The Gettysburg of the West - The 1862 Battle of Glorieta Pass

Union cavalrymen appeared on the cliffs above the Confederate camp.  “Who are you down there” shouted one of the horsemen.  “Texans, goddamn you” was the reply.  Pleasantries completed, the riders dismounted, clambered down the cliff, brushed aside the few defenders, and secured the camp.  The Confederate conquest of the Southwest had come to a screeching halt.

Here, James F. Byrne Jr looks at the 1862 Battle of Glorieta Pass.

The Battle of Glorieta Pass - Pigeon's Ranch by Roy Andersen.

The outbreak of the Civil War found the U.S. Army occupying ten outposts in the New Mexico territory.  Offered command of U.S. troops in the territory, Colonel Henry Sibley instead took  ownership of all the arms and supplies he could seize and departed with his plunder for Texas and a commission in the Confederate Army.

Sibley saw the weak Union presence in the Southwest as an opportunity to march into Colorado and then westward to California.  Rebel occupation of the Southwest would provide access to mineral resources  and  Pacific ports.  Pursuing his vision of a Confederate manifest destiny, Sibley set up headquarters in San Antonio and recruited a 3000 man army.   He struck north up the Rio Grande in February 1862.

Future events were to reveal Sibley’s leadership shortcomings.  His tactical acumen did not match his strategic vision, and he failed to fully consider supply requirements when developing his grandiose plans.  But his most significant shortcoming was captured in the nickname bestowed on him by his subordinates – the walking whiskey keg.

Sibley’s invasion was opposed by Colonel Edward Canby, who proved adept at husbanding his own combat strength while enabling Sibley’s to wither away.  Canby consolidated his scattered forces at Fort Craig, 170 miles north of El Paso, and unsuccessfully attacked Sibley’s column as it approached the nearby Valverde ford.  Beaten but not defeated, Canby retreated to his fortifications while Sibley continued north, occupying Santa Fe in mid-March.

Fort Union

Sibley had won a major battle and seized the territorial capital.  However, if his campaign were to continue, he needed to capture the supplies at Fort Union, 110 miles north along the Santa Fe Trail.  Fortunately for the Union cause, 1000 volunteers from Colorado commanded by Colonel John Slough were  moving rapidly south to reinforce the fort.  However once at Fort Union Slough disregarded instructions to remain there, and soon moved his command down the trail.

Twenty three miles east of Santa Fe at Glorieta Pass, Slough’s advance guard encountered and drove back Confederate scouts.  Informed of the setback, the walking whiskey barrel ordered up additional troops under the command of Col William Scurry.  As Scurry advanced, he left the army’s supply train in a small canyon west of the pass.  At midday on March 28th the battle was joined at the pass, and Scurry soon gained the upper hand, driving Slough back up the trail.

However, Slough had earlier detached 500 cavalrymen to move over an adjacent mesa and strike the flank of the Confederate column.  After hours of meandering, the cavalrymen arrived at a cliff overlooking the supply encampment.  Scattering the startled defenders, they set ablaze the captured supply wagons loaded with ammunition, food, and medical supplies.  Within an hour the Union force departed, leaving behind smoldering ruins and the shattered dreams of the Confederate conquest of the Southwest.

Up at the pass the main Union force continued to slowly withdraw, leaving the Confederates in possession of the battlefield.  However, as one rebel soldier described the situation, “here we are 1000 miles from home, not a wagon, not a dust of flower, not a pound of meat.” 

The “victorious” rebel force retreated down the Rio Grande while Canby herded the increasingly bedraggled invaders out of the territory.  Following a devastating 1000 mile march the tattered remnants of the Confederate column staggered back into San Antonio.  Over 40% of the proud “Texans, goddamn you” who struck the Santa Fe Trail in February, remained there in shallow graves.

Sibley was courts martialed for drunkenness and cowardice in 1863.  Elements of his defeated  army spent the remainder of the war fighting in Texas and Louisiana.  The remnants surrendered in Houston at the end of the war, a long way from the Pacific ports they sought in the heady days of 1862.

Lessons Learned

·       Armies need supplies.  “Hand waving” logistics planning is seldom an effective approach.

·       Do not assume you can live off the land.  An arid wasteland provides few opportunities for supplementing needed supplies. 

·       Tactical victories do not guarantee success.   Confederate “victories” weakened the force and left it unable to achieve strategic objectives. 

·       Victory does not require annihilation.  Slough kept his outnumbered force intact and allowed the enemy to self-destruct.

·       Do not bring a knife to a gunfight.  Sibley’s force was inadequate for the mission of securing half a continent.

·       Leadership is a combat multiplier.  Rank and file contempt for Sibley’s keen sense of self-preservation eventually hobbled the army’s morale and fighting ability.

·       Force protection matters.  Scurry’s failure to protect his supply train doomed the entire Confederate campaign.

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The Seeds of Civil War: England After Edward III

The dynastic struggle that would later erupt into the Wars of the Roses did not emerge suddenly in the mid–fifteenth century. Its roots lay decades earlier in the complicated aftermath of the reign of Edward III, one of England's most powerful medieval kings. When Edward died in 1377 after a reign of fifty years, he left behind a formidable legacy of military victories and royal prestige. Yet beneath the apparent strength of the monarchy lay a dangerous problem: a tangled web of royal descendants whose competing claims to the throne would gradually destabilize the kingdom. The seeds of civil war had already been planted within the royal family itself, and over the following generations, those seeds would steadily grow into one of the most destructive internal conflicts in English history.

Terry Bailey explains.

An 15th century depiction of Edward III of England. From the Bruges Garter Book made by William Bruges (1375–1450), first Garter King of Arms, British Library, Stowe 594 ff. 7v.

Edward III had fathered several sons who survived into adulthood, each of whom founded powerful branches of the royal lineage. In the medieval system of dynastic succession, such an abundance of heirs could appear to strengthen a monarchy, yet it could just as easily generate rival claims. The king's eldest son, Edward the Black Prince, was widely admired as one of the greatest military commanders of his age. During the early campaigns of the Hundred Years' War against France, the Black Prince gained fame for his leadership and battlefield skill, particularly in victories such as the Battle of Poitiers. He appeared destined to succeed his father and continue England's military dominance on the continent. Fate, however, intervened. The Black Prince died in 1376 after a long illness, a year before Edward III himself passed away.

The death of the heir apparent created an immediate problem of succession. The Black Prince left behind only one legitimate son, the young Richard II. When Edward III died the following year, the crown therefore passed not to an experienced adult prince but to a ten-year-old boy. Although medieval monarchies were accustomed to child rulers, such circumstances almost always created opportunities for political rivalries to flourish. A king who was too young to rule independently depended upon advisers and regents, and those who surrounded him inevitably competed for influence.

The early years of Richard II's reign were therefore dominated by powerful relatives and leading nobles who sought to guide royal policy. Among the most influential figures was John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, Edward III's third surviving son. Gaunt possessed enormous wealth, extensive estates, and vast political influence throughout the kingdom. The lands and titles associated with the Duchy of Lancaster gave him resources that rivalled those of the crown itself. As a result, the Lancastrian branch of the royal family emerged as one of the most powerful political forces in England.

Another of Edward III's surviving sons was Edmund of Langley, Duke of York. Though less politically dominant than his brother John of Gaunt, Edmund's descendants would later form the basis of the Yorkist claim to the throne. At the time, however, these various branches of the royal family coexisted uneasily within the aristocratic structure of England. The stability of the realm depended heavily on the king's ability to balance the interests of these powerful houses. A strong monarch could maintain harmony; a weak one risked allowing rivalry to flourish.

Richard II struggled to command the authority necessary to maintain such a balance. Although he displayed intelligence and a sense of royal dignity, he often proved politically inflexible and suspicious of the great magnates whose support he required. His reign became increasingly characterized by factionalism and mistrust. Early in his rule England experienced a major social upheaval in the form of the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. This uprising, one of the most dramatic popular revolts in medieval Europe, was fueled by widespread resentment over taxation and economic hardship in the aftermath of the Black Death.

The revolt brought thousands of rebels marching toward London, demanding relief from oppressive taxes and the abolition of certain feudal obligations. Though still a boy, Richard II confronted the rebels personally in an attempt to defuse the crisis. The revolt was eventually suppressed, but the event left a lasting impression on the young king and revealed how fragile social and political stability could be during times of economic strain. England's ruling elite became increasingly aware that the kingdom faced internal pressures that could erupt unexpectedly.

As Richard matured, his style of governance became more assertive and increasingly controversial. Determined to strengthen royal authority, he relied heavily on a small circle of trusted favorites while punishing opponents with severity. This approach alienated many influential nobles who believed their traditional rights and privileges were being ignored. Over time, the king's court became associated with factional intrigue and personal rivalries rather than broad political consensus.

One of the most significant figures drawn into this growing conflict was Henry Bolingbroke, the son of John of Gaunt. Bolingbroke was a capable and respected nobleman who had cultivated strong support among England's aristocracy. In 1398 he became embroiled in a dispute with another prominent lord, leading Richard II to intervene by exiling both men from the kingdom. The situation worsened dramatically the following year when John of Gaunt died. Instead of allowing Bolingbroke to inherit the vast Lancastrian estates, Richard confiscated them for the crown.

This decision proved to be a fatal miscalculation. By denying Bolingbroke his inheritance, Richard effectively transformed a political rival into a determined enemy.

In 1399 Bolingbroke returned to England while Richard was campaigning in Ireland. Initially, he claimed that his goal was simply to recover his rightful lands, yet discontent with the king's rule had become widespread among the nobility. As Bolingbroke advanced through the country, support for his cause rapidly grew.

The political situation quickly escalated into a full-scale revolution. Richard II found himself abandoned by many of his supporters and was eventually captured. Forced to abdicate the throne, he was imprisoned and later died under mysterious circumstances. Bolingbroke then claimed the crown and was crowned as Henry IV, inaugurating the Lancastrian dynasty.

The deposition of Richard II marked a profound turning point in English constitutional history. For centuries the legitimacy of kingship had been based on hereditary succession. By removing the reigning monarch and replacing him with another claimant, the nobility had demonstrated that the crown could be transferred through political force. Although Henry IV justified his claim by emphasizing his descent from Edward III, his hereditary right was not the strongest available within the royal family.

Indeed, another line of descent from Edward III provided the foundation for a potentially stronger claim. Through the descendants of the king's second surviving son, Lionel of Antwerp, later Yorkist supporters could argue that their lineage represented the senior branch of the royal family. Although this issue did not immediately provoke conflict, it created an unresolved question of legitimacy that would later resurface with dramatic consequences.

Henry IV's reign was therefore far from secure. Throughout his rule, he faced rebellions, conspiracies, and political instability. Noble families who had supported his rise to power expected rewards and influence, while others remained loyal to the memory of Richard II. Maintaining authority required constant vigilance and careful political management. Though the Lancastrian dynasty survived these early challenges, it did so in an atmosphere of uncertainty.

The broader political climate of the early fifteenth century further complicated the situation. England remained deeply involved in the long and costly Hundred Years' War against France. Maintaining armies overseas and defending English territories required vast financial resources. Heavy taxation placed increasing strain on the population, while military setbacks undermined confidence in royal leadership.

For a brief moment, however, the Lancastrian monarchy appeared to regain its prestige. Henry IV's son, Henry V, proved to be a charismatic and formidable warrior king. His dramatic victory at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415 revived English fortunes and restored a sense of national pride. Henry's campaigns in France brought new territorial gains and renewed confidence in the Lancastrian regime.

Yet this revival proved short-lived. Henry V died unexpectedly in 1422 at the height of his success, leaving the throne to his infant son, Henry VI. Once again England faced the political complications of a child king. A prolonged minority government placed power in the hands of competing factions among the nobility, each seeking influence over the young monarch.

As Henry VI grew to adulthood, it became increasingly clear that he lacked the political strength and military ability of his father and grandfather. Gentle and deeply religious by nature, he struggled to command authority over the powerful nobles who dominated English politics. At the same time, England's position in France began to collapse. During the final phases of the Hundred Years' War, French forces gradually recaptured most of the territories England had once controlled.

The loss of these lands dealt a severe blow to the prestige of the monarchy. Military failure abroad undermined confidence in royal leadership at home. Many noble families who had once profited from warfare in France found their opportunities disappearing, while the financial burden of past campaigns continued to weigh heavily on the kingdom. Discontent within the aristocracy steadily increased.

Within this unstable environment, alternative claims to the throne began to attract greater attention. Among the most prominent figures was Richard, Duke of York. Through his descent from multiple lines of Edward III's family, York possessed a powerful hereditary claim that rivalled—and in some interpretations exceeded—that of the Lancastrian kings. Combined with his considerable wealth and influence, this lineage placed him at the center of a growing political opposition.

By the mid-fifteenth century, England had become a kingdom strained by weak kingship, economic hardship, and unresolved questions of dynastic legitimacy. The precedent set by the overthrow of Richard II had demonstrated that a king could be removed if powerful nobles united against him. Meanwhile, the decline of English fortunes in France eroded the authority of the Lancastrian dynasty.

Thus the conditions for civil war were already firmly in place. What began as a complicated issue of royal inheritance gradually evolved into a bitter political rivalry between two powerful branches of the royal family. The Houses of Lancaster and York, later symbolized by their rival red and white roses, would soon plunge England into a prolonged struggle for control of the throne. In the decades ahead, battles, betrayals, and shifting alliances would reshape the English monarchy and leave an enduring mark on the nation's history.

Therefore, the Wars of the Roses were not the product of sudden ambition or isolated acts of rebellion, but the culmination of long-developing structural weaknesses within the English monarchy. The reign of Edward III, for all its outward strength and prestige, had unintentionally created a dynastic landscape crowded with competing lines of succession. This abundance of royal heirs, which might have ensured continuity under a strong ruler, instead became a source of instability when authority faltered. The premature deaths of key figures and the repeated accession of child kings—most notably Richard II and later Henry VI—further weakened the crown's ability to manage powerful nobles whose ambitions increasingly outpaced their loyalty.

The deposition of Richard II by Henry IV proved to be a decisive constitutional rupture. In overturning the principle of unquestioned hereditary succession, it introduced a dangerous precedent: that kingship could be claimed and justified through force as much as by lineage. From that moment onward, legitimacy became contested ground, open to interpretation and, crucially, to challenge. The rival claims descending from Lionel of Antwerp and John of Gaunt lingered unresolved, quietly hardening into ideological fault lines within the nobility.

Compounding these dynastic tensions were the broader pressures bearing down on the kingdom. The economic aftershocks of the Black Death, the social volatility exposed by the Peasants' Revolt, and the immense financial strain of the Hundred Years' War all contributed to a climate of uncertainty and discontent. Military decline in France, particularly during the reign of Henry VI, eroded confidence in Lancastrian rule, while simultaneously depriving the nobility of the wealth and purpose that foreign campaigns had once provided.

By the mid-fifteenth century, England stood on a knife-edge. The monarchy, no longer an unassailable institution, depended heavily on the fragile balance of noble support. Into this volatile environment stepped Richard, Duke of York, whose formidable lineage and political influence offered a credible alternative to Lancastrian authority. What had begun as a question of inheritance had evolved into a struggle for power, legitimacy, and survival between two rival houses.

Thus, the outbreak of the Wars of the Roses was less an abrupt descent into chaos than the inevitable consequence of decades of accumulating tension. Dynastic ambiguity, political miscalculation, and social strain converged to produce a conflict that would engulf the English nobility and redefine the monarchy itself. In this sense, the wars were not merely fought over the crown—they were born from the very foundations upon which that crown had come to rest.

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The Chicago Debutante Who Outwitted the Nazis - Part II: Surviving Scandal and Sashaying Around Europe

Aviatrix Mary Jayne Gold came from a prominent Chicago family. Under the Gestapo’s nose in Marseilles, she helped save thousands from Hitler’s concentration camps, all while carrying out a brazen l’affaire de guerre with a cutthroat French-American commando. Timothy M. Gay explains.

French prisoners of war under German guard in 1940. Source: Bundesarchiv, Bild 121-0404 / CC-BY-SA 3.0, available here.

No Hollywood mogul worth his salt would ever have greenlighted a script based on the life of Mary Jayne Gold. “Way over the top!” Jack Warner or Harry Cohn would have scrawled on the title page. “Audiences will never buy it!”

Except it was all very real – and very little of it needed embellishing.

She was an impossibly rich and fetching femme fatale, the daughter of one of Chicago’s leading industrialists. She didhave a mansion and a yacht (both called “Marigold”) named in her honor. She did become a famed aviatrix in an era when female pilots attracted flashbulbs and headlines. She was the prewar toast of London and Paris, an intimate of lords and ladies who followed the sun to St. Tropez and the snow to St. Moritz. She did leave in her wake a trail of champagne bottles and broken hearts. She did bribe a French judge to spring her illicit lover from jail. She did play deadly cat-and-mouse with Vichy and the Gestapo and help thousands of people escape Hitler’s concentration camps.

Surely, she’s the only refugee liberator honored by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum who grew up summering in an architectural marvel along the shores of Lake Michigan; who raced her own plane – a sleek Percival Vega Gull, the “Sports Car of the Skies” – at air shows across the North America and Europe; who consorted with mobsters in the French Riviera and once described herself as a “gangster’s moll”; who helped bankroll one of the war’s most effective evacuee operations; who sheltered some of the 20th century’s most celebrated surrealists; who was mistaken more than once for a high-priced hooker; who used her feminine wiles (twice!) to seduce a Vichy prison commandant, gaining favorable treatment for Resistance detainees; and whose provocative (in every sense) memoir late in life was edited by none other than Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, a fellow Francophile who enjoyed tales of a life richly lived.

“Fuugg-about it!” Sam Goldwyn would have barked. “No one will ever believe it!”

        *

How did Mary Jayne Gold ever find the moxie to lead a life that – let’s face it – turned a little tawdry at times? A lot of it had to come from her old man, one of the most ambitious and – let’s face it again – dissolute industrial pioneers in Chicago history. Maybe when your fabulously wealthy father is forced to skip town to avoid being prosecuted in a steamy sex scandal it steels you for whatever life throws your way.  

*

Egbert Habberton Gold (1868-1928) was rich the day he arrived in Chicago, but he got a lot richer in a hurry. The Golds were Old New England, a family that emigrated from East Anglia’s Bury St. Edmunds in the years before 1650 and quickly made themselves pillars of Cornwall, Connecticut, society, becoming benefactors of the Congregationalist Church and, two generations later, of Yale College.

Egbert’s ancestors had a yen for engineering. His father, Mary Jayne’s paternal grandfather, patented in the 1850s the forerunner to the cast-iron “mattress” radiator. The Gold radiator became the method of heating residential and commercial buildings for much of the next century, earning the family a huge fortune.

Its burgeoning reputation as a railroad hub lured Egbert Gold to Chicago in the 1890s. Following in his father’s footsteps, he soon devised a reliable method of using steam vapor to heat passenger rail cars. Gold’s breakthrough revolutionized wintertime train travel; virtually overnight, it became safer and more comfortable. 

Yet again, the Golds had struck, well, gold. Egbert eventually established the offices of the Gold Car Heating Company (later the Vapor Car Heating Co., Inc.) in the “Chicago Style” Railway Exchange Building bordering Grant Park. In 1904, he beat back a competitor by contesting a patent case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, winning an intellectual property precedent that’s still studied today. At roughly the same time, he began acquiring large and lucrative chunks of Chicago real estate.

He also acquired a level of infamy that might have caused his Congregationalist forebears to roll over in their graves. In the spring of 1901, the police began investigating reports of a 17-year-old woman being kept against her will in what the Chicago Daily Tribune called a “disorderly house” at 348 West Madison.

It was, all euphemisms aside, a brothel run by a madame named Mary “Mother” Lyons. Lyons’ apparent modus operandi was to snag unsuspecting young women to work as maids, then, once under roof, bully them into providing services of a more horizontal nature.

The teenaged Jeanette Johnston was one of Lyons’ hostages. “Mother’s” debasement of Jennie was abetted, police said, by a mystery man whom Johnston knew only as “Bert Brown.”

Brown, the cops told the press, was a pseudonym for one Egbert H. Gold, then 33 and married to the former Margaret Jayne Dickey. Brown/Gold was, it sounds like, a steady customer of Lyons’ bordello. He apparently took a fancy to young Jennie, ignoring her pleas to escape confinement, plying her with alcohol, and conspiring with Lyons to keep her under lock and key.

When Jennie somehow escaped and told her chilling story to a local minister (ironically of the Congregationalist faith), the preacher called the cops. Soon Chicagoans were waking up to headlines like, “TELL SECRETS OF ‘MOTHER’ LYONS: ATTORNEYS’ QUESTIONS POINT TO EGBERT H. GOLD AS ‘BERT BROWN.’”

Acting sub-rosa, Gold hired Chicago attorneys Kickham Scanlan and Edgar Lee Masters (perhaps Gold’s unsavory behavior encouraged Masters, a decade later, to publish Spoon River Anthology, his celebrated free-verse skewering of Midwestern “virtues”} to provide legal services for Lyons. Scanlan and Masters did their job: “Mother” got off easy, slapped with just a one-year sentence, with time off for good behavior.

Gold, meanwhile, had stayed elusive during Lyons’ trial, skulking off to a secret flat on Ellis Avenue, then decamping for Davenport, St. Louis, and Omaha, always keeping one step ahead of the subpoena server. On the day Lyons copped her plea, Gold fled to New York City, where he stayed incognito until the heat cooled.

Eventually, he returned to Chicago and his tony lifestyle, which by then included memberships at the South Shore and Exmoor country clubs, a side-stage box at Crosby’s Opera House, a luxurious yacht, and a summer home to die for on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan. The boat and vacation place were both named “Marigold” in honor of his wife and infant daughter.

The sordid episode with “Mother” and Jennie might have been forgotten if Gold had just paid Masters and Scanlan the $2,000 (the rough equivalent today of $63,000) he owed them. Their dispute erupted in 1914, the year poet Carl Sandburg wrote his paean to Chicago, not realizing that the line, “They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I have seen your painted women under the gas lamps,” was all too accurate in the case of one of the city’s business titans.

The public punches flew fast and furious. In mid-bout, Gold issued a defiant – and disingenuous – statement.

“The matter is hardly worth discussion,” Gold fumed. “It is simply a case of an attempt to hold me up for money which I refuse to pay. I did have some business with Attorney Masters nine or ten years ago, but he was paid every cent he was entitled to at that time. The matter was not in connection with any place of questionable repute. I do not know this woman Mary Lyons, referred to by Attorney Masters. Neither do I know Jeanette Johnston, or whatever her name might be. Long ago, when the first attempts were made to secure money from me, I turned the matter over to my attorneys.”

A settlement was eventually reached; the matter again died down but was no doubt the subject of much gossip around town. Over the years, the Golds, now the parents of two boys plus Mary Jayne, stayed quiet in the Chicago papers, eliciting only the occasional article about Mrs. Gold’s gardening triumphs, or their real estate purchases, or their patronage of the arts. Egbert Gold died of natural causes in 1928, when his daughter and oldest child was 19.

It wasn’t until Mary Jayne got her pilot’s license after she graduated from an Italian boarding school and began flying her two-seat monoplane at air shows across North America and Europe that the name Gold found itself back in the headlines. If press accounts were accurate, the other seat in Mary Jayne’s plane was often occupied by a dashing beau du jour or some member of European royalty. Her life took an abrupt turn after the German army invaded Poland.

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About the Author

Timothy M. Gay is the author of two critically acclaimed books on World War II: Assignment to Hell: The War Against Nazi Germany with Correspondents Walter Cronkite, Andy Rooney, A.J. Liebling, Homer Bigart, and Hal Boyle(NAL/Penguin, 2012) and Savage Will: The Daring Escape of Americans Trapped Behind Nazi Lines (NAL/Penguin, 2013). Tom Brokaw called Assignment to Hell, which was nominated for a Pulitzer, a Bancroft, and an American Book Award, “a book every modern journalist – and citizen – should read.” Historian Marcus Brotherton wrote that Savage Will was “powerful, intriguing, well-researched, and fierce.”

Gay’s lengthy article on the citizen response to the Nazi U-boat threat in U.S. waters early in WWII was featured in a pandemic-inspired special issue of American Heritage called “America in Crisis.”

He has been featured on PBS’ “History Detectives” and contributed on-camera and off- to two documentaries – one on Walter Cronkite’s coverage of the Kennedy assassination, the other on Lyndon Johnson’s legacy on civil rights – which have appeared in Britain and the U.S.

His latest book is RORY LAND, a biography of golf superstar Rory McIlroy. It looks at McIlroy’s life through the prism of Ireland’s sectarian Troubles that devastated both sides of his family.

The Conduct of War: The Lieber Code Part 2

At the start of the Civil War, the 1806 Articles of War was the only official document governing how the US military governed itself during conflicts. Based in large part on the British articles, it mainly stipulated the characterization and response to drunkenness, insubordination, desertion, etc. in other words, internal management. The 1806 Articles of War were revised with the Lieber Code (1863), to legally allow the Union Army to combat Confederate guerrillas and enemy civilians. The Lieber Code became the military law that governed the wartime conduct of the Union Army by defining and describing command responsibility for war crimes and crimes against humanity; and the military responsibilities of the Union soldier fighting against the Confederate States of America.

Lloyd W Klein explains.

Francis Lieber.

On April 24, 1863, U.S. President Abraham Lincoln issued “General Orders No. 100: Instructions for the Government of the Armies of the United States in the Field,” commonly known as the “Lieber Code” after its main author Francis (Franz) Lieber. The Lieber Code set out rules of conduct during hostilities for Union soldiers throughout the U.S. Civil War. Even today, it remains the basis of most regulations of the laws of war for the United States and is referred to in the foreword to the Department of Defense Laws of War Manual. The Lieber Code inspired other countries to adopt similar rules for their military and was used as a template for international efforts in the late 19th century to codify the laws and customs of war.

Lieber started with the problems raised by the US Army presence as an invading army on enemy soil that hadn’t been encountered by the US in the 3 previous wars. The Lieber Code was the first US attempt to codify the laws of war. Although they were binding only on the forces of the United States, they correspond to a great extent to the laws and customs of war existing at that time. There are 157 articles, and can be found here: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/liebercode-1863

Although made as a sincere attempt to make warfare more civilized, it failed to do so materially in the Civil War. This was a significant lesson in history which needed to be learned in practice. This paper looks at specific articles of the Lieber Code and identifies why it failed to succeed in its task.

Specific Codes of War

1. Reprisals Against Civilians and Prisoners

Lieber Code (Article 27, 28, 59): Permitted reprisals against civilians and even prisoners under certain conditions—such as when the enemy engaged in unlawful warfare or mistreated POWs.

Geneva Conventions (1949): Strictly prohibit reprisals against protected persons (civilians, POWs, medical personnel).

Example: Article 13 of Geneva III (POWs) and Article 33 of Geneva IV (civilians) forbid all reprisals against those groups.

2. Destruction of Civilian Property as Hard War

Lieber Code (Articles 14, 15, 44, 50): Permitted the widespread destruction of civilian property, including homes, food stores, and infrastructure, if justified by military necessity.

Geneva Conventions (Additional Protocol I, Article 52): Prohibit the indiscriminate destruction of civilian property and infrastructure unless there is a direct military advantage.

Example: Sherman’s March—burning crops, homes, and public buildings—was lawful under the Lieber Code but would likely be considered disproportionate or indiscriminate today.

3. Use of Starvation as a Military Strategy

Lieber Code (Article 17): Acknowledged that starving the enemy, including civilians in fortified places, could be a lawful strategy. Article 17 provides that it is lawful to starve civilians:

‘War is not carried on by arms alone. It is lawful to starve the hostile belligerent, armed or unarmed, so that it leads to the speedier subjection of the enemy.’

This is no longer legal in warfare.

The code basically built in a loophole: that none of its principles applied if by breaking them, a war’s end would be expedited.

Geneva Conventions (Protocol I, Article 54): Explicitly forbid starvation of civilians as a method of warfare.

Modern precedent: The use of siege warfare to starve civilians in Syria and elsewhere has been condemned as a war crime under international law.

4. Execution of Irregular Combatants Without Trial

Lieber Code (Articles 82–85): Allowed summary execution of guerrillas, spies, and other irregulars (e.g., Franc-tireurs) without due process.

Geneva Conventions: Require fair trial guarantees even for irregular combatants or suspected spies.

Example: Geneva Convention III, Article 84, ensures POWs cannot be sentenced without proper judicial process.

5. Permissibility of Occupation Requisitions Without Compensation

Lieber Code (Article 52): Allowed occupying forces to requisition supplies from civilians without compensation, depending on circumstances.

Geneva Conventions (Article 53, Geneva IV): Allow requisitions only under strict limitations, and generally require compensation.

One of the more contentious issues addressed in the Lieber Code was the treatment of fugitive and freed slaves that entered the Union territory. Lieber took the view that international law did not distinguish between people based on color (Art. 58) and that the law of nature and nations has never acknowledged slavery (art. 42). He therefore included provisions that held that fugitive slaves that escaped to the North became free (Arts. 42, 43) and that all soldiers no matter their skin color must be awarded POW status (Art.57).

Finally, in modern warfare, were a commander to order soldiers to enter a home to steal valuables and they instead murdered the man and raped the women, the commander as well as the soldiers would be breaking the rules; but under the Lieber Code, the commander would not be considered to have done anything illegal.

https://blogs.loc.gov/law/2018/04/the-lieber-code-the-first-modern-codification-of-the-laws-of-war/

The chapter on “military necessity” is a well-known part of the Lieber Code which one author calls its “greatest theoretical contribution to the modern law of war.” The Lieber Code allows the use of military force which is justified by “military necessity,” defined as “measures which are indispensable for securing the ends of the war, and which are lawful according to the modern law and usages of war.” (Art. 14).

This loophole no longer exists for the most obvious reason that it is ensures that no rule of law would apply. The appropriate balance between military necessity and humane behavior remains controversial. Lieber was specific that mlitary necessity is limited by the principle of humanity.

The Lieber Code therefore states in article 16 that:

“Military necessity does not admit of cruelty—that is, the infliction of suffering for the sake of suffering or for revenge, nor of maiming or wounding except in fight, nor of torture to extort confessions. It does not admit of the use of poison in any way, nor of the wanton devastation of a district. It admits of deception, but disclaims acts of perfidy; and, in general, military necessity does not include any act of hostility which makes the return to peace unnecessarily difficult.”

Application to Sherman’s March

“ We are not only fighting hostile armies, but a hostile people, and must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war.” – William T Sherman

The Union army cut a swath of devastation approximately 60 miles wide and 300 miles long from Atlanta to Savannah. The severity of the destruction varied by location and depended on the resistance encountered, but overall, it was devastating. The troops dismantled railroad tracks, heating and twisting them to make them unusable and irreparable. Telegraph lines and bridges were also destroyed to cripple Confederate communication and transportation. Soldiers confiscated livestock, burned crops, and destroyed mills to deprive the Confederacy of essential supplies.

Sherman's march to the sea. By F. O. C. Darley.

Bringing the “hard hand of war” to civilians — especially as practiced by Union forces in campaigns like Sherman’s March — sits at the uneasy intersection of morality, military necessity, and the evolving laws of war. The Lieber Code (General Orders No. 100, issued April 1863) provided a legal and ethical framework for Union conduct during the Civil War. It did permit certain harsh measures against civilians under the doctrine of military necessity, but also imposed limits and obligations to avoid cruelty for its own sake.

The Lieber Code recognized that war sometimes requires harsh treatment, including against civilians, if they support or aid the enemy. Key sections include:

Article 14: “Military necessity… consists in the necessity of those measures which are indispensable for securing the ends of the war.”

Article 15: Military necessity does not admit of cruelty, torture, or wanton devastation.

Article 17: It is lawful to starve the hostile belligerent, armed forces or civilians, to reduce them into submission — but only as a measure of necessity.

Article 44: Destruction of property is lawful if demanded by the necessities of war.

Sherman argued his actions were not cruel for cruelty’s sake, but necessary to shorten the war and reduce total bloodshed. He avoided mass killings and tried to maintain discipline, though looting and violence did occur.

Arguments for moral justification:

It was a lesser evil: harsh tactics avoided longer, bloodier battles.

It targeted infrastructure and morale, not mass murder.

It followed legal principles of military necessity as codified in the Lieber Code.

Arguments against:

Civilians, especially women, children, and the elderly, bore undue suffering.

The line between necessity and punishment blurred.

In practice, looting and sporadic personal violence violated the spirit, if not always the letter, of the Code.

The Lieber Code allowed the application of the hard hand of war to civilians under strict conditions of military necessity. Sherman’s actions were arguably within its bounds, though the morality remains debatable. The Code tried to humanize war within the brutal logic of total conflict — but in practice, it offered a legal cover for actions that tested the limits of ethical warfare.

The March created severe food shortages for both civilians and the Confederate army. Many homes, barns, and businesses were burned, though some private homes were spared, especially if their occupants did not resist. Public buildings, factories, and Confederate government facilities were often deliberately targeted. Although the march inflicted severe hardship on the civilian population through widespread destruction, it was not intended to be, nor was it officially conducted as, a campaign of deliberate personal violence against civilians. While civilians undoubtedly suffered as their homes, livelihoods, and communities were devastated by the march, the intent was to break the Confederacy’s ability to wage war rather than to deliberately harm the civilian population.

The extent of the damage was severe, and arguably, the South never fully recovered from its effects. The march inflicted an estimated $100 million (equivalent to billions today) in damage. Although Savannah was largely spared destruction when it surrendered without a fight, cities like Atlanta, Milledgeville, and Griswoldville suffered heavy damage. Thousands of enslaved people fled plantations to follow Sherman’s army, further disrupting the Southern economy and labor force.

While the campaign inflicted significant damage, especially to infrastructure and Confederate military resources, some myths have overstated the extent of civilian suffering and total devastation. While Atlanta was heavily damaged, Savannah was largely spared because it surrendered without a fight. Many towns along the march suffered property destruction, but not all were burned to the ground. There is no evidence of mass killings of civilians. While foraging was often aggressive and left many families struggling, Union soldiers were under orders to avoid unnecessary harm to noncombatants. While some private homes were burned, most destruction focused on railroads, factories, mills, and farms that supported the Confederate war effort. Some homes were looted or destroyed if resistance was encountered, but not all were systematically targeted. 

In 1864, the convention that dictated the rules of war was The Lieber Code (1863): A set of military regulations issued by the U.S. during the Civil War, which influenced later international laws. Sherman’s March was within the law set by code, but it went right up to the line, thanks to certain exceptions and in some cases, beyond.

Let’s look at a few of its provisions and see what happened on the March. 

Article 15

 – Military necessity allows destruction of enemy forces and materials, but not cruelty for its own sake.

Sherman’s view: Destroying infrastructure, supplies, and morale was a legitimate strategy to shorten the war. He believed “hard war” would reduce bloodshed in the long run.

Technically adherent—Sherman could argue that all actions were militarily necessary. But looting and personal attacks on women, children, and the elderly can’t be defended by this clause. 

Article 17

Sherman’s March can be defended under Article 17 of the Lieber Code as a harsh but lawful application of military necessity. However, it tests the limits of that doctrine

Article 17 of the Lieber Code does not explicitly allow the deliberate starvation of civilians. However, it does create legal and moral space for actions that may incidentally cause civilian suffering—if those actions are deemed necessary for military success.

“War is not carried on by arms alone. It is lawful to starve the hostile belligerent, armed or unarmed, so that it leads to the speedier subjection of the enemy.”

Therefore, by saying the idea was to hasten the end of the war, legally Sherman could say it was military necessity to starve women and children and the elderly. A great example of how Sherman went right up to the line of legality, but did not cross it.

Article 22

 – The unarmed citizen is to be spared in person, property, and honor as much as possible consistent with military necessity.

Reality on the ground: Civilians were subjected to:Home invasions, looting, threats

Destruction of food, tools, personal items

Occasional physical violence and

 unprosecuted sexual assault

Technically compliant only if military necessity is broadly interpreted. In practice, this principle was often undermined by lack of discipline, particularly among foraging parties (“bummers”).

Article 31

 – A victorious army may appropriate supplies but must distinguish between military and private property

Sherman’s orders:

Special Field Orders No. 120 instructed foraging but prohibited personal pillaging and trespass.

Enforcement was inconsistent, and in practice, private homes and valuables were often looted.

Violated in practice, though Sherman issued technically legal orders. He at times turned a blind eye to violations, perhaps often,  prioritizing momentum and morale. If foragers drove off an old lady’s cows, for example, this is not covered under the Lieber Code, unless that old lady was a military threat or assisting the war effort, or generally to hasten the end of the war. This is how Sherman could say he was working under the Lieber Code.

Article 44

 – All wanton violence against persons, especially women and children, is prohibited.

No widespread directive or sanction for such violence from Sherman, but:

Documented instances of abuse, harassment, and some killings of civilians.

Rape likely occurred, though not prosecuted.

 Not directly ordered, but tolerated through weak enforcement.

Article 51

 – Military commanders must try to restore public order and protect persons and property in occupied areas.

Sherman’s army often left chaos in its wake—most notably the burning of Columbia, SC, where drunkenness, looting, and fire caused mass civilian displacement.

Technically breached—Sherman and his officers failed to control their troops in several instances.

One of the Lieber Code’s most crucial provisions is Article 22, which declares the importance of “the distinction between the private individual belonging to a hostile country and the hostile country itself.” Article 22 puts forward “the principle…. that the unarmed citizen is to be spared in person, property, and honor as much as the exigencies of war will admit.”

Key provisions of the Code on civilian property include:

Protection of Civilians: The code emphasizes the protection of civilian persons and property from military operations.

Prohibition of Destruction: It prohibits the destruction of civilian property unless absolutely necessary for military operations.

Respect for Private Property: The code instructs military personnel to respect private property and avoid unnecessary harm.

 Articles 37, 38, 46 & 47.cover this area as well.

It’s anyone’s subjective interpretation as to whether or not what Sherman ordered, versus what was often carried out, fits within these precepts. Either way, it’s a very close call.

Lieber himself was uncertain how to apply the principles. Military necessity, Lieber wrote, “allows of all destruction of property, and obstruction of the ways and channels of traffic, travel, or communication, and of all withholding of sustenance or means of life from the enemy; [and] of the appropriation of whatever an enemy’s country affords necessary for the subsistence and safety of the army.” Rather than constrain hard war, such language helped to make it possible.

https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/hard-war-in-virginia-during-the-civil-war/

Examples of personal injury and attacks: There were documented instances of personal violence against noncombatants, especially theft, property destruction, intimidation, and some physical abuse. While not officially sanctioned, these acts occurred frequently enough to be a recognized part of the civilian experience of the march. They highlight the blurred line between “hard war” and civilian victimization and are critical to understanding the real human impact of Sherman’s campaign. These accounts show theft, intimidation, physical abuse, and psychological terror, though—as with all wartime narratives—some must be read with attention to context, bias, and verification.

What Is the Function of Rules of War?

Whether creating rules or laws to govern war is t one of history’s most painful and persistent tensions: the desire for moral restraint versus the brutal realities of war. Are the “rules” or “laws” of war phony? No, they’re not phony—but they are imperfect and often inconsistently applied. The laws of war, such as those codified in the Lieber Code (1863), the Hague Conventions (1899, 1907), and the Geneva Conventions (especially after WWII), are real legal instruments. They’re backed by treaties, military doctrine, and in some cases, courts (like the International Criminal Court).

These laws serve several purposes:

Limit unnecessary suffering, especially of civilians and prisoners.

Maintain some moral legitimacy—for both domestic and international audiences.

Prevent escalation into unbounded barbarism (e.g., genocide, torture as routine policy).

Set standards for holding individuals accountable (think of the Nuremberg Trials or modern war crimes prosecutions).

However: Enforcement is uneven, often dependent on power dynamics. Victors rarely face the same scrutiny as the losers. States violate them regularly, sometimes justifying actions as “military necessity.” Non-state actors may ignore them entirely. So yes, there is hypocrisy—but that doesn’t mean the rules are fake. They are aspirational boundaries in an inherently chaotic and destructive endeavor.

Is winning all that matters? Militarily, winning ends the war. But how you win shapes the peace—and your legacy. If “winning” alone were the only standard:

Atrocities would become normalized.

Reprisals would spiral, making wars bloodier and longer.

The legitimacy of power would corrode, both domestically and abroad.

History is full of cautionary tales: the legitimacy of power depends on how its used. Overly severe punishment of the losers leads to long-lasting enmity . For example:

·       Sherman’s March was brutally effective, yet carefully (if controversially) calibrated under the laws of war at the time. It was one of the events leading to the Lost Cause.

·       Our treatment of Native Americans especially as illustrated at Sand Creek was abominable: immoral and illegal. Our relations with our aboriginal brothers remain tense over a century later.

·       The terms of the WW1 peace led almost directly to WW2.

·       Nazi Germany won many early battles, but their brutality turned most of the world against them.

·       The US offered Germany the Marshall Plan after WW2 while the Russian raped their way through the country. How has that turned out?

·       The My Lai Massacre during Vietnam might have had no strategic benefit but inflicted lasting moral and political damage on the U.S. As did napalming villages randomly.

Ethics in war isn’t about being gentle—it’s about staying human. Even amidst destruction, maintaining rules is an act of defiance against the abyss. Its a false binary to offer either winning or being humane. A civilized nation tries to do both. How you win determines who you become and whether your victory can endure the peace that follows.

Summary

The Lieber Code was written to provide a moral framework to guide the conduct of modern war. In that sense, it was a humanitarian step forward and became the basis of modern rules of war set under the Geneva Conventions. However, General Sherman used a loophole to get around its application in the March to the Sea. It is arguable that this loophole was expressly inserted for this purpose.

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The Greatest Trash and Recycling Innovator? George Roby Dempster

George Roby Dempster may not be as well known to the public as other historical inventors, but he is just as important as any of them. Garbage collection and junk removal were in their infancy before Dempster’s innovations. His inventions and business would revolutionize the trash and junk collection industry worldwide. Dempster’s time as a politician and businessman also left some positive outcomes. George Dempster left a lasting impact on the trash and recycling collection business, infrastructure, and Civil Rights.

Daniel Boustead explains.

Thornycroft Steam Dust-Cart of 1897 with tipper body.

Garbage collection before George Dempster was in the primitive stages of development. In the late 1800s, horse-drawn collection carts were the primary method of trash collection.[1] In 1897, the first powered steam-powered tip car was introduced in London, United Kingdom.[2] Steam and eventually gas-powered trucks replaced horse-drawn carriages for garbage collection in the coming years.  Garbage trucks of the 1920s were essentially pickup trucks with covered cargo bodies.[3] However, trash collectors still had the tedious task of lifting trash to shoulder level into these trucks.  In the late 1920s, the introduction of the hopper eliminated the need for garbage collectors to lift trash overhead.  The first external truck hopper was released in 1929 and was located on the side.  These trucks would become known as technically as Rear-Loader Garbage Trucks.

George Roby Dempster was born on  September 12th, 1887, and died on October 19th, 1964.[4]  By the age of 16, he was operating a locomotive.[5] It was before that time that Dempster had worked various railroad jobs in Virginia. It was after he graduated from high school in 1906 that he went to work with his brother Thomas on the Panama Canal. It was while he was there that he operated the first steam shovel on the Pacific Cut of the Panama Canal. Dempster had intimate knowledge of heavy machines from an early age. He would remain in Panama from 1907 until 1912, when he returned to the USA.[6]

Founding of businesses

It was after Dempster returned from Panama that he founded (with his brothers) the  Dempster Construction Company.[7] Around the same time, George Dempster also founded, again with his brothers, the Dempster Machinery Company. However, the Great Depression of 1929 forced both businesses into bankruptcy. Dempster was determined to remain a success despite this setback. In 1935, he conceived the Dempster-Dumpster to facilitate construction work further. The device was patented in February 1935.

The early Dumpster system involved a hydraulic hoist mounted on the back of a motor truck, which allowed open-top buckets to be engaged, lifted, and transported. The Dempster Dumpster truck system then allowed shallow buckets of the Dumpster to be tipped out in the back as they were held in a raised position by the hoist at the back of the truck.  The Dempster Dumpsters truck system eventually allowed the handling of 38,000 pounds net load, plus the two-ton weight of the bucket, all on a single-axle, heavy-duty truck.  The Dempster Dumpster truck system reduced the cost of collecting, hauling, and dumping garbage at a rate of 75% when compared with the conventional dump truck style garbage trucks of the day.  George Dempster’s invention soon began to attract the interest of other operators. Not long after George patented his device, he and his five brothers founded Dempster Brothers, Inc. to manufacture dumpsters. In 1937, Knoxville, Tennessee, became the first “Dumpster City” to employ George Roby Dempster’s invention.

George Dempster and his company would continue to help drive further innovations that would help propel the trash, junk, and recycling business forward. By 1939, George Dempster’s company designed and manufactured the Dempster-Balester (7). This machine was a hydraulic machine capable of crushing and baling an entire automobile into a convenient billet for easy shipping. This machine was so revolutionary that the Soviet government ordered sixteen Model 125 Balesters under the American government’s lend-lease program.[8] The deal required each of Dempster’s Balesters to be accompanied by 15 blueprints so that the government of the Soviet Union could build the machine after World War II  had ended. Today, every junkyard uses a similar Dempster-like machine to recycle and bale junk automobiles properly.

George Dempster’s company also made another significant development in trash collection in 1958 with the introduction of the modern Roll-Off Garbage truck system, the Dempster Dinosaur.[9] In the fall of 1958, Dempster introduced the roll-off Dempster Dinosaur garbage truck system.[10] The Dempster Dinosaur, like all other “roll-offs,” featured a tilting frame that enabled the container to be loaded onto and off the truck. However, unlike other “roll-offs” that used a hoist and cable to load their cargo, the Dempster Dinosaur's hoist was coupled directly to the container through a spring-loaded bail. By the time his career had ended, George Roby Dempster held over 75 patents for his inventions (7).

Politics

Dempster also had a productive political career in Tennessee.  In 1929, he was appointed as the city manager of Knoxville, Tennessee.[11] He would serve a two-year term in this position.  In 1935, George served as the city manager of Knoxville, Tennessee, for another two-year term.  George would later serve two terms on the Knoxville City Council. From 1952 to 1955, he served as mayor of Knoxville after the city adopted a mayoral form of government.  It was during his 10 years working in the city that he became an effective administrator.  According to one reporter, George would often talk to two callers simultaneously on two telephones at his desk.  George’s leadership was so decisive that an aggrieved citizen would talk to George on the first telephone, only to be surprised when Mayor Dempster called the appropriate department on the second telephone to negotiate a solution to the problem.  

George’s administrations in the Knoxville government resulted in the construction of the Henley Street Bridge, the construction of Smithson (later Bill Meyer) Stadium, and the construction of an extensive sewage disposal system[12]. He also helped start four branch libraries, a gas plant, and a municipal garage, all in Knoxville. Four Libraries were dedicated during his time in political office (4).

Civil rights

As a politician and businessman, George Dempster made significant progress in advancing Civil Rights for African Americans and people with disabilities. George’s time in the government in Knoxville saw him employ the first African American civil service secretary (11). He also helped build the first African American fire department in Knoxville. In addition, George conceived of an African American unit at Knoxville General Hospital. It was also because of George’s altruistic hiring practices that handicapped workers made up more than 10% of the workforce at his plant[13].  The high number of handicapped workers at the plant was not due to any accidents at the plant.[14]  This was because the plant had an outstanding safety record.

George Roby Dempster’s impact on society was just as significant as that of any other major inventor. George’s inventions and innovations took trash, recycling, and junk out of the primitive stages. In addition, his political impact during his time in office was both productive and positive. George Dempster left a lasting impact on the waste and recycling industry and was a champion for the disadvantaged.

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References

Btrmarketing.”Rear Loader  Garbage Truck Rental Service: The History of the Rear Loader Garbage Truck”. BTR, January 15th, 2019, https://bigtruckrental.com/blog/rear-loader-garbage-truck-rental-service/rear-loader-history/ .

Btrmarketing.”The History of the Front Loader Garbage Truck”,  BTR, April 15th, 2019, https://bigtruckrental.com/blog/front-loader-garbage-truck-rental-service/front-loader-history/ .

Btrmarketing.”The History of the Roll of Garbage Truck”, BTR, February 2nd, 2019, https://bigtruckrental.com/blog/roll-off-garbage-truck-rental-service/roll-off-history/ .

Classic Refuse Trucks. “Beginnings: The Dempster Dumpster”. January 7th, 2006, https://www.classicrefusetrucks.com/albums/DE/DE01.html .

Classic Refuse Trucks. “Dempster Dinosaur”. January 7th, 2006  (updated August 29th, 2021), https://www.classicrefusetrucks.com/albums/DE/DE05.html .

Commendatore, Cristina.”Then and Now: A Look at How the Garbage Truck Has Evolved”. Waste 360, by informa, November 14th, 2018, https://www.waste360.com/fleet-technology/then-and-now-a-look-at-how-the-garbage-truck-has-evolved.

Parkinson, Robert.”George Roby Dempster”, Tennessee Encyclopedia, The Tennessee Historical Society, October 8th, 2017, https://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/george-roby-dempster/ .

Tumblin, J.C. Fountain City: People Who Made a Difference: The History of Knoxville’s most fiercely independent community in the stories of 56 extraordinary citizens. Knoxville: Tennessee. Celtic Cat Publishing. 2016.

Tumblin, Jim, Dr. ”Geroge R. Dempster: The later years”, Fountain City, Our Town Stories, KnoxTN Today, April 16th, 2019, https://www.knoxtntoday.com/george-r-dempster-the-later-years/ .

Tumblin, J.C.”Fountain Citians Who Made a Difference: George R. Dempster (1887-1964)”.www.fountaincitynhistory.info, The Wayback Machine, 2002, https://web.archive.org/web/20110101120335/http://www.fountaincitytnhistory.info/People7-Dempster.htm .

[1] Commendatore, Cristina.”Then and Now: A Look at How the Garbage Truck Has Evolved”. Waste 360, by informa, November 14th, 2018, https://www.waste360.com/fleet-technology/then-and-now-a-look-at-how-the-garbage-truck-has-evolved.

[2] Btrmarketing.”Rear Loader  Garbage Truck Rental Service: The History of the Rear Loader Garbage Truck”. BTR, January 15th, 2019, https://bigtruckrental.com/blog/rear-loader-garbage-truck-rental-service/rear-loader-history/ .

[3] Btrmarketing.”The History of the Front Loader Garbage Truck”,  BTR, April 15th, 2019, https://bigtruckrental.com/blog/front-loader-garbage-truck-rental-service/front-loader-history/ .

[4] Parkinson, Robert.”George Roby Dempster”, Tennessee Encyclopedia, The Tennessee Historical Society, October 8th, 2017, https://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/george-roby-dempster/ .

[5] Classic Refuse Trucks. “Beginnings: The Dempster Dumpster”. January 7th, 2006, https://www.classicrefusetrucks.com/albums/DE/DE01.html .

[6] Tumblin, Jim, Dr. ”Geroge R. Dempster: The later years”, Fountain City, Our Town Stories, KnoxTN Today, April 16th, 2019, https://www.knoxtntoday.com/george-r-dempster-the-later-years/ .

[7] Tumblin, J.C. Fountain City: People Who Made a Difference: The History of Knoxville’s most fiercely independent community in the stories of 56 extraordinary citizens. Knoxville: Tennessee. Celtic Cat Publishing. 2016. 175.

[8] Tumblin, J.C. Fountain City: People Who Made a Difference: The History of Knoxville’s most fiercely independent community in the stories of 56 extraordinary citizens. Knoxville: Tennessee. Celtic Cat Publishing. 2016. 175 to 176.

[9] Btrmarketing.”The History of the Roll of Garbage Truck”, BTR, February 2nd, 2019, https://bigtruckrental.com/blog/roll-off-garbage-truck-rental-service/roll-off-history/ .

[10] Classic Refuse Trucks. “Dempster Dinosaur”. January 7th, 2006  (updated August 29th, 2021), https://www.classicrefusetrucks.com/albums/DE/DE05.html .

[11] Tumblin, J.C. Fountain City: People Who Made a Difference: The History of Knoxville’s most fiercely independent community in the stories of 56 extraordinary citizens. Knoxville: Tennessee. Celtic Cat Publishing. 2016. 177.

[12] Parkinson, Robert.”Georgeg Roby Dempster”, Tennessee Encyclopedia, The Tennessee Historical Society, October 8th, 2017, https://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/george-roby-dempster/ .; Tumblin, J.C. Fountain City: People Who Made a Difference: The History of Knoxville’s most fiercely independent community in the stories of 56 extraordinary citizens. Knoxville: Tennessee. Celtic Cat Publishing. 2016. 177.

[13] Tumblin, J.C. Fountain City: People Who Made a Difference: The History of Knoxville’s most fiercely independent community in the stories of 56 extraordinary citizens. Knoxville: Tennessee. Celtic Cat Publishing. 2016. 176.

[14] Tumblin, J.C. “Fountain Citians Who Made a Difference: George R. Dempster (1887-1964)”.www.fountaincitynhistory.info, The Wayback Machine, 2002, https://web.archive.org/web/20110101120335/http://www.fountaincitytnhistory.info/People7-Dempster.htm.

The Top 8 Modern Ways to Learn History in 2026

Modern ways to learn history now center on interactive technology and vivid storytelling. The traditional reliance on static memorization has evolved into a dynamic engagement with global heritage, which actually helps to improve knowledge, memory, and focus on reflection methods. Learners now use a diverse toolkit of digital resources and apps to help with history, so they can more dynamically explore the complexities of events, historical narratives, and context, and see human progress through direct experience.

When you compare your parents’ study methods with those used today, the differences stand out — what was once based on memorization has evolved into an interactive, participatory way of exploring history, opening up new perspectives and more data. Here, Andrii Andriievskyi created a list focused on identifying ways and tools that prioritize retention and historical accuracy. The selections below represent a shift from passive consumption to active, habit-based learning. Heer we review these modern methods to see which one fits into your daily routine!

 

Way 1. Studying History in 10-Minute Lessons

The biggest hurdle in history learning is often the wall of text factor. When we analyzed microlearning studies, the data consistently showed that shorter, spaced learning sessions with visuals actually improve long-term retention compared to cramming. To see how this works in practice, we tested the Nibble app, focusing specifically on history learning lessons.

Nibble uses microlearning, which means learning through short, focused lessons (about 5–10 minutes each). The content is delivered in interactive chunks, with a minimalistic, high-quality design that keeps you interested and organically brings you to the point where you already want to open and learn the next chapter. The app combines different formats, including:

●      Text with visuals

●      Quizzes

●      Memorable mini-stories

●      Interactive tasks

●      Playful dialogues

●      Recall and test practices

This makes history feel more like an engaging experience. Key events are explained in a simple way, covering topics like ancient civilizations and major events. The focus is on understanding why events happened. As a result, you’re much more likely to remember vivid details, like the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb or the destruction of Pompeii.

Way 2. Reading Nonfiction Summaries of Historical Bestsellers

Not everyone has the time or mental bandwidth to read The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire cover to cover. Long-term studies show a steady decline in daily reading for pleasure, while at the same time, attention is fragmenting, and learning habits are becoming more digital and flexible. This is where modern apps to learn history can help you.

You can get the core arguments, the pivotal dates, and the author's unique perspective without the 500-page commitment. You can read the book summaries or switch to audio mode while walking the dog. By highlighting key points within an app, you create a personalized cheat sheet of historical insights that you can revisit later to reinforce your memory.

If you like a summary with the main takeaways, the Headway app adapts to this by offering 12 or 15-minute summaries of major nonfiction works. You can extract key ideas, highlight insights, and revisit them later, getting a curated layer over centuries of knowledge.

 

Way 3. Discussing History Topics in Social Learning Communities

Learning shouldn't be a lonely endeavor. We analyzed behavior on platforms like Reddit (specifically r/AskHistorians) and found that the Q&A format is incredibly effective for clarifying misunderstandings. You also Google and check the data before providing facts, and that is where the magic happens as you start to deep-dive into the information and check more sources. When you engage with a community, you get to:

●      See expert rebuttals and different interpretations of the same event.

●      Articulate what you've learned, which is one of the best ways to ensure the information actually sticks in your long-term memory.

 

Way 4. Watching Visual Explanations with YouTube History Channels

Sometimes, you need to see the troop movements of the battle to actually understand them. Actually, educational video consumption is one of the fastest-growing sectors on YouTube, largely because visual stimuli improve geographic and chronological clarity.

Channels like OverSimplified or Kings and Generals use animated maps and clever illustrations to explain complex shifts in power. Watching a 12-minute video with a dynamic timeline helps you grasp sequences far faster than a static map in a textbook. It's an efficient way to visualize how borders shifted and why certain geographic chokepoints defined empires.

Way 5. Online Courses: Following Structured Lessons

If you find that your self-study feels a bit all over the place, you might need the rails provided by a structured course. Coursera and Khan Academy are great platforms to investigate the topics. Millions of learners still flock to history modules because they offer a clear beginning, middle, and end.

At Coursera, for example, you can take university-led courses (from the likes of Yale or Stanford) that follow a guided path. You watch a lecture, take a quiz, and participate in a peer-review assignment. This method is best for those who have 30–60 minutes a week to dedicate to a deeper, more academic exploration of a specific era.

Way 6. Tracking Events Chronologically

One of the most common complaints about learning history is that events feel disconnected. You might know about the American and Industrial Revolutions, but do you see how they overlapped?

Interactive digital timelines (like those found on Chronas or The Histomap) allow you to scroll through time globally. You can see what was happening in China at the exact same moment the Renaissance was hitting its stride in Italy. This spatial and chronological way of viewing the world helps you understand cause and effect across different continents. You can also create your own tracks and visuals using tools like Canva, Figma, or Notion, which offer useful dashboards.

Way 7. Using Historical Games and Learning Through Decision-Making

We reviewed studies on game-based learning, which suggest that making choices drastically increases engagement. Grand strategy games like Civilization VII or Europa Universalis V are what-if simulators that help you see how events were happening in real life.

When you have to manage the inflation of the Spanish Empire or navigate the diplomatic minefield of 19th-century Europe, you internalize the pressures that historical figures actually faced. It moves history from something that happened to someone else into a series of logical problems for you to solve.

Way 8. Listening During Daily Routines

Audio has become the backbone of modern education. Podcast listening reached record highs in the U.S. They actually help with secondary activity learning. You can listen to the story and follow the narrative of historical events and remember the core highlights.

You can find popular podcasts like 'Dan Snow's History Hit' or 'Hardcore History' by Dan Carlin, which offer deep dives that feel like storytelling and are up to date with modern learners' intentions. We actually recommend episodic formats that break eras into 10 or 20-minute segments. This allows you to build a rich, contextual understanding of the past simply by hitting play during your morning chores.

Choosing Practical Ways to Learn History and Testing Tools and Solutions

The most effective ways to learn history are those that fit into your life and use microlearning methods. Therefore, you can just swap 10 minutes of mindless scrolling for a structured visuals lesson at a site such as Nibble or listen to a podcast episode. Whether you prefer the visual depth of a YouTube documentary or the interactive challenge of a historical game, the goal is consistency over intensity.

You can start with one method today, perhaps an app that fits into your commute, and see how it changes your understanding of the world. Just testing the tools and methods above with small, daily sessions often yields much better results than an ambitious plan you never actually start!

Please note that this piece includes links to external sites. These are not affiliated with the site.

The First Japanese American to receive the Medal of Honor – Fighting in 1945: Sadao S. Munemori, CMoH

Among the many stories of courage that emerged from the Second World War, the life and sacrifice of Sadao S. Munemori stands as one of the most powerful examples of devotion to duty and selfless heroism. Munemori holds a special place in American military history as the first Japanese American to receive the Medal of Honor. His bravery on the battlefield in 1945 was extraordinary in its own right, yet it also carried a profound symbolic meaning. At a time when thousands of Americans of Japanese descent were living behind barbed wire in wartime internment camps, Munemori's sacrifice offered an unmistakable testament to the loyalty and patriotism of Japanese Americans.

Terry Bailey explains.

Sadao Munemori.

Sadao Saburo Munemori was born on the 17th of November, 1922, in Los Angeles, California, the son of Japanese immigrant parents. His father had come to the United States as part of the early wave of Japanese migrants seeking economic opportunity on the American West Coast. Like many second-generation Japanese Americans—known as Nisei—Munemori grew up navigating two cultural worlds. He was raised in a household that valued Japanese traditions while simultaneously embracing American life and opportunity. Friends and family remembered him as a cheerful and hardworking young man with a strong sense of responsibility. Before the war he worked in local industry and attended school in Los Angeles, living an ordinary life that was suddenly disrupted by the events of December 1941.

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on the 7th of December, 1941 unleashed a wave of fear, suspicion, and prejudice across the United States. In February 1942 President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, authorizing the forced relocation and incarceration of more than 120,000 Japanese Americans from the West Coast. Entire families were removed from their homes and placed in internment camps scattered across the interior of the country. The policy did not distinguish between immigrants and American-born citizens, and many young Nisei found themselves labelled as potential security risks in the very nation of their birth.

Despite this discrimination, thousands of Japanese American men volunteered for military service to demonstrate their loyalty to the United States. Out of this complicated and often painful moment emerged one of the most decorated units in American military history: the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Composed almost entirely of Nisei soldiers, the 442nd became renowned for its discipline, courage, and determination. Its motto, "Go for Broke," captured the spirit of soldiers who felt they had everything to prove. The regiment fought primarily in the European theatre and would eventually become the most highly decorated unit of its size and length of service in U.S. military history.

Munemori joined the U.S. Army in 1944 and was assigned to Company A of the 100th Infantry Battalion, a unit closely associated with the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. By the time he arrived in Italy, Allied forces were engaged in a grueling struggle against entrenched German defenses in the mountainous terrain of northern Italy. One of the most formidable defensive systems facing the Allies was the Gothic Line, a series of fortified positions stretching across the Apennine Mountains. Built by German engineers and defended by experienced troops, the Gothic Line was designed to halt the Allied advance toward the Po Valley and the industrial heartland of northern Italy.

In the spring of 1945, Allied forces launched a renewed offensive aimed at finally breaking through these defenses. The fighting around the Italian town of Seravezza was especially fierce, as German troops made full use of the rugged terrain, dense forests, and fortified machine-gun positions. It was here, on the 5th of April, 1945, that Sadao Munemori would perform the acts of bravery that would define his legacy.

During an assault on heavily defended German positions near Seravezza, Munemori's platoon encountered intense fire from multiple machine-gun nests. Early in the engagement the squad leader was wounded, leaving the unit momentarily without direction amid the chaos of battle. Munemori immediately assumed command of the squad, rallying his fellow soldiers and pushing forward despite the danger. Recognizing that the enemy machine-gun positions were preventing the company from advancing, he took it upon himself to eliminate the threat.

Armed with grenades, Munemori advanced under heavy fire toward the enemy strongpoints. With remarkable determination, he destroyed two German machine-gun nests, silencing the guns that had pinned down his comrades. His actions allowed the squad to move forward and continue the assault. Yet the fighting was far from over. As the soldiers regrouped behind a small ridge, an enemy grenade landed among them after bouncing off Munemori's helmet. In that split second, he understood the danger facing the men around him.

Without hesitation, Munemori threw himself onto the grenade. By absorbing the force of the explosion with his own body, he shielded the soldiers around him from the blast. His sacrifice saved their lives and allowed the assault to continue. Inspired by his courage, the company pressed forward and successfully captured the German position, contributing to the broader Allied breakthrough along the Gothic Line.

Munemori was only twenty-two years old when he died. His bravery was quickly recognized by his commanders, and he was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor. In the citation accompanying the award, the U.S. Army emphasized not only his gallantry in destroying enemy positions but also the ultimate sacrifice he made to protect his fellow soldiers.

Beyond the battlefield, Munemori's heroism carried immense significance for Japanese Americans across the United States. During the war, many Nisei soldiers fought while their families remained confined in internment camps. Their service became a powerful rebuttal to the suspicion and prejudice that had led to their incarceration. Munemori's Medal of Honor, the first awarded to a Japanese American, became a symbol of that loyalty and dedication. His story resonated deeply within both the military and civilian communities. For fellow Nisei soldiers of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, Munemori embodied the spirit of sacrifice and determination that defined their unit. For many Americans at home, his courage helped challenge stereotypes and highlight the injustice faced by Japanese Americans during the war years.

In the decades that followed the war, Munemori's legacy continued to grow. His name has been commemorated in memorials, military installations, and historical accounts of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. More importantly, his sacrifice remains a reminder that patriotism and courage often arise from communities that have faced hardship and discrimination.

Today the story of Sadao S. Munemori stands as both a wartime narrative and a broader reflection on American identity. In a moment when the nation struggled with fear and prejudice, a young soldier of Japanese descent gave his life to save his comrades and help defeat tyranny abroad. His actions on a hillside in northern Italy not only opened the path for his company's advance but also helped open a path toward greater recognition of the loyalty and contributions of Japanese Americans in the history of the United States.

In conclusion, the story of Sadao S. Munemori ultimately transcends the battlefield on which his life ended. His actions in the final weeks of the war in Italy represent the highest ideals of military service: courage in the face of overwhelming danger, devotion to comrades, and the willingness to place the lives of others above one's own. At just twenty-two years of age, Munemori displayed a level of leadership and self-sacrifice that has become synonymous with the meaning of the Medal of Honor.

His final act of throwing himself onto a grenade to save the men around him, was not simply a moment of battlefield bravery, but a profound demonstration of human character under the most extreme circumstances imaginable.

Yet Munemori's sacrifice carried a deeper resonance far beyond the immediate tactical success it helped achieve. In 1945, the United States was still grappling with the contradictions of a war fought in the name of freedom while many of its own citizens remained confined in internment camps. The courage displayed by Japanese American soldiers of the 100th Infantry Battalion and the 442nd Regimental Combat Team exposed that contradiction with undeniable clarity. Munemori's Medal of Honor became a powerful symbol of the loyalty and patriotism of Nisei soldiers who fought not only against enemy armies overseas but also against prejudice and suspicion at home.

In the years that followed the war, the story of Munemori and his fellow Nisei soldiers contributed to a gradual shift in national understanding. Their wartime service helped challenge the assumptions that had justified the internment of Japanese Americans and played a role in the broader process of recognition and redress that would come decades later. Through their bravery, the soldiers of the 442nd demonstrated that devotion to democratic ideals could flourish even in the face of injustice. Munemori's heroism thus became part of a larger narrative about the resilience of American citizenship and the capacity of individuals to uphold national ideals even when those ideals were imperfectly applied.

Today, the legacy of Sadao S. Munemori endures not only in military history but also in the broader story of the United States during one of its most turbulent periods. His name stands among those whose sacrifice helped secure victory in the Second World War, yet it also serves as a reminder of the complex social struggles that unfolded on the home front.

The young man who grew up in Los Angeles, the son of immigrant parents, ultimately gave his life in the mountains of northern Italy to save his fellow soldiers and advance the Allied cause. In remembering Munemori, one remembers more than a single act of heroism. His life illustrates the courage of a generation that fought for freedom across the world while seeking recognition and equality within their own nation. His sacrifice is a reminder that patriotism is not defined by ancestry or circumstance but by actions and principles. On that battlefield in April 1945, Sadao S. Munemori demonstrated that truth with extraordinary clarity, leaving behind a legacy that continues to inspire soldiers, historians, and citizens alike.

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The Chicago Debutante Who Outwitted the Nazis - Part I: Snookering Vichy

Aviatrix Mary Jayne Gold came from a prominent Chicago family. Under the Gestapo’s nose in Marseilles, she helped save thousands from Hitler’s concentration camps, all while carrying out a brazen l’affaire de guerre with a cutthroat French-American commando. Timothy M. Gay explains.

French gendarme and German officer in front of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris in 1941. Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1978-053-30 / Jäger, Sepp / CC-BY-SA, available here.

I was not there to witness the worst, only the beginning, and even then, I was embarrassed into a sort of racialism – like being ashamed of belonging to the human race.

Mary Jayne Gold, Crossroads Marseilles 1940

Mary Jayne Gold was hurrying through Marseilles’ Place de la Préfecture, intent on renewing her Vichy-mandated foreign identity card, when a friend came barreling up from behind, bellowing her name. Her pal was panting as he delivered the bad news: local cops had just thrown Gold’s boyfriend and Resistance comrade into jail.  

“Some bastard weaseled on him!” the messenger hissed, gulping for air. Then he volunteered that Mary Jayne’s beau had lied and told the authorities that he was engaged to be married. Having a wealthy and attractive American fiancée might help him soften up the police, her boyfriend clearly reckoned.

Gold, a 31-year-old heiress (who pretended to be much younger) from Chicago, had to move fast. People snatched by the Gestapo’s Vichy stooges tended to disappear in the hellscape that was the South of France in 1940. Marseilles was swarming with so many exiles, spies, and street sharpies that it inspired the ersatz “Casablanca” that took root on the back lot of Warner Brothers two years later. The city reeked of cheap perfume, human excrement, and backstabbing.

For weeks, the Evanston debutante turned European socialite and her colleagues in the Marseilles-based American Emergency Relief Center had managed to keep Adolf Hitler’s sycophants at bay. Even with plainclothes gendarmes hounding them, Gold and company had succeeded in slipping fake identities, food, cash, and escape-route maps to refugees desperate to flee the Third Reich. Most were Jewish. But there were Christians, Muslims, agnostics, and atheists seeking sanctuary from the Nazis, too, some with spouses and children in tow, their eyes wide with fear.

Such artists as Marc Chagall, other surrealist painters and sculptors, and writer-philosopher Hannah Arendt had been plotting their escapes through the rescue committee. The group was headed by American journalist and academic Varian Fry and underwritten by U.S. philanthropists and anti-Fascists.

Now Fry’s Scarlet Pimpernel operation, which hinged on a nascent Resistance ring that stretched across both sides of the Mediterranean, was imperiled by the arrest of Gold’s lover. He was sure to be interrogated; if tortured and broken, he could compromise the entire network.

Her paramour was a half-American, half-French hoodlum turned French Legionnaire named Raymond William Couraud. He was a slippery character with back-alley connections to the Riviera’s criminal underground. Certain mob leaders had, thanks to Gold’s pocketbook and Couraud’s slick machinations, switched allegiances from the Nazis to the Allies. The gangsters’ cooperation was proving crucial in sneaking people and things away from Vichy’s prying eyes.

Everything was on the line when Gold learned that Couraud was being charged with desertion and detained on suspicion that he was abetting the forbidden Resistance. As he was being marched to his jail cell, Couraud, who was just 20 (but pretended to be much older), had the presence of mind to insist that he be allowed to see his “fiancée.” The cops agreed to send a car to bring Gold to the station.

Mary Jayne had nicknamed Couraud “Killer,” not because of his (literal) cutthroat tendencies, but because of the way he mangled the English language. Weeks earlier, Killer had forged phony Legion discharge papers. One of the arresting officers had removed the papers from Couraud’s coat pocket and put them on a desk. Somehow, without being detected, the onetime pickpocket had snatched them back. If he’d been caught with fabricated discharge documents, he knew he would have faced a long prison term, possibly a firing squad, given his ties to crime chieftains and the hated Fry. That’s why he needed Gold to show up – and in a hurry.

Mary Jayne at that moment knew nothing of Killer’s sleight-of-hand but sensed what needed to be done. She ran back to her suite at the Hôtel Continental and changed into a demure beige dress, chose a diamond ring for her left ring finger, and applied just enough makeup and Chanel to cause a French detective’s head to turn. She glanced at herself in the mirror before going downstairs to climb into the Citroěn.   

“I looked as if I had just come from a smart ladies’ luncheon,” she remembered four decades later. “I was just the kind of girl you hoped your son would marry: pretty, respectable, and rich.”

On the way to the station, Gold blithely chatted, en française, about her love for her “darling” fiancé, claiming that she couldn’t understand how he could be considered a deserter if France had already surrendered. She was hoping to butter up the cops, still fearful that they could turn nasty. Gold couldn’t help but think about the stories of people vanishing overnight while in Vichy or Gestapo custody.

When she and her two male friends arrived at what turned out to be a suspiciously makeshift jail, they discovered Killer standing in the middle of a room flanked by two detectives. He was flush-red, theatrically biting his lip and fighting back tears. Suddenly Killer burst toward Gold, begging, in French, for Mary Jayne not to forget about him.  

“I was totally unprepared for this public display but, given the circumstance, I murmured softly, ‘Of course not, darling, mon pauvre cheri,’” Gold remembered. “Our bodies were close together, his back toward the policemen. He held me in this embrace and then I could feel his hand slipping between my thighs. This was no time to begin erotic games; I slid my hand down to play interference.”

She instantly felt the “faint crinkle” of papers touching her lingerie. A moment later he was kissing her neck, then whispering in her ear, “My fake discharge papers. Here, destroy them.”

As he sleuthed the crumpled paper into her hand, she stage-whispered, in French, “My love, my only joy, I will never abandon you.”

The Vichy officials were bemused and perhaps a bit aroused by the spectacle. “They understood these things in Marseilles: love and the flesh,” Gold wrote.

Now the challenge for Gold was how to dispose of the forgery. Once Killer was taken back to his cell, she asked for permission to use the restroom. She was chagrined to discover it was a “Turk” – a lavatory without individual commodes. Given the debris clogging the drain, she didn’t think torn-up paper would make it through.

Instead, she returned to the station’s main room and – when the cops were distracted – palmed the papers to her two pals, who happened to be Couraud’s fellow Legionnaires. Since they were American nationals, however, they weren’t considered deserters. The men’s lavatory was also a Turk, but the drain was less congested. They tore the paper into tiny pieces and watched them disappear.

Couraud would be incarcerated for the next four months, but thanks to a pile of francs that Gold slipped to a crony of the presiding judge, Raymond averted a lengthy sentence or an appointment with the executioner.  

Mary Jayne Gold and Raymond William Couraud – rebels, spies, torrid lovers – had dodged another Axis bullet. For Couraud, it would be far from the last. He would go on to become one of the most heavily decorated Allied commandos of WWII, a saboteur who specialized in behind-enemy-lines bushwhacking and an assassin entrusted with directing one of the war’s biggest hush-hush operations, the attempted July 1944 kidnapping of German Field Marshall Erwin Rommel in Normandy.

Couraud was also a crook, a bigamist, a mercenary drummed out of Britain’s two leading special ops forces, and, at the end of the war, a soldier accused of collaborating with a suspected enemy agent. Like his wartime lover, his life unspooled as if it were a Saturday matinee thriller: one do-or-die cliffhanger moment after another, peppered with plenty of forbidden romance and a contempt for authority.

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About the Author

Timothy M. Gay is the author of two critically acclaimed books on World War II: Assignment to Hell: The War Against Nazi Germany with Correspondents Walter Cronkite, Andy Rooney, A.J. Liebling, Homer Bigart, and Hal Boyle(NAL/Penguin, 2012) and Savage Will: The Daring Escape of Americans Trapped Behind Nazi Lines (NAL/Penguin, 2013). Tom Brokaw called Assignment to Hell, which was nominated for a Pulitzer, a Bancroft, and an American Book Award, “a book every modern journalist – and citizen – should read.” Historian Marcus Brotherton wrote that Savage Will was “powerful, intriguing, well-researched, and fierce.”

Gay’s lengthy article on the citizen response to the Nazi U-boat threat in U.S. waters early in WWII was featured in a pandemic-inspired special issue of American Heritage called “America in Crisis.”

He has been featured on PBS’ “History Detectives” and contributed on-camera and off- to two documentaries – one on Walter Cronkite’s coverage of the Kennedy assassination, the other on Lyndon Johnson’s legacy on civil rights – which have appeared in Britain and the U.S.

His latest book is RORY LAND, a biography of golf superstar Rory McIlroy. It looks at McIlroy’s life through the prism of Ireland’s sectarian Troubles that devastated both sides of his family.

The History of the First Punic War: Rome vs. Carthage

During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union competed to spread their influence and ideologies. During the 3rd century BC, there was a similar power struggle between an economic superpower and a military giant. The struggle was for control over the Mediterranean, which was during ancient times and still is today the highway for trade. Whoever controls the Mediterranean controls the flow of commerce. The world we see today would be so very different if Rome had lost this decisive engagement.

The Punic Wars were a clash of the giants. Rome and Carthage were the superpowers of the Mediterranean during the 3rd century BC. The term “Punic” is derived from the Latin word “Punicus”, meaning “Phoenician” in reference to the Carthaginian ancestry. Carthage was a wealthy naval power in the Mediterranean. Rome, on the other hand, was a new power eager to expand its borders and influence.

Sudhir Devapalan explains.

The Naval Battle Near Ecnomus (256 BC) by Gabriel de Saint-Aubin.

The Roman Empire During the Early 3rd Century BC

Rome was not an Empire at this time but rather a quickly expanding Republic. It was trying to exert its dominance on the Italian peninsula as well as the Mediterranean. Although Rome was strong and rapidly expanding, it was only a regional superpower, not a behemoth yet. They had a strong, professionally trained army, but they had no navy or experience in naval warfare, which restricted them to being a regional power. But this would soon change after the Punic Wars.

The Romans' idea of war was vastly different from the perception of the Carthaginians. For the Romans, wars had to be won despite the cost. Failures and losses were inevitable, but final victory was mandatory. They would never give up or surrender. They did not worry about the cost of war or whether it was not profitable for them. They were proud to fight in the army and gain glory through victory.

The Carthaginian Empire

Carthage was a major naval and commercial empire in the Mediterranean. It was centered around the city of Carthage, which was one of the largest and richest cities in the ancient world. Carthage’s strategic location gave it access to major maritime trade routes that brought in a lot of wealth through the trade of agricultural products and other manufactured goods. Carthage did not field citizen soldiers unless the city of Carthage was under threat, and they were not well-trained. Predominantly, Carthage relied on mercenaries to fight its battles.

The Carthaginians were more calculative towards the concept of war. They were traders, not conquerors. They would wage war if it would profit them, but would sue for peace the moment things didn’t go right. Huge losses were not acceptable or sustainable for the Empire. This lackluster approach to waging war would end up costing them the war, not once but twice.

The Casus Belli

The First Punic War was caused by a dispute over the control of the islands of Corsica and Sicily. These two islands were strategically important to exert control over the Mediterranean. In 264BC, the Mamertines, a band of mercenaries, were hired to protect the city of Messina in Sicily, but instead they massacred the population and took over the city. They were then besieged by Hieron II of Syracuse to liberate the city. Hieron II defeated them decisively in the Longanus River. The Mamertines, in desperation, called on the Romans as well as the Carthaginians for military aid. It was the Carthagians who arrived first and made a deal with Hieron. This, however, did not prevent the Romans from trying their luck. They eventually got a foothold on the city after the Carthaginians were forced to withdraw. This act of aggression started a war with Carthage.

The Battle of Agrigentum

The Battle of Agrigentum was the first major battle of the war. Carthage and Syracuse began a joint attack on Messana, but this was easily repelled by the Romans. In 263BC, the Romans mounted an attack on Syracuse and forced them to sue for peace and ally with them. They then laid siege to Carthage’s main base at Agrigentum. A large Carthaginian force was sent to lift the siege, but was soundly defeated by the Romans in the Battle of Agrigentum. The Carthaginians lost 3,000 infantry, 200 cavalry, and 8 elephants. However, during the siege, the Romans lost one-third of their army, losing 30,000 infantry and 540 cavalry. The Carthaginian army stuck inside the city also managed to escape by filling Roman trenches with straw. Although the Romans won and captured the city, it was not a complete success as most of the enemy had escaped unscathed.

After the battle, the Romans sacked the city and sold the entire population into slavery. This sort of brutality would be a common tactic used by the Romans. It, however, did not have the intended effect as most of the towns refused to ally with the Romans. Although this was not a big military victory due to the escape of the Carthaginian army, it was the first large-scale victory for the Romans outside of the Italian mainland. This boosted their confidence to expand their influence more in the Mediterranean.

The Battle of Akragas

Most of the battles between 264 and 256 BC were fought in Sicily, and due to its hilly and rugged terrain, this favored defense over offense. Most of the fighting was limited to sieges and small skirmishes due to the difficult terrain. Following the defection of Syracuse, many of the small Carthaginian cities in Sicily switched sides. Carthage then used Akragas, a port city, as its strategic center. In 262 BC, the Romans besieged Akragas. The Romans had supply issues due to Carthaginian naval superiority and resorted to foraging and harvesting crops in the area.

The Carthaginians, however, raised an army of 50,000 infantry, 6,000 cavalry, and 60 Elephants and sent them to Sicily under Hanno. He trained his army in Sicily for 2 months and on 261 BC attacked the Romans. The Carthaginians were soundly defeated in the battle, but the garrison troops managed to escape. The Romans then captured the city and sold the entire population of 25,000 inhabitants into slavery. The Romans won another victory in the Battle of Panormus in 250 BC. However, apart from these two victories, no other major battles were fought in Sicily. The Romans wanted to shift their focus to the navy and target mainland Carthage. To do this, they had to build their navy from scratch.

The Whale (Roman Army) and the Elephant (Carthaginian Navy)

The Romans were the masters on land and had a stronger, more disciplined army. Roman citizens were mandated to serve in the army and were well-trained. Most Roman citizens would serve as infantry, with a few wealthier citizens serving as cavalry. The Romans fielded a professional army year-round and were deadly in battle. They had helped Rome take control of the Italian peninsula and crush any external threats. The Carthaginians relied on mercenaries who were hired as and when needed. The Carthaginian navy, however, was undefeated at sea and a force to be reckoned with. The Quinquereme was the battleship of the ancient era, and the Phoenicians were experts in naval warfare.

The Romans were new to naval warfare and did not have a strong navy. They could defeat the Carthaginians on land, but at sea, they were vulnerable. This led to a stalemate with the Romans being stronger on land and the Carthaginians being stronger at sea. Neither could challenge the other in their own domain. The status quo would soon change with the invention of the Corvus.

Roman Ingenuity: the Corvus

The Romans initially lacked the technical expertise to build large warships like the Quinquereme. They then copied the designs of a captured Carthaginian ship and built their own navy. However, they were not expert sailors and not proficient in naval warfare like their adversaries. Naval tactics of the era included taking out the enemy ship’s oars or ramming the ships with skillful maneuvers. The Romans knew that they could not fight on equal footing with the Carthaginians in conventional naval warfare.

Therefore, they came up with an innovation that helped turn the tide of battle, the Corvus. The Corvus (“crow” in Latin) was a ship-mounted ramp or drawbridge. The ramp could swivel from side to side and had an iron hook at the end to latch onto enemy warships. Once latched on, the ramp was used by Roman legionnaires to board the enemy ship. Once the ship was boarded, the Romans used their strength in numbers (the Roman ships had far more soldiers) to overpower and capture the enemy ships. The Romans were able to win a string of naval victories thanks to this innovation.

The Corvus, however, was not without its weaknesses. The additional weight on the ship made it very unstable and hard to control. This meant that the ships were not as maneuverable as their Carthaginian counterparts. A skilled enemy crew could outmaneuver the ships due to their lack of control. Another major flaw was the ship’s stability in bad weather. This would be the reason for discontinuing its use in later years.

The Battle of Cape Ecnomus

The Battle of Cape Ecnomus was arguably one of the largest battles in ancient history, with a combined total of some 680 warships and 290,000 sailors and marines taking part in the battle. The Romans had about 330 ships, while the Carthaginians could muster 350 warships. The battle was fought off the coast of southern Sicily, with Rome coming off as the clear victor.

The Roman Quinqueremes were bulkier and slower than their Carthaginian counterparts and therefore less maneuverable. Due to the lack of expertise in naval warfare, the Romans were at a disadvantage. The Carthaginians, who had recently raised a larger navy, also did not have skilled seamen and were not as competent as they expected them to be. The Carthaginians hoped to use their superior sailing skills to decisively defeat the Romans. The Roman ships were initially rammed and sunk. On the other hand, the Romans were able to use the Corvus to board the enemy ships and capture or sink them. After a hard-fought battle, the Carthaginian center began to lose heart and fled. The Carthaginians lost 30 ships sunk and 64 captured, to Roman losses of 24 ships sunk. The Carthaginians also lost 30,000 to 40,000 men, mostly captured, to 10,000 Roman casualties.

Carthage Sues for Peace

After the Roman victory in the Battle of Cape Ecnomus, the Romans under Regulus landed in North Africa. The invasion went well initially, and in 255 BC, the Carthaginians sued for peace. The terms offered by Regulus were so harsh, however, that the Carthaginians refused to accept them and continued the fight. The Carthaginians were defeated again in the Battle of Cape Hermaeum and lost 114 ships. The Romans, on the other hand, were devastated by a storm and lost 384 ships and 100,000 men. The use of the Corvus made the Roman ships unstable in rough weather, which may have contributed to such heavy losses. The Corvus was never used again.

Rome Rebuilds Its Fleet Again

The war raged on with neither side gaining an advantage. The Carthaginians attacked and recaptured Akragas, but razed the city to the ground as they could not defend it. The Romans, on the other hand, rebuilt their navy, adding 220 more ships, but 150 of them were lost in a storm. The Romans slowly captured most of Sicily but were defeated by the Carthaginian navy at the Battle of Drepana in 249BC. Following up with their victory, the Carthaginians defeated the remaining Roman ships in the Battle of Phintias. The Romans had vast reserves of wealth to fund their war and a large pool of manpower to recruit from. This helped them stay afloat in the war despite their losses.

The Final Defeat

After several years of stalemate, the Romans rebuilt their fleet again in 243BC and blockaded the remaining Carthaginian garrisons in Sicily. The Carthaginians assembled a fleet to relieve them, but were defeated in the Battle of the Aegates Islands in 241 BC. The surrounding Carthaginian troops in Sicily were forced to sue for peace. As per the treaty signed, Carthage was forced to pay large reparations to Rome, and Sicily was annexed as a province of Rome. Rome rose as the dominant military power in the Mediterranean.

The key factors that led to the victory of Rome were the mentality of the Romans. Carthage would wage war if it was profitable. If the war became untenable, they would quickly sue for peace. However, defeat was not an option for the Romans. They would win no matter the cost, and they would never give up. The huge effort of building 1,000 warships laid the foundation for Rome’s dominance at sea for the next 600 years. This would not be the last time Rome and Carthage would face off against each other, and Hannibal Barca would bring the fight to the Roman heartland soon. Roman grit and conviction would be tested once more in the Second Punic War.

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References:

https://dcc.dickinson.edu/nepos-hannibal/first-punic-war

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

https://www.worldhistory.org/First_Punic_War/

https://www.britannica.com/event/First-Punic-War

From World War One Hero to Capture in World War Two: Lieutenant-General Sir Philip Neame, VC, KBE, CB, DSO

Among the many distinguished soldiers produced by the British Army in the twentieth century, few lives were as remarkable—or as unusual—as that of Philip Neame. An accomplished engineering officer, decorated combat leader in two world wars, and later a colonial governor, Neame occupies a unique place in British military history. He remains one of the very few recipients of the Victoria Cross ever to have been captured by the enemy. His life and career spanned some of the most turbulent decades of modern history, from the trench warfare of the First World War to the sweeping mechanized battles of the Second World War and finally into the complex post-war world of reconstruction and public service.

Terry Bailey explains.

Shown here are Philip Neame (centre), Brigadier John Combe (left), and Major-General Michael Gambier-Parry (right) following their capture in North Africa.

Philip Neame was born on the 12th of September 1888 in London, England, into a family rooted in professional achievement and intellectual discipline. His father, Charles Neame, was a respected barrister, and the household environment emphasized education, responsibility, and public duty. As a boy Neame was educated at Cheltenham College, one of Britain's leading public schools, where he demonstrated particular ability in mathematics and engineering. These subjects would strongly influence the path he later chose in the army.

In 1907 Neame entered the prestigious Royal Military Academy Woolwich, the institution responsible for training officers for technically demanding branches such as the artillery and engineers. Upon graduating the following year he received his commission in the Royal Engineers. The Royal Engineers were responsible for a wide range of essential tasks, including fortifications, bridge construction, demolitions, reconnaissance, and communications. Officers in this corps were expected not only to possess physical courage but also technical competence and analytical skill. Neame's early career consisted largely of training, professional development, and routine engineering duties—experiences that prepared him well for the far greater challenges soon to come.

When the First World War erupted in August 1914, Neame was among the many young officers who found themselves rapidly deployed to the Western Front. The initial mobile phase of the war soon gave way to the entrenched stalemate that would define the conflict. Vast networks of trenches stretched across northern France and Belgium from the North Sea to the Swiss frontier. Breaking through these defenses required enormous artillery bombardments and carefully coordinated infantry assaults, supported by engineers who cleared obstacles, constructed positions, and carried out reconnaissance under fire.

Engineer officers frequently operated close to the front line, where they doubled their responsibilities by observing enemy positions and coordinating artillery fire. By 1915 Neame had become involved in this hazardous work, acting as a forward observation officer. Such duties required an officer to expose himself to enemy fire to accurately observe targets and direct artillery batteries located miles behind the lines.

It was during the Battle of Neuve Chapelle that Neame performed the extraordinary actions that would earn him Britain's highest decoration for bravery. The battle took place in March 1915 in northern France and represented one of the first major offensives launched by British forces during the war. The objective was to break through German defensive lines near the village of Neuve Chapelle and potentially open the way toward the strategically important Aubers Ridge.

The attack began with a powerful artillery bombardment designed to destroy German trenches and barbed wire defenses. In its early stages, the bombardment proved remarkably effective, allowing British infantry to achieve a significant breakthrough. However, the initial success quickly gave way to confusion. Communications between units broke down, German resistance stiffened, and reinforcing troops struggled to exploit the gap in the enemy's defenses.

On the 12th of March 1915, amid fierce fighting and intense machine-gun fire, Lieutenant Neame was attached to forward infantry units to observe enemy positions and direct artillery fire. Operating from an exposed observation point, he maintained visual contact with German defenses and transmitted corrections to British artillery batteries. This task demanded remarkable composure, as enemy fire constantly swept the area and communication equipment was primitive by modern standards.

As the battle intensified, British troops encountered a strongly defended German trench position that threatened to halt the advance. Recognizing the danger, Neame took decisive action. Gathering a small group of soldiers and armed with grenades, he personally led an assault on the enemy trench. Charging forward under heavy fire, he and his party overwhelmed the defenders, killing or driving out several of them and capturing others.

Even after being wounded during the attack, Neame refused to leave the battlefield. Instead, he continued moving along the line, encouraging troops and coordinating artillery fire while still exposed to enemy fire. His determination and leadership helped maintain momentum during a critical moment in the fighting.

The official citation for his award praised his "most conspicuous bravery," noting how he repeatedly exposed himself to intense fire while directing artillery and assisting infantry operations. By neutralizing the German position and maintaining effective observation of enemy defenses, Neame played a significant role in the temporary success achieved during the battle.

For these actions, he was awarded the Victoria Cross, the highest award for gallantry available to British and Commonwealth servicemen. The decoration recognized acts of exceptional courage performed in the face of the enemy, his conduct at Neuve Chapelle perfectly embodied the spirit of the award. Neame continued to serve with distinction throughout the remainder of the First World War. His leadership and professional ability earned him further recognition, including the Distinguished Service Order. By the end of the war in 1918 he had established himself as both a brave combat officer and a capable professional soldier with valuable operational experience.

The years between the wars saw the British Army attempt to adapt to a rapidly changing technological and strategic environment. Mechanization, improved communications, and the increasing role of air power forced military planners to rethink traditional methods of warfare. During this period Neame held a variety of staff and command positions that drew upon both his combat experience and his technical background as an engineer. He gained a reputation as a thoughtful and reliable officer, steadily rising through the ranks as the army modernized its structures and doctrine.

When the Second World War began, Neame was already a senior officer. By 1941 he had reached the rank of lieutenant-general and was given command of British and Commonwealth forces operating in Cyrenaica in North Africa. At that time the desert war was entering a dramatic new phase with the arrival of German forces under the dynamic leadership of Erwin Rommel.

Rommel's Afrika Korps launched a rapid and aggressive offensive that caught Allied forces off balance. The speed and scale of the German advance produced confusion along the front, forcing British and Commonwealth troops into a difficult withdrawal across the Libyan desert.

During this chaotic withdrawal in April 1941, Neame was travelling in a convoy with several other senior officers near the coastal town of Derna. In the fluid and rapidly collapsing front line, their vehicles unexpectedly encountered advancing German units. Surrounded and unable to escape, the group was captured.

The incident was extraordinary in military terms. It resulted in a serving lieutenant-general—who also happened to be a Victoria Cross recipient—becoming a prisoner of war. Neame spent the remainder of the war in German captivity, held in special prisoner-of-war camps reserved for senior Allied officers.

Life in these camps was restrictive but intellectually active. Senior officers organized lectures, discussions, and educational programs in an effort to maintain morale and discipline. Neame participated in this environment, helping sustain the professional spirit among prisoners who were determined to endure captivity with dignity.

When Germany surrendered in 1945, Neame was finally liberated after four years as a prisoner. He returned to Britain having experienced both the highest honor of military distinction and the hardships of imprisonment during wartime.

Following his retirement from the army, Neame entered a new phase of public service. In 1948 he was appointed Governor of Guernsey, becoming the Crown's representative on the island. The Channel Islands had endured German occupation during the war, and the post-war years required careful reconstruction of local institutions and infrastructure. Neame's leadership, discipline, and administrative experience proved invaluable in guiding the island through this period of recovery.

Over the course of his long life, he received numerous awards recognizing his service to the nation, including appointment as a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire and Companion of the Order of the Bath. Yet despite these distinctions and his high military rank, he was most often remembered for the extraordinary bravery he displayed as a young engineer officer during the desperate fighting on the Western Front. Lieutenant-General Sir Philip Neame died on the 28th of April 1978 at the age of eighty-nine. His life spanned the dramatic transformation of the British Empire and the upheavals of two world wars. Few soldiers experienced such a varied and remarkable career: a decorated hero of trench warfare, a senior commander in the desert war, a prisoner of war, and finally a respected public servant.

His story remains one of the most distinctive in British military history and evidence of courage, resilience, and a lifelong commitment to duty in the service of his country.

In conclusion, the life of Philip Neame offers a striking illustration of the many different forms that service and leadership can take across a lifetime shaped by war and responsibility. His career began in the technical world of military engineering, a profession that demanded precision, intellect, and calm judgment. Yet it was on the battlefield, under the intense pressure of combat, that Neame demonstrated the extraordinary personal courage that earned him the Victoria Cross. The actions he displayed at Neuve Chapelle were not merely a moment of bravery, but a reflection of character, an ability to act decisively and selflessly when circumstances were at their most dangerous and uncertain.

What makes Neame's story particularly compelling is the remarkable contrast between the various chapters of his career. In the First World War, he was a young officer exposed to the brutal realities of trench warfare, directing artillery fire and leading men in close combat under relentless enemy fire. By the time of the Second World War, he had risen to one of the most senior ranks in the British Army, entrusted with the command of major formations during a complex and rapidly evolving campaign in North Africa. That such a senior officer—and a holder of the empire's highest award for gallantry—should later spend years as a prisoner of war illustrates the unpredictable and often unforgiving nature of modern conflict.

Yet captivity did not diminish Neame's sense of duty or professionalism. Like many senior officers held in German prisoner-of-war camps, he helped maintain discipline, morale, and intellectual activity among fellow prisoners. These camps often became improvised centers of learning and discussion, where officers sought to preserve the values and traditions of their service despite the limitations of imprisonment. Neame's participation in this environment reflected the same quiet determination and resilience that had defined his earlier military career.

His post-war appointment as Governor of Guernsey represented another form of service, one that required administrative ability, patience, and diplomacy rather than battlefield leadership. The Channel Islands had endured the hardships of German occupation, and the process of recovery demanded careful guidance and stability. Neame's experience, integrity, and sense of responsibility made him well-suited to this task. In this role, he demonstrated that leadership forged in war could also be applied to rebuilding communities and restoring civil institutions.

Looking back across the decades of his life, Philip Neame's career forms a remarkable arc that mirrors many of the defining experiences of the twentieth century. He witnessed the transformation of warfare from the static trenches of the Western Front to the fast-moving mechanized campaigns of the desert war. He experienced both the triumph of heroic recognition and the hardship of long captivity. Finally, he devoted his later years to the quieter but equally important work of public administration and post-war recovery.

Few individuals embody so many contrasting experiences within a single lifetime. Soldier, engineer, commander, prisoner, and governor, Neame's life demonstrates the enduring values of courage, adaptability, and dedication to public service. More than half a century after his death, his story continues to stand as a reminder that true distinction in military history is not measured solely by rank or decoration, but by the consistency of character shown across every challenge that history presents.

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Notes:

Other notable VC holders who ended their conflict as prisoners:

Group Captain Gilbert Insall VC: He is noted as a unique case for having both won a Victoria Cross and successfully escaped from a German prisoner-of-war camp during the First World War.

Charles Hazlitt Upham VC & Bar: A New Zealand soldier who was awarded the Victoria Cross twice (the only combatant to do so) during the Second World War. He was wounded and captured by the Germans in July 1942 and was later sent to Colditz Castle prison, where he remained until his liberation in 1945.