Squanto and the part he played in the history of the Thanksgiving holiday is more complicated than you might imagine. For instance, did you know that Squanto wasn’t even his true name?
Taken from his home, across the ocean, and back again, Squanto spent a portion of his life as a slave to European settlers. He lost both his freedom and his name in the process.
In this article, we’ll look deeper into the true story of Squanto–or as he was known before he was enslaved, Tisquantum.
Before his first contact with Europeans, Squanto lived a low-profile life with the tribe in which he was born, the Patuxet Tribe of the Wampanoags. Very little is known about Squanto’s early life. It’s believed that he was in his twenties or thirties when he was captured and forced into slavery for the Europeans.
The Patuxets were a portion of an overarching group of Native Americans in New England called the Ninnismissinuok, or simply “people”. The smaller tribes that made up this large grouping all spoke a version of the Algonquin language, though there were variations and idiosyncrasies specific to each tribe.
One of the first, and greatest, injustices that Squanto faced was the changing of his name. Most names have a deeper meaning behind them, but “Squanto” as a name is meaningless.
Instead, it was a shortened version of his real name, which was fierce and powerful. The name “Squanto” was neither of those things.
Squanto’s real name is Tisquantum. Its meaning is very odd when connected with the story of the helpful Native that most people are told.
Tisquantum means rage, or the rage of the manitou. The word manitou means the heart of spiritual power in Algonquian, so to put it in the simplest terms, Tisquantum means wrath of god.
Before Squanto was ever a part of the first Thanksgiving, he had already had a major life-changing encounter with English explorers. In 1614, an expedition led by none other than John Smith of Jamestown fame made landfall in Plymouth Harbor and tried to initiate trade with the Patuxet tribe.
By this time, John Smith had sailed back to England, and the ship that Squanto encountered was captained by the second-in-command of the expedition, Thomas Hunt. This expedition was only meant to harvest fish, but Hunt had other ideas.
Thomas Hunt offered to trade with the Native Americans, inviting them onto his ship where he trapped them. Among the 20 Native Americans that were captured was Tisquatum, who would soon come to be known as Squanto.
After abducting Natives from other tribes, Hunt sailed back to Málaga, Spain, with his human cargo in tow.
Once Hunt reached Spain, he faced immediate disapproval from John Smith and other superior officers. One major question from this time was, who freed Squanto from slavery?
Interestingly enough, it was Christian monks, also called Friars, who stopped Hunt when he tried to sell the Native Americans off quickly. After some time, Squanto would be smuggled on a ship to England, and eventually back to New England.
While his time in Europe was undoubtedly difficult, he did acquire skills that would serve him well later in life, like shipbuilding and the ability to speak English fluently.
Accounts of how long Squanto was in Europe are vague, but we do know that, by 1619, he was back in Massachusetts. Tragically, upon his arrival, he found all inhabitants of his home village had perished–victims of illness brought over by European settlers. Squanto was truly alone.
By this time, Squanto had fallen in with an explorer named Thomas Dermer. It would be with Dermer that he would discover his decimated village.
Afterward, the two would continue to travel, encountering hostile warriors from other tribes that Squanto would entreat with, saving Dermer’s life. But the adventurer’s luck didn’t hold forever, and he eventually died in Virginia.
Squanto was living with a nearby tribe, the Pokanokets when he was sought out by another American Indian named Samoset, who needed Squanto for his fluent English. Squanto would prove to be incredibly valuable to the colony, called Plymouth, and played a big part in their survival.
Squanto’s teachings led the colony to have its first successful harvest.
At the time, there were tensions between the settlers and the Pokanoket tribe led by Chief Massasoit. When the Pilgrims fired off their weapons in celebration of this harvest, the Pokanoket Wampanoag feared that it was a sign of aggression.
Outside of the border of Plymouth, the tribesmen gathered, but when they realized that there was no immediate threat, the Pokanoket warriors instead hunted deer and brought the venison to the settlement. There the Pilgrims and the Native Americans shared a meal, and this meal was the basis for the first Thanksgiving.
Oddly enough, Squanto was not mentioned by name in any of the recorded retellings of this event. But since he was living at Plymouth with the Pilgrims at the time, he did likely attend the feast, just not in nearly as large a capacity as stories might lead you to believe.
Following his participation in the first Thanksgiving, Squanto stuck with the Pilgrims and continued to help them both as an interpreter and a guide. He was a skilled diplomat when working with other Native Americans, and he helped facilitate a period of relative peace between the Wampanoag people and Plymouth.
This peace wouldn’t last forever, though, and tragically Squanto would lose his life just a year later in November of 1622. He came down with what the Governor of Plymouth Colony, William Bradford called the “Indian Fever”. This mysterious illness came upon Squanto swiftly, and he was reported to have been bleeding from the nose before he perished.
While it’s possible that Sqanto could have suffered from any number of different diseases brought to the Americas by Europeans, there were also rumors that he had been poisoned by Chief Massasoit.
Unfortunately, we have no clear answers to what might have caused the death of such an influential figure, and while the tales of Tisqunatum’s life might have become twisted through the years, he remains an enormous part of early American history.
]]>As the name implies, this was a form of torture that involved slicing into the victim over and over again until they died. It was normally saved for the very worst crimes. As a form of execution, lingchi was not administered lightly.
As barbaric as it sounds, the truth about lingchi is often obscured by a popular mythology that has turned what is an already gruesome way to die into something straight out of a nightmare.
In this article, we’ll look at what lingchi is, where it came from, and what we still get wrong about this ancient practice.
Lingchi began by tying the victim to a wooden pole or frame. Once bound, various executioners would take turns methodically slicing into different body parts.
Whether the executioners started with the chest, the arms, or the legs, was most likely up to their own discretion. But either way, it would have been agony for the person forced to endure the pain of being butchered alive.
Lingchi was cruel in more ways than just the physical pain, however.
According to the prevailing Confucianism, it was wrong to desecrate or cut up a person’s body. Thus, as the victim was being cut to ribbons, they would also die knowing they had not lived up to the principles of Confucianism.
Add to this the humiliation of experiencing all of this in public, and you can start to see why lingchi was regarded as so awful.
As a method of execution, lingchi dates back centuries.
One of the earliest examples is from Prince Liu Ziye. It is said that he ordered several officials to be killed by lingchi before he was ordered by the emperor to commit suicide. Liu Ziye was an early exception, as he was a man known for his cruelty and penchant for killing at a whim.
In general, it seems that lingchi was saved for only the most egregious crimes. But when lingchi was meted out as punishment, it no doubt left a lasting impression.
You could say that the high-water mark for lingchi occurred during the Liao and Song dynasties.
As an indication of just how prevalent it became, in the 12th century, one anti-lingchi activist felt compelled to write a damning criticism of the practice, arguing that:
When the muscles of the flesh are already taken away, the breath of life is not yet cut off, liver and heart are still connected, seeing and hearing still exist. It affects the harmony of nature, it is injurious to a benevolent government, and does not befit a generation of wise men.
Unfortunately, his calls to end lingchi would go unheeded for eight more centuries.
To many people, lingchi can seem absurdly cruel and barbaric – a relic of the medieval age that never should have survived into the supposedly civilized 19th and 20th centuries.
Yet it did survive. And with the arrival of cameras and mass printing, the awareness of lingchi spread throughout the world, shocking Westerners.
One of the earliest instances of lingchi finding its way to the West occurred in 1890 when a British captain was touring the city of Canton. As he strolled through the streets, the noise of a bustling crowd reached his ears.
As he followed the sound, it grew louder. Pretty soon he was standing at the edge of a throng of people all circling a strange object lying on the ground in the middle of the market.
As the captain drew closer, he felt his stomach drop as he recognized what the object was. It was a bloody and dismembered human, strewn across the ground.
The torso was full of deep slices, while the hands, legs, and head were all separated from the rest of the body. As discreetly as he could, the captain drew his camera, snapped a picture, and hurried back to his ship.
That picture became famous in countries like the United States and Britain.
It was circulated widely in the book, The Peoples and Politics of the Far East, which was written by journalist Sir Henry Norman and published in 1895. This is the description that readers of Norman’s book would have come across:
The criminal is fastened to a rough cross, and the executioner, armed with a sharp knife, begins by grasping handfuls from the fleshy parts of the body, such as the thighs and the breasts, and slicing them off. After this, he removes the joints and the excrescences of the body one by one—the nose and ears, fingers and toes. Then the limbs are cut off piecemeal at the wrists and the ankles, the elbows and knees, the shoulders and hips. Finally, the victim is stabbed to the heart and his head cut off.
The description was accompanied by the British naval captain’s photo. It was deemed to be so graphic that the page was made to be easily ripped out by the reader, in case it was necessary.
These kinds of graphic descriptions of lingchi, when filtered through to the West, excited the collective imagination. It fuelled a mythology that greatly misconstrued what lingchi was.
It also cemented an already widespread view of Chinese people as having been stymied in their progress by a backward culture.
Some of the misconceptions arose from the translation of the word “lingchi” from Chinese. Many Westerners translate it as “death by 10,000 cuts,” or “death by a thousand cuts,” making lingchi sound like a more excruciating ordeal than it was.
Although there is no doubt that lingchi was an extraordinarily unpleasant way to die, most of the cutting was done after the victim had already died.
The first cuts to the body were normally large. This meant that the person would not be able to stay conscious for long due to so much blood loss. What’s more, some families could afford to pay for a coup de grace or to provide large quantities of opium to ease the victim’s suffering.
Still, the imagery surrounding lingchi was too strong in the West to be diluted by reality. Today, lingchi is still known more commonly as “death by a thousand cuts.” It is seen as a symbol of the more barbaric side of Chinese culture.
The last known instance of lingchi occurred in the Fall of 1904, to punish a wealthy landowner who killed his neighbor and eleven of his family members.
French soldiers in the area photographed the event. Once again, Western countries were flooded with graphic evidence of a China that was unimaginably cruel and backward.
Lingchi was officially abolished the following year. But its legacy – mythology and all – has remained ingrained in the popular imagination ever since.
]]>As of March 2024, it has been five years since I arrived in Shenzhen.
These five years have been extremely challenging and lonely for me.
I had no particular dreams when I came, carrying only the thought of leaving once I saved 300,000 RMB. Looking back now, I’ve already achieved that goal, but circumstances have changed, and I find myself still in this city that fundamentally rejects me. Occasionally, I recall that initial thought and contemplate whether it’s time to leave.
However, where to go?
I sigh with emotion; there’s no place in this world where I can settle.
I see everyone seeking stability. They strive to find a life partner, a permanent residence, enter into marriage, and start a family. Most follow this secure and comfortable path, and then gradually clarifying their life goals, with the ultimate aim being “a harmonious family.”
How I envy that!
Those who are unable or unwilling to enter marriage and a family are pitiable. They are judged, looked down upon, categorized as part of a wandering ghost population. They are considered oddballs, people with psychological or physical issues. They reject a harmonious life, find it difficult to integrate into normal society, and society’s rules and morality will eventually corner them, apply pressure, force them to conform, or else quietly fade away.
But, you know, are there people who refuse to get married? Who wouldn’t want a home?
I believe there is no one!
Inability to love and marry causes me great agony. As for accepting the reality, I hypocritically convince myself, saying things like “without marriage, at least I can establish my career and enjoy it.” How is that possible? When basic human needs cannot be fulfilled, what’s there to talk about a career, a life?
But, this is my reality!
Time flies, three to five years disappear suddenly, like an old friend bidding you farewell after a happy night of drinking. You realize, they have to go, and you can’t hold them back. There’s a deep feeling of sorrow lasting thousands of years buried within, something we’ll all feel sooner or later, yet something we can never speak of, something we can never let go.
]]>其时已是二零二四年的三月,远离我初来深圳五年。
这是极为困苦的五年,也是极为孤独的五年。
我本无一点理想,当年只背负着存三十万便离开的想法,给自己三年的时间。如今看来,我早已实现了这个目标,只是时过境迁,我竟还没离开这个根本不容人的城市。这期间我也偶或回忆起当初的那个想法,思考着是不是该走了。
然而,去哪里呢?
感慨万千,这世界没有一处能留我安居。
我看到,每个人都在寻求那份安稳。他们努力寻找另一半,寻找一个永久的居所,走进婚姻,走进家庭。他们大多遵循着这样一条稳妥、健康的道路,并逐渐明确了自己的人生目标,那目标就是“一个和睦的家庭”与一份“相对得体的工作”。
多么令我羡慕啊。
那些迟迟不能或者不肯进入婚姻和家庭的人是悲哀与可怜的,或者不可怜,而只是可恨吧。他们会被嫌弃,会被另眼相看,会被划入流浪鬼群体。他们是一帮奇怪的家伙,是一群心理或身体有问题的人。他们拒绝和谐的生活,他们难以融入正常社会,他们应该早些从这个美好的世界里消失。社会的规则与道德,最终会将他们圈到一处,施以压力,强制他们走向正常,不然就叫他们安静地死亡吧。
可是啊,有人不肯结婚么?有人不愿有个家么?
我相信是没有的!
无法恋爱,以及无法结婚,让我备受煎熬,至于要接受现实,我便虚伪地说服自己,说什么“没有婚姻,至少还能确立自己的人生事业”。这是如何可能呢?人性最基本的诉求都得不到满足,谈什么事业,又谈什么生活?
可这就是我的现实!
时间真快啊,三五年就这么消失不见,就像一个老朋友与你酒后分别,你于是明白,他必须要走,无法挽留。这里面埋藏着千古的悲愁,我们早早晚晚都会感受得到,只是它,永远无法言说,也永远无法释怀。
]]>Brenda Ann Spencer was a 16 year old student who lived across the street from Grover Cleveland Elementary School in San Diego. On the morning of January 29, 1979, she took a position in her window overlooking the school armed with a Ruger 10/22 semi-automatic .22 caliber rifle.
What unfolded in the next few minutes would not only shock the nation but also thrust the issue of school shootings into the forefront of public consciousness.
The event marked the first high-profile school shooting that would set a precedent for the disturbing trend that would follow in the decades to come. Today we will explore the life of Brenda Ann Spencer and the events that surrounded the Grover Cleveland Elementary School shooting.
Brenda Ann Spencer was born on April 3, 1962, in San Diego, California. Her early life was marked by a challenging family environment.
Raised in poverty, Brenda’s family struggled with financial difficulties for many years.
Her parents, Wallace Spencer and Dot Spencer, divorced when she was still a child, and the separation took a toll on young Brenda’s childhood.
Like the many school shooters that would follow her, family instability, abuse, and neglect played a role in her development.
In the years leading up to the tragic events of January 29, 1979, Brenda began exhibiting signs of emotional and behavioral issues that raised concerns among those around her.
School records indicated that she missed many days of school and when she was there, was often in trouble. Other factors that may have contributed to her state of mind that morning are:
In the 1970s, there wasn’t much awareness and understanding surrounding mental health issues. Many individuals struggled in silence due to the stigma associated with seeking help for psychological challenges.
This societal mindset contributed to a general lack of support for those facing mental health difficulties. While the exact nature of Brenda’s mental health challenges remains unclear, her troubled demeanor hinted at underlying issues that needed attention and intervention.
One crucial factor that plays a role in all school shootings is easy access to firearms. Brenda’s father, Wallace Spencer, owned a collection of guns that was easily available to her. Again, we have to remember that this was before the advent of mass shootings so keeping guns locked up was not as high a priority as it is today.
Prior to the shooting, Brenda reportedly expressed a desire for infamy. She spoke to friends about her fascination with crimes and the desire to commit a significant act that would make her famous. Being in the age before school shootings, comments like these were easily disregarded.
The dysfunction within the Spencer household, coupled with Brenda’s troubled emotional state, and easy access to guns formed a toxic combination.
On the morning of January 29, 1979, Brenda Spencer opened fire on the school, indiscriminately targeting anyone in her line of sight.
The San Diego Police Department responded quickly and surrounded the school and secured the area. Spencer, barricaded in her home, continued her assault on the school from a distance.
Negotiations ensued between Spencer and the police, revealing a disturbing lack of remorse on her part. When asked why she did what she did, Spencer casually justified her actions by stating, “I don’t like Mondays. This livens up the day.” Eventually, after approximately seven hours, Spencer surrendered to the authorities.
The bullets struck and killed the school’s principal Burton Wragg and custodian Mike Suchar as they tried to protect the students.
Eight children ranging in ages from 8 to 13 and a police officer also sustained injuries during the shooting. They were rushed to the local hospital where they later recovered but the psychological damage was something they and the town would carry with them the rest of their lives.
Brenda Ann Spencer was charged as an adult with two counts of murder for the deaths of Principal Burton Wragg and custodian Mike Suchar, as well as multiple counts of assault for the injuries inflicted on students and staff during the shooting.
She was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison with a chance of parole. She was denied parole in 1993, 2001 and In 2009, The parole board citing that Spencer was psychotic and unfit to be released into the general population.
She remains in jail at the California Institution for Women in Chino. Her next shot for a parole hearing will be in 2025.
Brenda Ann Spencer’s infamous crime was heard around the world and inspired the Irish rock band “Boomtown Rats” to write the song “I Don’t Like Mondays”, based on Spencer’s quote to police.
It became the number one song on the UK charts in July 1979 and held its position for four consecutive weeks. While it didn’t make many waves in the United States, in their hometown of Ireland, it became the Boomtown Rats’ biggest hit
The Cleveland Elementary School shooting marked a tragic turning point in the way society perceives and responds to school shootings.
The incident raised awareness about the potential for violence in schools and public buildings and prompted a reassessment of school safety measures.
Looking back on the event today we can see it as a precursor of a disturbing trend of school shootings that would unfold in the following decades. The event underscored the need for ongoing discussions about gun control and mental health awareness.
]]>我知道消极不好,可为什么依然选择悲伤呢?
有人说,这和一个人的个性存在很大关系。有的人天生就不善于发现快乐,甚至对眼前的快乐视而不见,说的正是我这样的人。
我因此觉得很抱歉,抱歉于我给周围的人带去了不快乐。我因此请求他们远离我,忽视我。这并非自虐,而实在是因为自己不是什么吉祥鸟。
我也努力寻求快乐,可人们说快乐并不是寻求来的,而是去创造来的。是的吧,可这对于我,是多么的困难啊。
我感到抱歉,抱歉于我已经丢失了创造快乐的能力。因而,我也无法给身边的亲朋和同事带去快乐。然而,这并不是说我不想。
既然条件是这般真实,我大概只能接受吧。
我因此一个人生活着。
可即便如此,我却也常常遭受人们的责难。父母常常不满于儿子性格的内向,朋友往往有意无意地埋怨我的不够大方,同事则总似乎在说,瞧这个人,他真安静,真无趣,真怪诞。
这确实是一个人的过错,没有人喜欢如此糟糕的人,我也不例外。我是痛恨自己的,我也经常在内心指责自己。这是相当恶劣的心理体验,让我崩溃,让我无所适从。
我要告诉身边的人,我并非对这个糟糕的人麻木,相反,我非常痛恨自己。
我成长在错误的道路上,我很遗憾至今仍未能依靠自己的力量爬出那黑暗而漫长的隧道。我明白,这也是我的过错。
我因此,选择了一个人生活,不,这不是选择,这是上苍给我安排的道路,我只能这样做。
我很抱歉。
]]>Some say it has a lot to do with a person’s personality. Some people are naturally not good at finding happiness, even to the point of ignoring the joy in front of them, and that’s me.
Because of this, I feel sorry for bringing unhappiness to those around me. I ask them to stay away from me, and, to ignore me. It’s not self-harm, but because I am not a bird of good omen.
I have been tring to seek happiness, but people say happiness is not something you seek, it’s something you create. Yes, but for me, it’s so difficult.
I feel sorry for losing the ability to create happiness. Therefore, I cannot bring joy to family and colleagues. However, it doesn’t mean I don’t want to.
Since the conditions are so real, I probably can only accept it.
So, I live alone.
Even so, I often face criticism from people. Parents often blame their son for being introverted, friends subtly or intentionally complain that I’m not generous enough, and colleagues always seem to say, ‘Look at this person, he’s so quiet, so dull, so strange.’
This is indeed my fault. No one likes such a terrible person, and I am no exception. I hate myself, and I often blame myself internally. It’s a pretty bad psychological experience that makes me break down and feel lost.
I want to tell people around me that I am not numb to being this terrible person; on the contrary, I hate myself a lot.
I grew up on the wrong path, and I regret that I still haven’t been able to climb out of that dark and long tunnel with my own strength. I understand; this is also my fault.
Therefore, I chose to live alone. No, it’s not a choice; it’s the path arranged for me by the heavens, and I can only do this.
I’m sorry.
]]>Take a look below at some of the most haunting moments from history.
A starving Sudanese child crawls towards a United Nations feeding center while a vulture patiently waits for its next meal. This photo won a Pulitzer Prize, but the photographer, Kevin Carter, took his own life three months later.
The two siblings shown here are experiencing the thrill of an electrical storm at Sequoia National Park in California around 1975. Shortly after this picture was taken, they were struck by lightning. Both survived.
A photographer accidentally captures the moment a person jumped off a bridge in China.
Joseph Goebbels glares at Jewish photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt, 1933.
Anne Frank’s father Otto, revists the attic where he and his family hid.
Che Guevara’s final moments. Bolivia, 9 October 1967.
A slave named Peter, exposed the damage to his back
Replica dog tags of every soldier who never made it back from Vietnam.
People on display at the Coney Island Human Zoo in 1904.
Motel Manager James Brock pours Muriatic Acid in the Monson Motor Lodge Pool to evict black swimmers, 1964.
A woman undergoes treatment for mental illness during the 19th century
A father looks for his two missing sons during the Kosovo war in 1999. He would later find them.
The survivors the 1972 Andes plane crash.
British POWs after their release from Japanese captivity in Singapore, 1945
A starving child and a missionary in Uganda, 1980
The last photo ever of Nikola Tesla, 1943
Segregationists harass 6 year old Ruby Bridges with a doll in a coffin.
Windows on the World, the restaurant on top of the WTC North Center, 1976.
Shells from an Allied bombardment all fired in a single day on German lines in 1916
Women and girls using Radium paint, not knowing the health issues that would soon follow. 1922.
The Gadget, the first atomic bomb, 1945
Temporary NYPD headquarters at a Burger King, September 11, 2001.
Chinese guerrilla fighter Cheng Benhua smiling in her final moments.
Leftist woman handing out anti-shah manifesto. Tehran, Iran, 1979.
Pyramid of WWI German helmets in New York, 1919.
Austro-Hungarian trench raiders near Caporetto, 1917.
A young shrimp picker named Manuel, 1912. Photo by Lewis Hines
Kids work in a factory. Photo by Lewis Hines.
Tokyo residents mourning Hachiko the dog.
The Imprint of a Mitsubishi kamikaze Zero along the side of H.M.S Sussex. 1945.
Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic from Nirvana at Kurt Cobain’s funeral. Seattle, Washington (1994)
The temporary grave of Theodore Roosevelt Jr. in Normandy, July 1944.
Coal miner waiting to get into the communal shower at the end of his shift, taken in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, 1958. by photographer Max Scheler.
Russian inmate identifies a cruel camp guard at Buchenwald.
JFK’s funeral at the capitol. November 1963.
“The Thousand Yard Stare”—USMC Private Theodore J. Miller is helped aboard a ship after intense combat on Eniwetok Atoll. Miller was KIA a month later, 1944.
British infantryman in 1941 with a long WWI-style bayonet affixed to his rifle
A Chinese lady whose feet were bound from childhood. Late 1800s.
Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and his family, 1913
Anne Frank, with her sister Margot at Zandvoort Beach, 1940.
Earliest known photo of Chernobyl disaster, taken by powerplant’s photographer, dawn of April 26th, 1986
Indian Soldiers arriving in France, World War I, 1914
A young private waits on the beach during the Marine landing at Da Nang, 1965.
Little John F. Kennedy Jr. waiting for his Dad, President John F. Kennedy to land at Camp David, Maryland in October 1963.
A firefighter looks towards the heavily damaged Belgrade’s tallest building, NATO bombing, April 1999
Boy standing in front of fallen statue of Lenin, Ethiopia, 1991
The lost girl, 1874 Blanche Monnier was a Parisian socialite, known for her beauty. In France, she is referred to as “La Séquestrée de Poitiers” which means “The Confined Woman of Poitiers”.
John List takes a family portrait.
This is a photo of a British veteran of the Napoleonic wars posing with his wife. He can be seen wearing a campaign medal, commemorating the fact that he served in Spain.
Freddie Mercury said to Mary Austin in his will: “If things had been different you would have been my wife, and this would have been yours anyway.” (1984)
The last photo of The Dyatlov Pass Victims
A newly liberated women from the Bergen-Belsen camp is dusted with DDT powder to treat lice which spreads typhus in 1945. Photograph by Sgt. Hewitt, No 5 Army Film & Photographic Unit.
Throughout the USS Triton’s secret mission to circumnavigate the world submerged, the only unauthorized individual to spot the submarine during those sixty days was a Filipino man on his canoe, who noticed its periscope. April 1, 1960.
Kurt Cobain cries after an emotional set.
A photo of Joe Arridy giving his toy train to another inmate before he’s taken to the gas chamber for a crime he never committed.
Taken at the Michigan Carbon Works factory in Rougeville, the pile of bison skulls in this photo was slated to be processed and used in making products like bone glue, fertilizer, bone ash, bone char, and bone charcoal.
This photo of Heath Ledger is from his last film ‘The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,’ a few days before his passing.
The elephant’s foot of Chernobyl
4 Children for Sale
In 1925, a man flying from Casablanca to Dakar photographed a Barbary Lion in the Atlas Mountains. This photo is special because it’s the last known picture of a wild Barbary Lion before they went extinct.
Austro-Hungarian trench raiders near Caporetto, 1917.
Captured 16-year-old German anti-aircraft soldier during WW2, 1945
1929 – Boarding of British Airship R101 – This would likely be the Airships last voyage as it crashed shortly after in France.
WW1 photo of German friends in a trench bunker. Photos on the wall and one being a photo of a woman.
An American serviceman shares his rations with two Japanese children on the island of Okinawa, 1945
Men waiting in line for the possibility of a job during the Great Depression
6-year old Jewel Walker picks 20 to 25 pounds of cotton a day (1916)
Christmas dinner, 1936. Dinner consisted of potatoes, cabbage, and pie.
General Sherman overlooking Atlanta, 1864.
Lady and her horse on a snowy day in 1899.
Mother and daughter watch a tall ship navigate the Thames in London, 1880.
Old woman smoking a pipe on her porch, Appalachia Mountains, 1917.
Three young girls working as oyster shuckers. Port Royal, South Carolina, USA. 1909. Photograph by Lewis Hine.
A ghostly yet mesmerizing image from 1900.
Rainy nights in London, 1899.
Frozen Niagara Falls, 1911.
5-year-old Harold Walker picks 20 to 25 pounds of cotton a day, Oklahoma, 1916.
Part of the infamous crime-ridden slum in New York City known as the Five Points. Photo by Jacob Riis, 1872.
One of the oldest people to have been photographed in 1840-1850.
A cult-like, early meeting of the Mickey Mouse Club
A tent belonging to the missing campers of the Dyatlov pass
A boy is treated for a bite from a Russell’s viper as his father watches on
Terrifying Santa Claus.
Gas Masks for babies.
Inside a train in the 1800s.
A sharecropper and his wife in Missisipspi, 1937.
Josephine Smith digging a grave at the Drouin Cemetery during World War II
A photo of the bomb over Nagasaki mid-explosion
Family in front of their log house 1880’s.
28 students of a one-room school, Missouri, 1939.
A coal miner and his family, West Virginia, 1938.
Welsh woman washing her mine-working husband, 1931.
Two Boys in London, 1902.
Poor mother and children, Finland 1917.
Deadwood, South Dakota, circa. 1877.
The Endurance ship being stuck in the Antarctic ice (forever), 1915.
Two brothers from West Virginia who fought on opposite sides of the American Civil War in 1910
Photo of a Soviet war veteran near the Eternal Flame on the anniversary of Victory Day, 1966.
Zen monks at Asakusa Temple, in Tokyo, perform air raid drills with gas masks in 1936
Sharon Tate showing off the baby clothing she had bought in London, UK in 1969.
One of only 2 photographs ever taken of US president Andrew Jackson. 1845
A wedding during the Lebanese Civil War, Beirut, Lebanon, 1986.
A female Afghan communist revolutionary during the Saur Revolution, 1978
Departure of a Red Cross train going to Switzerland, Budapest, Hungary, 1947
Billboard swearing Manhattan Project workers to secrecy, 1945.
The first wave of Marine landing craft head towards the beaches of Iwo Jima. 08:59, 19 February 1945.
Two German Soldiers in 1916
Massive column of thousands of German prisoners of war marching down the Autobahn
Shoe shine boys talking to a Civil War Veteran, 1920s.
Shoichi Yokoi, the Japanese soldier who hid in the jungle in Guam for 27 years to avoid capture, weeps upon his return to Japan in February 1972.
A Zulu tribesman pulls a tourist in a pedicab in Durban, Union of South Africa. Photo by Melville Chater, 1930’s
Northern Ireland, The Bogside, Londonderry 1971. Photo by Don McCullin
French civilians erected this memorial to an American soldier in Carentan, France, in 1944.
Barricade constructed by revolutionaries of the Paris commune, 1871.
Gavrilo Princip’s parents in front of their house, Bosnia, 1910s/1920s
Tales of parents taking measures to prevent their children from marrying someone they do not approve of span the spectrum of human history. But in some cases, the measures they take are so drastic that it simply defies logic.
Such was the case for a 25-year-old Parisian socialite, Blanche Monnier, who, like many women her age, was actively seeking out a suitor to start a family and raise the next generation of humans.
Blanche fell for a lawyer. The man happened to be under financial strain and was on the older side. Blanche’s mother, Madame Lousie, wouldn’t hear of her daughter marrying this man, feeling he was beneath her. But who was she to tell Blanche who to love?
After Madame Louise decreed that Blanche was not to see the man anymore, Blanche refused. But, of course, her mother wasn’t going to let that be the end, so she proceeded to appeal to her daughter’s pity for her mother, begging her to end the relationship.
When Blanche refused again, Madame Louise understood that there was no way to change her mind about marrying a broke lawyer, so she took her next, and most drastic step yet: locking Blanche in a tiny room until she agreed to dissolve her courtship.
Madame Louise knew this was a drastic action, but she felt it was for the best. Besides, who could possibly endure such a fate for that long? Surely Blanche would relent sooner rather than later, right? Unfortunately for everyone involved, Blanche was far more resilient and refused to give in to the demands.
So Madame continued to keep her daughter locked up, feeding her only scraps from he own meals, never letting her come out for health or sanitary reasons, fearing that Blanche would run off to her lover.
Madame was surely going to prove how serious she was. Since Blanche wouldn’t give in, neither did her mother, keeping her daughter prisoner in the tiny room for 25 years.
Blanche withered away in that room from 1876 on. The irony of her imprisonment was that her lover passed away in 1885, just nine years later, though her sentence carried on for 16 more.
To everyone in France who knew her, Blanche simply vanished. Her mother and brother put on a cruel facade, mourning their lost family member, and after a time, settled into a standard daily routine as if nothing was off, hiding the terrible secret about Blanche for two and a half decades.
Years later, in May of 1901, the Parisian Attorney General was sent an anonymous letter describing a horrible and inhuman treatment of a woman being kept captive in Poitiers, France.
The scribbled letter read: “Monsieur Attorney General: I have the honor to inform you of an exceptionally serious occurrence. I speak of a spinster who is locked up in Madame Monnier’s house, half-starved, and living on a putrid litter for the past twenty-five years – in a word, in her own filth.”
This came as a shock to the attorney general. After all, Madame Louise Monnier Demarconnay was a woman living in an affluent neighborhood with her son Marcel and was considered an upstanding citizen.
The woman was a graduate of a prestigious law school, a former administration official with the Puget-Theniers commune, and the widow of the head of a local art facility, her late husband, Emile.
From what they knew of the family, they had grieved enough with the loss of their daughter Blanche two and a half decades earlier, so there was a lot of skepticism and aversion to the letter’s allegations. If for no other reason than to prove the letter to be a hoax, the police were directed to investigate the matter.
When they arrived at the home, the door was locked, and after repeated knocking, no one let them in. The police forced their way into the residence and were immediately stunned by the putrid smell.
Further investigation into the source of the smell on the upper floor of the home led them to the attic, where they forced open the entrance. They found a casement window blocked off by heavy curtains, coated in a thick layer of dust. The shutters were locked in place, so they needed to be removed from their hinges in order to let in any light.
Once the musty chamber was coated with sunlight, the investigators were shocked by what they found. There, covered by an aged and filthy blanket, huddled in the back corner of the room, was Blanche Monnier.
Somehow, she was still alive, despite her skeletal appearance. She wore no clothes and rested on a rotten straw mattress, completely soaked in feces and urine. She was badly malnourished, waiting in at a mere 55 pounds.
One can imagine the shock to general society when Madame Monnier, the winner of a Committee of Good Works award for her contributions of massive generosity to the city, was arrested. She confessed to her hideous crime once imprisoned but died a mere 15 days later.
Her son and Blanche’s brother Marcel was put on trial for assisting her, being sentenced to 15 months in prison. He claimed that Blanche could have left the room at any time but willingly chose not to do so and was allowed to walk free, much to the dismay and shock of the courtroom crowd.
Twelve years after her break from captivity which dominated half of her adult life, Blanch Monnier, who was also known as La Sequestree de Poitiers, passed away in a Bois sanitarium in 1913 leaving only the story of her family’s hideous crime behind her.
]]>At the front of the room, the man who was accused of murdering her daughter sat, his back turned to her. He was unaware that he was taking his last few breaths.
Marianne’s hand was in her coat pocket, holding on to something–a Beretta 70. But to Marianne, it wasn’t just a gun…it was revenge.
In 1981, in Germany, the view on violence had changed drastically since World War II. Some celebrated vigilante justice like the type Marianne carried out, while others were shocked by the mother’s behavior. Here, we will look deeper into Marianne’s revenge against her daughter’s killer.
Born on July 3, 1950, Marianne had it tough from the get-go. Her parents had been forced to flee from East Prussia during World War II. As a child, she lived in Sarstedt, West Germany, and the tension in her home grew year after year.
Marianne’s father was previously a member of the Waffen-SS–the combat portion of the Nazi’s SS unit. After the war, he took up drinking and was often rough and angry with his wife and daughter.
Her mother soon divorced the ex-Nazi and remarried, but Marianne’s stepfather wasn’t much better for the young girl. A short time later her mother and stepfather kicked her out of the house, and Marianne was forced to support herself despite still being a teenager.
Marianne Bachmeier would have three children in her lifetime–one at 16 whom she gave up for adoption, another at 18 whom she also gave up for adoption, and Anna Bachmeier at the age of 22.
Life after being kicked out of her mother’s house was turbulent for Marianne. By the age of 16, she was pregnant with her first child.
Two years later, at 18, she would have her second. Without the means to raise these children, Marianne gave them up for adoption, hoping that her children would have a better life.
When Marianne was 22, she found herself working at a pub called Tipasa. She quickly became romantically involved with the manager, and was pregnant once more.
On November 14, 1972, Marianne gave birth for the third time. She brought into the world little Anna Bachmeier, and unlike her first two children, Anna would stay with Marianne.
That isn’t to say that it was an easy decision. Reports from Marianne’s friends tell a sad story of a young mother torn between what was best for her daughter–putting her up for adoption like her first two children, or raising her all on her own.
Marianne went with the latter, but having a newborn didn’t fit into her life at all. She would resort to taking baby Anna to work with her, even letting the infant sleep at the pub while she partied after hours.
Despite all of this, Anna was said to be a bright girl with only a few bad habits. Anna was loved by her mother, and for a time, that was enough.
Anna was only 7 the day she decided to skip school. That morning, she had gotten into an argument with Marianne and decided to rebel by going to see a neighbor instead of attending class.
This neighbor, Klaus Grabowski, had been visited by Anna before. She liked to play with his cats and was no doubt hoping to do the same that day–May 5, 1980.
Instead, something horrifying would unfold. Klaus Grabowski would abduct Anna, holding her hostage for hours while he sexually assaulted her before finally murdering the young girl via strangulation. He tied Anna up, placed her body in a box, and left it on the shore of the local canal.
Almost immediately, Klaus’s fiance turned him in to the police. He was quickly arrested, telling police a bizarre story. Klaus Grabowski claimed that Anna Bachmeier had tried to blackmail him for money, saying that she would tell her mother Marianne that Klaus had molested her if he didn’t pay.
This strange accusation enraged the grieving Marianne and set into motion the events that would make her Germany’s “Revenge Mother”.
On the third day of Klaus Grabowski’s trial, over a year after the murder of Anna, Marianne walked into the courtroom. She raised the Beretta 70 she had hidden in her coat pocket, and fired the gun seven times.
Six of the bullets hit Grabowski in the back. He was likely dead before he hit the ground.
Marianne was furious with the horrible accusations Klaus had leveled against her daughter, and she wasn’t the only one. It came to light that Klaus had previously been charged with the crime of sexually assaulting two other girls in the past, and had requested to be chemically castrated.
Regretting his decision–the castration, not the assault–Klaus tried to reverse it with hormonal treatment. The behavior changes that come with hormonal imbalance were the reason the defense claimed for Klaus’s murder of Anna.
The public was angry that a man who had assaulted young girls before was able to reverse his castration in the first place.
After killing Klaus, Marianne surrendered to the police peacefully. Her job was finished.
Marianne Bachmeier had killed her daughter’s murderer, and her fate was in the hands of the court. The charge would be either murder or manslaughter.
At first, the public was vehemently on Marianne’s side, but when it was revealed that she had given up two other children for adoption and that her father was a former Nazi, opinions started to shift. Still, many people believed that Marianne’s actions were justified.
The prosecution eventually dropped the murder charge, and Marianne was convicted of manslaughter and unlawful possession of a firearm. Her sentence was initially six years, but she would only serve three before being released.
Once she was free, Marianne married and moved with her new husband to Nigeria, where he would teach. The marriage would last five years. Once they were divorced, Marianne moved once more–this time to Sicily.
In Sicily, she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She returned to her home country of Germany before succumbing to the disease at just 46 years of age.
Fittingly, Germany’s Revenge Mother would be buried next to her daughter Anna, whom she sought justice for all those years before.
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