in a field hospital after being hit with a Minié bullet.

His Harvard College classmate Francis Ellingwood Abbot did not, of course, need to seek such an exemption, despite the fact that he was not yet a minister, since he was cross-eyed and therefore exempt. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE It was probably just as well that Benjamin was not drafted, for his father was a determined white racist who nevertheless supported the Northern cause, and he himself had such a contempt for traditional forms of logic that he would offer the following syllogism as a demonstration of their utter inadequacy:

“All Men are equal in their political rights. Negroes are Men. Therefore negroes are equal in political rights to whites.”

Makes you stop and think, doesn’t it? HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1880

October 1, Friday: Brazzaville became a colony of France.

Das Spitzentuch der Konigin, an operetta by Johann Strauss to words of Bohrmann-Riegen and Genee after Cervantes, was performed for the initial time, in the Theater-an-der-Wien, Vienna.

John Philip Sousa enlisted for the 3d time in the United States Marine Corps, in order to accept the position of leader of the Marine band. He would be the 14th leader of the band, and the 1st to be native-born. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1881

January 1, Saturday: Julia Ward Howe wrote, “I have now been lame for twelve weeks, in consequence of a bad fall which I had on October 17, I am still on crutches with my left knee on a splint. Have had much valuable leisure in consequence of this, but have suffered much inconvenience and privation of preaching, social intercourse, etc. Very little pain since the first ten days. Farewell, Old Year! Thank the Heavenly Father for many joys, comforts and opportunities.”

At a reception in the White House, the United States Marine Corps Band made its initial public appearance under a new leader, John Philip Sousa. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1885

June 18, Thursday: US Marines went ashore in Panama to protect the trans-isthmus railroad. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1889

March 4, Monday: Benjamin Harrison replaced Stephen Grover Cleveland as President of the United States of America. As the United States Marine Corps Band reached the reviewing stand in the inaugural parade, it gave its 1st performance of “,” a march by the band’s director, John Philip Sousa. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1892

July 30, Saturday: A farewell concert for John Philip Sousa took place on the White House lawn, attended by President Benjamin Harrison. Despite the rain, a large crowd attended. Sousa was presented with an engraved baton by the United States Marine Corps Band, and after the festivities, received his discharge from the United States Marine Corps. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1893

January 16, Monday: A 3-day conference of trade unionists ended in Bradford, England with the creation of the Independent Labour Party.

North American and European residents of the Hawaiian Islands organized a Committee of Public Safety and called on the American minister for aid. US Marines were landed from a United States warship and surround the royal palace, ostensibly to protect American lives and property but, many were supposing, actually to enable Sanford B. Dole to set up a provisional government (as of April 1st this action would be disavowed by the United States of America but, of course, it had already taken place). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

April 1, Saturday: “As you were, everybody!” In the Hawaiian Islands, the US Marines who had ostensibly been protecting American lives and property while Sanford B. Dole had been setting up a provisional government were withdrawn, and such action was denounced as having been unauthorized. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1894

During this year and the following one, during the Sino-Japanese War, US Marines were stationed at Tientsin in China, and penetrated to Peking for purposes of protection of American interests. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

July 24, Tuesday: A guard of U.S. Marines was sent to protect the American legation and American lives and interests at Seoul, during the course of the Sino-Japanese War (until April 3d, 1896). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

February 15, Tuesday: The USS Maine exploded in Havana harbor killing 260, 28 of whom were US Marines.

1898

Although this was most likely an accident, the convenient incident would in April enable a US declaration of war.

TIMELINE OF ACCIDENTS

Thousands of Americans would protest this Spanish-American War. Leaders would include Mark Twain, the author of “A War Prayer” and other works on the folly of war. CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE

However, the vast majority of Americans would get sucked into a war lust sponsored by the media: Remember the Maine, to Hell with Spain HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE May 1, Sunday: United States warships attacked a Spanish squadron in Manila Bay, the . Was it close? No, it wasn’t close. All the Spanish ships were sunk. 167 died, all of them Spaniards.

US Marines occupied the Naval Station.

“The message to García”: U.S. Army Lieutenant Andrew S. Rowan, through the assistance of the U.S. government, the Cuban Delegation in New York, and the mambises in Cuba, made contact with General Calixto García in Bayamo to seek his cooperation and to obtain military and political assessment of Cuba. This contact benefited the Cuban Liberation Army and the Cuban Revolutionary Army and totally ignored the Government of the Republic in arms.

May 5, Thursday: The John Philip Sousa band escorted Troop A of the Ohio National Guard as it departed Cleveland for the US war against Spain. CUBA

June 3, Friday: There was an initial contact between the of the US Marines and leaders of the Cuban Liberation Army, aboard the armored USS New York, at which these revolutionary forces provided detailed information for the coming campaign.

June 6, Monday: The US squadron bombarded Santiago de Cuba with more than 2,000 shells, causing severe damage to various Spanish ships and fortifications. General Miles in Tampa received the final plans for the joint U.S./ Cuban Liberation Army attack.

June 9, Thursday: Rear Admiral William Thompson Sampson took the armored cruiser USS New York to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 10, Friday: A battalion of US Marines led by Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Watkinson Huntington seized Guantánamo Bay without a whole lot of trouble, with the support of naval gunfire and guided through the cactus forest of the landscape by Colonel Enrique Thomas y Thomas of the Cuban forces. Sergeant John Henry Quick, because of his intrepid signals to the gunfire support vessel USS Dolphin while under Spanish sniper fire –signals that saved a Marine unit that had mistakenly been taken under “friendly fire” by this gunship– would receive the Congressional .

Preliminary thinking on the topic of an Advanced Base concept began. Ruth Pickering was born in Wichita, Kansas into the Quaker family of Joseph J. Pickering and Elizabeth Ann Beamer Pickering.

June 11, Saturday: US Marines disembarked at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba (the nature of a coal-powered fleet was such that we had an immediate need to create a coaling station in this general vicinity; torture and extraterritorial terrorist detention would arrive only as some sort of unfortunate afterthought).

The McKinley administration renewed a debate in regard to the annexation of the Hawaiian Islands. Discussions in Congress centered on the idea that “we must have to help us get our share of China.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1899

March 11, Saturday: The United States and consuls in decided to back Malietoa Tanu, son of the late King Malietoa, in his power struggle against the German-backed Mataafa to become the next King of Samoa. Marines from both nations were put ashore, and the USS Philadelphia bombarded areas held by Mataafa.

October 8, Sunday: US Marines attacked Filipino insurgents at Novaleta. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1900

May 31, Thursday: US Marines were among the 337 foreign soldiers marching into Peking (Beijing) from Tientsin to help defend the Foreign Legation Quarter from the insurgents of the Boxer rebellion.

British troops occupied Johannesburg.

In the 1st official concert of the Paris Exhibition, Le feu céleste op.115 for narrator, soprano, orchestra and organ by Camille Saint-Saëns to words of Sylvestre was performed for the initial time.

The governing body of the Free Church of Scotland voted 592 over 29 to unite with the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland (which had already approved the merger), creating the United Free Church of Scotland. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

August 4, Saturday: US Marines under Captain Newt Hall participated in the International Relief Force that marched out of Tientsin to lift the siege in Peking (Beijing) (in the process Private Daniel “Dan” Joseph Daly would distinguish himself, and win the 1st of his 2 Congressional Medals of Honor).

US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

August 5, Sunday: 20,100 foreign (Japan//United Kingdom/United States/France/Germany/Italy/) soldiers, including a detachment of US Marines, departed Tientsin to relieve the foreign legations besieged at Peking. At Peitsang, just north of the Hsiku arsenal, Japanese troops attacked Chinese defenders, who retreated after losing 4,000 in a battle that had gone on for 7 hours. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 14, Tuesday: An international force (France/Japan/Russia/UK/US) including US Marines fought its way into Peking (Beijing) to put down the Boxers.

During the siege 66 of the foreigners had died and 150 were wounded (of the Chinese Christians who had sought refuge with the foreigners, an unknown number had perished). The triumphant foreigners of course went on to plunder the city. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1901

September 28, Saturday: Domingo Méndez Capote and Alfredo Zayas distributed a manifesto throughout Cuba in favor of Estrada Palma as the 1st President of the Republic. The manifesto was signed by 32 distinguished Cubans including General Máximo Gómez, Manuel Sanguily, and Gonzalo de Quesada.

The Filipinos of a port known as Balangiga, southeast of Manila on the island of , had attacked a local US Army garrison that was at its breakfast after a night of drinking tuba palm wine. When the signal was given they had attacked with their machetes, chopping down 48 as the village’s church bells rang. The United States of America retaliated against the entire 600-square-mile island of Samar. We know of this through the records of subsequent courts-martial: US Army Brigadier General Jacob Hurd Smith would be convicted of having issued an order on this day to kill all male Filipinos over 9 years of age, and US Marine Major Littleton “Tony” Waller Tazewell Waller, accused of the execution of 11 mutinous Filipino porters, would be characterized in the American press as the “Butcher of Samar.” Army order on this day, by Smith: “I want no prisoners. I wish you to kill and burn, the more you kill and burn the better it will please me. I want all persons killed who are capable of bearing arms in actual hostilities against the United States,” General Smith said. Since it was a popular belief among the Americans serving in the Philippines that native males were born with bolos in their hands, Major Waller asked, “I would like to know the limit of age to respect, sir?” “Ten years,” Smith said. “Persons of ten years and older are those designated as being capable of bearing arms?”, asked Waller. “Yes,” Smith confirmed his instructions a second time.

The Army General would perjure himself by testifying before the courtmartial board that he had given no specific verbal order to the Marine Major, but the Marine would be able to produce 3 other officers who had been present as the above had come out of the Army General’s mouth. It would be revealed in the courtmartial of this Major, also, that when he passed the General’s order along to his 314 US Marines, he had to some degree restricted the order: Marine order, by Tazewell Waller: “I’ve had instructions to kill everyone over ten years old. But we are not making war on women and children, only on men capable of bearing arms. Keep that in mind no matter what other orders you receive.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

The subordinate Marine officer would be acquitted and the superior Army officer convicted. President Theodore Roosevelt would cause Smith, who was an embarrassment because he had come to be referred to as “Howling Wilderness Smith” and “Hell-Roaring Jake,” to be subjected to early retirement from the US Army, without any punishment other than reprimand.

Another American soldier, Captain Edwin Glenn, a judge advocate for the US Army, would be found guilty of having tortured Filipinos by waterboarding, which he referred to as “the water cure,” and would be fined $50 and suspended from duty for one month (he eventually would attain during the temporary rank of Major General). In a private letter President Roosevelt would describe waterboarding as “mild torture” and point out that actually we hadn’t “seriously damaged” anyone. The war had been legitimate because our armies brought freedom. The New York World would describe an American family sitting down to breakfast with the morning paper: It sips its coffee and reads of its soldiers administering the “water cure” to rebels; of how water with handfuls of salt thrown in to make it more efficacious, is forced down the throats of the patients until their bodies become distended to the point of bursting; of how our soldiers then jump on the distended bodies to force the water out quickly so that the “treatment” can begin all over again. The American Public takes another sip of its coffee and remarks, “How very unpleasant!” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1903

Fear of hooliganism causes Parliament to pass the Pistol Act, which severely restricted handgun ownership in Britain. As the legislation would not stop firearm-related violence, the British would in 1996 ban all private handgun ownership.

From CUBA: A SHORT HISTORY, edited by Leslie Bethell: “Lacking any tradition of self-government or political discipline, with a low level of public education, and impoverished by the war, the Cubans found themselves trapped between growing American control of land and sugar, and Spanish domination of commerce, virtually guaranteed by the peace treaty between the USA and Spain. Politics thus became the principal avenue to economic improvement and one access to national resources.”

25 US Marines were sent to Abyssinia to protect the US Consul General while he negotiated a treaty (they would remain into the following year). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

March 30, Monday: A detachment of US Marines landed to protect American interests in the city of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic during a revolutionary outbreak (until April 21st). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

October 22, Thursday: Having completed the manuscript for his magnum opus THE SYLLOGISTIC PHILOSOPHY, OR PROLEGOMENA TO SCIENCE, on the 10th anniversary of his wife Katie Loring Abbot’s death, at the age of 54, the widower Francis Ellingwood Abbot took a bunch of carnations to her grave, lay down alongside it, and drank poison. I do not fall out of this world by accident as a lunatic, I do not sneak out of it as a coward. I go out of it as a free and proud soul, with open eyes, at the command of honor and love. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

As the Reverend offed himself the LIFE magazine currently on the news stands in Harvard Square (this was not the Henry Luce publication with which you might be familiar, but a previous one of that title published between 1883 and 1936) was displaying on its cover new statuary in front of the New York Custom House:

This issue also contained a full-page illustration of an auto running down pedestrians. It described how union musicians were struggling to destroy the non-union US Marine Band –and how Japan desired to control the Korean peninsula –and how Russia needed to conquer Manchuria in order to hold an overland passageway to their Pacific port of Port Arthur. The motto of the publication was “WHERE THERE’S LIFE, THERE’S HOPE.”

November 5, Thursday: Major John Archer Lejeune landed his battalion of US Marines to ensure Panama’s independence from Colombia. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

December 8, Tuesday: US Marines disembarked in Panama. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

When Samuel Pierpont Langley launched a 2d piloted heavier-than-air craft on the Potomac River, it also failed to fly.

Herbert Spencer died in Brighton, Sussex, England. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1904

For the first time an individual American stepped forward and claimed to be able to give personal eyewitness testimony to the Indian Rope Trick. This was a young English gentleman, Sebastian Thomas Burchett, who reported to the Society for Psychical Research that a few years before on a tour of India, he had personally witnessed this.

A few months later another tourist, an American this time, made this same allegation of being a personal eyewitness to the climbing of the rope that vanished upward into the sky — adding gross details such as mangled body parts eventually falling from the sky, which the fakir had covered with a cloth and reconstituted into the living boy.

A US naval squadron demonstrated to force release of a kidnapped playboy named Ion Hanford Perdicaris by Mulai Ahmed er Raisuli in Tangier, Morocco. Despite the fact that Perdicaris was not a US citizen, and despite his being happy to be in the company of Raisuli, and despite the resemblance of this incident to the above Indian Rope Trick, President Theodore Roosevelt had the message put out “Perdicaris alive or Raisuli dead.” The American president, who had his own version of the Indian Rope Trick up his sleeve, put US Marines ashore to protect his US consul general, Samuel Rene Gummere. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS I go so far as to say that I do not regret having been his prisoner for some time.... He is not a bandit, not a murderer, but a patriot forced into acts of brigandage to save his native soil and his people from the yoke of tyranny.

January 5, Tuesday: A US Marine guard was sent to protect the American legation in Seoul, Korea during the Russo- Japanese War (until November 11th, 1905). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1906

September 28, Friday: US Secretary of War William Howard Taft declared himself governor of Cuba following the resignation of President Estrada Palma. He would attempt to quell hostilities between the government and liberal rebels, and organize new elections.

After serious revolutionary activity in Cuba, a Provisional Marine Brigade of 2,800 men landed at Havana and would be seeking to restore order, protect foreigners, and establish a stable government (until January 23d, 1909). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1907

March 21, Thursday: At the Salle Pleyel in Paris, 2 songs by Nadia Boulanger were given their initial public performances. They were “Soleils couchants, to words of Verlaine” and “Elégie, to words of Samain.”

To protect American interests during a war between Honduras and Nicaragua, United States Marines landed in Honduras. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

April 1, day: Max Reger enters into duties as director of music at the University of Leipzig. April 7, day: Song of the Siskin for SAT choir by Carl Nielsen to words of Aarestrup, was performed for the first time, in Copenhagen. April 8, day: Gustav Holst was hired as a teacher at Morley College in London. April 9, day: Azara, a grand opera by John Knowles Paine to his own words, was performed almost completely for the first time, in a concert setting in Symphony Hall, Boston. See May 7, 1903. April 11, day: The Toronto Symphony Orchestra offered its initial performance.

The catcher for the New York Giants, Roger Bresnahan, made himself the 1st catcher in professional baseball to don shin-guards. April 12, Friday: Prince Albert of Monaco was a guest of Kaiser Wilhelm at Berlin’s Imperial Palace. The luncheon included not only Kaiser Wilhelm and Prince Albert, but also Camille Saint-Saëns, Jules Massenet, Edvard Grieg, and several other artistic personalities.

In Belgium, the government of De Stain de Naeyer resigned.

The Swiss Parliament reorganized the nation’s armed forces as a standing militia with military training obligatory for male citizens.

The remnants of the Honduran army controlled merely the town of Amapala on Tigre Island. Dealing with the probability that the Nicaraguans would proceed to shell the town, the captain of the USS Chicago negotiated an agreement. Per the terms of this agreement, Salvadoran troops were to withdraw from the town and President Bonilla would be guaranteed safe passage out of the nation. A contingent of United States Marines was put ashore, to secure this town. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS April 13, day: At the Imperial Palace, Berlin, Kaiser Wilhelm II has a long talk with Camille Saint-Saëns, Jules Massenet and Xavier Leroux. He confers distinctions on Massenet and Leroux and gives his portrait to Saint- Saëns.

The singspiel Fernando, D.220 by Franz Schubert to words of Stadler, was performed for the first time, in Vienna, 92 years after it was composed. April 16, day: Suite in E for string orchestra by Arthur William Foote was performed for the first time, in Boston. Apr 17 day: At Ellis Island in New York harbor, 11,745 immigrants were “FOB.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Apr 18 Augustus Thomas’s “Witching Hour” premiered in .

In San Francisco, California, the Fairmont Hotel opened. April 19, day: The Piano Sonata no.1 op.8 of Karol Szymanowski was performed for the first time, at a Young Poland concert in Warsaw. The critics were not kind.

Charlotte Snell enters duties as head of the vocal department at the Mar D’Mar School in Winona, Minnesota. She obtained the position through the efforts of her fiance, Carl Ruggles.

The 11th Boston Marathon was won by Tom Longboat of Canada in what was then the amazing time of 2 hours, 24 minutes, and 24 seconds. April 20, day: The symphonic poem Souvenirs, by Vincent d’Indy was performed for the first time, in Paris. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1908

November 12, Thursday: The United States Marine Corps consisted at this point of 267 officers and 9,100 enlisted men. Approximately a third were tied up in guarding warships, while another third was tied up in shore duty outside the continental United States (the largest contingent being in the Philippine Islands). The remaining third was tied up within the United States as navy yard guards. There was at this time Washington DC infighting between the Army and the Navy, with the Army eager to grow by incorporating these men into its formations. Others urged that the Marines be formed into permanent battalions with their own transports, so that they could either accompany the fleet as an expeditionary force, or seize and fortify advance bases, as occasion developed. Temporarily, one faction obtained President Theodore Roosevelt’s ear and he ordered the removal of Marine detachments from United States ships of war (6 months later President William Howard Taft would return them). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1909

November 27, Saturday: US Marines landed at Bluefields in Nicaragua in support of a conservative rebellion against President José Santos Zelaya (the rebellion was supported by American capitalists in the country). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

December 16, Thursday: President José Santos Zelaya of Nicaragua resigned due to the presence of US Marines in his nation and was succeeded by the jurist José Madriz. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1910

July 13, Wednesday: The Marine School for Advanced Base Training was established. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1912

May 22, Wednesday: 1st Lieutenant Alfred Austell Cunningham arrived at an aviation camp the US Navy had set up at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, to learn to fly. He would be the 1st United States Marine aviator. After receiving 2 hours and 40 minutes of instruction, he would make his initial solo flight in a Curtis seaplane.

June 5, Wednesday: More than 1,500 US Marines disembarked at Guantánamo and Santiago de Cuba. These all-white Americans would take no real part in the ongoing “Race War.” They would merely “protect American interests” in the province of Oriente, and in Havana (until August 2d). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS “Equally alarmed, the United States government landed Marines in Daiquiri and announced further actions if the Cuban government failed ‘to protect the lives or properties of American citizens’. Protesting against such intervention, President Gómez ordered the army to crush the rebellion. By June the leaders of the insurrection were dead and their followers killed or disbanded. The fear and resentment left by the episode hindered black participation in Cuban politics for many years.”

August 2, Friday: The last US Marines to leave Cuba embarked on the USS Prairie. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 14, Wednesday: Major Smedley D. Butler led the US Marines ashore in Nicaragua, beginning our intervention to prop up the Conservative government of Adolfo Díaz.

Per a brief notice in New Zealand’s Rodney and Otamatea Times, and Waitemata and Kaipara Gazette, headlined “Coal Consumption Affecting Climate,” “The furnaces of the world are now burning about 2,000,000,000 tons of coal a year. When this is burned, uniting with oxygen, it adds about 7,000,000,000 tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere yearly. This tends to make the air a more effective blanket for the earth and to raise its temperature. The effect may be considerable in a few centuries.”

(We don’t know who it was who had the forethought to make such a calculation, but in fact there had been a paper presented by Professor Svante Arrhenius on December 10, 1895 to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and extracted during April 1896 in The London, Edinburgh, and Dublin Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science, “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid [Carbon Dioxide] in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground.”) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 4, Friday: Max Reger’s Konzert im alten Stil op.123 was performed for the initial time, in Frankfurt-am-Main.

The US Marines fought at Coyotepe, Nicaragua.

James Kendall Hosmer, LLD’s THE LAST LEAF: OBSERVATIONS, DURING SEVENTY-FIVE YEARS, OF MEN AND EVENTS IN AMERICA AND EUROPE, a book of reminiscences (NY and London: The Knickerbocker Press, G.P. Putnam’s Sons): Thoreau in those days was known in the town as an irregular, eccentric spirit, rather hopeless for any practical purpose. He could make a good lead-pencil but having mastered the art he dropped it, preferring to lead a vagabond life, loitering on the river and in the woods, rather to the disquietude of the community, though he had a comfortable home cared for by his good mother and sister. He housed himself in a wigwam at Walden Pond and was suspected of having started from the brands of his camp a forest fire which had spread far. This strange man, rumour said, had written a book no copy of which had ever been sold. It described a week on the Concord and Merrimac [sic] rivers. The edition fell dead from the press, and all the books, one thousand or more, he had collected in his mother’s house, a queer library of these unsold books which he used to exhibit to visitors laughing grimly over his unfortunate venture in the field of letters. My aunt sent me one day to carry a message to Mrs. Thoreau and my rap on her door was answered by no other man than this odd son who, on the threshold received my message. He stood in the doorway with hair which looked as if it had been dressed with a pine cone, inattentive grey eyes, hazy with far- away musings, an emphatic nose and disheveled attire that bore signs of tramps in woods and swamps. Thinking of the forest fire I fancied he smelled of smoke and peered curiously up the staircase behind him hoping I might get a glimpse of that queer library all of one book duplicated one thousand times.

Hosmer, who had been born in Northfield, Massachusetts in 1834, was a son of the Unitarian Reverend George Washington Hosmer. We can gather from the above that at some point during his childhood, before he attended Harvard and became a minister, he had at least briefly visited Concord, boarding with relatives there. We can HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE also gather from the above that Henry Thoreau happened to be at home when he rapped upon the door of the Thoreau boardinghouse, that the author was casually dressed, and that he had gray eyes (for more information than that we should probably turn to other more informed sources). Having abandoned the ministry and spent some time in Germany during the 2d Reich (~1873), Hosmer had in 1890 and subsequently put out A SHORT HISTORY OF ANGLO-SAXON FREEDOM: THE POLITY OF THE ENGLISH-SPEAKING RACE, OUTLINED IN ITS INCEPTION, DEVELOPMENT, DIFFUSION, AND PRESENT CONDITION, a racist nativist treatise according to which Anglo-Saxons originating in the lower north German plains are the only ones who can lay claims to decency and civilization. Not until we Anglo-Saxons control the world, dominating the Celtic Irish and the French Canadians and, shudder, all those colored people, can there arise a realm of eternal peace. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE (Well, but you probably suppose me to be exaggerating — to verify that hypothesis, click the link.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1914

April 21, Tuesday: Luigi Russolo gave his initial concert of “noise music” in Teatro del Verme, Milan before an overflow crowd. A number of the audience, there for this specific purpose, attempted to disrupt the performance with boos, whistles, and “anti-noise” of all kinds, as well as the launching of produce toward the stage. In the middle of one piece, five of the musicians descended from the stage into the audience and physically attacked the demonstrators while their colleagues played on. One of the vanguard would remember, “It was a display of an amazing harmonic arrangement of bloody faces and dissonances, an infernal melee.” Eleven people would be hospitalized.

In an attempt to assist the overthrow of Mexican President Huerta, United States President Woodrow Wilson ordered the seizure of the port of Veracruz. US Marine regiments took part in this action. This was in order to forestall the off-loading of munitions from a German merchant ship. 200 Mexicans were killed in the process, causing the opposite effect of its intention — Huerta, in opposing the Americans, had been made a defender of Mexico from foreign invasion and Mexico would break relations with the United States (an American embargo on arms to Huerta would, however, eventually produce Huerta’s downfall). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1915

There having been some 20 rulers over Haiti since 1843, some 16 of whom had been thrown out by revolution or murdered, enough was enough and the US Marines landed. The suicide of a prominent black member of the Haitian literary movement La Ronde, Edmond Laforest, in this year indicated the curious relationship between a nonhegemonic writer and the hegemonic language in which of necessity he or she is to write in order to have an audience (in this case French). Laforest’s grand gesture was to tie a Larousse dictionary emblematically around his neck before leaping into the river. Other nonhegemonic writers have been suffocated as artists beneath the weight of these Western idioms of triumph, but in this case the manner of the death was made indicative of this linguistic indenture. Subsequently, until 1934, the nation would be in effect run by the US Marine Corps. We would make a mess of things and train the Haitian army. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

April 25, Sunday: In the 1st modern amphibious assault, the British went ashore at the Gallipoli peninsula just to the north of the Dardanelles, and got pinned down on the beach. (Winston Churchill’s reputation would scarcely survive this debacle. The sad history of this British invasion force would bring home the idea that amphibious operations amounted to a special, difficult problem of warfare, for the successful prosecution of which special tactics, special tools, and special training would be imperative.) MARINES

Dawn. The invasion of the Gallipoli (Gelibolu) peninsula began. Some of the 200 Allied ships sailing from Lemnos entered the Gulf of Saros and opened fire on Bulair. French troops landed at Kum Kale and captured the Turkish fortress there. Anzac forces reached shore north of their intended landing point at Gaba Tepe. Australians scaled the Sari Bair cliffs and put the Turks there to flight.

However the Turks rallied and halted the Australians’ advance. British troops attempted to land at Sedd el Bahr on Cape Helles, but withering Turkish fire allowed only about 200 to reach shore. British landed successfully at Tekke Burnu and took the high ground at Eski Hissarik Point. British also landed unopposed 6 kilometers north at Y beach.

German forces recaptured Lizerne. WORLD WAR I

A prominent Moscow surgeon made two incisions into Alyeksandr Skryabin’s swollen lip. A blood test revealed the presence of streptococcus and staphylococcus.

The Armenians arrested during the previous day were sent into the interior of . HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE July 28, Wednesday: A 4th British-French assault on Turkish defenders near Krithia failed.

An angry mob stormed the French legation in Port-au-Prince, Haiti and forcibly removed President Sam, whom they discovered hiding under a bed. The president was thrown over a wall to Haitian citizens who literally tore him to shreds, making his various body parts the central attraction of a parade through the streets of the capital. American admiral William B. Caperton disembarked from his gunboat, USS Washington, in Port-au-Prince harbor, and at the head of a contingent of US Marines, took control of the government, beginning what would turn out to be our longest and least satisfactory Caribbean intervention (until August 15th, Wednesday, 1934). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

The governor-general of Erzerum Province reported widespread looting and rape of Armenians.

The Interior Ministry issued a circular telegram instructing that Muslims be settled in the large Armenians villages.

The deportation of the Armenians of the town of Aintab began.

The deportation of the Armenians of the town of Kilis began.

The deportation of the Armenians of the town of Adiaman began.

Professor Kakig Ozanian of the American College and others from Marsovan (Merzifon), together with the Armenians community leader Dikran Diranian and others from Samsun, were transported to the prisons of Sivas to be killed. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 24, Sunday night: Gunnery Sergeant Daniel “Dan” Joseph Daly was among some 35-41 US Marines who got themselves ambushed from all sides by some 400 (give or take) “Cacos” while they were in a ravine HAITI approaching Fort Dipitie. At daybreak on the following day he led one of the 3 groups of ambushed men to refuge in the fort, and for this would receive a 2d Congressional Medal of Honor.

November 18, Thursday: In Haiti, US Marine Major Smedley D. Butler led an attack on Fort Riviere. This would produce a 2d Congressional Medals of Honor.

Major Butler would be proud of himself until he got thoroughly sick of himself.

A circular telegram was sent ordering the deportation of Armenian children.

Mehmet Talât Paşa left Constantinople for an inspection tour in . He would return on December 18th.

Piano Sonata no.8 op.66 by Alyeksandr Skryabin was performed for the initial time, in Petrograd.

Apple-Blossom-Time for piano by Arnold Bax was performed for the initial time, in Steinway Hall, London. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1916

May 5, Friday: Hussein ibn Ali became the King of Arabia.

After two days of bombardment, the Germans managed a foothold on Côte 305 at Verdun.

Amidst the threat of civil war, and against the wishes of President Juan Isidro Jiménez, US Marines landed in the Dominican Republic.

Professor Albert Einstein became head of the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft (German Physical Society) as successor to Max Planck. WORLD WAR I

May 15, Monday: Jesse Washington was emasculated and his fingers were cut off, and was then hung over a bonfire outside the Waco, Texas city hall. Many children attended the event, as it was their lunch hour. Many photographs would be snapped, with a charred black body in the foreground and grinning white people in the background. Parts of the body would be sold as souvenirs. TORTURE

A battalion of US Marine began our occupation of the Dominican Republic.

Vimy Ridge was gained by the British. WORLD WAR I HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1917

April 27, Friday: Formation of the 1st US Marine aviation unit: “Marine Aeromautic Company, Advanced Base Force.”

June 5, Tuesday: Istvan, Count Tisza resigned as prime minister of Hungary due to discontent over the war.

Arthur Farwell got married with a 25-year-old actress, Gertrude Everts Brice, daughter of a civil engineer, in New York.

Symphony no.1 “Sermons in Stone” by John Alden Carpenter was performed for the initial time, privately, in the Music Shed of the Litchfield County Choral Union.

This was Registration Day for the new draft army in the United States of America, land of the free and home of the slave. WORLD WAR I

June 6, Wednesday: Desirous of peace, sailors aboard the German warship Prince Regent Leopold staged a hunger strike. Similar actions followed on other German ships. On September 5th the leaders of the strike would be executed by firing squad.

Georges Auric, Louis Durey, and Arthur Honegger organized an homage to Erik Satie in Salle Huyghens. This was the beginning of the group of young composers organizing itself around Satie, soon to be called Nouveaux Jeunes.

The US 5th Marine Regiment sailed for France. WORLD WAR I HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1918

June 4, Tuesday: The Ottoman Empire claimed a protectorate over Armenia.

Horatio Parker’s morality play The Dream of Mary op.82 to words of Chapman was performed for the initial time, in Norfolk, Connecticut. Also premiered was Land of Our Hearts for male chorus and orchestra by George Whitefield Chadwick to words of Ware, conducted by the composer.

United States forces saw major action for the 1st time in the war, at Belleau Wood near Château-Thierry.

The Port of New York was closed because German U-boats had just sunk 9 ships off the Atlantic coast. WORLD WAR I

June 6, Thursday: The US Marine “devil-dogs” advanced into Belleau Wood against German machine gun nests. WORLD WAR I

Perhaps this was the day on which 1st Sergeant Daniel “Dan” Joseph Daly motivated a group of his fellow Marines by crying out “For Christ’s sake men — COME ON! Do you want to live forever?” Or perhaps it wasn’t.

June 7, Friday: The Czech Legion took Omsk. WORLD WAR I

The String Quartet no.1 by Arnold Bax was performed for the initial time, in Aeolian Hall, London. It was dedicated to Edward Elgar.

June 8, Saturday: The Czech Legion captured . WORLD WAR I

June 11, Tuesday: French and American troops counterattacked the Marne salient. Americans took Belleau Wood while the French captured Mery, Belloy, and Fretoy. WORLD WAR I

150 US Marine arrived in Murmansk to make sure it could not be used as a German U-Boat base.

William Walton passed the 1st half of his Bachelor of Music examination at New College, Oxford. Dr. Thomas Strong, Dean of Christ Church Cathedral, wrote to Walton’s father, urging him to allow the boy to matriculate at Oxford. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 12, Wednesday: Germans attacked in the Marne salient, driving toward Compiègne, but were pushed back by the French. WORLD WAR I

At a public rehearsal in Vienna an unknown woman approaches Arnold Schoenberg and hands him an envelope. In it were 10,000 kronen with a note “To the great artist, an admirer, a Jew.”

June 13, Thursday: Austro-Hungarian forces attacked the Italians through the Tonale Pass. The attack failed.

Germans counterattack in Belleau Wood but were driven back by Americans. WORLD WAR I

At the internment camp of Ruhleben, Germany, Ernest MacMillan received word that his Oxford examiners had accepted his oratorio England: an Ode.

June 14, Friday: Turkish troops advanced into Persia and took Tabriz. WORLD WAR I

Gustav Holst passes the minimum medical examination to become a YMCA Music Organizer. His duties might include organizing musical activities among training camps and hospitals in England, or might include internment camps in neutral and enemy countries.

Hubert Parry received a letter from Macmillan publishers rejecting his manuscript “Instinct and Character.”

June 29, Saturday: The Marines of the USS Brooklyn went ashore at Vladivostok, Siberia.20 WORLD WAR I

July 18, Tuesday: Russian music stores, warehouses and publishing houses were nationalized by the government.

French, British, and American forces attacked in the Aisne-Marne Salient and the Germans quickly fell back.

A vast Allied counter-offensive, including US Marines, met the Germans south of Soissons. WORLD WAR I

20. They went in to protect the American consulate and other points in the fighting between the Bolshevik troops and the Czech Army which had traversed Siberia from the western front. A joint proclamation of emergency government and neutrality would be issued by the American, Japanese, British, French, and Czech commanders in July. In August 7,000 fighters would land in Vladivostok and remained until January 1920 as part of an allied occupation force. In September 1918, 5,000 American troops would be joining the allied intervention force at Archangel and would remain until June 1919. Since these operations were in response to the Bolshevik revolution in Russia they were partly supported by Czarist or Kerensky elements. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 9, Monday: Charles Joseph Maria Ruys de Beerenbrouck replaced Pieter Wilhelm Adriaan Cort van der Linden as 1st minister of the Netherlands. WORLD WAR I

September 10, Tuesday: The Red Army, led by Lev Trotsky, recaptured Kazan from the Whites. WORLD WAR I

Muslims rioted in Calcutta.

September 12, Thursday: New Zealanders breached the outer defenses of the Hindenburg Line at Havrincourt, southeast of Cambrai.

The American forces (2d Division, including the Marine Brigade) and French forces attacked the Germans in the Saint Mihiel salient, near Verdun. The salient would be reduced in four days. Three American officers saw action: Colonel Douglas MacArthur, Colonel George Smith Patton, Jr. (only temporarily a colonel, as a battlefield expedient), and Captain George C. Marshall. WORLD WAR I

October 3, Thursday: Maximilian Prinz von Baden replaced Georg Friederich, Count von Hertling as Prime Minister of Prussia. He was expected to negotiate peace. WORLD WAR I

American forces captured Montfaucon northwest of Verdun from the Germans.

The 4th Marine Brigade assaulted Blanc Mont.

The City of Philadelphia closed schools, churches, and anywhere large numbers of people might gather, in an attempt to arrest the flu epidemic.

October 4, Friday: King Ferdinand of Bulgaria abdicated, succeeded by his son, Boris III. Under protection of German troops he left for Germany.

Indian troops captured Tyre.

The bloodiest day of World War I, for the US Marines.

Germany and Austria asked President Wilson for an armistice based on his “Fourteen Points.” American troops renewed their offensive in the Meuse-Argonne. WORLD WAR I HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 14, Monday: President Woodrow Wilson publicly responded to peace overtures from Germany and Austria- Hungary: All warfare must end, Germany must define the nature of its government, and Allied officers would decide the process of evacuating Belgium and France. WORLD WAR I

Ahmed Izzet Pasha replaced Mehmet Talât Paşa as Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire.

The US Marine fliers 2d Lieutenant Ralph Talbot and Gunnery Sergeant Robert G. Robinson would be awarded Congressional Medals of Honor for their activities on this day.

November 1, Friday: In Turkey, the Ittihad Party, with 120 delegates attending, convened under the guise of the “Tejeddut” party.

The American forces broke through the German defenses at Meuse. The US Marine Brigade entered Meuse- Argonne. WORLD WAR I HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE «La guerre est une série de catastrophes qui produisent la victoire.» — Georges Clemenceau

The Norwegian ship Bergensfjord, with Sergei Rakhmaninov and his wife aboard, steamed out of Christiania for the United States. The composer had 3 offers in the US, but no definite plans except for them to get the hell out of Europe.

180 mutineers were arrested by German naval authorities at Kiel.

War began between Poland and Ukraine over Galicia.

Mihály, Count Károlyi proclaimed the independence of Hungary.

The Society for Private Performances was formed in Vienna.

Italian troops took Belluno, north of Venice.

French forces entered Belgrade.

American forces began an offensive toward Sedan, smashing through the German lines at Buzancy and advancing 8 kilometers.

YMCA Music Organizer Gustav Holst arrived in France.

7 leaders of the ruling party of Turkey escaped from Constantinople aboard a German . HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE November 10, Sunday: The US 5th Marines made a night crossing of the Meuse River against German resistance. WORLD WAR I

French and Serbian forces crossed the Danube into Romania. Romanian forces invaded Transylvania.

After two years of German imprisonment, General Józef Pilsudski arrived in Warsaw to a hero’s welcome.

Elections were held in all German factories. Those elected convened in the evening to form a provisional government: the Executive Council of the Socialist German Republic. Over the next few days, the executive council enacts sweeping social reforms including the 8-hour day, the right to organize, press freedom and release of political prisoners. Friedrich Ebert and Hugo Haase were named Chairmen of the Council of People’s Commissioners.

American forces began a new offensive north from the Meuse toward Montmédy.

Sergei Rakhmaninov and his wife arrived in New York City from Europe.

Charles Koechlin arrived in New York City from France to give a series of lectures on French music.

John Philip Sousa led his band in Toronto as part of a campaign to aid the Victory Loans of Canada. With so many amputee veterans in attendance, Sousa called this one of the most moving experiences of his life. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1919

At the request of Italian authorities US forces landed at Trau in Dalmatia to maintain order there between Italians and Serbs.The Marines of the USS Arizona were landed on Turkish soil, to guard the US Consulate in US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Constantinople during a Greek occupation of that city. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

May 8, Thursday: The 4th session of the Ittihad Tribunal was held. 180,000 Turkish gold pounds were requisitioned from the Tejeddut Party.

The 5th session of the Ittihad Tribunal was held and the trial of Young Turk propagandist Zia Gokalp began.

Leaders in Ruthenia agreed to join Czechoslovakia.

Otto Strandman was named the 1st Prime Minister of Estonia.

The text of the Versailles Treaty reached Berlin by special courier. Read it and weep. WORLD WAR I

Virtual civil war in Bavaria ended with the restoration of order by government troops. During 9 days of fighting 557 had been killed.

A mob of sailors and white citizens roamed the streets of Charleston, South Carolina assaulting any black Americans they found. 2 black Americans were killed and 17 injured. To restore order in the town it was necessary to call in the US Marines.

September 11, Thursday: Adolf Hitler inspected the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei. He would join this group. PROTO-NAZISM

Viscount French, Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, banned the Dáil Éireann as dangerous. The government then instituted searches and seizures throughout the country.

Great Britain announced that it would withdraw its troops from Murmansk and Arkhangelsk. WORLD WAR I

US Marines landed in Honduras.

HMS Hermes was launched on the River Tyne (this was the initial vessel constructed expressly to be an , but would not be commissioned for another 4 years). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Troops in Boston were attacked when they tried to make arrests. One person was killed. The riots essentially came to an end on this day. When the police union leaders suggested to Governor Calvin Coolidge that they would return to work while negotiating, he replied that there was nothing to negotiate and endorsed a plan to fire every one of these striking policemen.

As the funeral of Horace L. Traubel was being held at a church in New York City, with something close to 1,000 attending, the church burst into flames and the funeral needed to be relocated to the People’s House of the Rand School of Social Science. There, by way of a ceremony, several of the deceased’s poems from OPTIMOS (New York: B.W. Huebsch, 1910) were read aloud (the remains would be deposited in Harleigh Cemetery in Camden, New Jersey, close by those of Walt Whitman).

October 31, Friday night: In Haiti, Marine Sergeant Herman Henry Hanneken and Corporal William Robert Button sneaked into the “Cacos” camp and managed to off their leader, Charlemagne Masséna Péralte. — an act for which both Hannekin and Button would be awarded Congressional Medals of Honor despite having snapped a souvenir photograph of the body of their victim. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1920

February 16, Monday: A US Marine guard was put in place to protect the United States radio station and property on Russian Island, Bay of Vladivostok, Siberia, Russia. The US troops would be remaining on duty there until November 19th, 1922. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1921

February 8, Tuesday: Serenade op.4 for clarinet, violin, viola, and cello by Ernst Krenek was performed for the initial time, in Berlin.

US Marines trashed the offices of the Managua newspaper La Tribuna because it published an article unfavorable to them. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Mustafa Pasha, presiding judge of the court martial that had condemned Nusret to death on August 5th, 1920, after 6 months of imprisonment and trial was acquitted of the charge of having joined in a conspiracy against the government. This verdict signaled the beginning in Turkey of the reversal of the policy on bringing the Ittihadists to justice.

July 23, Saturday: “Operations Plan 712” was accepted by the Major General Commandant of the USMC, establishing the US Marine Corps concept of war strategy for the Pacific Ocean. WORLD WAR II

DO I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION? GOOD.

The US Marines “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1922

Our national birthday, Tuesday the 4th of July: In Atlanta, messages from President Warren Harding and Governor Davis of Ohio were read to the crowd as a bronze memorial tablet to President McKinley was unveiled near the Peace Monument in Piedmont Park.

In Gettysburg, Pennsylvania the 4th Brigade of the US Marine Corps re-enacted Pickett’s charge using modern armaments.21

Lenox, Massachusetts presented a pageant depicting life 150 years ago.

In Constantinople a tablet was unveiled in commemoration of David Porter, the first American Minister to Turkey (1831 to 1843).

Restoring normality, in Washington DC the German flag was allowed to fly above the German Embassy for the first time since US/German relations had been interrupted in February 1917. Restoring normality, also, the skull of Sir Thomas Browne was re-interred at St. Peter Mancroft Church in England and marked with a Latin couplet on a paving stone (in the church’s sacristy, a plaster cast of this skull was placed on permanent display).

DIGGING UP THE DEAD In , New Hampshire a Park & War Memorial was dedicated. CELEBRATING OUR B-DAY

21. No live ammo was permitted this time, which of course represented a considerable improvement over the original event — guns don’t kill people, bullets kill people. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1924

July 12, Saturday: The US Marine Brigade departed from the Dominican Republic. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

September: To provide protection for Americans and other foreigners during Chinese factional hostilities, the US Marines landed in . (“Don’t make us hurt you!”) US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1925

August 1, Saturday: After an occupation of 12 years, the US Marines withdrew from Nicaragua. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1926

May 7, Friday to June 5, Saturday, and August 27, Friday: Upon a coup d’etat in Nicaragua by General Chamorro there were revolutionary activities that led to the landing of US Marines to protect the interests of the United States. US forces would be active against the charismatic outlaw leader Augusto César Sandino during 1828, and would be coming and going intermittently in Nicaragua until January 3, 1933. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

August 27, Friday: Kristen Nygaard was born in Oslo.

The cruiser USS Galveston anchored at Bluefields, Nicaragua and put ashore more than 100 US seamen and Marines. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

December 23, Thursday: US Marines landed at the Liberal strongholds of La Barra de Rio Grande and Puerto Cabezas. They seized weapons and gave the Liberal provisional government 24 hours to withdraw. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1927

From this year until 1930, pseudo-Gothic construction would be underway at the new “West Campus” of Duke University a mile west of the original “East Campus,” in native Hillsborough stone, to house the undergraduate college for men plus new professional schools.

The bans against cigarettes had by this point been rescinded in all states, and taxes upon tobacco products had become a major source of government revenue. A wave of mortality due to respiratory-system cancers was about to sweep over the nation.

Friend Elbert Russell’s “What Christmas Brought” appeared in the Friends’ Intelligencer. He went on a goodwill mission to Central America on behalf of the American Friends Service Committee (this was during the period in which US Marines were fighting Augusto César Sandino).

January 6, Thursday: Fearful that Mexico was spreading Bolshevism to Nicaragua, threatening US capitalist interests and the , President Calvin Coolidge again ordered US Marines to Managua, to fight the forces of Augusto César Sandino in the mountains.

Concerto for organ and orchestra op.27 by Howard Hanson was performed for the initial time, at the Eastman Theater, Rochester, New York, directed by the composer. The work was an arrangement of Hanson’s Concerto for organ, strings and harp op.22/3.

The “Gopher Limited,” a Great Northern passenger train, struck a stalled streetcar in Superior, killing 5 and injuring 16. MINNESOTA

March: Felix Frankfurter’s THE CASE OF SACCO AND VANZETTI appeared in The Atlantic Monthly (this was the Frankfurter who would later serve as a Justice of the US Supreme Court). ANARCHISM

After Chinese Nationalist forces captured Nanking, a US naval guard was stationed there. American and British anchored in the river would use shell fire to protect Americans and other foreigners. Subsequently, US Marines and naval forces would also be stationed in the vicinities of Shanghai and Tientsin. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

March 7, Monday: According to the TIME Magazine of this date, “To China sailed last week from San Diego, Calif., a Quaker who has helped to put down 22 revolutions in his day, and later fought to make of Philadelphia a ‘dry’ metropolis. This respected paladin from Pennsylvania is of course Brigadier General Smedley Darlington Butler, U.S.M.C.” US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE March 16, Wednesday: The 4th US Marines landed at Shanghai, where they would remain for 14 years.22 US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

May 4, Wednesday: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was founded.

A meeting took place between Henry L. Stimson, special representative of US President Coolidge, and José Maria Moncada, leader of the Nicaraguan Liberal rebels, in Tipitapa, west of Managua. Stimson offered a truce followed by disarmament. The US-backed president would remain in power until the next scheduled elections, with some cabinet posts going to Liberals. A new National Guard would be organized, commanded by North Americans. Meanwhile the occupation by US Marines would continue. He threatened that if Moncada did not agree, his troops would be disarmed by United States forces. Moncada agreed. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

July 16, Saturday: At its 1st performance before an international audience, at the Baden-Baden Festival, Alban Berg’s Lyric Suite was received so positively that the audience demanded an encore of the entire work. Among the listeners was Béla Bartók.

Rebels under Augusto César Sandino attacked the US Marines base at Ocotal, Nicaragua, bringing 800 peasants to sack the town. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

22. In this year the US would come to have a total of 5,670 armed Americans ashore, and 44 warships in Chinese waters. For many decades afterward, in the Corps, Shanghai would be regarded as the ultimate duty station and those who had pulled a tour of duty there would be regarded as the ultimate Marines — those were the guys you wanted to go drinking with. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1928

January 6, Friday: US Marine 1st Lieutenant Christian Frank Schilt began a series of 10 flights to aid a besieged Marine patrol at Quilali, Nicaragua. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

January 26, Thursday: After 2 days of aerial bombardment, US Marines captured a Sandinista stronghold at the summit of El Chipote in Nicaragua. Achieving their objective, the Marines discovered to their intense embarrassment that it had been defended by straw-filled dummies. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

March 8, Thursday: US Marine Captain Merritt Austin Edson set out on a Coco River patrol to hunt for Augusto César Sandino. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1930

July 25, Friday: Lieutenant Lewis Burwell “Chesty” Puller won the 1st of his 6 Navy Crosses for valor in combat, chasing Augusto César Sandino guerrillas in Nicaragua. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

December 28, Sunday: Piano Concerto by Henry Cowell was performed completely for the initial time, in Havana, with the composer himself at the piano. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1932

February 22, Monday: John Philip Sousa conducted the combined band of the Navy, Army and Marine Corps in front of the Capitol Building in Washington DC in the initial performance of his George Washington Bicentennial march, on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of Washington’s birth.

February 27, Saturday: Rightists attacked Social Democrats in Mäntsälä, Finland. This would escalate into a rightwing rebellion against the government by the Lapua Movement.

James Chadwick announced in an article in Nature the discovery of the existence in an atomic nucleus of a chargeless particle, that would come to be referred to as the neutron.

John Philip Sousa conducted the US Marine Band in his Hands Across the Sea march in Washington DC. This would be his final public performance.

March 8, Tuesday: Wassail Song for chorus by Gustav Holst to traditional words was performed for the first time, in the Town Hall, Huddersfield, Yorkshire.

The remains of John Philip Sousa lay in state, accompanied by an honor guard at the Marine Barracks in Washington DC.

March 10, Thursday: A short funeral service in memory of John Philip Sousa took place in the Marine Band Auditorium in Washington DC. The service was broadcast over the airwaves of the Columbia Broadcasting System. A military procession led the way to the Congressional Cemetery past thousands lining the route, and the remains were deposited.

Die Bürgschaft, an opera by Kurt Weill to words of Neher and the composer after Herder, was performed for the initial time, at the Städtische Oper inBerlin. The Städtische Oper had been strongly attacked in the right- wing press, but the opera was relatively successful.

Dichotomy op.12 for chamber orchestra by Wallingford Riegger was performed for the initial time, in Berlin.

In Tall Grass, a song for alto, oboe, percussion and piano by Ruth Crawford to words of Sandburg, was performed for the initial time, in Berlin.

When Duke Ellington and his Orchestra arrived in Los Angeles, they were given a parade to their hotel. They went immediately to radio station KHJ and broadcast to the west coast. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 26, Monday: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi broke his week-old fast after the British government acceded to his demands.

Lieutenant Lewis Burwell “Chesty” Puller won the 2d of his 6 Navy Crosses for valor in combat in Nicaragua, when his Marine unit was ambushed. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1933

As the year began Gerardo Machado y Morales was deeply entrenched in power in Cuba, using official brutality to intercept any and all opposition.

The Japanese army invaded the Hebei province of Manchuria.

Following the condemnation of this occupation, Japan left the .

The US in this year would have 3,027 armed Americans on the mainland of China. This sort of troop disposition was regarded at the time as protective and as fully legitimated by the spirit, if not the verbissima letter, of treaties we had entered into in good faith with China between 1858 and 1901 — at least, it was regarded in such a manner by us, and the issue, whether it was so regarded by them, apparently is a topic that seldom came up. What are friends for? US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

During a revolution against Cuban President Gerardo Machada, US naval forces demonstrated their force and presence but no landing took place.

The following is an excerpt from a speech by Major General Smedley Butler, USMC, twice awarded the Medal of Honor (1914, 1917): War is just a racket. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses. I believe in adequate defense at the coastline and nothing else. If a nation comes over here to fight, then we’ll fight. The trouble with America is that when the dollar only earns 6 percent over here, then it gets restless and goes overseas to get 100 percent. Then the flag follows the dollar and the soldiers follow the flag. I wouldn’t go to war again as I have done to protect some lousy investment of the bankers. There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes and the other is the Bill of Rights. War for any other reason is simply a racket. There isn’t a trick in the racketeering bag that the military gang is blind to. It has its ‘finger men’ to point out enemies, its ‘muscle men’ to destroy enemies, its ‘brain men’ to plan war preparations and a ‘Big Boss’ Super-Nationalistic-Capitalism. It may seem odd for me, a military man to adopt such a comparison. Truthfulness compels me to. I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country’s most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it. Like all members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service. I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912 (where have I heard that name before?). I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested. During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.

January 2, Monday: The 5th Marine Regiment departed from Nicaragua. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

November 14, Tuesday: Thinking outside the box, US Marines at Quantico, Virginia began work on a “Tentative Landing Operations Manual.”

December 7, Thursday: The US was established. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1934

US Marines landed at Foochow, China, to protect the American Consulate. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

January 15, Monday: Fulgencio Batista, with the blessing of the United States federal government, forced the resignation of the Ramón Grau San Martín/Antonio Guiteras y Holmes government in Cuba.

The USMC published its TENTATIVE MANUAL FOR LANDING OPERATIONS. WORLD WAR II

August 15, Wednesday: Paraguayans defeated Bolivians at Picuiba, opening the road west.

During the 19 years that the US Marine Corps had run Haiti, making a mess of things and training the Haitian army, we had maintained the road system in the countryside by a scheme of forced peasant labor, causing a guerrilla revolt. At this point President Franklin Delano Roosevelt ordered a Marine withdrawal.

US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1937

December 7, Tuesday: US Marine Captain Evans Carlson went to Yenan, China to observe the Communist Chinese armies in action. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1939

The US Congress granted funds for strengthening the defenses of the Panama Canal.

At this point United States Marine Corps training included a daily 30-minute session of boxing practice, based in part on British drills. The recruits lined up in two ranks and the Drill Instructor would give the command, “Open ranks, March! Front rank, About face! Box!” Every 30-60 seconds the DI would have the lines step left or right to expose each marine to a new opponent. Since this was bare-knuckle work the recruits tended to go easy on each other, and since the training concentrated on punching rather than slipping the opponent’s punches it was relatively useless for self-defense. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE The ornate Panama Pacific International Exposition that had been erected on what had been mud flats at the north of San Francisco, California in 1915 had been a great success, but had since been generally dismantled. At this point, therefore, the city attempted another such success, no Environmental Impact Study being necessary, by filling in another such mud flat, this one in the center of the bay, to create what would later come into use as a US Marine base, known as “Treasure Island”: HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 8, Friday: President Franklin Delano Roosevelt proclaimed a “limited national emergency” and ordered an increase in the enlisted strengths of all the US armed forces (naval enlisted men from 110,813 to 145,000, Marine Corps enlisted strength from 18,325 to 25,000), and authorized the recall to active duty of officers, men, and nurses on retired lists of Navy and Marine Corps. The Allies announced a long-range of Germany.

At Bedzin in Poland, Germans herded several hundred Jews into a synagogue and set it afire, burning them to death.

ANTISEMITISM

All Jewish businesses in German-occupied territories were ordered to from this point forward mark themselves with a star of David.

German forces captured Aleksandrow. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1940

June 30, Sunday: German troops landed unopposed on the Channel Islands. Soviet troops landed at Ismail (Izmail), Bessarabia.

Führer Adolf Hitler ordered the seizure of all art in Paris owned by the state or by Jews. ANTISEMITISM

The US Navy had 1,099 vessels at its disposal, and the following personnel: — Navy...... 160,997 — Marine Corps.....28,364 — Coast Guard...... 13,766 — Total ...... 203,127 WORLD WAR II

July 1, Monday: German U-boats began to attack merchant ships in the Atlantic.

The French government relocated from Clermont-Ferrand to Vichy.

The psychiatric Institute at Görden began operations as the center for killing “mentally defective” children.

The US Navy awarded contracts for 44 vessels.

Headquarters, Marine Corps Air Wing was established at San Diego, California.

The US Congress passed a Selective Training and Service Act by a margin of one vote — this was to be the initial peacetime draft in the history of the United States of America. WORLD WAR II

September 29, Sunday: The Midway Detachment of the Fleet Marine Force arrived at Midway Island. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1941

May 23, Friday: Mélancolie for piano by Francis Poulenc was performed for the initial time, in the Salle Gaveau, Paris.

Incidental music to Aristophanes’ play The Peace by Leonard Bernstein was performed for the initial time, in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The HMS Kelly, a K-class destroyer of 1,695 tons commanded by Captain Lord Louis Mountbatten, was bombarding German positions on the island of in company with the destroyer Kashmir when at 5:30AM they were engaged by German dive-bombers. The Kashmir, hit by a 1,000-pound bomb, sank immediately and 79 died. Soon after the Kelly was also hit and within minutes it also would sink and 128 more would die. Its floaters, including Captain Lord Louis Mountbatten, would be picked up by the destroyer HMS Kipling, which would also be able to retrieve 159 floaters from the debris field of the Kashmir.23

At a monster “America First” rally at Madison Square Garden in New-York, a recipient of the Distinguished Flying Cross, Charles Lindbergh, was urging us to decline to join in Britain’s struggle against our friend Der Führer Adolf Hitler. (In all probability at this point Chuck was being sincere — for he hadn’t yet met the German and Russian mistresses by whom he would be producing a number of illegitimate children.)

WORLD WAR II

23. At a first order of approximation there seems to be a remarkable similarity between fighting at sea and feeding fish. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 30, Monday: In a heroic action in the Borisov region, Soviet troops halted the German advance for two days.

German forces establish a bridgehead across the Berezina at Bobruysk.

300 Jews were shot in Lutsk.

300 Dutch Jews were rounded up and sent to the stone quarries at Mauthausen. None would survive. ANTISEMITISM

Vichy France severed diplomatic relations with the USSR.President Franklin Delano Roosevelt established his WORLD WAR II

Franklin D. Roosevelt Library at Hyde Park.

Naval vessels on hand (all types) — 1,899. Personnel: Navy...... 284,427 Marine Corps...... 54,359 Coast Guard...... 19,235 Total personnel..358,021

July 7, Monday: President Franklin Delano Roosevelt announced to Congress that an executive agreement has been made with for United States troops to occupy that country, and ordered the Navy to take all steps to maintain communications between the United States and Iceland. A naval task force under Rear Admiral D.M. LeBreton landed the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade under Brigadier General J. Marston at Reykjavik, Iceland.

The 1st Marine Aircraft Wing was formed at Quantico, Virginia. WORLD WAR II

Iceland, which fell within a United States defense zone, received American troops, replacing British forces previously guarding the island.

1,150 Jews were shot in Dvinsk (Daugavpils). ANTISEMITISM HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE July 10, Thursday: The 2d Marine Aircraft Wing was formed at San Diego, California.

Jump for Joy, a revue with music mostly by Duke Ellington, opened at the Mayan Theater, Los Angeles.

US Military Attache Smith-Hutton at reported that in Ariake Bay the Japanese navy was secretly practicing aircraft attacks against capital ships. This bay closely resembles Pearl Harbor.

Soviets counterattacked southwest of Korosten to fierce resistance.

Stalin became Chairman of the High Command.

In the Ukraine, the German Army crossed the River Dnieper. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE , Friday: 600 Jews were shot in Stawiski, northeast of Warsaw. ANTISEMITISM

Germans decree that all Jews in occupied Russia would wear two yellow badges, they would receive only food surplus to the needs of gentiles and they must join public works crews. WORLD WAR II

The United States reduces by 10% the amount of gasoline that can be delivered to filling stations in 17 states.

In the Pacific, the US Marine Corps established a Naval Air Station on Palmyra Island and a Naval Air Facility on Johnston Island.

Early in the morning, Corporal Josef Jakobs was taken to an old miniature .22 rifle range within the grounds of the (where spies had also been executed during the 1st World War), placed in a brown Windsor chair (not the same one used during World War I) because with his broken leg he could not stand, and at 7:12AM executed by firing squad. One of the eight men in the squad shot him in the head rather than the HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE heart. (All other persons convicted and executed under the Treachery Act of 1940 and the High Treason Act of 1351 were hanged, at either Wandsworth or Pentonville Prisons. His unmarked civilian grave at St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Cemetery in northwest London has since been re-used. This would be the sole spy to be executed at the Tower during this war. It now appears rather likely that his will be the last execution ever to take place at the Tower.)

FINAL EXECUTIONS

June 17, 1939 Eugen Weidman public execution by guillotine, at Versailles

German spy executed by firing squad at the Tower August 15, 1941 Corporal Josef Jakobs of London

General Dwight David “Ike” Eisenhower ordered Private Edward Donald his execution by firing squad for desertion during January 31, 1945 “Eddie” Slovik World War II by his own unit, the 28th Infantry Division, in a small town in northeast France

November 14, Friday: Concerto grosso for chamber orchestra by Bohuslav Martinu was performed for the initial time, in Boston (a scheduled 1938 premiere in Vienna had needed to be canceled due to the German Anschluss; one scheduled in Prague had needed to be canceled due to the German invasion of Czechoslovakia; and, a premiere scheduled in Paris during May 1940 had needed to be canceled due to the German invasion of Belgium).

New laws in Hungary prohibited marriages between Jews and Gentiles, prohibited Jews in the army, and expropriated Jewish lands. ANTISEMITISM

Germany banned correspondents of the three major American radio networks: NBC, CBS, and the Mutual Broadcasting Network.

The British aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal, that had been badly damaged by a German U-boat, slipped beneath the waves while still somewhat short of making a safe dock at .

The USA intercepted and decoded a communication from the Japanese Navy alerting the Japanese Merchant Marine that wartime recognition signals would be in effect as of December 1st.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt announced that the 970 US Marines currently in the cities of Shanghai, Beijing, and Tientsin in China were to be withdrawn. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE November 27, Thursday: Soviet troops retook Rostov.

The 4th Marines left Shanghai — the end of the era of the “Old China Hand.”

The Japanese news agency Domei reported that “there was little hope of bridging the gap between the opinions of Japan and the United States.”

The Australian Navy destroyer HMAS Parramatta was escorting a munitions ship from Tobruk to Alexandria when it was torpedoed and sunk off the Libyan port of Bardia by Kapitän-Leutnant Hans Heidtmann’s U559. 138 of the 164 on board died, including J.H.Walker.24

(When U559 would be destroyed by depth charges from British destroyers on October 30, 1942, 7 would die and 38 survive.)

Admiral H.R. Stark, Chief of Naval Operations, sent a “war warning” message to commanders of the Pacific and Asiatic Fleets. However, Secretary of War Stimson issued an unnecessarily confused and confusing “Hostile Action Possible,” or “DO-DON’T,” warning message. The Naval Court would subsequently find this message to have had the impact of directing attention away from rather than toward the naval facility at Pearl Harbor, which may have been its intent. The US Army, which was not equipped for reconnaissance, was directed to provide reconnaissance, and the US Navy, which was equipped for this, was directed not to provide it. The US Army was ordered onto a “sabotage alert” the impact of which would be to specifically preclude their focusing upon any outside threat. Although Admiral Stark’s war warning had been for the entire theater of operations, the US Navy’s attention was being diverted to a location 5,000 miles away from the Hawaiian Islands. The instruction repeated, no fewer than 3 times and as a direct instruction from the Commander-in- Chief, “The US desires that Japan commit the first overt act Period.” WORLD WAR II

(What this means is that everything you’ve ever learned about a “sneak attack” amounts to nothing more than and nothing less than Fake News.)

24. At a first order of approximation there seems to be a remarkable similarity between fighting at sea and feeding fish. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE December 5, Friday: After a night of -35° temperatures on the Russian Front panzers would not start and German guns would not fire. None of the Wehrmacht was equipped for winter fighting. The German advance towards Moscow was stalled.

Leonard Bernstein sent out cards announcing “the opening of his studio for the teaching of Piano and Musical Analysis” in his newly acquired apartment on Huntington Avenue in Boston. This would attract one student.

In the morning, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt dictated a letter to Wendell Wilkie to hand to the Australian Prime Minister, saying “There is always the Japanese to consider. The situation is definitely serious and there might be an armed clash at any moment.... Perhaps the next four or five days will decide the matters.”

According to John Tolland’s INFAMY (1982, chapter 14, section 5), Secretary of the Navy Knox commented at a Cabinet meeting, “Well, you know Mr. President, we know where the Japanese fleet is?” “Yes, I know” said Roosevelt. “I think we ought to tell everybody just how ticklish the situation is. We have information as Knox just mentioned.... Well, you tell them what it is, Frank.” Knox became very excited and said, “Well, we have very secret information that the Japanese fleet is out at sea. Our information is...” and then the Commander in Chief cut him off with a scowl.

Messages sent by the Japanese Striking Force were being picked up by Station Cast in the Philippine Islands. Japan assures the United States that her troop movements in French Indochina were only precautionary.

On the basis of traffic analysis, our forces in the Hawaiian Islands reported that the carrier force was at sea and was to the North. It was noted that all Japanese international shipping had returned to home port. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

All the existing bones of Beijing Man were taken aboard a train by a detail of 9 US Marines who were tasked to get the bones safely smuggled out of China before the arrival of the 1st Japanese troops (these fossil bones would make it safely to the Hawaiian Islands, but after the attack at Pearl Harbor would be lost in the confusion, and to everyone’s regret only plaster casts and sketches now remain; however, fortunately, additional skeletal remains of Beijing Man have since been discovered).

December 7 (7:40AM Honolulu time; December 8th in Tokyo), Sunday, “a day that shall live in infamy”: Admiral Husband Kimmel was giving his sailors one last weekend of liberty so they would have a chance to say farewell to their loved ones, and his fleet was all prepared to steam out of Pearl Harbor on Monday, December 8th, to seek a showdown Trafalgar-like battle with the Japanese fleet, destroying its offensive capabilities. The admiral’s battle plan was 113 pages in length and had already been approved by Harold Stark, Chief of Naval Operations.

But that’s not what happened, is it? Instead what we get is Fake News about how those sneaky little yellow Japs did a sneak attack on our peaceable Christian nation — simply because they attacked a day prior to the day on which we had been planning to sneak out to attack them. (I’m reminded of the time one of our draught horses was sick. Grandpa had a piece of water hose from an old washing machine, hanging out in the barn for just such purposes, and so, to get his horse to take its medicine, he shoved the hose down the horse’s throat and poured the medicine down the hose. However, he hadn’t gotten that hose far enough down the horse’s throat –so the medicine wouldn’t go down –so he put his lips to the end of the hose, and went to blow the medicine down the hose. Well, I’ll never forget this until the day I die — that horse blew first.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor, Oahu, and attacked Great Britain, invading Siam and Malaya and occupying the International Settlement at Shanghai. A sneak attack! (Well, but although the Japanese naval forces did not go ashore and take possession of the Kota Baharu airport until later in the day, they actually began to shell the Malayan coast at Kota Baharu and at Singora and Pattani, Thailand an hour and a half prior to the first activity at Pearl Harbor — which is strange behavior indeed for someone who is attempting to sneak up on your in your slumbers!) Soon a Japanese reply rejecting the United States note of November 26th would be delivered at Washington DC, and Japan would declare a state of war with the United States and Great Britain. Later in the day, the Netherlands East Indies, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Canada would declare war against Japan. I was on my way to one of the Young Friends’ meetings Sunday evening at about seven o’clock when the news of Pearl Harbor came over my car radio. Only a few others arriving there had heard it. JOHN R. KELLAM

Japanese carrier-based horizontal bombers, dive bombers, torpedo bombers, and fighters totaling 360 aircraft from naval Striking Force under Vice Admiral C. Nagumo heavily attacked ships of the United States Pacific Fleet and military installations at Pearl Harbor and other places on Oahu. Four , 1 , and 1 target ship were sunk; 4 battleships, 3 , 3 destroyers, 1 seaplane tender, and 1 repair ship were damaged. Navy Yard and Naval Base, Pearl Harbor; Naval Air Station, Ford Island; Naval Patrol Plane Station, Kaneohe; Marine Corps airfield, Ewa; Army airfields Hickam, Wheeler, and Bellows were damaged; 188 Naval and Army aircraft were destroyed.

Killed or missing: • Navy...... 2,004 • Marine Corps... 108 HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Army...... 222

Wounded: • Navy...... 912 • Marine Corps.... 75 • Army...... 360

[Personnel casualty statistics for the Pearl Harbor attack have been revised several times after evaluation of new data. The figures presented here were compiled in 1955 from official sources.]

Japanese losses: •5 kaiten suicide submarines • 28 aircraft • fewer than 100 men

Two Japanese destroyers shelled Midway Island. Japanese airplanes bombed Singapore, killing 63. Then bombs began to fall in Manila and other targets on and Davao in the Philippines as well as , Wake Island, Midway, and Hong Kong. Japanese troops took possession of Shanghai, including the buildings of the United States garrison.

United States naval vessels sunk by air attack, Pearl Harbor: [All ships sunk, except Arizona, Oklahoma, and Utah, would subsequently be raised, repaired, and returned to service.] • Oklahoma (BB-37). • Battleship Arizona (BB-39). • Battleship California (BB-44). • Battleship West Virginia (BB-48). • Minelayer Ogala (CM-4). • Target ship Utah (AG-16).

United States naval vessels damaged, Pearl Harbor: • Battleship Nevada (BB-36). • Battleship Pennsylvania (BB-38). • Battleship Tennessee (BB-43). • Battleship Maryland (BB-46). • Raleigh (CL-7). • Light cruiser Honolulu (CL-48). • Light cruiser Helena (CL-50). • Destroyer Cassin (DD-372). • Destroyer Shaw (DD-373). • Destroyer Downes (DD-375). • Seaplane tender Curtiss (AV-4). • Repair ship Vestal (AR-4). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Director J. Edgar Hoover ordered existing FBI war plans put into effect and Attorney General Francis Biddle authorized the Bureau to act against dangerous enemy aliens. Local police, in cooperation with the Federal Bureau of Investigation agents, began to round up the Issei leadership of Japanese-American communities both in the Hawaiian Islands and on the mainland (in today’s publicity documents, the Federal Bureau of Investigation unapologetically refers to these community leaders as having amounted to “previously identified aliens who threatened national security,” quote unquote).

By 6:30AM the following morning, 736 Issei would be in custody; and within 48 hours, the number would have risen to 1,291. Caught by surprise for the most part, these men would be held with no formal charges and family members would be unable to visit them. Most would spend the war years in enemy-alien internment HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE camps run by the Justice Department.

Within 72 hours the Agents would be working a 24-hour day, at the job of rounding up Americans to take them to detention camps. They would take a total of 3,846 citizens into custody as enemy aliens. Any radio capable of short-wave reception would be seized as an obvious weapon of war, as well as any weapons of any kind, their ammo — and, the records assert, dynamite. (Was some farmer blasting out the stumps in his pasture?)

A message was sent from the Japanese Consul in Budapest to Tokyo: “On the 6th, the American Minister presented to the Government of this country a British Government communique to the effect that a state of war would break out on the 7th.” The communique was the December 5th War Alert from the British Admiralty, which has since disappeared. This triple-priority alert was delivered to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt personally. The Mid-East British Air Marshall informed Colonel Bonner Fellers on Saturday that he had received a secret signal that in 24 hours America was coming into the war. Winston Churchill would summarize the message in GRAND ALLIANCE (page 601) as listing the two fleets attacking British targets and “Other Japanese fleets ... also at sea on other tasks” (there were three other Japanese fleets also at sea on these other tasks — those sailing toward Guam, toward the Philippines, and toward Hawaii). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Führer Adolf Hitler issued his Night and Fog decree.

Very early on this morning, 2 Marines, an emergency special detail, were stationed outside the door of the Japanese Naval Attache. Why, was there something special going on?

At 9:30AM Washington time, Stark’s aides were begging him to send a warning to Hawaii — but he wouldn’t.

At 10AM Washington time, Commander-in-Chief Franklin Delano Roosevelt read the 14th part of the decoded Japanese diplomatic declaration of war.

At 10:30AM Washington time, Bratton informed Marshall that he had a most important message (the 15th part of the decoded Japanese diplomatic declaration of war) and would bring it to Marshall’s quarters, but Marshall responded that he would take it at his office. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

At 11AM Washington time, Commander-in-Chief Roosevelt read the 15th part of the decoded Japanese diplomatic declaration of war, the part setting the time for the declaration of war to be delivered to the State Department as 1PM — which was about dawn Pearl Harbor time.

At 11:15AM Washington time, Navy Secretary Knox was given the 15th part of the decoded Japanese diplomatic declaration of war –the part setting the time for the declaration of war to be delivered to the State Department as 1PM, which was about dawn Pearl Harbor time– with this note from the Office of Naval Intelligence: “This means a sunrise today.” Naval Intelligence also transmitted this prediction to Hull and about eight others, including the White House.

Who would have thought they’d sneak up on us? At 11:25AM Washington time, according to Bratton, Marshall reached his office. Marshall’s story, later, would be that he had been out riding horses that morning — but this cover story would be directly contradicted by the testimony of Harrison, McCollum, and Deane. We know that Marshall perjured himself, because he also testified that he had never received the prior 13 parts of the decoded Japanese diplomatic declaration of war, and yet we know by his own account that he had read those first 13 parts by 10PM the previous night. Marshall was in no hurry. He read and he re-read all of the 10-minute-long 14-part message (some parts he went over several times), taking more than an hour. Then he refused to use the scrambler phone on his desk, and also refused to send out a warning to Hawaii by the fast, more secure Navy system. Instead, three times he sent Bratton to inquire how long it would take to send out his watered-down warning. When informed that this would require 30 or 40 minutes by Army radio (meaning that his warning couldn’t reach Pearl Harbor before the 1PM Washington-time deadline), he seemed satisfied. The warning would be sent out through commercial channels, without any priority identification, and although this message would reach all its other addressees, such as the Philippines and Canal Zone, in a timely manner, at Hawaii it would arrive six hours too late — which, of course, was what was intended.

At 6:30AM an American destroyer collided with a Japanese minisubmarine within the harbor area. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE At 7:55AM, Hawaii time: “AIR RAID PEARL HARBOR. THIS IS NOT DRILL.”

The battleships USS Arizona and USS Oklahoma were sunk at anchor, killing 1,177 on the one and 415 on the other. Two other battleships, the USS West Virginia (105 killed) and the USS Tennessee, were damaged and 196 Navy and 65 Army Air Force planes destroyed. A total of 2,341 servicemen and 68 civilians died that day and there were 1,178 wounded. 15 Navy men would receive the Congressional Medal of Honor, 10 posthumously.

We were able to shoot down only 29 of the Japanese aircraft.

At 1:50PM Washington time, Harry Hopkins, the only person with Commander-in-Chief Roosevelt when he received the phonecall from Knox that gave him the news of the attack, would write in his memoirs that the Commander-in-Chief had been unsurprised, and that he had expressed “great relief,” quote unquote. When Eleanor Roosevelt would write about the day that shall go down in infamy, on page 233 of her THIS IREMEMBER, what she would recollect was that upon Japan’s attack her husband became “in a way more HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE serene.”

At 3:00PM Washington time, as Harry Hopkins would later recall, “The (war cabinet) conference met in not too tense an atmosphere because I think that all of us believed that in the last analysis the enemy was Hitler ... and that Japan had given us an opportunity.”

That afternoon the Chief of Naval Operations communicated:

EXECUTE UNRESTRICTED AIR AND AGAINST JAPAN

A full nine hours after the “surprise attack” at Pearl Harbor, General Douglas MacArthur’s entire air force would get caught by surprise, and wiped out, in the Philippines. The general’s reaction to the news of Pearl Harbor was strange, for a commander who under normal circumstances prided himself upon being supremely effective. Instead of being on the scene and making necessary preparations, he locked himself in his room all morning, refusing to meet with General Brereton, his air commander, and refusing to engage the Japanese

forces on Taiwan. Instead the military record of commands issued reveals that MacArthur issued a series of HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE three conflicting orders, that ensured that his planes were on the ground most of the morning. He kept himself informed of the radar tracking of the Japanese planes as they approached, at 140 miles distance, at 100, at 80, at 60, and even at 20 miles distance, and then issued the last order of this series — obviously in order to ensure that his planes were on the ground where they could be destroyed. We would lose half of all the heavy bombers we had in the world. He could only have been acting under orders, since after doing this he retained his command, escaped any reprimand, and got his fourth star, along with, shortly after, the Congressional Medal of Honor. Obviously, it was important that on this day the Japanese succeed in destroying all the capability of our Pacific forces to respond immediately to the attack, putting them in the position of waiting for resupply of war materiel.

At 8:30PM Washington time, the President was commenting to his cabinet, “We have reason to believe that the Germans have told the Japanese that if Japan declares war, they will too. In other words, a declaration of war by Japan automatically brings....” (At this point he was interrupted, and we can only wonder what he had had on his mind to say. ;-)

By 9:30PM Washington time, the FBI was in war mode, on a 24-hour schedule. (It would need to augment its Agent force with National Academy graduates who took only an abbreviated training course. As a result, the HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE total number of agency employees would rise from 7,400 to over 13,000, of whom approximately 4,000 would be Agents, by the end of 1943.)

At midnight, Washington time, Commander-in-Chief Roosevelt met with CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow, who found him calm. After going over the latest from Pearl Harbor, the President inquired: “Did this surprise you?” Murrow said it had. Roosevelt then, cryptically, went “Maybe you think it didn’t surprise us?”

The Washington conspirators had produced war, exactly as they desired. WORLD WAR II

Why would we have been surprised? Our military men do study the history of warfare, and they knew perfectly well that the Japanese had, once before, initiated a war with this precisely sort of successful surprise assault upon a fleet:

When entomologist G.W. Kirkaldy provided species descriptions for a series of insects whose names all ended in “-chisme” (pronounced “kiss me”), the guy must have been terminally horny, for among his species names are such as Polychisme, Marichisme and Dollischisme.

By means of a surprise attack of undeclared war, the Japanese destroyed a Russian

Due to the circumstances of betrayal by their Commander in Chief, the US Marine detachments stationed at Tientsin and Beijing were of course obliged to surrender to the Japanese. Shine, Empire Powerful and armed, neutral in the midst of madness, we might have held the whole world’s balance and stood Like a mountain in a wind. We were misled and took sides. We have chosen to share the crime and the punishment. Perhaps justly, being part of Europe. Three thousand miles of ocean would hardly wash out the stains Of all that mish-mash, blood, language, religion, snobbery. Three thousand miles in a ship would not make Americans. I have often in weak moments thought of this people as something higher than the natural run of the earth. I was quite wrong; we are lower. We are the people who hope to win wars with money as we win elections. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

Hate no one. Roosevelt’s intentions were good, and Hitler is a patriot. They have split the planet into two mill-stones That will grind small and bloody; but still let us keep some dignity, these days are tragic, and fight without hating. It is war, and no man can see an end of it. We must put freedom away and stiffen into bitter empire. All Europe was hardly worth the precarious freedom of one of our states: what will her ashes fetch? If I were hunting in the Ventana canyons again with my strong sons, and to sleep under stars, I should be happy again. It is not time for happiness. Happy the blind, the witless, the dead. Now, thoroughly compromised, we aim at world rule, like Assyria, Rome, Britain, Germany, to inherit those hoards Of guilt and doom. I am American, what can I say but again, “Shine, perishing republic?” ... Shine, empire. — Robinson Jeffers HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

As the Red Army attacked Tikhvin, near Leningrad, the Germans retired to defensive positions before Moscow on a line Kursk-Orel-Medyn-Rzhev.

Areas ceded by Finland to the USSR on March 12, 1940 were reintegrated into Finland.

Thomas Merton, who had “lost interest in the Quakers,” would attempt to enlist in the military after the attack at Pearl Harbor only to find himself rejected on account of bad teeth. (A few days after this rejection, he would wind up at the gate of the Cisterian Order of the Strict Observance at Gethsemani, Kentucky. He had been glad to become an American because this was the land of and Emily Dickinson, and would claim that he was going into the silent service there in Kentucky in 1941 for the same reason that Thoreau had gone in 1845 to the shore of Walden Pond: “to front only the essential facts of life.”)25

More than 34,000,000 male United States citizens would be registered for the military draft. Of those 34 million, an estimated 72,000 would apply for conscientious objector status. Approximately 6,000 of those 72,000 applicants for “CO” status would, like Friend John R. Kellam, be imprisoned. Considering that warfare was not a proper path toward peace was going to constitute a sacrifice — your local draft board made up of your fellow citizens was going to ensure that there would be severe consequences, that this was an attitude that was going to generate not only persistent accusations of cowardice but also as great as possible a level of personal unsafety.

YOUR GARDEN-VARIETY ACADEMIC HISTORIAN INVITES YOU TO CLIMB ABOARD A HOVERING TIME MACHINE TO SKIM IN METATIME BACK HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE ACROSS THE GEOLOGY OF OUR PAST TIMESLICES, WHILE OFFERING UP A GARDEN VARIETY OF COGENT ASSESSMENTS OF OUR PROGRESSION. WHAT A LOAD OF CRAP! YOU SHOULD REFUSE THIS HELICOPTERISH OVERVIEW OF THE HISTORICAL PAST, FOR IN THE REAL WORLD THINGS HAPPEN ONLY AS THEY HAPPEN. WHAT THIS SORT WRITES AMOUNTS, LIKE MERE “SCIENCE FICTION,” MERELY TO “HISTORY FICTION”: IT’SNOT WORTH YOUR ATTENTION.

December 8, Monday: Croatia declared war on the United States and the United Kingdom. Soviet forces retook Tikhvin, southeast of Leningrad. Führer Adolf Hitler announced the suspension of military operations against the due to severe weather conditions.

A German policy of killing Jews by gas was put into effect. 700 Jews from Kulmhof (Chelmo), northeast of Lodz, were taken by van (with the exhaust system hooked into the van) to a nearby wood. By the time they arrived, they were dead. From this day on, Jews from the surrounding district were daily transported to Kulmhof for the same purpose. This was the first death camp to begin operations. The region would be emptied of its 360,000 Jews. ANTISEMITISM

This was the day on which the US Pacific fleet had been ordered to steam out of Pearl Harbor to seek battle engagement with the Japanese fleet, but the hulls of many capital vessels of this US fleet were resting on a bed 25. As a result of Roosevelt’s trick to get us into war, 2,403 American lives were lost at Pearl Harbor, and 1,178 Americans received nonfatal wounds, inclusive of our civilian casualties.

Eighteen of our ships were sunk or seriously damaged, including 5 battleships — we visit the USS Arizona today, with waving flags, to restore our patriotism. Of our aircraft, 188 were destroyed and 162 damaged. Out of their raiding force of 31 ships and 353 raiding planes, which in this way “achieved complete surprise,” the Japanese lost only 64 men, 29 planes, and 5 kaiten suicide submarines. The Commander-in-Chief’s trick to get us into war has recently been justified by certain historians, on the grounds of necessity: their argument is that we needed to get involved in this war but the American public was, unfortunately, reluctant, and thus we needed to be persuaded by being tricked in some manner. What these historians have missed is that the President had succeeded in two linked objectives rather than one objective on this day: not only had he obtained a morally righteous position by way of a “sneak attack” posturing, but also he had obtained, through the cooperation of General Douglas MacArthur, adequate destruction of our ability to respond in the Pacific to ensure that, as he desired, Japan would be forced to take a back seat and wait to be destroyed until after our VE-day victory over Germany (“...in the last analysis the enemy was Hitler...”). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE of mud in the warm shallow waters of Pearl Harbor, awaiting recovery and salvage efforts, and oil slicks were glistening upon the surfaces of these waters. On the California seacoast, the 4th Interceptor Command spotted two formations of enemy planes near San Francisco, heading toward Los Angeles.

After Japanese soldiers made a quick lunch of the defenses of the British crown colony of Hong Kong, Governor Mark Young was restricted to his quarters in the Peninsula Hotel. British civilians were rounded up and some 20,000 Chinese per month would be deported to the mainland.

US Marines and other Allied nationals were interned at Shanghai, Beijing, and Tientsin.

Striking Force, Asiatic Fleet (Rear Admiral W.A. Glassford) departed Iloilo, Philippine Islands for Makassar Strait, Netherlands East Indies.

The river gunboat Wake (PR-3) was surrendered to Japanese at Shanghai after an attempt to scuttle it failed (The Wake would be the sole United States ship to surrender during this war).

The Potomac River Naval Command, with its headquarters at Washington DC, and the Severn River Naval Command, with its headquarters at Annapolis, Maryland, were established.

The SS President Harrison, en route to evacuate US Marines from Chingwangtao, China, ran aground at Sha Wai Shan, China, and was captured by the Japanese.

Japanese aircraft bombed Guam, Wake, Hong Kong, Singapore, and the Philippine Islands. Extensive damage was inflicted on aircraft at Clark Field, Luzon, Philippine Islands.

Japan interned US Marines and nationals at Shanghai and Tientsin, China.

A United States naval vessel was sunk by a horizontal bomber: the minesweeper Penguin (AM-33), near Guam in the Marianas Islands. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

Japan invaded Thailand, which capitulated.

Japanese troops landed unopposed at Victoria Point, the southern tip of Burma.

Japanese landed on Bataan Island north of Luzon, Philippine Islands, and on the east coast of the Malay Peninsula. (At some point during their occupation of the Philippines, on Luzon, 14 Filipino resistance fighters would be forced to surrender because they ran out of ammunition. Other POWs were required to dig 14 foxholes for them and were then executed. These resistance fighters were forced into the foxholes and earth shovelled around them and stamped down, until only their heads and necks were above ground, so that the Japanese officer could use them for his sword practice. Some of the soldiers having defecated onto banana leaves, shit was stuffed into their mouths with considerable hilarity before the officer drew his sword. HEADCHOPPING

The Chelmno death camp near Lodz, Poland opened for business. ANTISEMITISM

In a conversation with Rosenman, one of his speechwriters, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt spoke of Führer Adolf Hitler as his first target, and “feared that a great many Americans would insist that we make the war in the Pacific at least equally important with the war against Hitler.” He was, however, saying nothing of the sort to the American people.

Instead we were receiving, on this day that will live in infamy, a lie that would send more than 16 million US citizens to war: TO THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES: Yesterday, December 7, 1941 -a date which will live in infamy- the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the . The United States was at peace with that Nation and, at the solicitation of Japan, was still in conversation with its Government and its Emperor looking toward the maintenance of peace in the Pacific. Indeed, one hour after Japanese air squadrons had commenced bombing in Oahu, the Japanese Ambassador to the United States and his colleague delivered to the Secretary of State a form reply to a recent American message. While this reply stated that it seemed useless to continue the existing diplomatic negotiations, it contained no threat or hit of war or armed attack. It will be recorded that the distance of Hawaii from Japan makes it obvious that the attack was deliberately planned many days HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE or even weeks ago. During the intervening time the Japanese Government had deliberately sought to deceive the United States by false statements and expressions of hope for continued peace. The attack yesterday on the Hawaiian Islands has caused severe damage to American naval and military forces. Very many American lives have been lost. In addition American ships have been reported torpedoed on the high seas between San Francisco and Honolulu. Yesterday the Japanese Government also launched an attack against Malaya. Last night Japanese forces attacked Hong Kong. Last night Japanese forces attacked Guam. Last night Japanese forces attacked the Philippine Islands. Last night the Japanese attacked Midway Island. Japan has, therefore, undertaken a surprise offensive extending through out the Pacific area. The facts of yesterday speak for themselves. The people of the United States have already formed their opinions and well understand the implications to the very life and safety of our Nation. As Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy I have directed that all measures be taken for our defense. Always will we remember the character of the onslaught against us. No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory. I believe I interpret the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost but will make very certain that this form of treachery shall never endanger us again. Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory, and our interests are in grave danger. With confidence in our armed forces - with the unbounded determination of our people - we will gain the inevitable triumph - so help us God. I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December seventh, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire. — Franklin D. Roosevelt DECLARATION OF WAR HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

The British declared war upon Japan. Declarations of war upon Japan were issued by Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, the Netherlands, the Free French, and Panama. Mexico, Colombia, Belgium, and Egypt did not declare war, but did sever diplomatic relations with Japan. (The USSR would neither declare war upon Japan nor sever diplomatic relations, until that nation lay prostrate and devastated in the very last moments of the hostilities.) WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Pearl Harbor I Here are the fireworks. The men who conspired and labored To embroil this republic in the wreck of Europe have got their bargain, — And a bushel more. As for me, what can I do but fly the national flag from the top of the tower, — America has neither race nor religion nor its own language: nation or nothing. Stare, little tower, Confidently across the Pacific, the flag on your head. I built you at the other war’s end, And the sick peace; I based you on living rock, granite on granite; I said, “Look, you gray stones: Civilization is sick: stand awhile and be quiet and drink the sea-wind, you will survive Civilization.” But now I am old, and O stones be modest. Look, little tower: This dust blowing is only the ; these torn leaves flying Are only Europe; the wind is the plane-propellers; the smoke is Tokyo. The child with the butchered throat Was too young to be named. Look no farther ahead. II The war that we have carefully for years provoked Catches us unprepared, amazed and indignant. Our warships are shot Like sitting ducks and our planes like nest-birds, both our coasts ridiculously panicked, And our leaders make orations. This is the people That hopes to impose on the whole planetary world An American peace. (Oh, we’ll not lose our war: my money on amazed Gulliver And his horse-pistols.) Meanwhile our prudent officers Have cleared the coast-long ocean of ships and fishing-craft, the sky of planes, the windows of light: these clearings Make a great beauty. Watch the wide sea; there is nothing human; its gulls have it. Watch the wide sky All day clean of machines; only at dawn and dusk one military hawk passes High on patrol. Walk at night in the black-out, The firefly lights that used to line the long shore Are all struck dumb; shut are the shops, mouse-dark the houses. Here the prehuman dignity of night Stands, as it was before and will be again. Oh beautiful Darkness and silence, the two eyes that see God; great staring eyes. — Robinson Jeffers

At the home of Helen Clarke Grimes, in Spragueville near Smithfield northwest of Providence, Rhode Island, as in many homes in America, the radio was being kept constantly on, not for the soap operas that filled the daytime airwaves, but for the sporadic news flashes about the war situation. Helen made notes for her diary: Dec. 8 — This Monday morning we face a turquoise and coral sunrise with the sick realization that we are at war, and that the radio bulletins are not something by Orson Welles. We had turned the radio off at eleven o’clock last night, worn dull by hours of incessant listening, and were about to go to bed when Charlie and Harriett who had spent the day at his mother’s, came home with two copies of the War Extra. We talked until twelve, soberly with no fine frenzy to fire us. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Constance and Oliver phoned, but there was nothing to say. It is 8AM and the news is pouring in over the radio. Hongkong has been bombed, and there is a report of 200 casualties suffered at Singapore. Ford Wilkins in Manila says there has been no violence in that city as yet. He tells of Japanese landing on some parts of the Phillipines, of the round-up and internment of Japanese in Manila; of the evacuation of Manila, and of a naval battle reported in the Pacific. A Washington commentator says our losses are far more serious (in Hawaii) than given out. Hangers have been flattened, planes destroyed, there has been torpedo damage — altogether a heavy naval defeat. At night the lights burned in embassy windows along Massachusetts Avenue [in Washington DC]. In Providence, the State Guard has been mobilized, and roving guards placed at industrial plants, at the airport, and along the waterfront. On the West Coast few went to bed last night, excitement running high the thoroughfares crowded. Charles Collingwood in a report from London, speaks of grey parliament buildings, and of Churchill in his black Homburg hat. Arthur Crock, in writing of the American reaction in the “N.Y. Times,” says one can almost hear national unity clicking into place. This is a grim day. Here, in one of the smallest communities in the smallest state in the union, the stark branches of the apple trees are bleak and cold against a lowering sky. Mother is having an asthma attack. Twelve o’clock noon — The sun is out, the sky a thin wash of blue. Japanese planes are only forty miles from Manila. 12:30 — President Roosevelt spoke to the joint session of House and Senate, a short address of five hundred words, at the end of which he asked “that Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday Dec. 7th, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire.” The “President Pierce” reported to have been torpedoed, was the first dollar liner on which Oliver sailed to the Orient. A news flash breaks into a concert of chamber music to tell of an air raid now in progress over Manila. 2:30 — The Phillipines direct. At 1:30 a terrific air attack had begun over Manila. It is thought that twenty-five American bombers have been destroyed. As the announcer broadcasts there is the sound of Japanese planes overhead. An N.B.C. announcer on the roof of an eight story building reports a great fire which is destroying the gasoline supply dump on Nichols Field, a base airfield in the heart of Manila. He is panting from his run up eight flights of stairs, the elevator boy having deserted his post. The stars were shining over the city and a bright moon rides directly over head. Galvanized iron rooftops stand out like HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE mirrors, the black-out rendered futile by the moon. 3:30 PM — Prime Minister Churchill has delivered a solemn speech in a tired, husky voice. 4:30 PM — The tires of the news boy’s bicycle grit on the gravel as he wheels up to the door. There is a thud as the “Providence Bulletin” hits the door. Its headlines have no power to shock those already benumbed by the radio. 9:35 PM — There is a report from the “San Francisco News Chronicle” that fifty unidentified planes have been sighted flying from the south west toward San Francisco. The city is blacked-out to a depth of ten miles. 10:00 PM — An air raid siren is blowing in San Francisco. All radio stations but one are off the air. Planes are said to have been seen off the Golden Gate. The man in the street is wondering if this is an air raid test or the real thing. A copy of the November “Atlantic Monthly” lies on the table, the back page given over to a vacation ad: “Hawaii. Standing two thousand miles out in the gentle latitudes of the South Pacific ...” San Francisco motorists are driving without headlights. The all-clear signal has been given. False alarm or practice work-out? 11:00 PM — A summary of to-day’s events — and so ends the first day of this war. We go to bed wondering why, when for months there has been a strong possibility of war with Japan, our forces were caught napping. Will close this with two lines from Shakespeare. King John, I think. “For when you should be told they do prepare The tidings come that they are all arrived.”

It goes on: “O where hath our intelligence been drunk? Where hath it slept?” Oh, where indeed!

December 10, Wednesday: Cuba declared war upon Japan. WORLD WAR II

The Japanese landed on Camiguin Island and at Gonzaga and Aparri on the island of Luzon in the Philippine Islands. They captured the British-controlled islands of Abemama, () and in the (Kiribati). The US Marine garrison on Guam surrendered to a Japanese landing force.

Führer Adolf Hitler commented that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s words on the previous day had amounted to a de facto declaration of war.

German and Italian forces began a full retreat to the west from Tobruk (Tubruq).

S.S. Commander Heinrich Himmler ordered that the ill, mentally ill and those otherwise unfit for work be removed from concentration camp populations and gassed to death. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

Brazil froze all the German, Italian, and Japanese assets it could get its hands on. Argentina froze all Japanese assets.

The British warships HMS Repulse and HMS Prince of Wales were sunk off Kuantan, Malaya. The ships had been spotted by submarine I-58 just before dawn and a flight of nine “Betty” torpedo-carrying planes of the Japanese 22nd Naval Air Flotilla led by Lieutenant Haruki Iki had scrambled from the Japanese base at Saigon. The battleship Prince of Wales was hit by 4 torpedoes and sank at 12:33PM. 327 died. The cruiser Repulse was hit by 14 torpedoes and sank at 1:20PM. 513 died. The Far Eastern Fleet commander, Admiral Sir Tom Phillips, went down with his ship. The Japanese lost 4 planes. A total of 2,081 would be plucked from the water by escort destroyers HMS Electra, Vampire, and Express and would be dropped off at Singapore.

Cavite Navy Yard, Philippine Islands was heavily damaged by enemy air attack. United States naval vessels damaged at Cavite, Philippine Islands: • Destroyer Peary (DD-226), by horizontal bomber • Submarine Seadragon (SS-194), by horizontal bomber • Submarine Sealion (SS-195), by horizontal bomber • Minesweeper Bittern (AM-36), by horizontal bomber

Japanese naval vessels sunk: • Submarine I-170, by carrier-based aircraft, Hawaiian Islands area, 23 degrees 45 minutes North, 155 degrees 35 minutes West

• Minesweeper No. 10, by Army aircraft, Philippine Islands area, 17 degrees 32 minutes North, 120 degrees 22 minutes East HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Minesweeper No. 19, damaged by Army aircraft and grounded by own forces (total loss), Philippine Islands area, 18 degrees 22 degrees North, 121 degrees 38 minutes EastAt the home of

Helen Clarke Grimes, in Spragueville near Smithfield northwest of Providence, Rhode Island, as in many homes in America, the radio was being kept constantly on, not for the soap operas that filled the daytime airwaves, but for the sporadic news flashes about the war situation. Helen made notes for her diary: Dec. 10 — From London comes news that the ill-fated and short- lived Prince of Wales has been sunk by Japanese aircraft. In the year of its service it saw action with the Bismark from which it emerged badly crippled, and later served as the meeting place of Churchill and Roosevelt in the mid-Atlantic. The Repulse has been lost, too. Keeping the radio tuned-in all day means listening to an endless series of “soap operas,” the daytime serials for moronic women. The sensible thing is to listen to regular news broadcasts at stated intervals, but I find myself compelled to listen almost continuously for every stray bulletin, which is downright idiotic of me. There is a report that American bombers have sunk one Japanese transport and hit five others, three by direct hits. Noon 12:00 — The Japanese attempt to land troops on Luzon has been beaten back by our forces. The British report a heavy battle going on in Hong Kong. No news from Germany. the last of the trans-Atlantic steamship service has been discontinued. Only planes now link us to Europe. Some idiot in Washington has chopped down four of the Japanese HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE cherry trees along the Potomac, and pinned messages to the hacked trunks.

December 11, Thursday: Canti di prigionia for chorus, two pianos, two harps and percussion by Luigi Dallapiccola, to words of Mary, Queen of Scots, Boethius and Savonarola, was performed completely for the initial time, in the Teatro delle Arti of Rome.

Lieutenant Haruki Iki flew over the area of ocean in which his flight of torpedo bombers had struck two ships on the previous day, killing 840, and dropped a bouquet of flowers.26

In Washington DC, four of the cherry trees were found to have been chopped down in what must have been a retaliation for the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor (because messages had been pinned to the stumps). In hope to prevent future vandalism, for the duration of the war the government would be referring to these trees as “Oriental” flowering cherries.

Soviet forces captured Istra, west of Moscow. As President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had hoped and expected, Germany and Italy declared a state of war with the United States. GERMAN WAR DECLARATION

At this point in time there were a grand sum total of two developed nations on this planet that explicitly

26. Maybe he should have been a florist. (Albert Einstein would suspect that maybe he should have been a plumber.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE restricted citizenship on the basis of race, the United States of America and Germany, which makes it curious that on this day these two nations that had so very much in common with one another were going to war against one another! Wow, what a curious coincidence! –What was this, some sort of twin-brother hullabaloo?

Adolf Hitler addressed the Reichstag in regard to these “circumstances brought about by President Roosevelt,” saying that he had been given information of “a plan prepared by President Roosevelt ... according to which his intention was to attack Germany in 1942 with all the resources of the United States. Thus our patience has come to a breaking point.”

The United States immediately declared by joint resolutions of the Congress a state of war with Germany and Italy. Costa Rica, Cuba, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic declared war against Germany and Italy. Poland declared a state of war with Japan. Mexico severed diplomatic relations with Germany and Italy.

Wake Island’s US Marines defenders repulsed a Japanese landing attempt and sank two of its destroyers: • Destroyer Hayate, by Marine shore batteries. • Destroyer Kisaragi, by Marine aircraft.

The Japanese effected landings at Legaspi, Luzon, Philippine Islands. WORLD WAR II

At the home of Helen Clarke Grimes, in Spragueville near Smithfield northwest of Providence, Rhode Island, as in many homes in America, the radio was being kept constantly on, not for the soap operas that filled the daytime airwaves, but for the sporadic news flashes about the war situation. Helen made notes for her diary: Dec. 11 — Now that President Roosevelt has all the power he has demanded in his insatiable desire to rule absolute, it remains to be seen if he is capable of applying it wisely — or if he will continue his Grand Court of Lagado. It is no time for national disunity, the people must stand or fall with the man thrice acclaimed by the majority. An early report gives news of a Japanese battleship sunk by HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE American bombers off the Phillipines. This morning, Hitler in one of his high flown speeches declared Germany at war with the United States. Italy obediently tailed along. By 10 o’clock we had received word that the United States had declared war against Germany. A late bulletin reveals that there were four attacks on our fleet in Pearl Harbor: three on Sunday and a fourth on Monday, which may have been the basis of a preposterous rumor emanating from Washington itself the early part of this week that ninety percent of the fleet stationed at Pearl Harbor had been destroyed.

December 22, Monday: A Japanese invasion force offloaded in the of the island of Luzon in the Philippine Islands. WORLD WAR II

American troops (Brigadier General J. F. Barnes) arrived at Brisbane, .

The Netherlands government-in-exile declared war on Italy.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill opened discussions in Washington DC leading to establishment of the Combined Chiefs of Staff.

In the defense of Wake Island, Japanese patrol boats Nos. 32 and 33, which were old destroyers that had been deliberately run ashore, were destroyed by US Marine gunfire.

December 23, Tuesday: The US Marine garrison on Wake Island surrendered to the Japanese while the United States Relief Expedition was still 425 miles from Wake, and so that relief expedition was recalled.

Three waves of Japanese bombers attacked Rangoon and its airport, starting fires and killing nearly 2,000 people. Ten bombers were lost. WORLD WAR II

The United States-British War Council composed of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, British Prime Minister, and naval, military, and civilian advisers met for the first time.

Mexico severed diplomatic relations with Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria.

Palmyra Island was shelled by a Japanese submarine.

The Japanese came ashore at Kuching, Sarawak, Borneo.

The following headline appeared in The Los Angeles Times: JAPAN PICTURED AS A NATION OF SPIES. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Veteran Far Eastern Correspondent Tells About Mentality of Our Enemies in Orient.

December 28, Sunday: Olivier Messiaen gave the first public performance of two movements from Les corps glorieux for organ, at the Palais de Chaillot in Paris.

Citizens on the island of Miquelon voted 69-4 for a Free French administration.

Allied forces fell back to Kampar, Malaya, northwest of Singapore.

British women and children were evacuated by train from Rangoon.

United States and Philippine troops on Luzon fell back to a line Tarlac-Cabanatuan. Most of the 4th Marines moved from Bataan to Corregidor Island in Manila Bay. This fortress island would hold until May 6th, 1942. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1942

During a great hurricane, 16 of the 22 islets of the Suvarov atoll in the Cook Islands were washed away within a matter of hours. The lives of the children of the islanders were saved by lashing each child into the fork of a tamanu tree elastic enough to bend with the wind until the violence of the storm was spent.

...but it’s good weather most of the time

Long-term fighting back and forth across the island of , deliberately kept inconclusive at the cost HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE of many American lives, helped to maintain the pretense that when the USA eventually was able to go on the offensive in the Pacific, we would be reacting to the original Japanese attack — rather than initiating a fresh aggression.In the Guadalcanal operation, the inspiration for which was entirely political rather than in any

sense military, between 7 August 1942 and 8 February 1943, 71 Marine officers and 1,026 enlisted men27 would be killed and 52 officers and 246 men would be listed as missing in action and presumed dead. In addition, 11 officers and 98 men would be listed as either dead or wounded, 223 officers and 2,693 men would

27. God must love enlisted men: he makes so many of them! HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE be more or less seriously wounded, and 357 officers and 4,063 men would become prisoners of war. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE February 5, Thursday: United States Naval Operating Base, Londonderry, , was established.

Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation J. Edgar Hoover communicated with the United States State Department about the visit to the United States of America of Sir Peter Neville Luard Pears, an English tenor who was a homosexual Quaker conscientious objector. There seems to have been something about this visiting singer that made the FBI man uneasy.

Incantation and Dance for oboe and piano by William Grant Still was performed for the initial time, in Elmira College Chapel, New York.

The National Naval Medical Center was established at Bethesda, Maryland. (I, 2d Lieutenant Ashley Edward Meredith, would receive mandatory cosmetic surgery there in 1962 at government expense — because my commanding officer at Marine Corps Schools – Quantico was offended by my appearance in the United States Marine Corps uniform.) ASSLEY

The following headline appeared in The Los Angeles Times: LOYAL JAPS MUST AID FIGHT AGAINST SABOTAGE, SAYS OLSON. Governor Asserts Action Will be Taken to Curb Spy and Fifth Columnist Activities. WORLD WAR II CALIFORNIA

March 29, Sunday: The Chinese government instituted the National General Mobilization Act which, in theory, placed every part of the economy in the hands of the government.

Speaking in New Delhi, Sir Stanford Cripps offered India dominion status, an elected constitutional convention and, after the war was over, the right to secede.

At Efate in the New Hebrides, the US Marine Corps arrived. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE April 10, Friday: Japanese troops landed on Cebu in the Philippine Islands.

A joint administration of Papua and was established by Australia.

News Headline: “Editorial: ‘Well Done’; in Praise of Gen. DeWitt and the Army”

At the southern tip of the peninsula of Bataan in the Philippines, near the town of Mariveles, the Japanese soldiers herded their prisoners of war on the infamous “Death March.” There were 105 US Marines among the American soldiers who set out. Each morning, in groups of several hundred, the prisoners would be herded onto the main road that led north to Camp O’Donnell. Any who fell behind were being shot, bayoneted, or beheaded, and their bodies were being left in full view for the edification of the following column. Between Mariveles and Cabcaben the column of prisoners was being shelled by their own guns on Corregidor. After a few days and 100 kilometers of walking, the 1st column of POWs arrived at San Fernando. There they boarded railroad boxcars, into which they were packed like sardines for about 4 hours, with no room for anyone to sit down, in the summer heat, with those suffering from dysentery defecating on each other. Many “died standing up” (600-650 Americans and 5,000 Filipinos were executed for falling behind or died of illness and exhaustion during the trip) before they detrained at Capas to hike the remaining 10 kilometers to Camp O’Donnell. About 9,300 Americans and 45,000 Filipinos would survive this Death March.

The US Pacific Fleet was reorganized into type commands: Battleships (Rear Admiral W.S. Anderson); Aircraft Carriers (Vice Admiral W.F. Halsey); Cruisers (Rear Admiral F.J. Fletcher); Destroyers (Rear Admiral R.A. Theobald); Service Force (Vice Admiral W.L. Calhoun); Amphibious Force (Vice Admiral W. Brown); Submarine Force (Rear Admiral T. Whiters); and Patrol Wings (Rear Admiral H.S. McCain).

United States naval vessels sunk: • Submarine tender Canopus (AS-9), by , off Mariveles Bay, Philippine Islands. • Minesweeper Finch (AM-9), by horizontal bomber, Philippine Islands area, 14 degrees 22 minutes North, 120 degrees 35 minutes East. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE May 27, Wednesday: Suite op.9 for violin and cello by Vincent Persichetti was performed for the initial time, at the commencement of Philadelphia Conservatory.

German forces defeated British and Indians south of Bir Hacheim, , but their move north was halted by the British. Free French troops fought off Italian at Bir Hacheim.

In Prague, Schutzstaffel Leader Reinhard Heydrich, Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia, whom his friends called “The Blond Beast” and his enemies referred to as “Hangman Heydrich,” was attacked by two Czechs (flown in by the British) near Prague and severely wounded. (He would die on June 4th. The assassins would be caught in Budapest and executed, as would 1,300 other Czechs including all the male inhabitants of the town of Lidice. The town, accused of having harbored the assassins, would be razed.)

An administration loyal to took over in Uvea and the Futuna Islands.

US Marines and Seabees occupied Wallis Island in the South Pacific Ocean.

United States Destroyer tender Prairie (AD-15) and the gunboat Spry (PG-64) were damaged by fire, near Argentia, Newfoundland. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 1, day: An airplane from the USSR arrived in New York. Aboard was a box of microfilm containing the score and parts of the Symphony no.7 “Leningrad” by Dmitri Shostakovich.

Great Britain restricted the clothing ration by one-quarter.

The United States Marine Corps sank so low as to allow some American black men to enlist (in all of World War II only a total of 19,168 such enlistments would be tolerated).

In fierce fighting, German and Italian forces eliminated the Free French defenders of Bir Hacheim, Libya.

After the sinking of a couple of its ships by German submarines, the government of Mexico declared that a state of war had existed with Germany, Italy and Japan retroactive to May 22d.

On this night the sent 1,036 planes over Essen, Germany (and, they weren’t waving hello).

Liberty Barricade, an underground newspaper of the Polish Socialist Party, published an extensive description of gassing at the Chelmo concentration camp. At least one of the German death camps was at this point exposed, to Europe and the West. ANTISEMITISM

June 14, Sunday: General Erwin Rommel’s German forces defeated Neil Richie at Gazala.

The first echelon of the 1st Marine Division, under Major General A.A. Vandegrift, arrived at Wellington, New Zealand. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 30, Tuesday: Rommel’s German forces reached El Alamein near Cairo, Egypt.

Naval vessels on hand (all types)...... 5,612

Personnel:

Navy...... 640,570 Marine Corps...... 143,528 Coast Guard...... 58,998 Total personnel...... 843,096

United States Coast Minesweeper Hornbill (AMc-13) sank after a collision in San Francisco Bay, California.

German submarine U-158 was sunk by naval land-based aircraft (VP-74) in the western Atlantic area, 32 degrees 50 minutes North, 67 degrees 28 minutes West. WORLD WAR II

The Germans placed severe restrictions on the freedom of movement of Dutch Jews. ANTISEMITISM

July: In November 1941, Führer Adolf Hitler had met with the grand mufti of the great temple of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, in Berlin, and the political leader of the Nazis and the religious leader of the Muslims had conspired as to how they might be able to make common cause to exterminate the half a million Jewish citizens of Palestine. At this point, therefore, it was no coincidence that a SS killing squad (Einsatzgruppe) was in the Middle East, under Walter Rauff, complete with a mobile gas van. If it should happen that the German armies under General Rommel would be able to sweep toward the east along the Mediterranean coast, for sure that gas van would be coming in very handy. (Actually, Rommel’s eastward movement would be intercepted in the fighting around El Alamein, which happens to be one of the reasons why the nation of Israel exists today.) ANTISEMITISM

The 1st Marine Division began preparations to seize and . Naval support and assault shipping were massed by the Allied Forces.

WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE July 18, Saturday: Chôros no.11 for piano and orchestra by Heitor Villa-Lobos was performed for the initial time, in Rio de Janeiro, conducted by the composer.

The Germans liquidated the ghetto in Szarkowszczyzna, Poland. 1,500 residents were removed while 900 escaped. ANTISEMITISM

Amphibious Force, South Pacific Area was established under the command of Rear Admiral R.K. Turner. WORLD WAR II USMC

August 7, Friday: In the first offensive against the Japanese, American troops landed on the islands of Guadalcanal, Tulagi, Gavutu, Florida, and Tananbogo in the , capturing on Guadalcanal an incomplete Japanese airfield.

Feeling that the British presence in India was a provocation to the Japanese, the All-India Congress Committee demanded that the British withdraw and threatened a campaign of civil disobedience. The Viceroy immediately had them interned at Poona.

General Bernard Montgomery took command of the British Eighth Army in . WORLD WAR II

To keep the conflict with the Japanese going in the Pacific for propaganda reasons (so that, when the US would finally be ready to go on the attack after its prime business in Europe was completed, our attack would be portrayable as defensive and righteous rather than as what it would in fact be, a fresh spate of aggression), the 1st Marine Division landed on Florida, Tulagi, Gavutu, Tanambogo, and Guadalcanal in the southern Solomon Islands. For the following two days, the Battle of would be being fought. The Allied Forces would lose four heavy cruisers, and one Japanese would be sunk by a submarine on its return voyage to Rabaul. Under cover of naval surface and air forces (Vice Admiral F.J. Fletcher), the 1st Marine Division (Major General A.A. Vandegrift) was put ashore by Amphibious Force, South Pacific (Rear Admiral R.K. Turner). The landings were supported by carrier and shore-based aircraft (Rear Admiral L. Noyes and Rear Admiral J.S. McCain). The overall commander was Vice Admiral R.L. Ghormley, Commander South Pacific, and the officer in tactical command was Vice Admiral F.J. Fletcher. (This conflict on the island of Guadalcanal, one end of the island versus the other end of the island, fighting in the jungle in between, would be kept going HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE interminably by careful application of always only sufficient reinforcements and supplies to keep the flame alive but never enough reinforcements and never enough supplies to actually eradicate the Japanese holding the other end of the island, and by carefully allowing the Japanese navy enough access to be able to reinforce their dwindling presence. The military objective would never be to complete the conquest of the island, but merely to perpetuate the conflict there endlessly while providing an unrelenting media stream of American- machismo publicity posturing — the Marines are excellent providers of that sort of thing.)

Naval cruiser and destroyer force (Rear Admiral W.W. Smith) bombarded , Aleutian Islands.

United States Destroyer Mugford (DD-389) was damaged by a Japanese in the vicinity of the HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Solomon Islands, 9 degrees 0 minutes South, 160 degrees 0 minutes East. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 8, Saturday: Les animaux modèles, a ballet by Francis Poulenc to a scenario by de LaFontaine, was publicly staged for the initial time, at the Paris Opéra.

Two works by Roy Harris were performed for the initial time, at Colorado College, Colorado Springs: Namesake (A Theatre Dance) for violin and piano, and What So Proudly We Hail, a ballet for chorus, strings and piano.

The 1st Marine Division won control of Tulagi, Gavutu, and Tanambogo in the Solomon Islands. An unfinished enemy air strip on Guadalcanal was captured and renamed Henderson Field. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Four German saboteurs were executed in Washington (their plans had not been realized and nothing had been blown up). A German submarine laid mines off mouth of St. Johns River, east of Jacksonville, Florida.

United States Transport George F. Elliott (AP-13) was damaged by Japanese suicide bombers in the vicinity of the Solomon Islands, and was sunk by United States forces at 9 degrees 10 minutes South, 160 degrees 10 minutes East. United States Destroyer Jarvis (DD-393) was damaged by a Japanese aircraft torpedo in the vicinity of the Solomon Islands, 9 degrees 10 minutes South, 160 degrees 1 minute East. WORLD WAR II

A resident of Switzerland, Gerhart Moritz Reigner, had learned thirdhand on July 29th from the managing director of a German mining company, Eduard Schulte, a man who had access to information from inside the 3rd Reich, that the Nazis had recently created something that was being termed the “Wannsee Protocol,” according to which they were planning to use a pesticide made from prussic acid to exterminate 3,500,000 to 4,000,000 Jews (Zyklon is in fact a pesticide derived from prussic acid: Zyklon-B is used by building custodians to kill rats and cockroaches and has a nasty warning odor added to it because the cyanide gas is itself odorless or smells only faintly of almonds, while for production of lots to be used for human extermination the pesticide factory would withhold the telltale odor additive).28

Reigner had gained the confidence of the American consul in Geneva, Howard Elting, and after a week or two of personal indecision he went to the consul and persuaded him to slip a message through this diplomat to the US Embassy in Bern. “Received alarming report that in Fuehrer’s headquarters plan discussed and under consideration, according to which all Jews in countries occupied or HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE controlled by Germany, numbering 3 1/2 to 4 million, should, after deportation and concentration in the East, be exterminated at one blow to resolve once and for all the Jewish question in Europe.”

Luckily, Reigner also submitted this message, at the same time, to the British Consulate in Geneva. The message submitted to the Americans went to the US Ambassador in Bern, who despite his doubts did submit the message to the Department of State in Washington DC. The District of Columbia, however, considered the information to be “unsubstantiated,” and refused to forward it inside the USA. “Never did I feel so strongly the sense of abandonment, powerlessness and loneliness as when I sent messages of disaster and horror to the free world and no one believed me.”

28. It is an interesting footnote to history that Fritz Haber, the German chemist who during the 1920s had developed this Zyklon gas, had in 1934 been forced out of Germany because, despite his early conversion to Christianity, and despite his wholehearted service to their cause, the Nazis considered him to be still “racially” a Jew. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

The British did pass the message, however, to its intended recipient, Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, leader of the American Jewish Congress.

When Rabbi Wise would go to the US Department of State with this alarming message from Switzerland, received through British diplomatic channels, he was told to keep his mouth shut as the info had not yet been officially confirmed and the State Department had made inquiries with the Vatican and the Red Cross but neither organization had a clue of this.

The message submitted by Gerhart Moritz Reigner is now at Memorial Museum in Washington DC. ANTISEMITISM WORLD WAR II

August 9, Sunday: Several leaders of the All-India Congress Party were arrested in cities throughout India, including Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Maulana Abul Kalam Azad. Gandhi was at this point being interned by the British in the Aga Khan’s palace at Poona. Rioting began in major cities causing hundreds of injuries and arrests.

German forces captured Maikop and Krasnodar in the foothills of the Caucasus, and the nearby oil fields — but the Soviets blew up these oil wells as they withdrew.

Symphony no.7 “Leningrad” by Dmitri Shostakovich was performed in the besieged city for which it was named. The score had been delivered to the front by a transport plane that was bringing medical supplies. The number of musicians living in the city being too small to perform the work, musicians serving on the Leningrad front were released from their military duties for the duration of the performance, and retired musicians were pressed into service. The musicians were allowed extra rations to buoy their strength. The hall was filled to capacity and the concert was broadcast on speakers throughout the city. Just before the performance, Soviet commanders bombarded the German lines to ensure their silence — and speakers had been set up so as to HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE ensure that the enemy troops would be able to hear the music.

Over the resistance of lightly armed Jews, the Mir ghetto was liquidated. ANTISEMITISM

The 1st Battle of Savo Island commenced in the darkness as a Japanese force of 7 cruisers and 1 destroyer approached undetected, west of Savo Island in the Solomon Islands, 9 degrees 42 minutes South, 158 degrees 59 minutes East. In an one-hour engagement they sank 4 Allied cruisers and damaged another cruiser and 2 destroyers by torpedo and gunfire, and then retired. The American warships were protecting and escorting US troop transports en route to Guadalcanal. The Allied ships were temporarily withdrawn from the waters around HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Guadalcanal, leaving the Marines onshore very much on their own.29

USMC United States naval vessels sunk: • Heavy cruisers Astoria (CA-34) (216 died), Quincy (CA-39) (529 died), and Vincennes (CA-44) (332 died), by naval gunfire (4th cruiser sunk was the Australian HMAS Canberra under Captain Frank Getting, on which 85 died; many of Canberra’s survivors were rescued by the American destroyers USS Patterson and USS Blue, but then the Blue would be itself sunk with all hands on August 23d)30 HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • While escorting troop transports during the Guadalcanal landings, the American destroyer USS Jarvis (DD-393) was hit by an aerial torpedo and a hole 50 feet long opened to its boiler room. (After emergency repairs at Lunga Point it would set out for Brisbane, Australia. Limping along at 8 knots, it would be a sitting duck for a swarm of Japanese dive bombers of the 25th Air Flotilla from Rabaul, which would come upon it near Cape Esperance. A hit from one of their torpedoes would split the ship in two and within minutes it would take to the bottom its captain, Lieutenant Commander Graham, and its entire crew of 247.)

In addition the heavy cruiser Chicago (CA-29) was damaged by a torpedo from a Japanese destroyer

29. At a first order of approximation there seems to be a remarkable similarity between fighting at sea and feeding fish.

30. A half-century later, a deep-sea diving team led by Robert R. Ballard and including one of the Canberra’s survivors, Ordinary Seaman Albert Warne, would place a plaque on the battered but upright hull “In Memory Of Our Fallen Comrades.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • destroyers Ralph Talbot (DD-390) and Patterson (DD-392), by naval gunfireTotal Allied losses

were 1,077 dead and 709 wounded. A number of floaters, covered with blood and oil, struggling in the water, were taken by sharks. Total Japanese losses were 58 dead and 70 wounded. WORLD WAR II

August 15-20: Henderson Field, an airfield on the island of Guadalcanal, was deemed operational and the first elements of Marine Air Group 23 arrived, preparing to initiate a battle for control of the air. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 17, Monday: The 3d of the radio dramas An American in England, entitled “Ration island,” with music by Benjamin Britten, was broadcast for the initial time, over the CBS radio network, originating in New York.

German troops took Pyatigorsk and Yessentuki and reached the high valleys of the Caucasus at Kislovodsk.

First all-American air attack in Europe. WORLD WAR II

2d Raider Battalion (“Carlson’s Raiders”), US Marine Corps, transported by submarines Nautilus (SS-168) and Argonaut (APS-1) raided Makin Island in the Gilbert Islands; Nautilus gunfire supported Marines ashore. They would complete their operation on the following day.

The troop transport Nino Bixio (7,137 tons) was carrying New Zealand POWs captured in North Africa in the Mediterranean between Libya and when it was struck by 2 tin fish, one of which exploded in the prisoners’ hold killing many.

Injured POWs who still lived were brought on deck and tended by Italian medical officers. The ship was taken in tow by one of its escorting destroyers and taken to Navarino in southern Greece, where the dead prisoners could be buried, the survivors being shipped via Corinth to a POW camp near Bari. The commander of this British submarine, the HMS Turbulent, had the blood of 118 New Zealanders on his hands. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

August 20, Thursday: The First of the Few, a film with music by William Walton, was shown for the initial time, in the Leicester Square Theater, London.

Banners: A Choreographic Chorale in Two Scenes by Henry Cowell to words of Whitman was performed for the initial time, in Lee, Massachusetts.

Aircraft escort vessel Long Island (AVG-1) delivered 31 US Marine Corps aircraft to Henderson Field, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands.

President Getulio Vargas of Brazil prohibited German nationals from leaving the country (except on a diplomatic passport). Those remaining were to be detained in retaliation for the arrest of Brazilian nationals by the Germans in Europe.

German submarine U-464 was sunk by naval land-based aircraft (VP-73) in the North Atlantic, at 61 degrees 25 minutes North, 14 degrees 40 minutes West. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 21, day: On Guadalcanal, in the Battle of the Tenaru River, the 1st Japanese attempt to reduce US Marine perimeters was driven back into the jungle. In this battle more than 800 were killed.

WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 24, Monday: Music for MacDougall’s play Lumberjacks of America by Benjamin Britten was performed for the initial time, over the airwaves of the BBC, conducted by the composer.

The fourth of the radio dramas An American in England, entitled “Women of Britain,” with music by Benjamin Britten, was broadcast for the initial time, over the CBS radio network, originating in New York.

The German Army entered Stalingrad.

Battle of the Eastern Solomons begins and continues into the next day. Naval carrier-based aircraft (Vice Admiral F.J. Fletcher) supported by Marine and Army aircraft turned back a major Japanese attempt to recapture the islands of Guadalcanal and Tulagi in the Solomon Islands. 17 American planes were downed while the Japanese lose 70 planes. Several thousand people were killed.

United States Carrier Enterprise (CV-6) was damaged by a dive bomber at 8 degrees 38 minutes South, 163 degrees 30 minutes East. Japanese Carrier Ryujo was sunk by carrier-based aircraft at 6 degrees 10 minutes South, 160 degrees 50 minutes East. WORLD WAR II

August 31, Monday: The fifth of the radio dramas An American in England, entitled “The Yanks were Here,” with music by Benjamin Britten, was broadcast for the initial time, over the CBS radio network, originating in New York City.

The US government announced that meat rationing would go into effect in about four months.

Japanese forces landed on Guadalcanal in a 2d attempt to retake the island from the US Marines.

The Japanese begin to evacuated Milne Bay, Papua.

United States Carrier Saratoga (CV-3) was damaged by a submarine torpedo 260 miles southeast of Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, at 10 degrees 34 minutes South, 164 degrees 18 minutes East.

Japanese submarine RO-61 was sunk by US destroyer Reid (DD-369) and naval land-based aircraft (vp-43) in the vicinity of the Aleutian Islands, 52 degrees 36 minutes North, 173 degrees 57 minutes West. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Late August-early September: Japanese commanders inaugurated a system the US Marines dubbed the “,” utilizing their light naval forces to continually supply and reinforce their garrison on Guadalcanal.

WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 12, Saturday: Brazil places its navy under the operational control of the United State Navy. German aircraft and submarines launch sustained 10-day attack against large Allied to northern Russia.

The Laconia, a British Cunard Line luxury liner (19,695 tons) converted to a transport ship, was torpedoed and sunk by Kapitän-Leutnant Werner Hartenstein’s U-156 just south of the equator off the coast of Africa. The ship was carrying over 1,800 Italian POWs captured in North Africa and guarded by 160 Polish guards, former Russian prisoners of war. Also on board were 268 British military and civilian personnel including 80 women and children. About 500 POWs were killed instantly when the torpedoes hit the prison holds. Upon learning of the cargo, the U-boat captain radioed to all ships that he would not attacked any ship coming to the rescue. More than 200 survivors were picked up by the U-156 helped by the U-506 and U-507 and then the U-boats in turn were brought under attack by an American 4-engined Liberator of the USAF 343 Squadron from the US base on Ascension Island. Even though they were displaying a large Red Cross flag, the plane dropped three depth charges. Altogether, including the crew, 2,732 persons were on board the Laconia when attacked. A total of 1,649 died including the captain, Rudolf Sharpe (ex Lancastria). Vichy naval craft would pick up 1,083 floaters. (This incident would cause the German Naval Authorities to issue the infamous “Laconia Order” by which U-boat captains were forbidden to come to the assistance of floaters. At the Nürnberg Trials, Grand Admiral Donetz would be accused of a for having signed this order but would be acquitted — only to spend 11 years and 6 months in prison for other offenses.)

The Germans ended their action in Warsaw. Of the 350,000 Jews in the ghetto on July 22d, only 45,000 remained. WORLD WAR II ANTISEMITISM HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 13, Sunday: German forces drove towards the center of Stalingrad, reaching Minina in the south (this would drag on and on until January 31, 1943). WORLD WAR II

In the night Battle of Edson’s Ridge, the US Marines (1st Marine Raider Battalion and a Parachute Battalion) repulsed a 2d major Japanese ground attack on Henderson Field on Guadalcanal, leaving 640 bodies littering the field. The killing area would come to be known as “Bloody Angle.” Colonel Merritt Austin Edson would be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

The destroyer HMS Sikh was about a mile offshore, taking part in a night raid on the Libyan port of Tobruk, when it was illuminated by searchlights and hit repeatedly by shore batteries. It became disabled and had to be taken in tow by its sister ship, the HMS Zulu. When its tow cable was parted by a shell, it drifted back into the line of fire. Then 7 German dive-bombers attacked and the crew abandoned ship. 275 died. Those who made it to shore were of course taken prisoner.31

31. At a first order of approximation there seems to be a remarkable similarity between fighting at sea and feeding fish. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

What goes around keeps coming around and around and around...

September 18, Friday: Soviet troops took up positions in Stalingrad’s grain elevator and proceeded to repulse ten German attacks on this day.

British troops landed at Tamatave, Madagascar.

A German U-boat laid mines off Charleston, South Carolina.

The 7th Marine Regiment landed at Lunga Point on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. Subsequently, perhaps in preparation for a larger confrontation, the Japanese would begin a stepup of their “Tokyo Express” reinforcement schedule. As the month continued, both forces would escalate. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

October 2, Friday: The federal congress granted to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt the authority to control wages, salaries, and agricultural prices, effective November 1st.

The HMS Curacoa, a British light cruiser of 4,290 tons, engaged mainly in convoy escort duties during World War II. It was while escorting the Queen Mary off the coast of Donegal, Ireland that disaster struck.

That immense Cunard White Star liner was carrying 15,000 American troops to England when the Curacoa’s lookout reported what he supposed was a submarine on the port bow. The Queen Mary turned sharply to starboard and the Curacoa, in pursuit of this phantom, crossed its bows with insufficient clearance. Proceeding on a zig-zag course at a speed of 28 1/2 knots, the Queen Mary went through that escort cruiser like a hot knife through butter, the halves of the ship being pushed about a hundred yards apart. There were 26 floaters, which means that 338 of those aboard the Curacoa had died. The liner had of course been badly damaged — its bow plates had been folded back at least 40 feet into the ship. Still fearful that there were U-boats in the area and conscious of his primary responsibility for the lives of his many passengers, the captain would not slow his ship until it entered the more secure waters of the . LOST AT SEA

WALDEN: If we read of one man robbed, or murdered, or killed by accident, or one house burned, or one vessel wrecked, or one steamboat blown up, or one cow run over on the Western Railroad, or one mad dog killed, or one lot of grasshoppers in the winter, –we never need read of another. One is enough. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE US Marines occupied Funafuti in the Ellice Islands.

German submarine U-512 was sunk by US Army aircraft off French Guiana, 6 degrees 50 minutes North, 52 degrees 25 minutes West

WORLD WAR II

October 10, Saturday: Japanese reinforcements arrived on Guadalcanal to begin a 3d attempt to retake the island from the United States Marine Corps.

Political commissars were abolished in the Red Army. Full control was granted to military authorities. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 11, Sunday: The 3d suite from Descobrimento do Brasil, a film with music by Heitor Villa-Lobos was performed for the initial time, in the Teatro Municipal, Rio de Janeiro, the composer conducting. The film was commissioned by the Brazilian Cacao Institute of Bahia.

For the 1st time in 2 months, there was no fighting in Stalingrad.

Soviet partisans blew up the Bryansk-Lgov railroad in 178 places.

That night the Battle of Cape Esperance commenced, and would continue into the following day. Surface forces (Rear Admiral N. Scott) attacked enemy cruisers and destroyers headed for Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands on the “Tokyo Express” to reinforce the Japanese forces assaulting the US Marine beachhead there. 2 United States cruisers and two destroyers were damaged. A Japanese destroyer was sunk and 2 cruisers and a destroyer were damaged.

United States naval vessels damaged: Heavy cruiser Salt Lake City (CA-25), light cruiser Boise (CL-47), and destroyers Duncan (DD-485), and Farenholt (DD-491), by naval gunfire, Battle of Cape Esperance.

Japanese naval vessel sunk: Destroyer Fubuki, by surface craft, off Savo Island. WORLD WAR II

October 11/12: In the Battle of Cape Esperance, American cruiser/destroyer forces under Admiral Spruance prevented the bombardment of the USMC’s Henderson Field on Guadalcanal by the Japanese. WORLD WAR II

October 13, Tuesday: The 1st Marine Division was reinforced by the 164th Infantry Regiment of Americal Division, United States Army; this was the first major unit to reach Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. WORLD WAR II

October 14, Wednesday:Incidental music to the radio play The Man Behind the Gun by David Diamond was performed for the initial time, over the airwaves of the CBS radio network.

A couple of Japanese battleships bombarded the shit out of US Marine Henderson Field on Guadalcanal. Only 42 of the American planes remained intact and 41 people were killed. Motor torpedo boats attempted to engage the Japanese destroyers that were screening these battleships as they conducted the operation, but were ineffective.

Axis forces renewed their offensive at Stalingrad, sending 5 divisions and 300 panzers toward the tractor and Barrikady factories. In hand-to-hand fighting in every building in the vicinity, the Germans were unable to dislodge the Soviets.

Germans began the deportation of 22,000 Jews from Piotkrow, Poland to Treblinka. ANTISEMITISM

The Komet, a German commerce raider (3,287 tons), was being escorted into the North Atlantic by four motor torpedo boats and some minesweepers. The British Admiralty, knowing that an attempt would be made to send HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE the Komet to sea, had positioned a strong force in the English Channel to intercept it. In a brief encounter the Komet was set on fire and soon blew up. All 351 aboard died. The British also sank a couple of the torpedo boats and one of the minesweepers.

The SS Caribou was a 2,222-ton passenger ferry of the Newfoundland Railways, built in Rotterdam and launched on June 9, 1925 for service in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. While sailing between St. John’s and Port aux Basques, the ferry was blown apart at 3:20AM by a torpedo from Kapitän-Leutnant Urlich Gräf’s German U-69. The Caribou was carrying 237 passengers and crew of whom 118 were military personnel. Also aboard were 50 cows. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE This torpedo took the lives of 136, including 16 women and 14 children.

104 floaters were rescued by the Canadian destroyer HMCS Grandmere but 2 died before they could be gotten to a hospital. Of the ferry’s crew of 46, 31 died. (When U-69 would be sunk east of Newfoundland on February 17, 1943 by depth charges from the British destroyer HMS Fame, all 46 aboard would die.) WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 20-25: On Guadalcanal, US Marines and Army troops fought off the heavy ground attacks of a major Japanese counteroffensive.

WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 24, Saturday: I capricci di Callot, an opera by Gian Francesco Malipiero to his own words after Hoffmann, was performed for the initial time, in Teatro Reale dell’Opera, Rome.

Lieutenant-Colonel Lewis Burwell “Chesty” Puller won the 3d of his 6 Navy Crosses for valor in combat on Guadalcanal, when his Marine unit held its position during a Japanese night attack.

Allied forces made slow gains at El ‘Alamein. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 25, Sunday: The largest in a series of roundups of Norwegian Jews took place. ANTISEMITISM

German troops resumed their offensive south of the Terek in the Caucasus.

A massive tank battle continued at El ‘Alamein. Australians struck north, toward the Mediterranean.

The Japanese launched another assault to capture the US Marine Henderson Field on Guadalcanal, losing another 3,000 soldiers. Their “Tokyo Express” resupply and reinforcement of their troops on the island would step up again, and during the next couple of weeks the Japanese garrison would be greatly reinforced. (The US high command would very carefully do nothing to intercept the continuing incursion of Japanese reinforcements onto this island, as it was our strategic objective that the fighting there be both continuous and HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE entirely indecisive.)

The submarine Whale (SS-239) laid mines off Honshu, Japan, at entrance to Inland Sea. Submarine Amberjack (SS-219), landed Army personnel and supplies at Tulagi, Solomon Islands.

United States naval vessel sunk: Tug Seminole (AT-65), by naval gunfire, off Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands.

United States naval vessels damaged: • Destroyer Hughes (DD-410), accidentally by United States naval gunfire, Solomon Islands area, 8 degrees 38 minutes South, 166 degrees 41 minutes East. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • High speed minesweeper Zane (DMS-14), by naval gunfire, Sealark Channel off Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands

Japanese naval vessel sunk: Light cruiser Yura, damaged by Naval, Marine, and Army aircraft, off Santa Isabel, Solomon Islands, and sunk by own forces. WORLD WAR II

October 26, Monday: Arthur Honegger met Werner Egk for the initial time, in Paris. Egk was in town for a production of his Peer Gynt at the Opéra. He was an admirer of Honegger’s work.

Allied forces secured the heights of Kidney Ridge at El ‘Alamein.

1,866 Jews were deported from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz.

The Quisling government expropriated all property of Norwegian Jews. ANTISEMITISM

Battle of Santa Cruz Islands was joined as carrier task forces (Rear Admiral T.C. Kinkaid and Rear Admiral G.D. Murray) close a numerically superior Japanese force; heavy damage was inflicted on United States forces but immediate Japanese movement toward Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, was checked. The battle of Henderson Field, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, ended as Marines repulsed Japanese land and air attacks that damaging a number of US naval vessels. • Carrier Enterprise (CV-6), by dive bomber • Carrier Hornet (CV-8), by air attack • Battleship (BB-57), by dive bomber • Light cruiser San Juan (CL-54), by dive bomber • Destroyer Porter (DD-356), by submarine torpedo, and sunk by United States forces • Destroyer Smith (DD-378), by suicide bomber • Destroyer Hughes (DD-410), by collision WORLD WAR II

November 4, Wednesday: Three Romances on Texts by Burns for voice and piano, part of op.62 by Dmitri Shostakovich were performed for the initial time, in Kuibyshev.

Indian troops sealed the outcome of the Battle of El ‘Alamein by breaking through Axis defenders south of Tel el Aggagir. German and Italian forces began a long and wholesale retreat back into Libya.

Cruisers and destroyers bombarded Japanese positions near Koli Point, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands as American troops landed at Aola, Guadalcanal, well outside the Marine Corps perimeter. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE November 12, Thursday: Fearful that Governor-elect Earl Warren would keep his campaign promise to deny parole to sex offenders, Henry Cowell applies to California Governor Culbert Olson for a pardon.

United States Naval Operating Base, Casablanca, Morocco was established.

The naval battle of Guadalcanal began as Japanese aircraft attacked US troop transport ships unloading troops in Lunga Roads, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, under the protection of air and surface forces (Rear Admiral R.K. Turner).

While escorting troop transports and supply ships to the island’s Lunga Point, the USS Monssen was fired on near Savo Island by Japanese warships. In this engagement the destroyer USS Barton sank and the Monssen inadvertently ran through the field of floaters, killing many. Suddenly the Monssen was illuminated by starshells and a devastating hail of high-explosive missiles crashed into the ship demolishing the bridge and engine room. The ship lay dead in the water and the survivors among its crew abandoned ship. Minutes later, hearing cries for help, 3 of them paddled their raft back and retrieved 8 wounded men who had been below decks. Rescue boats from Guadalcanal picked up these survivors just before the Monssen’s magazine exploded and sent the hulk down. 150 had died.

During the night actions of the naval battle of Guadalcanal the American antiaircraft cruiser USS Juneau was hit by a torpedo that Japanese submarine I-26 had sent off toward the cruiser San Francisco. Badly damaged, the ship tried to escape from the battle zone but then was hit again. This time, apparently, the ship’s powder magazine had been reached, as the vessel went up in a great ball of fire taking the lives of her Captain and 687 crew members. 10 would survive. On board the Juneau had been the five Sullivans, George, Francis, Joseph, Madison, and Albert, who had enlisted together and had sought service in the same unit. (President Franklin Delano Roosevelt would issue instructions that if any American family lost more than two sons, the surviving sons were to be taken out of combat. A new ship would be named The Sullivans and christened by the boys’ mother in April 1943. The Sullivans would be decommissioned in 1965, and is moored at the Naval and Servicemen’s Park in Buffalo NY.)

United States naval vessels sunk: • Transports Tasker H. Bliss (AP-42), Hugh L. Scott (AP-43), and Edward Rutledge (AP-52), by submarine torpedoes, off Morocco, North Africa • Gunboat Erie (PG-50), by submarine torpedo, Caribbean area, 12 degrees 3 minutes North, 68 degrees 58 minutes West

United States naval vessels damaged, Naval Battle of Guadalcanal: • Heavy cruiser San Francisco (CA-38), by Japanese aircraft • Destroyer Buchanan (DD-484), accidentally by United States naval gunfire HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

Japanese submarine sunk: Submarine I-22, by PT-122, southwest of New Guinea, 8 degrees 32 minutes South, 148 degrees 17 minutes East WORLD WAR II

November 13, Friday: Symphony no.1 by Bohuslav Martinu was performed for the initial time, in Boston.

Concerto for two pianos and orchestra no.1 by Darius Milhaud was performed for the initial time, in Pittsburgh.

Allied troops entered Tobruk (Tubruq).

General Dwight David “Ike” Eisenhower struck a deal in Algiers with Admiral Darlan whereby Darlan would retain control over French West and North Africa in return for his cooperation with the Allies.

Brazil broke relations with the Vichy government.

In the naval battle of Guadalcanal, Japanese battleships bombarding Henderson Field were attacked by American surface action groups. In the second night of the battle, Rear Admiral D.J. Callaghan’s task group of cruisers and destroyers engaged a Japanese raiding group including two battleships. The U.S. force were heavily damaged, but the Japanese retired. Carrier force (Rear Admiral T. C. Kinkaid) arrived close to battle area and launched air search and attacks against the enemy. Afterward, Marine reinforcements would be landed at Lunga Point.

When the American destroyer USS Barton was hit by 2 tin fish from the Japanese destroyer Amatsukaza, HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE its forward magazines detonated and the ship split in two, the bow remaining above water for about 10 minutes. Those who could jumped into the water, but then the ship’s depth charges began to explode beneath them, and other ships cruised through the field of floaters, and shells fired at the destroyers landed among the them. We estimate that 80%, about 275, died of one or another of these causes. 42 would survive.

The American light cruiser USS Atlanta was struck by a torpedo from the destroyer Akaksuki and shells from the battleship Hiei. Then it ran into the “friendly fire” of the USS San Francisco and received 19 8-inch shells. Receiving shells from both sides, the cruiser was soon entirely ablaze and Admiral Scott was dead. The commander of the San Francisco, Admiral Callaghan, was killed a few minutes later by a 14-inch shell from the Hiei. Of the Atlanta’s 735 men, 165 died.

The American destroyer USS Laffey was hit by a salvo of 14-inch shells from the Hiei, and the order to abandon ship was being given when a torpedo set off the vessel’s depth charges, ripping it apart. The entire crew went down with the ship (a Presidential Unit Citation would be issued) United States naval vessels sunk, Battle of Guadalcanal: • Light cruiser Atlanta (CL-51), by naval gunfire • Light cruiser Juneau (CL-52), by submarine torpedo, as she left the Solomon Islands area to proceed to , New Hebrides, after Battle of Guadalcanal • Destroyer Cushing (DD-376), by naval gunfire • Destroyer Monssen (DD-436), by naval gunfire • Destroyer Laffey (DD-459), by gunfire and torpedo from surface craft

United States naval vessels damaged Battle of Guadalcanal: • Heavy cruiser Portland (CA-33), by torpedo from surface craft • Light cruiser Helena (CL-50), by naval gunfire • Destroyer Sterett (DD-407), by naval gunfire • Destroyer O’Bannon (DD-450), accidentally by United State naval gunfire • Destroyer Aaron Ward (DD-483), by naval gunfire

Japanese naval vessels sunk, Battle of Guadalcanal: • Battleship Hiei, by naval gunfire, carrier-based aircraft, and Marine land-based aircraft • Destroyer Akatsuki, by naval gunfire • Destroyer Yudachi, by naval gunfire WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE November 14, Saturday: Béla Bartók’s Concerto for two pianos, percussion and orchestra, an arrangement of his Sonata for two pianos and percussion, was performed for the initial time, in London.

Japanese forces occupied in the Solomons.

An assault on a perceived informant at the Poston detention camp for Japanese-Americans, and the subsequent arrest of two popular inmates for this offense, mushroomed into a massive strike. A similar uprising would take place one month later at our Manzanar detention camp.

Japanese cruisers and destroyers engaged in night bombardment of Henderson Field, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, area attacked by motor torpedo boats. In the morning this enemy force, while retiring, was struck by Marine and Naval aircraft from Henderson Field, and aircraft from carrier Enterprise (CV-6). The same aircraft sink seven Japanese transports during the afternoon. Beginning shortly before midnight and continuing on 15 November, battleship force (Rear Admiral W.W. Lee) composed of 2 battleships and 3 destroyers engages and turns back large Japanese Naval Group.

Part of Task Force 64 racing to intercept a Japanese naval unit under the command of Vice Admiral Kondo as it sailed into Savo Island Sound. The naval unit consisted of the battleship Kirishima, the heavy cruisers Atago and Takao, light cruisers Sendai and Nagara, and nine destroyers. When radar contact was made with the cruiser Nagara our destroyers opened fire and scored several hits. The USS Preston received a number of 6- inch shells that reduced it to a blazing hulk. Minutes later it listed heavily to port, rolled over, and went down stern first. Amid the tangle of floating wreckage would be found the bodies of its captain, Commander Max Stormes, and 116 of the crew. The survivors of this were rescued by the destroyer USS Meade.

Allied troops reach Gazala, Libya.

The SS Scillin, an Italian cargo/passenger ship, was torpedoed by Lieutenant John Bromage’s submarine HMS Sahib while enroute from Tripoli to Sicily, 10 miles north of Cape Milazzo in the Tyrrhenian Sea, carrying about 815 Commonwealth POWs. The Sahib managed to pull 27 of our POW out of the water (26 British and one South African) but only when they heard the survivors speaking English did they begin to realize that they had sunk a ship carrying British prisoners of war, and had killed 787 of their own. Also saved were 35 members of the Italian crew. Immediately after the sinking, the Sahib was bombed by escort German Ju-88s and depth charged by the Italian corvette Gabbiano. Badly damaged, the sub would be scuttled by its crew. At an inquiry, Lieutenant Bromage would testify that he had supposed the SS Scillin to be carrying Italian troops and would be excused from responsibility. The Ministry of Defence would hold this incident as a closely guarded secret for 54 years, telling relatives an inventive tale about how their boys had succumbed in Italian POW camps. It would not be until 1996 that the persistence of the families would cause the reality of this “friendly fire” incident to be acknowledged.

United States naval vessels sunk, Battle of Guadalcanal: • Destroyer Preston (DD-379), by naval gunfire • Destroyer Walke (DD-416), by gunfire and torpedo from surface vessel

Japanese naval vessel sunk: Heavy cruiser Kinugasa, by Naval and Marine aircraft WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

November 15, Sunday: Rear Admiral Lee with 2 battleships and 4 destroyers turned back large Japanese naval group to end the naval battle off Guadalcanal.

The HMS Avenger (a 13,785-ton British escort carrier built in the United States as the passenger liner Rio Hudson and transferred to the United Kingdom under Lend-Lease to be converted to an auxiliary aircraft carrier in March 1942), while in convoy from North Africa to the Clyde in Scotland on her way home after the landings in North Africa, was torpedoed just west of the Rock of Gibraltar by Korvette-Kapitän Adolf Piening’s German U-boat U-155. At approximately 0307 hours the ship was hit on its port side in its bomb magazine, blowing out its center section. The magazine had contained 100 depth charges and about 220 bombs. Enveloped in flames and black smoke, the hulk went down in less than a couple of minutes. 67 officers, including Commander A.P. Colthurst, and 446 ratings, a total of 514, died. 12 floaters would be picked up by HMS Glaisdale. (U-155 would survive to be scuttled during Operation Deadlight at the end of the war. Adolf Piening would die in 1984.) LEND-LEASE AGREEMENT

United States naval vessel sunk: Destroyer Benham (DD-397), damaged by torpedo from surface vessel and sunk by United States forces, off Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. United States naval vessels damaged: • Battleship South Dakota (BB-57), by naval gunfire, Battle of Guadalcanal • Destroyer Gwin (DD-433), by naval gunfire, Battle of Guadalcanal • Cargo ship Electra (AK-21), by submarine torpedo, off North Africa, 33 degrees 45 minutes North, 7 degrees 52 W • Cargo ship Almaack (AK-27), by submarine torpedo, off North Africa, 36 degrees 19 minutes North, 7 degrees 52 W

Japanese naval vessels sunk, Battle of Guadalcanal: • Battleship Kirishima, by naval gunfire • Destroyer Ayanami, by naval gunfire WORLD WAR II

November 30, Monday: The destroyer IJN Takanami (Rear Admiral Tanaka) which helped sink the USS Minneapolis was sunk by gunfire from cruiser and destroyer force (Read Admiral C.H. Wright) off Tassafaronga Point, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, south of Savo Island. Her captain, Commander Ogura Hasami and 211 members of the crew perished. There were 33 survivors who eventually reached Guadalcanal in a lifeboat.

United States naval vessels damaged: Heavy cruiser Pensacola (CA-24), Northampton (CA-26), New Orleans (CA-32), and Minneapolis (CA-36), by torpedoes from Japanese destroyers, off Tassafaronga, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. Japanese naval vessel sunk: Destroyer Takanami, by surface craft, Tassafaronga, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Late November-early December: Relief of the Marine forces on Guadalcanal began. The forces on the island came under command of XIV Corps and the expansion of the perimeter at Lunga Point began. The XIV Corps proved unable, however, to impede the evacuation of the Japanese end of the island.

WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE December 7, Monday: Japanese destroyers, carrying reinforcements to Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, were attacked by aircraft from Henderson Field, Guadalcanal; two destroyers were damaged. WORLD WAR II

December 8, Tuesday: Roger Désormière conducted the Orchestre Pierné in Paris in the first recording of any music by Olivier Messiaen.

German forces occupied Bizerte, Tunisia, capturing 16 French warships.

Motor torpedo boats attacked and turned back Japanese destroyers attempting to reinforce Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. WORLD WAR II

December 9, Wednesday: Huit hommes dans un château, a film with music by Arthur Honegger, was shown for the initial time, in Paris.

The 20th anniversary of the League of Composers was celebrated in Town Hall, New York with several first performances, including String Quartet no.11 by Darius Milhaud, Quintet for flute and strings by Walter Piston, Danzón cubano for two pianos by Aaron Copland, performed by the composer and Leonard Bernstein, and Madrigal-Sonata for flute, violin and piano by Bohuslav Martinu.

Aircraft from Henderson Field, Guadalcanal, begin what become virtually daily attacks on Japanese installations at Munda Point, New Georgia, Solomon Islands. Major General Alexander A. Vandegrift, USMC, was relieved by Major General A.M. Patch, USA, as commander of Marines and Army troops, Guadalcanal area, Solomon Islands. Japanese Submarine I-3 was sunk by PY-59 off Cape Esperance, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Major General Alexander A. Vandegrift, Commanding General of the 1st Marine Division, was relieved by Major General A.M. Patch, Commanding General of the Americal Division, as commanding general of the operation on the island of Guadalcanal. The 1st Marine Division made preparations to retire from the combat zone to rehabilitate and retrain.

WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1943

January 12, Tuesday night: The capture of Wake Island, some 2,000 miles west of Hawaii, had cost the Japanese 11 naval craft, 29 planes, and about 5,700 men, because the garrison of 388 US Marines and 1,200 civilians workers had held out for 14 days. On December 23d, 1941 Major James P.S. Devereux of the 1st Defense Battalion, US Marine Corps, and Commander Winfield Cunningham of the Naval Air Station had raised a white flag. During January 1942 the US Marines who had become POWs and had not been wounded had been put on the Nitta Maru bound for Yokohama and then Shanghai.

The wounded, and 98 American civilians, had remained as POWs on the island. On this night the Japanese guards accused them of being in radio communication with US naval forces and they were lined up with their backs to the ocean, and machine-gunned (for this the Japanese commander on Wake Island, Rear Admiral Shigematsu Sakaibara, and 11 of his officers, would be hanged after a trial by a US Naval Court at Kwajalein). WORLD WAR II

January 29, Friday: The 11th of 18 patriotic fanfares for brass and percussion commissioned by Eugene Goossens and the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Fanfare for Airmen by Leo Sowerby was performed for the initial time, in Cincinnati.

In Germany an alleged necrophiliac, Bruno Ludke, was taken into custody (which poses an interesting question).

Institution of the United States Marine Corps Women’s Reserve.

The naval battle of Rennell Island commenced as the cruiser and destroyer task force of Rear Admiral R.C. Giffen, covering a movement of troop transports to Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands, was bombed by Japanese aircraft. WORLD WAR II

February 13, Saturday: The Woman’s Reserve program was announced (birthday of the Women Marines).32 WORLD WAR II

32. During my period of military service, in the 1960s, the Women Marines were known affectionately as BAMs, or “Broad Ass Marines.” This acronym rebounded on me, of course, since because of my twisted spine I could be derogated by other Marine officers as being in the same category as the Women Marines: I also was a “BAM.” (The only thing worse than being termed a BAM was being termed a “Candy Ass,” like “Seaman 1st Class Peter Paul Mounds.”) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE February 21, Sunday: Fanfares for the Red Army for brass by William Walton was performed for the initial time, in the Royal Albert Hall, London. On the same program was the premiere of A Solemn Fanfare for brass by Arnold Bax.

Music for MacNeice’s play Pericles by Benjamin Britten was performed for the initial time, over the airwaves of the BBC.

This being the 25th anniversary of the Red Army, King George VI of England, who happened to be a distant relative of Tsar Nikolai II, dedicated a sword of honor to the City of Stalingrad (Prime Minister Winston Churchill would dispose of this cutting edge of silliness by handing it off to General Secretary Stalin at the meeting at Teheran in November).

US Marines and Army troops occupied Mbanika and Pavuvu in the Russell Islands of the Solomon Islands northwest of Guadalcanal.

German forces began an offensive towards Kharkov.

German Submarine U-225 was sunk by US Coast Guard cutter Spencer (PG-36) in the North Atlantic, at 51 degrees 25 minutes North, 27 degrees 28 minutes West. WORLD WAR II

June 21, Monday: Michael Tippett, after having been found guilty of failing to comply with the conditions of registration (conscription), was taken to Wormwood Scrubs handcuffed to an army deserter. His neighbors in prison were a rapist and a murderer. Years later, Tippett’s mother would describe the day as “her proudest moment” and the composer himself would state that he felt he had “come home.”

Violin Sonata by Francis Poulenc was performed for the initial time, in the Salle Gaveau, Paris, with the composer himself at the keyboard.

A fight between a black man and a white man on Belle Isle Bridge, Detroit escalated when white mobs invaded black districts intent on revenge. Blacks responded by hurling missiles at the whites from windows. The national guard was called out and a curfew imposed. In all 34 were killed, 700 injured, and 600 arrested.

The 4th Raider Battalion of US Marines, and US Army troops, landed at Segi Point, the southern tip of New Georgia, in the Solomon Islands. WORLD WAR II

June 30, Wednesday: La vita è sogno, an opera by Gian Francesco Malipiero to his own words after Calderón, was performed for the initial time, in the Opernhaus of Breslau.

In San Francisco, Gene Krupa was found guilty of using a minor to transport marijuana (he would be sentenced to one to six years in prison).

Elimination of the “CCC” Civilian Conservation Corps.

Confusion over blackout warning signals in Ticonderoga, New York resulted in air raid wardens, auxiliary firemen, and police officers being called out in error. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

Beginning shortly before midnight on 29 June, 4 cruisers and 4 destroyers (Rear Admiral A.S. Merrill) bombarded Vila-Stanmore on Kolombangara and Buin-Shortland, Bougainville, Solomon Islands; mines were laid of Shortland Harbor, Bougainville.

Third Fleet Amphibious Force (Rear Admiral R.K. Turner) supported by land-based aircraft (Vice Admiral A.W. Fitch) landed US Marines and Army troops on Rendova and other islands in the New Georgia area, Solomon Islands.

Naval vessels on hand (all types)...18,493

Personnel: • Navy...... 1,741,750 • Marine Corps.....310,994 • Coast Guard...... 154,976 • Total personnel...2,207,720

United States Mccawley (APA-4) was damaged by Japanese submarine torpedo and sunk by United States Motor Torpedo Boat near New Georgia, Solomon Islands, at 8 degrees 25 minutes South, 157 degrees 28 minutes West. United States Coast Guard Cutter #83421 was sunk by collision en route to Miami, Florida. United States naval vessels damaged: • High speed minesweeper Zane (DMS-14), by grounding, Solomon Islands area, 8 degrees 30 minutes South, 157 degrees 25 minutes East • Submarine chaser SC-1330, by collision with Coast Guard cutter, en route to Miami, Florida WORLD WAR II

July 5, Monday: Under Heinrich Himmler’s orders, the Sobibor extermination camp became a mere concentration camp. ANTISEMITISM

At 1:10AM the Red Army opened up with an artillery barrage and at 3:30AM the German army began its final offensive against the Kursk salient. This would become the largest tank battle in this history of human warfare and a perpetual inspiration for generations of war-game hobbyists. Combined forces equalled 2,000,000 men, 6,000 tanks, and 5,000 planes.

Cruisers and destroyers (Rear Admiral W.L. Ainsworth) bombarded Vila, Kolombangara, and Bairoko Harbor, New Georgia, Solomon Islands.

An Allied invasion fleet set sail for Sicily.

US Marines and Army troops landed at Rice Anchorage, New Georgia, Solomon Islands.

United States Destroyer Strong (DD-467) was sunk by a Japanese submarine torpedo in the Solomon Islands, at 8 degrees 5 minutes South, 157 degrees 15 minutes East. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 27, Friday: Marines and Seabees occupied Nukufetau, Ellice Islands.

Army troops were landed on Arundel Island, Solomon Islands.

German Submarine U-847 was sunk by aircraft (VC-1) from escort carrier Card (CVE-11), in the mid- Atlantic, at 28 degrees 19 minutes North, 37 degrees 59 minutes West.

Oxford University scientists announced the discovery of a new substance that was 100 times more effective than sulfa drugs in killing bacteria. This would be termed penicillin.

China and 7 Latin American countries recognized the French Committee of National Liberation in Algiers.

Soviet troops took Sevsk, south of Byansk.

185 American bombers struck the rocket launch site at Eperclecques on the Channel coast.

In the presence of Soviet, British and American officers, held their 1st national assembly, in Jajce.

Kurt Weill took the oath to become a citizen of the United States, in New York.

Henry Cowell’s dance music Chinese Partisan Fighter, to a scenario by Chen, was performed for the initial time, in Redlands, California. WORLD WAR II

August 28, Saturday: The Germans presented an ultimatum to the Danish government. Strikes and meetings must end. Curfews, press censorship and the death penalty for harboring arms and sabotage must be introduced. King Christian and his government refused the ultimatum.

King Boris III of Bulgaria died in Sofia, officially from a heart attack but conspiracy theories abound. He was succeeded by his six-year-old son Simeon II. Bogdan Dimitrov Filov was named regent.

Marines occupied Nanumea, Ellice Islands.

Marine Corps dive bombers sank Japanese Destroyer Asagiri off Santa Isabel, Solomon Islands, damaged two others, and prevented enemy reinforcements from landing on Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands.

Japanese Submarine I-123 was sunk by light minelayer Gamble (DM-15), Solomon Islands area, near Guadalcanal.

German submarine U-94 was sunk by naval land-based aircraft (VP-92) and HMCS Oakville in the Caribbean at 17 degrees 40 minutes North, 74 degrees 30 minutes West. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE November 1, Monday: Kurt Weill relocated from New York City to Hollywood to work on a film with Ira Gershwin.

The amphibious force under Rear Admiral T.S. Wilkinson provided aircraft and destroyer gunfire cover, and the First Marine Amphibious Corps (3d Marine Division under the command of Lieutenant General A.A. Vandegrift) went ashore at Cape Torokina on the island of Bougainville in the Solomon Islands. Puruata Island was also taken.

Cruiser and destroyer force (Rear Admiral A.S. Merrill) and carrier task force (Rear Admiral F.C. Sherman) shelled and bombed Japanese airfields and installations in the Buka-Bonis area of the Solomons. Rear Admiral Merrill’s force would later bombard enemy airfields on Shortland Island in the Solomons.

United States Destroyer Fullam (DD-474)was damaged by grounding in the Solomon Islands at 6 degrees 25 minutes South, 154 degrees 53 minutes East.

Soviet forces captured Armyansk, cutting off Axis troops in the .

British troops took Roccamonfina, southeast of Rome.

German Submarine U-405 was sunk by destroyer Borie (DD-215) in the North Atlantic at 49 degrees 0 minutes North, 31 degrees 14 minutes West. WORLD WAR II

November 21, Sunday: New waves of Marines came ashore on Tarawa, and by noon the invasion of that island was back on track.

British troops gained a bridgehead over the River Sangro in Italy.

British planes bombed Berlin, killing 1,315 more Berliners.

French authorities released the Lebanese government leaders who had been arrested on November 11th.

A Marine reconnaissance company was put ashore on Abemama in the Gilbert Islands, by the submarine Nautilus (SS-168).

The Imperial Japanese Navy destroyer IJN Urakaze was acting as a for a Japanese fleet, including the battleships Yamato and Kongo, as they were returning from Brunei toward Kure, Japan. Under cover of darkness the USS Sealion sent off a salvo of 6 torpedoes toward the Kongo, three of which would detonate. In the meanwhile it sent of another salvo of 3 torpedoes, which struck the Urakaze. A torpedo exploding in the ship’s magazine sent the destroyer down in a matter of minutes, about 65 miles north west of Taiwan. 308 died. Apparently, from the Urakaze, there was not a single floater.33 Some hours later, after an internal explosion, the Konga also sank. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE November 24, Wednesday: Americans complete their conquest of Tarawa. Over 6,000 lives had been lost in the battle, primarily due to a miscalculation of the level of the ocean above an offshore reef that had caused an entire wave of invading Marines to be stranded in a kill zone.

The American escort carrier USS Liscombe Bay (CVE-56) was struck by Japanese torpedoes near Makin Island in the Gilberts, 2 degrees 58 minutes North, 172 degrees 26 minutes East. They had been sent from Lieutenant-Commander Tadashi Tabata’s I-175 sub.

Our carrier went down in 23 minutes. The stern of the ship simply vanished when the aircraft bombs in the hold blew. 644 died including its commander, Rear Admiral Henry A. Mullinix.34 Fragments of steel, tatters of clothing, and shreds of human flesh showered onto the deck of the USS New Mexico almost a mile away. 55 officers and 217 enlisted men were plucked from the waves by the destroyer USS Hoel. Many depth charges 33. At a first order of approximation there seems to be a remarkable similarity between fighting at sea and feeding fish. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE were of course being dropped randomly, but I-175 escaped intact.

The Carrier Wasp (CV-18) was commissioned at Quincy, Massachusetts; this vessel was named for carrier Wasp (CV-7) that had sunk on September 15, 1942 near Espirtu Santo, New Hebrides. WORLD WAR II

December 26, Sunday: After heavy pre-invasion bombardment and bombing by ship gunfire and aircraft of the 7th Amphibious Force (Rear Admiral D.E. Barbey), the 1st Marine Division (Major General W.H. Rupertus) landed on Cape Gloucester, . While escorting , the destroyer USS Brownson (DD- 518) was hit by a couple of 500-pound bombs from a Japanese dive-bomber. The ship’s entire upper structure was blown apart and it began to list to starboard. Within minutes, its back broken, it settled rapidly, and went under at 14:59 hours at 5 degrees 20 minutes South, 148 degrees 25 minutes East. 108 died. The destroyers USS Daly and USS Lamson picked up 168 floaters while depth charges from the Brownson were going off underneath them.

Admiral Erich Bey’s 32,700-ton German battleship Scharnhorst was attempting to intercept an Allied convoy sailing to the port of Murmansk in northern Russia when it was engaged by the British battleship Duke of York and the destroyers Savage and Saumarez about 75 miles off the North Cape, the northernmost point in Europe. 55 torpedoes were sent at the Scharnhorst and 11 struck it. The battleship was then engaged by the cruisers Jamaica, , and Norfolk. After 36 minutes of this pounding, at 7:45PM, the battleship rolled over and went down bow-first. There were 36 floaters. 1,933 died including all 51 of its officers. On the British ships 18 had died, and 16 were wounded. (In September 2000 the wreck of the Scharnhorst would be located, by some curious Norwegians, on the bottom at almost 1,000 feet.35

34. Black mess steward and ships’ boxing champion Doris “Dorie” Miller was also among the dead. (Notice that whenever we give a body count we make special mention of the corpses of the important or famous. Although we consider that all human corpses are equivalently dead, we don’t seem to be self-conscious about this practice at all. Isn’t that amazing?) Miller had won the Navy Cross at Pearl Harbor by moving his mortally wounded captain to a place of greater safety and then manning a .50-caliber machine gun on the deck of the USS West Virginia until its ammo ran out. Miller had had no formal training in the use of weapons, other of course than his fists, but remarked afterward, “I think I got one of those Jap planes.” On June 30, 1973, the destroyer USS Miller would be named in his memory. Don’t you love a good story? –there have been legislative efforts to upgrade Dorie’s medallion to the Congressional Medal of Honor but to date these efforts have been unsuccessful. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE United States Destroyers Lamson (DD-367), Shaw (DD-373), and Mugford (DD-389) were damaged by Japanese dive- bombers off Cape Gloucester, New Britain. Landing Ship – Tank LST66 was damaged by a Japanese horizontal bomber. WORLD WAR II

35. At a first order of approximation there seems to be a remarkable similarity between fighting at sea and feeding fish. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1944

January 3, Monday, morning: Soviet troops secured Novograd-Volynskiy, east of Lublin.

Returning to the USA after completing its 3rd Atlantic convoy duty, the destroyer USS Turner (DD-648) had anchored the night before in the Ambrose Channel off Sandy Hook, New Jersey, to wait its turn to enter the for repairs. At about 6:30AM, while the crew was preparing for their breakfast, a series of internal explosions began in the ship’s ammunition stores. Its fuel tanks were ignited. The bottom of the vessel blew open and it began to sink by the stern. The hulk now lies at #7 on the chart below. We will never know for certain what began this process, of course, but our presumption is that the initial explosion was produced during an incautious and unnecessary cleaning of an anti-submarine weapon. 15 officers, including Robert Lowell’s cousin 1st Lieutenant Warren Winslow, and 138 enlisted men died.36 TIMELINE OF ACCIDENTS

165 floaters were picked up by nearby ships and taken to the hospital at Sandy Hook. A Coast Guard helicopter

36. My cold-blooded intent here is to characterize the period of our 2d world war as what it was. It was a convulsion of helplessness beyond anything humankind had to that point experienced. I will attempt to forego sympathy and access the affect of helpless people on the various sinking ships at sea –torpedoed or whatever, waiting for their collective fate to engulf them– merely to assist in depicting the general helplessness of such a spasm. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE brought in several cases of blood plasma from New York City, which saved a number of lives.

In the South Pacific, US Marine Major Gregory “Pappy” Boyington shot down his 26th enemy plane, thus tying the record set by US Army Captain Edward “Eddie” Vernon Rickenbacker during World War I, before he was himself shot down and taken prisoner by a Japanese submarine crew. For this he would be awarded the Navy Cross.

The submarine Bluefish (SS-222) laid mines off eastern Malayan coast. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE January 9, Sunday: Lieutenant-Colonel Lewis Burwell “Chesty” Puller won the 4th of his 6 Navy Crosses for valor in combat at Cape Gloucester, New Britain, when his Marine unit held an exposed ridge against the Japanese.

Soviet forces secured Polonnoye east of Lvov.

After a couple of German soldiers were killed in Lyon, Gestapo chief Klaus Barbie directed that 22 Frenchmen be killed in reprisal.

German Submarine U-81 was sunk by Army aircraft off Pola, Italy WORLD WAR II

January 31, Monday: US Marines and Army troops (Major-General H.M. “Howling Mad” Smith) land on Kwajalein and Atolls in the . The operation was under the overall command of Commander Central Pacific Force (Vice Admiral R.A. Spruance) and was composed of Southern Attack Force (Rear Admiral R.K. Turner), Northern Attack Force (Rear Admiral R.L. Conolly), and Reserve Force and Majuro Attack Group (Rear Admiral H.W. Hill). Landings were supported by carrier-based aircraft (Rear Admiral M.A. Mitscher) and land-based aircraft (Rear Admiral J.H. Hoover).

Aircraft from fast carrier group (Read Admiral F.C. Sherman) bombed Japanese aircraft and airfield facilities at Engebi Island, Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Attacks by this carrier group continue on the first three days of February and afterward by Rear Admiral S.P. Ginder minutes South carrier group through 7 February.

Carrier Franklin (CV-13) was commissioned at Newport News, Virginia.

United States naval vessels damaged: • Heavy cruiser Louisville (CA-28), by naval gunfire, Marshall Islands invasion, 9 degrees 0 minutes North, 167 degrees 0 minutes East • Destroyer Colahan (DD-658), by grounding, Marshall Islands invasion, 8 degrees 52 minutes North, 167 degrees 38 minutes East HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Cargo ship Enceladus (AK-80), by storm, Solomon Islands area, 8 degrees 9 minutes South, 157 degrees, 38 minutes East

Japanese naval vessels sunk: • Submarine I-171, by destroyers Guest (DD-472), and Hudson (DD-475), area, 5 degrees 37 minutes South, 154 degrees 14 minutes East • Minelayer Nasami, by submarine Trigger (SS-237), Central Pacific area, 9 degrees 50 minutes North, 147 degrees 6 minutes East • Auxiliary submarine chaser #33, by aircraft, Central Pacific area WORLD WAR II

February 1, Tuesday: Oswald T. Avery, Colin M. MacLeod, and Maclyn McCarty’s “Studies on the Chemical Nature of the Substance Inducing Transformation of Pneumococcal Types” in the Journal of Experimental Medicine demonstrated that DNA was the carrier of genetic material.

Piet Mondrian died in New York at the age of 71.

Carl Irvin Oscarson committed suicide by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge.

A Soviet offensive captured Kingisepp, southwest of Leningrad, reaching the border of Estonia.

The command designated “Amphibious Forces, Pacific Fleet” was established, with headquarters at Pearl Harbor, Oahu in the Hawaiian Islands. Vice Admiral R.K. Turner, Commander Fifth Amphibious Force, assumed this command as additional duty.

An United States Naval Base was established at Finschhafen on the island of New Guinea.

The 4th Division’s 23d and 24th Marines landed on the islands of Roi and Namur in the of the Marshall Islands. US Army troops landed on Kwajalein Island itself, under cover of heavy naval gunfire from battleships, cruisers and destroyers.

Several United States naval vessels were damaged in the Marshall Islands invasion: • Destroyer Anderson (DD-411), by grounding, 9 degrees 10 minutes North, 167 degrees 25 minutes East • Destroyer Haggard (DD-555), by accidental explosion, 9 degrees 0 minutes North, 167 degrees 0 minutes East TIMELINE OF ACCIDENTS

WALDEN: If we read of one man robbed, or murdered, or killed by accident, or one house burned, or one vessel wrecked, or one steamboat blown up, or one cow run over on the Western Railroad, or one mad dog killed, or one lot of grasshoppers in the winter, –we never need read of another. One is enough.

Japanese naval vessels sunk: HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Destroyer Umikaze, by submarine Guardfish (SS-217), Caroline Islands area, 7 degrees 10 minutes North, 151 degrees 43 minutes East • Submarine RO-39, by destroyer Walker (DD-517), Marshall Islands area, 9 degrees 24 minutes North, 170 degrees 32 minutes East WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

February 12, Saturday: Radio Moscow announced that a National Council of Poland had been set up in areas of the country occupied by the Red Army, in opposition to the London government in exile.

German newspapers carried notices that all men 51-60 years old not yet mobilized were to report for duty by February 16th.

US Marines went ashore at Arno Atoll to the east of Majuro in the Marshall Islands (this was the beginning of a series of “mopping-up” operations on minor atolls of the Marshall Islands, that under other circumstances would have amounted to tourism).

Japanese aircraft bombed and destroyed supply concentrations on Roi Islands, Marshall Islands.

United States naval vessel sunk: Submarine rescue vessel Macaw (ASR-11), by grounding, entrance to Midway Channel.

The Khedive Ismail, an Egyptian troopship of 7,513 tons, was carrying 1,250 West African soldiers and a detachment of British Wrens, nurses, and ATS girls (members of the British Army Auxiliary) when torpedoed in the south west of Ceylon by Lieutenant-Commander Fukumura’s I-27.

There were only about 200 floaters.37 HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE (I-27 would later be sunk by the escort destroyers.)38

WORLD WAR II

37. At a first order of approximation there seems to be a remarkable similarity between fighting at sea and feeding fish.

38. That those who live by the sword will die by the sword is of course a mere rule of thumb, so there have been some notable exceptions — but as rules of thumb go this one seems fairly accurate. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE February 17, Thursday: William Schuman’s William Billings Overture was performed for the initial time, in New York.

The 22d Marines helped the US Army seize Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands.

Naval task force (Vice Admiral R.A. Spruance), which included 9 carriers and 6 battleships, struck Japanese installations and vessels at Truk in the Caroline Islands; attack would be repeated on the following day.

United States naval vessel damaged: Carrier Intrepid (CV-11), by aircraft torpedo, Truk, Caroline Islands, 7 degrees 23 minutes North, 153 degrees 32 minutes East. Japanese naval vessels sunk: • Light cruiser Naka, by carrier-based aircraft, Truk area, Caroline Islands, 7 degrees 15 minutes North, 151 degrees 15 minutes East •Training cruiser Katori, by carrier-based aircraft and surface craft, Truk area, Caroline Islands, 7 degrees 45 minutes North, 151 degrees 20 minutes East • Destroyer Maikaze, by carrier-based aircraft and surface craft, Truk area, Caroline Islands, 7 degrees 45 minutes North, 151 degrees 45 minutes East • Destroyer Oite, by carrier-based aircraft, Truk area, Caroline Islands, 7 degrees 40 minutes North, 151 degrees 45 minutes East • Destroyer Tachikaze, by carrier-based aircraft, Truk area, Caroline Islands, 7 degrees 40 minutes North, 151 degrees 55 minutes East • Minesweeper #26, by aircraft, Rabaul, New Britain • Submarine I-11, by destroyer Nicholas, (DD-449), Marshall Islands area, 10 degrees 34 minutes North, 173 degrees 31 minutes East • Submarine chaser #24, by destroyer Burns (DD-588), 7 degrees 24 minutes North, 150 degrees 30 minutes East WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE February 18, Friday: Soviet troops captured Staraya Russa and Shimsk, south of Novgorod.

A third successive attack in as many days by Indian forces failed to dislodge Germans defending Monte Cassino. New Zealanders forced their way across the River Rapido near the town of Cassino but were driven back.

Captain George D. Belben’s cruiser HMS Penelope was returning from the Anzio beach-head to Naples when Oberleutnant Horst-Arno Fenski’s U410 got it with a torpedo. It went down at 7:18AM. 417 out of 623 died.

(U410 would sink on March 11, 1944 during a US bombing raid on the Vichy Naval Base at Toulon.)

On the eve of the American carrier-borne air strike on the Japanese naval base at Truk Lagoon, the 1,270-ton destroyer Oite and the light cruiser Agano were due for a refit. They headed out together for Japan but only got about 200 miles before the Agano took a torpedo and had to be abandoned. Its crew of 523 piled on board the Oite and the vessel attempted to return to Truk. However, at this point Operation Hailstorm, an air attack against the ships anchored in Truk Lagoon, was taking place. As the Oite approached the entrance to the lagoon it was engaged by Avenger torpedo planes from the carrier USS Yorktown. The ship’s back was broken and within minutes it plunged to the 240-foot bottom. As might be expected, just about everybody died.

US Marines and Army forces landed on Engebi Island, Eniwetok Atoll, in the Marshall Islands. Preliminary landings were made on February 17th on several nearby islets. The operation was under the command of Rear Admiral H.W. Hill and was supported by naval gunfire and carrier-based aircraft.

Destroyers bombard enemy positions at Kavieng, , and Rabaul, New Britain.

United States naval vessel sunk: Tug YT-198, by mine, Italian area, 41 degrees 27 minutes North, 12 degrees 38 minutes East. United States naval vessel damaged: Minesweeper Pilot (AM-104), by collision, Italian area, 40 degrees 48 minutes North, 14 degrees 16 minutes East. Japanese naval vessels sunk, Truk area, Caroline Islands: • Destroyer Fumizuki, by carrier-based aircraft, 7 degrees 24 minutes North, 151 degrees 44 minutes East. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Submarine chaser #29, by carrier-based #29, by carrier-based aircraft, 7 degrees 25 minutes North, 151 degrees 45 minutes East WORLD WAR II

February 19, Saturday: American bombers struck at Leipzig in the afternoon, and then at night British bombers also struck. In total 13,696 were killed and 50,000 left homeless. Meanwhile the German was making its heaviest raids on London since May 1941. (Oh, God, when is this going to be over?)

US Marines and Army troops supported by naval bombardment landed on Eniwetok Island of Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands. The operation was under the command of Rear Admiral H.W. Hill.

Army, Naval, and Marines land-based aircraft heavily attacked the airfield and other Japanese installations at Rabaul, New Britain. The area was repeatedly bombed and after this the Japanese would abandon their air defense of Rabaul.

Motor torpedo boats engaged a German convoy southeast of the island of Elba.

Allied cruiser and destroyer gunfire supported US positions at Anzio, Italy.

Japanese naval vessels sunk: Submarine chasers #22, #34, and #40 by Army aircraft, off New Ireland WORLD WAR II

February 22, Tuesday: Two Songs op.18 for voice and piano by Samuel Barber were performed for the initial time, in New York: The Queen’s Face on a Summery Coin, to words of Horan, and Monks and Raisins, to words of Villa.

Soviet forces captured Dno, east of Pskov.

At Dachau, 31 Soviet POWs were executed.

After torpedoing the tanker British Chivalry, Japanese submarine I-37 machine-gunned its lifeboats, killing 20. Chivalry, what’s that?

Completing United States control of Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands, under cover of naval bombardment and carrier-aircraft bombing US Marines landed on Perry Island.

Destroyers bombarded the Japanese airstrips, pier area, and anchorages at Kavieng on New Ireland.

US submarine Ray (SS-271), laid mines at the entrance to the port of Saigon in French Indochina.

United States naval vessel sunk: PT-200, by collision with unknown object, off Long Island, New York, 41 degrees 23 minutes North, 71 degrees 1 minute West

Japanese naval vessels sunk: • Minelayer Natsushima, by destroyers, off New Ireland, 2 degrees 40 minutes South, 149 degrees 40 minutes East HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Tug Nagaura, by destroyers, off New Ireland, 6 degrees 54 minutes South, 148 degrees 38 minutes East • River gunboat Francis Garnier, by mine, South China Sea, 10 degrees 30 minutes North, 108 degrees 0 minutes East WORLD WAR II

March 20, Monday: Soviet forces captured Vinnitsa, east of Lvov and Mogilev-Podolskiy to the south. They also captured Soroki on the west bank of the Dnestr (Moldova).

The express train between Moscow and Leningrad resumedservice.

Naval attack group (Commodore L.F. Reifsnider) landed the 4th Marine Division (Brigadier General A.H. Noble) on , Bismarck Archipelago.

Task force including 4 battleships, 2 escort carriers, and destroyers (Rear Admiral R.M. Griffin) bombarded and bombed Kavieng, New Ireland.

The submarine Angler (SS-240) evacuated 58 persons including women and children from the west coast of Panay, Philippine Islands.

Japanese naval vessels sunk: Auxiliary submarine chasers #47 and #49, by Army aircraft, north of New Guinea, 2 degrees 55 minutes South, 143 degrees 40 minutes East. WORLD WAR II

June 15, Thursday: Naval task force (Vice Admiral R.K. Turner) landed US Marines (Lieutenant-General H.M. “Howling Mad” Smith) on , Marianas Islands, under cover of intensive naval gunfire and carrier-based aircraft.

Carrier-based aircraft from two task groups (Rear Admiral J.J. Clark and Rear Admiral W.K. Harrill) bombed Japanese installations on in the , and Chichi Jima and Haha Jima in the ; attack on Iwo Jima would be repeated 16 June.

United States naval vessel damaged: Battleship Tennessee (BB-43), by coastal defense gun, Saipan, Marianas Islands, 15 degrees 2 minutes North, 143 degrees 50 minutes East

United States naval vessels damaged, Normandy area: LST2, LST266, LST307, LST331, LST360 by coastal defense guns, and LST133, by mine

Japanese naval vessel sunk: Minelayer #101, by surface craft, Marianas Islands area, 15 degrees 15 minutes North, 145 degrees 45 minutes East

German submarine sunk: U-860, by aircraft (VC-9) from escort carrier Solomons (CVE-67), South Atlantic area, 25 degrees 27 minutes South, 5 degrees 30 minutes West WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 15/16: U.S. XXth Air Force planes based in Bengal, India staged the first bombing raid on Japan since the in 1942. WORLD WAR II

From airfields in China, B-29 Superfortresses began long range attacks on Tawata.

The 2d and 4th Marine divisions began their assault on the island of Saipan.

June 30, Friday: A general strike began in Copenhagen against curfew and other occupation restrictions. Germany cut off all water, gas and electricity to the city.

The last season at the Vienna Opera House ended, appropriately enough, with a performance of Richard Wagner’s Götterdämmerung.

The United States broke diplomatic relations with Finland.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed a bill providing independence for the Philippines (just as soon as the Japanese could be cleared away).

Naval vessels on hand (all types) — 46,032.

Personnel: Navy — 2,981,365 Marine Corps — 472,582 Coast Guard — 169,258 Total personnel — 3,623,205 WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE July 21, Friday: At the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Senator Harry S Truman was nominated to run for vice-president.

A naval attack force (Rear Admiral R.L. Conolly) landed US Marines (Major General R.S. Geiger, 3d Marine Division) and Army formations on the island of Guam in the Marianas. The assault was preceded by intensive naval gunfire and attacks by carrier-based aircraft.

United States naval vessel damaged: Submarine chaser SC-1316, by Japanese coastal mortar, Marianas area, 13 degrees 24 minutes North, 144 degrees 39 minutes East WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE July 24, Monday: In spite of Admiral Horthy’s order to the contrary, 1,500 Jews from Savar were deported to Auschwitz. These were the last Hungarian Jews to be sent to Auschwitz. ANTISEMITISM

The Germans arrested all 2,000 Jews on Crete and transported them to Auschwitz. Only 275 managed to hide through the intercession of local citizens.

The 2d and 4th Marine divisions landed on , employing napalm for the 1st time, and cleared the Japanese from the airfield from which a year later the “Enola Gay” would take off bound for Hiroshima, etc.

Naval attack force (Rear Admiral H.W. Hill) landed Marines (Major General H. Schmidt) on Tinian, Marianas Islands. Landing was supported by naval gunfire, carrier aircraft, and land-based aircraft from Saipan.

United States naval vessels damaged: • Battleship Colorado (BB-45), by coastal defense gun, Marianas Islands area, 15 degrees 2 minutes North, 145 degrees 50 minutes East HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • LST481, by coastal defense gun, Marianas Islands area, 13 degrees 24 minutes North, 144 degrees 39 minutes East WORLD WAR II

August 8, Tuesday: Japanese forces occupied Hengyang.

Antti Verner Hackzell replaced Edwin Johannes Indegard Linkomies as prime minister of Finland.

Executions of the bomb-plotters began in Plötzensee Prison, Berlin. They were hung with wire nooses.

American troops entered Le Mans.

US troops under the command of George Smith Patton, Jr. captured Le Mans and reached Avranches.

Destroyers and land-based US Marine aircraft from Majuro in the Marshall Islands bombarded and bombed Japanese positions on the island of Taro at Maloelap Atoll. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 15, Friday: Soviet forces occupied Praga, near Warsaw, but again came to a halt.

American forces landed unopposed on Morotai Island in the Netherlands East Indies, but simultaneous 1st Marine Division landings on Peleliu () Island in the Carolines met fierce Japanese resistance. The naval operation was commanded by Vice Admiral T.S. Wilkinson, and the landing was preceded by several days of intensive carrier-based aircraft bombing and ship gunfire bombardment. The heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis (CA-35) participated in this operation.

The Marine landing itself was commanded by Major General W.H. Rupertus.

A naval task force under Rear Admiral D.E. Barbey landed Army troops under Major General J.C. Persons on Morotai Island in the Netherlands East Indies. The assault was supported by the cruisers and destroyers of Rear Admiral R.S. Berkey and aircraft from the escort carriers of Rear Admiral T.L. Sprague.

Submarine Stingray (SS-186) landed men and stores on Majoe Island, Molucca Sea.

Carrier Shangri La (CV-38) was commissioned at Norfolk, Virginia.

Japanese naval vessel sunk: Transport #3, by submarine Guavina (SS-362), Philippine Islands area, 5 degrees 34 minutes North, 125 degrees 23 minutes East WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 16, Saturday: Second Quebec Conference attended by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill ended (it has been in session since September 11th).

American troops completed their conquest of Morotai Island.

A Polish advance across the Vistula (Wista) at Czerniakow was badly mauled by the Germans.

Soviet forces occupied the Bulgarian capital, Sofia.

American troops captured Beaugency, southwest of Orléans, along with 20,000 Germans.

A general strike took place on this day and the following one in Denmark, to protest German troops having fired on a crowd in Copenhagen, wounding 29.

Michael Tippett’s motet for chorus acappella Plebs angelica was performed for the initial time, in Canterbury Cathedral.

Marine Air Wings, Pacific was redesignated Aircraft, Fleet Marine Force, Pacific (Major General F.P. Mulcahy) with headquarters at Ewa, Oahu.

United States naval vessel damaged: Destroyer Wadleigh (DD-689), by mine, Palau Islands area, Caroline Islands, 7 degrees 51 minutes North, 134 degrees 39 minutes East. Japanese naval vessel sunk: Escort carrier Unyo, by submarine Barb (SS-220), South China Sea, 19 degrees 18 minutes North, 116 degrees 26 minutes East. WORLD WAR II

September 28, Thursday: Supported by naval aircraft and gunfire, the Marines seized Ngesebus and Kongauru Islands, north of Peleliu (Palau), to little resistance.

The Allied armies occupied Calais. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE November 17, Friday: Juho Kusti Paasikivi replaced Urho Jonas Castren as prime minister of Finland.

Virgil Thomson’s orchestral suite Portraits was performed for the initial time, in Philadelphia, conducted by the composer. The portraits included were: Bugles and Birds (Pablo Picasso), Cantabile for Strings (Nicolas de Chatelain), Fugue (Alexander Smallens), Percussion Piece (Jessie K. Lassel), and Tango Lullaby (Mlle Flavie Alvarez de Toledo).

The destroyer USS McKean was transporting 185 Marines from Guadalcanal to Bougainville when it took a direct hit from a Japanese torpedo plane at the battle of Empress Augusta Bay. The ship’s after magazine, containing depth charges, exploded and ruptured its fuel tanks. Minutes later its forward magazine blew and the ship began to sink by the stern. 64 crewmen and 52 Marines died. Floaters were picked up by other ships. United States naval vessel damaged: Attack transport Alpine (APA-92), by Japanese , area, Philippine Islands 11 degrees 7 minutes North, 125 degrees 2 minutes East

Japanese naval vessels sunk: • Escort carrier Jinyo, by submarine Spadefish (SS-411), Yellow Sea, 33 degrees 2 minutes North, 123 degrees 33 minutes East • Submarine I-26, by aircraft (VC-82) from escort carrier Anzio (CVE-57) and destroyer escort Lawrence C. Taylor (DE-415), Philippine Sea, 12 degrees 44 minutes North, 130 degrees 42 minutes East • Torpedo boat Hiyodori, by submarine Gunnel (SS-253), South China Sea, 16 degrees 56 minutes North, 110 degrees 30 minutes East WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE December 12, Tuesday: Allied (Great Britain-India) forces begin a general offensive against the Japanese in the Arakan Hills of Burma (Myanmar).

American troops captured Düren, southwest of Cologne.

Heitor Villa-Lobos arrived in New York by train from Los Angeles.

United States naval vessel damaged: Destroyer Caldwell (DD-605), by Japanese Kamikaze, Leyte area, Philippine Islands 10 degrees 30 minutes North, 124 degrees 42 minutes East

Japanese naval vessels sunk: • Destroyer Uzuki, by surface craft, Leyte area, Philippine Islands 11 degrees 3 minutes North, 124 degrees 23 minutes East • Transport #159, by Marine and Army aircraft, Leyte area, Philippine Islands 11 degrees 20 minutes North, 124 degrees 10 minutes East WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1945

February 16, Friday: While in prison awaiting trial, Jacques Larsac, the former police chief of Dijon, was lynched by a mob.

Aircraft from fast carrier task force (Vice Admiral M.A. Mitscher) bombed airfields, aircraft factories, and shipping in the Tokyo area; attack would be repeated on 17 February.

Fire support vessels and carrier-based aircraft commence 3-day prelanding bombardment and bombing of Iwo Jima in the Volcano Islands.

Cruiser and destroyer task force (Rear Admiral J.L. McCrea) bombards enemy shore installations at Kurabu Zaki, Paramushiro, Kurile Islands.

Army forces, preceded by naval bombardment and attack by Army aircraft, land on Corregidor, Luzon, Philippine Islands.

United States naval vessel sunk: • Submarine Barbel (SS-316), Pacific Ocean area, reported as presumed lost.

United States naval vessels damaged: HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Destroyers Ingraham (DD-694) and Barton (DD-722), by collision, Iwo Jima area, 31 degrees 45 minutes North, 141 degrees 54 minutes East • Submarine chaser PC-1119, by coastal defense gun, Luzon area, Philippine Islands 14 degrees 23 minutes North, 120 degrees 35 minutes East

Japanese naval vessel sunk: • Minelayer Nariu, by submarine Sennet (SS-408), off Shikoku, Japan, 32 degrees 10 minutes North, 135 degrees 54 minutes East

WORLD WAR II

February 17, Saturday: British troops landed south of Myebon, Burma.

German scientists evacuated Peenemünde and make for Oberammergau.

Switzerland agreed to freeze all German assets pending an investigation.

Koblenz fell to the Allies.

United States naval vessels damaged: • Battleship Tennessee (BB-43), by Japanese coastal defense gun, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 44 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East • Heavy cruiser Pensacola (CA-24), by Japanese coastal defense gun, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Destroyer Leutze (DD-481), by Japanese coastal defense gun, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East • Destroyer Dortch (DD-670), by Japanese strafing, Iwo Jima area, 30 degrees 1 minute North, 141 degrees 45 minutes East • Destroyer Waldron (DD-699), by intentional ramming of Japanese picket boat, Iwo Jima area, 29 degrees 27 minutes North, 141 degrees 34 minutes East • Tug Hidatsa (ATF-102), by mine, Luzon area, Philippine Islands 14 degrees 25 minutes North, 120 degrees 30 minutes East

Japanese naval vessels sunk: • Transport #114, by Army aircraft, off Formosa, 23 degrees 4 minutes North, 120 degrees 30 minutes East • Coast defense vessel #56, by submarine Bowfin (SS-287), off Honshu, Japan, 33 degrees 53 minutes North, 139 degrees 43 minutes East WORLD WAR II

February 18, Sunday: American forces breached the Siegfried Line north of Echternach, .

Suite no.2 from the ballet Gayaneh by Aram Khachaturian was performed for the initial time, in Moscow Conservatory Bolshoy Hall.

United States naval vessels damaged, Iwo Jima area: • Light minelayer Gamble (DM-15), by Japanese horizontal bomber, 24 degrees 55 minutes North, 141 degrees 8 minutes East • High-speed transport Blessman (APD-48), by Japanese horizontal bomber, 25 degrees 5 minutes North, 141 degrees 10 minutes East WORLD WAR II

“A victory described in detail is indistinguishable from a defeat.” — Jean-Paul Sartre

February 19, Monday: Street fights erupt in Bucharest between members of the National Peasant Party and Communists.

American troops land on Samar Island, Philippines as well as the small offshore islands of Dalupiri and Capul.

The Japanese Army evacuated from Mandalay.

The 4th and 5th Marine divisions assaulted Iwo Jima, supported by intensive naval gunfire and air attack. The operation was under the overall command of Admiral R.A. Spruance, Commander Fifth Fleet, who had strong feelings about the pointlessness of the whole affair. The final sentence of the most recent analysis of this battle, HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE at , is a comment that “Perhaps the most appropriate tribute later generations can offer Iwo Jima’s valiant dead is to ask why they had to die to secure fighter escorts that never materialized.” (We notice that in Clint Eastwood’s Hollywood versions of the struggle, such issues go entirely unmentioned. We had to attack the island, and they had to defend it, because it was sacred Japanese soil? –In point of fact, this chain of volcanic islands had never been that. After the island was conquered, the impact of this on the remainder of the war was nil, as, entirely without port facilities, the island was essentially useless. Had the island simply been bypassed, and the Japanese troops there simply have been allowed to sit there and rot, the impact of this on the war would similarly have been nil. The invasion was a photo-op. However, after the bloodletting, an entire historical apparatus had to be created to legitimate the operation after the fact, and we have had to submit to fully half a century of mendacity about the usefulness of the island in the recovery of our endangered flight crews.)

Vice Admiral R.K. Turner was the Joint Expeditionary Force Commander and Major-General H.M. “Howling Mad” Smith, USMC, commanded the Expeditionary Troops. Naval gunfire and air bombing continued to support the troops ashore during this difficult campaign.

Army troops covered by Marine aircraft were landed at Allen on the northwest coast of Samar and on Capul Island, Philippine Islands to insure control of San Bernardino Strait.

United States naval vessels damaged, Iwo Jima area: • Heavy cruiser Chester (CA-27), by collision with amphibious force flagship Estes (AGC-12), 24 degrees 13 minutes North, 141 degrees 25 minutes East • Destroyer Bradford (DD-545), by collision, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 20 minutes East • Destroyer John W. Weeks (DD-701), by coastal defense gun, 25 degrees 32 minutes North, 141 degrees 1 minute East • Destroyer escort Finnegan (DE-307), by collision, 22 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East WORLD WAR II

February 20, Tuesday: Saarbrucken was captured by the Allies and Danzig by the Soviet army.

In Piazzas Palladio for voice and piano by Ned Rorem to words of Phemister was performed for the initial time, over the airwaves of radio station WNYC, New York, the composer himself at the keyboard.

Army troops under cover of Marine aircraft were landed on Biri Island, Philippine Islands to insure control of San Bernardino Strait.

United States naval vessels damaged, Iwo Jima area: • Light cruiser Biloxi (CL-80), accidentally by United States naval gunfire, 25 degrees 47 minutes North, 141 degrees 15 minutes East • Samaritan (AH-10), accidentally by United States naval gunfire, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East • Attack transports Napa (APA-157) and Logan (APA-196), by collision, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Attack cargo ship Starr (AKA-67), by collision, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East • LST779, by coastal mortar, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East

Japanese naval vessel sunk: • Destroyer Nokaze, by submarine Pargo (SS-264), South China Sea, 12 degrees 48 minutes North, 109 degrees 38 minutes East WORLD WAR II

February 21, Wednesday: The 10,982-ton escort carrier USS Bismarck Sea (CVE-95) had been launched in 1944 under the name Alikula Bay. It had been put into the US 7th Fleet and had seen action off Leyte and at landings in the Lingayen Gulf. then, while taking part in that nothing-better-to-do assault on Iwo Jima, three Japanese Kamikaze flew down from Kyushu and one guy crashed his plane onto the deck. The gunners then managed to knock down the other two guys before they could get in. Never mind, the fire caused an explosion in the ammunition store and in about 90 minutes the carrier sank. There were 860 on board, and 318 died.

After heavy fighting, American forces reached the base of Mt. Suribachi on Iwo Jima.

After 13 days of heavy fighting, Canadian forces captured Goch, Germany northwest of Cologne.

Italy raised the daily bread ration from 200 to 300 grams.

The US government cut the rations of sugar.

Naval land-based and Army aircraft bomb and strafe enemy installations at Truk, Caroline Islands.

United States naval vessel sunk: • Escort carrier Bismarck Sea (CVE-95), by Japanese Kamikaze, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 36 minutes North, 141 degrees 48 minutes East

United States naval vessels damaged: • Carrier Saratoga (CV-3), by Japanese , Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 56 minutes North, 142 degrees 1 minute East • Escort carrier Lunga Point (CVE-94), by Japanese Kamikaze, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 40 minutes North, 141 degrees 44 minutes East • Destroyer Williamson (DD-244), by collision, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 39 minutes North, 142 degrees 1 minute East HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Destroyer Renshaw (DD-499), by submarine torpedo, Luzon area, Philippine Islands 24 degrees 36 minutes North, 141 degrees 48 minutes East • Attack cargo ship Yancey (AKA-93), by collision, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East • Net cargo ship Keokuk (AKN-4), by Japanese Kamikaze, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 36 minutes North, 141 degrees 48 minutes East • LST390, by collision, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East • LST477, by Japanese Kamikaze, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 40 minutes North, 141 degrees 44 minutes East • LST809, by Japanese Kamikaze, Iwo Jima area, 24 degrees 8 minutes North, 142 degrees 6 minutes East WORLD WAR II

February 23, Friday: Turkey declared war on Germany.

Kurt Weill’s operetta The Firebrand of Florence, to words of Mayer and Ira Gershwin, was performed for the initial time, in the Colonial Theater, Boston, under the title Much Ado About Love. The lead role was played by Lotte Lenya.

Heitor Villa-Lobos conducted the Boston Symphony Orchestra in his own music in Symphony Hall, Boston.

Poznan fell to the Soviet Army.

Media-savvy Marines demonstrated for a lucky photographer how they had just raised the flag atop Mount Suribachi:

United States naval vessels damaged, Iwo Jima area: • Submarine chaser PC 877, by collision, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East • LST684, by coastal defense gun, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East • LST716, by grounding, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East • LST792, by coastal defense gun, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East

Japanese naval vessels sunk: •Frigate Yaku, by submarine Hammerhead (SS-364), off Indochina, 12 degrees 39 minutes North, 109 degrees 29 minutes East • Submarine chaser #35, by Army aircraft, South China Sea, 10 degrees 15 minutes North, 107 degrees 31 minutes East WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE March 3, Saturday: George Smith Patton, Jr.’s 3d Army reached the Rhine River near Coblenz.

American forces landed on Ticao Island and Burias Island, south of Luzon.

Finland declared war on Germany.

German forces counterattacked against the Soviets in western Hungary.

King Petar II appointed 3 regents to govern for him in .

American troops took Forbach, France to the southwest of Saarbrücken.

Hermine von Webern learned that her husband, Lance Corporal Peter von Webern, had died on February 14th. In the afternoon she and her sister inform his parents, Anton and Wilhelmine von Webern.

Army troops landed on Masbate, Burias, and Ticao Islands, Philippine Islands; landings were supported by naval gunfire and US Marine aircraft.

Submarine Tuna (SS-203) landed supplies on northeast coast of Borneo United States naval vessel damaged, Iwo Jima area: Attack transport Bolivar (APA-34), by coastal defense gun, 24 degrees 46 minutes North, 141 degrees 19 minutes East. Japanese naval vessel sunk: Oiler Hario, by mine, off French Indochina, 18 degrees 10 minutes North, 109 degrees 40 minutes East. WORLD WAR II

March 26, Monday: Vingt regards sur l’enfant Jesus for piano by Olivier Messiaen was performed for the initial time, in the Salle Gaveau, Paris.

Army forces were landed on Kerama Retto, Ryukyu Islands, by naval attack group (Rear Admiral I.N. Kiland) under cover of naval bombardment and carrier aircraft attack.

Army forces were landed at Talisay Point, Cebu, Philippine Islands by naval attack group (Captain A.T. Sprague) under cover of cruiser and destroyer gunfire and air attack.

United States naval vessel sunk: Destroyer Halligan (DD-584), by mine, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 10 minutes North, 127 degrees 30 minutes East. United States naval vessels damaged: • Battleship Nevada (BB-36), by Japanese Kamikaze suicide plane, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 127 degrees 18 minutes East • Light cruiser Biloxi (CL-80), by Japanese Kamikaze suicide plane, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 127 degrees 18 minutes East, Destroyer Murray (DD-576), by dive bomber, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 129 degrees 46 minutes East • Destroyer Porterfield (DD-682), by Japanese Kamikaze suicide plane, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 127 degrees 18 minutes East • Destroyer O’Brien (DD-725), by Japanese Kamikaze suicide plane, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 16 minutes North, 127 degrees 26 minutes East • Destroyer Callaghan (DD-792), by Japanese Kamikaze suicide plane, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 127 degrees 43 minutes East HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Destroyer escort Foreman (DE-633), by Japanese Kamikaze suicide plane, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 127 degrees 18 minutes East • High-speed minesweeper Dorsey (DMS-1), by Japanese Kamikaze suicide plane, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 127 degrees 18 minutes East • Minelayer Skirmish (AM-303), by Japanese Kamikaze suicide plane, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 25 minutes North, 127 degrees 5 minutes East • Submarine chaser PC-1133, by grounding, Philippine Islands area, 10 degrees 13 minutes North, 123 degrees 51 minutes East WORLD WAR II While preparing to bombard the shore of Okinawa for the American landings scheduled for April 1st, Lieutenant-Commander E. Grace’s USS Halligan struck a mine and its forward magazine exploded, disintegrating the forward section of the ship. 162 died. The hulk drifted onto a reef near shore.

The worthless island known as Iwo Jima had been secured at the cost of 25,851 United States Marine casualties. The entire assault had been a waste of effort and lives, an exercise in sheer confrontation. The island would of course now need to be abandoned, and with as little publicity as humanly possible.39 Unfortunately, there would be a whole lot of publicity:

“Patriotic Fervor and the Truth About Iwo Jima,” by Karal Ann Marling and John Wetenhall [Ms. Marling is professor of art history and American studies at the University of Minnesota. Mr. Wetenhall is executive director of the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art]

IWO JIMA has a special place in our nation’s past. For many Americans it is a place where emotion merges with memory, where 39. Except that when US Marines returned to Hawaii, some of them would place a Japanese skull atop a pole and wave it in front of Japanese-Americans, taunting them with “There’s your uncle on the pole!” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE feeling and facts become one. It is a holy place in our civil religion, where emotions gather and linger–for generations. With our notes and books and claims of objectivity, we historians sometimes trespass –at our peril– upon this terrain where others have fought and died. When we wrote about the commemoration of the World War II battle at Iwo Jima in Iwo Jima: Monuments, Memories, and the American Hero (Harvard UP, 1991), we, as outside observers, became part of the process of remembering deeds of war. But quite unintentionally, we were dragged into a vortex of misremembering, as hearsay and emotion quickly subsumed the truth. On February 23rd, 1945, the fifth day of the bloody , Marines were ordered to take Mount Suribachi, the besieged Japanese stronghold. A 40-man patrol ascended the volcanic slope, attained the summit, and hoisted “Old Glory” on a makeshift flagpole. That was at 10:35 a.m., precisely. Horns blew. Bells tolled. Cheers rang out from American positions below. “Mopping up” skirmishes followed, but, within an hour, the men of Easy Company had declared Suribachi secure. Early that afternoon, some combat photographers circumvented security outposts and climbed up to the restricted position. They arrived at the top just in time to witness, and photograph, an impromptu ceremony as the first, historic flag was exchanged for a larger one. Within a week, the Associated Press spread AP photographer ’s triumphant picture across front pages nationwide, accompanied by stirring headlines detailing the capture of Suribachi. The image captivated war-weary America and was rapturously compared with Delacroix’s painting “Liberty Leading the People,” with Leutze’s “Washington Crossing the Delaware,” even with Leonardo’s “Last Supper.” In the course of the next few weeks, the story of the first flag merged with the photo of the second one. The original flag- raisers faded into anonymity while the country became obsessed with the identities of the faceless heroes in Rosenthal’s picture. The aesthetic power of the photo seemed to demand a full and revised explanation of how it became to be taken. So history was rewritten–not by conspiracy, but through partial truths, omissions, overstatements, and poetic license. Before long, the gallant men in Rosenthal’s photograph–by now a Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph–came to be considered the original heroes. Our book simply retold the facts of the battle and sorted out the confusion that followed. We traced the evolving myth of Iwo Jima from John Wayne’s , through the booze- soaked martyrdom of flag-raiser (the hapless last figure in the Rosenthal photograph), to the oversized colossus of the Marine Corps Memorial near Washington. We ended with the somber memories of the men who fought the battle and their poignant reflections on the tragedy of war. Why did this matter? The truth was important to the men who were there, many of whom complained to us that their deeds had been revised for the sake HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE of public relations. In a larger sense, it was values such as truth and justice for which World War II was fought, not half- truths and orchestrated sentiment. Yes, we thought we had this story nailed: we would set the popular misconceptions straight once and for all. What we couldn’t foresee was that our book would embroil us in a tragi- comical farce, all in the name of patriotism or outright nostalgia. Shortly after publication, our account was blindsided by Richard Harwood, The Washington Post’s ombudsman, in a review in that newspaper that expressed outrage that we had dared to broach the very subject of the first flag-raising. He accused us of criticizing Rosenthal’s photo as “phony” and the men in it as “imposters.” But we never wrote this. In fact, we went to considerable lengths to prove that the photo was legitimate, the men reluctant heroes who consistently said they had not dodged bullets to raise the flag, but had simply replaced one flag with another. Mr. Harwood assumed the true story somehow undermined the valor of those who participated (it did not), and he set us up as straw men for a conspiracy theory–that the deception was planned–that the book overtly disproves. A few weeks later, took the same tack under the headline: “Birth of an Icon, but an Illegitimate One.” The review attributed to us–again falsely–allegations that the Iwo Jima icon was “illegitimate, a fraud, a dark hoax unworthy of the men who died in that battle.” The review in The Times touched off a barrage of letters to the editor. G. Greely Wells, the oft-proclaimed “man who carried the flag” to the foot of Suribachi, got three columns of space in The Times’s op-ed page to rebut our book–space he used to recount, with pristine accuracy, facts that he might have read on our Page 42. (Mr. Wells hadn’t read the book. We called him the day that his column appeared and offered to send him one. He replied that he had ordered one, but that it had not yet arrived.) Undeterred, Mr. Wells took his crusade to National Public Radio, where Alex Chadwick of “Morning Edition” announced to the nation’s breakfast tables that we had pronounced the Iwo Jima photo “staged propaganda.” Had he bothered to read the book, he might have seen the photo and caption on Page 79 that asserts the “spontaneity” of Rosenthal’s picture. MORE ANGRY LETTERS followed in The Times, and other newspapers picked up the story–often assembling their opinions from misstatements contained in the Post and Times reviews. The best came from the West Coast: a column by William Endicott in The Sacramento Bee titled “Can an Icon Sue for Libel?” Mr. Endicott blasted us as leftist revisionists and tried to bury our account by invoking his venerable father: “My dad watched from a troop transport as the flag was hoisted, and he never forgot the sight for as long as he lived.” But the great moment that Endicott senior remembered was not the one in the Rosenthal photograph. That moment occurred, that flag was raised at 10:35 A.M. Photographed by Louis Lowery of HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Leatherneck magazine, it is a forgotten footnote in history. Once begun, distortions spread by the news media are almost impossible to correct. The New York Times rejected no fewer than three rebuttal letters from us. Editors called us twice to negotiate what they might print: 100 words without reference to any error in the Times review. In the end, even though they had printed six columns of misdirected attacks inspired by their inaccurate review, the newspaper editors refused to publish anything from us. Ironically, our experience demonstrates precisely how the process of patriotic myth-making works. It isn’t a conspiracy; it isn’t orchestrated. It is a series of assumptions, a few leaps of faith. A reviewer who’s too busy, complacent, or lazy to read carefully and check the facts. An editor too pompous to concede that the “Fourth Estate” might have gotten something wrong. Over time, a story is crafted out of scraps and innuendo. This was the very process that had led to the convolution of the Iwo Jima story in the first place–the very web of half truths and hearsay that we had worked so hard to untangle. IN THE END, though, we were the ones who were wrong. We underestimated the patriotic fervor that we had so carefully chronicled. It is an overwhelming reverence for the heroic feeling of the Iwo Jima myth that still renders the facts of its birth–to some people, at least–irrelevant. Americans want desperately for the real-life story of the heroes of Mount Suribachi to turn out like the Duke’s heart-rending martyrdom in Sands of Iwo Jima, when his last vision was the raising of Old Glory amidst a shower of enemy fire. The famous War Bond poster –“Now All Together”–made Rosenthal’s image look so real that it had to be true. And the Marine Corps Memorial stands proudly as the last great vestige of monumental realism in American sculpture–big, commanding, more real that reality. In the noble cause of celebrating our nation’s reverence for truth and justice, Americans prefer to let reality slip by, to ignore inconvenient facts. But Americans’ yearning goes deeper than a willingness to believe Hollywood formula and fantasy. It involves the preservation of a passionate faith in the hero, a belief in the individual’s ability to change the course of history (the valor of Delacroix’s flag-waving “Liberty” and the resolve of Leutze’s “Washington”), a faith now so distressingly contradicted by the 58,180 names on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. We discovered an unusual phenomenon in the course of our research: the fake flag-raisers, people who insisted they had been in Rosenthal’s picture and had helped hoist the Stars and Stripes over Iwo Jima. There were, and are, a lot of them. Some Iwo vet, probably a fine Marine, spins a few Pacific yarns in a local tavern. Over the course of years, his story takes him from the D-Day landing, to the base of Suribachi, and on up its sulfurous slopes, until one unfortunate evening, he tells how he grabbed a length of metal pipe and helped his buddies hoist Old Glory in the Pacific breeze. Before he knows it, somebody at the next table tips off a reporter. An interview. A picture. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE A story in the hometown newspaper. Then the wire services. Another hero. And for the rest of his life, this unlucky hero will have to go on spinning his yarn to sustain his newfound glory. And so what difference is there between getting caught up in a good story and creating a national myth? Hardly any.

April 1, Easter Sunday: US troops encircled German troops in the Ruhr.

The Allies took the offensive in North Italy.

Allied troops occupied Legaspi in southern Luzon.

Soviet forces captured Sopron, Hungary, south of Vienna.

Führer Adolf Hitler moved his headquarters from the Chancellery to a bunker system deep below it.

American forces linked up at Lippstadt, south of Bielefeld, trapping 325,000 German troops in the Ruhr. They also captured Hamm, northeast of Dortmund and Paderborn, southeast of Bielefeld.

Roy Harris’ motet Alleluia for chorus and brass was performed for the initial time, in Grace Episcopal Church, Colorado Springs.

Twenty-six B-29 Superfortresses flew a final US bombing mission from bases in India.

The US 10th Army, which included the 1st and 6th Marine divisions, achieved a 13-kilometer beachhead on Okinawa, pointing to the difficulties ahead if the Allies were to find it necessary to conduct amphibious assaults against Japanese home islands.

2,500 tons of Red Cross relief supplies had been transported from Portland, Oregon to Nakhodka, 100 miles south of Vladivostok in December 1943 by 5 Soviet ships. Under an agreement between Japan and the US which guaranteed safe passage for ships doing such relief work, Captain Hamada Matsutaro’s 11,249-ton passenger/cargo ship Awa Maru had picked up 175 tons of these relief parcels at Nakhodka and delivered them to American and Allied POWs in Japanese custody. In direct violation of the relief-for-POWs agreement, however, the vessel had also been conveying crates of aircraft parts, munitions and other commodities desperately needed by Japanese troops in Southeast Asia. American intelligence was aware of this; nevertheless our submarines had been ordered not to torpedo it because of the relief supplies. The vessel had been painted green and was identified with large white crosses on its sides and funnel, crosses that were illuminated by special spotlights. This was the 3rd Japanese ship to carry out this work. Having offloaded its cargo at various stops on its journey south, the Awa Maru had prepared in Singapore for its return journey. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE When it left Singapore on March 28, it had on board more than 2,000 Japanese officials, diplomats, technicians, and civilians. When it stopped at Jakarta, it took on 2,500 tons of crude oil, thousands of tons of oil-drilling machinery, tin ingots, tungsten, and rubber. However, Commander Charles E. Loughlin’s USS Queenfish, on its 4th patrol on Easter Sunday, was lurking in the Taiwan strait through which the Awa Maru would need to pass. At 11PM the RADAR man on the Queenfish noted a pip indicating a possible target at 17,000 yards. The Awa Maru, loaded as it was far beyond normal limits, was travelling low in the water, and thus presented a smaller than usual radar image — an image not unlike that of a destroyer. Without seeking to make any identification, the Queenfish sent out a fan of 4 torpedoes and this target was sunk.

In the oil slick from the sinking, the crew picked up one floater, 46-year-old Shimoda Kantaro, a 1st-class steward. 2,003 had died, including 72 Taiwanese civilians.40

40. At a first order of approximation there seems to be a remarkable similarity between fighting at sea and feeding fish. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE (Commander Loughlin would be relieved of his command, but his court-martial would erase all charges of wrongdoing.) WORLD WAR II

US Marines and Army forces land on Okinawa, Ryukyu Islands, under cover of heavy naval gunfire and air attack. The operation against Japanese forces was under the overall command of Admiral R.A. Spruance, Commander Fifth Fleet. Vice Admiral R.K. Turner commands the Joint Expeditionary Force, and the troops were commanded by Lieutenant General A.B. Buckner, USA.

Army forces were landed near Legaspi, southern Luzon, PI, under cover of naval gunfire and Army aircraft.

United States naval vessels damaged, Okinawa landings: • Battleship West Virginia (BB-48), by Japanese Kamikaze, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 127 degrees 40 minutes East • Destroyer Prichett (DD-561), by Japanese dive bomber, 26 degrees 38 minutes North, 127 degrees 25 minutes East • Destroyer escort Vammen (DE-644), by mine, 26 degrees 18 minutes North, 127 degrees 29 minutes East • Minesweeper Skirmish (AM-303), by Japanese dive bomber, 26 degrees 33 minutes North, 127 degrees 33 minutes East • Attack cargo ship Achernar (AKA-53), by Japanese Kamikaze, 26 degrees 7 minutes North, 127 degrees 45 minutes East • Attack cargo ship Tyrrell (AKA-80), by Japanese Kamikaze, 26 degrees 21 minutes North, 127 degrees 45 minutes East • Attack transport Elmore (APA-42), by Japanese horizontal bomber, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 127 degrees 41 minutes East HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • Attack transport Alpine (APA-92), by Japanese Kamikaze, 26 degrees 20 minutes North, 127 degrees 41 minutes East WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 3, Sunday: Naval task group (Rear Admiral L.F. Reifsnider) landed US Marines on Iheya Shima, Ryukyu Islands.

Carrier Lake Champlain (CV-39) was commissioned at Norfolk, Virginia

American troops occupied Iheya Shima north of Okinawa.

French troops were removed from Damascus to billets outside the city. They were replaced by British peace- keeping forces.

Five Prayers for women’s voices over the Pater noster as cantus firmus by Ernst Krenek to words of Donne, was performed for the initial time, at Hamline University, St. Paul, Minnesota.

United States naval vessel damaged: Cargo ship Allegan (AK-225), by Japanese Kamikaze suicide plane, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 0 minute North, 128 degrees 0 minute East WORLD WAR II

June 9, Saturday: In a temporary agreement signed in Belgrade, Yugoslavia would evacuated Trieste and turn it over to an allied military government pending resolution of competing claims to the area.

Prisoner No.217, a film with music by Aram Khachaturian was released.

In the Ryukyu Islands, a naval task group under Rear Admiral L.F. Reifsnider landed US Marines on Aguni Shima while another naval task group under Rear Admiral A.W. Radford bombed and bombarded Okino Daito Jima.

A United States naval vessel was damaged in the Okinawa region, the destroyer escort Gendreau (DE-639), by coastal defense gun, at 26 degrees 3 minutes North, 127 degrees 12 minutes East.

A Japanese coast defense vessel was sunk, #41, off southern Korea, by the submarine Sea Owl (SS-405), at 34 degrees 18 minutes North, 127 degrees 18 minutes East. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE An agreement was reached for the Provisional Administration of Venezia Giulia. READ THE FULL TEXT

Premier Kantaro Suzuki declared that rather than unconditionally surrender Japan would fight to the bitter end. WORLD WAR II The Eye The Atlantic is a stormy moat; and the Mediterranean, The blue pool in the old garden, More than five thousand years have drunk sacrifice Of ships and blood, and shines in the sun; but her the Pacific: — Our ships, planes, wars are perfectly irrelevant. Neither our present blood-feud with the brave dwarfs Nor any future world-quarrel of westering And eastering man, the bloody migrations, greed of power, clash of faiths — Is a speck of dust on the great scale-pan. Here from this mountain-shore, headland beyond stormy headland plunging like dolphins through the blue sea-smoke Into pale sea, — look west at the hill of water: it is half the planet: this dome, this half-globe, this bulging Eyeball of water, arched over to Asia, Australia and white Antarctica: those are the eyelids that never close; this is the staring unsleeping Eye of the earth; and what it watches is not our wars. — Robinson Jeffers

June 18, Monday: Lieutenant-General Simon Buckner of the US Army having been killed in action on Okinawa, the ranking Marine Major General, Roy Geiger, assumed command of the 10th Army.

Battleship and destroyers bombarded shore installations on Emidj Island, Jaluit Atoll, Marshall Islands.

United States naval vessel sunk: Motor minesweeper YMS-50, damaged by mine, Balikpapan area, Borneo, 1 degrees 18 minutes South, 116 degrees 49 minutes East; sunk by United States forces.

United States naval vessel damaged: Seaplane tender (small) Yakutat (AVP-32), by collision, Okinawa area, 26 degrees 10 minutes North, 127 degrees 19 minutes East.

Organized Japanese resistance ended on Mindanao.

Australian troops captured Tutong, Brunei.

William Brooke “Lord Haw-Haw” Joyce was put on trial for treason, in London. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 26, Tuesday: The Conference on International Organizations meeting at San Francisco’s War Memorial Opera House adopted the Charter of the United Nations. READ THE FULL TEXT

President Harry S Truman delivered an address at the closing session of the U.N. Charter Conference.

The establishment of the International Court of Justice. READ THE FULL TEXT

All air transport companies in France were nationalized.

Rhapsody in Blue, a film biography of George Gershwin, was released in Hollywood.

US Marines were landed on Kume Shima, Ryukyu Islands, by naval task group (Capt. C.A. Buchanan).

United States naval vessels sunk, Balikpapan area, Borneo: • Motor minesweeper YMS-39, by mine, 1 degrees 19 minutes South, 116 degrees 49 minutes East • Motor minesweeper YMS-365, damaged by mine, 1 degrees 18 minutes South, 116 degrees 50 minutes East; sunk by United States forces WORLD WAR II

June 30, Saturday: US Representative John Rankin of the House of Representatives’s Un-American Activities Committee announced a major investigation of the film industry, indicating that this was “the greatest hotbed of subversive activities in the United States.” It was “one of the most dangerous plots ever instigated for the overthrow of this government.” Against such an internal enemy the most powerful navy in the world is impotent to protect us!

Naval vessels on hand (all types) 67,952. Personnel: Navy...... 3,383,196 Marine Corps....476,709 Coast Guard....171,192 Total personnel..4,031,097 United States naval vessels damaged, Balikpapan area, Borneo: • Destroyer Smith (DD-378), by coastal defense gun, 1 degrees 17 minutes South, 116 degrees 53 minutes East • Minesweeper YMS-314, by mine, 1 degrees 18 minutes South, 116 degrees 51 minutes East

Japanese naval vessel sunk: Destroyer Nara, by mine, Sea of Japan, 33 degrees 54 minutes North, 130 degrees 49 minutes East. WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 1, Wednesday: A priest from nearby San Lorenzo in Lucina was summoned to administer Last Rites to Pietro Mascagni in his hotel room. He was joined by an emissary from Pope Pius XII, Monsignor Pucci.

Carrier aircraft and battleships struck the Japanese on Wake Island.

A United States naval vessel was damaged, the battleship Pennsylvania (BB-38), by coastal defense gun, Wake Island raid, 19 degrees 20 minutes North, 166 degrees 30 minutes East. However, at 0004 hours on this morning, the heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis (CA-35), launched on March 30th, 1930, that had served throughout the and had taken part in one of its most secret missions, the delivery of components of the “Little Boy” bomb dropped on Hiroshima, had been at 12 degrees-2 minutes north by 134 degrees-48 minutes east when it was struck by 2 of a fan of 6 torpedoes from Captain Hashimoto’s I-58 submarine. It had been on its way to Leyte to join up with the USS Idaho for gunnery practice before rejoining the rest of the US fleet off Okinawa for the expected invasion of Japan — but then one of the torpedoes tore off 60 feet of her bow and the other struck it amidships, igniting its powder magazine and shutting off most of its electrical power. Radio Room II had maintained power, and Radio Technician 2nd Class Herbert J. Minor observed as Chief Radio Electrician L.T. Woods sent out an SOS with the position of the sinking ship on 500 kilocycles. According to Minor, at least 3 such signals were transmitted before the cruiser rolled over and went down bow first. Former Yeoman 2nd Class Clair B. Young stated in a letter to Commander T E. Quillman, Jr. that “while stationed at U.S. Navy 3964 Naval Shore Facilities , Philippine Islands” he personally awakened Commodore Jacob H. Jacobson, US Navy, delivering this SOS message. The yeoman noted a strong odor of alcohol in the room while Commodore Jacobson read the message, which identified the ship, her location, and her condition. The yeoman asked the commodore “Do you have a reply, sir?” The answer he received was “No reply at this time. If any further messages are received, notify me at once.” Which is to say, the SOS had been received and communicated, but was being ignored. Meanwhile, Commander Hashimoto of the I-58 sent a radio message to Japan that he had just sunk a battleship, and provided the location. This message was intercepted and decoded by the US Navy and nevertheless no one though to check on the whereabouts of the Indianapolis.

883 died. 316 of the 1,199 crewmen became floaters. Most of these would not survive the long exposure and the shark attacks. Of the 39 US Marines on board 30 died and 9 floated.41 HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE The surviving floaters would be picked up 4 days later by US destroyers Cecil Doyle, Talbot, and Dufilho. After hospital treatment on Guam they would soon be on their way home on board the carrier USS Holandia. (The captain of the Indianapolis, Charles Butler McVay, was later court-martialled for failing to zig-zag in hostile waters. His sentence was remitted by the Secretary of the Navy, James Forrestal, and he was restored to duty. He retired as a Rear Admiral in 1949 and in 1968, in Litchfield, Connecticut, committed suicide by putting a service pistol to his head. Our national trajectory might have been somewhat altered, had Captain Hashimoto been able to get at this cruiser on its outward journey!) WORLD WAR II

August 30, Thursday: The Royal Navy reached Hong Kong.

Byelorussia and Syria ratified the Charter of the United Nations.

General Douglas MacArthur arrived in Japan. Landings by the occupation forces began in the Tokyo Bay area, spearheaded by the 4th Marines, under cover of the guns of the 3rd Fleet plus Naval and Army aircraft. The surrender of the Yokosuka Naval Base was accepted by Rear Admiral R.B. Carney and Rear Admiral O.C. Badger and a headquarters for the Commander 3rd Fleet was established there. WORLD WAR II

John R. Kellam’s and Agnes Carol Zens Kellam’s first child, Susan Kellam, was born on the couple’s 1st wedding anniversary. When Carol came back from Toledo, to Washington to live with her mother up on River Road NW, she returned to attend Friends Meeting in Washington. As soon as they knew she was back, they welcomed her very warmly and asked her what she needed and so on. The baby was imminent, due in August, which was almost eight months after I went into prison. She didn’t have a crib yet, and suddenly a crib appeared, having been shipped in for her by various younger and older Friends from Florida Avenue Meeting who chipped in. There were many other ways in which Friends helped Carol all the way through that period and beyond and until I got home. Even beyond that, they helped to get me settled. They found that another member, Frederick Libby, could use another employee in the National Council for Prevention of War. 41. At a first order of approximation there seems to be a remarkable similarity between fighting at sea and feeding fish. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE He was one of the most active members in the ministry to that meeting. In fact he spoke too often! He was just full of feelings and ideas and ways of trying further to get wars put into the background of history. His office had been right across Eighteenth Street from the State Department Office which is now the Executive Office Building of the President. So they had several big posters displayed in rotation in the windows and new ones coming out with lettering large enough to be read from the windows of the US Department of State. The staff realized that even with the war going on, here was this little pacifist agency continuing to work to get some improvements in the world that would let wars be less likely or obsolete. There were some hotheads who would take various means and occasionally destructive means, letting that organization know that they didn’t approve because everybody had to be for the war. While we were in the war it was only the people with adverse political ideas that would be so stubborn as to say that the war was bad. And such a “good war” was going on!

ESSENCES ARE FUZZY, GENERIC, CONCEPTUAL; ARISTOTLE WAS RIGHT WHEN HE INSISTED THAT ALL TRUTH IS SPECIFIC AND PARTICULAR (AND WRONG WHEN HE CHARACTERIZED TRUTH AS A GENERALIZATION).

The US Marines “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 31, Friday: Works for piano by Peter Sculthorpe were performed for the initial time, over the local Tasmanian airwaves of the Australian Broadcasting Commission, by the composer: Nocturne, Short Piece for Pianoforte no.1, and Prelude to a Puppet Show.

Cuatro Nocturnos for soprano, alto and orchestra by Carlos Chávez to words of Villaurrutia, were performed for the initial time, in the Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico City.

The Chinese Nationalist army took control of Canton.

A government for the Republic of Indonesia was installed with Sukarno as president and Mohammed Hatta as vice-president.

US President Harry S Truman abolished the Office of War Information.

On US Destroyer Bagley (DD-386), the surrender of Marcus Island (Minami Tori Shima) was accepted by Rear Admiral F.E.M. Whiting.

US Marines landed at Tateyama Naval Base, Honshu, Japan and accepted its surrender. WORLD WAR II

September 30, Sunday: US occupation authorities seized 21 Japanese banks.

Chinese Nationalists and Communists agreed to submit their differences to a political council made up of members from the 2 groups and non-political members.

“War time,” year-round daylight savings time, was ended in the United States of America.

Ross Lee Finney received a Certificate of Merit from the Office of Strategic Services for his work during the war.

US Marines of the III Amphibious Corps began landing in North China, where they would be collecting the arms of 630,000 Japanese soldiers. WORLD WAR II

October: 35,000 French soldiers under the command of World War II General Jacques Philippe Leclerc arrived in South Vietnam to restore French rule. The immediately began a guerrilla campaign against them. The French would succeed in expelling the Viet Minh from Saigon.

50,000 US Marines were sent to North China to assist Chinese Nationalist authorities in disarming and repatriating the Japanese in China and in controlling ports, railroads, and airfields. This was in addition to approximately 60,000 US forces remaining in China at the end of World War II. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 6, Saturday: Baron Kijuro Shidehara replaced Prince Naruhiko Higashikuni as prime minister of Japan.

The trial of Pierre Laval continued in Paris without the defendant, he challenging the impartiality of the court. Former President Albert Lebrun gave testimony.

Süddeutsche Zeitung began publication as München’s 1st daily newspaper since the end of the war.

US Marines engaged in their 1st firefight with the Chinese Communists. –Well, stand by, guys, there’ll be more wars to fight, there’ll be more dying to be done. (I guarantee it.) US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1946

Ira Hayes, a Pima Indian who had helped raise the famous larger replacement United States flag over Iwo Jima in the previous year, the “photo-op” flag, died a drunk face-down in a ditch.

USMC

January 2, Wednesday: King Zog I of Albania formally abdicated his throne. WORLD WAR II

Protests and a general strike took place in Damascus and Beirut against French rule.

Aaron Copland wrote to William Schuman trying to negotiate a more flexible teaching position at the Juilliard School than the one Schuman was offering. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE January 3, Thursday: William Brooke “Lord Haw-Haw” Joyce was hanged for treason on the gallows in Wing “E” of Wandsworth Prison in London. WORLD WAR II

The Polish government nationalized all industries with over 50 workers and all businesses formerly owned by Germans.

Evelyn Waugh’s BRIDESHEAD REVISITED.

At the US Marine Barracks in Washington DC, Concerto for clarinet and orchestra op.230 by Darius Milhaud was performed for the initial time. The work had been commissioned by Benny Goodman.

January 4, Friday: The 2d Austrian Republic was recognized. WORLD WAR II

Concert Music for orchestra by Norman Dello Joio was performed for the initial time, in Pittsburgh.

January 6, Sunday: The Polish government nationalized banks, communications, mines, factories and utilities. WORLD WAR II

January 30, Wednesday: 14 Germans, including 3 generals, were hanged in Minsk for their part in the murder of millions of Soviet civilians and prisoners of war. WORLD WAR II

Clarinet Concerto by Darius Milhaud was performed for the initial time, at the US Marine Barracks in Washington DC.

January 31, Thursday: The Chinese People’s Consultative Congress held its final session in Chungking. They finalized plans to create a coalition government under a new constitution, and to reorganize the army. WORLD WAR II

Kuang Aphaiwong replaced Seni Pramoj as Prime Minister of Siam.

A new constitution for Yugoslavia was announced, based on the Soviet model.

Enrico Gaspar Dutra replaced Jose Linhares as president of Brazil. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1949

A US Marine consular guard was sent to Jerusalem to protect the US Consul General.

Nanking fell to Chinese Communist troops, and US Marines were put ashore to protect the American Embassy. US Marines also went ashore at Shanghai to aid in the protection and evacuation of Americans. Our side wasn’t winning. Who lost China? US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Dr. Lin Yu-t’ang became Head of the Arts and Letters Division of UNESCO. His novel CHINATOWN FAMILY.

This would be the year in which the US Marine Corps would for the 1st time require that all male Marines – regardless of the color of their skin– were to be assigned to vacancies — in any unit. Fancy that. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1950

During the early years of this decade President Harry S Truman would have the interior of the White House gutted and rebuilt on a skeleton of steel beams on a concrete foundation, making the house safe and ensuring its continued use by American presidents. Thank you, Harry.

The United States of America adopted the Security Act of 1950, which contained an emergency civilian detention plan that was to remain in effect for more than 20 years.42

General Curtis LeMay, commander of the United States Air Force’s nuclear-capable Strategic Air Command, became concerned about base security. “The Russians didn’t threaten us,” said LeMay. “But I was worried about fifth column activity. Sabotage… And the stupidest people we had in the Air Force were put in the Military Police.” To reduce this perceived systemic risk, this American general adopted an agenda of searching out and publicly dismissing bad examples: incompetent provost marshals, unconcerned wing commanders. The general arranged for his security forces to be designated “Air Police” and took steps to treat the key commanders not as unwanted stepchildren but as key members of his hands-on personal security team. To make sure his Air Police understood how very special they were, he provided a distinctive uniform and arranged for professional instruction in aikido, judo, and karate. The general established an Air Police school at Fort Carson, Colorado that would teach his new Air Police how to rise above the level of gate guards and make of themselves a deadly mixture of military police with security.43

Meanwhile, there were those who were underimpressed by this uncritical pursuit of safety through power. For instance, in this year Milton Mayer, without renouncing his Jewishness, became a member of the Religious Society of Friends. JUDAISM

August 2, Wednesday: The 1st Provisional Marine Brigade, reinforced (5th Marine Regiment) landed at Pusan in South Korea.

42. During the early 1980s in Washington DC, US Marine Lieutenant-Colonel Oliver North would help draft secret wartime contingency plans which would provide for “the imposition of martial law, internment camps, and the turning over of government to the president and FEMA,” and more than two decades later, the Sydney Morning Herald would report that the Bush administration might employ these Reagan-era security initiatives, installing “internment camps and martial law in the United States.” Following 9/11, reports of civilian detention camps and plans to “herd people into sports stadiums” would be punctuated by John Dean’s question: “Could terrorism result in a constitutional dictator?” By late 2005, after President Bush would propose a greater role for the military during natural disasters and the imposition of marshal law should there be an avian flu outbreak, former Reagan cabinet member Paul Craig Roberts would assert “The Police State Is Closer Than You Think.” 43. During this decade, about twenty Japanese martial art instructors would be touring Air Force bases, and hundreds of US airmen would be taking month-long courses at the Kodokan. His Japanese instructors were among the best available: karate teachers such as Nakayama Masatoshi and Nishiyama Hidetaka; judo teachers such as Daigo Toshiro and Kotani Sumiyuki, and aikido teachers such as Tomiki Kenji. The Air Police were to practice their judo and karate in the gyms that LeMay had ordered built on their bases (following discharge, former Air Police often would continue teaching and practicing judo or karate in their home towns; for instance, Laverne Raab in Omaha and Bill Reuter in Seattle). Karate instructors would no longer emphasize the building up of knuckle calluses but LeMay would seek to make his America become more and more like the pre-WWII Shinto Japan that he had gone to such lengths to defeat. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 4, Friday: The Pusan Perimeter in southeastern Korea was established by US and Republic of Korea troops. KOREAN WAR

September 1, Friday to 5, Tuesday: The North Korean People’s Army Naktong Offensive, consisting of five main thrusts, was stopped by the 2nd Engineers, and on September 2nd was relieved by the US Marines. KOREAN WAR

September 3, Sunday: US forces counterattacked in the area of Yongsan, Korea. KOREAN WAR

September 3, Sunday to 5, Tuesday: The 1st Provisional Marine Brigade drove the North Korean People’s Army back across the Naktong River. KOREAN WAR

September 4, Monday: The US 5th Marines were ordered by General Douglas MacArthur to Inchon, Korea.

Why did they call him “Dugout Doug”?

KOREAN WAR HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 15, Friday: The 1st Marine Division retook Seoul on the east coast of Korea by marine assault while assaulting Inchon on the west coast. British, Australian, New Zealand, Canadian, and Netherlands forces participated. KOREAN WAR

November 2, Thursday: The US Marines came into engagement with Chinese Communist soldiers near the Chosin Reservoir at the border of China. KOREAN WAR

November 21, Tuesday: The US 17th Regiment advanced through Korea to the Yalu River. KOREAN WAR

November 23, Thursday, Thanksgiving: The 7th Marines took Yudam-ni in Korea. KOREAN WAR

November 27, Monday/28, Tuesday: In Korea, the US Marines withdrew from Yudam-ni. KOREAN WAR

November 27, Monday-December 11, Monday: Chinese Communist Forces struck the 1st Marine Division and the 7th Army Division near the Changjin (Chosin) Reservoir in the east of Korea. X Corps fought back toward port of Hungnam in the east (the breakout). Under orders from the 10th Corps Commander, General Almond’s US Marines withdrew from Changjin (Chosin) Reservoir. KOREAN WAR

November 25, Saturday: Chinese Communist Forces struck at the Eighth Army along Chongchon River in the west of Korea. KOREAN WAR

November 28, Tuesday: The Colombo Plan for Co-operative Economic and Social Development in South and South- East Asia was signed by Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, , Ceylon, and the United Kingdom. It would go into force on the following July 1st.

The US Marines in Korea would be repulsing 8 Chinese divisions, and then would begin their “breakout” toward the sea from encirclement on December 1st.

President Harry S Truman seemed to suggest at a press conference that his government might resort to nuclear weapons in Korea. KOREAN WAR ATOM BOMB HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE December 9, Saturday: Colonel Lewis Burwell “Chesty” Puller was winning the 5th of his 6 Navy Crosses for valor in combat in the vicinity of Koto-ri, Korea, as his Marines drove off attacking enemy soldiers in sub-zero weather.

General Douglas MacArthur requested that civilian control over the use of atomic weaponry be foregone in favor of a scheme he termed “commander’s discretion.” President Harry S Truman wrote “it looks like World War III is here.” CHINA HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

“Trust me.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1951

The US Army published a study showing that soldiers’ decision to mutiny or surrender was a sequential process. That is, the research indicated that this was a long slow process rather than some sudden decision, and that invariably it involved a serious lack of faith in both the national government and the military chain of command. Rather than trying to rid itself of inept politicians and callous generals, the United States of America would choose to indoctrinate its troops in the field in techniques for coping with minor contributing factors — such as fears about death, frozen feet, and the loss of sweethearts.

The effectiveness of Communist Chinese and North Korean artillery fire caused the US Marines to issue fiberglass body armor to its infantrymen. While combat aircrew had worn similar armor during World War II, this would be the 1st widespread use of body armor by infantry since the good old 17th Century.

In addition to the above Army “mind armor” and Marine “body armor,” the United States Marine Corps of HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE course as always was engaged in the manipulation of its public image. A Hollywood film entitled (what else?) “Halls of Montezuma” and characterized as “The everlasting story of the everlasting glory of the United States Marines!” was filmed on location at Marine Corps Base – Camp Pendleton, California using actual military equipment of the current period. This work product would a box office hit, bringing in more than two and a half million dollars, and in addition would be of great value to Marine Recruiters. Richard Widmark had unfortunately been unable to participate in World War II due to a perforated eardrum. Jack Webb was going to be an Air Force flyboy but unfortunately needed to request a hardship release because his mother and grandmother needed more support than he could provide on a military salary. However, one of the actors in this production, Neville Brand playing “Sgt. Zelenko,” had actually served with great distinction in the United States Army in combat in Europe during World War II! HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE January 11, Thursday: President Harry S Truman appointed a mission headed by John Foster Dulles to go to Japan to confer with MacArthur and Japanese leaders in regard to a peace treaty (said treaty would be signed in San Francisco on September 8th by delegates from 48 countries, Russia and her satellites refusing to participate).

A full company of recruits took one step forward and enlisted in the United States Marine Corps, in front of the San Francisco, California premiere of the World War II film “Halls of Montezuma.” Great boxoffice! HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 20, Wednesday: The 1st Marine Division reached “the Punchbowl” in Korea. KOREAN WAR

President Harry S Truman created the Psychological Strategy Board to handle American psychological warfare — propaganda, economic, and political activities during the “.” The board would be directed by former Secretary of the Army and University of North Carolina president Gordon Gray. This would be one of many cold war attempts to use psychological research to promote political goals.44

In the Durham Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends:

Clerks of Meeting 1943-1947 Edward K. Kraybill 1947-1948 William Van Hoy, Jr. 1949-1949 John de J. Pemberton, Jr. 1950-1951 Harry R. Stevens 1951-1952 John A. Barlow 1952-1957 Susan Gower Smith 1957-1960 Frances C. Jeffers 1960-1961 Cyrus M. Johnson 1961-1965 Peter H. Klopfer 1965-1967 Rebecca W. Fillmore 1967-1968 David Tillerson Smith 1968-1970 Ernest Albert Hartley 1970-1971 John Hunter 1971-1972 John Gamble 1972-1974 Lyle B. Snider (2 terms) 1974-1975 Helen Gardella 1976-1978 Cheryl F. Junk 1978-1980 Alice S. Keighton

44. Street, W.R. A CHRONOLOGY OF NOTEWORTHY EVENTS IN AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGY. Washington DC: American Psychological Association, 1994 HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1980-1982 John B. Hunter 1982-1984 Edward M. Arnett 1984-1986 Calhoun D. Geiger 1986-1988 John P. Stratton 1988-1990 J. Robert Passmore 1990-1992 Karen Cole Stewart 1992-1995 Kathleen Davidson March 1995-1998 Nikki Vangsnes 1998-2000 Co-clerks J. Robert Passmore & Karen Cole Stewart 2000-2002 Amy Brannock 2002-2002 Jamie Hysjulien (Acting) 2002-2005 William Thomas O’Connor 2005-2007 Terry Graedon 2007-2009 Anne Akwari 2009-2012 Joe Graedon 2012-2013 Marguerite Dingman 2013-2016 Co-clerks Cathy Bridge & David Bridge 2016- Toby Berla HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1955

October: When Lee Harvey Oswald attempted to enlist in the United States Marine Corps he was turned aside as too young. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1956

January 7, Saturday: Jordanian caretaker Prime Minister Ibrahim Hashim resigned. Promised elections in April were canceled. A mob protesting this and the Middle East Treaty Organization attacked the US consulate in East Jerusalem wielding stones and were chased away by US Marine guards firing into the sky. In Amman, a mob attacked western interests, including the Philadelphia Hotel.

Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears arrived in Jakarta. Indonesian music had and would have an impact on Britten’s music.

Three Sacred Songs for female voices and violin by Bohuslav Martinu was performed for the initial time, in Policka. Also premiered was Martinu’s Easter for voice and piano to words of Erben.

April 8, Sunday: 6 US Marine recruits drowned in Ribbon Creek at Parris Island, South Carolina.

July 26, Thursday: Off Nantucket Island, the Andrea Doria sank with at least 52 dead or unaccounted for. TIMELINE OF ACCIDENTS

Adin Ballou’s “Thoreau’s Concord River,” an “after reading Thoreau” sonnet, appeared in New York City’s Herald Tribune.

Israel charged before the UN Security Council that Jordan had been guilty of 101 border violations since April.

In Alexandria, Egypt President announced the nationalization of the Company and a plan to use the revenue to build a high dam at Aswan on the Nile River, precipitating an international crisis. A Marine battalion from the US 6th Fleet evacuated US nationals and other civilians from Alexandria.

October 24, Wednesday: India adopted the Gregorian Calendar for official business (effective March 22d).

In the early morning Ernö Gerö, First Secretary of the Hungarian Workers’ Party, appointed Imre Nagy as prime minister. An appeal was made to the Soviet troops in Budapest, to restore order. At 2AM Soviet armored vehicles began to rumble through the streets of Budapest. Students would demonstrate in front of the Magyar Radio building, desiring their demands to be broadcast. These would include the removal of Soviet troops, and democracy, and freedom of speech. They would be fired upon by Hungarian secret police and widespread fighting would break out across the country.

Le Corbusier’s design for the Philips Pavilion at the Brussels World’s Fair was accepted by the company. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

President Dwight David “Ike” Eisenhower stated that in his estimation, atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons didn’t pose any great threat.

Lee Harvey Oswald was allowed to enlist in the United States Marine Corps at the age of 17.

Il Canto Sospeso for soprano, mezzo-soprano, tenor, chorus and orchestra by Luigi Nono to words from letters written by resistance fighters was performed for the initial time, in the Großen Sendesaal, Cologne.

Serenata for orchestra by Walter Piston was performed for the initial time, in Louisville.

October 26, Friday: The statute of the International Atomic Energy Agency was signed at United Nations headquarters in New York City.

Lee Harvey Oswald reported to the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego, California.

Revolutionary Workers’ Councils appeared throughout Hungary, and began to function as local governments.

A statue of Stalin was removed from East Berlin.

The Village Voice was published for the first time, in New York.

Overture op.60 for orchestra by Wallingford Riegger was performed for the initial time, in Cincinnati, Ohio.

New England Triptych for orchestra by William Schuman was performed for the initial time, in Miami (this would prove to be the composer’s most popular work).

October 30, Tuesday: Britain bombed Egyptian airfields.

Private Lee Harvey Oswald took a series of aptitude tests in which overall he scored 2 points below average.

Insurgents occupied the Budapest headquarters of the Hungarian Communist Party. In the fighting, hundreds of communists were killed. An article in Pravda offered to revisit Soviet relations with eastern Europe. József Cardinal Mindszenty was released from prison and immediately sought asylum in the United States embassy. Soviet envoys Anastas Mikoyan and Mikhail Suslov reappeared in Budapest and reaffirmed the decision to remove the Soviet troops from the streets. Prime Minister Imre Nagy announced that the one-party system was abolished and legalized 3 non-communist parties. János Kádár, First Secretary of the Communist Party, announced abolition of the collective farm system.

British Prime Minister Anthony Eden announced that British and French forces would intervene in the Sinai war and occupy , Ismailia, and Suez. An ultimatum by Great Britain and France demanded that Egyptian and Israeli forces withdraw to at least 16 kilometers from the Suez Canal. Prime Minister Eden HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE alerted the House of Commons that unless both Egypt and Israel complied with the ultimatum within 12 hours, Britain and France were going to send in troops “in what ever strength may be necessary to secure compliance.”

Israeli forces captured El Quseima and reached within 30 kilometers of the Suez Canal west of Nakhl.

Two attempts in the UN Security Council to end the Suez fighting, one by the US and the other by the USSR, were vetoed by France and Great Britain.

Michael Tippett’s Piano Concerto was performed for the initial time, in Town Hall, Birmingham.

December 21, Friday: Private Lee Harvey Oswald scored 212 on his rifle marksmanship test, qualifying him for the United States Marine “Sharpshooter” ornament. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1957

January 18, Friday: Robert Shelton, a copy editor at the New York Times, was found guilty of contempt of Congress for refusing to say whether or not he was a communist — he would be sentenced to 6 months in prison and fined $500. Mary Knowles, a librarian at the Quaker community of Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania, was found guilty of contempt of Congress for refusing to answer questions about communism put to her by a Senate committee and sentenced to 120 days in jail and fined $500 — however, within a week her employers would increase her salary. RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS

Private Lee Harvey Oswald reported to Camp Pendleton, California, where he was assigned to “A” Company of 1st Battalion, 2nd Infantry Training Regiment, United States Marine Corps.

February 27, Wednesday: In a 4-hour closed speech in Beijing, Mao Tse-tung signaled an apparent shift in policy, urging the acceptance of criticism and open debate. His slogan was the well-known classic line, from a famous poem, “Let a hundred flowers blossom, let a hundred schools of thought contend” (this speech would be published in June).

A new Polish government was constituted along Stalinist lines.

United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald went on leave for 2 weeks.

March 18, Monday: United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald reported to the Naval Air Technical Training Center in Jacksonville, Florida.

May 1, Wednesday: United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald was promoted to Private 1st Class.

May 3, Friday: The English newspaper News Chronicle delivered its verdict on the life and influence of the late Senator Joseph R. McCarthy: “America was the cleaner by his fall, and is cleaner by his death.” NEO-NAZISM

United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald was granted a “Confidential” security clearance, and departed for Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi.

June 17, Monday: United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald completed the Aircraft Control and Warning Operator Course at Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi.

June 20, Thursday: United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald went on leave, possibly visiting Marguerite. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 25, Tuesday: United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald was given the occupational specialty of Aviation Electronics Operator.

July 9, Tuesday: Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald reported to the Marine Corps Air Station at El Toro, California, and was attached to the 4th Replacement Battalion.

August 22, Thursday: The USSR began a new series of nuclear tests.

Secretary of State John Foster Dulles authorized 24 news organizations to send correspondents to China for a 7-month trial period. This was not reciprocal: Chinese correspondents were not to be allowed into the United States of America.

United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald departed for Japan.

September 12, Thursday: Cross Section, a revue with 6 songs by Peter Sculthorpe to words of McKellar, was performed for the initial time, in the Phillip Street Theater, Sydney.

Paul Teitgen, Secretary-General of Police in Algiers, resigned because of his objection to the use of torture against rebels.

United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald arrived at Yokosuka, Japan, where he was assigned to the Marine Air Control Squadron #1, Marine Air Group 11, 1st Marine Aircraft Wing, based in Atsugi, Japan.

October 27, Sunday: United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald accidentally shot himself in the arm with a derringer.

November 15, Friday: United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald was discharged from the hospital at Yokosuka, Japan.

November 20, Wednesday: US officials confirmed that they has unfrozen about a quarter of the $40,000,000 in Egyptian assets that had been frozen during the Suez Canal crisis of the previous year.

United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald’s unit departed from Japan for the Philippine Islands. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1958

At the Anniversary dinner of the War Resisters League the 1st Peace Award was presented to Jeannette Rankin.

The Lebanese government knew that it needed help in keeping the peace, and so it asked the United States Marines to assist against insurrection supported from outside the nation. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

March 7, Friday: United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald’s unit departed from the Philippine Islands for Atsugi, Japan.

Indonesian federal troops landed at Bengkalis off Sumatra, 500 kilometers from the rebel centers of Padang and Bukit Tinggi.

The French National Assembly voted confidence in the Algeria policy of Prime Minister Gaillard.

Symphony no.1 by Charles Wuorinen was performed for the initial time, in the Great Hall, Cooper Union, New York.

Concerto for viola and orchestra by Walter Piston was performed for the initial time, in Symphony Hall, Boston.

April 11, Friday: Japanese police arrested 3 government officials and charged them with being members of the Communist Party and giving government information to the party.

United States Marine Corps Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald was court-martialed for the initial time, for illegal possession of a firearm.

Van Cliburn played the Third Piano Concerto of Sergei Rakhmaninov at the Tchaikovsky International Piano Competition at Tchaikovsky Conservatory, Moscow. His performance met with uproarious applause. Through the competition he had become the idol of the city.

The South African government banned all meetings of more than 10 blacks. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE May 14, Wednesday: Pierre Pflimlin of the Popular Republican Movement (a center-right party) replaced Félix Gaillard as prime minister of France. He ordered General Raoul Salan, commander of French forces in Algeria, to take political control.

The United States of America sent arms to the pro-Western government of , dispatching 11 ships with 3,600 US Marines from Gibraltar to the eastern Mediterranean.

As Vice-President Richard Milhous Nixon was driven from the US embassy to the airport in Caracas, for security the road was closed to all traffic and lined with troops.

Quintet with Voice for baritone, clarinet, horn, cello, harp and piano by Stefan Wolpe to words of his 3d wife, Hilda Morey, was performed for the initial time.

June 27, Friday: United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald was court-martialed for the 2d time, for assaulting a superior, and sentenced to the brig.

Soviet fighters forced down a US transport plane near Yerivan (the plane had entered Soviet airspace on a flight from Ankara to Teheran; all 9 aboard would survive).

July 15, Tuesday: About 3,500 United States Marines landed in Lebanon south of Beirut at the request of President Camille Chamoun. They were there to stabilize the pro-western government in the face of rebel attacks and the coup in Iraq.

The head of the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory, Edward Teller, held a press conference in Juneau, to persuade the local politicians, who were he pointed out “the most reasonable people,” to allow the detonation of a string of like 5 “Project Plowshare” atomic bombs, excavating a nice keyhole-shaped harbor on the northwest coast of Alaska about 30 miles from Cape Thompson’s Eskimo village of Point Hope. They didn’t need to worry about becoming radioactive, he mentioned. In response, someone pointed out to him that this coast was free of ice, and available to shipping, only 3 months out of the year.

What Teller didn’t confess was that in secret a classified application had already been submitted by his laboratory in Livermore, California to the Department of the Interior, to set aside a chunk on this Alaskan coast nearly the size of Delaware.

August 13, Wednesday: Private Lee Harvey Oswald was released from United States Marine Corps brig confinement.

September 14, Sunday: The United States Marine Corps unit containing Private Lee Harvey Oswald embarked from Japan for the South China Sea.

After September 14, Sunday: The United States Marine Corps unit containing Private Lee Harvey Oswald arrived in Taiwan, where he had a nervous breakdown and was sent back to Japan. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 5, Sunday: Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.’s “Auf Wiedersehen,” a television drama based on Vonnegut’s “D.P.,” was broadcast by CBS.

United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald arrived in Atsugi, Japan.

With the publication of a new constitution, the Fifth French Republic formally came into existence.

In the early morning, 3 bombs destroyed an integrated high school in Clinton, Tennessee (no-one was around to be injured).

Lamentatio Jeremiae prophetae for chorus by Ernst Krenek was performed completely for the initial time, in St. Martin Kirche, Kassel.

Two Last Poems for flute and orchestra by Ernest Bloch was performed for the initial time, in Naples.

On the 10th anniversary of his 1st Concert de bruit, Pierre Schaeffer’s Etude aux allures and Etude aux sons animés for tape were performed for the initial time, at the Brussels International Exposition. Also premiered was Diamorphoses for 2-track tape by Iannis Xenakis.

October 6, Monday: Private Lee Harvey Oswald was put on general duty (for a Marine private, that ordinarily means to report immediately to the Kitchen Police).

China suspended its bombardment and blockade of Nationalist-held islands for 7 days, and called for peace talks (the Nationalist government on Taiwan would reject this offer).

October 31, Friday: Representatives of the USSR, UK, and US met in Geneva for talks on discontinuing atomic weapons testing.

Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and his wife dined with the Cuban Ambassador at the Cuban Embassy in Washington DC to commemorate Teddy Roosevelt — who had in 1898 refused to allow the Cuban liberating army to enter Santiago de Cuba.

United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald received his last overseas rating (4.0 to 4.4 is their range, from low to high, for “average” at that rank, and Oswald, at the rank of Private, received a 4.0).

Arabs began 2 days of rioting in Aden against the British arrest of 2 journalists who had charged the colonial administration with corruption.

Trio Concertante for oboe, violin and piano by Charles Wuorinen was performed for the initial time, in Sloan Hall at the School, Troy, New York. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE November 2, Sunday: United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald departed from Japan for San Francisco.

Mainland China ended its shelling of offshore Nationalist-held islands.

Solitude Sonore for orchestra by Toru Takemitsu was performed for the initial time, in a radio broadcast from NHK Symphony Hall, Tokyo.

Voluntaries for organ by Leslie Bassett was performed for the initial time, in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

November 3, Monday: Soviet scientists observed a volcanic eruption on the moon.

Bendita sabedoria for chorus by Heitor Villa-Lobos to words of the Bible was performed for the initial time, at the opening of the new UNESCO building in Paris.

November 15, Saturday: United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald arrived in San Francisco, California from Japan.

November 19, Wednesday: United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald took 30 days leave.

The Sogetsu Arts Center opened in Tokyo (it would become, during the 1960s, a center for artistic development, including film video, electronic music, and theater).

December 22, Monday: Back from his annual leave, United States Marine Corps Private Lee Harvey Oswald was assigned once again to El Toro, California, this time with MACS-9.

Louis Joseph Maria Beel replaced Willem Drees as Prime Minister of the Netherlands.

December 31, Wednesday: The International Geophysical Year ended.

Cuban rebels captured Santa Clara as increasing numbers of government troops went over to the rebel side. (Terrence Cannon would analyze the situation in the following manner: “The US did not send in the Marines for one basic reason: it did not fear the Revolution. It was inconceivable to the US policy makers that a revolution in Cuba could turn out badly for them. After all, US companies owned the country.”) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1959

From this year into 1960, during the crisis in Cuba, the 2d Marine Ground Task Force would be deployed in the Caribbean to protect US nationals. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

January: The Lawrence Radiation Laboratory in Livermore, California initiated a classified letter requesting that as part of their “Project Plowshare” or “Operation Chariot” demonstration of atoms for peace, they be allowed to create “two to three 20KT explosions plus two at about 200KT,” excavating a nice keyhole-shaped harbor on the northwest coast of Alaska about 30 miles from Cape Thompson’s Eskimo village of Point Hope. They weren’t worried about Eskimos becoming radioactive. They weren’t worried about this coast being in fact locked in ice 9 months out of the year. TIMELINE OF EXPLOSIONS

In the US Marines, Private Lee Harvey Oswald was given semi-annual ratings, which were again average.

February 25, Wednesday: Private Lee Harvey Oswald took a foreign language assessment test in Russian and scored “poor.”

Romania had recently released its Jews, indicating that they would be permitted to depart. El Al Israeli airlines initiated an airlift for them, from Vienna to Israel.

March 9, Monday: Despite his persistent ratings as “average,” the US Marines again promoted Private Lee Harvey Oswald to Private 1st Class.

The revolt against the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Abdul Karim Kassem was put down in Mosul. Top members of the embassy of the United Arab Republics in Baghdad were ordered to leave the country.

Greek Cypriot rebels called a halt to their activities and pledged their support to Archbishop Makarios.

Former Nazi Gauleiter of eastern Poland Erich Koch was sentenced to death in a Warsaw court for the murder of 300,000 people during World War II.

The Barbie Doll was 1st exhibited in New York.

After 7 weeks in Washington and Boston, substantial cuts and rewrites, changes in essential personnel, and the involvement of several lawyers, Juno, a musical play by Marc Blitzstein to a book by Stein after O’Casey and his own lyrics, opened in New York City at the Winter Palace. The press went from disappointed to scathing. The play would close after 16 performances.

Sweet Bird of Youth by Tennessee Williams opened in the Martin Beck Theater, New York. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE March 19, Thursday: The New York Times reported that during August and September of the previous year, the United States of America had detonated 3 small nuclear devices 500 kilometers above the South Atlantic (this would be confirmed by the Department of Defense).

“Green Mansions,” a film with some music by Heitor Villa-Lobos, was screened for the initial time, in New York.

US Marine Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald applied to the Albert Schweitzer College in Switzerland.

June 19, Friday: US Marine Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald forwarded a $25 registration fee to the Albert Schweitzer College.

Big Four foreign ministers meeting in Geneva agreed to recess until July 13th. After 41 days of negotiation over Berlin and German reunification, this was one of the only things they had been able to agree upon.

At ceremonies marking graduation from Moscow Conservatory, works by the diploma recipients were performed in the conservatory’s Bolshoy Hall. Among them were a Symphony in Eb by Sofia Gubaidulina.

July: American journalist Walter Lippmann wrote, in regard to Cuba, “For the thing we should never do in dealing with revolutionary countries, in which the world abounds, is to push them behind an iron curtain raised by ourselves. On the contrary, even when they have been seduced and subverted and are drawn across the line, the right thing to do is to keep the way open for their return.”

North Vietnam sent south, as infiltrators, some 4,000 Viet Minh originally born in South Vietnam.

US Marine Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald was given semi-annual ratings, which were again average.

August 17, Monday: US Marine Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald requested a hardship/dependency discharge because of an injury allegedly sustained by his mother, who needed care, and was transferred to reserve status.

The USSR charged that Laos has violated its neutrality agreement by allowing the presence of US military personnel on their soil.

August 28, Friday: US Marine Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald’s request for a hardship/dependency discharge was recommended for approval.

At 7:30PM Bohuslav Martinu died in Liestal, Switzerland, at the age of 68 of stomach cancer.

Transición II for piano, percussion, and two tapes by Mauricio Kagel was performed for the initial time, in Darmstadt. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September 4, Friday: The government of Laos appealed to the UN to send a force immediately to deal with Pathet Lao guerrillas who, reportedly, were being supported by North Vietnam.

By the time the American National Exhibition closed in Sokolniki Park, Moscow, since its opening during July it had been visited by an estimated 2,700,000.

Musik für sieben Instrumente by Isang Yun was performed for the initial time, in Darmstadt.

On his way out the door, US Marine Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald was transferred to H.&H. Squadron. He applied for a United States passport.

September 10, Thursday: US Marine Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald’s US passport was issued.

September 11, Friday: Private 1st Class Lee Harvey Oswald was released from active duty in the United States Marine Corps.

October 31, Saturday: West Nigeria Television began broadcasting from Ibadan (this was the 1st television station in Africa).

A former United States Marine enlisted man, Lee Harvey Oswald of Ft. Worth, Texas, informed the US embassy in Moscow that he had applied for citizenship in the USSR. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1960

September 13, Tuesday: The political parties of Indonesia were suspended by President Sukarno.

The Parliament of the Congo voted in joint session, 88 over 25, to award special powers to Prime Minister Lumumba against President Kasavubu. Independent observers, doubting that there were that many members present, insisted there had not been a quorum. At the demand of 3 African nations and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the United Nations ended control of Léopoldville radio and opened the nation’s airports. Lumumba petitioned the United Nations for specific military aid and threatened to “seek such assistance elsewhere.”

When representatives of 19 American republics signed a sweeping economic aid program for Latin America, the Act of Bogotá, Cuba refused to sign (the Dominican Republic had been barred from the meeting).

The Department of Justice sued 27 people and 2 banks in Memphis federal court, to stop a campaign that was intended to discourage black citizens from voting.

On account of his attempt to defect, the discharge of Lee Harvey Oswald from the United States Marine Corps was changed from “hardship/dependency discharge under honorable conditions” to “undesirable discharge.”45

45. Why shouldn’t Lee Harvey have defected? We know very well, as he knew very well, that he had always been treated like shit in the nation of his birth, the United States of America — and here was this foreign nation, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, that was proclaiming it had been basing itself on the Communist/Christian ideal: people shouldn’t just be treated like shit. People should all be treated equally and fairly, that was their story and they were for the time being sticking with it, and of course they had all sorts of elaborate Marxist/Leninist gobbledegook and mind-fuck to back this up. –And this Lee Harvey, he wasn’t the brightest bulb as we know. He hadn’t been loyal to the United States of America, but had the United States of America ever been loyal to him? Back stateside he would be told falsely by his own mother, that he was receiving a Dishonorable Discharge! Faced with a confidence game like that of Russia he had wanted to have faith, because of course he needed to believe that somewhere in this sorry world there was somebody who would actually care about him and actually offer him a decent chance. Had that been so very wrong? HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1961

January 30, Monday: Lee Harvey Oswald learned that his discharge from the United States Marine Corps, which had previously been incorrectly reported to him by his mother as a “Dishonorable Discharge,” had actually been “Undesirable,” and wrote from Russia to John Connally, former Secretary of the Navy, asking Connally to “repair the damage done to me and my family.” He had made a serious mistake, supposing that Russia would be a kinder and fairer place than America, and he was ready to acknowledge now that this had been a mistake, his mistake. People are pretty much the way they are all over the world, he had learned — if people treat you like shit in the place where you are, he had learned, they are likely to treat you like shit someplace else as well.

February 13, Monday: Lee Harvey Oswald notified the United States Embassy in Moscow that he desired to return from the Soviet Union to the United States of America. Russia actually wasn’t the caring and decent place it claimed to be — who would have thought?

The death of Patrice Lumumba was announced by the Congolese government, 4 weeks after it occurred. The cover story given out was that he had escaped from custody and had been offed by enraged local tribesmen. Angry demonstrators attacked the Belgian embassy in Rome over his death.

Symphonic Dances from West Side Story by Leonard Bernstein was performed for the initial time, in Carnegie Hall, New York, conducted by Lukas Foss.

Fall: The conflict in Vietnam was widening as 26,000 Viet Cong launched several successful attacks on South Vietnamese troops, and President Ngo Dinh Diem urgently appealed for more military aid from the administration of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

With US help, the South Vietnamese Air Force initiated herbicide operations. President Ngo Dinh Diem’s request for this sort of “help” initiated a policy debate in the White House and the State and Defense Departments, a policy debate during which we learned that such poisons were not unprecedented as weapons of war: the British had already employed such herbicides and defoliants during the Malayan Emergency of the 1950s. Gosh, so actually, we may be doing something evil — but we are not doing anything that has not been done before. How utterly reassuring! SECRET MEDICAL EXPERIMENTS

My petition for Conscientious Objector status was denied on the basis that it was a federal crime of Selective Service fraud, punishable by years in prison, to attempt to transit from a 2S Student Deferred status to a CO status (it didn’t matter that the “2S” classification was something imposed on me, John Paul Smith, by Local HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Draft Board #60 in San Jose, California when I reached 18 years of age, rather than having been in 1955 my own election). I (Austin Meredith) was classified as ready for my obligatory military service. Despite my twisted spine, which had been categorized by the Selective Service physician as “pes planus, asymptomatic” while I was explaining to them that I was a Conscientious Objector, I was ordered to report for induction processing as an Army private — so I started moving from town to town one jump ahead of arrest by one or another local sheriff.

Each time they caught up with me I would simply get on a bus and go to some different town. Meanwhile I kept after the Marine recruiters as to whether I was going to be acceptable as a Marine Officer, on the basis of my college education and test scores. It is so simple to explain to you now, why I needed to do this! During the course of my 24 years, from birth in 1937 to 1961, I had been bashed a number of times by other males my own age or slightly older. I had been beaten once in 1st grade at Brown Military Academy north of San Diego –beaten with sticks shaped and painted to resemble rifles for training and marching purposes– and my left forearm had been cracked and my upper jaw crushed and one of my front baby teeth knocked out. Then during my Junior High years other schoolboys in Wabash, Indiana had purchased #1 hard-lead pencils, sharpened them to needle points, and made a practice of jabbing these pencils into my thighs and buttocks in the halls of the school (I still bear inside the muscle tissue of my left leg the marks of pencil-lead from pencils that had their sharp points snapped off against the long bones of my legs). Then during my High School years in Wabash I had been bashed during a gym class and my nose utterly crushed, filling my nasal passages with bone fragments and making me an obligate mouth-breather. –I had gone into public education deformed and physically very ill due to my bout with bovine tuberculosis and had come out of public education no longer physically ill, but not merely deformed any longer, having been subsequently disfigured. All these attacks had occurred because of a personal appearance which others found disgusting, the boys calling me “Commie Queer” since my appearance was something like a centaur. (My upper torso and my lower torso, during my adolescence, appeared to be from different bodies that had somehow gotten pasted together at the beltline, with the bottom half hugely muscular and the top half puny. Believe me, the last thing in the world that you want to have is a physical appearance that can be sexualized by attackers!)

This being my appearance and my consequent history, I expected that were I put into a prison, or into an army barracks as a private, I would again find himself being physically abused on the basis of my bodily appearance, and might even possibly be called “Commie Queer” again as I had been in public school, and be ganged up on again, and stomped again. So my attitude at the time was that this application for Marine Officer Candidate School, using my higher education to my advantage, might be what it would take to preserve my life and health if in fact I were to be inducted into the Armed Forces of the United States of America. I didn’t want to be taken out behind a barracks and stomped to death by a gang of other Army privates.

I scored very highly on the Marine Officer written test. The recruiting sergeant at Navy Yard in Boston told me that I had scored quite a bit higher than the highest that this recruiter had personally ever previously seen, in his 14 years experience. So he sent me over to the doctors at the Navy Yard, and I had the first real rigorous physical examination that I had in his 24 years of my life ever received. They classified my Potts Disease physical defects, due to my past bovine tuberculosis, again as “asymptomatic,” the same way these defects had originally been classified when I had turned 18 years of age — as it was clear to them not only that I was no longer infectious but also that I could readily accomplish any physical requirements that military service places upon its young recruits. That is, it was easy for me to pass and even to excel, at the standard military “Physical Readiness Test,” since this merely required a certain number of push-ups, a run of a certain distance (two or three miles in a quite generous period of time under a rather light load, as I recall), etc.

Nevertheless the Marines then rejected me as physically unfit. The ruling was in effect that although I was physically fit to be a private in the US Army –that being a position of appropriately low status– I was not HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE physically fit to be a 2d Lieutenant in the USMC — that being a position of a status incompatible with such a disgusting personal bodily configuration. I couldn’t look good in the uniform. So I appealed this ruling, alleging that it was not actually a medical response to my physical condition but was, rather, a prejudiced rejection on grounds of personal appearance alone. I cited various remarks they had made to me about the importance that a Marine Officer look like a Marine Officer, that the standard uniform fit properly, etc. I pointed out that I had scored very highly on his written examination, and pointed out that despite my twisted spine I had easily been able to accomplish each and every task required in the standard military Physical Readiness Test. I pointed out that I had been working on a Texas road surveying crew as a sledgehammer-man, and that for sure no “disabled” person would have been able to work all day on caliche roads in that hot sun swinging a sledgehammer. I pointed out that as a youth I had made myself a set of weights out of cement poured over scrap metal in buckets, and had developed a series of exercises which I had rigidly followed daily in order to strengthen myself to cope with my “nonstandard” physical configuration. I pointed out that I could raise my left shoulder, at least in appearance if that was what counted, simply by using extra padding in the uniform blouse for that shoulder. Etc.

Did I exactly want to become a Marine infantry officer, was that what I had decided to do with my life? –Well, no, but considering the actual alternatives actually available, I was simply struggling to limit my risks.

My medical dossier went on appeal and made its way up through the offices, while I was moving from town to town evading the local sheriffs and ignoring letters and telegrams demanding that I report for induction into the US Army as a private.

Every once in awhile I would fire off a letter asking the status of my appeal. Finally I received a response directly from the Surgeon General of the Navy. The Surgeon General concurred that to reject such a candidate on appearance grounds alone would be to reject him prejudicially. The Surgeon General required that the USMC send me to their Officer Candidate School at Quantico, Virginia, to determine there, by actual candidacy, whether I would be physically and mentally qualified to be a Marine infantry officer.

My appearance at the Marine Officer Candidate School and subsequently at the Marine Officer Training Course, in Quantico during Fall 1961, was obviously distressing to the officers in charge there. One of the very first things that happened was that they discovered that I was embarrassed to be seen in the nude, or in my “skivvies” — and that I had brought pajamas with me to the enlisted Marine barracks used by these Officer Candidates. In the barracks I was quickly and forcibly stripped of these nighttime modesty garments so that my platoon mates could get the full impact of my physical deformity. (They even put a tape measure to me, and among themselves they marveling at how much more huge the muscles in my legs were than their own leg muscles.) The officers there quickly professed to have discovered my political attitudes and to have found these attitudes treasonous, and threatened to award me a general court martial. They put a great deal of time and attention into the fact that in college I had been a student of philosophy, and my “DI,” an Apache Indian named Sergeant Wolf Mule, posed questions such as “How could we possibly trust you? How would we know HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE what you are thinking?”

Here is how this “treason” gambit was developed. At an Effective Presentation class, DI Mule assigned to me the topic “Better Red Than Dead — Bertrand Russell.” He gave me precisely the standard 3 minutes to prepare. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE I went to the front of the classroom and delivered my 3-minute effective presentation.

I said something about Lord Russell’s attitude toward the current global predicament. He believed that the world was poised to destroy itself in an exchange of nuclear warheads by intercontinental ballistic missiles, and he believed that mutual disarmament was unlikely. He therefore proposed that the Western powers resort to unilateral disarmament, and embrace the Communism of the Eastern powers as our ideology. Soon, he urged, the ideology of Communism would collapse of its own dead weight, because as an ideology, Leninism/ Stalinism was intellectually impoverished. It could no more sustain itself as a viable ideology long term than, say, Nazism or Fascism or Shinto, three other intellectually impoverished ideologies. By unilaterally disarming and embracing the ideology of our “enemies” we would, granted, be subjecting ourselves to some short-term intellectual discomfort, but within a matter of decades the world that such a step would create would be a world of peace and safety.

I said that and sat down, meeting I think my 3-minute requirement, and the “turd” seated next to me stood up and delivered his own 3-minute Effective Presentation on the basis of whatever it was that DI Wolf Mule had written on his own file card 3 minutes before.

At the conclusion of this Effective Presentation class I was marched to the office of the Company Commander and processing began for a General Courts Martial, in that allegedly by virtue of this classroom effective presentation I had been attempting to convert other military personnel to pacifism. I had expressed disloyal thoughts to these other Marine officer candidates who had the temporary status of enlisted men, causing them to doubt and reducing their effectiveness in combat, and oh boy, that is indeed treason. I said “Fine, I’ll plead guilty.” They said “You'll what?” I said “I’m guilty of treason, because I obeyed the direct order of my superior when that order was an unlawful order. That’s the Nürnberg Principle, in case you didn’t know. I’m as guilty as Goebbels and fully deserve the same punishment.”

I pointed out, in that Company headquarters at Marine Officer Candidate School in Quantico, Virginia in 1961, that this was a fine turn of events. Everybody could be happy, everybody would get what they needed. You folks need to establish the Nürnberg Principle as a basic principle of the United States Military Code of Justice, known as the “Red Book.” I need to devote my life to doing something worthwhile that will be of benefit to society — and sitting out the remainder of my life in a prison cell in a military brig for having established the Nürnberg Principle as a basic principle of the United States Military Code of Justice would be an excellent way for me to devote my life to doing something worthwhile that would be of benefit to society. This would HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE be a fine thing, fine for you and fine for me. “So,” I said, “let’s get along with my trial for treason by general courts martial. I’m guilty, Your Honors, guilty as sin. I throw myself on the mercy of the court. Thank God we’re not at war, so I cannot be hanged. Do with me as you will.”

I mentioned something that I had had no chance to mention during the 3 minutes of my Effective Presentation, that the slogan “Better Red Than Dead” was not something that had been originated by philosopher Bertie but was merely a repudiation of Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels’s slogan “Lieber tot als rot” — and therefore it would be possible for the popular media to construe the Commanding Officer’s disagreement with Bertie as being in sympathy with the Nazis.

They went “Well, but, uh, do you believe what you said in class?” I replied “Not a word of it. I had only 3 minutes, only long enough to make a brief statement of what Professor “Better Red than Dead” believed, not what I personally believe. Professor Russell was a Conscientious Objector during World War I — but while he waiting out that war in prison in England I had not yet been born.” The Commanding Officer, and the base attorney, then purported to feel relieved, when they discovered through further questioning that actually I did not agree with Russell, that actually I considered Bertie’s “better Red than dead” polemic to have been a stupid self-defeating one, and that I had delivered my 3-minute Effective Presentation as being in favor of such a posture only because in standard debate mode one is supposed to adopt the “pro” or the “con” position that one has been assigned to represent, and that I had considered that it had been intended that I was to deliver the difficult “pro” argument rather than the easy “con” argument. The two of them expressed themselves as so relieved, that actually I didn’t believe any of that “better Red than dead” stuff! This had all been the most dreadful mistake! The Quantico school disposed of this problem by handing me my shiny golden 2d- Lieutenant bars, which I affixed proudly to my shoulders, and by sending me off on my after-graduation leave of absence. I went to a military airport near Washington DC in my new Marine officer green formal winter uniform, to search out a free standby seat on one or another military aircraft and go home to Wabash, Indiana and show off.

I was directed to a propeller-driven cargo plane sitting on the runway with propellers whirling, ready for takeoff. Three military personnel in uniform chased after me, shouting abuse. They attempted to hound me into the plane’s whirling propeller, but I managed to evade them because, fortuitously, a Marine Lieutenant Colonel happened to be just inside the door of the aircraft, and he reached out and grabbed me. He was angry, he thought I was just stupid, because he supposed I had been unaware of the rotating propeller. I heaved my duffel bag into the side door of the aircraft, and clambered aboard. There was just room for the airplane’s hatch to swing open and shut without being struck by the invisible blades. Safely inside, I looked back through the window and the 3 military personnel in uniform who had been chasing after me shouting abuse had vanished, were nowhere to be seen. I went to a window on the opposite side and looked out, and likewise on that side, they were nowhere to be seen. Although I was intending to go home to Indiana for my post-graduation leave to show off my new uniform and the new golden bars on my shoulders, as I soon discovered, this cargo plane to which I had been directed was headed not for Indiana but for New Orleans, carrying a load of folding bleachers — there was not even a seat in which I could sit, so I needed to lie down across my duffel bag atop a pile of metal pipes. Clearly, I had not been intended to get aboard that cargo plane alive.

(I am omitting here a description of the mandatory cosmetic surgery to which I would be subjected due to my offensive appearance in Marine uniform, at the Naval Hospital in Bethesda, Maryland, since that is covered in a section of this database dated early in 1962.)

During the entire period of my military obligation, three and a half years, the Office of Naval Intelligence and HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE the FBI would be conducting a full-scale Background Investigation on my entire life, from the point of birth on September 17, 1937 onward, attempting to discover any factoid on the basis of which they could demand that I resign this officer’s commission.

I would be interrogated with regularity, in rooms with one-way mirrors and a lie-detector machine, on Navy Pier in San Diego. They would manage to get a few things on me, basically various fringe political attitudes that I had taken, plus the fact that during my college education the Communist Manifesto had been assigned reading in one of my classes, plus the fact that my mother would tell the nice men who came to visit her on the farm, in suits, that when I had been a teenager I had masturbated. They would manage to establish that I had an unsatisfactory attitude, one proof of that being that on a security form I had been required to fill out, stating my exact address at every point since January 1, 1937, my first entry on the form had been: January 1, 1937 — September 17, 1937: in utero HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE This they would evaluate as my “trying to make a joke out of the national security of the United States of America,” thus placing our national security at risk. However, they never would get enough on me that I felt I had to accept their demands that I resign my commission. To the best of the information I have available to me at this point, I was the first deformed person to serve as an officer in the USMC, and seem in addition to be the sole such person — even to this day. I would manage despite them all to complete his period of military obligation, and without being sent to prison. –And then starting in 1965, my “military obligation” completed, I would be freed to dispose of my uniforms and struggle to get on with my life. ASSLEY A REPLY TO AN EMAIL LIST: The inimitable ex-Marine sergeant Lawrence Helm has commented on Henry Thoreau’s civil disobedience: ... the Civil Disobedience defined by its creator Henry David Thoreau as an activity surely destined to draw blood? My argument there was that “passivity” was a later addition and doesn’t properly define the activity as created by Thoreau. I believe this discussion was in regard to whether “Passive Resistance” was “non- violence.” I deny that it is.

I want to say that I have over the years made myself something of an authority on Thoreau, and Helm has it exactly right here. Indeed the sort of activity intended by Thoreau in refusal of the system of violence (in his day he was particularly concerned over human enslavement) was violent, was essentially violent, was only violent. The responsible American citizen was to proclaim “I will not in any way, shape, or manner cooperate with such a system of violence, regardless of what you may do to me in retribution for this refusal,” and the responsible citizen was to issue this proclamation by action and by example in such manner that the authorities who maintain such a system of violence will be hooked by the horns of a dilemma: either they must destroy this patriotic resister and then suffer whatever political consequences follow from their act of suppression of a martyr — or they must abandon their system of violence. Thoreau, the ultimate practitioner of personal responsibility, violently intended to allow to these governmental perpetrators of systemic violence no third option.

Having gotten Thoreau right, however, our badass ex-Marine sergeant has gone on to say also: Nevertheless, to be herded into buses & told to line up holding hands & singing Cum Baya in order to block an activity that is sure to be blocked is different from walking into the Marine Corps recruiting depot during time of war and enlisting — it seems to me.

Such words strike a particularly sensitive spot in my heart. In 1961, when I left behind my formal education, I was presented by my local draft board #60 in San Jose, California with this HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE option, that option, and no 3d option. I could either “serve my country” in the military for my allotted period, or I could don a jumpsuit of prison orange. There was no other possibility.

What could a young man with a badly twisted spine have done, to insert himself into such an absurd predicament? The answer to that can be straightforward. When, at the age of 18, having completed public high school, in the Year of Our Lord 1955, I appeared at San Jose’s Draft Board #60 to register for the draft, I had told them I had conscientious objections to engaging in warfare. I should not have done that, for obviously, with my badly twisted spine, I was 4F ineligible for military service. The military would not want me, would not want to be responsible for me — but, this young man had asked to be a CO. That infuriated them to the extent that they refused to medically classify me as ineligible. Instead they permuted my lordotic, scoliotic, disfiguring spine into mere “Pes Planus, Asymptomatic.” A severely twisted spine was recorded as “this kid has flat feet but it’s not a problem.” This was their way of displaying contempt for a young American who wanted to be a CO, a young American who was so cowardly and selfish that he would seek to refuse to give his life for his country.

They said to me “Don’t do this to yourself, kid. You’re about to enter college, let us give you a 2S Student Deferment. Then, after four years of education, if you still want to throw your life away, you can come back to us and give us your ridiculous ‘I don’t believe in war’ CO shit-talk again.” So I left the Draft Board in San Jose, that day in 1955, with a draft registration card that said 2S, not at my choice but at theirs. Then the years of education passed, and I became as of 1961 a young man with a college degree in Philosophy, and I went back to the Draft Board and again asked that I be classified as a conscientious objector. Their response in 1961 was very different from their response in 1955. Their response was “Now we’ve got you, you son of a bitch! You are guilty of Selective Service fraud, in accepting a deferment when actually you were a cowardly and selfish refusenik. You, sir, are going direct to prison for the criminal offense of Selective Service fraud!”

In threatening me in such a manner, of course, these denizens of the draft obviously were expecting such a young man to wet his pants in fear. They had me figured. —And they had me figured right: that is exactly how under this pressure I did respond. Instead of making the honorable and responsible choice and allowing them to slap handcuffs and leg chains on me and incarcerate me in their prison, I took the coward’s way out — I allowed these San Jose psychopathic pseudopatriots to fit me into a military uniform. “Oh,” they said, “You’ll be so glad someday that you listened to reason and decided to do the honorable and decent and manly thing, and serve your country in its time of need.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE I had what I thought at the time was a great idea. Faced with the alternative, put on the national military uniform or put on an orange prison jumpsuit, I formed the notion that of all the military services, the Army, the Navy, the Coast Guard, the Air Force, the branch with the very most impossible physical entrance requirements would be the United States Marine Corps. So I took the oath to enter the USMCR, figuring that with my deficient spine, I would flunk their physical requirements and be freed from all this madness. However, when I actually took this test, I found it was over almost before it began. They had me do a bit of this and a bit of that, and before I had even gotten into a sweat they had me out on a 3-mile jog at a moderate pace, and then they surprised me, saying it was over and I had passed. I was physically fit for military service, having easily met their minimum requirements.

Then, in answer to the fact that the USMC didn’t want me, obviously was horrified at the idea, didn’t want such a disfigured body to appear within their honorific Dress Blues and Dress Whites military parade uniforms, they forwarded my medical case all the way up to the Surgeon General of the Navy. This guy, you should see him, he will look just disgusting in our honorific uniform! From that high office in Washington DC came back a remarkable response: if this young man has passed the standard military Physical Readiness Test then you simply cannot reject him on the grounds of a disgusting appearance in uniform. That would be prejudice. That would be unfair. It would be like discriminating against someone merely because they are ugly. You can’t get out of your military obligation simply because you are not as pretty as Ollie North. You are going to be the 1st physically disfigured Marine in uniform!

I can only thank whatever Gods there be that the Marine expeditionary brigade I was sent off on, our mission to effect an amphibious landing near Guantanamo de Cuba and capture a seaport through which the 5 divisions of Army dogfaces waiting in Florida could pass in order to conquer the island of Cuba (this happens to be the closest to global nuclear war that we have ever come, with an estimated chance of death of 40%), was turned aside at the ultimate moment — so that in my personal lucky case my cowardice did not result in my now having blood on my hands.

I have reached the age of 80 and have all my life regretted this youthful cowardice –donning USMCR dress blues rather than an honorable prison yellow jump suit– and sought to atone for it.

— A.E. Meredith, former groundpounder 1st Lieutenant, USMCR serial number 083522 HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1962

January 11, Thursday: During his State of the Union address, President John Fitzgerald Kennedy averred that “Few generations in all of history have been granted the role of being the great defender of freedom in its maximum hour of danger.” He went on to characterize this as “our good fortune.”46 VIETNAM

The US Marines issued a 20-page pamphlet in praise of guess-who for having in 1859 stopped the raid by Captain John Brown on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry: THE UNITED STATES MARINES

AT

HARPER’S FERRY, 1859

Historical Branch, G-3 Division

Headquarters, U. S. Marine Corps

Washington, D. C.

DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY

HEADQUARTERS UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS

WASHINGTON 25, D. C.

REVIEWED AND APPROVED 11 JAN 1962

46. The special Washington terminology that describes such head-up-your-own-ass assertions is “spin.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE H. W. BUSE, JR.

Brigadier General, U. S. Marine Corps

Assistant Chief of Staff, G-347

Brevet Colonel the detachment of Marines Robert E. Lee, from his report to the Adjutant General of the suppression of John Brown’s Raid.

James Ewell Brown Stuart, First Lieutenant, U.S. Cavalry, was enjoying six months’ leave from his frontier post at Fort Riley, Kansas Territory. Yet, the joys of coming home to Virginia had not made him forget that he was a cavalryman by profession. On the rainy morning of 17 October 1859 he had ridden over the muddy streets of Washington to the office of the War Department, and now he sat waiting to speak with Secretary of War John B. Floyd. Jeb Stuart had an idea for a new type strap to fasten a cavalryman’s sabre to his belt. While the young lieutenant was rehearsing in his mind for the coming interview, the Secretary himself was face to face with the spectre of a slave insurrection.

John B. Floyd was a poor administrator, a failing which almost resulted in his removal from office; but on this day there was no need for paper shuffling. Word had come by way of Baltimore that an insurrection had broken out at Harper’s Ferry. A band of armed men had captured the United States arsenal there and was fomenting a slave rebellion. A native of Virginia, the Secretary must have heard the oft-told tales of the Haitians revolt against their French masters with all its barbarism. Nor had any son of the Old Dominion forgotten Nat Turner’s Rebellion, a slave uprising which occurred a generation before and claimed the lives of 55 whites in a single bloody night.

Swinging at once into action, Floyd fired off a telegram to Fort Monroe; and by noon Captain Edward O.C. Ord with 150 coast artillerymen was on his way toward Baltimore on the first leg of the journey to Harper’s Ferry. There was no question as to who would command operations against the insurgents. Floyd called for his chief clerk and set him to writing orders summoning to the War Department Brevet Colonel Robert E. Lee, then on leave at his estate, Arlington, just across the Potomac from the Capital.

Message in hand, the harassed aide came dashing out of the office, only to halt when he spied the forgotten cavalry officer. Stuart, by now thoroughly bored, was easily persuaded 47. This 20-page booklet is a reprint of “At All Times Ready...” by Bernard C. Nalty, describing how in 1859 the USMC squashed the takeover of the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia by the forces of Captain John Brown. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE to deliver the sealed envelope. Even as this message was speeding toward its destination, President James Buchanan called upon Secretary Floyd to move even faster a demand which was to bring the Marine Corps into the picture.

Since there were no troops nearer the scene of the uprising than those en route from Fort Monroe, Floyd was powerless to comply; but Secretary of the Navy Isaac Toucey quickly offered a solution to his dilemma. About noon Charles W. Welsh, chief clerk of the Navy Department, came riding through the main gate of the . He sought out First Lieutenant , temporarily in command of Marine Barracks, Washington, and asked how many Leathernecks were available for duty. Greene estimated that he could round up some 90 men from both his barracks and the small Navy Yard detachment. He then asked Welsh what was wrong. The civilian told him all he knew— that the armory at Harper’s Ferry had been seized by a group of abolitionists and that state and federal troops already were on the march....

Learning that the militiamen, whatever their faults, had at least forced the insurgents to barricade themselves in a single small building on the armory grounds—the Engine House—Lee decided to attack as quickly as possible. Because of the danger to the hostages, a night assault was out of the question, so the colonel, his aide, and the Marines crossed the river to await the dawn.

About 2300 on the night of 17 October, Greene led his men across the covered bridge and into the armory yard...

Early in the year, graduating from the Marine Officer Candidate Course at Quantico, Virginia, I put on my new Marine Officer green dress uniform (with special padding built into its left shoulder to make me appear slightly more presentable), and someone pinned the bright yellow 2d-Lieutenant bars on my epaulets, and attired in my new uniform with its new decorations I went on leave back to my family in Indiana. At the military airport near Washington DC, I was assigned to an aircraft that I took to be a C123, that was out on the runway. As I slung my duffel bag over my shoulder inside the building, a group of enlisted people standing around me, not travelers but military workers at this airport, and began to haze me, professing to believe that what I had on was a Coast Guard uniform, and professing to believe that the brown Marine globe-and-anchor insignia on my uniform cap was a Coast Guard insignia. They taunted me with these “jokes” until they got me good and riled up and then they set me running toward the aircraft warming up out on the dark runway, and I lurched in that HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE direction carrying my heavy duffel bag over my shoulder in a high state of agitation.

It was late in the evening, raining, almost dark, and the runway was unlit. They were chasing after me, yelling in derision. It was almost as if they were herding me. As I neared the aircraft, someone inside opened the entry port in the fuselage and leaned out and began to wave and scream at me. Just at the last moment I was deterred by a curious blur in the air and I passed to the side of the rotating propeller, and then this man had me by the shoulder strap of my duffel bag and was jerking me in through the port. He was a Lieutenant Colonel and proceeded to give me a good dressing down. What kind of fool was I? Had I not seen that rotating propeller? I had almost lost my head and shoulders, he mentioned repeatedly — they had almost been turned into a spray of hamburger. I looked out the door and the people who had been chasing me and yelling at me had HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE disappeared.

There was no seat inside the aircraft for me. It was carrying a load of pipe and boards and I had to find a place to stretch out atop my duffel bag atop this strapped-down pile of cargo, directly on top of the sloping cargo ramp in the floor of the ass-end of the aircraft.

As we flew through the night, I saw something curious. In order to verify our flight path, one of the crewmen opened a little round hole in the top of the fuselage, poked the top of a marine sextant through this hole, and took a sighting on the stars.

We landed to my surprise at a military base in New Orleans and I was left to figure out how I had been directed to a flight to New Orleans rather than to Indiana, in a military cargo aircraft that was loaded down with the pipes and boards of a set of portable bleachers and didn’t even have seats. Gradually I began to pull the pieces together and suspect that I hadn’t really been expected to make it alive, onto that aircraft. The purpose of the hazing and excitement as I was directed toward the aircraft in the dark, with it standing there on the dark runway with its propellers already swiftly rotating, had been to herd me to my death. Thus it hadn’t mattered that this was a flight that didn’t have seats, and it hadn’t mattered that this was a flight heading elsewhere. I was supposed to be lying dead in a metal tray in the morgue in Washington, and therefore no longer an embarrassment to the service. The only reason I was alive was that that Lieutenant Colonel had not been a party to the plot, and had at the last moment seen me approaching past that whirling propeller and had reacted instantly to save another Marine’s life.

(But who could I report this to? –Was I to file a complaint to the people who had tried to kill me, that they had tried to kill me and shame on them? Obviously, I just had to eat this, and try to be more cautious in the future. And then again, maybe I imagined the whole thing, or maybe the whole thing had been an innocent coincidence. Maybe as they were chasing after me and yelling at me, they hadn’t actually been attempting to steer me into the invisible rotating propeller. Maybe, when I was going to Indiana, I had been directed to an aircraft destined for New Orleans — by some sort of innocent inattention. Maybe I had been directed to a loaded-down cargo aircraft without any seats as some sort of mistake. Maybe the hazing and excitement had been nothing at all, a figment of the imagination.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

In order to improve my appearance in uniform, my superiors at Marine Corps Schools – Quantico send me to Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland for mandatory cosmetic surgery. (Cosmetic surgery at government expense is not only never mandatory, it is normally very rigorously prohibited. This would qualify me, perhaps, as the only citizen ever ordered to undergo, at the government’s expense, appearance-enhancement surgery. In order to justify this they pretended there had been a training accident. They certified that I had been injured by a bounds stake driven by a quarter-pound block of explosives during a live-fire training exercise.) The doctors at the hospital took a look at me and knew that they would be able to do nothing about his spinal twist, which would not disable me for function as an active duty officer — but had the bright idea that at least they could help me by fixing the fact that I needed to keep my mouth open all the time in order to breathe –I had been unable to breathe through my nose since being stomped in gym class in high school– by performing what is termed “DVS” surgery. I would be in this hospital for this relatively minor operation (relatively minor, compared to the spinal surgery which my superior officers presumed to be occurring) only for two or three weeks. The radical turbinatoplasty in which all my turbinate bones would be cut away was of course to be performed while I was conscious.48

How this came to be arranged may be of interest. I was out on a live-fire exercise with the company, at Basic School, when unexpectedly our company commander barked out my name and put me in charge of the frontal assault unit. We lay down a base of fire and leapfrog-assaulted across a valley, at an “enemy” machine gun position on the opposing hill firing blanks — and I had, I thought, carried this off but then unexpectedly at the end of this exercise I was called to attention, denounced, and charged with disobedience to orders. It was loudly alleged that I had taken the unit outside the defined perimeter of the operation. There was a dirt road stretching across the valley toward the enemy position, and two of my marines had at one point darted into the cover offered by this ditch across this road rather than proceed directly forward. Their spontaneous movement was being held against me, as a deliberate disobedience since that dirt road had been described to me in advance by my commanding officer as the left margin of my field of operations. Once again I was to face courtmartial for disobedience to orders — on and on like that. (Unless you’ve yourself stood at attention and taken this sort of verbal abuse, you can’t imagine.)

However, on the march back in from the field that night, to my amazement, I was approached by my company commander. First he buddied up to me by attempting a joke: “Lieutenant Meredith, do you know what an atomic fart is? —It’s a fart with fallout.” At first I was supposing that this was going to lead up to more abuse of the sort I had been receiving all that day — or perhaps, since farts come out of one’s ass, it was going to be a leadup to a reference to my huge ass? –But no, as it turned out, the captain was merely trying to break the ice. He had an apology he needed to get off his chest. What had happened that day had been a setup. He had been told in advance by his battalion superiors, “Get Lieutenant Meredith. He has no business being in the Corps.” He apologized abjectly, with crestfallen face. He had caved to this pressure and had attacked me in an entirely unwarranted manner and he felt personally dishonored by his obedience to his orders from his superior officers.

We discussed the situation. It was a situation that had arisen due to my appearance in uniform. Consider what a problem Franco Alfano would have had in signing Placido Domingo as lead tenor, if he had chosen to write an opera about “Cyranass de Bergerac,” a great guy whose body problem is not a putty prosthesis of a protruding nose but a padded prosthesis of a protruding ass and tailbone.49 The only way for him to protect

48. Later, my personal physician at the University of California Medical Clinic has commented to me (this was during the 1990s) that I was certainly lucky that they did not attempt spinal surgery, back in the early 1960s, as such operations are simply no longer performed. –The track record is that these surgical intercessions to the lumbar spine, and the screws and metal strips that were then being inserted, typically did no good and often over the long run weakened the bone structures they were designed to strengthen and straighten. My physician said “You would never have recovered as you have, had such an operation been attempted.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE me was to get me the hell away from there. What to do? The scheme to send me off to Bethesda Naval Hospital grew out of this. Originally the scheme would be to subject me to spinal surgery, and that plan did not change to the far less drastic nasal surgery until after I had been checked in to that military hospital and the surgeons there had had a chance to evaluate what was being proposed by the brass at Marine Corps Schools – Quantico. The radical turbinatoplasty was what one might term a compromise solution between the officers involved, one that would satisfy the demand being placed by the Marine higher-ups while at the same time satisfying the Navy surgical officer and his hospital Colonel by not doing me any great permanent harm.

I’ll never forget that joke about the atomic fart! I’ll never forget that Marine Lieutenant Colonel waving me in next to the fuselage of the C123 as I moved past that invisible whirling propeller! ASSLEY

49. On the Greek stage, in antiquity, slaves had been portrayed wearing a very brief Greek costume over a body stocking which was stuffed, at belly and ass, to produce unseemly bulges. (They also wore a standard repulsive face mask, and a huge hanging leather apparatus mimicking exposed male genitals.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE February 23, Friday: TIME Magazine reported the finding by Dr. Widukind Lenz of Hamburg University that thalidomide was causing birth defects.

Igor Stravinsky’s cantata A Sermon, a Narrative and a Prayer to words of Dekker and the Bible, was performed for the initial time, in Basel. It was very successful and the audience requires the entire work to be encored.

The Juggler of Our Lady, an opera by Ulysses Kay to words of King was performed for the initial time, at Xavier University, New Orleans.

Lee Harvey Oswald had on January 30th, 1961, more than a year earlier, written from Russia to former Secretary of the Navy John Connally, asking for his help in regard for his United States Marine Corps discharge being subsequently downgraded, without any hearing, to “undesirable.” He had asked Connally to “repair the damage done to me and my family.” At this point he received a belated letter from Connally inside a garish envelope announcing that Connally was a candidate for Governor of Texas. The letter was brief and impersonal, and indicated only that Connally had passed Oswald’s letter on to his successor as Secretary of the Navy. Eventually this would be followed by another letter, from the Department of Navy, stating that it would not contemplate a change in the downgraded discharge. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE March: “Operation Sunrise” began the Strategic Hamlet resettlement program in accordance with which the scattered villages of South Vietnam were to be resettled into fortified villages that could be defended by the local militias, while being separated from their ancestral farmlands. However, more than fifty of these strategic hamlets were soon infiltrated and taken over by Viet Cong who killed or intimidated the village leaders. President Ngo Dinh Diem was ordering bombing raids against strategic hamlets suspected of being under the control of the Viet Cong. These air strikes were by the South Vietnamese Air Force, but they were being supported by US pilots, who also were themselves perpetrating some of the bombings. The civilian causalities were resulting in peasant hostility toward America, which was being largely blamed for the unpopular resettlement program as well as for the indiscriminate bombings, and were eroding even further Diem’s popular support.

The Atomic Energy Commission launched its “Atoms for Peace” nuclear-powered luxury liner NS Savannah. It could be able to cruise all the way around the planet without refueling. It offered 30 air-conditioned luxury staterooms and a swimming pool. It would never prove economically viable — but it looked damned nice. Meanwhile, up above the air, Marine Lieutenant-Colonel John Herschel Glenn, Jr. orbited the earth in the 1st manned American space capsule. His swimming pool would be an ocean, hopefully, upon touchdown.

March 13, Tuesday: As an anti-terrorism measure the French government banned all civilian flights except those by regularly scheduled airlines.

Magnificat and Nunc dimittis for chorus and organ by Michael Tippett was performed for the initial time, in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The NBC news program The Land with music by Ulysses Kay was shown for the initial time, over the airwaves of the network.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff (the USA’s top military leaders) had all signed off on a plan to trick the American public into supporting another invasion of Cuba to oust the island’s then new leader, , a Commie symp. They were to accomplish this by orchestrating covert military acts of violent terrorism in US cities, murdering innocent citizens: [C]asualty lists in US newspapers would cause a helpful wave of national indignation.

Every one of the Joint Chiefs having given written approval of this proposed false-flag “Operation Northwoods” operation, on this day they pitched it to Secretary of Defense Robert Strange McNamara, President John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s go-to Ford Motor Company expert, he of the impeccable slicked-back hair, for final approval. They urged him to provide them with, get this, political support in, bullet point, the assassination of Cuban émigrés, bullet point, the sinking of boatloads of Cuban refugees on the high seas, bullet point, the hijacking of planes, and, bullet point, the blowing up a US ship à la the battleship Maine and the Spanish/American War: We could blow up a U.S. ship in Guantánamo Bay and blame Cuba.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff even suggested to our strange Secretary of Defense that, bullet point, if US Marine Lieutenant-Colonel John Hersichel Glenn, Jr. should happen (unfortunately) to get blown away during our 1st attempt to rocket an American into orbit in a space capsule, we could use this as a false pretext for our coming war upon Cuba by announcing that those nasty Cubans must have shot our right-stuff guy right out of the sky: HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE [T]he objective is to provide irrevocable proof ... that the fault lies with the Communists et all Cuba [sic].

The Joint Chiefs were at the time headed by an Eisenhower appointee, Army General Lyman Louis Lemnitzer. Details of the plan are now available in BODY OF SECRETS: ANATOMY OF THE ULTRA-SECRET NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY, a 2001 book by investigative reporter V. James Bamford issued by Doubleday. There is no doubt about this! –Bamford points out that we have the actual documents: These were Joint Chiefs of Staff documents. The reason these were held secret for so long is the Joint Chiefs never wanted to give these up because they were so embarrassing. The whole point of a democracy is to have leaders responding to the public will, and here this is the complete reverse, the military trying to trick the American people into a war that they want but that nobody else wants. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS March 14, Wednesday: India formally annexed Goa, Diu, and Damão.

A meeting of 17 nations to discuss disarmament convened in Geneva under UN auspices.

Three of the 15 études pour alto saxophone et piano op.188 by Charles Koechlin were performed for the initial time, in Brussels.

Serenade for flute, clarinet, harp, viola and cello by Thea Musgrave was performed for the initial time, in London.

Guidelines for OPERATION MONGOOSE drafted by General Maxwell Davenport “Max” Taylor were approved by the SG-A.They noted that the United States would attempt to “make maximum use of indigenous resources” in trying to overthrow Fidel Castro but recognize that “final success will require decisive U.S. military intervention.” Indigenous resources would act to “prepare and justify this intervention, and thereafter to facilitate and support it.” President John Fitzgerald Kennedy would be briefed on the guidelines for this US conquest of Cuba on March 16th. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

March 22, Thursday: Conservative terrorists attacked French security forces at 3 places in Algiers. 3 were killed and 3 wounded. 6 Muslims were killed by conservative terrorists elsewhere in Algiers.

Several exiled key leaders of the Cuban Revolution formed a “Cuban Revolutionary Council” presided over by José Miró Cardona (he had been the 1st prime minister of the Cuban revolutionary government during January/February 1959). Additional members included Antonio Varona, Manuel Ray and José Pérez San Román.

Lee Harvey Oswald had on February 23d received a letter from former Secretary of the Navy John Connally, in regard to his United States Marine Corps discharge having been subsequently downgraded, without any hearing, to “undesirable.” He had asked Connally to “repair the damage done to me and my family,” but all that Connally had sent in response was a brief and impersonal statement that he had passed Oswald’s letter on HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE to his successor as Secretary of the Navy.

This had been followed by a letter from the Department of Navy stating that it would not contemplate a change in the downgraded discharge. Therefore on this date Oswald posted an appeal for further review. (Oswald wrote “I shall employ all means to right this gross mistake or injustice to a bona fide U.S. citizen and ex- serviceman.” In response to his appeal, the department would reply that it had no authority on the matter and send along a form that Oswald could fill out and file with the Navy Discharge Review Board. Oswald would fill out the form and post it to the Navy Discharge Review Board. I don’t know anything about that board’s response, but very clearly, Oswald was considering that he and his family were being unjustly persecuted by the government, and very clearly, he was frustrated by the process of appeals and rejections. He carried in his wallet his original discharge card, which showed his discharge as honorable, and yet his employment prospects were impaired because potential employers were able to learn about the later change of this discharge from “honorable” status to “undesirable” status. Need we wonder why this marginal and aggrieved man who had been trained by the USMC in marksmanship became a shooter?)

April 15, Sunday: Georges Jean Raymond Pompidou replaced Michel Debré as prime minister of France.

Muslims in Algiers dragged 2 Europeans from a car and beat them to death. 15 Muslims were killed and 22 wounded in attacks by conservative terrorists in Algiers.

Three Pieces for two pianos by Arthur Berger was performed for the initial time, in Sanders Theater, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

A US Marine helicopter squadron (HMM-362) arrived in the Mekong Delta region of South Vietnam. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE May 17, Thursday: In an effort to halt the influx of refugees as China’s “Great Leap Forward” came to its unfortunate end, Hong Kong authorities began constructing a new barrier along its land border (an estimated 50,000 refugees had entered the colony since May 1st).

Dutch forces shot down a plane carrying Indonesian paratroopers near Fakfak, Netherlands New Guinea.

Concert for Eight for flute, clarinet, mandolin, guitar, accordion, percussion, piano and double bass by Roberto Gerhard was performed for the initial time, in London.

Traversée op.393 for chorus by Darius Milhaud to words of Verlaine was performed for the initial time, in Cork.

In the previous year the military had detonated an atomic bomb in a buried bed of rock salt near Carlsbad, New Mexico. The idea had been to demonstrate that nukes weren’t only for war, they could be used for peaceful purposes. The plan had been to run pipes down to the underground chamber of molten salt created with this explosion, and pipe water through it to generate steam to turn a turbine at ground level and thus generate electricity for the local power lines. During the intervening months they had dug down to this cavity and on this day workers actually entered the cavity to take some photographs. The cavity was about 170 feet across and almost 90 feet high and the temperature was about 140 degrees Fahrenheit. It was a sight to behold. Would they ever actually use this heat to generate electricity for the local power lines? –Nah, this is your government, they were just dicking around.

The 3d Marine Expeditionary Unit landed to support Thailand during a threat of Communist pressure from outside (by July 30th these 5,000 US Marines would be withdrawn). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

June 1, Friday: The conservative Secret Army Organization (conservative terrorists) suspended its terrorist campaign in Algeria. Secret negotiations had begun between the conservative terrorists and the provisional executive in Algeria.

Lee Harvey Oswald signed a promissory note for $435.71, loaned to him by the Department of State of the United States of America as an American in hardship overseas, which enabled the Oswalds to leave for America.

Before departing Cuba in early June, Marshal Sergey Biryuzov sought to determine whether the deployment of Soviet missiles could be accomplished without detection by the United States or others. Upon the return of the party to Moscow, First Secretary would be told that Fidel Castro has accepted the offer to place Soviet missiles in Cuba, and Biryuzov would report that he believed such a deployment could in fact be carried out covertly. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE September: I (Austin Meredith) had received orders to become the US Marine officer in command of a Nike antiaircraft installation at Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii.50 During that summer my wife María de los Angeles García Meredith and I had traveled across country in our black Volkswagen bug from my Marine Officer Training on the East Coast to my first duty station, Alameda Naval Air Station on a flat island in San Francisco Bay. When I had arrived and reported for duty, the bird colonel in command of the Naval Air Intelligence Training Center there had gone hyperbolic. He didn’t like my physical appearance. The first thing he did was order ordered this newly minted Marine 2d Lieutenant onto a diet, and the base doctor prescribed little white pills to help me lose weight without warning me that these were amphetamines, mood-altering uppers. But the thing was, I was not overweight — in fact I had just completed the Marine basic training and was in the best shape I have ever been in, in my entire freaking life! It quickly became clear that my 1st commanding officer wasn’t going to be able to make my “fat ass” go away by ordering it to go away — because my buttocks simply had no fat on them, their offensiveness being a mere matter of their protruding to the rear due to my spine twisted in lordosis. I had to have those bulging muscles in my hips, along with the bulging muscles in my calves, along with my flat

50. Nowadays such Nike installations are considered of historical interest:

COLD WAR MUSEUM INTERNSHIP The Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA), a unit of the , is preserving and restoring the last intact Nike missile site in the United States. Located at Fort Barry, in the Marin Headlands, Nike Site SF-88L is the last remnant of the Cold War preserved and open to the public. Golden Gate is seeking a dynamic, full-time intern to work on an exciting preservation opportunity to assist in museum accountability, resource management, and interpretation projects at the site. The park has acquired obsolete –and now extremely rare– Nike missiles, computers, and other accouterments worth in excess of $30 million. RESPONSIBILITIES: Cataloging some of the more unique objects in any museum collection. Assisting in rehabilitating the site to working condition. Documenting progress. Assisting in interpretation of the site. Working with a cadre of dedicated volunteers. QUALIFICATIONS: Knowledge of museum cataloging requirements. Familiarity with computer cataloging programs (the NPS uses a system called ANCS+, a Windows-based program customized from RE:Discovery). Knowledge of American military history and material culture, particularly of the post- WWII era. Ability to work with a variety of people. TERMS: Full or Part-Time; 5-10 months; Tuesday-Saturday. Out-of-pocket expenses ($15/day) and housing may be available for full-time positions. The GGNRA and the Parks Association are committed to equal opportunity and nondiscrimination policies regarding employees and volunteers. (An interesting factoid about our national condition is that such “equal opportunity and nondiscrimination policies regarding employees and volunteers” still would allow them to refuse to employ a deformed person for such public work.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE feet, in order to be able to stand upright.

[This isn’t to indicate that this was the first experience of its kind, for as you know I only became a Marine officer in the first place through the intercession of the Surgeon General of the Navy, over their dead body so to speak — this was merely the first experience of persecution of my physical deformity which would involve that phenomenon of the J. Edgar Hoover/Joseph McCarthy cold-war years which is now known as harassment- by-investigation.]

“Lists of the disloyal have been compiled!” — Roman Senator Crassus, played by Sir Lawrence Olivier in the 1961 Hollywood movie “Spartacus” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

THE STALKER HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Here is an illustration from a medical textbook, showing “exaggerated lumbar curve” as typical of lordosis:

What the medical textbook fails to point out is that this exaggerated lumbar curve, when it is not disabling, produces enormous muscular masses in the buttocks and calves as the growing body struggles to accommodate itself. And, of course, the medical textbook also fails to point out –it isn’t any of a medical doctor’s concern, as doctors treat illnesses rather than the effects of illnesses– that the primary liability for the patient is that these exaggerated muscular masses result in the most extreme social discrimination. ASSLEY

So what happened was that when it became obvious that this pseudo-diet with amphetamines was not going to cure the perception problem, my company CO (my direct commanding officer, this bird colonel school commander’s captain subordinate) engaged me in a casual, “friendly” conversation before class, in their air- intelligence school library. He drew out of me, in the course of this conversation, the attitude that it had been a singular mistake, that we had acquired the Panama Canal in the 19th Century in the manner in which we did, and that, in order now to get out of this embarrassment in the best manner possible, I supposed, we ought to turn the protection of the Canal Zone over to an organization which we could dominate, upon which we could rely — the Organization of American States. In that way, I suggested to him in this casual conversation, we might be able to transform what had always been a propaganda disaster into something of a triumph of diplomacy. Of course, if we did this we would no longer be able to run our “School of the Americas” there, our training station at which we have been for many decades teaching fascistic South American and Central American military officers such as Manuel Noriega how to torture the citizens of their countries. –And, that Canal Zone army base would no longer be available as a cushy just-before-retirement command slot for aging American generals.

[Sucker that I was, I didn’t realize until it was too late that this company CO was just buttering me up, merely pretending to be interested in having kill-time casual conversation with me — that actually what he was doing was searching for something on which the command could so to speak hang its hat.]

So my new CO ran off to tattle to the bird colonel school commandant, and then I was called into his command office and found myself once again being accused of treason. Soon I was being interrogated by an Agent of HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE the Oakland office of the FBI.51

The school’s Commanding Officer banished me to temporary duty at Treasure Island in San Francisco Bay while he fired off a top-secret telegram to Headquarters Marine Corps, “8th and I” in Washington DC (a telegram which is classified TOP SECRET to this day) saying that he would not tolerate a Marine officer with such an objectionable appearance in uniform as this.

(Treasure Island in its salad days, before it became a Marine base)

This top-secret telegram got me instantly reassigned to the 5th Marine Expeditionary Brigade, headed through the Panama Canal for Vieques and Port au Prince, Haiti and Guantánamo Bay for the invasion of Cuba. I sailed in September aboard the USS Bexar, APA237 as the commanding officer of the 1st Replacement Draft in

President John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s Cuban Missile Crisis. I was to receive from the federal government the 51. The interrogation focused upon three items: my recent camping trip into the mountains with Berkeley resident and college acquaintance Allen Carrico, since he had since become a member of the “Turn Toward Peace” organization, the FBI’s principled refusal to show me the list of organizations being considered for inclusion on the Attorney General’s list of prohibited associations so that I might verify that indeed this organization “Turn Toward Peace” was on that list (on the grounds that this list was secret), and the absurd idea that I had, that it was just obvious to anyone who read the newspapers, that Director J. Edgar Hoover could only have been maintaining his position in Washington DC all these years, by blackmailing national politicians. The agent asked over and over again whether I had any specific evidence that the Director was a blackmailer, and I responded over and over that he himself surely was aware that that must be the case. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE sort of treatment that Uriah the Hittite had received from King David (2 SAMUEL 11) — I was to be exposed in combat in such manner as to make it likely that I would be killed.

What you need of course to understand is that as a member of that “replacement draft,” I would automatically be assigned to replace the first infantry platoon commander to become a casualty during the projected Marine assault to seize the port of Santiago de Cuba. –And, you will also need to come to understand, of all the various ways to figure out how to get killed, replacing the 1st Marine infantry platoon commander to fall during an amphibious assault is the very most excellent and certain way. 14 And it came to pass in the morning, that David wrote a letter to Joab, and sent it by the hand of Uriah. 15 And he wrote in the letter, saying, Set ye Uriah in the forefront of the hottest battle, and retire ye from him, that he may be smitten, and die. 16 And it came to pass, when Joab observed the city, that he assigned Uriah unto a place where he knew that valiant men were. 17 And the men of the city went out, and fought with Joab: and there fell some of the people of the servants of David; and Uriah the Hittite died also. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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Aboard the USS Bexar, I was designated as Library Officer. The ship’s library turned out to consist of a small storage room with several shelves holding stacks of paperback novels, intended for the amusement of the ship’s crew rather than of its cramped Marine passengers. The center of the space was crammed with open cardboard boxes containing the 5th Marine Expeditionary Brigade’s secret attack maps of the south coast of Cuba. From the coverage of these maps it was evident that we were to conduct an amphibious landing and seize the port of Santiago de Cuba, start pumping US Army troops through that port (divisions brought directly over from Florida). After securing the port we were to swing east along the southern coast of the island and relieve the besieged Marines of Guantánamo. I picked out a tattered copy of Walter M. Miller, Jr.’s A CANTICLE FOR LEIBOWITZ for perusal in my bunk.

When the war down there would not happen, when Soviet General Secretary Nikita Khrushchev would blink and the atomic bombs wouldn’t go off and I would come back to the US in 1963 still alive and personally offensive, I would find that I would be receiving the benefit of a full background investigation and a long-term harassment-by-investigation from the Office of Naval Intelligence and from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, complete with lie-detector tests, one-way mirrors, mail covers, the persistent demand that I resign my officer’s commission, threats to award me a general courts-martial for treasonous political postures, demands that I explain why according to my mother I had masturbated as a teenager, negotiations to allow me to escape all this harassment by accepting a general discharge which they suggested might yet be “under honorable conditions” bu t only if I were to play my cards right, etc. The whole thing was covered up by pretending that I had been guilty of some sort of thought crime, of believing something bad about the USA. When, decades later, I would file a Freedom of Information Act petition in order to get to see that evil telegram, my formal submission was simply ignored. They know very well that they cannot ever allow it to become known that the United States government tolerates such shameful activities. ASSLEY

In follow-up to this personal history, I should tell you that this was 1962, and later on in our national history, President Jimmy Carter would do precisely what I had so casually schemed in 1962. –He would negotiate to turn the Canal Zone over to the Organization of American States. That is what is still, according to the news HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE release below, a current project. When I had suggested it in casual conversation in September 1962, that casual conversation had been made treasonous as a way to dispose of me and my twisted spine, but when the President of the United States actually would go and do it, well, that would be of course very OK (the President’s spine is straight, you see). The President of the US can get a blow job in the Oval Office and that ain’t sex, and the President of the US can give away the Panama Canal and that ain’t treason.

AMANAPLANACANALPANAMA But isn’t it curious, in spite of the fact that my spine has straightened starting in 1980 and 1981 — no agency of our government has as yet sought me out to offer me an apology for having persecuted me for having harbored such treason thought!

Anyway, here’s the latest twist on the long story: HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE CENTRAL AMERICA-OUTLOOK: Farewell to US Weapons in 1999 By Silvio Hernandez PANAMA, Dec 21 (IPS) — Central America is getting ready to enter the third millennium without the presence in Panama of a U.S. military enclave whose existence throughout this century has been a thorn in the side of the region’s incipient democracies. On Dec. 31, 1999, the United States will withdraw from Panama’s Canal Zone, where the U.S. Army’s Southern Command exerted political influence on Central America and from where Washington launched many military operations, including one that toppled Panama’s General Manuel Noriega in late 1989. The Southern Command, which is assigned operations throughout Latin America, was moved from Panama to Miami in 1996 under treaties signed between the two governments in 1977. However, 4,400 U.S. soldiers are still stationed in the Canal Zone. Until 1983, the U.S. military base in Panama also housed the School of the Americas, which gave training to most of the military dictators who seized power in Latin America in the 1960s and 1970s. They include ’s Augusto Pinochet, Nicaragua’s Anastasio Somoza, Bolivia’s Hugo Banzer, and Manuel Noriega himself. “Girl, hide, here come those marines dressed in white looking like butchers,” went a popular rhyme sung by children in the San Miguel neighbourhood of the Panamanian capital in the 1940s. The ditty was a legacy of constant U.S. invasions between 1856 and 1989, which did not target Panama alone. The U.S. invaded Honduras in 1911 and 1933 and Nicaragua in 1912 and 1927. U.S. troops left Nicaragua without being able to defeat the resistance of the popular army led by General Augusto Cesar Sandino. At the Palmerola military base in central Honduras, there is still a group of 500 U.S. soldiers of the Southern Command which began its activities in the early 1980s, when Washington backed the war against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. The Salvadoran army was also assisted by U.S. military advisers from the Southern Command during that country’s civil war which began in the 1980s and ended in the early 1990s, when the government and the guerrilla signed a peace accord. Panamanian writer Carlos Changmarin, who has repeatedly denounced U.S. intervention in Central America in his work, pointed out that following the end of the Cold War, the forces of democracy are leading the world towards relationships with the United States that are free of coercion. “The world is against these kinds of supervision,” Changmarin told IPS when asked about the possibility of continued U.S. military presence in the region in connection with the war on drugs. U.S. Secretary of Defense William Cohen told a recent Inter- American Conference of Defense Ministers in Cartagena, Colombia, that his government was negotiating the establishment of a centralized, multilateral centre to fight drug trafficking with HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE some regional countries, including Ecuador, Honduras and Peru. Plans to build one such center in Panama failed because Washington wanted to use the elite military units housed there in other missions in the region. Reactions to the latest proposal have not been very favourable. Honduran congressman Matias Fuentes said “the military presence of the U.S. has always been harmful” to his country and he opposed its legitimisation “under the pretext of the fight against drugs.” Honduran congressmen said the stationing of U.S. soldiers at Palmerola base was never ratified by their country’s parliament, something its constitution requires.

September 18, Tuesday: US Marine helicopters flew a combat mission from Da Nang, South Vietnam for the initial time, airlifting South Vietnamese troops south into hill country.

Therese Neumann, German Catholic mystic and stigmatic, died at the age of 64 — her followers inform us that she had a condition known as “inedia,” an ability to survive without any sustenance, and had eaten no food whatever since 1926.

4 nations were admitted to the United Nations: the Kingdom of Burundi, Jamaica, the Republic of Rwanda, and Trinidad and Tobago.

Hermes Lima replaced Francisco Brochado da Rocha as Prime Minister of Brazil.

October 27, Saturday: Indian Prime Minister Nehru refused peace feelers pending the withdrawal of Chinese combat forces. Chinese troops advanced into Ladakh in the area of Damchok.

When 4 power stations of the US-owned Creole Petroleum Corporation were blown up around Lake Maracaibo, the Venezuelan government blamed communists.

The 3d and final installment in the Saturday Evening Post of the novel FAIL-SAFE (in 1964 Sidney Lumet would make this atomic-warfare nightmare into a movie starring Henry Fonda, Dan O’Herlihy, and Walter Matthau, and in 2000 it would be recycled as a live TV play on CBS). Meanwhile, on this day, Soviet diesel submarine B-59, in international waters outside the exclusion zone that the US had declared around Cuba, was being depth-bombed by charges from 11 US destroyers such as the USS Beale protecting the aircraft carrier USS Randolph (CVS-15)52 in an attempt to force the sub to the surface (the charges were small ones used for practice and the intent of the dropping of these charges was to cause the submarine to surface rather than to destroy it, but the people on the sub had no way to know this). Aboard this sub at depth, isolated from all radio communications, the three highest officers, considering that nuclear war might already have begun, followed to the letter the Soviet rules of engagement: they took a vote as to whether it was time to send off a nuclear- warhead torpedo. Soviet rules of engagement required that the decision of the 3 be unanimous. Captain 52. The USS Randolph (CVS-15), USS Independence (CVA-62), USS Okinawa (LPH-3), USS Thetis Bay (LPH-6), 15 destroyers, 3 submarines, 14 amphibious ships including the USS Bexar aboard which I was situated, with 4 mobile support ships, were part of PHIBRIGLEX 62, which proclaimed itself to be an amphibious exercise to train and exercise naval forces to conduct an amphibious assault and associated naval operations to the Virgin Islands (specifically, the island of Vieques). This was of course nothing but cover story: the task of our 5th Marine Expeditionary Brigade would be to stage a regimental-level amphibious assault on the port of Santiago de Cuba, swing east through the Cuban mountain chain, and relieve the besieged US Marine garrison at Guantanamo Bay. At the time of this incident the USS Randolph was part of our landing force sailing in a holding circle south of Santiago de Cuba. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Valentin Grigorievitch Savitsky voted to send off the warhead and political officer Ivan Semonovich Maslennikov joined in this, but Vasili Alexandrovich Arkhipov (who was already suffering from radiation sickness due to exposure to an overheating reactor) voted “Nyet” — and so at this point an intercontinental missile exchange between the superpowers did not get triggered. When the submarine ran low on battery power it surfaced among the American destroyers, made radio contact with Moscow, and headed toward home.

CLOSE CALLS

During a contractor checkout, a Titan I ICBM exploded in its silo near Chico, Califor- May 22, 1962 nia. The contractors and the crew of the silo were unharmed.

Soviet patrol diesel submarine B-59 almost launched a nuclear-tipped torpedo while under harassment by American naval forces. One of several vessels surrounded by American destroyers near Cuba, the sub had dived to avoid detection and been out of touch with Moscow for days. When the USS Beale dropped practice depth charges to signal the B-59 to surface, the Soviet commander considered that war had begun. The commander of the B-59 had a 10-Kiloton nuclear torpedo to use against an American aircraft carrier within range, the USS Randolph. The submarine political officer October 27, 1962 agreed but as low batteries affected the submarine’s life support systems, commander of the sub-flotilla Vasili Arkhipov voted “Nyet” and forced them to surface and radio for orders. On the same day an American U-2 spy plane was shot down over Cuba while a U-2 flown by US Air Force Captain Charles Maultsby strayed by navigational error 300 miles over the Chukotka Peninsula, causing Soviet MIGs to scramble and pursue. American F-102As escorted the U-2 into friendly airspace. These interceptors were armed with GAR-11 Falcon nuclear air-to-air missiles (each having a 0.25 kilo- ton yield) which their pilots were authorized to arm and launch.

About 190 nautical miles (220 land miles) east of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, our nuclear submarine USS Thresher was in serious trouble due to improper welds that were allowing in seawater that was forcing a shutdown of its reactor. Poor design of April 10, 1963 its emergency blow system would prevent the ship from surfacing and the disabled ship would ultimately descend to its crush depth and implode, killing all 129 mem- bers of its crew. When the vessel would be raised, it would be discovered that some of its valves had been installed backward.

6:00AM: The CIA intelligence memorandum containing information compiled as of 6:00AM reported that 3 of the 4 MRBM sites at San Cristóbal and the 2 sites at Sagua la Grande appeared to be fully operational. The mobilization of Cuban military forces was reported to be continuing at a high rate, but the Central Intelligence Agency advised that Cuban forces remained under orders not to engage in hostilities unless attacked.

9:00AM: Radio Moscow began broadcasting a message from Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev. In contrast to the private message of the day before, the new message called for the dismantling of US missile bases in Turkey in return for the removal of the Soviet missiles in Cuba. While the broadcast was underway, the original copy of Khrushchev’s previous letter to President John Fitzgerald Kennedy was delivered to the US embassy in Moscow. The letter was signed by Soviet Premier Khrushchev but probably not written by him. President Kennedy chose to respond to the more conciliatory letter of the previous night while ignoring the letter of this morning. He agreed that the of Cuba would end and pledged not to invade Cuba after the missiles HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE were removed. 10:00AM: The ExComm met in the Situation Room at the White House. After the usual intelligence briefing by John McCone, the minutes of the meeting record that Secretary of Defense Robert Strange McNamara reported on the positions of Soviet Bloc ships moving toward Cuba. He recommended that we be prepared to board the Grozny, which was now out about 600 miles. Under Secretary Ball pointed out that the Soviets did not know the extent of our quarantine zone. The President agreed that we should ask U Thant to tell the Russians in New York where we are drawing the quarantine line. The Russians would then be in a position to decide whether to turn back their tanker or allow her to enter the quarantine zone sometime later today.During the meeting, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s 2d message began to be received. The full text of Khrushchev’s formal letter had completed across a Foreign Broadcast Information Service ticker in the White House at 11:03AM The message stated in part: You are disturbed over Cuba. You say that this disturbs you because it is ninety miles by sea from the coast of the United States of America. But ... you have placed destructive missile weapons, which you call offensive, in Turkey, literally next to us.... I therefore make this proposal: We are willing to remove from Cuba the means which you regard as offensive...Your representatives will make a declaration to the effect that the United States ... will remove its analogous means from Turkey.... And after that, persons entrusted by the United Nations Security Council could inspect on the spot the fulfillment of the pledges made....

The new letter set the stage for a protracted ExComm discussion, which would continue throughout the day, about how to respond, with the President stating that to go to war with the Soviet Union instead of accepting a trade would be “an insupportable position.”

Around 10:15 to 11:00AM: A U-2 from a Strategic Air Command base in Alaska strayed into Soviet airspace over the Chukotski Peninsula on what was reported to be a “routine air sampling mission.” The U-2 pilot had apparently entered Soviet airspace as a result of a navigational error. The pilot radioed for assistance and a US F-102 in Alaska scrambled and headed toward the Bering Sea. At the same time, Soviet MiGs took off from a base near Wrangel Island to intercept the U-2, which eventually managed to fly out of Soviet territory with no shots being fired. Alaskan Air Command records suggest that the fighter planes were armed with nuclear air-to-air missiles. According to one account, when Secretary of Defense McNamara heard that a U-2 was in Soviet airspace, “he turned absolutely white, and yelled hysterically, ‘This means war with the Soviet Union.’” President Kennedy’s laconic reaction upon hearing of the incident was simply to laugh and remark “there is always some [son of a bitch] who doesn’t get the word.”

Around noon: A U-2 spy plane was shot down over Cuba and its pilot, Major Rudolf Anderson, killed. Anderson had flown one of the 1st U-2 missions responsible for detecting the Soviet missiles. The ExComm, when informed of the downing, assumed that the attack had been ordered by the Kremlin and speculated that the move was designed to escalate the crisis. (In fact, as Soviet and Cuban officials have recently revealed, the attack was the result of a decision made by local Soviet commanders. Although a Soviet major general, Igor I. Statsenko, would claim responsibility for the decision in 1987, other Soviet sources suggest that Lieutenant General Stepan N. Grechko and General Leonid S. Garbuz were the officers in Cuba who authorized the firing of the surface-to-air missile. After the incident Marshal Malinovsky mildly reprimanded the officers and ordered that no other U-2s be attacked.)

2:30PM: Several ExComm members assembled in George Ball’s conference room to consider possible options HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE in light of the deteriorating crisis situation.

3:41PM: F8U-1P low-level reconnaissance planes took off for afternoon missions over Cuba. 2 of the 6 planes were forced to abort their mission due to mechanical problems. As the remaining planes flew over San Cristóbal and Sagua la Grande, Cuban troops opened fire with anti-aircraft guns and small arms. One of the US aircraft was hit by a 37mm anti-aircraft shell but managed to return to its base.

4:00PM: The ExComm was called back to the White House. President Kennedy ordered the immediate dispatch of a message to U Thant asking urgently whether he would ascertain if the Soviet government was willing to stop work on the bases while negotiations continue to find a solution to the crisis. In the middle of the meeting General Maxwell Davenport “Max” Taylor brought in a late report confirming that the missing U- 2 had been shot down over Cuba, probably by a surface-to-air missile. President Kennedy, however, decided not to retaliate but agreed that if any more surveillance planes were fired on over Cuba, the surface-to-air missile sites would be attacked. Kennedy’s order to call off the planned reprisal was reportedly received with HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE disbelief in the Pentagon.

CLOSE CALLS

Staff at the Strategic Air Command Headquarters (SAC HQ) simultaneously lost con- tact with NORAD and multiple Ballistic Missile Early Warning System sites. Since these communication lines had been understood to be redundant and independent from one another, the communications failure was interpreted as either a very November 24, 1961 unlikely coincidence or a coordinated attack. SAC HQ had the entire ready force pre- pared for takeoff before aircraft already aloft confirmed that there did not appear to be any attack. It was later found that the failure of a single relay station in Colorado in this supposedly redundant and independent system had been the sole cause of the problem.

Soviet patrol diesel submarine B-59 almost launched a nuclear-tipped torpedo while under harassment by American naval forces. One of several vessels surrounded by American destroyers near Cuba, the sub had dived to avoid detection and been out of touch with Moscow for days. When the USS Beale dropped practice depth charges to signal the B-59 to surface, the Soviet commander considered that war had begun. The commander of the B-59 had a 10-Kiloton nuclear torpedo to use against an American aircraft carrier within range, the USS Randolph. The submarine political officer October 27, 1962 agreed but as low batteries affected the submarine’s life support systems, commander of the sub-flotilla Vasili Arkhipov voted “Nyet” and forced them to surface and radio for orders. On the same day an American U-2 spy plane was shot down over Cuba while a U-2 flown by US Air Force Captain Charles Maultsby strayed by navigational error 300 miles over the Chukotka Peninsula, causing Soviet MIGs to scramble and pursue. American F-102As escorted the U-2 into friendly airspace. These interceptors were armed with GAR-11 Falcon nuclear air-to-air missiles (each having a 0.25 kilo- ton yield) which their pilots were authorized to arm and launch.

There was a massive power outage in the northeastern United States and several nuclear bomb detectors near major US cities –circuits intended to distinguish between November 9, 1965 regular power outages and power outages caused by a nuclear attack– malfunctioned due to circuit errors. They warned the Command Center of the Office of Emergency Planning of an attack and the office went to full alert.

Most of the long meeting, however, centered on formulating a response to Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s most recent proposal. President Kennedy, in deliberations throughout the day, continually favored trading away the missiles in Turkey for those in Cuba as Khrushchev has offered — possibly because he secretly had hinted to the Soviet government through Attorney-General Robert Francis “Bobby” Kennedy and Anatoly Dobrynin on October 26th that the United States would agree to such a deal. However, most of the group argued that an open trade could fragment the NATO alliance. Alternative courses of action were suggested: Secretary of Defense McNamara argued that the Jupiters in Turkey should be removed, but only as a prelude to an invasion of Cuba; Maxwell Taylor forwarded the Joint Chiefs of Staff recommendation simply to initiate the airstrike and invasion plans; and the State Department drafted a letter flatly rejecting the Soviet proposal.

As the meeting progressed, the idea of ignoring Khrushchev’s new proposal and responding only to the October 26th letter (which did not mention the Jupiters) gradually began to emerge. President Kennedy, HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE initially hesitant to accept the idea because he did not believe Khrushchev would accept such a deal, finally agreed when Soviet specialist Llewellyn Thompson argued that Khrushchev might. Theodore Sorensen and Robert Kennedy left the meeting to compose the proposed response. After 45 minutes, they returned to present the draft. The president refined the letter, had it typed, and signed it. The letter was sent that evening (see entry for 8:05PM, below).

After the ExComm meeting broke up, a smaller group composed of President Kennedy, Secretary of Defense McNamara, Attorney-General Robert Francis “Bobby” Kennedy, Bundy, Rusk, Llewellyn Thompson, and Theodore Sorensen met in the Oval Office. The group agreed that the 2d letter to Khrushchev should be reinforced with an oral message passed through Ambassador Dobrynin. They further agreed that Dobrynin should be informed that if the Soviet missiles were not withdrawn, there would be military action against Cuba. If they were removed, however, the United States would be willing to give a non-invasion pledge. suggested one further component to the message: an assurance that, while there could be no public or explicit deal over the Turkish missiles, the Jupiters would in fact be removed once the Cuban crisis was resolved. The proposal quickly gained the approval of the group and the president. Concern was so acute that the assurance not be leaked to the public or to NATO that not even other ExComm members were told of the additional assurances regarding the Jupiters.

4:15P.M: At Dean Rusk’s request, ABC News correspondent John Scali and Soviet embassy official Fomin met once again. When Scali asked Fomin why the October 26th proposal had been scrapped and the Jupiters introduced into the deal, Fomin explained that the change was a result of “poor communications.” He stated that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s new message had been drafted before his report on the favorable US reaction to the October 26th proposal had arrived. Furious at Fomin’s response, Scali shouted that Fomin’s explanation was not credible and that he thought it was simply a “stinking double cross.” An invasion of Cuba, Scali warned, was now “only a matter of hours away.” Fomin said that he and Ambassador Dobrynin were expecting a reply from Khrushchev at any moment and urged Scali to report to US officials that there was no treachery. Scali replied that he did not think anyone would believe Fomin’s assurances but that he would convey the message in any case. The two parted ways, and Scali immediately typed out a memo on the meeting which was sent to the ExComm.

7:45PM: Attorney-General Robert Francis “Bobby” Kennedy and Soviet Ambassador Antoly Dobrynin met. In his memoirs on the crisis, Kennedy would recall telling Dobrynin: ...We had to have a commitment by tomorrow that [the missile] bases would be removed. I was not giving them an ultimatum but a statement of fact. He should understand that if they did not remove those bases, we would remove them... He asked me what offer the United States was making, and I told him of the letter that President Kennedy had just transmitted to Khrushchev. He raised the question of our removing the missiles from Turkey. I said that there could be no quid pro quo or any arrangement made under this kind of threat or pressure, and that in the last analysis that was a decision that would have to be made by NATO. However, I said, President Kennedy had been anxious to remove those missiles from Turkey and Italy for a long period of time. He had ordered their removal some time ago, and it was our judgment that, within a short time after this crisis was over, those missiles would be gone.... Time was running out. We had only a few more hours—we needed an answer immediately from the Soviet Union. I said we must have it the next day. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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(Anatoly Dobrynin has recently contradicted Robert Kennedy’s account of the meeting in several ways. According to Dobrynin, Kennedy did not in fact threaten military action against the missile sites if the Soviet government did not remove the missiles. Second, Kennedy reportedly did not say that the Jupiters had been ordered removed earlier, instead he suggested that an explicit deal on the Turkish missiles could be struck.)

After the meeting with Dobrynin, the attorney general returned to the White House. At President Kennedy’s direction, Secretary of Defense McNamara instructed Secretary of the Air Force Eugene Zuckert to order to active duty 24 Air Force Reserve units totaling 14,200 personnel. Attorney-General Robert Francis “Bobby” Kennedy would later recall the mood at the White House: We had not abandoned hope, but what hope there was now rested with Khrushchev’s revising his course within the next few hours. It was a hope, not an expectation. The expectation was a military confrontation by Tuesday [October 29] and possibly tomorrow.... 8:05PM: President Kennedy’s letter to Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev drafted earlier in the day was transmitted to Moscow. The final text read in part: As I read your letter, the key elements of your proposals—which seem generally acceptable as I understand them—are as follows: 1) You would agree to remove these weapon systems from Cuba under appropriate United Nations observation and supervision; and undertake, with suitable safe-guards, to halt the further introduction of such weapon systems into Cuba. 2) We, on our part, would agree—upon the establishment of adequate arrangements through the United Nations, to ensure the carrying out and continuation of these commitments (a) to remove promptly the quarantine measures now in effect and (b) to give assurances against the invasion of Cuba.

The letter was also released directly to the press to avoid any communications delays.

8:50PM: In response to U Thant’s request that Cuba stop work on the missile sites while negotiations continue, Fidel Castro indicates in a letter to the UN acting secretary general that he would order work to cease, provided the United States lifted the blockade. Castro also extended an invitation to U Thant to visit Cuba. (U Thant would accept the invitation on October 28th and travel to Havana on October 30th.)

9:00PM: U Thant informed Adlai Stevenson that Soviet representative Zorin had refused to accept information about the exact location of the quarantine interception area that the United States had passed on earlier in the day.

9:00PM: The ExComm again reviewed various options for the following day, including ordering an airstrike on the missile sites in Cuba and extending the blockade to include petroleum, oil, and lubricants. As the meeting came to a close, Secretary of Defense McNamara turned to Attorney-General Robert Francis “Bobby” Kennedy. The United States had better be “damned sure,” McNamara stated, that we “have two things ready, a government for Cuba, because we’re going to need one ... and secondly, plans for how to respond to the Soviet Union in Europe, because sure as hell they’re going to do something there.”

Evening: Unknown to other members of the ExComm, President Kennedy and Dean Rusk prepared a contingency plan to facilitate a public Turkey-for-Cuba missile trade. At Kennedy’s instruction, Rusk phoned HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Andrew Cordier, a former UN undersecretary, and dictated a statement that Cordier was to give to U Thant upon further instructions from Washington DC. The statement was a proposal to be made by U Thant calling for the removal of both the Jupiter missiles in Turkey and the Soviet missiles in Cuba. During the day, Kennedy also asked Roswell Gilpatric to draw up a scenario for the early removal of the missiles from Turkey.

Night: Fidel Castro met with Soviet Ambassador Alekseyev for lengthy discussions in the Soviet embassy in Havana. Castro, Alekseyev would later report, had been briefed by him on each of the messages sent back and forth between Moscow and Washington DC during the crisis. Aleksandr Alekseyev would recall that despite Castro’s “characteristic restraint, he [Castro] also evaluated the situation as highly alarming.”

10PM: The US received word that the USSR agreed to remove its offensive missiles in Cuba. The US agreed to remove missiles in Turkey within 6 months, to end the quarantine, and to pledge not to invade Cuba. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1963

As part of a post-graduate project at Oxford University, a retired US Marine Corps general, Samuel Griffith, published a heavily annotated translation of Sun Tzu’s 5th-Century BCE THE ART OF WAR. Griffith’s reasons for doing the translation included his belief that the United States of America could no more win a war against the Chinese without understanding Sun Tzu’s 13 chapters than it could win a war against the Nazis without understanding MEIN KAMPF. Ho Chi Minh had translated the work for his North Vietnamese officers to study. Other Western generals would insufficiently appreciate Sun Tzu until the United States’s forced withdrawal from Vietnam in 1972.

Sun Tzu had also authored a treatise on mathematics which has never been translated into English. Obviously such an author hadn’t written anything on the art of mathematics that would be of interest to us.

At about this point I learned something important about hierarchical organizations. There is a pervasive problem in the military, as in all hierarchical organizations. Typically, your US Marine officer is an unreflective Republican Christian who doesn’t make much of a distinction between being a Democrat and being a traitor, or much of a distinction between being a non-Christian and being simply irreligious. Such people tend to be very, very sensitive to the expression of Democratic, or liberal, or non-Christian, thoughts into a military setting. They react badly. However, such people also tend to be very, very insensitive to the intrusion of Republican, or conservative, or Christian, or fundamentalist, ideology into the military setting. They don’t notice this so much. At some point during this year I was sitting with a group of other Marine officers at the Company level, on a couple of telephone poles that were lying on the ground. We were eating C-rations. At the far end of one of the telephone poles, sitting alone, was the Company staff sergeant, eating C-rations. Across a field, quite separate from us, the troops were squatting on the ground, eating C-rations. Our discussion was about taxes. My company commander, a captain, opinioned that in this country we have a “progressive” income tax, meaning that the greater your income, the higher the percentage of it you were going pay to the government on April 15th. I pointed out that the effect of the many income exclusions and tax deductions that would be sought by the tax accountant of a rich person worked to transform what was nominally a progressive income tax, into what was actually a regressive income tax: in actuality, I claimed, the likelihood was that the greater one’s income, the lower the percentage of it one would need to pay. Typically, I pointed out, the middle class pays the most, between twenty and thirty percent of their total income going for income taxes, while the rich pay the least, actually paying between zero and ten percent. The numbers don’t lie. The next day, back at the company headquarters, I was summoned to stand tall before the CO in his office. I was to receive a bad fitness report, for damaging the morale of the unit, and its combat cohesiveness. The reason given was that I had contradicted my commanding officer, within the earshot of an enlisted man (the Company’s staff sergeant, sitting alone at the far end of that telephone pole). Over and above damaging the morale of the unit, and its command cohesiveness, this Lieutenant (me) was uttering falsehoods, and perhaps was actually lying, and this could only be in order to damage his country. “Everyone knows,” the Captain asserted, that the federal income tax is progressive, not regressive. This is simply not open to dispute. To argue otherwise is illogical. Sign here to indicate that you have received this personnel evaluation. As I am making this record, just the other day I have read a news article about the investor Warren E. Buffett, chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway. Mr. Buffett has been showing around a data sheet he compiled on the basis of the salaries of the men and women who work in his Omaha office. He has had each of them construct HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE a fraction. The numerator of their fraction was the sum of their actual federal income tax plus payroll taxes for Social Security and Medicare, while the denominator of their fraction was their total taxable income. Mr. Buffett pointed up the fact that he personally, with his immense income from dividends and capital gains, was paying far, far less as a fraction of his income than any of his secretaries and clerks and advisers. He points out that he is able to get away with this without using any tax planning at all. He fills out his own form, and it takes him about an hour. Every year he just writes the government a check, for exactly what the Internal Revenue form requires, taking only the usual obvious deductions that everybody knows about. He says he doesn’t dick with it at all. He points out that this really amounts to class warfare of the rich against the poor, with the rich victimizing the poor every year. But, the Captain was the Company Commander of the unit, and the Company Commander is always right. This is a systemic problem, I notice, that has to do with hierarchy. There’s nothing peculiarly military about it, now was what happened due to the fact that he was the CO and I the underling. This isn’t personalities. Those who have power over others inevitably wind up abusing others. Consider, for instance, if it had been me who had been the Company Commander, and him who had been the Lieutenant, would I have been able to refrain from such exercise of arbitrary power? I’d like to think I would have been somewhat more subtle, me being me, but what would there be to prevent me from abusing him? Self-awareness? –We lie to ourselves so completely!

No, the event might have come off a bit differently if it had been me in charge, different in trivial ways, but the outcome would have been the same: the overlings would still have been screwing over the underlings. ASSLEY HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Reconstructing what was going on in my (Austin Meredith’s) head during this period, I can remember that I had become aware through Marine scuttlebutt of how many of our junior officers were getting “fragged” by their own men in the Nam, and I can remember being very well aware that I was precisely the sort of junior officer who would be most likely to have a hand-grenade dropped in his lap by one of his own men. There was no question but that, even stateside, certain of them found the experience of being led by a man they could not respect due to his physical deformity, to be distinctly unsettling. Already, I was so fearful of my own troops and fellow officers that I was never coming onto base without tucking my little .32-caliber automatic into my girdle, in the hollow of my back under my belt, for use in protecting myself should the occasion arise perhaps on a live-fire exercise in the hills — and there in Camp Pendleton barracks they were not supposed to have routine access to the live ammo! I could well understand that if they were able to get me to Vietnam, it was exceedingly unlikely that I in particular would be able to get back home alive. I can remember thinking “Why should I kill people for these American people, on cue? –America’s never done anything for me, really, but abuse me and take advantage of my condition.” So my thinking was at the time, primarily, focused on what I needed to do to avoid being sent to a place like Vietnam. Could I shoot myself in the foot? Could I develop some sort of specialty that was of a sort that would not get sent into a shooting war, such as the Motor Pool?

I don’t remember that I ever mused on what I might do, if I wound up in the Nam and had to try to escape and make my way through Southeast Asia. It was just, like, too impossible a thing to think about. There were too many unknowns.

So I don’t know how I would have tried to handle the situation had it arisen. Bear in mind, my wife was the only woman who had ever accepted me in my condition, so I wasn’t particularly interested in trying to disappear and begin a new life with some other woman in the way regular men sometimes do when they are in difficulties. ASSLEY HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE January 25, Friday: Lee Harvey Oswald made the final 2 payments on the loan from the US State Department that had enabled him to return to America.

In New Orleans, 5 black students registered at Tulane University without incident.

Symphony no.8 by Karl Amadeus Hartmann was performed for the initial time, over the airwaves of Westddeutsche Rundfunk originating in Cologne.

January 28, Monday: Lee Harvey Oswald ordered a .38 caliber Smith and Wesson revolver by mail.

In South Carolina, Harvey Gantt, accompanied by 150 policemen, became the 1st black student at Clemson College.

Undetected, a grandmother, her grandson, and 5 other teenagers climbed the Berlin Wall and escaped.

Hans Werner Henze delivered a public lecture in the Kongreßhalle, Berlin (he would always consider this to have been one of his most important statement of his beliefs as an artist).

March 9, Saturday: United States government officials alleged that the chemical defoliants they were using in Vietnam were not harmful to humans or animals (footage exists in which an American pilot posturing for the TV cameras dipped a finger into the defoliant, and licked his finger).

An expanded version of Jephtha’s Daughter, a theater piece with flute, percussion and other optional instruments by Lou Harrison, was performed for the initial time, at Cabrillo College, Aptos, California.

Lee Harvey Oswald began to take some photographs of the home of former Major General Edwin Walker, who had been forced to leave the US military on account of being a right-wing activist.

March 12, Tuesday: Lee Harvey Oswald ordered a rifle from Klein’s Sporting Goods in Chicago.

March 20, Wednesday: In France, 140,000 gas and electric workers staged a 4-hour nationwide strike for higher pay. Electric railroads halted and businesses closed. Iron miners in Lorraine returned to work after gaining concessions from the government.

Antithèse for electronic and environmental sounds by Mauricio Kagel was performed for the initial time, in München.

Incidental music to Dumas’ play The Lady of the Camelias by Ned Rorem was performed for the initial time, in Winter Garden Theater, New York.

Prime Minister János Kádár of Hungary announced an amnesty for most political prisoners. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE The US federal prison on Alcatraz Island shut its doors.

Symphony no.16 “Icelandic” by Henry Cowell was performed for the initial time, at the University of Iceland in Reykjavik.

Choral Triptych by Ulysses Kay to words of the Bible and The Prayer of Jonah by Charles Wuorinen, new works for chorus and strings, were performed for the initial time at the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

The rifle and revolver that Lee Harvey Oswald had ordered by mail were shipped from Klein’s Sporting Goods in Chicago.

March 25, Monday: The US Supreme Court decided by a vote of 5 justices over 4 that government investigators must demonstrate that a group was engaged in subversive activity, before seeking access to their membership lists (this tactic had been being used as a routine tool for the intimidation of civil rights organizations).

In Texas, Lee Harvey Oswald received his mail-order rifle and pistol. “Lock and load,” as they say in the Corps! HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE March 31, Sunday: Mrs. Marina Oswald snapped the infamous “Backyard Photos” of Lee Harvey Oswald with his rifle and pistol. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE April 10, Wednesday: The nuclear submarine USS Thresher experienced difficulties with its atomic power plant and HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE went to the bottom of the North Atlantic, taking with it its crew of 129. TIMELINE OF ACCIDENTS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

CLOSE CALLS

Soviet patrol diesel submarine B-59 almost launched a nuclear-tipped torpedo while under harassment by American naval forces. One of several vessels surrounded by American destroyers near Cuba, the sub had dived to avoid detection and been out of touch with Moscow for days. When the USS Beale dropped practice depth charges to signal the B-59 to surface, the Soviet commander considered that war had begun. The commander of the B-59 had a 10-Kiloton nuclear torpedo to use against an American aircraft carrier within range, the USS Randolph. The submarine political officer October 27, 1962 agreed but as low batteries affected the submarine’s life support systems, commander of the sub-flotilla Vasili Arkhipov voted “Nyet” and forced them to surface and radio for orders. On the same day an American U-2 spy plane was shot down over Cuba while a U-2 flown by US Air Force Captain Charles Maultsby strayed by navigational error 300 miles over the Chukotka Peninsula, causing Soviet MIGs to scramble and pursue. American F-102As escorted the U-2 into friendly airspace. These interceptors were armed with GAR-11 Falcon nuclear air-to-air missiles (each having a 0.25 kilo- ton yield) which their pilots were authorized to arm and launch.

About 190 nautical miles (220 land miles) east of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, our nuclear submarine USS Thresher was in serious trouble due to improper welds that were allowing in seawater that was forcing a shutdown of its reactor. Poor design of April 10, 1963 its emergency blow system would prevent the ship from surfacing and the disabled ship would ultimately descend to its crush depth and implode, killing all 129 mem- bers of its crew. When the vessel would be raised, it would be discovered that some of its valves had been installed backward.

A B-52 disintegrated in a severe winter storm while on airborne alert above Salisbury, Pennsylvania. A crewman failed to bail out and other crewmembers succumbed to January 13, 1964 injuries or exposure to the harsh winter. Only the 2 pilots survived. The plane’s ther- monuclear bombs would be recovered from wreckage at a farm northwest of Frost- burg, Maryland.

For having printed allegations that he had had an affair with Christine Keeler, an Italian magazine apologized to John Profumo and paid him damages.

In New York, Sonata for clarinet and piano by Francis Poulenc was performed for the 1st time, by Benny Goodman and Leonard Bernstein.

Variations on a Medieval Tune for band by Norman Dello Joio was performed for the 1st time.

Lee Harvey Oswald attempted to assassinate former Major General Edwin Walker, firing through his kitchen window (his bullet was deflected by the window frame). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE July 25, Thursday: A Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was initialed by representatives of the USA, UK, and USSR in Moscow.

Suite de sonnets op.401 for vocal quartet and chamber ensemble by Darius Milhaud was performed for the initial time, in Dieppe.

Former United States Marine Lee Harvey Oswald’s request for a review of his undesirable discharge was denied.

October 23, Wednesday: Lee Harvey Oswald attended a right-wing rally at which former Major General Edwin Walker was a speaker.

The new Prime Minister of Great Britain, the Earl of Home, renounced his peerage and adopted the name Alec Frederick Douglas-Home. He would run for a seat in the House of Commons.

Symphony for Metal Orchestra (Symphony no.17) by Alan Hovhaness was performed for the initial time, in Cleveland.

November 22, Friday: A memorial window to John Ireland was unveiled in the Musicians’ Chapel of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, London.

C.S. Lewis died in Oxford at the age of 64. Aldous Huxley died of cancer in Los Angeles at the age of 69.

The nuclear doomsday black comedy Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb was in the final stages of preparation. The voice of Slim Pickins, reviewing his B-52’s “survival kit” which included a condom, $100 in gold coins, and a pair of nylon stockings, was altered so that instead of saying “Shoot, a fella could have a pretty good weekend in Dallas with all that stuff,” he seemed to say “Shoot, a fella could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all that stuff.” Although the film was scheduled to be screened on this evening, the screening would be indefinitely postponed in consequence of another event of this day, in Dallas, Texas. Details follow:

6:30 AM: At the boarding house in Dallas, Texas at which he was residing because he had been thrown out by his wife, Lee Harvey Oswald rose.

7:15 AM: When Linnie Mae Randle saw Lee Harvey Oswald, he was carrying a long paper bag.

7:23 AM: Lee Harvey Oswald and Buell Wesley Frazier departed from 500 North Beckley Street and headed toward the Texas School Book Depository, where they needed to clock in at 8 AM. Oswald had a package, which he put in the back seat. The trip was mostly silent, with Frazier explaining to the FBI that Oswald wasn’t ever much of a conversationalist.

Approximately 7:50 AM: At the Texas School Book Depository, Buell Wesley Frazier watched as Lee Harvey Oswald entered with his package. Frazier would later insist that this package couldn’t have contained a rifle, even disassembled, because Oswald had it tucked between his cupped hand and his armpit.

Approximately 9:45 AM: Junior Jarman, a Texas School Book Depository employee, saw Lee Harvey Oswald looking out a window toward the motorcade route. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 11:40 AM: Lee Harvey Oswald was seen on the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository, near the windows.

11:45 AM: Lee Harvey Oswald remained on the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository when other workers took the elevator to the 2d floor for their lunch break.

Approximately 11:55 AM: Lee Harvey Oswald assembled his rifle and, it is presumed, fashioned his “Sniper’s nest” next to a window on the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository.

12:18 PM: Howard Brennan arrived near the Texas School Book Depository to watch the Presidential motorcade and soon noticed that there was a man in a 6th-floor window.

12:30 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald fired 3 rounds from the 6th-floor warehouse window at the open limousine carrying President John Fitzgerald Kennedy with former Secretary of the Navy John Bowden Connally, Jr. (the man whom Oswald had asked for help who had not provided any).53

President John Fitzgerald Kennedy was hit twice and would be pronounced dead at Parkland Hospital.54 Former Secretary of the Navy John Bowden Connally, Jr. was seriously injured but his survival was not at risk.

12:31:30 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was confronted in the lunchroom of the Texas School Book Depository by Patrolman Marrion Baker. When Roy Truly, superintendent of the building, identified him as an employee, this policeman was satisfied.

12:33 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald exited the Texas School Book Depository, presumably by its front door.

12:40 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald boarded a bus to make his escape.

12:44 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald got off the bus as it became bogged down in traffic, requesting a transfer pass.

12:48 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald hailed a cab to be taken to 500 North Beckley Street, his rooming house.

12:54 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald exited the cab in the 700 block of Beckley Street.

1:00 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald arrived on foot at 500 North Beckley Street, his rooming house, and retrieved his pistol.

1:03 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald left his rooming house.

1:16 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was sighted on the sidewalk by Dallas Police Officer J.D. Tippit, as a slender white male of approximately the right height and weight and age approximating a description that had been put out across the police radio. Oswald walked over to the police cruiser and apparently spoke with the policeman through an open vent window. The policeman got out and as he walked toward the front of the

53. Connally would remain convinced for the rest of his life, that despite what the Warren Commission thought, he had not in fact been struck by the 1st bullet. 54. It is said that everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing when they received the news of this death. Driving a Volkswagen bus carrying Merce Cunningham and his dance company on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, John Cage pulled into a gas station to inquire why American flags were at half-mast. I, Austin Meredith, was in US Marine Corps winter green uniform in downtown San Diego, with a detail that was picking up a prisoner named Spain to take back up to Camp Pendleton for incarceration when a taxi driver rushed by shouting “Hey, that son of a bitch Kennedy has got shot!” ASSLEY HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE cruiser, was shot 4 times by Oswald. As Oswald left the scene he was observed to be shaking the empty cartridges out of his pistol and muttering either “poor damn cop” or “poor dumb cop.”

1:22 PM: The Dallas police radio carried a description of the suspect in the murder of Dallas Police Officer J.D. Tippit.

1:40 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was observed by Dallas police and ducked into the Texas Theater without paying.

1:50 PM: After a struggle in the Texas Theater with Dallas police, Lee Harvey Oswald was subdued.

2:00 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald arrived at Dallas police headquarters.

2:16 PM: In the restaurant of the House of Representatives in Washington DC, having lunch, Speaker of the House John William McCormack was approached by reporters who advised him that President John Fitzgerald Kennedy had just been shot. A minute later he was advised inaccurately that Vice-President Lyndon Baines Johnson had also been shot. A minute after that he was advised that Secret Service agents were on their way to protect him — because if both the President and the Vice-President were dead, he was next in line to be sworn in as President of the United States of America.

2:18 PM: Rising unsteadily from his chair, Speaker of the House John William McCormack experienced an attack of vertigo and sank back down. Soon, however, another Congressman called over to his table to inform him that there had been some misinformation, that actually Vice-President Lyndon Baines Johnson was unharmed.

2:30 PM: The Dallas police began to question Lee Harvey Oswald, initially in regard to the murder of Dallas Police Officer J.D. Tippit.

4:05 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was taken to the basement of the Dallas police headquarters for the 1st lineup.

4:20 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was returned upstairs from the basement of the Dallas police headquarters, for further questioning in the office of Captain John William “Will” Fritz.

6:20 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was taken down to the basement of the Dallas police headquarters again for a 2d lineup.

6:35 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was returned from the basement of the Dallas police headquarters upstairs, for additional questioning.

7:10 PM: The Dallas police formally arraigned Lee Harvey Oswald for the murder of Dallas Police Officer J.D. Tippit.

7:40 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was taken down to the basement of the Dallas police headquarters again for a 3d lineup.

11:26 PM: The Dallas police formally arraigned Lee Harvey Oswald for the murder of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

On the plane heading back to Washington, Vice President Johnson put his hand on a Bible and was sworn in HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE as President. He would be the 4th US president to attempt to cope with the situation in Vietnam and would oversee a massive escalation of the war while continuing to heed the advice of many of the same hawk apparatchiks who had been serving the Kennedy administration.

At that time the FBI had no statutory authority to investigate presidential assassinations. President Lyndon Baines Johnson, however, ordered the Bureau to investigate. The conclusion that would be arrived at would be that Lee Harvey Oswald had acted alone. They would have arrived at that conclusion regardless of the facts that they developed — but I happen to believe that conclusion to have been not only the politically mandatory conclusion, but (quite coincidentally) also what had actually gone down there on Dealey Plaza in Dallas.

Aldous Leonard Huxley died. Here is some of his legacy: • There isn’t any formula or method. You learn to love by loving — by paying attention and doing what one thereby discovers has to be done. • Experience is not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him. • You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad. • Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. • There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving and that is your own self. • To his dog, every man is Napoleon; hence the constant popularity of dogs. • It is a bit embarrassing to have been concerned with the human problem all one’s life and find at the end that one has no more to offer by way of advice that “Try to be a little kinder.” • I wanted to change the world. But I have found that the only thing one can be sure of changing is oneself.

(I’m not sure what Jack Kennedy’s legacy was. Perhaps it was that during his era the President of the United States of America got to fuck whoever he wanted wherever he wanted — a legacy that would not remain the case as standards of media reticence changed, and would be entirely gone by the florut of President Bill Clinton.)

Martin H Manser’s THE FACTS ON FILE DICTIONARY OF ALLUSIONS (Facts On File, Incorporated, 2008) offers the following: shot heard round the world The shooting of a bullet or some other event that proves to have momentous international significance. The phrase has been applied to more than one such shot in history, but is particularly associated with the first shot of the American Revolution. It was fired on the morning of April 19, 1775, when a force of farmers and minutemen confronted British troops across a bridge at Concord, Massachusetts. An unidentified man fired the first shot without any order being given, and the first of many battles was joined. The phrase was later incorporated by (1803-82) in his HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE “Concord Hymn” (1836): “By the rude bridge that arched the flood, / Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled, / Here once the embattled farmers stood, / And fired the shot heard ’round the world.” In 1914 another “shot heard round the world” was fired by Gavrilo Princip at Sarajevo, triggering World War I. In 1963 Lee Harvey Oswald fired a shot that was heard round the world.

November 23, Saturday: At approximately 12:05 AM in the basement of the Dallas police headquarters, Lee Harvey Oswald was taken for the customary perp-walk before the media.

12:20 AM: The Dallas police returned Lee Harvey Oswald to his holding cell.

1:30 AM: Lee Harvey Oswald was formally arraigned for the murder of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

At some point during the early hours of this morning, secret service agent Gerald S. Blaine, stationed outside the Washington DC home of new President Lyndon Baines Johnson, heard footsteps and raised his Thompson submachine gun to his shoulder. Yanking on the lever to chamber a round made a loud sound but in the darkness the footsteps continued. Blaine’s finger was on the trigger as the walker came around the corner — and his Thompson was pointed directly at President Johnson’s chest.

10:25 AM: Another day of questioning suspect Lee Harvey Oswald began.55

11:35 AM: Lee Harvey Oswald was returned to his holding cell.

55. A Secret Service agent, Mike Howard, was dispatched to protect the Oswald family because the new president, Lyndon Johnson, had heard rumors that some Texan was talking about dragging their bodies through the streets of Dallas. In Oswald’s apartment he recovered a little green address book in which the 17th page bore the heading I WILL KILL. Oswald had made a list of 4 names: John Connally, James Hosty (a FBI agent whom Oswald had threatened), former General Edwin Walker (at whom Oswald had shot), and Vice-President . At the top of the list, former Secretary of the Navy Connally’s name was marked with a dagger dripping drops of blood (the book is now in the National Archives, with this one page torn out, and you can look at the pages, except for this one mysteriously missing page, here). Testifying before the Warren Commission, Mrs. Marina Oswald would try to explain that her husband’s target had been not Kennedy but Connally. She would repeat this in 1978 when called before the House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE 12:35 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was taken to the office of Captain John William “Will” Fritz for additional questioning.

1:10 PM: Mrs. Marina Oswald and Marguerite Claverie Oswald, the mother, visited Lee Harvey Oswald.

1:40 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald tries unsuccessfully to contact Attorney John Jacob Abt, chief counsel to the Communist Party of the United States of America.

2:15 PM: The Dallas police subjected Lee Harvey Oswald to yet another lineup.

2:45 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald gave permission for the collection of fingernail scrapings and hair samples.

3:30 PM: Robert Lee Oswald, Jr., the older brother and also a former US Marine, visited Lee Harvey Oswald.

4:00-4:30 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald phoned Ruth Hyde Paine, a friend of his wife, and asked her to try to obtain Attorney John Jacob Abt, chief counsel to the Communist Party of the United States of America as his attorney.

5:30 PM: Aware that the Dallas police would not automatically offer Lee Harvey Oswald legal representation while he was under questioning, the president of the Dallas Bar Association, H. Louis Nichols, visited Oswald in his holding cell. Nothing would come from this, as Oswald was still insisting that he needed to be represented by Attorney John Jacob Abt, chief counsel to the Communist Party of the United States of America.

6:00 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was taken again for questioning.

7:15 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was returned to his holding cell.

8:00 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald phoned Ruth Hyde Paine, a friend of his wife, asking to speak to Marina. She was no longer there.

That evening Mrs. Alveeta A. Treon and Mrs. Louise Swinney were working the Dallas switchboard that handled the local jail. When Mrs. Treon arrived for work she was advised by Mrs. Swinney that their supervisor wanted them to assist 2 law enforcement officials listening in an adjacent room. At about 10:45PM either prisoner Lee Harvey Oswald attempted to place a collect phone-call to a John Hurt in Raleigh, North Carolina, area code 919, or else this person attempted to telephone to Oswald in his cell. Mrs. Swinney handled the call, alerting the 2 law enforcement officials. Without attempting to make the requested connection she informed the prisoner falsely “I’m sorry, the number doesn’t answer” and pulled the plug (a John David Hurt who lived at 201 Hillsbro in Raleigh at phone number 834-7430 had during WWII functioned as a U.S. Army Counterintelligence officer; his wife would allege that it had been her husband who, drunken, had initiated this phone-call).

That evening the newly reconstructed Nationaltheater of München was opening to the public with Richard Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. LISTEN TO IT NOW HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE November 24, Sunday: At 9:30 AM, Lee Harvey Oswald was signed out of the Dallas, Texas city jail in anticipation of a transfer to the county facility.

11:15 AM: The transfer party moving Lee Harvey Oswald from the Dallas city facility to the county facility left Captain John William “Will” Fritz’s office after a final round of questions.

11:21 AM: In the midst of a press of reporters and kibitzers, before the television cameras, Lee Harvey Oswald was shot and killed by Jack Ruby in the basement of the Dallas city jail.

1:07 PM: Lee Harvey Oswald was pronounced dead at Parkland Hospital. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1964

April 21, Tuesday: A Transit 5BN-3 satellite carrying a General Electric SNAP-9A system for nuclear auxiliary power, that is, a nuclear reactor based upon Plutonium238, burned up in the atmosphere. The fissile material, all 2.1 pounds of it, thus “vaporized” and “dispersed widely.” According to an interview conducted in August 1988 with Dr. John Gofman, professor emeritus of medical physics at UC-Berkeley, this caused an increase in the rate of lung cancer. Most of what the public now knows about the accident comes from a report published on April 24-28, 1989 by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s Nuclear Energy Agency, and from the Swedish National Institute for Radiation Protection, based in Stockholm, entitled “Emergency Preparedness for Nuclear-Powered Satellites.” Where were you and what were you doing in 1964? If you were alive and aware in 1964 and yet remember nothing whatever about all this from your perusal of the newspapers — needless to say you have no reason to fault your memory. The strange thing is, I may or may not have witnessed this accident. At least, it was in 1964 that I was in the coastal hills of California during the night, inland from the Point Mugu rocket station, as a US Marine 1st lieutenant on night training maneuvers, when I witnessed one humongous rocket take off and arch out across the Pacific. The rocket went up for a certain distance and then lost its stability and began to pinwheel in the most spectacular manner. It gyrated for an extended period of time spewing comet-trails of rust-colored sparks before finally, as it began to spiral downward, the station’s security officer pressed the red button and abruptly ended its show. The entire thing took place in silence, and ceased long before the first of the roar came to us from that distance. When my spouse and I came later to live atop a hill in Irvine just south of Disneyland, I must say that although for color this Point Mugu rocket of 1964 wasn’t all that much, for activity and movement this rocket sure did beat out anything I have ever seen for an evening’s fireworks display over the Anaheim suburb to the north of our home. It is interesting to speculate that in addition to a display of incompetence and the waste of tax dollars, I was perhaps witness to the creation of a radioactive cloud which would drift silent and deadly across America. Of the 24 space missions flown to the present date by the USA at least 3 which have involved quantities of onboard nuclear materials have admittedly had accidents. Of the total of 39 space missions flown by the USSR at least 6 which have involved quantities of onboard nuclear materials, such as the Cosmos-954 which disintegrated over Great Slave Lake in 1978, have had accidents. –There may have been more from each nation, but this is what has been so far acknowledged. ASSLEY HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Summer: Voting registration workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James Chaney were murdered near Philadelphia, Mississippi. At the Department of Justice’s request, the FBI conducted an investigation. Never before had the Bureau taken on the persecution-by-investigation of a right-wing group with as much fervor as their typical persecution-by-investigation of a left-wing group. The case against the perpetrators would, however, require years to go through the courts. Only after 1966, when the Supreme Court made it possible for federal law to be used to prosecute civil rights violations, would 7 men, including local law enforcement officials, be found guilty. The role of the FBI would be exaggerated in a popular movie which suppressed all the officious footdragging.

When my period of obligation was complete after four and a half years as a US Marine Lieutenant, my wife Mary Angela Meredith and I journeyed up the coastal highway from Camp Pendleton to Berkeley, where I had been accepted as a law student by Boalt Hall of the University of California (I had aced their LSAT Law School Aptitude Test). In order to support ourselves during my several years of law school without savings, postponing our existing undergraduate loans, without scholarships or financial assistance from family, we would both need to have jobs. Mary would need to hired again at a local public school teacher but we would find she had already exhausted her welcome due to previous miserable evaluations at this, that, and the other HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE grade levels. I answered a newspaper advertisement to be for instance a Claims Adjustor (I blew the interview when Allstate asked whether I had ever broken the law by speeding, a trick question to cull those inclined to the sort of truthfulness that is inadvisable in the field of claims adjustment). I answered a newspaper advertisement from a public library in benighted Martinez, to work at a reference desk. However, at the interview they explained that there was just no way that they were they going to take a risk on a former Marine ground-pounder — because obviously I could only be using such a boring, low-paying job as a temporary stopgap and would quickly make myself scarce. And so on and so forth. Finally there was one and only one possibility, that I abandon my Boalt-Hall agenda and we would need to journey in our Volkswagen bug all the way across the continent, where I was to punch in at a factory in Ivorydale, Ohio as a Procter and Gamble Job Study Engineer (whatever the hell that might turn out to be). ASSLEY

November 26, Thursday: Martial law was declared in Saigon to deal with the widespread anti-government unrest by Buddhists.

Belgian troops captured Paulis and freed 211 white hostages. They also found the bodies of 22 hostages killed by the Congolese rebels. Over 2,000 Congolese reportedly had been killed by the rebels.

200 Egyptians protested US/Belgian intervention in the Congo attack on the US embassy in Cairo and burned the USIS library and US Marine barracks. Demonstrators protested before the US and Belgian embassies in Nairobi. Protesters roamed the streets throwing fire bombs.

President Humberto Castelo Branco ordered the removal of Governor Mauro Borges of Goiás state, charging him with Communist subversion. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1965 IN THE

February 22, Monday: General William C. Westmoreland requested 2 battalions of US Marine as protection for the American air base at Da Nang, Vietnam, because we had noticed 6,000 Viet Cong massing in its vicinity (over the “grave” reservations of Ambassador Maxwell Davenport “Max” Taylor, this request would be approved).

Having failed in an attempt to rally support from Vietnamese army commanders throughout the nation, Lieutenant-General Nguyen Khanh accepted the decision of the Armed Forces Council and stepped down.

March 8, Monday: The 1st US combat troops arrived in Vietnam as 3,500 US Marines of the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade landed at China Beach to defend the American air base at Da Nang. They joined the 23,000 American military advisors already in Vietnam. (I could well have been with this group, but I had sat on the papers I had been given to sign back in 1963, papers to extend my tour of duty by a matter of some 6 weeks so that I could stay with my battalion during its “lock on” training at Camp Pendleton, California. Again and again they asked me if I had signed these papers, and I kept telling them “Oh, I left them at home, I’ll bring them in tomorrow” — and finally they gave up on this and simply transferred me as “a short-timer” to another Marine battalion, a local training command not scheduled to go on overseas tour.) ASSLEY

April 1, Thursday: Ernesto “Che” Guevara resigned his Cuban citizenship and departed to wage armed struggle in Latin America.

President Lyndon Baines Johnson authorized sending 2 more US Marine battalions and up to 20,000 logistical personnel to Vietnam. The President also authorized American combat troops to go on the offensive go out on patrol to root out the Viet Cong. Although immediately this of course would come to be no secret at all in the countryside, for two months the American press and public would be kept in the dark.

Hey, hey, LBJ!

April 28, Wednesday: The 6th Marines landed in the Dominican Republic. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August:The plan became that “Combined Action Platoons” made up of US Marines, operating in conjunction with units of the South Vietnamese militia, were going to defend new fortified village enclaves and patrol the surrounding countryside.

August 3, Tuesday: Following a mortar attack against the air base at Da Nang, Vietnam, 7 US Marines had been killed while patrolling for Viet Cong. A rifle company of US Marines went out to torch a nearby village, Cam Ne, suspected of Viet Cong sympathy, and some 150 homes were destroyed, and this was videotaped and appeared on American TV on the CBS channel (none of it made particularly pleasant viewing).

Differences between the Senate version and the House of Representatives version of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 having been resolved in conference, the House of Representatives accepted the Conference Report.

August 17, Tuesday: During a concert at the Tanglewood Music Festival, conductor Erich Leinsdorf announced the retirement of Aaron Copland from the Berkshire Music Center, to be replaced by Gunther Schuller.

After a deserter from the 1st Vietcong regiment revealed that an attack was imminent against the US Marine base at Chu Lai, the American army launched Operation Starlite. In this, the 1st major battle of the Vietnam War, the United States achieved a resounding victory. Ground forces, artillery from Chu Lai, ship bombardments, and air support combined to kill nearly 700 Cong. US forces sustained 45 dead and more than 200 wounded.

August 18-24: Operation Starlite, the 1st major US ground operation in Vietnam, began with US Marines making a preemptive strike against 1,500 Viet Cong who had been planning to assault the American airfield at Chu Lai. The Marines arrived by helicopter and by sea following heavy artillery and air bombardment of Viet Cong positions. 45 Marines were killed and 120 wounded, while 614 Viet Cong were being killed and 9 being taken prisoner.

August 19, Thursday: In the initial ground battle of the Vietnam War fought solely by US troops, US Marines captured Vantuong, south of Chulai.

The Viet Cong captured the district capital of Daksut, north of Saigon near Laos.

Ilias Ioannou Tsirimokos replaced Georgios Themistokleous Athanasiadis-Novas as Prime Minister of Greece.

In a Frankfurt court, 16 people who had worked at Auschwitz were convicted of mass murder and torture and assigned sentences ranging from 39 months to life (3 of the accused were acquitted). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 10, Sunday: US/Saigon troops began a major offensive into Binhdinh Province but failed to encircle the North Vietnamese/Viet Cong there.

Parliamentary elections in Turkey resulted in a small majority for the Justice Party.

The New York newspaper strike was settled after 25 days.

Three Studies in Electronic Sound by Leslie Bassett was performed for the initial time, in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

October 15, Friday: 2 days of demonstrations were held in major cities in the United States against government policy in Vietnam.

October 16, Saturday: There were anti-Vietnam-War rallies in 40 cities across American, plus in centers such as London and Rome.

“A victory described in detail is indistinguishable from a defeat.” — Jean-Paul Sartre

October 17, Sunday: Attorney-General Nicholas deBelleville “Nick” Katzenbach announced a government investigation of Communist influence in the anti-Vietnam-War movement. If you don’t want us to be wasting our lives and treasure in a foreign jungle, why then what other reason could there be — you must be Un- American!

The New York World’s Fair closed after its 2d year.

Miniature Overture for orchestra by William Grant Still was performed for the initial time, in Miami.

October 27, Wednesday: Viet Cong raids wrecked US Marine aircraft at Marble Mountain and Chu Lai in South Vietnam. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1966 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

May 25, Wednesday: About 2,000 anti-government protesters in Saigon, Vietnam were dispersed by troops with tear gas.

The New York Times reported that Li Chi, propaganda chief for the Peking branch of the Communist Party, had been purged from the Chinese government.

Rhapsodic Ballad for cello by Arnold Bax was performed for the initial time, at the Cork Municipal School of Music.

Incidental music to Lunel’s play Jerusalem à Carpentras by Darius Milhaud was performed for the initial time, in Théâtre Carpentras, Paris.

During late May the North Vietnamese 324B Division was crossing the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) when it encountered a US Marine battalion. 324B Division held its ground and the largest battle of the war to date broke out near Dong Ha. Most of the 3rd Marine Division (some 5,000 men in 5 battalions) headed north. In the Marine Corps’s Operation Hastings, Marines backed by South Vietnamese Army troops, the heavy guns of US warships along the coast, and their own artillery and air power, would over a period of weeks drive 324B Division back inside North Vietnam.

July 15, Friday: Operation Hastings was launched against some 10,000 soldiers of the North Vietnamese Army in Quang Tri Province. “What is it about ‘demilitarized zone’ that you fail to understand?” This effort by US Marines and South Vietnamese troops amounted to the largest combined military operation to date in the war. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1967 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

February 28, Tuesday: PFC James Anderson, Jr. became the initial black US Marine to be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor (he was of course dead, killed of course in South Vietnam).

April 24, Monday-May 11: Near Khe Sanh, an isolated air base in the mountains near the border of Laos less than 10 miles from North Vietnam, fighting between the US 3rd Marines and the North Vietnamese Army resulting in a reported body count of 940 enemy dead. The American losses were announced to be 155 killed and 425 wounded (our reports of our own combat dead and wounded during this war were, generally, not misrepresentations). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1968 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

At the Anniversary dinner of the War Resisters League the League Peace Award was presented to The Resistance.

“Killing to end war, that’s like fucking to restore virginity.” — Vietnam-era protest poster

In Vietnam, United States military lawyers boasted of winning 200 convictions for a practice which the GIs were referring to as “fragging,” that they characterized for court purposes as “assault with explosives.” Explained one unidentified officer to a reporter, “Given beer, whiskey or drugs, mixed in with a crowd of blacks and whites, and you can have trouble. But you never know which came first — the booze, the drugs, or racial disagreements.” The problem had not begun in Vietnam, for during World War II, Dr. Joseph W. Owen, the head of a psychiatric section in the Solomon Islands, had described a case in which a US Marine captain had been routinely ridiculing a lieutenant in front of the enlisted men. That lieutenant had sneaked a mine into his commanding officer’s tent and hidden in some nearby bushes to detonate it.

For crippling 2 American M-48 tanks and leading 2 successful attacks against a South Vietnamese military base near Saigon, the North Vietnamese Army awarded a 17-year-old named Vo Thi Mo its Victory Medal Third Class. “The first time I killed an American,” she would tell an interviewer 20 years later, “I felt enthusiasm and more hatred.” After a while, she reported, her enthusiasm for this sort of thing had waned, in part because after watching American soldiers look at pictures and cry, she had come to the realization that most of these Americans, rather than being the faceless baby-burners that filled her nightmares, were simply scared young men one hell of a long way from home.

January 5, Friday: The US began an effort to map the positions of the North Vietnamese Army gathering ominously in the vicinity of the isolated US Marine air base at Khe Sanh. Was this going to be another Dien Bien Phu?

DIEN BIEN PHU ⊃ MY LAI TED BUNDY HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE January 31, Tet: The Republic of Nauru, under President Hammer De Roburt, proclaimed itself as independent of Australia, New Zealand, and Great Britain.

West Germany and Yugoslavia resumed diplomatic relations (after 10 years of only indirect contact).

In Berlin, Musique pour les soupers du Roi Ubu, a ballet noir by Bernd Alois Zimmermann, was performed for the initial time in a concert setting.

The turning point of the Vietnam war occurred on this day as 84,000 Viet Cong aided by North Vietnamese troops launched a Tet Offensive, simultaneously attacking 100 cities and towns throughout South Vietnam, capturing Hué, Dalat, Kontum, and Quangtri. Some Viet Cong commandos entered the grounds of the Presidential Palace before being repulsed. The surprise offensive would be closely monitored by American TV news crews, which would for instance be filming as the US embassy in Saigon was being assaulted by 17 Viet Cong commandos, who held the embassy for 6 hours before being killed. After more than 100 US Marines had been killed at Hué, we would watch as a Marine under fire opinioned that “The whole thing stinks, really.”

January 31-March 2: In the ancient capital of Hué during the Tet holiday, which had been only lightly defended, 12,000 North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops begin systematic executions of over 3,000 “enemies of the people,” including South Vietnamese government officials, captured South Vietnamese military officers, and Catholic priests. South Vietnamese troops and 3 US Marines battalions counterattacked and retook the old imperial city house by house and street by street, aided by American air and artillery strikes. On February 24th, Marines took possession of the Imperial Palace in the heart of the citadel, and soon afterward the city was re-secured. American losses had been 142 Marines killed and 857 wounded, 74 US Army killed and 507 wounded. The South Vietnamese military losses had been 384 killed and 1,830 wounded (the enemy body count was reported as at least 5,000, but that’s to the nearest round thousand).

February 8, Thursday: At Khe Sanh, 21 US Marines were killed by North Vietnamese soldiers. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE April 1, Monday: Federal troops were sent into Rio de Janeiro to quell rioting.

In South Vietnam, the US 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) began Operation Pegasus to reopen Route 9, the relief route to the besieged US Marines at the Khe Sanh air base. Dien Bien Phu all over again?

April 8, Monday: In the largest American offensive of the Vietnam War, 100,000 men (US-Saigon government- Australia-New Zealand-Thailand) attempted to dislodge the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong from 11 provinces near Saigon.

As a result of intensive American bombing and the reopening of Route 9, the siege of the Khe Sanh air base was lifted with the withdrawal of the North Vietnamese troops in the area. Enemy losses during the siege were estimated at up to 15,000. The US Marines had lost 199 killed and 830 wounded. The 1st Cavalry had lost 92 killed and 629 wounded while reopening Route 9. The US command would secretly shut down Khe Sanh and withdraws the Marines. Although President Lyndon Baines Johnson would state that the troops that had defended Khe Sanh had “vividly demonstrated to the enemy the utter futility of his attempts to win a military victory in the South,” a North Vietnamese official would label the closing of this remote air base as America’s “gravest defeat” to that point in the war.

Hey, hey, LBJ! Reformer Oldrich Cernik replaced hard-liner Josef Lenart as prime minister of Czechoslovakia.

Concerto for cello and orchestra en forme de “pas de trois” by Bernd Alois Zimmermann was performed for the initial time, in Strasbourg. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE October 22, Tuesday: On this day Private 1st Class Robert Carlos Pahcheka of Indiahoma, Oklahoma, of H Company, 2d Battalion, 1st Marines, 1st Marine Division, USMC and Private 1st Class Kenneth Allen Pahl of Minneapolis, Minnesota, of C Company, 1st Battalion, 27th Infantry, 25th Infantry Division, United States Army, were killed in Vietnam.

On this night Republican presidential candidate Richard Milhous Nixon instructed H.R. Haldeman (his closest aide and future chief of staff, who would be a key member of the Watergate cover-up crowd in the White House) that he wanted him to “monkey wrench” (that is, to sabotage) President Lyndon Baines Johnson’s current efforts to begin negotiations to wind down the war in Vietnam (we know this, because Haldeman wrote Nixon’s instruction down, and because we have now transcribed Haldeman’s notes). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE April 30, Tuesday: New York City policemen attacked and routed students from the 5 occupied buildings at , injuring 148 and arresting 720.

“The Trial of Anne Opie Wehrer and Unknown Accomplices for Crimes against Humanity,” an electronic music theater by Robert Ashley to his own words, was performed for the initial time, in Sheboygan, .

The United States embassy in Saigon announced evidence that up to 1,000 people had been executed during the occupation of Hué during the Viet Cong’s Tet Offensive.

The North Vietnamese would be seeking, until May 3d, to open an invasion corridor through the Demilitarized Zone but would be halted at Dai Do by Lieutenant Colonel William Weise’s battalion of US Marines known as the “Magnificent Bastards,” and by heavy artillery and air strikes. 81 Marines would be killed and 297 wounded. The enemy body count would be said to be 1,568. 29 US Army soldiers would be killed and 130 wounded while supporting these US Marines. For the time being, this defeat would end North Vietnam’s prospect of successfully invading straight down the coast (they would need to wait 4 more years, until 1972, before trying this again after most Americans had fled; it would actually require 7 years, until 1975, for them to succeed in such a movement down the coast). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1969 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

January 22, Wednesday: In the Da Krong valley, the beginning of Operation Dewey Canyon — the last major US Marine operation in Vietnam.

February 25, Tuesday: In a raid by the North Vietnamese upon a base camp near the Demilitarized Zone, 36 US Marines were killed.

Jan Zajic, an 18-year-old high school student from Sumperk, Moravia, set himself alight in Wenceslas Square Prague. He left a note praising Jan Palach. This was the 21st anniversary of the communist takeover of Czechoslovakia.

A bomb set by Palestinian terrorists went off in Jerusalem, severely damaging the British consulate. There was one person injured. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Late August: Dr. Daniel Ellsberg, a Harvard University graduate who had served as a lieutenant in charge of a company in the United States Marine Corps and then returned to Harvard to obtain a PhD in economics, had in 1959 joined the RAND corporation’s Economics Department as an analyst, and in 1964 during the Johnson Administration had served in the Pentagon under Secretary of Defense Robert Strange McNamara, and then

had done a 2-year stint in Vietnam for the State Department, and then had returned to RAND. He was the first Rand researcher to work directly for the president’s assistant for national security. He attended a conference that had been organized by War Resisters International at Haverford College, a Quaker institution near Philadelphia. He had just been reading Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on civil disobedience when he met Randall Kehler, discovering to his amazement that this conscientious objector was actually ready to accept a prison sentence in order to attempt to raise a moral issue to his countrymen. Randy expected to go to prison (he would in fact be sentenced to 2 years). He changed HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Daniel Ellsberg’s life by his example. Ellsberg for the first time found himself asking himself what he could do to help end the Vietnam affair if he were willing to go to prison.

He would try to arrange to testify before Congress, and in preparation for such testimony, would begin to make himself a personal copy of the Pentagon Papers in the “top-secret/sensitive” safe in his office. When Ellsberg had been a Marine lieutenant in Vietnam, he had thought of himself as serving the president — because the Marines tend to think of themselves as a fast reaction force that is at the Commander-in-Chief’s disposal. Reading through these papers as he copied them burned out of him all desire to work for the executive branch, for in these 7,000 pages he saw how 5 presidents in a row had been operating in an utterly stubborn, selfish, foolish, immoral, and illegal manner year after year for 24 years. He found himself no longer wanting to function as the president’s man. And the point was that what Randy Keeler revealed to me was that there were other ways of being conscientious than serving the president. There are other kinds of courage. And I had to ask myself, well, if I was willing to be blown up in Vietnam or captured, as friends of mine were, when I accepted the cause or supported it, should I not be willing to go to prison or risk my freedom? And when I faced that question, it was quickly answered. THE QUAKER PEACE TESTIMONY HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1970 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

February 18, Wednesday night: A peaceful anti-American demonstration by 25,000 people in Manila turned violent when about 3,000 of them invaded the US embassy throwing rocks and firebombs. US Marine guards at the embassy used tear gas to eject them from the grounds. The rioters then entered a wealthy district of the city creating mayhem and destruction.

All defendants in the “Trial of the Chicago 7” were acquitted of conspiracy to create a riot at the 1968 Democratic convention. 5 were found guilty of crossing state lines with intent to incite a riot.

February 19, Thursday night: A 5-man combat patrol of Company B, 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, a self-styled “killer team,” sent to Son Thang-4, South Vietnam south of Danang because sniper fire and booby traps had been encountered in the vicinity and instructed by 1st Lieutenant Lewis R. “Ron” Ambort, their company commander, to “get some” (increase the unit’s body-count performance statistics) and told “I want you to pay these little bastards back,” rounded up and gunned down in 3 batches a total of 16 noncombatant women and children, the hamlet’s entire population, at a range of 10 to 15 feet. When they went back to their source unit they filed a false report and, as corroboration, turned in an enemy weapon they had not captured. Lance Corporal Randall “Randy” Herrod, Private Michael A. Schwarz, Private 1st Class Samuel G. Green. Jr., Private 1st Class Thomas R. Boyd, and Lance Corporal Michael S. Krichten would face general courts martial56 on 11 charges of premeditated murder and one of their defenses was that their patrol leader had ordered them to

56. As I have reviewed the records of these 4 general courts martial, I could not help but reflect on my own personal experience serving as an officer on Marine courts martial. I have watched as time after time rows of Marine officers empaneled have glanced up at the defendant from their personal red copies of the UCMJ and recited procedural words they have just read off their page — and I have no doubt whatever as to these pseudo proceedings having been fucked up to a fare thee well. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE do it.

Although Marine 2d Lieutenant Oliver L. “Ollie” North would provide character witness that would help obtain an acquittal on all charges for the patrol leader, 20-year-old Lance Corporal Randall “Randy” Herrod, pointing out irrelevantly to the judges that Herrod was scheduled to receive a Silver Star — that allegedly he had saved North’s life in combat.57 In this village Herrod had shouted to the 3 other young Marines “shoot them, kill them all, kill all of them bitches,” but never mind that noise. Some of the patrol members were granted immunity in return for their testimony, and despite the fact that the patrol leader had been found innocent on all charges, Private Michael A. Schwarz was sentenced to life imprisonment58 and the only black Marine, Samuel G. Green. Jr., not represented by civilian counsel, was busted back to Private, pay confiscated, dishonorably discharged, and confined at hard labor for 5 years.59

DIEN BIEN PHU ⊃ SON THANG TED BUNDY

57. Herrod would in fact be handed this Silver Star in an unpublicized office ceremony just prior to being dismissed from Marine service. 58. On appeal this would be reduced to a year most of which had already been served, plus dishonorable discharge, in part because of Schwartz’s IQ score of 74 and in part because the superior who had told him to “shoot them, kill them all, kill all of them bitches” had been deemed to be innocent. 59. The discharge would be changed from dishonorable to general, but before this could be delivered to Green, he had committed suicide during July 1975. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1971 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

February 3, Wednesday: Saigon government forces began a sweep into the Kompong Cham Province of Cambodia.

As British troops began a search for arms in the Clonard district of Belfast, they were attacked by Roman Catholics with automatic weapons, bombs, hand grenades, and more traditional flying missiles. The British responded with water cannon and rubber bullets.

Private Gary Coy gave sworn testimony that would result in an 18-page “Coy Allegation” of alleged Vietnam War crimes perpetrated between May and November 1967 during the Song Ve Valley and Operation Wheeler military campaigns. This document would not surface, for the American public, until 2003, when Michael D. Sallah, a reporter at Toledo, Ohio’s The Blade, would gain access to a large collection of documents produced during the Army’s Criminal Investigation Command investigation between 1971 and 1975. The CIC studied the activities of a “Tiger Force” unit originated by Colonel David Haskell “Hack” Hackworth subsequent to his leaving that unit. Although the Criminal Investigation Command inquisitors would conclude that many of the reported incidents were of events that could only be described as war crimes, and had indeed taken place, the US Army would decide not to proceed with prosecutions. For instance, when Captain Harold McGaha landed in the operations area of the Tiger Force, he noticed that several of these American soldiers had adorned themselves with what he recognized as human ears. It was no secret at this base that some American soldiers were mutilating VC bodies. Colonel Morse of the 327th Battalion had urged his troops to produce a body-count totaling 327 in order to match the battalion’s infantry designation (by the end of the campaign, he would be congratulating his soldiers for their 1,000th kill, a nice round number). The Blade would be able to track down and interview dozens of Tiger Force veterans, plus the CIC investigators who had conducted the Army’s inquiry. The reporters of this newspaper would travel to Vietnam and track down numerous residents of Song Ve Valley who would eagerly provide corroborating witness stories. All such accounts would amount to the same pattern of conduct: • routine torture and execution of prisoners • routine practice of intentionally killing unarmed Vietnamese villagers including men, women, children, and elderly people • a routine practice of cutting off and collecting the ears of victims • a practice of wearing necklaces composed of human ears • a practice of cutting off and collecting the scalps of victims • incidents of soldiers planting weapons on murdered Vietnamese villagers • an incident in which a young mother was drugged and raped, then executed HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • an incident where a soldier killed a baby and cut off its head after the baby’s mother had been killed

This sort of behavior was not isolated to the United States Army, but according to some reports, occurred to varying degrees also in US Marine units.

April 29, Thursday: The sum total of American deaths in Vietnam surpassed 45,000.60

April 30, Friday: The last US Marine combat units departed Vietnam.

June 25, Friday: The last Marine ground troops left Vietnam. The US Supreme Court granted the federal administration’s appeal petition in the Washington Post case and also granted the New York Times’s appeal petition.

60. A fake fact would arise in later years, that more Vietnam combat vets had died by suicide subsequent to the war than had died in combat during that war. This would more or less be the baseline figure for such a postwar suicide count were this postwar suicide count factual — which it most emphatically is not. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1972 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

March 27, Monday: Protestants staged a 2-day general strike to protest the imposition of direct rule over Northern Ireland.

The new president of Boston University, John R. Silber, had invited the United States Marine Corps onto his campus to recruit straight male students. When protesting BU students and faculty blocked the entrance, President Silber asked the city police to arrest them — with the explanation that such a protest was violating the civil liberties of US Marine recruiters.61 The actors in the Boston University affair could not be better cast. The United States Marine Corps, whose business abroad is mass murder, played a benign employment agency. The Boston Tactical Police, whose business is brutality, played the role of the protector of the community. And Boston University’s President John Silber, whose business is obfuscation, played the role of educator. — Professor Howard Zinn

61. Presumably the civil liberties of USMC recruiters include believing what they are told to believe by their superiors, and include saying what they are told to say by their superiors — and, I am sure, any number of other items too numerous to imagine. I can vividly remember what was said to one USMC enlisted man in my presence, once, by his Commanding Officer, when said enlisted man had requested leave to get married: “When we want you to have a wife, we’ll issue you one.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1973 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

September 11, Tuesday: After a week of heavy fighting Cambodian government troops pushed Khmer Rouge rebels out of Kompong Cham, northeast of Phnom Penh.

During a riot over wages in Carletonville, South Africa, police killed 11 black miners.

A violent military coup began after Chilean President Salvador Allende refused military demands that he resign, saying, “I am ready to resist with whatever means, even at the cost of my life, to serve as a lesson in the ignominious history of those who have strength but not reason.” The coup was led by General Augusto Pinochet with the complicity of President Richard Milhous Nixon. Allende was killed, although the military would claim he had killed himself. The military would begin to arrest, torture, and murder anyone it suspected to be its enemy. GOVERNMENT SCANDALS

“Like Caesar peering into the colonies from distant Rome, Nixon said the choice of government by the Chileans was unacceptable to the president of the United States,” Senator Frank Forrester Church III would later remark, “The attitude in the White House seemed to be, ‘If in the wake of Vietnam I can no longer send in the Marines, then I will send in the CIA.’” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1974 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

August 19, Monday: After a mob killed our ambassador during hostilities between Turkish and Greek Cypriot forces, US Marines defended the American Embassy in Nicosia while the US Navy evacuated US civilians. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

The Niagara Parks Commission refused Phillipe Petitt’s proposal for a highwire walk between Prospect Point Park in Niagara Falls, New York and the Table Rock poised above the Horseshoe Falls in Niagara Falls, Ontario. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1975 IN THE VIETNAM WAR

January 12, Sunday: A 23-year-old registered nurse, Caryn Eileen Campbell, disappeared while walking down a well- lit hallway between the elevator and her room at the Wildwood Inn in Snowmass Village southeast of Salt Lake City. It is suspected that she fell victim to Ted Bundy.

DIEN BIEN PHU ⊃ MY LAI TED BUNDY

January 14, Tuesday: Testifying before the federal Congress, Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger pointed up the fact that the United States of America was not living up to the commitment it had made to South Vietnam’s President Nguyen Van Thieu that we would take “severe retaliatory action” were North Vietnam to violate the peace treaty they had agreed to in Paris.

January 18, Saturday: An airlift of Turkish Cypriots from the British military base at Episkopi began. They were to be brought to Turkey and then allowed to resettle in Cyprus. This sparked violent protests by Greek Cypriots. About 5,000 set fire to the US embassy in Nicosia, British consular offices, and the British Council. US Marines battle the mob at the US embassy when Greek Cypriot security forces stood aside. Protesters ransacked the British embassy in Athens and attempted to set it on fire.

April 12, Saturday: A few days after Josephine Baker had performed, at the Bobino Theater in Paris, a retrospective medley of routines of her 50-year career, she had slipped into a coma. On the early morning of this day she suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. More than 20,000 people would crowd the streets of Paris to watch the funeral procession on its way to the Church of the Madeleine. The French government would honor this performer with a 21-gun salute — which makes her the 1st American woman to be buried in France with military honors. Her gravesite is in the Cimetiére de Monaco.

US Marines evacuated foreigners before the Khmer Rouge seized Phnom Penh, Cambodia. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

April 26, Saturday: North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces began a massive attack against Phuoc Le, 60 kilometers southeast of Saigon.

The Indian Parliament annexed Sikkim pending ratification by half of the states. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE April 27, Sunday: Saigon was encircled and the 30,000 South Vietnamese soldiers inside the perimeter were leaderless. General Duong Van Minh took over the presidency of the Saigon government from Tran Van Huong. Rockets hit the center of Saigon for the 1st time since the 1973 cease fire. 10 people were killed and the ensuing fire would leave 5,000 homeless. The city of course erupted into chaos and widespread looting.

April 28, Monday: Proclaiming himself as a “Neutralist,” General Duong Van “Big” Minh replaced Tran Van Huong as president of South Vietnam and appealed for a cease-fire. He was ignored.

Communist forces attacked the outer defenses of Saigon, sending rockets into Tan Son Nhut air base. The office of the United States military attache was hit, killing 2 US Marines, the final American military to die in Vietnam.

The Courtship of Yongly Bongly Bo for voice and piano by Virgil Thomson to words of Lear was performed for the initial time, in the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church Chapel, New York.

Ukiyo-e for solo harp by George Rochberg was performed for the initial time, at Grape Stake Art Gallery, San Fransisco.

April 29, Tuesday: The North Vietnamese shelling of the Tan Son Nhut air base of Saigon, Vietnam had killed 2 US Marines at the compound gate. Conditions deteriorated as the South Vietnamese began to loot the base, and President Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. gave the go-ahead to Operation Frequent Wind, a helicopter evacuation of the remaining 7,000 Americans and their South Vietnamese collaborators from the capital city to 3 US aircraft carriers standing by off the coast, an operation which began with the pre-arraigned radio signal of Bing Crosby singing on the local radio station about a “White Christmas.” (We’ll never experience that song in the old way again.) So many frantic civilians were swarming the helicopters at Tan Son Nhut, that the evacuation had to be shifted to the American embassy, which was of course secured by locked-and-loaded US Marines. The scene there also deteriorated into some serious photo opportunities as thousands of our collaborators, rightly fearing instant execution, and rightly fearing abandonment, attempted to get inside. Meanwhile, many South Vietnamese pilots were managing to bring their American-made helicopters down onto the flight decks of the carriers offshore. We would have at the end an enduring image, in film footage of these choppers, at $250,000 each worth as much as a fine home anywhere in America, being simply shoved over the edge to make room for those still hovering. In 19 hours more than 6,000, mostly Vietnamese, were airlifted by helicopter. In addition least 74 Saigon government air force planes flew to Thailand carrying about 2,000.

Greece and the United States announced that Athens would no longer be the home port for the US 6th Fleet and that the US air base at Athens International Airport would be closed. April 30, Wednesday, 8:35AM: On orders of President Duong Van Minh, the Saigon government had unconditionally capitulated to the Viet Cong. Enemy forces entered the city and began to take control. The 4th Marines under Colonel Alfred M. Gray completed the evacuation by helicopters from the Saigon embassy and from Tan Son Nhut airfield. With the evacuation of the final 10 US Marine defenders from the United States embassy in Saigon, our presence in Vietnam came to an end. The North Vietnamese troops pouring into Saigon would of course encounter little resistance. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE April 30, Wednesday, 11AM: The red and blue flag of the Viet Cong was raised at the presidential palace. With President Minh broadcasting a message of unconditional surrender, war in Vietnam came to an end.

According to the Vietnam Veterans Wall in Washington DC, the final American pilot casualties occurred as William C. Nystal and Michael J. Shea attempted to land their helicopter on the USS Hancock in the China Sea.

Breakfast Rhythms I&II for six players by Joan Tower was performed for the initial time, in Town Hall, New York.

May 14, Wednesday: United States Marines boarded the American container ship Mayaguez, which Cambodian pirates had seized.

May 15, Thursday: President Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. ordered military forces to retake the SS Mayaguez, a merchant vessel en route from Hong Kong to Thailand with a US-citizen crew which had been seized from Cambodian naval patrol boats in international waters and forced to proceed to a nearby island. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

According to the Vietnam Veterans Wall in Washington DC, Kelton Rena Turner, an 18-year old US Marine, was the final American ground soldier, and 2d Lieutenant Richard Vandegeer, Air Force helicopter pilot, was the final American pilot, to die in the Vietnam War, both of whom were killed during this incident. The information may be inaccurate as in this incident Gary L. Hall, Joseph N. Hargrove, and Danny G. Marshall, US Marine veterans, were mistakenly left behind on Koh Tang Island — their fate is unknown.

April 26, Saturday: North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces began a massive attack against Phuoc Le, 60 kilometers southeast of Saigon.

The Indian Parliament annexed Sikkim pending ratification by half of the states. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE April 27, Sunday: Saigon was encircled and the 30,000 South Vietnamese soldiers inside the perimeter were leaderless. General Duong Van Minh took over the presidency of the Saigon government from Tran Van Huong. Rockets hit the center of Saigon for the 1st time since the 1973 cease fire. 10 people were killed and the ensuing fire would leave 5,000 homeless. The city of course erupted into chaos and widespread looting.

April 28, Monday: Proclaiming himself as a “Neutralist,” General Duong Van “Big” Minh replaced Tran Van Huong as president of South Vietnam and appealed for a cease-fire. He was ignored.

Communist forces attacked the outer defenses of Saigon, sending rockets into Tan Son Nhut air base. The office of the United States military attache was hit, killing 2 US Marines, the final American military to die in Vietnam.

The Courtship of Yongly Bongly Bo for voice and piano by Virgil Thomson to words of Lear was performed for the initial time, in the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church Chapel, New York.

Ukiyo-e for solo harp by George Rochberg was performed for the initial time, at Grape Stake Art Gallery, San Fransisco.

April 29, Tuesday: The North Vietnamese shelling of the Tan Son Nhut air base of Saigon, Vietnam had killed 2 US Marines at the compound gate. Conditions deteriorated as the South Vietnamese began to loot the base, and President Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. gave the go-ahead to Operation Frequent Wind, a helicopter evacuation of the remaining 7,000 Americans and their South Vietnamese collaborators from the capital city to 3 US aircraft carriers standing by off the coast, an operation which began with the pre-arraigned radio signal of Bing Crosby singing on the local radio station about a “White Christmas.” (We’ll never experience that song in the old way again.) So many frantic civilians were swarming the helicopters at Tan Son Nhut, that the evacuation had to be shifted to the American embassy, which was of course secured by locked-and-loaded US Marines. The scene there also deteriorated into some serious photo opportunities as thousands of our collaborators, rightly fearing instant execution, and rightly fearing abandonment, attempted to get inside. Meanwhile, many South Vietnamese pilots were managing to bring their American-made helicopters down onto the flight decks of the carriers offshore. We would have at the end an enduring image, in film footage of these choppers, at $250,000 each worth as much as a fine home anywhere in America, being simply shoved over the edge to make room for those still hovering. In 19 hours more than 6,000, mostly Vietnamese, were airlifted by helicopter. In addition least 74 Saigon government air force planes flew to Thailand carrying about 2,000.

Greece and the United States announced that Athens would no longer be the home port for the US 6th Fleet and that the US air base at Athens International Airport would be closed. April 30, Wednesday, 8:35AM: On orders of President Duong Van Minh, the Saigon government had unconditionally capitulated to the Viet Cong. Enemy forces entered the city and began to take control. The 4th Marines under Colonel Alfred M. Gray completed the evacuation by helicopters from the Saigon embassy and from Tan Son Nhut airfield. With the evacuation of the final 10 US Marine defenders from the United States embassy in Saigon, our presence in Vietnam came to an end. The North Vietnamese troops pouring into Saigon would of course encounter little resistance. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE April 30, Wednesday, 11AM: The red and blue flag of the Viet Cong was raised at the presidential palace. With President Minh broadcasting a message of unconditional surrender, war in Vietnam came to an end.

According to the Vietnam Veterans Wall in Washington DC, the final American pilot casualties occurred as William C. Nystal and Michael J. Shea attempted to land their helicopter on the USS Hancock in the China Sea.

Breakfast Rhythms I&II for six players by Joan Tower was performed for the initial time, in Town Hall, New York.

September 22, Monday: In front of the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco, Sara Jane Moore pulled out a Smith and Wesson .38 revolver she had just purchased and discharged it at President Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. from a distance of 40 feet. She missed, presumably because the sights of this pistol were off by six inches at that distance. Before she could fire again a bystander, former US Marine Oliver Wellington “Billy” Sipple, a decorated wounded Vietnam veteran, knocked her on the arm and took her down. Sipple, a closeted gay man, would be outed by the press and by Supervisor Harvey Milk, and although he would instance “My sexual orientation has nothing to do with saving the President’s life,” his mother would disown him. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1979

October 30, Saturday: The body of French Labor Minister Robert Boulin was found floating in a pond in the Rambouillet forest, the victim of a suicide. He was recently accused in the press of unethical real estate dealings.

300 leftists attack the US embassy in San Salvador but were repulsed by Salvadoran troops and US Marines using tear gas.

Output for tape by Gottfried Michael Koenig was performed for the initial time, in Essen-Werden.

Lied ohne Namen for two bassoons by Igor Stravinsky was performed for the initial time, in Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, 61 years after it had been composed.

The Nantucket Songs for voice and piano by Ned Rorem to words of various authors, was performed for the initial time, in the Library of Congress, Washington, the composer at the keyboard.

November 4, Sunday: A mob overran the embassy in Tehran, Iran; 13 US Marines were among 65 Americans taken hostage; 52 would be held captive for 444 days.

November 21, Wednesday: In Islamabad, Pakistan, a mob torched the US Embassy as 7 US Marines defended the building. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1980

April 24, Thursday: During an effort to rescue the Tehran hostages, 3 United States Marines died in a desert helicopter accident. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

May 12, Monday: The Embassy Marine guard in San Salvador used tear gas to rescue the US ambassador from a mob. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

June 23, Monday: As Vietnamese troops crossed the border into Thailand, more than 160 Thai and Vietnamese soldiers were killed.

Sanjay Gandhi, heir apparent in India to his mother, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, was killed in a plane crash.

United States Marines landed in Lebanon to evacuate civilians. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1982

August 21, Saturday: President Ronald Wilson Reagan reported the dispatch of 80 US Marines to serve in the multinational force to assist in the withdrawal of members of the Palestine Liberation force from Beirut, Lebanon. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

August 25, Wednesday: A contingent of 80 US Marines landed in Lebanon, walking into a thousand-year-old conflict without bullets in their guns. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

September 20, Monday: More US Marines departed for Lebanon. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

September 29, Wednesday: President Ronald Wilson Reagan reported the deployment of 1,200 US Marines to serve in a temporary multinational force to facilitate the restoration of Lebanese government sovereignty. Since this was a peace-keeping force there were to be no bullets in the weapons. It was going to be “please,” and “thank you,” and everyone was going to behave themselves. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Someone had taken new bottles of Johnson&Johnson’s Extra-Strength Tylenol™ capsules from store shelves, laced them with potassium cyanide, and put them back on the shelves. A sick 12-year-old girl in Elk Grove Village, Illinois took one of these capsules and died. Six others would die but the crime would never be solved, although James William Lewis would be convicted of extortion for sending a letter to Johnson&Johnson taking credit for the deaths and demanding $1,000,000 to stop. In 2011 the FBI would solicit DNA from Ted Kaczynski in “Supermax,” to verify that this had not been one of his ecoterrorist acts. An auction of his belongings was being planned, to pay off part of the $15,000,000 he owed his victims and their families, and the items to be auctioned included an original handwritten version of his manifesto, written on lined 3-hole paper, with the current high bid being at more than $14,000. His later draft, typed, was also being offered, for about $2,500. Ted would provide a DNA sample, he offered, only after the government canceled that auction.

Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel asked the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court to constitute a board of inquiry into the events of September 17th in Beirut.

A Paganini for violin solo by Alfred Schnittke was performed for the initial time, in Leningrad. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1983

In July the United States began to undertook a series of exercises in Honduras that some believed might lead to conflict with Nicaragua. This would be going on until 1989. On August 8, 1983, President Ronald Wilson Reagan reported the deployment of two AWACS electronic surveillance planes and eight F-15 fighter planes and ground logistical support forces to assist Chad against Libyan and rebel forces. On September 29, 1983, Congress passed the Multinational Force in Lebanon Resolution (P.L. 98-119) authorizing the continued participation for eighteen months.On October 25, 1983, the President reported a landing on Grenada by US Marines and Army airborne troops to protect lives and assist in the restoration of law and order and at the request of five members of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

“The reason we gave for the intervention – American medical students there– was phony but the reaction of the American people was absolutely and overwhelmingly favorable,” Irving Kristol would explain. “They had no idea what was going on, but they backed the president. They always will.”

April 18, Monday: A massive car bomb destroyed the US embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, collapsing part of the building. 63 were killed and hundreds injured, mostly Lebanese. The US ambassador himself narrowly escaped injury, but newspaper reports indicated that the entire CIA staff had been wiped out. One US Marine guarding the Embassy was among the dead. Several terrorist organizations, including Islamic Jihad, would claim responsibility.

Ellen Taaffe Zwilich was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Music for her Symphony no.1, the 1st woman to win the honor.

Profils for 7 instruments and tape by Jean-Claude Risset was performed for the initial time, at Centre Georges- Pompidou, Paris.

Horn Trio for french horn, violin, and piano by Charles Wuorinen was performed for the initial time, at the 92nd Street Y, New York, with the composer himself at the keyboard.

Piano Sonata no.12 op.145 by Vincent Persichetti was performed for the initial time, in Notre Dame, Indiana.

Snow Dreams for flute and guitar by Joan Tower was performed for the initial time, in St. Paul, Minnesota.

August 29, Monday: 2 US Marines were killed and 14 injured by mortar fire from Muslim militiamen surrounding Beirut.

The 5-year-old state of emergency in Chile was lifted by US-backed dictator General Augusto Pinochet.

September 6, Tuesday: 2 US Marines were killed and 3 injured by artillery fire from Muslim militiamen in Beirut.

The Druse militia captured Ghamdun, east of Beirut, in an area evacuated by the Israelis. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

October 23, Sunday: At 6:22AM a truck was driven into the headquarters of US troops in Beirut, exploding a bomb that demolished the building and killed 241, 220 of them of the 1st Battalion, 8th Marines. Then at 6:24AM a bomb was detonated at the barracks housing French paratroopers in Beirut, killing 58 soldiers and 2 terrorists.

The government of Grenada assured the US embassy of the safety of its citizens on the island.

Guai ai gelidi mostri for two altos, instrumental ensemble and electronic sounds by Luigi Nono to words of Cacciari was performed for the initial time, in the Großer Sendesaal, Cologne.

October 25: 5:30AM: 1,900 US Marines and US Army soldiers with token contingents from Antigua, Barbados, Dominica, Jamaica, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent Islands invaded Grenada in the West Indies. Despite hurried, inadequate preparations and woefully inept intelligence, they managed to secure Pearls Airport, Point Salinas, and Ft. Frederick. During the attack a United States Navy plane bombed a psychiatric hospital on Grenada, killing 12. The facts about this bombing would be kept secret until October 31st.

British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher told Parliament that she had expressed her “very considerable doubts” to President Ronald Wilson Reagan upon hearing of his plan to invade Grenada. The French government termed this “a surprising action in relation to international law.”

December 4, Sunday: When US warplanes attacked Syrian positions east of Beirut, 2 got shot down. One aviator was killed and the other captured. In Beirut, 8 US Marines were killed by Druse militia artillery fire.

String Quartet II by Morton Feldman was performed for the initial time, at the University of Toronto.

December 19, Monday: A House of Representatives report placed the primary blame for the bombing of the US Marines barracks in Beirut on the Marine commander at the scene, but also criticized the entire chain of command including the “policy making authority” in Washington DC.

December 28, Wednesday: A Pentagon report on the bombing of the US Marines barracks in Beirut laid blame on commanders at the scene, on intelligence, and on policy makers. It faulted a constant “emphasis on military options” rather than diplomacy.

The Reagan administration informed the UN that it intended to withdraw, by December 31st, 1984 from UNESCO. . HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1984

January 30, Monday: A US Marine was killed and 3 injured when their positions were shelled by Muslim militia in Beirut, Lebanon.

Zwei Balladen after Guillaume de Machaut for chorus and instruments was performed for the initial time, over the airwaves of Süddeutscher Rundfunk, Stuttgart, and was directed by its composer Mauricio Kagel himself.

The initial public performance of Study for Player Piano no.45 by Conlon Nancarrow took place in Los Angeles.

February 7, Tuesday: Muslim militia pushed the Lebanese army out of the western portion of Beirut, Lebanon.

After a week of saber-rattling, during which he deemed suggestions that we should withdraw to amount to “surrender,” President Ronald Wilson Reagan did order the US Marines out of Beirut, Lebanon.

Captain Bruce McCandless II became the 1st human to travel in space untethered to a spaceship, as he exited the space shuttle Challenger (then he was closely followed by Colonel Robert L. Stewart, the 2d human to travel in space untethered to a spaceship).

February 15, Wednesday: Druse militia pushed the Lebanese out of their positions south of Beirut, Lebanon, linking up with Shia militia and thereby surrounding the US Marines at the Beirut airport.

President Gemayel of Lebanon signed a Saudi Arabian peace plan which included trashing the May 17th, 1983 treaty with Israel.

Concerto for saxophone and orchestra by Robert Ward was performed for the initial time, at Ovens Auditorium in Charlotte, North Carolina.

February 26, Sunday: US Marines, having accomplished approximately nothing, completed their withdrawal from Beirut, Lebanon.

July 31, Tuesday: All US Marines except embassy guards, after a pointless 533-day “intervention,” departed from Lebanon.

After 4 days of meetings in Beijing, Chinese and British officials came to agreement about the future of Hong Kong.

Philip Van Doren Stern died of a heart attack in Sarasota, Florida at the age of 83. The body would be placed in the Jewish Center of Venice Cemetery in Venice, Florida with the grave of his wife Lillian Diamond Stern (who had died in 1979). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1985

The world’s atomic testing continued: TIMELINE OF EXPLOSIONS

The South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty. Multilateral agreement among the nations of the South Pacific.

My mother Mildred Geraldine Mattox Smith Turner was by this point living in a doublewide during the winters, with her husband Wilson Turner the fisherman, at a pond in Kissimmee, Florida near Orlando and Disney World. The pond was about a third the size of Walden Pond. She had had a number of ministrokes, and had had the operation that cleans the goop out of one’s artery into the brain and leaves a long scar up the side of the neck. I visited her, and come Sunday she put the arm on me to attend her church there. This was one of those megachurches that have what looks like a Broadway stage, with a state of the art sound and light system, instead of an altar or pulpit. Their “worship” was entertaining, but I had had a swiftie pulled on me. In his sermon, the blow-dry preacher told a joke about the USMC and then asked if there were any ex-Marines in the pews, “Would you please stand,” and allova sudden Mom starts to give me the elbow, I was supposed to stand up. A bunch of guys stood up, in this huge audience in this huge auditorium, and the preacher honored them and called for a round of applause. I was mortified. If there is anything in my life that I am ashamed of, it is that when given the choice of USMC or prison, I caved and put on that uniform. –But my mom, bless her pointy head, had set this up with her pastor in advance.

On the way back toward the doublewide on the pond, we passed through beautiful downtown Kissimmee and I viewed their town monument, which was an erection made up of a rock from every state in the US of A. We passed a high-rise office building (well, high-rise for Kissimmee), and Mother announced that that was where the atheists had their office. From the back seat, I went “Huh?” and she explained that there was this bunch of atheists, who were always trying to cause trouble, and agitate, and prevent people from praying, and mock God, and they had an office with a lot of initials in the name of it. But she couldn’t remember the initials. So I suggested “Maybe you mean the ACLU?” and she went “That’s it, the ACLU.”

One of my more horrible memories, which I will insert here because I don’t remember exactly in what year it happened, is of sitting at the kitchen table there in that doublewide, staring out at the necks and heads of the cormorants cruising around in that pond and listening idly to her tell me about a recent neighborhood happening. “See that raft over on the other side,” she pointed out, “there were some niggers, lived over there. One day one of them drowned,” and on like that. I gradually began to pay attention, and learned that my mother and her fisherman husband had recently sat at that kitchen table, right next to a telephone, and watched a preadolescent black child drown about a hundred yards away — and learned that it had not occurred to either her or her husband to reach out and pick up the telephone and dial 911. They had witnessed a drowning as if it had been a TV drama. Now, my mother was a warm and affectionate and sensitive person who cared deeply about other people and I don’t believe that would have been possible, had the child in question been white. Understand, also, that my mother was not entirely white (in public school I had repeatedly been warned to stay away from the white girls). Understand, also, that my family of origin was not Southern, but was from Brazil, Indiana and Olney, Illinois. White righteousness was precious to them, and for that reason, among other reasons, my family of origin was intensely religious. –Being religious was our way of being righteous. –Being righteous was our way of being white. –Being white was our way of being safe. Being safe, and white, and righteous, and religious, meant condemning other people to Hell for their wickedness. Being safe, and white, HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE and righteous, and religious, is a strange animal: In my case, my family of origin’s being safely white and righteous and religious had on the day after my high school graduation meant taking me and my twisted spine to the edge of town with a suitcase and dumping me by the side of the road as a so-called atheist.

Well, back from this general reminiscing about undated events, to things that for sure did happen during this particular year of 1985: During contract talks this year, extending into the following year, the labor council representing workers at the Department of Energy’s Fernald, Ohio production facility for the fabrication of uranium atomic cores demanded disclosure of all human studies involving Uranium and Plutonium, as well as information about toxic releases to the environment, use of atomic workers as experimental subjects, and the confiscation and destruction of human bodies. (This is the plant that I didn’t know about because it was operating under a cover story, that was only a few miles downwind of where my family and I had lived on Wyscarver Road in Sharonville, Ohio in the 1965-1968 timeframe.) HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE The response of the DOE officials was to contact AFL-CIO leadership and threaten to close the plant if labor there would refuse to honor its “national security obligations.” The unions complied, backing off on their demands for information and, eventually, abruptly terminating their legal council that had been communicating these disloyal demands to the government. After being thus summarily fired, the legal council presented a copy of the smoking-gun “Buchenwald” memo that had been written in 1950 by Joseph Hamilton, the scientist in charge of radiation experiments at the University of California, to reporter Matthew Wald of the New York Times. (The New York Times would, however, do nothing whatever with this smoking-gun information. It was simply unthinkable, that our government had in secret been conducting harmful tests upon us, using us as expendable guinea pigs! Who would be willing to believe such a thing?) SECRET MEDICAL EXPERIMENTS ASSLEY HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE June 19, Wednesday: A car bomb killed 75 in Tripoli, Lebanon.

Gunmen killed 13 at sidewalk tables in San Salvador. Among the dead were 4 US Marines and 2 US civilians who were apparently targeted, 5 Salvadorans, a Chilean, and a Guatemalan.

Little Suite of Four Dances for Eb clarinet and piano by William Bolcom was performed for the initial time. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1986

December 1, Monday: Discretion being the better part of valor, before a Senate panel investigating the Iran Contra arms sale US Marines Lieutenant-Colonel Oliver North stood tall and proud in uniform, while seeking refuge behind the 5th Amendment to the US Constitution — his right not to be forced to incriminate himself. GOVERNMENT SCANDALS

Duck and cover, guy!

Billionaire H. Ross Perot was expelled from the board of directors of General Motors.

What Time Is It? for boys chorus and jazz orchestra to the words of the composer was performed for the initial time, in New York City, directed by its composer T.J. Anderson. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1987

June 17, Wednesday: An American television reporter was kidnapped in Beirut.

Central Park Reel for violin and piano by Lukas Foss was performed for the initial time, in Victoria Concert Hall, Singapore.

In Beverly Hills, California, Stanley Kubrick’s “Full Metal Jacket,” about the US Marine adventure in Vietnam, was shown for the 1st time.

July 17, Friday: US Marine Lieutenant-Colonel Oliver North and US Navy Rear Admiral John Poindexter began testifying to the regarding the Iran/Contra scandal. They had only been following orders. GOVERNMENT SCANDALS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1988

February 17, Wednesday: A US Marine officer working for the UN was kidnapped near Tyre, Lebanon.

March 16, Wednesday: As part of the Iran-Contra affair, US Marine Lieutenant-Colonel Oliver L. North and US Navy Vice-Admiral John M. Poindexter of the National Security Council were indicted on charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States of America.(Defraud their nation? Get serious, these are dedicated military GOVERNMENT SCANDALS

personnel, standing ready and willing to give someone else’s life for their country!)

April 5, Tuesday: Arab terrorists hijacked a Kuwaiti airliner and diverted it to Mashhad, Iran. They demanded that Kuwait release 17 Shiite terrorists.

As rival Shiite militias battled each other for 4 days in southern Lebanon, 51 were killed and 130 injured.

1,300 US Marines began arriving in Panama.

Agents of the federal government of the United States of America kidnapped a suspected drug trafficker in Honduras, and spirited him to the USA in direct violation not only of the Honduran constitution but also of international law. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1989

December 1, Friday: As President George Herbert Walker Bush would announce on the following day, fighter planes from Clark Air Base assisted the Aquino government of the Philippine Islands in repelling a coup attempt. In addition, 100 US Marines were sent from the Navy base at to protect the United States Embassy in Manila. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

December 20, Wednesday: United States Marines were part of the force that attempted to capture Panama’s dictator, General Manuel Antonio Noriega. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

December 21, Thursday: President George Herbert Walker Bush reported that he had ordered US military forces to Panama to protect the lives of American citizens and to bring his former good old buddy General Manuel Antonio Noriega to justice. the US troops that had invaded Panama, including US Marines, had failed in their effort to capture Noriega. The event would be denounced by the UN General Assembly (by February 13th, 1990 all the invasion forces would have been withdrawn). US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1990

The United States of America invaded Panama to oust General Manuel Antonio “Pineapple Puss” Noriega, who used to be President George Herbert Walker Bush’s good-ol’-buddy despite the fact that he dealt in hard drugs.

US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Speaking of interventions, by this point an unsubstantiated assertion or “Fake News” item had gained popularity — that more American Vietnam combat veterans of the US Army, US Navy, and US Marine Corps had been committing suicide since the US exit from that theater of operations than had actually been killed there in combat. As near as we can now tell, this assertion seems to have been initiated in the original edition of POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDERS OF THE VIETNAM VETERAN, a 1980 text for use by the Department of Veterans Affairs Veterans Outreach Center Program. That source was not based upon studies and failed to provide substantiation for its assertion, and in fact in subsequent editions, this assertion is absent. However, by 1981 this too-shocking-to-be-disbelieved “fake news” item had elaborated into one according to which more than 50,000 had committed suicide. By 1985 “more than 50,000” had become “58,000,” by 1986 “more than 50,000” had become “60,000 or more,” and by 1987 “more than 50,000” had become “more than 100,000.” In 1988 a CBS network news anchor asserted with great apparent authority on the airwaves that between 26,000 and 100,000 suicides had occurred among Vietnam veterans “depending on which reputable source you believe.” Yeah, “depending on which reputable source you believe” the talking head said! The problems with such pseudo-statistics are, 1st, that there simply has never existed any reputable source for such information since no statistical study has ever been attempted, and, 2d, that the numbers cited are merely preposterous: if such statistics even approximated reality we would have been seeing obituaries of Vietnam veterans in our newspapers, on each and every day of the year some 14 instances asserting the possibility that the death was a suicide, for some 30 years — and clearly we have not been subjected to such a daunting string of obituary suicide reports. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE August 5, Sunday: US Marines landed in Monrovia, Liberia to evacuate foreign-nation civilians threatened by civil war (they would successfully extract 125 over the course of 3 days).

The Japanese government banned oil imports from Iraq and Kuwait, ends exports to those countries, and suspends all monetary transactions with them.

August 25, Saturday: The 7th Marine Expeditionary Brigade began its buildup (Operation Desert Shield).

The United Nations Security Council voted 13-0-2 to grant member states the right to use force in the embargo of Iraq.

Lebanese terrorists released Irishman Brian Keenan after 4 years in captivity.

200,000 Bosnian Muslims gather in Foca to pay tribute to Muslims killed by Serbs during World War II. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1991

Louis Farrakhan declared that the Gulf War was going to turn out to be the “War of Armageddon which is the 62 final war” (Abanes, Richard. END-TIME VISIONS. NY: Four Walls Eight Windows, 1998, page 307). Just prior to Operation Desert Storm, a US Marine attorney provided the following decency-for-idiots description of the law of war: “All the laws of war boil down to these 3 fundamentals. 1. If it needs to be killed, kill it. 2. If it doesn’t need to be killed, don’t kill it. 3. If you see somebody killing something that doesn’t need to be killed, try to stop them. Any questions?”

Exemplifying a more “Rashomon-like” what-is-truth frame of mind, Alfred A. Knopf of New York, a subsidiary of Random House, published Simon Schama’s DEAD CERTAINTIES (UNWARRANTED SPECULATIONS) in regard to the famous Professor John White Webster/Doctor George Parkman case. There are no facts, only interpretations — so maybe the butler did it.

62. Armageddon = the place (possibly to be identified with Har Megiddo, the Mount of Megiddo, near Tel Aviv, near which many battles were fought) designated in REVELATION 16:16 as the scene of the final battle between the kings of the earth at the end of the world. Here is the layout of the Battle of Megiddo as won by the pharaoh Thutmose III over the Canaanites in 1482 BCE: HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE The bulk of the reviews of this book characterize Simon Schama’s speculations as unwarranted.

By the time of the Gulf War cease-fire, Iraq had weaponized anthrax (using strains of the microorganism that had been collected in Texas and supplied to Saddam Hossein by the United States federal government), botulin toxin, and aflatoxin and had several other lethal agents in development. Inspectors from the UN Special Commission (UNSCOM) would spend frustrating years chasing down evidence of the scope of this program, the very existence of which Iraq would indignantly deny. The UNSCOM team would find that Iraq’s stockpile included Scud missiles that had been pre-loaded with disease organisms. GERM WARFARE

On January 18th, President George Herbert Walker Bush reported that he had directed US armed forces to commence combat operations on January 16th against Iraqi forces and military targets in Iraq and Kuwait, in conjunction with a coalition of allies and UN Security Council resolutions. On January 12th Congress had passed the Authorization for Use of Military Force against Iraq Resolution (P.L. 102-1). Combat operations would be suspended on February 28th.

On May 17th, President Bush stated in a status report to Congress that the Iraqi repression of the Kurdish people had necessitated a limited introduction of US forces into northern Iraq for emergency relief purposes.

On September 25-27th, after widespread looting and rioting broke out in Kinshasa, US Air Force C-141s transported 100 Belgian troops and equipment into Mnshasa. US planes also carried 300 French troops into the Central African Republic and hauled back American citizens and third country nationals from locations outside Zaire. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

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January 4, Friday: United States Marine helicopters evacuated personnel (281 in total) from the US Embassy at Mogadishu, Somalia.

April 14, Sunday: United States Marines were ordered to Iraq/Turkey border to help a multinational relief force protect Kurds.

A final round of voting in the Albanian elections left the final count: Communists 169, Democratic Party 75, Omonoia 5, Veterans Committee 1.

Marching to a Different Song for soprano and chamber ensemble by Jonathan Lloyd to his own words was performed for the initial time, in Bracknell, Great Britain.

Frederick Douglass, an opera by Ulysses Kay to words of Dorr, was performed for the initial time, in Newark Symphony Hall, New Jersey.

April 30, Tuesday: United States Marines assisted millions of homeless after a cyclone killed 125,000 in Bangladesh.

David Oddsson replaced Steingrimur Hermannsson as Prime Minister of Iceland.

Concerto for bass trombone, strings, timpani and cymbals by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich was performed for the initial time, in Chicago on the composer’s 52nd birthday. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE May: US Marine Eric Larson, Gulf War conscientious objector, was formally charged with “desertion in time of war,” an offense punishable by execution in front of a firing squad, and became the 1st of our conscientious objectors since WWI to thus face a death sentence for taking such a stand (some 2,500 military personnel would apply for CO status during this military operation).

! OHNE MICH

19 survivors of a Saudi Arabian oil tanker explosion found safe harbor in St. Helena. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1992

December 9, Wednesday: United States Marines landed in Somalia to rescue foreigners, as part of “Operation Restore Hope.” US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

December 10, Thursday: President George Herbert Walker Bush reported that he had deployed US armed forces to Somalia in response to a humanitarian crisis and a UN Security Council Resolution determining that the situation constituted a threat to international peace. This operation was part of a US-led United Nations Unified Task Force and would come to an end on May 4th, 1993. US forces would continue to participate in the successor United Nations Operation in Somalia, which the UN Security Council would authorize to assist Somalia in political reconciliation and restoration of peace. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1993

June 20, Sunday: US Marines returned to Mogadishu, Somalia to maintain peace. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1994

April 12, Tuesday: US Marines evacuated foreigners from Rwanda. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

September 20, Tuesday: In regard to the Enola Gay exhibit, Peace groups met with Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Director Martin Harwit. The Reverend John Dear submitted ten suggestions and the Fellowship of Reconciliation issued a press release: “The basic tone, we would argue, should be that the atomic bombing ... was a grave mistake and that the only way to ensure that it never happens again is to dismantle every nuclear weapon and every weapon of mass destruction that we possess and learn non-violent ways to resolve international conflict.” WORLD WAR II

The US Army, and 1,900 Marines, without resistance at Cap-Hatien, Haiti. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Pro-Aristide demonstrators were clubbed by police in Port-au-Prince. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1995

In this year the United States Marine Corps took over from the Haitian forces which during the period 1915- 1934 they themselves had trained, who had been making a mess of things, and again ran Haiti, again making a mess of things.

Michel-Rolph Trouillot’s SILENCING THE PAST: POWER AND THE PRODUCTION OF HISTORY (Beacon Press). Reviewed by Bob Corbett, June 1996 Without writing a book about Haiti, Michel-Rolph Trouillot has written one of the most interesting books about Haiti I’ve ever read. SILENCING THE PAST: POWER AND THE PRODUCTION OF HISTORY is a philosophy of history, that is, a book about how history is created by historians. Reality, what is, is created by events and processes. But history is the human narration of that reality as seen by the historian. On Trouillot’s view the serious and honest historian tries to tell the story as accurately as possible from the data — the various records left in time. But, it is a crucial part of Trouillot’s thesis that much of the past, even the past which is preserved in records, gets “silenced,” gets passed over or pushed to the background. This scholarly book is the story of how history is produced and how this selective “silencing” occurs. Of course, the flip side is there too — history is the story of what is not silenced, of what is broadcast and generally accepted as “history,” the general narrative of the past that most of us learn and internalize. Trouillot reminds us “human beings participate in history both as actors and narrators.” Events and processes often leave traces — records of various texts, and ideally, the narration of history is from these sources. However, no historian, no narrator of the past, has access to all sources, nor deems each source of the same value or power in creating the narration. To some genuine extent each historical narrative is a fictional story, but with special power. But history is “fiction” with special power — the power is that it is not regarded as fiction by its hearers, and most of us who “consume” history come to believe there is THE PAST — a relatively true narration of the past which shapes not only our view of the past, but explains our present and dictates our future as well. Trouillot is concerned with the various silences which spring up in the process of making history and he identifies four specifically: • there is a silencing in the making of sources. Which events even get described or remembered in a manner which allows them to transcend the present in which they occurred? Not everything gets remembered or recorded. Some parts of reality get silenced. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE • there is a silencing in the creation of archives — the repositories of historical records. Again, choices are made, accidents occur, judgments made, and some of our recorded past is silenced. At times this archival silencing is permanent since the records do not get preserved; other times the silencing is in the process of competition for the attention of the narrators, the later tellers of the historical tales. • the narrators themselves necessarily silence much. In most of history the archives are massive. Choices, selections, valuings must be done. In this process, huge areas of archival remains are silenced. • finally, not every narrative becomes a part of the “corpus,” the standard historical narrative received and accepted by various groups as THE PAST. This “corpus” will be different for professional historians, critical readers, the general public and so on, but only a handful of narrations become the final produce: “history.”

It is Trouillot’s purpose to trace this process of the creation of history, cautioning us as consumers of history, to be critically aware of the “silencing of the past” and of the often ideological nature of historical narrations. In order to illustrate these philosophical concepts Trouillot turns to two examples from Haitian history, which, for those especially interested in Haitian history, can be read as fascinating “narrations” separate from Trouillot’s larger purpose. On the other hand, these Haitian narratives draw one into Trouillot’s general thesis. The first “Haitian story” is that of Sans Souci — the palace of Henri Christophe? Well, yes and no. Trouillot deals with three Sans Soucis. • the palace of Henri Christophe, which is the standard narrative • the palace of Frederick the Great in Potsdam, Germany • finally the “real” story here, Sans Souci the person, colonel in the Haitian Revolution. Who? we ask? Who is this Sans Souci? And that is Trouillot’s point. He is the “silenced” Sans Souci.

Colonel Jean-Baptist Sans Souci was an African born slave who emerged as a leader very early in the revolution. He excelled in guerrilla-like tactics, a fact which interests Trouillot a great deal since it suggests an influence on the tactics used by the Haitian revolutionaries which is usually not suggested (i.e. a silenced source). When the main revolutionary army led by Toussaint Louverture, Dessalines, Henri Christophe, Petion and others finally “submitted” to the French in 1802, Sans Souci did not, leading to a war within a war. He was especially at odds with Henri Christophe, who eventually betrayed him and murdered him, very HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE close to the spot where he later built the palace of Sans Souci. Trouillot makes much of story. The sources which survive are few, inconclusive, but intriguing. (Here is the silencing via the archives.) Even with the few sources that survive, the “war within a war,” the role of the “Bossales” (African born slaves and revolutionaries), the possible role of African-influenced guerrilla tactics, all intrigue Trouillot since they are a narrative rarely told — a silenced narrative; all of which leaves us, the twentieth century consumer of Haitian history with a view of the revolution suffering these silences of the past. The second detailed example of the process of silencing again comes from Haitian history. When the slave rebellion began in 1791, and even as it gained power and momentum, contemporary observers found it virtually impossible to take it all seriously. First of all it was unthinkable that black slaves could ever defeat the “superior beings,” the white French. And even as that phenomenon began to unfold before their very eyes, the narrators found other explanations: yellow fever or some plot of whites against white and/or mulattoes which got out of hand. (One is here reminded of Madison Smartt Bell’s recent ALL SOULS RISING.) Trouillot’s point in telling this intriguing story is to show how our conceptions of the world limit what is even “thinkable” and functions as a silencing of the past. Trouillot uses one last lengthy example to illustrate his general thesis, the story of Columbus’ “invasion.” While I won’t detail the story here, Trouillot vividly shows how later use of celebrations function as powerful forces in shaping our views of THE PAST. Trouillot’s lengthy treatment of his two Haitian examples (pages 31-107, almost 50% of the whole book), make this a fascinating read of two most unusual and untold narratives of Haitian history. Those two stories fit magnificently into a powerful story and philosophical argument about the nature of the writing of historical narratives. This primary thrust and bulk of the book I found both persuasive and fascinating. However, in the last pages of the book I was troubled by another thesis which I found to be insufficiently developed, unconvincing and even downright wrong. Trouillot rightly cautions against any notions of history as telling us THE PAST. He demonstrates the process of conscious and unconscious, of natural and human generated silencing of the past. But he goes too far in arguing that the only acceptable use of history is to shape current ideological views. He warns that “...the focus on THE PAST often diverts us from the present injustices for which previous generations only set the foundations.” (p. 150). Even more pointedly he argues: “But no amount of historical research about the Holocaust and no amount of guilt about Germany’s past can serve as a substitute for marching in the streets against German skinheads today. Fortunately, quite a few prominent German historians understand that much.” (p. 150). HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE While I find myself persuaded by Trouillot’s strong arguments that history is told in relation to the powerful forces which silence some sources while favoring others, his argument for a radical historically rooted activism seems to come from nowhere, a pronouncement rather than the result of persuasive argumentation. Despite my unwillingness to follow Trouillot in the last argument of this book, I come away from SILENCING THE PAST: POWER AND THE PRODUCTION OF HISTORY knowing I’ve read a very well argued, important and powerful book. I come away from SILENCING THE PAST having read two historical narratives of Haiti as interesting and challenging as anything I’ve read anywhere before and I’m grateful to Michel-Rolph Trouillot for yet another quality book on Haiti. One final comment in closing. Structurally SILENCING THE PAST has a preface, 5 chapters and an epilogue. Each begins with a journal-like entry from his own experiences. These personal tales, stories, are extremely fascinating and extraordinarily well written. It would be my hope that some day Trouillot might take a short vacation from his more scholarly writings and produce a volume of the personal and informal stories and reflections which he tells so well. I’d be first in line to buy a copy of such a volume. To: H-NET/IEAHC ASSOCIATION IN EARLY AMERICAN STUDIES I would like to concur with Bob Corbett’s review of Michel-Rolph Trouillot’s SILENCING THE PAST: POWER AND THE PRODUCTION OF HISTORY. This new study is must reading. Night before last my wife and I went to a screening of the recently released movie “Lone Star,” and when this movie got to its PTA-argument scene, I was reminded very strongly of Professor Trouillot’s analysis. If I had to suggest, whether to see this scene in this movie about Texas first, and then read SILENCING THE PAST: POWER AND THE PRODUCTION OF HISTORY about Haiti, or whether to read SILENCING THE PAST first, and then see the movie — I suppose I’d say read the book, then go see the movie, then reread the book. Such materials are rewardingly ruminated upon.

March 3, Friday: The last United Nations peacekeepers exited Somalia, with their positions being taken by competing Somali clans. Last out were the US Marines. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Tens of thousands of Russians paid last respects in Moscow to Vladislav Listyev, killed earlier.

In an interview published in Pagina 12, former Commander Adolfo Francisco Scilingo of the Argentine Navy claimed that 1,500-2,000 leftists had been thrown out of airplanes at altitude into the ocean by the military during the “dirty war” of the 1970s. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE March 8, Wednesday: A team of 40 US Marines rescued the Air Force pilot who had been shot down over Bosnia- Herzegovina on June 2d. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS

Costis Stefanopoulos replaced Konstantinos Karamanlis as President of Greece.

The First Composite Group suggested returning the Enola Gay to a living history museum at a restored Wendover Field, Utah: “This sparse treatment [the “new” exhibit that will simply display the plane] of what is perhaps the most famous piece of World War II memorabilia is sure to trigger a new round of criticism for the Smithsonian. [We] feel the only solution is to bring the Enola Gay home to Wendover Field where [we plan] to present it in an historically correct manner.” WORLD WAR II HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1997

May 30, Friday: Traveling with Gulliver, a theater piece by John C. Eaton to his own words after Swift, was performed for the initial time, in Boston.

US Marines helped evacuate 2,500 from Kinshasa, Zaire. US MILITARY INTERVENTIONS HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

1998

Gottlieb, Gottlieb, Bowers and Bowers produced a treatise entitled 1,000 YEARS, 1,000 PEOPLE: RANKING THE MEN AND WOMEN WHO SHAPED THE MILLENNIUM (Japan, New York: Kodansha America). Of the 1,000 influential people these authors report from the millennium, 1000AD to 1998AD, they list Henry David Thoreau, “America’s down-to-earth philosopher,” as their 375th most influential. Emerson, by way of contrast, has come in at 504th place. (Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi comes in as 2nd most influential person of the millennium, after Gutenberg.) In their list of the 1,000 most influential of the millennium, Ronald Reagan and Pocahontas don’t quite make the cut, ditto for Bill Gates and Lady Godiva. Here’s what they have to say about their #375, Thoreau, has “shaped the millennium”: Most deep thinkers are a day late and a dollar short when it comes to implementing ideas. We like Thoreau because he didn’t just talk about man’s return to nature, he lived it. Thoreau and pal Ralph Waldo Emerson (ranked 504th) laid down the tenets of Transcendentalism, which paid homage to nature and the individual. Emerson was cozy in his Concord, Massachusetts home when Thoreau chopped down some trees, built a cabin on Walden Pond, and wrote about his two-year experiment. He parlayed an overnight jail visit for failing to pay his poll tax into CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE, which made him the patron saint of the 1960s antiwar movement. At the time no one paid much attention: one night in prison –commuted when an unknown benefactor paid the tax– hardly seemed fodder for lofty ideals of resistance to an unjust civil authority. Decades later, however, even India’s Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (rated 2nd) and civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. (rated 56th), found inspiration in Thoreau’s disobedience.

One lemma frequently added to this “influence” ploy has been that although Thoreau did influence all these people, ultimately their agendas failed, because ultimately all agendas of nonviolence always fail.

Gandhiji asked us to remember that there is always a limit to self-indulgence, but none to self-restraint.63 That’s not a description of our situation but is, rather, an exhortation; the fact that it is an exhortation rather than a description is amply demonstrated by the fact that it is something which needs to be said. By way of contrast, here’s a description of our real situation in this real world: every one who exalts himself will be humbled.64 MY LOBSTER-BASKET TALE My main point is how do we who struggle to live principled lives deal with people who are only looking for the flaw in our character in order to justify selling smallpox-tainted blankets to the Menominee, tainted meat to the Cherokee, slavery to the African and yet maintain that they are virtuous because of their relative material/power successes. No matter, our intention to continue living in tender spirits remains. But to move the nation back toward the center of democratic and (forbid) liberal attitudes toward the condition of all our inhabitants. Penn’s experiment failed in about 75 years, Gandhi's in 20 and Martin Luther King in a decade. We are traveling so fast, Can the inertia be deflected toward increasing peace? How do we get people to 63. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi 1975, L:289. 64. Luke 18:14. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE choose integrity?

I think I’ll respond to this idea that the agenda of nonviolence always fails, by recounting my lobster-basket parable. One day I, while I was a US Marine infantry officer, I was issued a .45 and eight rounds of ammunition, and handed $80,000 in small bills in a brown paper sack, and told to go pay off some battalion that was arriving from sea duty. So I went down to the piers of San Francisco, locked that paper bag in the trunk of the car, and went touristing and shopping while waiting for the battalion to show up dockside. While there I was watching some lobsters in a wicker basket sitting on the pier, about three or four feet from the drop back into the safety of the brackish waters, and I noticed that the lid was not on the basket and the lobsters were groping around. I also had reason to notice that the guy who was running the lobster pot, the pot of steaming water in which these lobsters were one by one being transformed from dull green beasties to bright red beasties as customers selected them and purchased them, was keeping a careful eye on me. Evidently he was worried that I was going to grab a lobster and run for it, or something. So, partly to satisfy my curiosity and partly to disengage his suspicion, I asked him whether he wasn’t worried that his prize lobsters would heave themselves over the edge of this basket, scuttle over to the edge of the pier, and drop themselves back into the waves.

He said “Just watch them, you’ll see.” And presently I became aware that each time a lobster reached up and got a purchase on the edge of the basket and began to haul himself (or herself) upward on the wicker, another lobster or two would reach up and grab him or her and yank him or her back down into the bottom of the basket. They were keeping each other down and making certain that they would all one by one go into the pot and achieve that bright red coloration.

Well, I think it is like that with humans too. What would the world be like if there were no war and if there were no murder and if there were not any theft and if we just got along with one another perfectly and nobody ever got in anybody else’s way? I’ll tell you what the world would be like as of 2011. THERE WOULDN’T BE ANY HUMANS. We would have already destroyed our environment back in the days of the Roman Empire, or earlier, and extincted our silly selves, and the world would now be clean and beautiful, and empty of “intelligent” life.

It is suggested that Friend Penn’s experiment, Gandhiji’s experiment, and King’s experiment failed. I think not. The test of success is not perpetuation, as all good things must come to an end and be recreated afresh. Penn’s experiment was a success simply because it did come into being, and did not cease to have come into successful being merely because it “failed” to perpetuate itself — and likewise for Gandhi, and likewise for King.

February 3, Tuesday: A US Marine pilot flew his jet under the cable of a ski lift near Cavalese, Italy, snapping the cable and causing a gondola to fall 90 meters to the ground, killing all 20 aboard. HDT WHAT? INDEX

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1999

May 7, Friday: In error, a NATO warplane dropped 3 bombs on the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, killing 3 Chinese citizens and injuring 20 people.

At Camp Lejeune, North Carolina the courts martial board sentenced Captain Richard Ashby (who had previously been acquitted, but only on the charge of manslaughter) to 6 months in the brig for obstruction of justice and conspiracy, in that he helped destroy the videotape of a flight accident that had caused the death of 20 people in the Italian Alps. Upon the completion of this prison sentence he was to be dismissed from the United States Marine Corps.

Wild Air, a dance by Kevin Volans to a choreography of Davies, was performed for the original time, in the Oxford Playhouse. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

2016

Second Quarter: On the basis of United States Marine Corps statistics, Joint Forces Quarterly ran an article headlined “Officers Are Less Intelligent”: According to data obtained from a Freedom of Information Act request, the intelligence of new Marine Corps officers has declined steadily since 1980. Two-thirds of the new officers commissioned in 2014 would be in the bottom one-third of the class of 1980; 41 percent of new officers in 2014 would not have qualified to be officers by the standards held at the time of World War II. Similarly, at the top of the distribution, there are fewer of the very intelligent officers who will eventually become senior leaders.... [The Army and Air Force FOIA responses denied having any information on average Scholastic Aptitude Test scores for officers.]... It is impossible to link particular episodes in recent history to a decline in intelligence in the officer corps. However, one can point to incidents and note that they are what one would expect to see and that will be seen more often if current trends continue. For example, in May 2010, 13 junior Marine Corps officers were administratively discharged because they had cheated on a land navigation course at TBS [].... The average college student today, however, is much less intelligent than they used to be because there are so many more of them. Insofar as we believe that the military should reflect society in general, the officer corps continues to accomplish that goal. But in absolute terms, our officer corps today is less intelligent than it was 35 years ago.... Simply cutting a number of the least intelligent candidates, however, is not a solution in itself; to make the average of 2014 equal to the average of 1980, the Marine Corps would have to cut the bottom 57.4 percent of second lieutenants.... The sea change in American higher education has had a “freakonomics”-type effect on the quality of our military by lowering the average intelligence of officers.... The instinctive reaction of many members of the military will be to circle the wagons and deny that there is a problem.... HDT WHAT? INDEX

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2017

February 9, Thursday: At 6:57AM, President Donald J. Trump tweeted that Senator Richard Blumenthal (Democrat, Connecticut) “never fought in Vietnam when he said for years he had (major lie).” At 8:19AM he tweeted that CNN News interviewer Chris Cuomo “in his interview with Sen. Blumenthal, never asked him about his long- term lie about his brave ‘service’ in Vietnam. FAKE NEWS!”

To be fair to the messenger, during this interview CNN News interviewer Cuomo had in fact discussed with Senator Blumenthal his previous misstatements of his United States Marine Corps service during the Vietnam years. But never mind, for it is a fact that on 3 occasions, delivering political speeches in 2003 and 2008 and 2010, Senator Blumenthal had used words that could at the very least be subject to misinterpretation. In 2000, Slate Magazine profiled him as having “enlisted in the Marines rather than duck the Vietnam draft.” We know of no evidence that he ever sought to correct such inaccurate news accounts, which would recur and recur. In 2003, at a rally for military families in Bridgeport, Connecticut, he told the crowd “When we returned, we saw nothing like this,” continuing with “Let us do better by this generation of men and women.” This seemed to suggest that he had been one of the returning Vietnam veterans who had been ignored or condemned upon returning home after combat, and what he should have said would have been “When our Vietnam combat veterans returned, they saw nothing like this.” He should not have suggested that he had been one of these returning soldiers, for in fact he had not been sent overseas. On July 20, 2006 the New Haven Register described him as “a veteran of the Vietnam War.” On April 6, 2007 the New Haven Register described him as having “served in the Marines in Vietnam.” Speaking in 2008 to a group of veterans and senior citizens who had sent presents to soldiers overseas, he orated “We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam, and you exemplify it ... we owe our military men and women unconditional support.” We have a report from the chairwoman of the Connecticut Vietnam Veterans Memorial Inc., Jean Risley, that she had listened as he had delivered emotion-laden remarks at the dedication of that memorial in Coventry, Connecticut on May 18, 2008. She remembers him as having orated sadly that “when we came back, we were spat on; we couldn’t wear our uniforms.” Rather than having said “the days that I served in Vietnam,” what he should have said would have been something like “the days when I wore the USMCR dress uniform in safety stateside, during the period in which others were wearing the USMC utility uniform and getting shot at overseas.” He alleged, “I served during the Vietnam era, ... I remember the taunts, the insults, sometimes even physical abuse.”In fact, however, these taunts, these insults, that physical abuse had largely been an invention of the media, greatly exaggerated if it ever occurred at all, which means that he didn’t actually remember it, what he remembered was these largely exaggerated media reports of that time. And even if these things had occurred, for certain sure none of such taunts, insults, or physical abuse had been directed at him personally. On May 23, 2008 the Shelton Weekly reported on his “experience as a Marine sergeant in Vietnam.” On May 26, 2009 the Bridgeport Connecticut Post described him as “a Vietnam veteran.” On May 17, 2010 he again claimed, speaking in Norwalk, Connecticut, that he had served “in Vietnam,” but then on May 19th, two days later, challenged on this, he asserted that “On a few occasions I have misspoken about my service, and I regret that and I take full responsibility, But I will not allow anyone to take a few misplaced words and impugn my record of service to our country.” This had been a mere gaffe, “absolutely unintentional, a few misplaced words, ‘in’ instead of ‘during,’ totally unintentional.” In fact he had received “no special favors, no privileges.”

In fact Blumenthal had not been to Vietnam, had never been himself in harm’s way, and had never had occasion to be spat on. Instead, he had on at least 7 occasions sought to avoid personal inconvenience, obtaining multiple deferments between 1865 and 1970. His initial 3 draft deferments had been to pursue his studies at Harvard University, and then he obtained a 4th draft deferment for a graduate fellowship at Trinity College, HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE Cambridge, and then he obtained a 5th deferment to be a special assistant to the publisher of the The Washington Post, Katharine Graham (for this his draft deferment had been changed from the 2S educational deferment to 2A, supposedly restricted to those whom our nation needed to retain in their civilian occupation for reasons of “national health, safety and interest”), and then he obtained a 6th deferment and a 7th deferment as an aide for the urban affairs advisor in the Nixon White House. After a draft lottery in which he drew the very low number #152, a number practically guaranteeing prompt induction into the US Army, he obtained his 8th and final reprieve by volunteering to serve with the United States Marine Corps Reserve in his home state, Connecticut, in a cushy capacity with the Fourth Civil Affairs Group wearing a snazzy-looking uniform while seeing to the refurbishing of tent decks and showers at a campground for underprivileged Washington DC children, collecting and distributing toys and games in the annual Toys-for-Tots drive, organizing recycling programs in neighboring communities, and so on and so forth. To complete this period of cushy and safe Marine Reserve enlistment he also was allowed by his superiors to act as one of the law clerks of the US Supreme Court — although we have not found out whether he was allowed to don civilian clothing, or obliged to remain in military uniform, while sitting at a desk in the back rooms of the Supreme Court in Washington DC.

We should all be so lucky!

Well, but, all of this pales in comparison with the military service record of our Commander in Chief. He had a bone spur in one heel, he forgets whether it had been the left one or the right one, and also received a string of educational deferments. However, he says, he feels as if he has sacrificed for his country, because while in pricey New York Military Academy in Cornwall, New York he had been obliged to wear the school uniform, which was very military-seeming. He would claim to have received there during his high school years “more training militarily than a lot of the guys that go into the military,” quote unquote. He would write, or have ghost-written, in one of his books, NEVER ENOUGH: DONALD TRUMP AND THE PURSUIT OF SUCCESS, that he “always felt that I was in the military,” because of the uniforms and disciplines at that private academy — a school to which his parents had been forced to send him in order to deal with his poor behavior as a child. So let’s cut Blumenthal a break. (Besides, he’s a Democrat, so he can’t be all that bad ;-)

February 10, Friday: The United States of America dunned Cambodia for $500,000,000 to repay the humanitarian food assistance we provided to Phnom Penh while we were perpetrating our 1965-1973 anti-Vietcong bombing campaign along the Cambodian border. We had prevented the farmers from growing crops by dropping some 275, 000,000 tons of bombs on more than 113,000 locales, forcing more than 2,000,000 to flee from rural villages into the capitol city in fear for the lives of their families. Ambassador William Heidt orated that it was unfortunate that Cambodia, like Sudan, Somalia, and Zimbabwe, had fallen behind in its repayment to the US military for “past favors performed.” Cambodian official Hun Sen responded “Oh America, and U.S. President Donald Trump, how can this be? You attacked us, and demand that we give money.” Kenton Clymer, author of THE UNITED STATES AND CAMBODIA, 1969-2000: A TROUBLED RELATIONSHIP, points out that “The renewed American demand for repayment of the debt is very much in line with President Trump’s unsubstantiated assertion that the United States is being taken advantage of by countries all over the world.” HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE COPYRIGHT NOTICE: In addition to the property of others, such as extensive quotations and reproductions of images, this “read-only” computer file contains a great deal of special work product of Austin Meredith, copyright 2017. Access to these interim materials will eventually be offered for a fee in order to recoup some of the costs of preparation. My hypercontext button invention which, instead of creating a hypertext leap through hyperspace —resulting in navigation problems— allows for an utter alteration of the context within which one is experiencing a specific content already being viewed, is claimed as proprietary to Austin Meredith — and therefore freely available for use by all. Limited permission to copy such files, or any material from such files, must be obtained in advance in writing from the “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project, 833 Berkeley St., Durham NC 27705. Please contact the project at .

“It’s all now you see. Yesterday won’t be over until tomorrow and tomorrow began ten thousand years ago.” – Remark by character “Garin Stevens” in William Faulkner’s INTRUDER IN THE DUST

Prepared: December 11, 2017 HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE ARRGH AUTOMATED RESEARCH REPORT

GENERATION HOTLINE

This stuff presumably looks to you as if it were generated by a human. Such is not the case. Instead, someone has requested that we pull it out of the hat of a pirate who has grown out of the shoulder of our pet parrot “Laura” (as above). What these chronological lists are: they are research reports compiled by ARRGH algorithms out of a database of modules which we term the Kouroo Contexture (this is data mining). To respond to such a request for information we merely push a button. HDT WHAT? INDEX

THE US MARINES USMC GO TO MASTER INDEX OF WARFARE

Commonly, the first output of the algorithm has obvious deficiencies and we need to go back into the modules stored in the contexture and do a minor amount of tweaking, and then we need to punch that button again and recompile the chronology — but there is nothing here that remotely resembles the ordinary “writerly” process you know and love. As the contents of this originating contexture improve, and as the programming improves, and as funding becomes available (to date no funding whatever has been needed in the creation of this facility, the entire operation being run out of pocket change) we expect a diminished need to do such tweaking and recompiling, and we fully expect to achieve a simulation of a generous and untiring robotic research librarian. Onward and upward in this brave new world.

First come first serve. There is no charge. Place requests with . Arrgh.