Witness To A Miracle

June 1st, 2007

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The Announcement

in 1891, General Theodore Monteith attacks Topeka, Kansas, plowing into the city from the west, easily driving the few defenders out of his way. However, as the last of his column entered the city, he was surrounded by the superior numbers of the Kansan reinforcements, and started fighting a desperate battle against overwhelming odds. As the sun set on Topeka, Monteith had suffered almost 4,000 casualties, and 'Sockless' Jerry Simpson called again for his surrender. Monteith read Simpson's demand at the same time that a messenger brought him the news he had been waiting for. “It would be imprudent for me to surrender at this time,” Monteith wrote back to Simpson, “when rescue is just at hand.” As Simpson read this, panic broke out in the back of the Kansan lines – Colonel Mark Wainwright was arriving at Topeka with 30,000 militiamen drawn from the states surrounding Kansas, and was obliterating the rebels who stood between him and his commanding officer. By midnight, Simpson and the rest of the Farmers Council were forced to abandon Topeka and move west with their wounded soldiers.

in 1999, King Arthur II, with victory sounding her trumpet on every front, retires to the Welsh countryside for a few days to rest from his grueling schedule. Queen Gwen accompanies him, as does the psychiatrist, Dr. Archibald Mordred. Dr. Mordred has a fresh supply of Brightol for the king, which he has started taking in ever-increasing doses; he attributes all his recent success to the confidence that the drug has given him. It is in the euphoric state induced immediately after taking the drug that Queen Gwen tells Arthur, “My beloved majesty, I have news even greater than our war fortunes to tell you. You shall have an heir.” Arthur is overcome with happiness at the news of his queen's pregnancy, and they plan the announcement to the nation together. As Queen Gwen prepares for bed, though, Dr. Mordred approaches her and asks to speak with her privately. She sends her servants away, and asks, “What is it that you wish to say, doctor?” The psychiatrist hesitantly begins, “Your Majesty, I have access to all of the king's medical records. It's never come up before, of course – I mean, he's only been king for a year, after all – but...” The queen impatiently demands that the doctor get whatever he plans to say out. “Well, Your Majesty, the king... he's sterile. He cannot have children.” The queen regards him coldly for a moment, then says, “Then, you have been witness to a miracle, doctor. And you shall not speak of this again.” Mordred withdraws from her withering presence, conflicted as to what he should do next.

In 1955, the Indochina War neared its end in Vietnam, and the French Union offered to surrender to the United States. The British, eager to keep the Chinese out of the Gulf of Tonkin, urged President Stevenson to accept. A month later, a small American force steamed into Saigon. At the Paris Peace Conference, America accepted a League of Nations Mandate over Vietnam. General of the Armies Dwight David Eisenhower commanded American forces.

~ variant from Steve Payne: extensive use of original content has been made to celebrate the author's genius.

In 1941, the author Robert Heinlein completed a thirteen-hour marathon writing session to complete his latest story By His Bootstraps. He did not see the circle grow and was unable to prevent the stranger throwing them both through it. Recovering, he asked the stranger where they were. "In the Hall of the Gate in the High Palace of Norkaal. But what is more important is when you are. You have gone forward a little more than thirty thousand years."

~ variant from Steve Payne: extensive use of original content has been made to celebrate the author's genius.

William Westmor..	In 1988, on this day William Westmoreland published his auto-biographical work Chunnel : No End of a Lesson. The book gave a somewhat one-sided account of the Channel Tunnel Crisis of 1982. The casus belli was English Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's decision to nationalize the Channel Tunnel, refusing to pay financial ..
.. compensation to the Confederate States of America who had built and paid for it. President Westmoreland ordered CS 101st Airborne Division to scramble from their bases on the Rhine and march to Sangatte to seize back the Confederate property. The background was quite simple; fundamentally England was a bankrupt nation. When Westmoreland had decided not to bankroll the north sea oil field development program, he had inadvertently pushed the Iron Lady into a corner from which she chose to come out fighting. Whilst England was ultimately defeated at Sangatte, the peace settlement included development funding for the North Sea and Thatcher became a cause célèbre and rallying point for European nationalists. You could say the Confederacy had won the battle and lost the war.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

In 1760, a terrible silence reigned across the great continent of Europe. For various reasons of molecular biology that were unrealised at the time, the plague known as the Red Death came out of China decimating the Caucasoid. The great cities of Europe were choke with the dead, each with the crimson kiss upon the neck. Yet ..	Caucasian Map, ..
.. a few survived, and their deliverance was at hand. The wise know that God helps those that help themselves. And so it was in 1760. All the survivors had to do was to figure out how they had survived. What was their connection? And more importantly, how could they issue forth survivor infants?
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

Kaspar Hauser	In 1828, Maestro arrived in Nuremberg to seek the mysterious feral child Kaspar Hauser. Discovered wandering the streets of Nuremberg, Hauser was wearing peasant clothing and could barely talk. He said that he had spent most of his life in a darkened 2×1×1.5 metre cell with only a straw bed to sleep on and a horse carved ..
.. out of wood for a toy. He was given nothing but bread and water, and was periodically drugged so that his clothes could be changed and his hair cut. The first human being he ever had contact with was a mysterious man who visited him on occasion, always taking great care not to reveal his face to Kaspar, and from whom the boy acquired his limited spoken vocabulary and learned to write his name. The stranger eventually released Kaspar from his cell and deposited him outside, where he fainted. His next memory was of wandering the streets of Nuremberg.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

In 2008, on Prince of Wales Boulevard, Phase 2 building works were moving very slowly. Which was surprising when you pause to consider that the construction crew were working like demons. In a low-key way, it registered on his mind that somehow, things were not quite what they seemed.	Welding
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

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