After seven months, the American occupation of Vera Cruz ends, “with little show of enthusiasm on the part of the Mexicans.” In the end, they just left, without deciding to which of the competing Mexican regimes to hand over the port, the customs house, and seven months of customs duties. Carranza’s soldiers take over the town, following two blocks behind the withdrawing Americans, and issue orders that everyone has to turn in their weapons or face execution, anyone who commits crimes will face execution, and all the saloons are closed until further notice. Which probably explains the lack of enthusiasm.
Headline of the Day -100: “Wilson To Receive Women.” For Christmas? Actually, he will receive and, I’m gonna predict, condescend to, a women’s suffrage deputation.
The Belgian authorities in Antwerp are refusing to pay the fine demanded by Germany until they stop requisitioning anything they want from the city.
Germany complains to the US and other neutral nations that Britain is violating the laws of the sea in seizing what it declares to be contraband.
Someone or other has calculated that it takes 168 pounds of bullets, which is 5,860 bullets, to kill a man on the Belgian front.
Headline of the Day -100: “Football, Not War, Attracts English.” English newspapers are working themselves into a froth, as is the custom, over this. Recruiters at Saturday’s games succeeded in getting only one man to take the king’s shilling. Now that the first giddy rush to arms is over, recruitment is way down. They’ve raised the pay, already the highest in Europe (they’re the only warring country without conscription) and reduced the minimum height to 5’3”.
A British patrol trawler, the Dorothy Gray, rams a German U-boat, the U-18, off Scotland’s coast, causing it to founder and surrender. 26 crew are taken prisoner, only one died.
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