Picture of the day

[Gibbs505]

 

[diopter]

British 'R' class WW1 vintage 15 in battleships at sea, 1930: HMSs Revenge, Ramillies, Royal Sovereign and Resolution, taken from sister HMS Royal Oak. The latter was to be sunk by U 47 with heavy loss of life inside Scapa Flow in October 1939; all the other sisters survived WW2.

 

[Gibbs505]

Thanks D!

 

[shredder]

Portrait of Captain Edward Camden: Volusia County, Florida, April 1917. "He put on his Civil War veteran's uniform and tried to register for the draft on the first day of World War I."

Slightly old for military service, no?

You'd never see something like this in this day and age.

 

[purple]

Slightly old for military service, no?

You'd never see something like this in this day and age.

Actually we might if we are to believe a recent Leger survey which indicated that only 22% of Quebecers and 45% of other Canadians would take up arms to protect their country.

 

[grelmar]

Actually we might if we are to believe a recent Leger survey which indicated that only 22% of Quebecers and 45% of other Canadians would take up arms to protect their country.

Got a link for that? Was trying to explain to a friend why another country would have to be crazy to invade Canada, in spite of our small military. My reasoning is "Canada is huge, we have a lot of guns in private hands. Look how much trouble the US Military had trying to control a relatively small piece of desert."

He contended that Canadians are soft and would just roll over and take it.

My counter is that with 30 million people, if even 5% fought back, that's 1.5 million people roaming this vast land to try and round up and control, and I don't think there's an army in the world up to the task.

 

[purple]

I picked this up in the Toronto G&M last month. Its a report on Leger's new book, "Cracking the Quebec Code".

 

[RMXC51]

Got a link for that? Was trying to explain to a friend why another country would have to be crazy to invade Canada, in spite of our small military. My reasoning is "Canada is huge, we have a lot of guns in private hands. Look how much trouble the US Military had trying to control a relatively small piece of desert."

He contended that Canadians are soft and would just roll over and take it.

My counter is that with 30 million people, if even 5% fought back, that's 1.5 million people roaming this vast land to try and round up and control, and I don't think there's an army in the world up to the task.

Unfortunately there would be 15 million Canadians all too eager to turn in the 1.5 million patriots, just to get their face on cbc

 

[Gibbs505]

 

[grelmar]

Ok, this should be an easy one for some of you:

Medically retired from service in WWI after an enemy grenade shattered his knee.

Spent a couple decades recuperating (and making a small fortune in business), then after the attack on Pearl Harbour, petitioned the President to be re-instated.

He was re-commissioned as a Lt. Colonel.

While serving in New Guinea, an enemy grenade shattered the same knee.

He holds the distinction of being the only US soldier to be medically discharged, for the same injury twice in two different wars.

 

[vandoo66]

Unfortunately there would be 15 million Canadians all too eager to turn in the 1.5 million patriots, just to get their face on cbc

Not once those 15 million would, one by one, start becoming bloody unrecognizable messes. The number would radically decline.
Just saying

 

[LA cowboy]

Ok, this should be an easy one for some of you:

Medically retired from service in WWI after an enemy grenade shattered his knee.

Spent a couple decades recuperating (and making a small fortune in business), then after the attack on Pearl Harbour, petitioned the President to be re-instated.

He was re-commissioned as a Lt. Colonel.

While serving in New Guinea, an enemy grenade shattered the same knee.

He holds the distinction of being the only US soldier to be medically discharged, for the same injury twice in two different wars.

He looks like the Col from I dream of Genie

 

[vandoo66]

He looks like the Col from I dream of Genie

The Psychiatrist.

 

[diopter]

Roses are Velt. Argh, he bald.

 

[Gibbs505]

 

[fraserdw]

Ok, this should be an easy one for some of you:

Medically retired from service in WWI after an enemy grenade shattered his knee.

Spent a couple decades recuperating (and making a small fortune in business), then after the attack on Pearl Harbour, petitioned the President to be re-instated.

He was re-commissioned as a Lt. Colonel.

While serving in New Guinea, an enemy grenade shattered the same knee.

He holds the distinction of being the only US soldier to be medically discharged, for the same injury twice in two different wars.

Archibald Roosevelt, his cousin went ashore on D Day despite crippling arthritis and saved Utah beach. Quite an American warrior family in the old minute man tradition; never professional soldiers but always professional at soldiering.

 

[grelmar]

Roses are Velt. Argh, he bald.

Archibald Roosevelt, his cousin went ashore on D Day despite crippling arthritis and saved Utah beach. Quite an American warrior family in the old minute man tradition; never professional soldiers but always professional at soldiering.

Correct. Kinda like the way diopter phrased it.

And fraserdw: Too true. I came across the tidbit about Archibald clicking through the Roosevelt clan on Wikipedia. You could write an entire history of "crazy brave things Roosevelts did during wartime."

 

[grelmar]

Not once those 15 million would, one by one, start becoming bloody unrecognizable messes. The number would radically decline.
Just saying

Every nation has its Quislings. They seldom have a happy ending to their story.

 

[Dark Alley Dan]

Bit of a story to this one. Africa, 1914, and this ship, the SMS Konigsberg, is playing hob with British shipping on the east coast:

She was tracked down by Major P.J. Pretorius, a fellow who had a long and unpleasant history with the administration of German East Africa (please read about this in Capstick's Death in the Silent Places, great read) and set upon by two monitors (HMS Mersey and HMS Severn, towed to the location from Belgium, just for this party) and HMS Goliath at the Battle of the Rufiji River in November, 1914.

Here's Goliath, flagship of the wee fleet:

(She was sunk by Turkish topedo boats in the Dardenelles on May 13th of the following year, losing 570 of her 700 crew.)

And a few of the monitors, an interesting class of boat - shallow draft, big guns, not pretty:

Not sunk - just low.

Konigsberg after the gentle attentions of His Majesty's Navy:

A small action in a backwater theater, but of such things are interesting stories made.

 

[RRCo.]

William Hiseland (6 August 1620? – 7 February 1732/33), sometimes spelt William Hasland or Haseland, was an English and later British soldier and reputed supercentenarian. In 1709, at the age of eighty-nine, he fought at the Battle of Malplaquet and was believed to be the oldest soldier on the field. He lived to become the last survivor of the English Civil Wars, which he had served in from 1642 to 1651.

Hiseland attained the rank of sergeant. In extreme old age he became a Chelsea pensioner, although he had to give up his place as an in-pensioner when he married at the age of 103. He is buried at the Royal Hospital, Chelsea.

The inscription on Hiseland's tomb in the Royal Hospital's burial ground reads as follows:

Here Lies WILLIAM HISELAND
A Vetran if ever Soldier was
Who merited well a Pension
If Long Service be a Merit
Having served upwards of the Days of Man
Antient but not Superannuated
Engaged in a series of Wars Civil as well as Foreign
Yet not maimed or worn out by either
His Complexion was fresh & florid
His Health hale & hearty
His Memory exact & ready
In Stature He exceeded the Military size
In Strength He surpassed the prime of Youth
and What rendered his Age Still more Patriarchal
When above one Hundred Years Old
He took unto him a Wife
Read Fellow Soldiers and Reflect
That there is a Spiritual Warfare
As well as a Warfare Temporal
Born VI of August 1620 Died VII of Feb. 1732 Aged 112

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Hiseland

Jean Thurel, or Jean Theurel (6 September 1698 – 10 March 1807),[3] was a fusilier of the French Army with an extraordinarily long career that spanned over 75 years of service in the Touraine Regiment. Born in the reign of Louis XIV and dying during that of Napoleon I, Thurel lived in three different centuries.

Thurel was born in Orain, Burgundy in 1698. He enlisted on 17 September 1716 in the Régiment de Touraine at the age of 18 and served there for 75 years altogether, under Louis XV and Louis XVI, until 29 January 1792.

Thurel was severely wounded in battle on two occasions. In 1733, during the siege of Kehl, he was shot in the chest with a musket, and at the battle of Minden in 1759, he received seven sword slashes, including six to the head. Three of his brothers were killed in the battle of Fontenoy in 1745. One of Thurel's sons was a corporal and a veteran in the same company who died at the Battle of the Saintes, a naval battle that occurred on 12 April 1782 off the coast of Dominica, West Indies during the American Revolutionary War.

A well-disciplined soldier of the line infantry, Thurel was only admonished once during his entire career, during the 1747 Siege of Bergen as the French troops occupied the citadel. He was admonished because, the doors of the fortress being shut, he scaled its walls to gain entry so that he would not miss muster.[4] Another example of Thurel's discipline and physical fitness occurred in 1787. When his regiment was ordered to march to the coast to embark on ships of the French Navy, he was given the opportunity to travel in a carriage due to his advanced age. The 88-year-old Thurel refused the offer and marched the entire distance on foot, stating that he had never before traveled by carriage and had no intention of doing so at that time.[5] His humility is evident in his steadfast refusal to accept any promotions; he remained a low-ranking fusilier for his entire military career.

On 26 October 1804, at the age of 106, Thurel became one of the first recipients of the newly established Ordre National de la Légion d'Honneur (National Order of the Legion of Honor), the highest decoration in France.[4] Napoleon I also rewarded him with a pension of 1,200 francs. He was later appointed as the "oldest soldier of Europe". He remained healthy in body and spirit throughout his remarkably long life. He died in Tours on 10 March 1807, at the age of 108, after a brief illness

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Thurel