Today -100: December 4, 1914: Of the just aspirations of Italy, naval mishaps, moral surveillance, shell shock, and hangings

Italian Prime Minister Antonio Salandra tells Parliament that just because Italy is neutral in the war doesn’t mean it won’t try to scavenge the bones of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and annex Trento and Trieste (“the just aspirations of Italy,” he calls this goal).

British newspapers are again complaining about censorship, specifically the continued refusal to let the public be informed of “a certain naval mishap” (i.e., the sinking of the Audacious on October 27) of which the German public is fully informed.

After a campaign by suffrage and other feminist groups in Britain against a government circular to local police forces asking them to enquire into the moral worthiness of soldiers’ wives, the government backs down only slightly, and police will continue to consider it their business whether those wives are drinking or screwing around.

Headline of the Day -100:  “Shell Fire Wrecks Reason.”  They don’t have the phrase “shell shock” yet, but will soon.

Pennsylvania holds its last hanging (they’re switching to electrocution).

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