Musings and History

Quote of the day:
On the TV show “Hollywood Squares” Don Knotts was asked “As people age which has the most trouble sleeping men or women?” Don answered “It is worrying about which one I am is what keeps me up at night.”

Trivia question of the day
Who played the police chief in the movie Casablanca? Answer at the end of the blog.

Does anyone know how the custom of clinking the rim of your glass with someone else before taking a drink came from? It certainly was not for the purpose of fellowship. Among royalty of the middle ages the act of poisoning someone became a common route up the ladder of power. So they began exchanging a little of their beverages from glass to glass to show that there had been no poisoning.

Some of you have probably heard this but the tradition of hand saluting in the military also began in the Middle Ages. When two knights in armor approached each other, they would raise the visor on their helmets if there was no hostile intent.

And finally, the act of shaking right hands as a show of friendship began with the knights once again. When two knights approached each other they would show the palm of their right hands to indicate that there was no hidden knife. That did not get the job done so they began grabbing each others hands and wrists to make sure there was no knife hidden in their sleeves.

                 This Date in History   November 14

1862 On this date President Abraham Lincoln approved US General Ambrose Burnside’s plan for the capture of the Confederate capitol of Richmond, Virginia. Burnside was the replacement for US General George McClellan who had been fired by Lincoln for being an obnoxious horse’s ass. McClellan was the architect of landing troops southeast of Richmond and attack Richmond up the James River Peninsula. Well, he ran into CSA General Robert E. Lee in a series of battle over the span of seven days and McClellan had his ass handed to him and he retreated back down the peninsula and took his ass back north. However, he ran into Lee again near a small town in Maryland named Sharpsburg. The battle took place near a body of water named Antietam Creek. This was the bloodiest single day in American history and the battle was called a draw. Both armies were beat up badly which forced Lee to retreat back into Virginia to regroup and refit. McClellan, remembering what happened to him in Virginia before, decided to wait a couple of months near Sharpsburg and refused to follow Lee into Virginia. This was the last straw and Lincoln canned him in favor of Burnside. Burnside’s plan was to march down the east bank of the Rappahannock River cross over to the west side near the town of Fredericksburg, Virginia and attack Richmond from the south. Lincoln would have rather had Burnsides to try and crush Lee’s army but for the lack of any other choice he approved Burnside’s plan. So Burnsides’ went down the river bank until he was opposite Fredericksburg but he had to wait for two days because of the weather. By then Lee’s army had deployed on Marye’s Heights facing the River and had pre-registered (aimed) their artillery. Burnsides sent his troops on the attack a regiment at a time and those poor guys were literally chopped to pieces. This did not slow Burnside down he kept sending more and more troops into that cauldron for 14 separate charges. All of them failed. Can you imagine what those soldiers that were in the 14th charge were wading through? Anyway, Burnside ordered a retreat but then there came three days of torrential rain which turned the roads into quagmires. Burnsides’ retreat bogged down and the Confederates on the opposite bank was sniping at them from cover and was yelling taunts at them. Burnside finally completed his retreat after suffering horrendous losses. This was an ignominious end to the combat command of US General Ambrose Burnsides.

1851 Earlier an author named Herman Melville had published a novel named Typee about his experiences aboard a trading ship in the south Pacific. But on this date he released one of the most engrossing books ever written. He gave us Moby Dick. This novel is based on Melville’s experiences on a whaling vessel. The first line of this book is famous: “Call me Ishmael.” It is a story of the revenge of a whaling vessel captain named Ahab against an albino sperm whale that he named Moby Dick, for taking off his right leg on an earlier expedition. His desire for revenge was absorbed by the rest of his crew and their whole being became aimed at killing the great whale. I will let it go at that and y’all can find out what happened on your own. It gives you an insight to the depths that human hatred can descend.

1882 This is a tale about one of the lesser known gunmen in the old west named Franklin “Buckskin” Leslie. According to him he was either born in Texas or Kentucky depending upon his mood at the time. He also said that he went to medical school in Europe. No one really knew much about him except he was a very capable gunman. He gained a reputation as a bad-ass long before he arrived in that famous city of hell called Tombstone, Arizona. He was not as well known as the Earp brothers and Doc Holiday but he was just as deadly. He got into a cuss-fight with man named John Killeen about Killeen’s wife. They drew down on each other and Killeen was killed. Very shortly afterward Leslie married the former Mrs. Killeen.  After a while of him beating her up, his wife and Leslie were divorced. Leslie then took up with a Tombstone prostitute. Then one night he got drunk and chose to shoot and kill the prostitute. Even in Tombstone, the killing of a woman would not be tolerated and “Buckskin” went to the slammer for ten years. After he was released he returned to Tombstone and resumed his life of before. He had a drinking partner named Johnny Ringo that was just as mean and deadly as Buckskin. Ringo was found dead outside Tombstone in Turkey Creek and yet another gunslinger named Billy “The Kid” Claiborne blamed Buckskin as the murderer. No one knows why, but on this date Claiborne proclaimed all of this in public which was essentially a challenge to Buckskin to fight and fight they did. Claiborne lost. After this the trail of Buckskin becomes obscure. Some claim that he made a fortune in the Klondike gold fields no one really knows but Buckskin Leslie faded from the pages of history. By the way, Wyatt Earp later claimed that it was he that had killed Johnny Ringo at Turkey Creek.

1940 On this date German Luftwaffe bombed the hell out of the English city of Coventry. There is a story that Winston Churchill knew that the Germans were going to attack Coventry because they had broken the German code named Enigma which is what the Luftwaffe used. He could not warn the people of Coventry that a raid was coming because then the Germans would know their code had been broken. War is hell.

Born today:

1952 US Representative Maureen Murphy. She said “The reason there are so few women politicians is that is so much trouble to put make-up on two faces.” I think we all know a female politician that has multiple faces, don’t we?

Answer to the trivia question:
The police captain in the movie Casablanca was Claude Rains.

      Thanks for listening   I can hardly wait until tomorrow