Illuminati-R-Us

Much better than any Shakespearean nonsense, that quote.

The late lamented Kenneth Williams who from certain angles has more than a passing resemblance to Donald Trump Jr.

16 March, 1968 - One of the moment of deepest shame for the United States of America: The My Lai massacre took place. It "only" took 504 lives, but up until today it seen as a decisive turning point in the Vietnam war. No more moral high ground for Uncle Sam after slashing babies, raping women, blowing up people while still alive and machine-gunning whole lines of people on the edge of irrigation channels.

Hardly their finest hour right enough.

Also March 16th:

1190 - around 150 jews are massacred at York Castle.
1872 - first ever win of a football cup, the English F.A. Cup, by Wanderers FC.
1940 - James Ibister is the first person to be killed by a WW2 air raid in the UK, in Orkney.
1945 - the historic German town of Würzburg is almost entirely destroyed by the RAF in 20 minutes. No strategic value, but certainly not a war crime. No sir.

Lianachan wrote:1945 - the historic German town of Würzburg is almost entirely destroyed by the RAF in 20 minutes. No strategic value, but certainly not a war crime. No sir.

These occurrences always bring to mind a great line from DS 9, when Miles O'Brien barks at a Cardassian, 'I don't you for what you did to us, I hate you for what you turned us into.'

20th March, 1649: The House of Commons of England passes an act abolishing the House of Lords, declaring it "useless and dangerous to the people of England".

That move doesn't seem to have been very effective...

20 March, 1995: The Tokio subway is attacked with a nerve gas, Sarin. 13 people died. The perpetrators belong to a crackpot sect named Aum Shinrikyo. It's leader, Shoko Asahara, was sentenced to death, along with 11 other members of his sect. He has been on death row since 2006.

21st March, 867: Death of Ælla, King of Northumbria. Anglo-saxon sources say he was killed in battle at York, while Norse sources say he was executed by Ivar using the blood eagle - a particularly gruesome ritual execution method of uncertain historicity, which everybody should google.

21st March, 867: Death of Osberht, an earlier (and the "rightful") King of Northumbria, who had been usurped by Ælla 1 - 5 years earlier. Killed with Ælla.

No, no-one should google bloodeagle.

100 years ago today was the start of the Kaisersclacht, the German Spring Offensives in the West which were their last throw of the dice. Ludendorff knew the German armies couldn't take many more defensive battles so used the troops freed up by the Russian surrender in the East to attack in the West. After initial success the attacks failed for a number of reasons, partly the German High Command were out of ideas, and partly the German tactics burned up the good units leaving only mediocre and poor units to defend after the initial assaults.

March 26th, 1031: Birth of Máel Coluim mac Donnchada, King of Scots from 1058 - 1093. Known as Malcolm Canmore (from ceann mòr, Gaelic for "great chief"). By most accounts, a good king. He was never king up here, though, we were still doing our own thing in those days.

Lots of things named after him round these airts.

Heid the Ba wrote:Lots of things named after him round these airts.

"Canmore" to me is this, which I use all the time.

Nice use of a fine example of a Gaelic word that's been adopted into Scots/English, by the way.

March 27th, 1871: First ever rugby union international sees Scotland beat England in Edinburgh.

March 28th, 1917: J.R.R. Tolkien attends a medical board examination in Furness, and is found to be improving, but with pains in his knees and elbows.

April 6th, 1320: The signing of the Declaration of Arbroath, the principles of which were recently abandoned by 55% of the North British.

This was yesterday, but....

April 8th, 2013 - Ding-Dong! The Witch Is Dead.

April 9th, 1747 - Simon Fraser, 11th Lord Lovat becomes the last person executed by beheading in Britain.

This is the man who turned out to be a woman half his age?

Yes, that's the fellow.

9 April, 1945 -
1 fall of Königsberg to the Red Army, after a gruelling, madly suicidal defence campaign by a fanatical Gauleiter
2 Execution by hanging in Flossenbürg concentration camp of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a Protestant priest of the Confessing Church, a counter-institution to the gleichgeschaltete German Christians. There are very few people Germans can be truly proud of during those last months of the war, but he is one of them.

Here is a poem he wrote vor the New Year 1945, already arrested and knowing they would most probably kill him. I don't know about the translation, but it's quite touching in the German orignal.

By loving forces...

By loving forces silently surrounded,
I feel quite soothed, secure, and filled with grace.
So I would like to live these days together,
and go with you into another year.

Still matters of the past are pressing our hearts
and evil days are weighing down on us.
Oh Lord, to our souls, so scared and sore,
give rescue, as it's that you made us for.

And when you pass to us the bitter chalice
of suffering, filled to the brim and more,
we take it, full of thanks and trembling not,
from this, your caring and beloved hand.

But if you want to please us, over and again,
with our shining sun and wondrous world,
let us muse on what is past, and then we shall,
with our lives, in all belong to you.

Warm and bright be our candles' flame today,
since into gloom you brought a gleaming light,
and lead again us, if you will, together!
We know it: you are beaming in the night.

When silence now will snow around us ev'rywhere,
so let us hear the all-embracing sound
of greater things than we can see and wider,
your world, and all your children's soaring hail.

By loving forces wonderfully sheltered,
we are awaiting fearlessly what comes.
God is with us at dusk and in the morning
and most assuredly on ev'ry day.

© Hilmar H. Werner, 2010
25.10.2015: 3d slightly altered version (text in the musical sheets still has to be up-dated)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, evangelical theologian, member of the anti-nazi resistance movement.
Written shortly before the turn of the year 1944/45.
Bonhoeffer was killed by the Nazis on April 9, 1945.

Bleak and inspiring at the same time, thanks.

The war dieary of the last days of WWII is full of important moments:

10 April, 1945
Fall of Hannover to the U.S. Army
Last flight of a Luftwaffe plane over England (yes, really! Only a reconnaissance flight, but still. April 45!)
RAF bombers bomb 1139 tons of bombs in the bombing of Plauen (in the corner between Bavaria, Saxonia, and Bohemia), all of 6 days before it was taken by the U.S army.

In quite a different vein, but very illustrative of how it's a pain and a koy to be German, here is another big anniversary:

One of the greatest pieces of music, ever, Johannes Brahms' German Reuqiem, was first performed 150 years ago today in Bremen Cathedral (on Good Friday of that year).
Have a look here. Claudio Abbado is one of the great conductors of the century, he performs the piece with his beloved Berlin Philharmonic (the performance is in Vienna, if I am not mistaken. . God, how many memories I have of the people on that stage.

11th April 145: Birth of Septimius Severus, Emperor from 193 - 211 and one of the most prominent of those who were Roman in the gloaming. He arrived in Britain in 208 with a huge force, intent on conquering all of what's now Scotland. He strengthened Hadrian's Wall, conquered southern Scotland and refortified the Antonine Wall. Cassius Dio describes this campaign as:

Cassius Dio wrote: Severus, accordingly, desiring to subjugate the whole of it, invaded Caledonia. But as he advanced through the country he experienced countless hardships in cutting down the forests, levelling the heights, filling up the swamps, and bridging the rivers; but he fought no battle and beheld no enemy in battle array. The enemy purposely put sheep and cattle in front of the soldiers for them to seize, in order that they might be lured on still further until they were worn out; for in fact the water caused great suffering to the Romans, and when they became scattered, they would be attacked. Then, unable to walk, they would be slain by their own men, in order to avoid capture, so that a full fifty thousand died. But Severus did not desist until he approached the extremity of the island. Here he observed most accurately the variation of the sun's motion and the length of the days and the nights in summer and winter respectively. Having thus been conveyed through practically the whole of the hostile country (for he actually was conveyed in a covered litter most of the way, on account of his infirmity), he returned to the friendly portion, after he had forced the Britons to come to terms, on the condition that they should abandon a large part of their territory.

For his 210 campaign, he said to his soldiers:

Septimius Severus wrote:Let no-one escape sheer destruction, no-one our hands, not even the babe in the womb of the mother, if it be male; let it nevertheless not escape sheer destruction.

During this campaign, he fell ill and returned to Eboracum (York), where he died in 211.

He has left a wealth of archaeological evidence, much of it very well preserved, in Scotland.