The odd objects looted from Washington DC in 1814

 

 

(BBC) Other than an off-colour tweet and subsequent apology by the British Embassy, the bicentennial of the punitive mission of 1814 that left the US capital in flames has received little attention this week.
The burning was one of the final events of the often-forgotten War of 1812, a conflict which saw the US try and fail to grab bits of Canada and Britain try and fail to blockade the US. British troops torched the White House, Treasury and parts of the Capitol Building in a punitive mission near the end of the war. They also looted what they could, effectively collecting "souvenirs".
After the attack, the Royal Navy sailed to Bermuda with their spoils, included four paintings of King George III and Queen Charlotte, a grandfather clock and President James Madison's personal government receipt book. Continued

1859: First Temporary Insanity Defense in U.S.

(Wikipedia) ... Sickles's career was replete with personal scandals. He was censured by the New York State Assembly for escorting a known prostitute, Fanny White, into its chambers. He also reportedly took her to England, leaving his pregnant wife at home, and presented White to Queen Victoria, using as her alias the surname of a New York political opponent. In 1859, in Lafayette Square, across the street from the White House, Sickles shot and killed the district attorney of the District of Columbia Philip Barton Key II, son of Francis Scott Key, who Sickles had discovered was having an affair with his young wife.  Continued

The Greenbrier Ghost

(Wikipedia) The Greenbrier Ghost is the name popularly given to the alleged ghost of a young woman in Greenbrier County, West Virginia, United States, who was murdered in 1897. The events surrounding the haunting have led to it becoming a very late instance in American legal history in which the testimony of a "ghost" was accepted at a murder trial. Continued 

 

 

Hampton takes flak for title of black history program

(Baltimore Sun) Officials at the Hampton National Historic Site in Towson this week officially changed the name of a black history program planned for next month after controversy erupted over its original title — "Slave for a Day."
The July 8 event, which park ranger and event organizer Angela Roberts-Burton said is part of the historical site's monthly black history educational series, caused a stir on the Internet for what some believe was insensitive wording. Continued

Photo: Farm at Hampton (Falmanac)

Too Soon? Gettysburg gift shop pulls Booth bobbleheads

(Hanover Evening Sun) Bobblehead dolls of Abraham Lincoln's killer have been removed from the bookstore at the Gettysburg Museum & Visitor Center.
The bobbleheads of John Wilkes Booth drew criticism last week from some visitors and a distinguished historian who said they felt Lincoln's death should not be trivialized, nor his killer celebrated with such a souvenir. Continued

York GAR post was named for slain U.S. general, and apparent pachyderm, John Sedgwick

(Cannonball) Major General John Sedgwick was one of the highest ranking officers in the Union Army to lose his life during the Civil War. He commanded the Sixth Corps of the Army of the Potomac for much of the war until perishing at the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House on May 9, 1864, when a Confederate sharpshooter shot him in the head from across the lines.
Sedgwick, when warned of the danger only moments before and observing his men ducking when they heard rifle fire, reportedly sneered, "What? Men dodging this way for single bullets? What will you do when they open fire along the whole line? I am ashamed of you. They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance." Continued

Trees of Perry Point

"This is a video I made of the trees of Perry Point. The engravings are from mentally ill patients from the Veterans Hospital. They date back to 1911." For more information see http://hdghistory.wordpress.com/

Disputed Va. textbook wasn't reviewed by history experts

(Washington Post) State officials had no historian review the textbook "Our Virginia" before it was distributed to fourth-graders last month with a passage saying - wrongly, according to most scholars - that thousands of African Americans fought for the Confederacy during the Civil War. The Virginia Department of Education has long said that its textbooks are vetted by review committees "made up of content specialists, teachers and other qualified persons." But department spokesman Charles Pyle said Thursday that the review committee for "Our Virginia" consisted entirely of three elementary school classroom teachers. Continued

Jackboots on Whitehall Trailer

Civil War Road Trip: How Robert E. Lee Saved the Union

(Slate) ... Located about 15 miles east of Atlanta, Stone Mountain is a large granite monadnock, into which has been carved a bas relief sculpture of Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Confederate President Jefferson Davis. ... A large crowd has formed on the lawn beneath the sculpture, and a booming voice is welcoming visitors and thanking a group of corporate sponsors. The show begins. It's every bit as strange as I'd hoped it would be. Continued

First World War officially ends on Sunday

(Yahoo! News) The First World War will officially end on Sunday when Germany pays off the last of the enormous debt which was set by the Allies 92 years ago. Continued

Why isn’t Labor Day in May?

(Dictionary.com) In more than 80 countries, on May 1, labor unions and working people take to the streets. The holiday is often referred to as International Workers’ Day or May Day.
The day marks the 1886 Haymarket Affair in Chicago, where police shot and killed several demonstrators who were fighting for the eight-hour workday. Over the next several years, people across the globe began demonstrating on May 1, and in many countries the day became an official holiday. Continued

The Great Moon Hoax of 1835

(HistoryBuff.com) Every History of American journalistic hoaxing properly begins with the celebrated moon hoax which "made" the New York Sun of Benjamin Day.It consisted of a series of articles, allegedly reprinted from the nonexistent Edinburgh Journal of Science, relating to the discovery of life on the moon by Sir John Herschel, eminent British astronomer, who some time before had gone to the Cape of Good Hope to try out a new type of powerful telescope. Continued

Hauling William Penn into court

(Lancaster Online) William Penn has been dead almost 300 years, but that doesn't stop his name from popping up in the most unexpected places. Take civil cases filed with the Lancaster County prothonotary's office, where Penn is a recurring defendant in proceedings known as actions to quiet title. In layman's terms, that means plaintiffs want the court to give them title to a piece of land whose ownership is unclear. Continued

A Legal Battle Over Jim Thorpe’s Remains

(NYTimes) ... He very likely never visited the towns of Mauch Chunk and East Mauch Chunk, straddling the Lehigh River in the Pocono Mountains of eastern Pennsylvania. But months after Thorpe died in 1953 at age 64, his third wife, Patricia, struck a deal.
Build a monument and care for the remains, and a nifty roadside attraction and Jim Thorpe’s name for the merged towns are yours. And so it has been, for more than 50 years. Continued

Image: Library of Congress

Seasonal bear hysteria heats up

(Baltimore Sun) Less than two weeks after a young black bear was fatally injured by a car on the Beltway near Lutherville, state wildlife officials are tracking another bruin last spotted Wednesday in Cockeysville." I suspect this guy dropped down from Pennsylvania along the Susquehanna River," said Harry Spiker, a bear biologist with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources. "This bear is probably wishing he hadn't come this way." Continued

When Liquor Was Prescribed as Medicine

Author Daniel Okrent describes how wealthy people managed to evade Prohibition in this episode of Slate V's Bookmark. Link

No lard for Navy plebes in yearly academy ritual

(AP/Google) As they have for 70 years, students at the U.S. Naval Academy celebrated the end of their grueling first year by scaling a 21-foot obelisk on Monday. But this time, without a lard coating on the monument, students completed the task in minutes. Continued

Image: Naval Academy, Annapolis, Md., May 20, 2004 (US Navy/Wikipedia)

Nuts and Dolts

(NYTBR) Paranoia is a bipartisan temptation. Amid last August’s town hall frenzy, there was a stir over a poll showing that roughly a third of Republicans believed that Barack Obama had been born outside the United States. Liberals trumpeted the finding as proof of the Republican base’s slide into madness. But conservatives had a rebuttal: As recently as 2007, they pointed out, polls showed that a third of Democrats believed George W. Bush knew about 9/11 in advance.
Neither statistic would come as a surprise to a reader of “Voodoo Histories: The Role of the Conspiracy Theory in Shaping Modern History,” a sweeping tour of the paranoid style in Western politics by David Aaronovitch, a British journalist. Continued

Whisky Toothpaste!

"Genuine 6 proof stuff! Scotch! Bourbon! Why fight oral hygiene - enjoy it! Here's real he-man toothpaste, best argument yet for brushing 3 times a day. 3 1/2 oz. tubes flavored with the real thing - Scotch or Bourbon. Night-before feeling on the morning after. Rinse with soda if you prefer." Yummy. (Via boingboing).