Monthly Archives: March 2021

History

Remembering History: Wells Fargo Begins Freight Service

A Butterfield Overland Mail Coach at Fort Chadbourne museum in Bronte, Texas.
Photo: Pi3.124/Wikimedi

Today with our vast networks of freeways, highways and transportation systems it is hard to remember a time when it did not exist. Outside of the major cities and the areas around them, traveling long distance was difficult and often dangerous. When gold was discovered in California in 1849, the need for cross-country shipping increased. On 18 March 1852 Henry Wells and William Fargo along with several investors created a freight service called Wells Fargo & Company . At the time, sending important documents were often sent by courier rather than the U.S. Postal Service as it was faster. The second option was to use stagecoach drivers, railroad conductors or steamship crews to deliver your letters or packages. You really had to hope for the best with the second option, which was cheaper than hiring a private courier. This is where Wells Fargo fit in by having a dedicated service that would deliver documents and freight securely as paid courier for multiple customers.

While messenger services were well established on the East Coast and had penetrated the Midwest, the discovery of gold in California meant people were migrating in large numbers to seek their fortunes. This meant the need for reliable shipping from coast-to-coast was needed along with better communications between them. The telegraph had already been developed but it would take a while to set up the lines between east and west coasts. Ships took a long while to sail either around South America and up to California (or drop you off on the eastern side and you would walk to the west to catch a northbound ship, a perilous journey on its own!). Wells and Fargo wanted to set up a system of messengers that would convey freight to the Pacific Coast. The approached the American Express Company but they did not think it would be profitable. So Wells and Fargo established Wells Fargo & Co on their own with investors.

The first shipment was in July 1852 by shipping freight from the East Coast to mining camps in Northern California. Using contracted stagecoach companies, they were able to establish a service that was known for its fast delivery of freight, important documents, and other valuables. Wells Fargo also served as a bank providing loans, bank notes, and buying gold dust from miners. In 1857 Wells Fargo formed the Overland Mail Company that became knows as the Butterfield Line. This provided regular mail and passenger service along many routes during this time. During this time of boom and busts, they became a standard that people could rely on. They also had a premium service that would deliver and pick up mail or packages. By 1866 they had become the largest stagecoach company around. When the transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869, they used it to ship freight to locations where the company would receive the shipment and transport it to the destination. By 1910, it had established a large shipping network that stretched from large cities on the East Coast to farm towns in the Midwest, to ranches and mines in Texas and California, and up into the Pacific Northwest where lumber camps were. It was a huge network and showed how valuable such companies were to the growth of the United States.

The bank would split away from the freight business in 1905 and be headquartered in San Francisco. Although the bank’s offices were destroyed in the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906, it was able to recover as its vaults were untouched. Wells Fargo Company Express was nationalized with other shipping companies during World War I into American Railway Express. An overseas armored car service with the Wells Fargo name would operate overseas but ultimately merge with Loomis in the 1990’s.

Sources:

Brittanica.com
History.com
Wells Fargo


Holidays, Religion

St. Patrick’s Day

St. Patrick, Patron Saint of Ireland.
Church of Our Lady, Star of the Sea, and St. Patrick, Goleen, County Cork, Ireland
Photo:Andreas F. Borchert/Wikimedia

St. Patrick is the patron saint of Ireland and known for bringing Christianity to Ireland. He was born in 390 A.D in Britain and raised by a Christian family. However he was not much interested in God and at the time was illiterate. When he was 16, he was kidnapped and taken to Ireland where he was forced to work as a shepherd on a hillside. All alone except for his sheep and captors. he began to cry out to God for rescue him. He had a dream in which God revealed himself and that he would be going home.

Risking his life, he boarded a ship for Britain where he returned to his family. He was welcomed back but realized that he had been transformed by God. He entered a monastery to pursue his calling as a Catholic priest. As a result of his education, he came to understand Holy Scripture and impressed his peers and superiors with his character. He would be made a bishop in due course. Nearly three decades after this slavery in Ireland, he felt a call from God that he had to return to Ireland and spread the word of Jesus to a people who had become lost. This was no easy journey for him since travel was difficult but he faced hostility from those who opposed him trying to convert people away from paganism. Patrick was ready though to face the trials that might take his life (he was attacked and beaten by thugs and Irish royalty disdained him) and persevered in proclaiming the Gospel and training converts.

His courageous leadership and his crisscrossing the countryside paid off as thousands and more would be converted. Churches were being established and he was training those to shepherd the church after he was gone. He would die on March 17, 461 A.D. He has been venerated as a saint and patron saint of Ireland since then by the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Anglican and Lutheran churches. In Ireland it is a solemnity and thus a holy day of obligation. It is also a cultural day as well to celebrate Ireland. Traditionally many in Ireland will wear shamrocks, wear green, attend Mass, watch parades, have a special breakfast and dinner, and of course celebrate by having a beer in their favorite pub (or outside due to the crowds). It has been a public holiday in Ireland since 1903. Since the feast does fall within Lent and is a solemnity in Ireland, it is permissible to eat foods normally excluded during this time (or any food you have selected to give up). Outside of Ireland though, it is not and local bishops will offer guidance. If it should fall on a Friday, generally the Lenten rule of no meat is lifted for that day.

History

Remembering History: The Ides of March/Assassination of Julius Caesar

The Death of Julius Caesar,Vincenzo Camuccini (1771–1844). Public Domain
The Death of Julius Caesar,Vincenzo Camuccini (1771–1844).
Public Domain

Today is 15 March and on the old Roman calendar was a day of religious observance to the Roman god Jupiter and other lesser deities. But it is most famous as the date in 44 BC when Julius Caesar was assassinated at a meeting of the Roman Senate. 60 conspirators were involved but the leaders were Brutus and Cassius. Caesar was forewarned of his death by a seer according to Plutarch. And in his famous work Julius Caesar, Shakespeare has the soothsayer say “beware the ides of March” which Caesar ignores and if course he ends up stabbed to death uttering the famous line before death:

Et tu Brute!

The assassination was a turning point for Rome. It brought about a civil war and ended the Roman Republic. Octavian (later Augustus) would become emperor and the Roman Empire would come to dominate the entire Mediterranean Sea, North Africa, and parts of Europe and Britain. In Julius Caesar Mark Antony gives perhaps the most remembered funeral oration ever done. Most people recall the famous opening line:

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears! I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones; so let it be with Caesar.

The oration is masterful in that it cleverly turns the people against Brutus and Cassius by showing they were ambitious and not Caesar. By the end the plebeians call them traitors and murderers.

In real life, it was much the same. Antony played them by seemingly supporting amnesty but turning people against them both. Brutus was forced to leave and ended up on Crete, Cassius went east to gather support among the governors and to amass an army. Antony and Octavian would clash militarily causing divisions in Rome. This allowed the forces of Brutus and Cassius to march on Rome. However Octavian made peace with Antony upon this news so both forces joined to stop Brutus and Cassius. They met at Philippi on 3 Oct 42 BC. The first battle resulted in Brutus defeating Octavian but Antony defeating Cassius. Not knowing that Brutus had defeated Octavian, Cassius took his own life. At the second battle of Philippi on 23 October, Brutus was defeated and forced to flee into the hills where he committed suicide. Antony treated his body with great respect by having it wrapped his most expensive purple mantle. His body was cremated and remains sent to his mother.


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History

Remembering History: Nazi Germany Annexes Austria

 

Cheering crowds greet the Nazis in Vienna
Source: Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1985-083-10 / CC-BY-SA 3.0 (Via Wikimedia)

On 12 Mar1938 German troops marched in Austria and formally annexed the German-speaking nation.

The movement to unify Germany and Austria (Anschluss) began after the Austro-Hungarian Empire was dissolved in 1919 (by the Treaty of Saint German-en-Laye). There was sentiment to a union with Germany but it was barred by the Treaty of Versailles. Anschluss became an issue during the 1920’s and in 1931 the German and Austrian governments proposed a customs union. Austria had been weakened by the collapse of the Loan Bank (Kreditanstalt) and anarchy in politics. France opposed it as did Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and Romania. The International Court of Justice in The Hague decided it was illegal. 

When Hitler came to power in 1933, Anschluss was revived. Hitler considered it a cornerstone of his foreign policy. Austrian chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss was murdered in the  Chancellery in Vienna by Austrian Nazis trying to stage a coup’état. It failed but Hitler backed the Austrian Nazi Party (illegal in Austria) even though he by treaty in 1936 guaranteed independence for Austria. In 1938, the Austrian Nazis were plotting another attempt to seize Austria and unite with Germany. Austrian Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg was invited by Hitler to meet with him in February, 1938. Hitler demanded concessions that involved appointing Nazi sympathizers into positions of power.  Schuschnigg, knowing he had no support from Britain or France, gave in. Arthur Seyss-Inquart as Minister of Public Security, who had control of the police, was the key appointment that Hitler sought. Seyss-Inquart was an Anschluss supporter.

Schuschnigg called for a national vote on 9 March on Austrian independence. Meanwhile German troops began massing at the border. Hitler demanded that Schuschnigg resign in favor Seyss-Inquart. Under intense pressure, he resigned and the vote was cancelled. Seyss-Inquart was ordered by Hermann Goering to request German troops be sent in restore order. With that, German troops entered the country on 12 March 1938. Enthusiastic crowds greeted Hitler and the troops. A new Nazi government was created and the Anschluss was proclaimed. Jews in Vienna and other parts of Austria were subject to new harsh measures and many were imprisoned. Known opponents of the unification were also arrested. Many Jews tried to emigrate or flee Austria as well.

The reaction of Britain and other powers was mostly moderate to the annexation. And this emboldened Hitler to use more aggressive tactics to expand as neither Britain or France were going to stop him. Austria would remain a German federal state until after World War II when Austria was made independent again.

Sources:

Internet
History.com
Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team

Book
Snyder, Lewis: Encyclopedia of The Third Reich, Marlowe & Company, New York, 1976

,,

History

Northeast Blizzard of March 11-14 1888

The Great Blizzard that struck the Northeast of the United States on 11 Mar 1888  resulted in one of the most deadly blizzards to strike in the 19th century.. With massive snow drifts, powerful winds and 55 inches of snow in some places, virtually everyone between Washington D.C. and Maine was effected.

Blizzard of 1888, Park Place in Brooklyn NY. March 14, 1888.
NOAA Photo Library
Public Domain

No one was prepared for the blizzard. March 10 had been a pleasant day with temperatures in the mid-50’s Fahrenheit. Arctic air from Canada collided with Gulf air on March 11 resulting in a massive temperature drop. Wind quickly began to churn and soon reached hurricane-strength levels in places like New York City. Heavy snow fell everywhere and in New York residents awoke on March 12 to find their city in a complete whiteout. The snow drifts were so high in some cases that they nearly reached the second story of buildings.

Despite this, many did try to get to work using the elevated trains. Alas snow drifts blocked the rails and so trains could not go anywhere. Getting off the platforms proved formidable in some cases as snow drifts blocked exits. Some took advantage of this to offer assistance with ladders for a fee. It is estimated up to 15,000 were stranded. But the problems in New York City multiplied. With telegraph lines, water mains and gas lines all above ground, they were covered with snow and ice made inaccessible. Telegraph lines snapped as well making communication with the outside world difficult impossible.

Getting to work on foot proved perilous as well. With so much snow and ice, many businesses could not open since no one could reach them. Only 30 made it to the New York Stock Exchange. It remained closed for three days. Many people also were injured walking and some fell into small drifts and died (including a New York state senator).

Stereoview picture of Grand Street in New Britain, Connecticut, published by F. W. Allderige in 1888
Public Domain/Wikimedia

Outside of New York, it was just as bad. The wind and snow covered train tracks stopping trains. People had to endure freezing conditions as they awaited for assistance. Hundreds of boats were sunk due to the high waves and winds. Historic amounts of snow fell throughout the Northeast making it difficult for anyone to move about. Telegraph lines were knocked down as well cutting off areas from the outside world.

Aftermath

The storm resulted in $20-25 million in property damage. It took days to clear the railway lines of the snow drifts. Cities and towns had to deal with massive snow that had to be cleared and people were stuck in their homes in many places. Additionally emergency services such as fire and police were unable to respond or assist much in many places during this period. Fires in some places could not be put out as a result. Ships caught out at sea during the blizzard suffered badly; many that survived had to be fixed and lives were lost as well. Food deliveries were delayed since trains could not run for up to eight days until the snow was cleared from the tracks. 

Broken telegraph lines had become a hazard in New York City and like the snow took days to clear. With the telegraph down, communication went down between Washington D.C. and the Northeast including Canada. This would begin the start of moving critical infrastructure underground. New York City would begin construction of a subway line, telegraph lines and other important infrastructure would be moved underground as well.

This was the second major blizzard that had hit the United States in 1888. The first one occurred in January1888 and is often called the Children’s Blizzard over the number of children that died in the midwest as a result of it. The Weather Bureau, run by the U.S. Signal Service, did not see this blizzard nor the one that hit the Northeast in March. With all the damage that resulted from the Northeast blizzard, it was clear a change would have to be made. The New York press criticized the bureau for not manning weather reporting stations 24 hours a day. That was changed after this event but did not mollify a lot of critics. In 1890 the Weather Bureau was removed from the U.S. Army Signal Corps and put under the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It would be moved over to the Commerce Department during the Roosevelt Administration. In 1970 it was moved to the National Atmospheric Administration and renamed the National Weather Service in 1970.

Sources: 

History.com
National Museum of American History
Thoughtco.com


History

Ironclad Battle Changes Naval Warfare

 

“The Monitor and Merrimac: The First Fight Between Ironclads”, 1886
U.S. Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs, digital ID pga.04044
Public Domain/Wikimedia

A naval battle between two ironclad ships during the American Civil War would herald the change in ship technology leading to the use of metal over wood in shipbuilding. Wood was used in shipbuilding for centuries. Ships built for combat would often have thickened wooden hulls to reduce the impact of cannons and musket fire. The downside of building huge warships was sometimes they would be too heavy. They might be well armed and deliver heavy blows but smaller more maneuverable warships would be able to move around her easily and perhaps just outside their cannon limits. 

By the 19th century, the idea of using metal armor of some kind on ships was being considered. With cannon technology able to deliver massive blows, wood was no longer practical in battle. If you were up against a ship armed with those cannons, you probably would think twice about taking them on knowing they could sink you with just a few cannon shots and possibly out of distance of your own guns. The heavy weight of the metal made it impractical for sail powered vessels but the development of steam technology changed that. The French were the first to use ironclad ships during the Crimean War (1854-1855). Their armored ships withstood significant damage but their floating batteries defeated Russian coastal fortifications. The French would follow later with the first oceangoing ironclad frigate Gloire in 1859. The British would build the  HMS Warrior.

At the start of the American Civil War, the Union Navy was not that much interested in ironclad ships. Once they learned the Confederate Navy was converting a ship to an ironclad (the Virginia), they realized the necessity of having one of their own. The feared the Confederate ship would cause damage not only to Union ships and coastal cities and riverfronts. Congress approved funding of armored ships and the rush was on to build the USS Monitor. Construction was begun on 25 October 1861 and launched on 30 January 1862. The Virginia had sunk two Union frigates (Cumberland and Congress) and on 8 March 1862 forced the steam frigate Minnesota aground near Hampton Roads, Virginia before the Monitor arrived that night.

On 9 March 1862, the USS Monitor and CSS Virginia engaged in battle. The four hour battle that ensued saw neither ship destroy or seriously damage the other despite close range heavy cannon fire. However while it was a draw, the Monitor succeeded in defending the Minnesota and other Union ships threatened by Virginia. Thus the Union was able to hold on to Hampton Roads leaving the Confederacy with Norfolk and several rivers. Also as a result of the battle, the North would build more ironclads improving on the design in the process. The Confederacy would start construction on Virginia II.

Two months later the Confederacy was forced to scuttle the Virginia when Union forces attacked James Peninsula forcing a retreat. The Monitor was sunk in a storm off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina on 31 December 1862 with a loss of 16 seaman and four officers. The wreck was not located until 27 August 1973 but not confirmed until 1974 when clear photos taken proved it was the Monitor. When the U.S. Navy formally abandoning its claim on the wreck in the 1950’s, it was open to anyone. Since it was located in North Carolina territorial limits, the wreck and a specific radius around it was declared a marine sanctuary on 30 January 1975 and a National Historic Landmark in 1986.

Sources:

History.com
Monitor National Marine Sanctuary
USS Monitor Center
Wikipedia


History

The Russian February Revolution (8 March 1917)

Russian February Revolution in Saint Petersburg. March 1917. The crowd is in front of the Tauride Palace.
Public Domain/Wikimedia

On March 8, 1917 (February 24 on the Julian calendar used at the time) events would begin unfolding in Russia that would bring about the end of the Czarist regime in Russia and the establishment of a new provisional government that would transition to a parliamentary democracy. Unfortunately that interim government would itself be overthrown in October (November) by the Bolsheviks that established the Communist government in Russia that would last until 1991.

Russia lagged behind the major powers of Britain, France and Britain in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Unlike those powers which had fully industrialized and developed powerful economies, Russia was still primarily agrarian and had a very small industrial sector. Additionally it failed to modernize during this period and clung on to old social and political structures that made little sense in a more industrialized world. Capitalism was able to flourish in many places but not in Russia, where the autocracy did not allow it much room to develop. So Russia was considered a very backward nation.

Russia had disastrously involved itself in World War I. With a poor industrial sector, it was no match for heavily industrialized and better led German forces. Russia suffered heavy casualties and defeats. The economy could not absorb the cost of the war causing shortages of all kinds leading to unrest in the streets of Petrograd (formerly St. Petersburg-renamed to remove any connection to Germany). Radicals and moderates united to call for change and the end of the Czar. Widespread demonstrations began on March 8 in Petrograd. By 10 March all of Petrograd’s workers were on strike and some factories had elected their own deputies to workers committees.

The Petrograd garrison was called out on 11 March and some demonstrators were killed but the demonstrations continued. Then the Czar dissolved the Duma on the same day and troops began to waver. The following day on 12 March 1917, the Petrograd regiments defected to the demonstrators giving them 150,000 new supporters. On 15 March 1917 the rule of the Czars came to an end with the formal abdication of Nicholas II (his brother declined to be Czar). The new provisional government decided to stay in the war but had major challenges such as how to resolve the food shortages and other crises as well. Vladimir Lenin, leader of the Bolshevik Party but exiled in Switzerland, was brought back to Russia by the Germans in a sealed train. He would take charge and ultimately lead the Russian Revolution later that year that would install the first Communist government in world history.

Sources

Britannia.com
History.com

,,,

History

Remembering History: Alexander Graham Bell Patents Telephone

The old reliable rotary dial phone. The basic rotary dial had different looks but remained the same until the 1980’s when touch tone replaced it. A remarkably simple device that needed no batteries or internet connection.
Photo: R Sull (Wikimedia Commons)

It is hard to remember a time without telephones. Important messages and correspondence was limited by foot, horse and sail. Mail sent overseas could take, depending on the distance involved, weeks or months (and even longer when you depended on wind to power your sails). When the railroad arrived, mail could be loaded onto trains but still had to be delivered at the end. The telegraph had speeded things up enormously. Messages could be sent fast from point to point but it had its limitations as well. It required hand delivery of messages from the telegraph to its recipients. Enter Alexander Graham Bell and his invention called an harmonic telegraph that would combine the telegraph and a record player so that people could speak with each other over long distances.

On 7 March 1876, his patent for this device was registered. He had begun work on the device in 1871 and was able to get investors to back his idea. By 1875 with the help of his partner Thomas Watson, he had come up with a simple receiver that could turn electricity into sound. Two other scientists, Antonio Meucci and Elisha Gray, were working on similar technologies as well.The prototype that he and Watson developed allowed sound waves to create an electric current causing a soft thin iron plate (called the diaphragm) to vibrate. It was these vibrations when transferred magnetically to another wire connected to another diaphragm in another distant instrument that would replicate the original sound. A few days after the patent was filed, Bell called his assistant and uttered the now famous “Mr Watson, come here, I need you.”

Aftermath

The Bell Telephone Company was founded in 1877 (now AT&T) to market the new product. The first telephone line from Boston to Somerville, Massachusetts was completed in 1877 and by 1880 there was an estimated 49,000 telephones in the United States. It would spread to major East coast cities and by 1915 transcontinental service had begun. Bell Telephone grew quickly and bought out competitors or merged with them to form American Telephone and Telegraphy Company. Since they held the patent on this technology, they had a monopoly on the industry. And one they would not give up until a 1984 settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice requiring them to end control over state markets.

Litigation by those who claimed to have invented the telephone before Bell would last for over 20 years. At one point there was an attempt by the U.S. government to withdraw the patent over the numerous claims in 1887. However the Supreme Court ruled in 1897 that the U.S. government lacked standing. Simply put the patent had been duly registered as required by law with the Patent Office. In order cancel a patent, it must show that the patent had been fraudulently obtained requiring such fraud to be proved by testimony. Since the case lacked that determination, the Supreme Court told the government you have no standing to cancel a patent. 

The telephone system that was created resulted in major changes, large and small. It was easy in many places to now call for a doctor, the police, or fire department. Likewise other important business and government information could be done by phone rather than by sending a messenger or a telegraph. Speaking long distance was possible as well instead of telegraph. And dialing O for the operator meant a live human person would respond to assist.

Telephone technology would continually change over time. Calling long distance sometimes took a while depending on where you were located in earlier times (direct dialing was not yet possible due to many local exchanges, so the local exchange would set up the long distance call with other exchanges and that would take sometime to do that). In some rural locales, you had party lines where everyone was on the same line. So when you picked up the phone, you might find someone already talking! Dialing a number meant just that, you dialed a number on the old rotary phone. Speed dialing was not really possible except by mechanical means.

When touch-tone came into being, it made dialing a whole lot faster and easier. Phones changed as well from the old standard wall and desk types to more functional and even stylish types. And technology changed how phone calls were made too. Direct dialing ended the need for having to go through local exchanges for long distance calls. Now you just dialed an area code and the local number to speak with your favorite relative who lived far away. And as predicted by some futuristic science fiction, we now have wireless phones these days without the need of a phone line. Bell’s invention has certainly had an impact on us all. We cannot imagine a world without a phone.

Sources

History.com:
Alexander Graham Bell
Samuel Morse
This Day in History

Thought.co
Supreme.Justia.com

 


History

Remembering History: Boston Massacre (5 March 1770)

19th-century lithograph by Henry Pelham is a variation on Revere’s engraving and emphasizes Crispus Attucks, the African-American in the center, who became an important symbol for abolitionists. Circa 1856
Public Domain/U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (via Wikipedia)

It was a cold snowy night on 5 March 1770 when a mob of American colonists gathered at the Customs House in Boston. The protestors were objecting to the occupation of Boston by British troops. The troops had been sent in 1768 after resentment grew at unpopular taxation measures (Stamp Act and Townshend Act) passed by the British parliament. Since no one from the colonies was represented in parliament, it led to a backlash back in Boston.

Tensions had been running high for a while. Skirmishes between soldiers and colonists, and between patriot colonists and loyalists (colonists loyal to Britain) had been going on for a while. Loyalist stores were vandalized and customers intimidated. One such attack on a loyalist store on 22 Feb 1770 ended tragically. A Customs officer (Ebenezer Richardson ) tried to break up the rock throwing crowd by firing his gun through the window of his home. He ended up killing an 11 year old boy named Christopher Seider. This enraged the Patriots and tensions between Patriots and British soldiers were raised.

The one guard outside the Customs House was facing a mob and called for assistance. The commanding officer of the Customs House, Captain Thomas Preston, ordered his soldiers to fix their bayonets and join the guard outside. The colonists began throwing snowballs, which hit some of the troops. One of the troops, Private Hugh Montgomery, was hit and fired back. Others fired as well. When the smoke cleared, five were dead or dying and three more were injured. The five that were killed were Crispus Attucks (African American), Patrick Carr, Samuel Gray, Samuel Maverick and James Caldwell. Many consider them the first casualties of the American Revolution.

Aftermath

The British soldiers were put on trial and were defended by John Adams and Josiah Quincy. Two soldiers were convicted of manslaughter in December 1770. The two soldiers had their thumbs branded with an M for murder as punishment.The incident would be used by the patriot group Sons of Liberty (formed in 1765) who advertised this as a just cause for removal of British troops.

Paul Revere made an engraving that was widely distributed showing the British soldiers lining up to shoot the patriots. Though not accurate, it helped convey an anti-British message to many in the colonies. Tension decreased for a while but many were unhappy at the lack of representation in British parliament. The hated Stamp Act had already been repealed by this time (in 1766) but the Declaratory Act passed at the same time said parliament had the right to pass any colonial legislation it saw fit. Rather that quell the tension, it was made worse. Patriot colonists were outraged that as citizens of the British colonies they had no voice in government on any of these major issues like taxes or how justice was to be administered. It would lead to growing tension until the revolt would break out in earnest in 1775.

Sources:

Britannica.com
History.com


Titanic

Daily Mail: New Book On Titanic Focuses on Survivor Accounts

Collapsible lifeboat D photographed by passenger on Carpathia on the morning of 15 April 1912.
Public Domain(Wikipedia)

The Daily Mail has an article about a new book by author James Bancroft. This new book, titled ‘Iceberg Ahead,’ contains various survivor accounts to make the tragedy more personal. Some of the accounts are related in the news story. I think what makes this interesting is that it tries to get a good cross section of survivors who each have an interesting story to tell.

Source:

Tales of terror from the Titanic: From picture framer awoken by ship hitting iceberg to perfume salesmen hearing ‘pitiful cries’ as his lifeboat sailed away… the horrific 1912 tragedy from the eyes of 10 survivors (Daily Mail, 4 Mar 2021)