Category Archives: Historical Figures

Strange Bedfellows

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This phrase refers to unlikely companions or allies; or usual opponents banding together. Dictionary.com says it is often used in the phrase “politics makes strange bedfellows.”

Bardwords quotes the phrase from The Tempest Act 2, Scene 2:

“Alas, the storm is come again! My best way is
to creep under his gaberdine; there is no other shelter hereabout:
misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows. I will here
shroud till the dregs of the storm be past.”

They further say that “although set in different times many of the most famous quotes about life and love by William Shakespeare are still relevant today. Did you know that William Shakespeare is credited by the Oxford English Dictionary with the introduction of nearly 3,000 words into the language?”

Encyclopedia.com notes that the expression “adversity makes strange bedfellows” was an early 17th-century saying meaning that difficult circumstances will bring together very different people. So I guess Shakespeare can’t take all the credit. And the full phrase “politics makes strange bedfellows” was a mid 19th century proverbial saying. Wikiquote says the phrase “politics makes strange bedfellows” was used in print by American essayist and novelist Charles Dudley Warner. The phrase appeared in his 1870 book My Summer in a Garden.

Equating adversity with politics sure fits these days. Maybe it always has.

America’s Forgotten History – Surprising, Important, and Sometimes Funny

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here is whereHere is Where is a fun read. Andrew Carroll had a file of clippings about events in “America’s great forgotten history.” He was also between jobs and between girlfriends, so he decided to visit the sites of events that have no plaque, no memorial, and may only be known to local historians.

Carroll’s style is conversational. He writes about his problems arranging his trips, contacting people who might know about the sites he is seeking, even his troubles operating the car’s GPS. While he is on the trail of some particular event, he is sometimes distracted by other places he discovers.

Carroll concentrates on little-known events that had an impact on the nation. For example, the first amphibious landing and ground campaign of World War II was on American soil. During the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, a Japanese plane crashed on Niihau, an outlying Hawaiian island. The pilot survived and the residents seized documents from his cockpit and held the pilot until authorities could arrive. Three residents of Japanese descent tried to help the pilot escape. There was a gun battle and a death before Company M of the 299th Infantry arrived on the island. Americans were “terrified” by the “sudden betrayal of their neighbors” by the three Japanese-Americans. The fact that Company M included loyal Japanese-Americans got lost. This event contributed to the internment of Japanese-Americans.

He also covers some famous Americans who have memorials that may be in the wrong place. Daniel Boone – who did not wear a coonskin cap! He wore a felt Quaker hat with a brim that came in handy shielding his gun barrel during muzzle-loading in rainy weather. A fifteen foot obelisk in Kentucky displays a carving of Boone in a coonskin cap, much to the annoyance of a local historian. He is also “peeved by the last image, of Boone fighting Native Americans… If anything, he was a peacemaker.” But the obelisk gets into the book because it marks one of two Daniel Boone graves. The other is in Missouri. The Missouri gravesite was raided and some bones brought to Kentucky. The original grave contained jumbled remains from several individuals and only some bones were retrieved, so Boone probably lies in both graves. Continue reading →

The Man Behind the Rosenbergs

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the-man-behindThis is a fascinating book written by retired KGB agent Alexander Feklisov with Sergei Kostin. The book begins with an interesting description of Feklisov’s life in the Soviet Union as a youngster and his eventual acceptance into the INO, or Soviet Foreign Intelligence. He is sent to the United States early in World War II and spends four years sending and receiving messages without being involved in espionage. He is a capable and loyal employee and he eventually enters the world of the “illegals” with the assignment of recruiting spies from the many Americans who sympathized with the Communism and the Soviet cause. I found it interesting that Feklisov ardently defended his contacts as being “anti-fascist activists” and not Communist spies.

Feklisov’s advancement in Soviet intelligence was enhanced by the remarkable fact there were few older agents when he began his training. Feklisov was surprised there “…was only one older officer in our section…” He “…later learned that the Stalinist purges had not spared the intelligence services. The leadership of the INO had been decimated as much as the Red Army by the end of the 1930s.” It is difficult to understand Feklisov’s dedicated loyalty to the Stalinist system after such a revelation.

Feklisov was almost prohibited from receiving a foreign assignment because he wasn’t married. He was told, “How can you recruit any agents if you can’t even recruit a wife?” His immediate supervisor praised his abilities and recommended him for an overseas assignment. He even complimented him with the comment, “If you want my opinion, it’s rather good that he didn’t get married on command. It goes to prove he’s a serious sort of fellow.” That and the fact the NKVD was short of people in the United States led to his assignment in New York as a communication specialist.

He became Alexander Fomin with the code name “Kalistrat” and was assigned to establish a clandestine radio link. The announcement of the Nazi attack on the USSR revealed some attitudes that disturbed Feklisov, or Fomin. Senator Harry Truman announced that Russia should be helped if the Germans were winning or the Germans should be helped if the Russians were winning. “The first prize for bluntness would go to the New York Daily News, which published a cartoon depicting the USSR and Germany as two snakes fighting each other. The caption read, ‘Let’s let them eat each other!’” Feklisov felt Roosevelt was fairer in his assessment. “His attitude toward the USSR in general, now that it was bearing the brunt of the war effort was favorable.” (My reading of history says that FDR’s attitude went far beyond “favorable.) Continue reading →

Capture and Escape in the Golden Age of Piracy

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at the point of a cutlassIf you’re in the mood for some pirate tales but your tastes run to non-fiction, here’s the book for you – At the Point of a Cutlass by Gregory N. Fleming. Fleming presents the story of Philip Ashton, a young New England fisherman who was kidnapped from his boat by pirates in 1723. It was three years before Ashton returned home, and a large part of that time he was marooned, alone, on an uninhabited Caribbean island. Ashton published his story in a memoir which is one of Fleming’s sources.

Fleming rounds out his book with the story of piracy in the era. “The governor on Bermuda, John Hope, would blame the surge in Atlantic piracy on Spanish efforts [to evict other nationalities.] ‘It is no great wonder if they embrace the only thing left them to do… This, my lords, is the reason and source of piracy.'”

Pirates were remarkably democratic for the 18th century. “The captain and quartermaster for a pirate ship were elected by the crew, a practice that stood in stark contrast to the nearly unlimited power of sea captains on naval or merchant ships.” Pirate ships had written articles to govern the ship that each man signed, and each signed crewman got an equal vote. Each pirate got a share of the loot, and the captain got a double-share.

Where a fishing or merchant ship might have less than a dozen sailors, pirate ships would carry fifty or more to have enough hands to attack and seize other vessels. Since many men were needed on a pirate ship, they routinely took captives to fill their ranks. Some signed the articles to join the crew willingly, but many were “forced”, beaten and abused until they signed. Anyone who signed would be executed if the ship was captured by authorities, and any association with pirates might get a man executed.

Ashton refused to sign on the ship that captured him, and his life aboard was difficult. One day he was able to hop into a boat going ashore for water (food and water aboard ship were horrible – no wonder they drank alcohol whenever possible). He hid onshore and was left behind without any tools, weapons, or even shoes. He was almost dead when a Scotsman arrived in a canoe. The Scotsman left his supplies with Ashton and left to go hunting, never to be seen again. But at least Ashton had his supplies, including a knife and a flint to make fire. Eventually he was rescued. Continue reading →

Killing Patton

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killing patton book cvrThis is another in the series of “Killing” books written by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard, and my wife says this is her favorite book in the series. The subtitle of the book is “The Strange Death of World War II’s Most Audacious General.” The book does present some compelling evidence that Patton may have been killed. He did create some powerful enemies, including some in the U.S. military, Stalin, and some Germans.

The book begins with a description of Private First Class Robert W. Holmund, an explosives expert in Patton’s army. Private Holmund and his fellow soldiers have been ordered to attack a heavily fortified and mostly underground fortification called Fort Driant. The bombing and artillery strikes that preceded the assault have had no effect on the Wehrmacht fighters who have remained safe within the fort’s fifteen-food thick walls and hidden forest pillboxes. Machine guns that the soldiers have named “Hitler’s Zipper” because of the high-speed ripping sound as it fires twelve hundred rounds a minute open up on the attackers as their advance stalls at the barbed wire around the fort. The machine guns are joined by rifle fire, mortars, and artillery. The Americans eventually disengage and crawl back to safety. Eighteen have been killed or wounded. And that’s just the start.

The soldiers try again a few days later, and this time they make it through the barbed wire to again be faced with precision fire from everything the Germans have. The survivors are forced to hastily dig foxholes to escape the barrage. The medics race from foxhole to foxhole to tend to the wounded until they are killed. The soldiers find a way into to the tunnels and battle the Germans underground. The survivors withdraw to the foxholes and the Germans mount a counterattack. There are only four of Holmlund’s squad left alive by the time a sniper’s bullet fells him. The descriptions of the combat are vivid.

The book intersperses descriptions of Patton and the speeches he gave his troops to prepare them for war with descriptions of the war. He said, for example, “Americans despise cowards.” “Americans play to win all the time. I wouldn’t give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That’s why Americans have never lost nor will ever lose a war; for the very idea of losing is hateful to an American.” I wondered whether the parents of Private Holmlund wished he had been a little less brave. Continue reading →

What Do You Do?

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“When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?”

I was saddened to discover this wonderful quote is apocryphal.

Wikiquotes says a 1940 book titled A Treatise of Melancholie by Timothie Bright, attributes a close version to John Maynard Keynes: “When my information changes, I alter my conclusions. What do you do, sir?” But this source is also in question.

Quote Investigator says “The earliest statement found… that fits this template was not spoken by Keynes but by another prominent individual in the same field, Paul Samuelson who was awarded the 1970 Nobel Prize in economics.” He used it on Meet the Press in 1970: “Well when events change, I change my mind. What do you do?”

The Economist calls the quote an “oral tradition.”

It’s such a good thought that I’m willing to believe many people bandied it about and created their own versions. I’m glad someone said it.