The Night Mail

[Happy Hippo]

19 minutes ago, monkeysarefun said:

 

 

Surely you can still give them a bit of a "hows your father!?!" at least,  like the regulations say we can do here?

 

 

Take that Skippy🤣

[Winslow Boy]

53 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

Since they've already been through either a scissor or tunnel type trap, they are long past caring if they get nailed to a fence.  Although we have to remember that this is a now a practice very much confined to history.

 

We also no longer legally have cock fighting or bear baiting in the UK, nor do we flog human miscreants for minor offences nor hang them for slightly more serious ones..

Damn I knew we'd gone wrong somewhere. Trust the Hippo to be on top of these things.

[SM42]

26 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

Take that Skippy🤣

 

Ttt tttt ttttt tttttt tt ttt!

 

Andy

[Winslow Boy]

3 hours ago, Willie Whizz said:

No, just a student of naval history as my “other hobby”. But that’s the chap all right!

 

And it has to be said, it worked - for the next 200 years or so, aggressive tactics characterised the conduct of Royal Navy admirals and captains, even when the numbers were against them and it might have been more appropriate to be more reticent against hefty odds. I’m only aware of one actual subsequent Court Martial of an admiral for over-caution (Troubridge, 1914) - the precedent was enough. 
 

The really annoying thing, though, is that if Byng had done his job properly then Menorca might still be a British colony and we could be holidaying there without having to change currencies or learn pidgin-Spanish!

Highly unlikely as we would have probably traded it for some obscure island in the south Atlantic like the Falklands or some such. Little realising that two hundred and fifty years later we could be having jollies in the sun.

[Oldddudders]

Well this morning went much better than expected. Overnight the swollen elbow had reduced somewhat, although some of the bulge had moved along the forearm. I took the car in for service, and Alison picked me up at the garage. Sadly one of her dogs had gone missing, so we set off for her place - and found Caline locked in the Woodhouse (sort of summerhouse-turned-storeroom), having sneaked in while Alison was fetching something earlier this morning. After coffee we set off for the hospital to get the requested second x-ray. This being France, my lack of any sort of piece of paper was a poor basis to expect anything. But, hey, when I went into the x-ray office it was clear I was expected, as the two ladies exchanged nods. Similarly when I went to the accounts office, where nothing was too much trouble. Zounds! Back to x-ray, where things dipped a bit. We waited about 10 mins before an apologetic lady said we needed to go to the other x-ray facility near the station, because that was where the doctor was working today. And lo, when we arrived, after waiting in the queue for a bit, the lady said "Monsieur Dudley?" Again very smooth passage despite my not having my carte vitale - the key to all state healthcare. And another charming x-ray lady took off the bandage and took a couple of snaps, which the doctor then said were fine. The scan results and a copy of the x-ray will be available Monday.

 

Alison had an idea why it was all sweetness and light - the scan tech had screwed up causing me pain and shock, as well as the swelling. Being nice to me today was essential to hopefully avoid me claiming against the hospital. Apparently the average French person might well do that. It honestly never crossed my mind. There was an error but nobody died. Fair enough. Did I never make a mistake at work? Life at 75 may well be much too short for such things!

[polybear]

 

6 hours ago, SM42 said:

"Would you like a drink?" she asked 

 

"that would  be nice thanks "

 

A few minutes later it arrives. 

 

The coaster is far too obvious a place to put it. 

 

No that book will look a lot better with a ring on the cover  ☹️

 

 

Let me guess....your book.....

 

1 hour ago, Happy Hippo said:

.....nor do we flog human miscreants for minor offences nor hang them for slightly more serious ones..

 

More's the pity.....

[rockershovel]

5 hours ago, Willie Whizz said:

No, just a student of naval history as my “other hobby”. But that’s the chap all right!

 

And it has to be said, it worked - for the next 200 years or so, aggressive tactics characterised the conduct of Royal Navy admirals and captains, even when the numbers were against them and it might have been more appropriate to be more reticent against hefty odds. I’m only aware of one actual subsequent Court Martial of an admiral for over-caution (Troubridge, 1914) - the precedent was enough. 
 

The really annoying thing, though, is that if Byng had done his job properly then Menorca might still be a British colony and we could be holidaying there without having to change currencies or learn pidgin-Spanish!

 

Troubridge was, of course acquitted at his Court Martial but never again given command. Cradock, who knew him well, would have known this. To a man like Cradock, a long service, career officer with a great reputation for personal courage but little experience of sea combat - very much a product of the Pax Brittanica - that would have been a very difficult situation to be in. 

 

The Admirality would subsequently claim that their orders were for Cradock to concentrate around Canopus - an ageing near-hulk which never actually arrived on station, and ended the campaign run ashore in the Falklands as a fixed battery. 

 

Quite what purpose might have been intended by ordering a small, distinctly miscellaneous squadron to close with an enemy force well known to be capable of destroying that squadron long before it could exchange fire, is hard to determine. 

 

However, de mortuus nil nisi bonum, so did Cradock achieve anything? He caused the German squadron to expend around 50% of its irreplaceable ammunition, and the hunt for the scattered remnants of his squadron dispersed and delayed the Germans. 

 

Canopus, by then beached but still very much at action stations, deterred the Germans from approaching Port Stanley, where they might have coaled. 

 

The German fleet would eventually be intercepted at the Fslkland Islands and sunk there. The Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were very much the Bismarck and Tirpitz of their day, so this was a primary goal of British naval strategy. 

 

So I wouldn't say that the Coronel action achieved nothing whatever, although whether it was necessary or proportionate is a somewhat different matter. It was a tactical disaster forming the opening stages of a strategic success. It made the point forcibly that putting obsolete vessels to sea with scratch crews of reservists unable to fight them effectively, served no useful purpose - and this was not repeated. 

 

 

Edited April 4 by rockershovel

[jamie92208]

8 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Ignorant bars***d!

As HH has explained it was to stop valuable sheep and cattle breaking their legs.  The moles weren't hung up alive. All part of growing up in the country, for which I am grateful. 

 

My school friends were both farmers sons with neighbouring farms.  You would probably have liked the style of our GP, David Hyslop aka Dr Slop.  He carried detonators in his boot in case he had a patient up the valley who needed to get to hospital  30 miles away when the roads were snowed up.  He also attended the farm next to the moles where my friend Richard lived. Their sheepdog had nearly ripped 8 yr old Richards ear off.  His mother was a former nurse and the hospit was 20 miles away.   Dr Slop told the mum to scrub the kitchen table and sewed the ear back on. We closely examined the stitches at school 2 days later.   

 

Many years later

A Dr friend of Beth's heard that I was from Settle and told us about Dr Slop and the urban (rural) legends that were still told about him.  She told us about a totally fabricated tale about him sewing boys ear back on in a farmhouse kitchen.  Her face was a picture when I told her that the tale was very much true. 

 

 

Jamie

[bbishop]

5 hours ago, Willie Whizz said:

 

Conversely the Byng and Troubridge precedents (the latter especially, as it was so very recent) are thought to lie as a significant factor behind why Adm. Cradock in late 1914 took his antiquated and outgunned cruiser squadron into action off Coronel in Chile against the German admiral, Graf von Spee, when realistically he stood no chance and probably knew it. Hundreds died and precisely nothing was achieved. But ‘honour’ was saved; whatever else might be said, no-one ever criticises him for lack of bravery. 

Just as a footnote, Troubridge's flotilla comprised four Armoured Cruisers.  Three of them were sunk at Jutland, the fourth managed to interrupt the British fleet as it maneuvered to cross the German "T".  Bill

[Northmoor]

5 hours ago, Flanged Wheel said:

Churchill was fond of a good court martial threat… He once threatened Edward VIII (when he was Duke of Windsor) with a court martial if he refused to leave Portugal and return to a British territory. That would have been an amazing case to prosecute!
 

It would make a great play. “The King’s Court Martial”… You could explore all sorts of themes regarding loyalty and honour. I already have my eye on Andrew Scott to play the Duke. He would be excellent!

The more I have learned about Edward VIII over the last few years, convinces me that Wallis Simpson did Great Britain a monumental favour.

[Compound2632]

Knowledge gained is never knowledge wasted. Without @monkeysarefun's vehicular interjections, I would have been stumped by 2 down in the TLS crossword: "Vehicle from Perth may be seen in Buteshire (3)".

Edited April 4 by Compound2632

[Willie Whizz]

Not the place for a full-scale debate on naval history, but worth mentioning that Cradock’s orders were confused and contradictory (some say Winston Churchill as 1st Lord of the Admiralty was meddling again). When the armoured cruiser Defence, which had been promised him as a reinforcement and should have been at very least the equal of one of the big German ships)  was diverted elsewhere, he got the  clear impression his courage was being called into doubt.
 

Knowing the old battleship Canopus creeping up to join him, rather than a ‘citadel’ around which he should supposedly concentrate, was actually a cripple with less firepower and armour than a modern armoured cruiser, he seems to have believed that when the German squadron turned-up, the Admiralty reckoned he was both equipped and expected to go up against them. With the example of Troubridge’s failure fresh in his mind, he did so. 
 

Of course unlike Byng, Troubridge did technically get off, partly on the grounds (again) of ambiguities in his orders, though his promising career was ruined. But many in the Navy felt the true villain of the piece was his Flag Captain, Fawcett Wray, who in the depths of a dark night poured weasel-words into his ear and persuaded him the odds of four middle-aged cruisers taking-on a modern battle cruiser were too great, even in an ambush. A generation later, at the 1939 Battle of the River Plate, three British cruisers in similar circumstances showed what could have been done, and their Commodore was promoted and knighted. 
 

A sad story …

[J. S. Bach]

8 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

That you have no sheds?

But I have THREE!!!

[J. S. Bach]

7 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

At one stage in the 1950s, there used to be a 2/- bounty on grey squirrel tails.

 

I do have  a recipe for grey squirrel if anyone is interested.

Tasty little critters!

[Winslow Boy]

19 minutes ago, J. S. Bach said:

But I have THREE!!!

Oh do keep up. Anyway he wasn't talking about you.

[J. S. Bach]

Night Owl from the Piedmont.

[rockershovel]

5 hours ago, Willie Whizz said:

Not the place for a full-scale debate on naval history, but worth mentioning that Cradock’s orders were confused and contradictory (some say Winston Churchill as 1st Lord of the Admiralty was meddling again). When the armoured cruiser Defence, which had been promised him as a reinforcement and should have been at very least the equal of one of the big German ships)  was diverted elsewhere, he got the  clear impression his courage was being called into doubt.
 

Knowing the old battleship Canopus creeping up to join him, rather than a ‘citadel’ around which he should supposedly concentrate, was actually a cripple with less firepower and armour than a modern armoured cruiser, he seems to have believed that when the German squadron turned-up, the Admiralty reckoned he was both equipped and expected to go up against them. With the example of Troubridge’s failure fresh in his mind, he did so. 
 

Of course unlike Byng, Troubridge did technically get off, partly on the grounds (again) of ambiguities in his orders, though his promising career was ruined. But many in the Navy felt the true villain of the piece was his Flag Captain, Fawcett Wray, who in the depths of a dark night poured weasel-words into his ear and persuaded him the odds of four middle-aged cruisers taking-on a modern battle cruiser were too great, even in an ambush. A generation later, at the 1939 Battle of the River Plate, three British cruisers in similar circumstances showed what could have been done, and their Commodore was promoted and knighted. 
 

A sad story …

Troubridge essentially presented the Admiralty and the nation with an outcome which was tactically defensible but strategically, a huge failure. Goeben's mission would have the ultimate consequence of involving Turkey in the war on Germany's side. someone was going to carry that can and it would not have been feasible in terms of the command structure, to pilory the Flag Officer without involving the overall commander. 

 

As you say, the later Battle of the River Plate showed a possible alternative scenario. 

 

IMHO, Troubridge was wrong given the extreme strategic risks. Whether that was properly his decision is a different question. 

 

Nelson famously said that "no captain can be very wrong, if he lays his ship alongside the enemy". Napoleon valued "lucky" generals. Cradock appears to have fallen at both fences. 

 

It's an interesting comment, about "feeling his courage to be questioned". He was a brave man but his career was chequered with periods on half-pay and suggests someone who lacked some indefinable spark, and couldn't progress as a result. He reminds me of Robert Falcon Scott, another captain whose royal patronage and technical ability were insufficient to overcome his greater limitations, ending in a largely futile disaster for his command. 

 

 

[Flanged Wheel]

For those interested in Troubridge (and if you’re not then please accept my apologies for my part in prolonging and protracting the musings on this topic), then there is an excellent blog from the National Archives on this case.

 

https://blog.nationalarchives.gov.uk/court-martial-rear-admiral-troubridge/

 

With respect to the Battle of the River Plate, I had the fortune to be a Young Officer in HMS EXETER when we hosted three World War Two veterans of our namesake. Not only had they fought in the South Atlantic, they stayed with the ship until she was sunk in the Java Sea in 1942 and were then captives of the Japanese with all that entailed. They were amazing men to meet and needless to say that we treated them like royalty for the day. 

[jamie92208]

8 hours ago, J. S. Bach said:

Tasty little critters!

Learning to shot the critters to feed his family as a boy was how the famous Sgt. York learned to shoot superbly.  Those skills were put to a different use against rather larger grey targets in WW1.  If I remember correctly he single handedly pinned down a whole German regiment with accurate rifle fire. 

 

Jamie

[Oldddudders]

I see an MP has told the Times how he handed out fellow-MPs personal details to a dating-site contact he hadn't even met. At least a dozen MPs report unsolicited approaches including photos.

 

And these people are entrusted with running the country? 

[polybear]

27 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

I see an MP has told the Times how he handed out fellow-MPs personal details to a dating-site contact he hadn't even met. At least a dozen MPs report unsolicited approaches including photos.

 

And these people are entrusted with running the country? 

 

Absolutely - he should be booted out straight away.

[Winslow Boy]

1 hour ago, Oldddudders said:

I see an MP has told the Times how he handed out fellow-MPs personal details to a dating-site contact he hadn't even met. At least a dozen MPs report unsolicited approaches including photos.

 

And these people are entrusted with running the country? 

Just because there an MP doesn't stop them from making stupid decisions I'm afraid. Much as though we'd like to think otherwise they are still subject to the same 'emotions' as the rest of us.

[GMKAT7]

Good morning folks,

 

In other reports this morning, the True Blues considered setting up an app that gave out the personal details of all party members in return for a donation to their coffers.

 

Not sure how this squared with data protection rules but as money-grabbing bar stewards that's got to be up there with the orange man-baby and his 400 dollar trainers!

 

Cheers, Nigel.

[Happy Hippo]

1 hour ago, Oldddudders said:

I see an MP has told the Times how he handed out fellow-MPs personal details to a dating-site contact he hadn't even met. At least a dozen MPs report unsolicited approaches including photos.

 

And these people are entrusted with running the country? 

I'm rather paranoid about giving out personal details.

 

If someone asks if I have xxx's telephone number/email address/home address, I ask the for theirs and tell them I will pass it on to xxx who can decide to call them back if required.

[monkeysarefun]

13 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

Knowledge gained is never knowledge wasted. Without @monkeysarefun's vehicular interjections, I would have been stumped by 2 down in the TLS crossword: "Vehicle from Perth may be seen in Buteshire (3)".

 

 

Glad to be of service, I include a picture of an Australian police car in case thats another clue at some point.