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Turks lost something like 200 ships and 35,000 men. That's a whole lot of killing considering the technology of the day and the constraints of rowing around chasing after the enemy. Still hard to wrap your head around.

I only read a portion of this thread before I felt compelled to answer. Others more qualified than me, may have already answered, But as a Vietnam Veteran, here goes. My take on this is, once you comit, anything else does not matter. Death you have to face within yourself. Once that is done, the rest is a matter of Honor, still within yourself. My take, others may disagree. miles

If transported back in time, any true son of Texas would take his place on the Alamo walls.

I knew a man who was at the Bulge and another who was on Wake Island. Neither was someone to mess with, even as old men. I can only imagine what they went through.

Yep, right there alongside Moses Rose! Just picking!
Another of those Alamo myths that nobody can put any substance to!
There’s no solid evidence that he was there, other than William Zuber’s story, told 30 some years later.
His word was good with the Texas land office though. His testimony got land grants for the families of a few Alamo defenders.
It’s a shame that nobody really tried to write down the history into after the Civil War.
Although I can understand the Negligence what with setting up a new Republic!
Kaywoody, you and Mike are gonna have to refresh my memory about Medina. It’s been 10’or 15 years since I read about the Texas Revolution, and you gotta admit the story of The Alamo, The Runaway Scrape, And San Jacinto can get a guy sorta sidetracked!
I’m probably as well versed as near any Texan. Lord knows I envy Travis and Bowie.
To leave your past behind and run off into a developing country and start all over again, is something I dare say many others besides me have thought of!
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Many people don't realize that Missouri ranks third among all the states for the number of Civil War battles. Add in the guerilla fighters and bushwhackers Missouri was a dangerous place to be in that time frame.

most people associate the name Jesse James with the wild West. it's pretty much more of a leftover from the civil war with a lot of hard feelings. Jesse was a Missouri native with a bad attitude some would say others would say he was a real hero..

Wake Island. "Send more Japs"

The (real) Battle of Sabine Pass.

Never mind, you guys are off the hook!
I still have the TSHA site bookmarked!
Battle of Medina.
I ran across TSHA several years ago, and I gotta say, as a Pennsylvanian, I’m quite jealous!
With The French & Indain Wars, the Revolution, the industrial revolution, and Civil War, The Keystone State is as rich in history as anybody. (Something I’m very proud of)
I wish we had something like TSHA! Type in a word, hit the button, and off you go!
Did I ever tell youns about the Lost Children OF The Alleghenies, or the Tull’s Hill Massacred?
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Lots of info on my kin on the TSHA site.

Had an old friend that was UDT in the Pacific, swam at Tinion,Iwo amd Okinawa. After many conversations with him and lots of reading about it I would have liked to watch the Iwo battle.

Right now, I’m about 2/3rds through Bruce Catton’s “The Coming Fury”, about the beginning of the Civil War. Been quite a while since I read it. Lotta things about the election of 1860, Ft Sumter, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri that I had forgotten. You can probably look for a thread on this in a couple weeks or so!
Stxhunter, hook me up. I’d like to know about your ancestors. Like I said, the Texas Revolution is very interesting.
Nykkie, I read a little about the UDT guys in WW2. They had to have balls of steel.
But my question to one of them would be about how Kilroy got there first!
A friend of mine was a tunnel rat in Vietnam. Down the hole with a flashlight and a 1911! I didn’t know it at first. He just seemed a little off to me, until somebody clued me in. He was pretty hesitant to talk when I asked him about it, but after while we became pretty good friends. That man has my respect as much as anyone!
Much as I brag about being an American, crawling down o probably booby trapped hole with a pistol might be beyond my level of patriotism!
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The problems with actually seeing most any battle, is that no one present at a battle actually ever saw a battle, they only saw a very small part of a battle. I have interviewed many members of the 101st Airborne that were engaged at Bastogne, they all saw small parts of the battle and every event was a fight to the death. You had, in effect 1 American Division, surrounded by 16 German divisions. The 101st Airborne Division plus splinters of other units that had been smashed by the German initial attack, that had light weapons and no armor, the 16 divisions included Airborne, Armor , mechanized infantry and SS standard bearer crack Divisions Das Reich and Adolf Hitler and the 2nd Parachute Div.

Battle began on 12-16-44 and ended 12-31-44, during the worst winter recorded in 100 years.The German code name for the attack was Autumn Mist, in the US it became known as the Battle of the Bulge.

I would not have wanted to be there, just to be able to observe from a safe, warm, vantage point at distance. Everything was a target and every place was a free fire zone.

Another battle to observe would be hill 937 in the A Shu Valley. I have talked to several members of my unit that were there in the battle and took part in that battle. It took 11 frontal assaults to neutralize the mountain, which was used as an underground NVA HQ, with reinforced concrete gun positions . The Mountain was used by the NVA to control the valley on the Laos border. After demolishing the tunnels, trenches and positions, the 101st withdrew. The mountain started as a triple canopy jungle covered mountain and ended as a bare knob, of plowed and disked, smoking earth, nothing over knee high was left standing on the mountain. The withdrawal was controversial, but based on paratroopers present at the battle, there was nothing left to hold.

If you’re interested 7mm this was my GGGrandfather, on TSHA site.

https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/moncure-john-james

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Rumor has it there may be an important announcement at this years Texas Archaeological Society meeting concerning the Battle of the Medina. If so, I’ll post it here. Like I said just rumors for now, 😉

A book you need to read if you haven’t already:

The Decisive Duel: Spitfire vs. 109. Isby 2012

https://www.amazon.com/Decisive-Duel-Spitfire-109/dp/1408703068

Goes into detail about the development and flight characteristics of the successive versions of these two fighters that stayed in front line service from beginning to end. A lot of pilots died learning to land a 109, which only got worse as later versions got heavier and even less forgiving as the stalling speed got closer to the landing speed.

Another BoB book I’m currently re-reading….

The Most Dangerous Enemy. Bungay 2000.

https://www.amazon.com/Most-Dangerous-Enemy-History-Britain/dp/1781314950

A bit tedious at first as he starts post WWI and goes exhaustively into the politics vs. technology on both sides (and huge props to Dowding, among other things if not for him, the RAF would have invested a great deal more in the Bolton Paul Defiant concept, with catastrophic results).

The best BoB book I have read. Turns out the Luftwaffe was already a stretched and weary force when it was launched against England, and British factories were cranking out fighters at close to twice the rate that Germany was.

By the numbers the BoB was never as close as popular history assumes, if the Luftwaffe couldn’t get it done in the first rush, and they didn’t, they didn’t have the numbers to withstand a battle of attrition.

Little Bighorn.

Yep, I heard that too, a lot of discoveries about the exact location recently made.

August of 1813, Arredondo comes in, slaughters hundreds of American and Tejano prisoners on the battlefield. Arrives in San Antonio, hands the women and girls out to the soldiers. One woman refuses so he hangs her in a cage naked over the town plaza to shame her.

Executes I believe ten prisoners on the main plaza every three days for a month, puts their severed heads on pikes.

Sends his men up the Camino Real to Nacodoches where they execute 100 men and youths. Arredondo’s motto was it is easier to kill people than it is to forgive them. If you couldn’t prove you had always been loyal to Spain you were shot. Arredondo put Texas to the torch and caused about 15,000 Americans living here to flee.

Memories of Arredondo’s brutality contributed directly to the mass panic of the Runaway Scrape twenty three years later.

Just eight years later, 1821, Mexico gained independence and the same butcher Joaquin de Arredondo himself was now military commander of Coahuila Y Tejas.

Irony of ironies, the butcher Arredondo was a main mover and shaker on the Mexican side approving Moses and Stephen Austins’ request to settle Americans in Texas. Arredondo more than anyone knew from personal experience that you couldn’t kill enough Americans to keep us out.

EYLAU 1807.

WAGRAM 1809.

BORODINO 1812.