Infinite Wisdom

"In war we must be swift."

--	Silius Italicus

La Triviata

• On October 31, 1918, the last day of the existence of the Imperial-and-Royal Austro-Hungarian Navy, the shortly-to-be-unemployed Minister of Marine announced a major round of promotions for senior officers.


• The “Star Spangled Banner” – the one that flew over Ft. McHenry during the British bombardment in 1814 – was hand-sewn by Mrs. Mary Young Pickergill and her 13-year old daughter in a brewer’s malt-room, for which labors they were paid $405.90, more than two years’ wages for a common laborer.


• During the desultory Austro-Papal War of 1708-1709, Pope Clement XII’s army retreated so often that his troops earned the nickname Papagallini – The Pope’s Chickens.”


• From 1942 until shortly after World War II both the U.S. and Britain conducted repeated experiments in airdropping mules, but were unable to come up with an effective technique, much to the misfortune of quite a number of the poor animals.


• Among the benefits accorded young Athenian men who had lost their fathers in war was the gift of a hoplite panoply – sword, armor, shield, etc. – when they came of age.


• In addition to his prodigious military accomplishments and voluminous literary output, the great German Field Marshal Helmuth von Moltke found time to raise pigeons.


• During World War II it cost the US an average of $1,000 to prepare an airplane for shipment abroad by sea.


• It was not until 1916 that Congress finally resolved the last claims made by the states for expenditures incurred in the common defense during the War of 1812, paying North Carolina $25,000.


• During the 1880s an annual average of 41 in every thousand troops in the Regular Army were hospitalized for alcohol-related problems, though the rate for the men of the four “Colored” regiments was only 5.5 in every thousand.

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