Christmas Every Day

1415 St Crispin’s Day Battle of Agincourt

The Hundred Years War pitted England against France, a a conflict that should easily have been won by the French, a much larger and richer nation. France, however, was militarily hampered by relying on their cavalry of heavily armoured aristocrats in an age when English longbow men could dominate a battle field. After years of a truce, Henry V of England decided to press his (dubious) claim to the French throne and invaded France. On this day in 1415 his small army of 5,000 archers and 800 men-at-arms was forced to meet a much larger French army (perhaps 20,000-30,000 men) in a muddy field near the village of Agincourt.

The English fought on foot with a line stretched between two forest groves that would protect their flanks. In front of their line the archers had hammered in sharp stakes to deter the French horsemen. The French relied on their cavalry, knights eager to be in the first lines so as to benefit from the ransoms they hoped to take from English prisoners. It was a vain hope. Waves of French cavalry were cut down by the archers; those who fell drowned in the mud or had their throats cut by nimble English infantry. Those who were taken prisoner and moved to the rear were murdered when Henry feared they might escape. After losing about 10,000 men in four hours the French retreated and Henry’s force was allowed to slip away with rich booty and high-ranking prisoners.

Today this bloody encounter is remembered by English-speakers mostly for the speech that Shakespeare puts in Henry’ mouth on the eve of the battle but at the time this was the song that was on the lips of folks back home, the “Agincourt Carol”:

Deo gratias Anglia redde pro victoria!

[Give thanks, England, to God for victory!]

Owre Kynge went forth to Normandy

With grace and myght of chyvalry

Ther God for hym wrought mervelusly;

Wherefore Englonde may call and cry

Chorus

Deo gratias!

Deo gratias Anglia redde pro victoria!

He sette sege, forsothe to say,

To Harfleur towne with ryal aray;

That toune he wan and made afray

That Fraunce shal rewe tyl domesday.

Chorus

Then went hym forth, owre king comely,

In Agincourt feld he faught manly;

Throw grace of God most marvelsuly,

He had both feld and victory.

Chorus

Ther lordys, erles and barone

Were slayne and taken and that full soon,

Ans summe were broght into Lundone

With joye and blisse and gret renone.

Chorus

Almighty God he keep owre kynge,

His peple, and alle his well-wyllynge,

And give them grace wythoute endyng;

Then may we call and savely syng:

Chorus

1943 The Provisional Government of Free India is formed

Though most people associate the non-violent methods of M.K. Gandhi as the means by which India achieved its independence, there were many in the movement who were prepared to use force against their British rulers. Among those was Subhas Chandra Bose, who had been the charismatic president of the Indian National Congress in the pre-war years. When war broke out in 1939, Bose was put under house arrest by the British but he escaped and made his way to Nazi Germany. His view was that he would cooperate with anyone who could bring about an end to the British Raj.

Attempts by Bose and the Germans to set up an army drawn from the ranks of Indian soldiers in the British army who had been taken prisoner proved to be a failure, so Bose and his Nazi hosts decided he could be better employed in Asia. He journeyed by submarine to Japanese-occupied territory and set about to form an Indian puppet government and construct an army from prisoners held by the Japanese. On this day in 1943 the Provisional Government of Free India was formed, with its own currency, postage stamps, courts and laws but its only territory being a couple of islands in the Indian Ocean.

Troops of Bose’s new Indian National Army (INA) accompanied the Imperial Japanese army in its invasion of Burma and India but they met little success. British and Indian troops loyal to the British blunted the Japanese attack and pushed them back through the jungles of Burma, killing over half the INA in the process. Bose could see that the Japanese attempt to form a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere and its plans for a free India were doomed. He planned to defect to the Soviet Union but died in 1945 in a plane crash on Taiwan.

Free India failed in its war-time efforts but within a few years the British agreed to withdraw from the Indian subcontinent where Bose is now regarded as a national hero.

1947 HUAC begins its investigation of Communism in Hollywood

Since World War I the American House of Representatives had set up a number of committees to investigate foreign subversion in the United States. Their scrutiny fell on supporters of both fascism and communism, or anyone who might incite disloyalty, such as Japanese residents of California during World War II.

In 1945 these ad hoc investigations were replaced with a permanent format: the House Committee on Un-American Activities which came to be known as HUAC. It was HUAC that would unmask Alger Hiss as a Russian agent who had worked in the White House, and in 1947 the committee turned its attention on Communist infiltration of Hollywood.

This set of hearings found easy pickings. Hollywood was full of those who had supported the Soviet Union at one time or other, particularly during the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) and during World War II when the Soviets were an ally. Having been associated with such pro-Stalin movies as Mission to Moscow (1943), which praised the infamous show trials and accused Leon Trotsky of collaborating with the Nazis, or one of the groups set up to send aid to the Spanish Republic, now left many open to charges of sympathizing with Bolshevism. And, to be sure, there was no shortage of genuine Communists and party members in Hollywood, especially among screenwriters and the craft unions. (See the Coen brothers’ comedy Hail Caesar for an exploration of this.)

The committee summoned a string of Hollywood luminaries to testify about their experience with Communism in the film industry. Some of them such as Walt Disney identified others who were suspected of party membership or sympathies but some refused to testify at all. This group, known as the Hollywood Ten included no actors but prominent screenwriters and directors: Herbert Biberman, Ring Lardner Jr, Dalton Trumbo, Edward Dymytryk. They made no apologies about their left-wing sympathies – one of them, Alvah Bessie, boasted that he had inserted pro-Soviet propaganda “subversive as all hell” into his work – but stood on their First Amendment Rights. They were convicted on contempt of Congress and sentenced to a year in jail.

These hearings led to a blacklist of the Ten and hundreds of other perceived Communist sympathizers who were not permitted to openly work in the film industry for decades. Though HUAC had successfully exposed pro-Soviet elements in Hollywood, popular culture would come to view it as part of a witch hunt and make heroes of those who refused to “name names”.

1529 The Siege of Vienna Fails

Since the late 1300s the Ottoman Turks had been expanding into eastern Europe, conquering a number of Christian states and levying tribute from others on their borders. In 1453 they stormed the walls of Constantinople and ended the Byzantine Empire which had stood as a bulwark against Islam for 800 years. The Turks gradually moved out of the Balkans toward central Europe. In 1526 they smashed the Hungarians at Mohács and set their eyes on Vienna, capital of the Holy Roman empire.

The Turkish sultan was Suleiman the Magnificent, victor of battles against Wallachians, Serbs, Hungarians, the Knights of Rhodes, and Persia. He styled himself the Kayser-i-Rum, emperor of Rome and successor to Alexander the Great, the Byzantines and the Caesars. In 1529 he assembled a massive army of over 100,000 men and marched into Austria. His elite cavalry, the sipahis, and his elite infantry, the janissaries, were accompanied by artillery, often pulled by camels, and a force of Christian infantry from territories in Serbia subject to the Turks. They reached Vienna in late September and laid siege to the city.

Vienna was not well fortified nor were her walls manned by an abundance of troops. The Emperor Charles V was off in western Europe making war on the French and could spare only a very few soldiers, Spanish musketeers. The rest of the defenders were townsfolk and German landsknecht mercenaries, wielders of long swords and pikes. Fortunately, the defence was led by a cunning old strategist, Count Nicholas von Salm, a German mercenary who had been a soldier since the 1470s and who countered the Turkish siege attempts by intercepting the tunnels beneath the walls and occasional sallies against enemy trenches. In the end, sickness, heavy rain and snow sapped Turkish morale and on this date Suleiman abandoned the siege. Islamic forces would not penetrate this deep into Europe again until another disastrous siege of Vienna in 1683.

1066

In the first year of the War of 1812, the United States hoped to invade and conquer Canada by a four-pronged attack over a number of fronts. One army was to aim at Montreal, another at Kingston, another would cross into the Niagara region, and the last would be launched from Detroit against Amherstburg.

The plans never fully materialized. The American general Hull would be besieged in Detroit and forced to surrender to British General Isaac Brock, General Dearborn dallied in Albany, and the assault on Kingston never materialized. The thrust into the Niagara area did have profound consequences.

In October, General Van Rensselaer, based in Lewiston, New York, planned to cross the Niagara River and seize Queenston Heights. There he would establish a fort from which he could mount further attacks into Upper Canada. To do this, he assembled a force of 900 American army regulars and 2,650 militia men; opposing him was Brock’s contingent of 1,900 British regulars, Canadian militia, and Mohawk natives.

Though the boats carrying the invasion force on October 13 were heavily damaged by British artillery, American troops stormed gamely ashore and, advancing up the hill, took the guns and “spiked” them, putting them out of commission. Their capture of the Heights, and the death from sniper fire of General Brock and his replacement Lieutenant Colonel John Macdonnell, seemed to signal an American victory but British and Canadian reinforcement and a dread of the Mohawks caused nerves to fail and troops refuse to advance to consolidate their position. A bayonet charge and Mohawk war whoops finally brought about an American surrender.

The USA lost 100 killed, 170 wounded, and 835 captured; the defenders lost 21 killed, 85 wounded, and 22 captured. Canada lost a very able general in Brock (that’s him dying in the bottom right of the picture above) but the American invasion had been, not for the first, nor the last, time, thwarted.

The victory is commemorated by the towering Queenston Monument and is memorialized in song. The battle is celebrated in what really ought to be the Canadian national anthem, “The Maple Leaf Forever”, Stan Roger’s ballad “Macdonnell on the Heights”, and the 1959 novelty tune “The Battle of Queenston Heights”, penned in answer to Johnny Horton’s hit single “The Battle of New Orleans”.

From Chambers’ Book of Days:

On 12^th October 1492, Columbus with his followers landed on Guanahani or San Salvador, one of the Bahama Isles, and planted there the cross in token of gratitude to the Divine mercy, which, after guiding him safely through a perilous voyage, had at last, in the discovery of a western world, crowned with success the darling aspiration of his life. Land had already been descried on the previous evening, but it was not till the ensuing morning that the intrepid admiral beheld the flat and densely-wooded shores gleaming beneath the rays of an autumn sun, and by actually setting his foot on them, realized the fulfilment of his hopes.

It is now well known that although Columbus was unquestionably the first to proclaim to the world at large the existence of a new and vast region in the direction of the setting sun, he cannot literally be said to have been the first European discoverer of America. The ancient Scandinavians or Norsemen, so renowned for their maritime enterprise, had, at the commencement of the 11^th century, not only settled colonies in Greenland, but explored the whole east coast of America as far south as lat. 41° 30′ N, and there, near New Bedford, in the state of Massachusetts, they planted a colony. An intercourse by way of Greenland and Iceland subsisted between this settlement and Norway down to the fourteenth century.

There is also satisfactory evidence for believing, that in the twelfth century the celebrated Welsh prince, Madoc, having sailed from his native country with a small fleet, landed and founded a colony on the coast of Virginia. But to Columbus still belongs the merit of having philosophically reasoned out the existence of a New World, and by practically ascertaining the truth of his propositions, of inaugurating that connection between the Eastern and Western Hemispheres which has effected so remarkable a revolution in the world’s history.

The story of Prince Madoc continues to fascinate. Check out this site for the possibility of a tribe of Welsh Indians: https://www.thestar.com/news/insight/2007/07/22/will_dna_turn_madoc_myth_into_reality.html

From Chambers’ Book of Days, the most medieval thing you are going to read about this week:

On 8^th October 1361, there took place on the Ile Notre Dame, Paris, a combat, which both illustrates strikingly the maxims and ideas prevalent in that age, and is perhaps the most singular instance on record of the appeals to ‘the judgment of God’ in criminal cases.

Aubry de Montdidier, a French gentleman, when travelling through the forest of Bondy, was murdered and buried at the foot of a tree. His dog remained for several days beside his grave, and only left the spot when urged by hunger. The faithful animal proceeded to Paris, and presented himself at the house of an intimate friend of his master’s, making the most piteous howlings to announce the loss which he had sustained. After being supplied with food, he renewed his lamentations, moved towards the door, looking round to see whether he was followed, and returning to his master’s friend, laid hold of him by the coat, as if to signify that he should come along with him.

The singularity of all these movements on the part of the dog, coupled with the nonappearance of his master, from whom he was generally inseparable, induced the person in question to follow the animal. Leading the way, the dog arrived in time at the foot of a tree in the forest of Bondy, where he commenced scratching and tearing up the ground, at the same time recommencing the most piteous lamentations. On digging at the spot thus indicated, the body of the murdered Aubry was exposed to view.

No trace of the assassin could for a time be discovered, but after a while, the dog happening to be confronted with an individual, named the Chevalier Macaire, he flew at the man’s throat, and could only with the utmost difficulty be forced to let go his hold. A similar fury was manifested by the dog on every subsequent occasion that he met this person. Such an extraordinary hostility on the part of the animal, who was otherwise remarkably gentle and good-tempered, attracted universal attention. It was remembered that he had been always devotedly attached to his master, against whom Macaire had cherished the bitterest enmity. Other circumstances combined to strengthen the suspicions now aroused.

The king of France, informed of all the rumours in circulation on this subject, ordered the dog to be brought before him. The animal remained perfectly quiet till it recognised Macaire amid a crowd of courtiers, and then rushed forward to seize him with a tremendous bay. In these days the practice of the judicial combat was in full vigour, that mode of settling doubtful cases being frequently resorted to, as an appeal to the ‘judgment of God,’ who it was believed would interpose specially to shield and vindicate injured innocence. It was decided by his majesty, that this arbitrament should determine the point at issue, and he accordingly ordered that a duel should take place between Macaire and the dog of the murdered Aubry.

We have already explained that the lower animals were frequently, during the middle ages, subjected to trial, and the process conducted against them with all the parade of legal ceremonial employed in the case of their betters. Such an encounter, therefore, between the human and the canine creation, would not, in the fourteenth century, appear either specially extraordinary or unprecedented.

The ground for the combat was marked off in the Ile Notre Dame, then an open space. Macaire made his appearance armed with a large stick [and a shield], whilst the dog had an empty cask, into which he could retreat and make his springs from. On being let loose, he immediately ran up to his adversary, attacked him first on one side and then on the other, avoiding as he did so the blows from Macaire’s cudgel, and at last with a bound seized the latter by the throat. The murderer was thrown down, and then and there obliged to make confession of his crime, in the presence of the king and the whole court.

Chambers does not tell us the fate of the murderer Macaire but French sources say he was executed and buried in unhallowed ground. Serves him right.

1571 Battle of Lepanto

Since the 1370s the Ottoman Turks had been making themselves the dominant power in the Middle East and the Mediterranean, rolling back Christian and other Muslim opponents. In 1453 they destroyed the last remnant of the Roman Empire when they smashed in the walls of Constantinople; in 1517 they seized Egypt and Arabia and claimed the Sunni Caliphate; in 1522 they drove the Knights of St John out of their fortress in Rhodes; 1527 they reached the gates of Vienna. Turkish fleets, including those of their North African pirate underlings, threatened every mile of the Christian Mediterranean coastline. From his Topkapi Palace their Emperor ruled territory from the Atlantic to the Euphrates.

Turkish success owed much to Christian disunity. Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq, the ambassador of the Holy Roman Empire to Constantinople, surveyed the situation in the 1550s and declared

 On their side is the vast wealth of their empire, unimpaired resources, experience and practice in arms, a veteran soldiery, an uninterrupted series of victories, readiness to endure hardships, union, order, discipline, thrift and watchfulness. On ours are found an empty exchequer, luxurious habits, exhausted resources, broken spirits, a raw and insubordinate soldiery, and greedy quarrels; there is no regard for discipline, license runs riot, the men indulge in drunkenness and debauchery, and worst of all, the enemy are accustomed to victory, we to defeat. Can we doubt what the result must be?

Though previous attempts at a Christian alliance against the Turks had failed, Pope Pius V laboured to put together a coalition to save Cyprus in 1571. The resulting “Holy League” included ships from Spain, Venice, Genoa, the Knights of St John, the Papal States and Florence. Keeping order in this fragile alliance was the job of Don John of Austria, the bastard brother of the Spanish King, who had to hang a few troublesome captains to assert the necessary unity.

The combined Christian fleet numbered 212 ships, almost all oar-propelled galleys, 40,000 sailors and 28,000 infantry. They faced a Turkish force of 251 ships, 50,000 oarsmen and 31,000 soldiers in the Gulf of Patras off the coast of southwestern Greece. The key to the battle was the deployment, in front of the Holy League’s ships, of four galleasses, large, clumsy, heavily-armed vessels bristling with cannons which blew up 70 Muslim galleys before they could reach the Christian line. The Turkish galleys carried crack Janissary troops, the elite fighting force of the Ottomans, but they were outgunned by their opponents. The day ended in a near-complete Christian victory; they sunk or captured over 150 enemy ships, killing or capturing 20,000 men and liberating 12,000 Christian slaves from the Turkish galleys.

The Turks would soon rebuild their fleet and continue to dominate the eastern Mediterranean but their defeat at Lepanto cost them dearly in experienced sailors and fighters. The Holy League would soon dissolve but Christian fleets would never face a serious naval threat again in the central or western Mediterranean. The boost to morale was incalculable and Lepanto still figures prominently in the civic mythology of Venice and Spain.

1981 The assassination of Anwar Sadat

Since its overthrow of the corrupt King Farouk in 1952, Egypt’s government has struggled with the forces demanding a truly Islamic state. Leaders in this push came largely from the Islamic Brotherhood, a group demanding sharia law and opposed to secular rule and westernization. The military officers involved in the coup at first cooperated with the Brotherhood but soon realized it was incompatible with their view of the future. The new dictator, Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser, cracked down on the movement, arrested its leadership and executed Sayyid Qutb, the theorist behind Islamic supremacism. The Brotherhood went underground but developed popular support in its mosques and charitable organizations. When Nasser died in 1970 and was succeeded by Anwar Sadat, most oppressive measures against it were lifted, its members were released from prison and the influence of the Brotherhood and Islamicization grew grew.

When Sadat signed a peace treaty with Israel and shared the Noble Prize with Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin, Islamic discontent in Egypt grew. Groups more radical than the Brotherhood such al-Jihad and Gama’a Islamiyya began to plan violent action against the ruling regime. On October 6, 1981 in the midst of a military parade to celebrate the crossing of the Suez Canal in the 1973 war with Israel, a truck full of troops stopped in front of the reviewing stand and attacked the dignitaries with grendades and submachine guns. President Sadat and ten others were killed.

One of the assassins was shot on the spot and three others were put on trial and executed. Sadat’s assassin proudly proclaimed “I have killed Pharoah! I am not afraid to die.” Though this plot failed to spark a Muslim uprising, the ideology that hopes to overthrow all existing Arab governments and replace them with a Sunni Islamic state remains strong.