Christmas Every Day

1943

The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising is crushed

As a prelude to mass deportations and extermination, the German government in occupied Poland moved the Jewish population into packed and disease-ridden urban ghettos. From there they were told they would be put on trains to labour camps in the East but in fact, these journeys led only to places whose names live on in infamy: Treblinka, Sobibor, Auschwitz and Majdanek.

By early 1943 the remaining Jews of the ghetto in Warsaw knew what their fates would be — about 200,000 had already been deported — and began to resist sporadically. When German forces entered the ghetto in strength on Passover in April large-scale fighting began to take place. Various Jewish groups, separated by ideology but united in determination to go down fighting, had collected weapons, built strong-points and bunkers, and made alliances with Polish resistance fighters outside the ghetto.

For weeks they prevented the SS and Gestapo units aided by Jewish ghetto police and Polish police  from proceeding with the deportations until finally the Nazis resorted to burning down the ghetto, building by building. Some fighters escaped through tunnels to the outside where they joined the larger anti-German resistance, some committed suicide, and some surrendered. On May 16, the SS commander Jürgen Stroop (later executed for war crimes) announced the end of the uprising, marked by demolition of the synagogue, though minor incidents continued for weeks. German casualties were light but 13,000 Jews perished and a further 57,000 were deported. Stroop, who would late write a lengthy account of the battle praised the Jewish fighters. “The Jews surprised me and my officers with their determination in battle. And believe me, as veterans of World War I and SS members, we knew what determination in battle was all about. The tenacity of your Warsaw Jews took us completely by surprise. That’s the real reason the Großaktion lasted as long as it did.”

The next year, Warsaw would rise again in rebellion and again the Nazis would crush the resistance.

1948 Arab-Israeli War begins

The collapse of the Turkish Ottoman empire after World War I led to much of the Arab world being governed by Britain and France as “mandates”: the British were given Palestine and Iraq to supervise, while France took over ruling Syria and Lebanon. The most problematic of these territories was Palestine where the local Arab population resented Jewish immigration and where a number of radical Jewish groups wished to expel the British and establish an independent Jewish state. Terrorism and atrocities were the order of the day for both sides.

After the Second World War, Britain was desperate to be rid of its Palestinian mandate, having tried to keep the peace but ending up unpopular with both Arabs and Jews. In late 1947, the United Nations proposed a partition of the territory, allotting land for both a Jewish and an Arab state while maintaining Jerusalem and Bethlehem under an international regime. Both Arabs and Jews prepared for conflict, gathering troops, establishing fortifications and buying weapons abroad. Sporadic fighting broke out and terrorist attacks were undertaken. When the partition was to take effect and the republic of Israel was declared, war erupted on May 15. Irregular forces of Muslim volunteers from the Holy War Army and the Arab Liberation Army, the Arab Legion of Jordan, and the armies of Egypt, Syria and Iraq descended upon Jewish-held territories; fighting lasted over 9 months. When the smoke cleared the Israeli state had survived and expanded its territory, Jordan had seized the West Bank, and a massive relocation of refugees begun. Seventy-four years later, the wounds have not healed.

1878

America’s last witchcraft trial

It was, appropriately enough, in Salem, Massachusetts that what came to be known as the last American witchcraft trial took place.

Lucretia Brown was a 50-year old spinster, who had been an invalid since she injured her spine in a childhood accident, when she  became a disciple of  Mary Baker Eddy. She became convinced that Christian Science had healed her but when she suffered a “relapse” in 1875, Mrs. Eddy convinced her that Daniel Spofford of Newburyport, whom Mrs. Eddy had recently excommunicated for “immorality”, was exercising mesmeric powers upon her. Eddy’s term for these powers was “Malicious Animal Magnetism”.

Mrs. Eddy believed that Spofford was an enemy of her church and tried unsuccessfully to publish an attack against him in papers throughout the county. She directed twelve of her students to spend two hours each every day around the clock in concentrated thought against Mr. Spofford to prevent him from doing further harm to her patients. She had her lawyer in Lynn draw up a bill of complaint in Lucretia Brown’s name, setting forth the injuries that Spofford had supposedly inflicted and petitioning the court to restrain him from exercising his powers against her. The text stated that “the defendant practices the art of mesmerism and by his said art and the power of his mind influences and controls the minds and bodies of other persons for the purpose of injuring the persons and property and social relations of others”.

Mrs Eddy’s attorney refused to argue the case in court, so she ordered her student Edward Arens to do so and twenty of her followers to stand as witnesses. On June 3, 1875 they assembled at the railway station in Lynn for the train to Salem. The Boston Globe reported that one of the appointed witnesses approached Mrs. Eddy to complain that he knew nothing whatever about the case and would not know what to say, whereupon she assured him that he would be told what to say. At the courthouse in Salem, nearly two centuries after the witchcraft hysteria, the last charge of witchcraft in this country was brought to trial. Mr. Spofford did not bother to appear. When Mr. Arens rose before Judge Horace Gray and presented the bill of complaint, Mr. Spofford’s attorney Mr. Noyes objected. Judge Gray declared that it was not within the power of the Court to control Mr. Spofford’s mind, even if he were to be jailed. Mrs Eddy was not given any opportunity to argue that disease could be the work of mesmeric powers, and the case was dismissed due to “defects in the writ.”

Lucretia Brown lived out her life still convinced of her Christian Science beliefs, dying in 1883 of pneumonia after refusing medical care.

1878

America’s last witchcraft trial

It was, appropriately enough, in Salem, Massachusetts that what came to be known as the last American witchcraft trial took place.

Lucretia Brown was a 50-year old spinster, who had been an invalid since she injured her spine in a childhood accident, when she  became a disciple of  Mary Baker Eddy. She became convinced that Christian Science had healed her but, when she suffered a “relapse” in 1875, Mrs. Eddy convinced her that Daniel Spofford of Newburyport (pictured above), whom Mrs. Eddy had recently excommunicated for “immorality”, was exercising mesmeric powers upon her. Eddy’s term for these powers was “Malicious Animal Magnetism”.

Mrs. Eddy believed that Spofford was an enemy of her church and tried unsuccessfully to publish an attack against him in papers throughout the county. She directed twelve of her students to spend two hours each every day around the clock in concentrated thought against Mr. Spofford to prevent him from doing further harm to her patients. She had her lawyer in Lynn draw up a bill of complaint in Lucretia Brown’s name, setting forth the injuries that Spofford had supposedly inflicted and petitioning the court to restrain him from exercising his powers against her. The text stated that “the defendant practices the art of mesmerism and by his said art and the power of his mind influences and controls the minds and bodies of other persons for the purpose of injuring the persons and property and social relations of others”.

Mrs Eddy’s attorney refused to argue the case in court, so she ordered her student Edward Arens to do so and twenty of her followers to stand as witnesses. On June 3, 1875 they assembled at the railway station in Lynn for the train to Salem. The Boston Globe reported that one of the appointed witnesses approached Mrs. Eddy to complain that he knew nothing whatever about the case and would not know what to say, whereupon she assured him that he would be told what to say. At the courthouse in Salem, nearly two centuries after the witchcraft hysteria, the last charge of witchcraft in this country was brought to trial. Mr. Spofford did not bother to appear. When Mr. Arens rose before Judge Horace Gray and presented the bill of complaint, Mr. Spofford’s attorney, Mr. Noyes, objected. Judge Gray declared that it was not within the power of the Court to control Mr. Spofford’s mind, even if he were to be jailed. Mrs Eddy was not given any opportunity to argue that disease could be the work of mesmeric powers, and the case was dismissed due to “defects in the writ.”

Lucretia Brown lived out her life still convinced of her Christian Science beliefs, dying in 1883 of pneumonia after refusing medical care.

1619

The execution of a Dutch patriot

Johan van Oldenbarneveldt (1547-1619) was a Dutch lawyer who took part in the resistance to Spanish occupation, the so-called 60 Years’ War. He was a prominent politician who stood up for the rights of the province of Holland and those adhering to the anti-Calvinist branch of Protestantism known as Arminianism. Both of these brought him into conflict with Maurice of Nassau, leader of the Orange faction. In 1618 Oldenbarneveldt was arrested and charged with treason; the trial was infamous for its unfairness, Chamber’s Book of Days was still angry about it 200 years later:

His name is usually associated with ideas of national ingratitude. Another is evoked by it, that there is no party or body of men safe by their professions of liberal principles, or even their professed support of liberal forms of government, from the occasional perpetration of acts of the vilest tyranny and oppression. After William of Orange, the Netherlands owed their emancipation from the Spanish yoke to the advocate, Johan Van Olden Barneveldt. He it mainly was who obtained for his country a footing among the powers of Europe. As its chief civil officer, or advocate-general, he gained for it peace and prosperity, freed it from debt, restored its integrity by gaining back the towns which had been surrendered to England as caution for a loan, and extorted from Spain the recognition of its independence. It owed nearly everything to him. Nor could it be shewn that he ever was otherwise than an upright and disinterested administrator. He had, however, to oppose another and a dangerous benefactor of Holland in Prince Maurice of Orange. A struggle between the civil and the military powers took place.

There was at the same time a struggle between the Calvinists and the Arminians. In British history, the former religious body has been associated with the cause of civil liberty. The history of the Netherlands is enough to shew that this was from no inherent or necessary affinity between liberty and the Genevan church. Barneveldt, who had embraced the tenets of Armin, contended that there should be no predominant sect in Holland; he desired toleration for all, even for the Catholics. The Calvinists, to secure their ascendancy, united themselves with Prince Maurice, who, after all, was not of their belief. By these combined influences, the sage and patriotic Barneveldt was overwhelmed. After a trial, which was a mockery of justice, he was condemned to death; and this punishment was actually inflicted by decapitation, at the Hague, on the 13^th of May 1619, when Barneveldt was seventy-two years of age.

1945  A very busy day

V-E Day

Victory in Europe Day. In the ruins of conquered Berlin, German Field-Marshal Wilhelm Keitl signed the document to “surrender unconditionally to the Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force and simultaneously to the Supreme High Command of the Red Army all forces on land, at sea, and in the air who are at this date under German control.” This officially ended the European phase of the Second World War, though sporadic fighting continued for a few days.

Prague Uprising

One of those places where fighting continued was in Prague, the capital of Czecho-Slovakia, where citizens had risen up against the occupying German forces. Believing that American and Russian armies were near, the Czech partisans began attacking German positions in the city on March 5. Several days of heavy fighting ensued, including tank battles and air attacks, before an agreement allowed the German forces to slip westward to avoid surrendering to the Soviets.

Sétif Massacre

In the French colony of Algeria, during celebrations of the war’s end, fighting broke out between pro-independence natives and French colons (settlers) resulting in the massacre of over 100 French civilians. The military took revenge against Algerian villages believed to be involved and conducted a series of atrocities that resulted in thousands of deaths, souring relations between the French and their Arab and Berber subjects.

Halifax Riot

When news of the end of the war in Europe reached Halifax on May 7, the city was swollen with the presence of over 25,000 servicemen anxious to celebrate. The commanding admiral, Leonard W. Murray, against the advice of his officers, unwisely allowed 9,000 sailors to go ashore, asking them to “be joyful without being destructive or distasteful.” The men found there were no places they could legally drink and began a riot in which liquor stores were looted, shops were vandalized and robbed, streetcars were overturned and burnt and the police attacked. The next morning, the clueless Murray allowed another 9,500 men shore leave with a similar result. Finally, aware of the disorder, the military declared a curfew and herded men back into their barracks. The damage was three men dead (two from alcohol poisoning, and one a possible murder), 363 arrested, 654 businesses damaged and 207 establishments looted.