Friday, November 28, 2014

Today -100: November 28, 1914: Of football, fighting clergy, disguised steamers, impudent good will, and muffs


London newspaper owners jointly decide to stop reporting on football beyond the scores.  If that doesn’t make everyone join the army, I don’t know what will.

Headline of the Day -100:  “German Clergymen Want To Fight.”  Some clergymen in Berlin protest being exempted (I guess actually barred) from the military.  It’s an insult, they say.

Churches are not exempt from military service, however.  At least according to the London Morning Post, which claims that the German army has put machine guns and anti-aircraft guns in the towers of Cracow Catholic churches to lure Russia into bombing them, thereby alienating the Poles.

German schoolboys have been “volunteering” for military training at their schools.  They will go to the front in the spring as young as 16.

Headline of the Day -100:  “Lusitania Drops Disguise.”  Arrives in New York painted in its Cunard Line colors again, after having been cunningly disguised for two months by being painted black.

British newspapers are castigating former diplomat Sir Roger Casement for going to Berlin and getting a statement from the kaiser that Germany would never invade Ireland (which the Daily News calls “an impudent message of good will”).  Casement is also negotiating for more concrete aid for Irish rebels.

Turkey has decided not to default on its pre-war bonds.  But it will pay the interest only in person at the Ministry of Finance in Constantinople.  Just make your way through the front lines, foreigners who hold most of the bonds.

Headline of the Day -100:  “WANT MUFFS FOR SOLDIERS.; German Officer Appeals to Women to Send Their Furs.”  Say, what sort of war is this, anyway?


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