Do you have a question about history and have always been afraid to ask? Well, today is your lucky day. Ask away!
Specifically soldiers that were in the middle of a fight or battle when the war ended, did they just awkwardly stare down the dude they were shooting at 20 minutes ago? Also what was packing up like? Did separate countries just watch the other pack up all of their stuff and just walk back? Sorry if my question is worded poorly or I come across as not knowing much about ww1. I’m only a junior in HS and my teachers haven’t gone in-depth about small little things like this.
Edit 1: just got back from school and JESUS CHRIST MY PHONE WAS BLOWING UP. Thank you for all the replies (serious and comical). I didn’t expect this post to blow up like it has. I really do enjoy learning about history, and with the 100th anniversary of ww1 ending this question popped up into my head. Once again thank you to everyone who answered my question and added more situations from other wars in them!
Edit 2: Just checked my messages and turns out I made the front page of reddit. THANK YOU YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME
Edit 3: Their*
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In other words, did "unemployment" as we know it exist before machines and full-blown capitalism came into play? Unemployment rate has been at the center of all election campaigns for decades, but when did people start paying attention to it?
I know extreme poverty touched every country during medieval times, but the idea of people being "job seekers" (or something resembling job seekers) during that era feels strange.
Did they just leave them where they’d been buried during the war? Or have big mass graves afterwards?
And no mans land, who’s job was it to go thru and clear all of the barbed wire and fill in the trenches? Just the country the land is in?
Movie depiction of massed battles in medieval times (most recently, Outlaw / King) depict heroic warriors striding through a chaotic battle killing a couple of enemy soldiers per minute. While I don’t doubt this is not an accurate depiction of a medieval battle, it did make me wonder if we knew how lethal a person could be in such a chaotic arena. Surely no single person, no matter how skilled, could be so effective on the battlefield. I would have expected a high risk of being attacked by a person unseen, leading to a high casualty rate for the men who put themselves in the most dangerous positions?
Recently saw War Horse and a couple of other documentaries and films about trench warfare in WWI and I was so surprised by the number of soldiers who followed orders while knowing that they would die in seconds after climbing that ladder. I personally would really consider climbing that ladder.
I’m rewatching Saving Private Ryan and i had a question. In the movie it shows how the US troops were getting slaughtered right as the dropped the ramp, was that just Hollywood? In the actually footage of that invasion (and pictures) it shows the troops walking a great distance before getting shot at.
I forget if it was on Netflix or some other streaming site but before you click to watch the movie (sometimes it shows slideshows of scenes) you can see a Sherman. I thought armor didn’t make it onto the beach
Also, where can I find stories of eye witness like a medic on the beach or a Higgins boat driver
Thanks!
This recently popped into my memory - I remember a few years ago before my great grandfather passed away I asked about his time in the army and how he got into fighting for the US even though he was born and raised in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico until his early 20's.
When I asked him about how did he fight for the US even though he was a Mexican citizen. He told me during the thick of the war a US Army recruiter came to Nuevo Laredo and went to his job (im not sure what he was doing for work at the time) asking the men if they would join the US Armed forces in exchange for US citizenship and a small bonus (I believe).
He then went to tell me a handful of other men and himself took the offer and were transported from Nuevo Laredo a few days later.
He then went to fight in Germany.
My question is, was this an actual practice by the US for recruitment? Or was this an under the table procedure?
Any clarifications on this story would be awesome!
Often enough human error or bad calls in decisionmaking/politics/strategies lead to bad results in retrospect. But what examples of everybody doing everything right turned out a giant mess when looking back?
I was watching The Last Kingdom on Netflix, and in one episode there is a scribe present in the meeting between two opposing leaders. One of the leaders says the scribe is recording literally every word of the conversation, in response to which the other says a bunch of curse words, making a joke out of the situation.
It made me wonder - is there any record of any sort of unfiltered recorded dialogue between people pre-modern age? It would be super interesting to see an actual, realistic human dialogue, with all the umm's, stutters, y'know, etc. present in the text, as opposed to the crisp and clean recorded dialogue that's typically seen in most historical texts.
If possible, please provide a link to the source material - thanks!
I learned about how Paul Revere turned the Boston Massacre into a fighting rally to get the colonies to revolt against Britain, but am interested in learning more about how leaders use it to manipulate their subjects.
To me it seems counterintuitive to allow these men to die pointless deaths due to a failure to evolve battle tactics. Both sides knew how devastating artillery, cannonry, and rifles were due to industrial improvements and we saw how armies evolved their tactics during the First World War for the same reasons. Yet it just doesn’t make sense to me that both sides in the American Civil War didn’t adapt to the times.
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I was wondering if there are any known instances of soldiers in WW2 who actually killed their own officers or mutinied because they were appalled by war crimes they were forced to commit or for other reasons.
I can find lots of references to fragging during the Vietnam War, but nothing during WW2, which seems odd considering the sheer size of the conflict.
Most people can name the first couple of US Presidents: Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, etc. Then it typically jumps to Andrew Jackson at 7, then to Lincoln at the 16th, and then doesn't appear much until the 20th century (Grant being the exception).
I'm just curious as to what neat facts there are about Presidents like Millard Filmore, John Quincy Adams, William McKinley, or Calvin Coolidge. Surely some pretty monumental things happened during some of their presidencies. If so, what are those things?
There’s much more to this question than the title. So here we go. It is my understanding that the car overtook the horse much quicker in the United States than it did in Europe. That being said, this question can apply to either place during that transition period, in which I’m going to give us a rough time frame of late 1800s-early 1900s.
This transition had to be unlike any other in history. Other major things such as the cell phone, computer, etc. that people transitioned to didn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. Some people had a computer and some didn’t. Some had a cell phone and some didn’t. The affect on life as a whole was extremely small. The means of transportation an individual had, however, is a huge one.
During this time frame, I’m just imagining a parking lot with hitching posts everywhere as well as spots for the automobile. How accurate is this thought in my head?
Big events such as the first Rose Bowl in 1902 had an estimated crowd of nearly 10,000. Surely some people got there by horse and others by car didn’t they? The first World Series was held in 1903 and their crowds there got up to nearly 20,000 for some games. Of course many of these people traveled by train or walked I’m sure. But some of them had to take their own personal means of transportation, whether that be by horse or by car. Were horses just waiting outside the stadium on their hitching posts next to a bunch of vehicles?
This transition had to be a unique one. With town squares trying to compensate for this new means of transportation to bring business to their city. But at the same time wanting to accommodate those who were still using the horse.
What exactly was life like in these times with regards to how everyone ensured that both means of transportation were accommodated for and didn’t hinder the other?
I asked this same question on /r/askhistorians and it’s crickets over there.
I apologize if this is a question commonly asked. I tried to see if it was posted before but couldn't find a similar post. But, after finding out that there are some books that I was interested in, only to find out that they aren't credible or worse, could actually make you less informed about the topic, I wanted to know if there are books I should avoid reading or disregard.
This sounds like an odd question, but it has a simple core. I've recently read about some European and western nations not really acknowledging the existence of the Soviet Union, meaning that they didn't have any diplomatic and economic relations with the Soviets. How did this refusal of acknowledging the Soviet Union work in these nations? I know that a bunch of embargoes was put upon them regardless, but I'm still not quite sure how these nations (Yugoslavia for example as far as I remember) did actually handle this situation. Was in their diplomatic view the Russian Empire still a thing for example? Was there just nothing in the place of the Soviet Union except for those states that became independent after the Russian civil war? I'm really confused by this.
King Tut's entire treasure is insured for something like 650 million, and clearly there were many, many more burials that have obviously been looted over the generations, but I just can't wrap my brain around them having enough gold to just bury the amounts they did. I mean, the innermost part of Tuts coffin was 240 pounds (110 kilograms) of solid gold, and the mask was like 24 pounds (11 kilograms) of gold. Plus there were hundreds of other insanely beautiful gold objects. That blows my mind. I think I read somewhere that the looting of the tombs was for the most part done pretty quick after the initial burial and that sometimes it was looted by the same people (the religious priests) who buried the king/queen/important person. How could they afford to just bury that much gold to be lost to the sands of time?
Throughout the continental war, American troops would use skirmish tactics which was basically not stand in lines and would utilize cover, but British troops would stand in lines and wait for orders from their officer. The American militia made new hit and run tactics which were shooting a high rank officer then run. So this is where my question comes in: did the British come up with some sort of tactic to overwhelm the militia? If so what did they do?
After the Ottoman Empire signed the Armistice of Mudros and the Entente/Allies won World War I, British, French, and Italian troops occupied the Ottoman capital of Constantinople. They set up a military government until they withdrew after the Turkish War of Independence.
What impact did this have on day-to-day life for the people of the city? Was resistance to these foreign soldiers common? What changes did the occupying powers make? Any religious conflicts that arose in this time (beyond the broader Turkish struggle to be independent)?
Hi all - writing to ask recommendations for informational historical documentaries. I really would like to brush up on ancient history. I took history class for granted in high school and college, but now I am very interested in it!
Thanks in advance.
I’m really interested in what North America was like before good old Christopher Columbus arrived - what it looked like, native plants and animals, etc. I’d also love to learn about the culture of the native tribes. I’m particularly interested in ancient America, even back to prehistoric times. Maybe about extinct animals that once roamed, about plants, whatever. I just think it’s really interesting and would appreciate it if people could link me to some sites or just spout random trivia and whatnot. Thanks!
I have 3 contributing questions. Was it through continued financial contributions from catholic officials such as Bishop Hudal and Cardinal Caggiano and other members of the catholic church who aided the escape of these people? Has there been an official rebuke or apology issued from the church for the involvement of their officials and resources in the crimes that were preformed to reposition nazis in South America and other destinations? Lastly, are the claims that blackmail by the nazis that wound up in South America to political and business leaders in the areas they colonized substantiated in any formal way?
I have a bunch of duels that I find interesting (hot air balloons over Paris, Lincoln vs Shields, French knights defending the honor of their wives, etc.
What''s the craziest or most interesting duel you know of?
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