Lost Battalion Dispatch #41

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Both sides had about 12,000 men. The Confederate force was augmented by 18 cannons recently acquired from the Union at the Battle of Mansfield. The Confederates attacked along the whole line simultaneously. They drove back the Union left and center, but General Hamilton Bee’s columns on the Union right were held up by a surprise attack from Union troops hiding in the woods east of Pleasant Hill Road. The rest of the Union line rallied, and the Confederates fell back after fighting for about two hours. Casualties were heavy for such a small, short engagement. Both sides lost over 10% of the forces engages.

The combination of the heavy casualties suffered at Mansfield and Pleasant Hill and low water on the Red River, which prevent a further advance by Admiral David Porter’s gunboats, prompted Hill to retreat and abandon the Red River campaign.

As president, Smiths sent a force to occupy a nearby island and drive away the native inhabitant. He also bought a nearby village for the price of some cooper and the bonded servitude of young settler Henry Spelman. The boy learned the Algonquin and served as interpreter to broker trade deals.

Smith tried to get English setters to move to the island and the village, which he renamed Nonsuch, but these efforts failed. In October of 1609 he returned to England for treatment of injuries suffered when gunpower exploded in his canoe. He never visited Jamestown again.

Two hundred sixty-six people were killed, and 1500 were injured in all. One tornado in Howard County, Indiana, leveled the towns of Alton and Kokomo before severely damaging Greentown and crashing into Marion, where it tore the roof off the VA Hospital and wrecked the Panorama shopping center (which was promptly looted). Over 200 homes were destroyed by this single storm.

In the aftermath, it was concluded that the high death toll could be attributed to many people being outdoors, enjoying the first day of seasonable weather or attending Church services, and not receiving weather updates from radio or television. As a result, several victims were killed in their cars. Furthermore, the Weather Service determined that the public did not discern the difference between a Forecast and an Alert. They implemented “tornado watch” and “tornado warning.”

The single orbit went smoothly with only a minor SNAFU when the service and reentry modules did not separate properly during descent. However, the wires connecting the two soon burned away, allowing the reentry to go as planned. As planned, Gagarin ejected from the reentry module about 4 miles above the ground, and both landed separately via parachute.

The first people Gagarin encountered were a farmer and his daughter, who began backing away from him in fear, “Don’t be afraid,” he told them, “I am a Soviet citizen like you, who has descended from space, and I must find a telephone to call Moscow.”

Sasaki Kojirō was known as the “Demon of the Western Provinces” because his nodachi-style sword was often depicted as the sword borne by demons. Kojirō’s weapon was also unusually long, 35.5 inches, given in the nickname “The Laundry Drying Pole.” He was also known as Ganryu after the school of swordsmanship he taught, “large rock style.” His most renowned move was “the turning swallow’s cut,” where a second cut on a different line of attack rapidly followed the initial stroke.

Musashi later became famous for fighting with two swords, a long katana and a short wakizashi. But he brought no blade at all to this fight.

Musashi arrived two hours late for the duel. Some cite this as a psychological tactic; others say he overslept and then took his time eating breakfast. While he was being rowed out to the island where the duel was to take place, legend has it that Musashi carved a bokken, a long wooden sword, out of one of the oars.

When Musashi finally arrived, Kojirō was furious. He rushed to the beach and said, “Are you late because you are scared?” He then pulled his sword out of the scabbard and flung the scabbard into the sea. Musashi replied, “If you have no further use for your scabbard, you are already dead.”

The outraged Kojirō struck first, using his famous “turning swallow’s cut.” Musashi avoided the blows, although some sources say one of them was so close that it severed Musashi’s headband. His counterblow with the heavy wooden bokken struck Kojirō squarely on the forehead, driving him to his knees. The stunned Kojirō lashed out at Musashi’s legs but failed to connect. Musashi’s second strike came down on Kojirō’s chest, breaking a rib and driving it into his heart. The duel was over.

Miyamoto Musashi would go on to spend many years studying Buddhism and swordsmanship. His enigmatic writings on the subjects are preserved in The Book of Five Rings, a manuscript he gave to his closest disciple days before he died in 1645.

At that exact moment, another conspirator attacked the home of Secretary of State Willaim Seward. Seward was ill, and the would-be assassin posed as a courier delivering medicine. Seward’s son Frederick became suspicious and prevented the man from entering his father’s bedroom. The assailant tried to shoot Frederick, but the gun misfired. In the ensuing scuffle, the man struck Frederick on the head with the gun and managed to burst into the bedroom. He stabbed Steward five times in the face and neck before a guard, and a nurse pulled him off.

A third conspirator had been assigned to attack Vice President Andrew Johnson, but he chickened out and went drinking instead.

Lincoln died at 7:22 on April 15th. Andrew Johnson was sworn in as President. Seward, though several wondered, recovered.

The Seward assailant was captured two days later when he returned to the boarding house the conspirators had occupied. Johnson’s would-be assassin was tracked to a barn on a relative’s property in Maryland and arrested on April 20th. Finally, Lincoln’s assassin and the man who held the getaway horse were hunted down in a Virginia barn on April 26th. The horse holder surrendered. The assassin was killed. All three men who took direct roles in the assassination attempts and the woman who owned the boarding house where the conspiracy was planned were sentenced to hanging by a military tribunal. Four others were sentenced to prison. One did behind bars. The remainder had their sentences commuted by Andrew Johnson in 1889.

A Spirited Game of Sergeants at Adepticon 2023

Big things have come out of our trip to the convention! Look for announcements about new products and other great stuff in the coming months!