Infinite Wisdom

"I cannot for the life of me comprehend the religion of an officer who prays all one day, and flogs his men the next."

La Triviata

• What one historian has called “the most comprehensive scheme ever devised for the invasion” of Britain was issued at the end of December 1941, by a special joint staff of the Royal Navy, the Royal Air Force, and the British Army which had been formed to help develop defense plans in the event Hitler tried his luck.
• During his invasion of Italy in 1494-1495, Charles VIII of France was astonished to discover that to maintain an army of 20,000 men in the field required him to feed about 30,000 camp followers – wives, engineers, children, waggoners, priests, whores, physicians, and more.
•  Hans Delbruck, who wrote the monumental History of Warfare in the Framework of Political History (1920), served as a lieutenant in the Prussian 29^th (Rhineland) Infantry Regiment, during the war with France in 1870-1871, and later rose to major in the reserves, the highest rank allowed.
• Formed in 1702, the British 38^th Foot (South Staffordshires) served in West Indies from 1705 until 1763, occasionally receiving drafts to replace the many men lost to disease, though only rarely pay, and apparently never a new issue of uniforms (nor battle honors for services on Guadalupe and Martinique during the Seven Years’ War until 1909!), an experience that was long commemorated by small patches of brown cloth worn under the cap and collar badges, to commemorate their predecessor's need to improvise repairs to their kit.
• During the fifteenth century it was common for German mercenary companies to have a special officer named the “Booty Master,” charged with assessing the value of and overseeing the division of loot.
•  In 1930 there were only about 500 African-American personnel among the 80,000 enlisted men in the U.S. Navy, almost all of whom were serving as messmen.
• In the Second Century, the minimum height requirement for cavalry recruit in the Roman Army appears to have been 5 feet 10 inches in Roman measure, about 5 feet 8 inches in English usage.
• During the Imperial period (1871-1918), most Prussian generals belonged to the Prussian Evangelical Church, though about 7 percent belonged to various Protestant denominations that were not part of the state church and about 5 percent were Roman Catholics.

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