When A Spaghetti Tree Hoax Caused A Nationwide Uproar
Once upon a time in 1957, a BBC news crew decided to broadcast an April Fool’s Day joke. Producers allowed a cameraman a shoestring budget of £100 and the freedom…
Liquor Numbed the Pain, Took the Edge Off Homesickness… and Caused Havoc During the Civil War
Rain fell along Virginia’s Rapidan River in December 1863 as the 5th New York Cavalry set about building its winter quarters at Germanna Ford. The thickly wooded hill of Devil’s…
Read Henry Kissinger’s Secret Message on the Fall of Saigon
This cable from April 19, 1975, was sent by U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to Graham Martin, U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam about the impending evacuation of Saigon. It…
Louisa May Alcott Wanted to Be a Nurse…Until She Realized It Required Bathing Soldiers
New England novelist Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888) is perhaps best known as the author of young adult fiction, including Little Women (1868), and Little Men (1871). However, Alcott put her…
Why Was This Soldier Betrayed?
As a housekeeper for the German Embassy in Paris, Marie Bastian had two tasks. She was expected to gather the day’s paper trash twice a week…unless she recognized something worth…
How the Hungarian Hussars Started a Fashion Craze
Hussars were light cavalry units with roots in Central and Eastern Europe. Famed for thundering into battle on horseback and fighting with sabers, they were fierce and not easily turned…
A Witness to the July 1863 New York Draft Riots
In her day, Elizabeth Oakes Smith was a national figure. Born in Maine in 1806, she and her family moved to New York City in the late 1830s, where she…
Most POWs Want to Go Home—But After World War II, Some Faced Death on Arrival
When the Second World War in Europe ended in May 1945, the United States military had custody of a staggering number of enemy prisoners of war: 4.3 million total worldwide,…
Kidnapped During World War II, These German Corpses Proved A Headache for the U.S. Army
As Germany crumbled in fire and rubble in the final months of World War II, Adolf Hitler issued orders for four famous Germans to be held hostage—not living Germans, but…
Civil War–Era Envelopes Bore Patriotic Messages—On the Outside
A massive amount of correspondence passed between Union armies and the home front. Chaplain Richard Eddy of the 60th New York Infantry, who also served as the regimental postmaster, noted…