Infinite Wisdom

"We went to sleep on the laurels of Frederick the Great"

La Triviata

• Werner G. Goering, a native of Utah and member of the Mormon Church, served as a B-17 pilot in the Eighth Air Force during World War II, flying 48 missions over Europe, and often tangling with the Luftwaffe, which was commanded by his uncle, Herman Göring.
• When British Maj. Gen. James Wolfe secured his celebrated victory – and met his death -- over the French under Montcalm on the Plains of Abraham, outside Quebec (Sep. 13, 1759), his army included only one piece of artillery.
• Since every admiral commanding a fleet needs a flagship, even if he's running his operations from a shore-side desk, for part of the Second World War the Commander, Second Fleet flew his flag from the U.S.S. Constellation, a sloop-of-war completed in 1854, which is now preserved at Baltimore.
• Perhaps the busiest rail line in Germany during mobilization in 1914 was the Berlin metro, as it linked several railroad stations in the city, making it easier for hundreds of thousands of troops converging on the capitol from different parts of the country to switch trains without having to march through the streets.
• At the height of the "French Wars" (1793-1815), every East India Company ship sailing for Britain allocated at least 16 percent of its cargo space to carrying saltpetre, so that His Majesty's soldiers, sailors, and marines would have an adequate supply of gunpowder.
• During the Second World War, one of the 98 generals who saw service in the U.S. Marine Corps was arguably a "native son" of Japan, as Maj. Gen. Samuel Calvin Cumming was born in Kobe to American missionary parents in 1895.
• At the Council of Arles in 314, the assembled churchmen adopted a canon that forbade Christian soldiers from "throwing away their arms," that is, deserting the service.
• To help British housewives cope with rationing and food shortages during the war, in 1940 an enterprising publisher brought out A Kitchen Goes to War, which contained 150 recipes from some of the country's leading citizens, including mystery writer Agatha Christie, actor John Gielgud, art historian Kenneth Clark, and even Mrs. Neville Chamberlain.

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