Only hours had passed since John F. Kennedy was buried. Late on November 25, after the White House reception ended and the guests had gone, the public rituals of mourning were finally over. That evening, Jackie Kennedy had stood in Arlington as soldiers, dignitaries, cameras, and a grieving nation watched her light the eternal flame … Read more
When Louis XIV died in 1715 after a 72-year reign, he left France culturally dominant but financially ruined. The royal accountants discovered a national debt of roughly 3 billion livres, while annual tax revenue stood at only about 145 million livres. Interest payments alone consumed nearly all government income, paralyzing trade and crushing the peasantry … Read more
Pierre Laval remains one of the most controversial figures in modern French history. A man who began his career as a champion of the working class ended it as a symbol of collaboration with Nazi Germany. Laval was born on June 28, 1883, in the village of Châteaudun in central France. His father worked as … Read more
Im Dezember 1944 drängte die Dritte Armee durch die Ardennen. Das Wetter war brutal, die Kämpfe noch schlimmer. In einer Feldküche im rückwärtigen Bereich stellten sich Soldaten für eine warme Mahlzeit an – einer der wenigen Trostpunkte, bevor sie zurück an die Front mussten. Die Feldküche versorgte jeden: weiße Soldaten, schwarze Soldaten, Panzerbesatzungen, Infanteristen, Artilleristen. … Read more
On March 15, 1939, six months after the annexation of the Sudetenland, Nazi Germany invaded and occupied the Czech provinces of Bohemia and Moravia in flagrant violation of the Munich Agreement. Adolf Hitler himself arrived in Prague, and on March 16 he established the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia by proclamation. Konstantin von Neurath, the … Read more
President Harry S. Truman fired Assistant Treasury Secretary Harry Dexter White on August 15, 1945, ending a twelve-year career that had shaped American monetary policy from the New Deal through Bretton Woods, after Treasury auditors flagged unauthorized currency operations that had placed American printing plates in Soviet hands and 𝓮𝔁𝓹𝓸𝓼𝓮𝓭 the United States Treasury to … Read more
Granny Blackwater’s grandson was Thomas, a boy she had raised from infancy after his parents died. He grew up in her remote Kentucky mountain cabin, learning the healing arts with the same diligence he applied to farming and hunting. Thomas was her entire world. The trouble began when Vernon Crawford, the county’s political boss, decided … Read more
On November 22, 1963, Robert Kennedy was having lunch beside the pool at Hickory Hill in McLean, Virginia, with Attorney General Robert Morgenthau and an aide. They had just returned from a Justice Department conference on organized crime. His wife, Ethel, called him to the phone. J. Edgar Hoover was on the line. Kennedy picked … Read more
General George S. Patton had witnessed the worst of human destruction across a long and violent military career. He was a cavalryman forged in the trenches of the First World War and a commander who led armored columns through North Africa, Sicily, and Western Europe. Known to the world as "Old Blood and Guts," he … Read more
The German invasion of the Netherlands began on May 10, 1940, eight months after the start of the Second World War. German bombers struck military airfields and barracks around The Hague, while paratroopers were used to capture tactical points and support the advance of ground troops. Adolf Hitler justified the attack with a lie, claiming … Read more