Infinite Wisdom

"Wise men say, and not without reason, that whoever wished to foresee the future, might consult the past."

La Triviata

• Once, told that Rebel raiders had just captured a brigadier general and a herd of horses, President Lincoln is said to have remarked that the loss of horseflesh troubled him greatly, for "I can make a brigadier general in five minutes, but it's not easy to replace 110 horses."
• Of about 13.2 million men who served in the German Armed forces during World War I, only about 50,000 were charged with desertion.
• From its establishment in 1934 to its abolition in 1991 nearly 12,000 people received the title “Hero of the Soviet Union,” included Gamal Abdal Nassar of Egypt, Fidel Castro, and several other dictators, as well as Ramón Mercader, who got his for murdering Trotsky, which must have greatly chagrined the many men and women who won theirs under fire.
• Between 1789 and 1796, agents of the Spanish government secretly subsidized James Wilkinson, a Revolutionary War veteran and later the senior officer of the U.S. Army, to the tune of about $30,000, today easily $12 million on the basis of equivalent minimum wage.
• On the first day of the landings in North Africa (“Operation Torch,” Nov. 8, 1942), Maj. Gen. George S. Patton’s Western Task Force lost 219 out of its 320 landing craft, primarily due to poor boat handling by inexperienced crews.
• During World War I, dogs donated for military service who failed training with the British Army were usually shot, rather than returned to their original owners.
• Launched in Nova Scotia in 1970 as part of preparations to commemorate the bicentennial of the American Revolution, HMS Rose, a full-sized replica of the 1757 28-gun frigate of that name, was later rebuilt to serve as the 24-gun HMS Surprise for the 2003 movie Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, and now sails out of San Diego.
• Conscription regulations introduced in France by the restored Bourbon monarchy in 1818 remained in force with only minor modifications through the Orleanist monarchy of 1830-1848, the Second Republic of 1848-1852, and the Second Empire of 1852-1870, not being abolished until after the collapse of Napoleon III’s regime and the institution of the Third Republic during the Franco-Prussian War.

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