.......

The Battle of the Bulge was no ordinary battle; it was the one of the biggest land battles of World War II and resulted in the highest number of American casualties. There had long been rumors that Hitler was secretly developing a "miracle weapon," and it was at the Battle of the Bulge that the jet airplane was first used by the Germans. The area in Belgium where the battle was fought had been the scene of similar battles in 1870, 1914 and 1940. This was Hitler's last stand, the last counteroffensive of the German army, and the Germans knew that if this battle was lost, the war would most likely be lost. The battle was very intense with the Germans putting everything they had into it. As John Toland wrote, regarding the gallant battle fought by the Germans at the Battle of the Bulge: "Boys of fourteen and fifteen died, rifles frozen to their hands; men in their fifties were found in cellars, feet black with putrefaction." Hitler was counting on Dietrich's Sixth Panzer Army, whose soldiers had fought heroically against the Soviet Communists on the Eastern front, to save the Fatherland from the Bolsheviks by winning this crucial battle in Belgium.

Dietrich assigned Peiper the great honor of leading the battle group which would spearhead the attack. Peiper was a veteran of the greatest tank battle of all time, fought between the German Tiger tanks and the Russian T-34 tanks at Kursk in July 1943. At almost 30 years of age, Peiper was the youngest combat colonel in the Waffen-SS and he was on track to becoming the youngest General in this elite German army. He had been awarded the Iron Cross first class for bravery in battle, and was regarded as one of Germany's leading experts in tank warfare. Under his command, Peiper's 1 SS Panzer Korps had disabled more than one hundred Russian tanks in combat. Such was Peiper's reputation as a panzer ace that his defense attorney made the suggestion that he should be brought to America as a consultant in America's Cold War with the Soviet Union. In fact, General Heinz Guderian, Germany's leading expert in armored strategy, had been brought to Ft. Knox after the war to advise the American Army on tank warfare. Peiper and his men had already been interviewed extensively in prison by US Army tactical experts.

In the first few days of the battle, there was mass confusion caused by a team of 28 Germans dressed in American uniforms, led by the famous commando Otto Skorzeny. Riding in stolen American jeeps, they created havoc by directing American troops down the wrong road, changing signposts and cutting telephone wires to General Bradley's field headquarters. Four of the team were captured and when they confessed their mission, the American army immediately broadcast the news that there were thousands of Germans operating behind enemy lines. Skorzeny and his men were later brought before the American military tribunal at Dachau in another proceeding.

Otto Skorzeny, famous German commando

John Toland described the opening scene of the battle in the following passage from his book entitled Adolf Hitler:

By midnight the Ardennes battlefield was in turmoil, a scene of indescribable confusion to those involved in the hundreds of struggles. No one - German or American, private or general - knew what was really happening. In the next two days a series of disasters struck the defenders. On the snowy heights of the Schnee Eiffel at least 8000 Americans - perhaps 9000 for the battle was too confused for accuracy - were bagged by Hitler's troops. Next to Bataan, it was the greatest mass surrender of Americans in history.

The enlisted men among the Malmedy Massacre defendants averaged less than 22 years in age. There were only 30 men who were original members of the Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler, including Lt. Col. Peiper and General Sepp Dietrich. Many of the accused SS soldiers were baby-faced, uneducated 18 and 19-year-olds with little combat experience, but a few others were some of the toughest and most battle-hardened men in the German armed forces, who had been in combat for six years. They had fought some fierce battles on the Eastern front and seen unbelievable atrocities committed by our Russian allies, including mutilated bodies on the battlefield, sodomy on German POWs and cannibalism in which parts of the bodies of German POWs had been sliced off and eaten. The photograph below, taken in the fall of 1941 on the eastern front, was published in a book by Professor Franz W. Seidler who found it in the files of the Wehrmacht War Crimes Bureau, Case 304, after the war.

Body of German soldier in Russian POW Camp 2, Stalag 305, 1941

Because the Soviet Union had not signed the Geneva Convention of 1929, the Germans were not required to observe the international rules of warfare with regard to our Russian allies who were committing the most sickening atrocities on the battlefield with no regard for the unwritten rules of civilized warfare. During the proceedings, the prosecution contended that Lt. Col. Jochen Peiper had instructed his men to fight as they had fought against the Russians, disregarding international law about the treatment of prisoners of war. The defendants testified that they had been instructed to take no prisoners, but they understood this to mean that because they were fighting in a tank unit, they were supposed to send POWs to the rear to picked up by infantry units.

Gen. Sepp Dietrich is No. 11, Lt. Col. Jochen Peiper is No. 42

In the photograph above, General Sepp Dietrich is No. 11; he was sentenced to death by hanging. Next to him is Prisoners No. 33, General Fritz Krämer, who was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Prisoner No. 45 is General Hermann Priess who was sentenced to life in prison, but his sentence was commuted to 20 years. No. 42 is Lt. Col. Jochen Peiper who was sentenced to death by hanging.

Besides the killing of 72 American soldiers at the Baugnez Crossroads, near the village of Malmedy, there were many other charges against the 73 accused. The charge sheet specifically stated that the 73 accused men

"did....at, or in the vicinity of Malmedy, Honsfeld, Büllingen, Lignauville, Stoumont, La Gleize, Cheneux, Petit Thier, Trois Ponts, Stavelot, Wanne and Lutre-Bois, all in Belgium, at sundry times between 16 December 1944 and 13 January 1945, willfully, deliberately, and wrongfully permit, encourage, aid, abet, and participate in the killings, shooting, ill treatment, abuse and torture of members of the Armed Forces of the United States of America, then at war with the then German Reich, who were then and there surrendered and unarmed prisoners of war in the custody of the then German Reich, the exact names and numbers of such persons being unknown aggregating several hundred, and of unarmed civilian nationals, the exact names and numbers of such persons being unknown."

In all, the accused were charged with murdering between 538 to 749 nameless Prisoners of War and over 90 unidentified Belgian civilians in the locations mentioned on the charge sheet, which is quoted above. The accused SS men claimed that the civilians, who were killed, had been actively aiding the Americans during the fighting. According to the rules of the Geneva Convention, shooting partisans was allowed.

The prosecution claimed that General Sepp Dietrich, on direct orders from Hitler himself, had urged the SS men to remember the German civilians killed by the Allied bombing, and to disregard the rules of warfare that were mandated by the Hague Convention of 1907 and the Geneva convention. This meant that all of the accused were charged with participating in a conspiracy of evil that came from the highest level, the moral equivalent of the Nazi conspiracy to exterminate all the Jews in Europe, which was one of the charges against the major German war criminals at Nuremberg.

............

The Malmedy Massacre proceedings were conducted like a US Army court martial, except that only a two-thirds majority vote by the panel of 8 judges was needed for conviction. Each of the accused was assigned a number because it was hard to keep the names of the 73 men straight. They all wore their field uniforms, which had been stripped of the double lighting bolt SS insignia and all other military emblems and medals. The proceedings lasted for only two months, during which time both the prosecution and the defense presented their cases. Fearful that they might incriminate themselves on the witness stand, their defense attorney, Lt. Col. Everett, who believed that they were guilty, persuaded most of the SS soldiers not to testify on their own behalf. Col. Joaquim Peiper, volunteered to take all the blame if his men could go free, but this offer was declined by the court.

The courtroom was in the Dachau complex where the former concentration camp was located. The blackened chimney of the Dachau crematorium loomed in the distance, only a quarter of a mile away from where the Jewish "law member" of the court sat under a huge American flag pinned to the wall. It had been only a little more than a year since soldiers in the American Seventh Army had discovered the horror of the gas chamber at Dachau and dead bodies piled up in the morgue of the crematorium building.

After only 2 hours and 20 minutes of deliberation by the panel of judges, all 73 of the accused SS soldiers, who were on trial, were convicted. Each of the accused was required to stand before the judges with his defense attorney, Lt. Col. Everett, by his side, as the sentence was read aloud.

Waiting for the Malmedy Massacre verdict outside the courtroom

Forty-two of the accused were sentenced to death by hanging, including Col. Peiper. Peiper made a request through his defense attorney that he and his men be shot by a firing squad, the traditional soldier's execution. His request was denied. General Sepp Dietrich was sentenced to life in prison along with 21 others. The rest of the accused were sentenced to prison terms of 10, 15 or 20 years.

None of the convicted SS soldiers were ever executed and by 1956, all of them had been released from prison. All of the death sentences had been commuted to life in prison. As it turned out, the Malmedy Massacre proceedings at Dachau, which were intended to show the world that the Waffen-SS soldiers were a bunch of heartless killers, became instead a controversial case which dragged on for over ten years and resulted in criticism of the American Occupation, the war crimes military tribunals, the Jewish prosecutors at Dachau and the whole American system of justice. Before the last man convicted in the Dachau proceedings walked out of Landsberg prison as a free man, the aftermath of the case had involved the US Supreme Court, the International Court at the Hague, the US Congress, Dr. Johann Neuhäusler who was a survivor of the Dachau concentration camp and a Bishop in Munich, and the government of the new Federal Republic of Germany. All of this was due to the efforts of the defense attorney, Lt. Col. Willis M. Everett.

James J. Weingartner, the author of "A Peculiar Crusade: Willis M. Everett and the Malmedy Massacre," wrote the story of the Dachau proceedings from information provided by Everett's family and gleaned from his letters and diary. According to Weingartner, shortly before the proceedings were to begin, defense attorney Lt. Col. Everett interviewed a few of the 73 accused with the help of an interpreter. Although the accused were being held in solitary confinement and had not had the opportunity to consult with each other, most of them told identical stories of misconduct by their Jewish interrogators. The accused claimed that they had already had a trial, which was conducted in a room with black curtains, lit only by two candles. The judge was a Lt. Col. who sat at a table draped in black with a white cross on it. After these mock trials in which witnesses testified against the accused, each one was told that he had been sentenced to death, but nevertheless he would have to write out his confession. When all of them refused to write a confession, the prosecution dictated statements which they were forced to sign under threats of violence. There was no question that these mock trials had actually taken place, since the prosecution admitted it during the investigation after the Dachau proceedings ended.

Lt. Col. Joachim Peiper on the witness stand, June 17, 1946

According to Weingartner, Lt. Col. Peiper presented to Everett a summary of allegations of abuse made to him by his soldiers. They claimed that they were beaten by the interrogators and that one of the original 75 accused men, 18-year-old Arvid Freimuth, had hanged himself in his cell after being repeatedly beaten. A statement, supposedly written by Freimuth, although portions of it were not signed by him, was introduced during the proceedings as evidence against the other accused. As in the Nuremberg IMT and the other Dachau proceedings, the accused were charged with conspiracy to commit war crimes, as well as with specific incidents of murder, so Freimuth's statement was relevant to the case, even after he was no longer among the accused himself.

An important part of the defense case was based on the fact that the accused were classified as Prisoners of War when they were forced to sign statements incriminating themselves even before they were charged with a war crime. As POWs, they were under the protection of the Geneva Convention of 1929 which prohibited the kind of coercive treatment that the accused claimed they had been subjected to in order to force them to sign statements of guilt. Article 45 of the Geneva Convention said that Prisoners of War were "subject to the laws, regulations and orders in force in the armies of the detaining powers." That meant that they were entitled to the same Fifth Amendment rights as American soldiers. After being held in prison for an average of five months, the SS Malmedy veterans were charged as war criminals on April 11, 1946, a little over a month before their case before the American military tribunal was set to begin. By virtue of the charge, they were automatically reduced to the status of "civilian internee" and no longer had the protection of the Geneva Convention.

As quoted by Weingartner, the defense made the following argument at the trial:

"As previously outlined, International Law laid down certain safeguards for treatment of prisoners of war, and any confession or statement extracted in violation thereof is not admissible in a court martial or any subsequent trial under a code set up by Military Government. If a confession from a prisoner of war is born in a surrounding of hope of release or benefit or fear of punishment or injury, inspired by one in authority, it is void in its inception and not admissible in any tribunal of justice.

Could anyone, by artifice, conjure up the theory that the Military Government Rules and Ordinances are superior to the solemn agreements of International Law as stated in the Geneva Convention of 1929? Is this court willing to assume the responsibility of admitting these void confessions?....It is not believed that the Court will put itself in the anomalous position of accepting statements into evidence which were elicited from prisoners of war in contravention of the Geneva Convention and therefore a violation of the Rules of Land Warfare on the one hand and then turn squarely around and meet out punishment for other acts which they deem violations of the same laws. To do so would be highly inconsistent and would subject the Court and all American Military Tribunals to just criticism."

Col. Peiper listens to closing statement with his arms folded

Lt. Col. Rosenfeld ruled against a defense motion to drop the charges, based on the above argument, by proclaiming that the Malmedy Massacre accused had never been Prisoners of War because they became war criminals the moment they committed their alleged acts and were thus not entitled to the protection of the Geneva Convention of 1929. (Both Rosenfeld and Everett may have been unaware of the fact that on August 4, 1945, an order signed by General Dwight D. Eisenhower reduced the status of all German POWs to that of "disarmed enemy forces," which meant that they were no longer protected under the rules of the Geneva Convention.) Moreover, as the law member of the panel of judges, Lt. Col. Rosenfeld ruled that "to admit a confession of the accused, it need not be shown such confession was voluntarily made...." Contrary to the rules of the American justice system, the German war criminals were presumed guilty and the burden of proof was on them, not the prosecution.

The prosecution case hinged on the accusation that Adolf Hitler himself had given the order that no prisoners were to be taken during the Battle of the Bulge and that General Sepp Dietrich had passed down this order to the commanding officers in his Sixth Panzer Army. This meant that there was a Nazi conspiracy to kill American prisoners of war and thus, all of the accused were guilty because they were participants in a "common plan" to break the rules of the Geneva Convention. Yet General Dietrich's Sixth Panzer Army had taken thousands of other prisoners who were not shot. According to US Army figures, there was a total of 23,554 Americans captured during the Battle of the Bulge.

US Army Major Harold D. McCown testified as a witness for Col. Peiper

Lt. Col. Jochen Peiper was not present during the alleged incident that happened at the crossroads near Malmedy. The specific charge against Peiper was that he had ordered the killing of American POWs in the village of La Gleize. Major Harold D. McCown, battalion commander of the 30th Infantry Division's 119th Regiment of the US Third Army, testified for the defense at the trial. McCown had been one by Peiper's prisoners at La Gleize; he claimed that he had talked half the night with the charismatic Peiper, who allegedly didn't sleep for 9 straight nights at the beginning of the Battle of the Bulge. McCown had heard the story of Peiper's men shooting prisoners at the crossroads near Malmedy and he asked Peiper about the safety of the Americans at La Gleize. By this time, Peiper's tanks were trapped in the hilltop village of La Gleize and he had set up his HQ in the cellar of the little schoolhouse there. McCown testified that Peiper had given him his word that the American POWs at La Gleize would not be shot, and McCown also testified that he had no knowledge that any prisoners were actually shot there.

The main evidence in the prosecution case was the sworn statements signed by the accused even before they were charged with a war crime, statements which defense attorney Everett claimed were obtained by means of mock trials and beatings in violation of the rules of the Geneva Convention of 1929. The war crimes with which they were charged were likewise violations of the Geneva Convention of 1929, a double standard which didn't seem right to defense attorney, Lt. Col. Willis M. Everett.

Another double standard that bothered Everett was that there had been many incidents in which American soldiers were not put on trial for killing German Prisoners of War, but the defense was not allowed to mention this. Any of the accused men who inadvertently said anything about American soldiers breaking the rules of the Geneva Convention were promptly silenced and these comments were stricken from the record.

Peiper poses for his mug shot at Schwabish Hall prison

Eventually all 73 of the convicted German war criminals in the Malmedy Massacre case were released from Landsberg prison, including Col. Peiper who was freed on December 22, 1956, the last of the accused to finally walk out of Landsberg.

Peiper had been born on January 30, 1915, so he was just short of his 30ieth birthday when the Malmedy Massacre happened. He spent 11 of the best years of his life in prison, including 55 months on death row. After he was freed, he could not overcome the stigma of being a convicted war criminal. He took a series of jobs, but was unable to keep any of them. Finally, in 1972, he moved to the French village of Traves. Just as he was starting to write a book on the Malmedy Massacre, Peiper was killed on July 14, 1976 when his house was firebombed. Peiper had been warned to leave, but he refused; he died as he had lived, with a weapon in his hands, refusing to be driven out of his home. His charred body was found in the ruins of his burned home. The date of July 14th was the French Bastille Day, the equivalent of the American 4th of July. A group of Frenchmen, wearing ski masks were photographed as they announced "We got Peiper." This photo was published on November. 7, 1976 in the New York Times Magazine.

The bodies of the Malmedy Massacre victims were buried in temporary graves at Henri-Chappelle, 25 miles north of the village of Malmedy. The temporary cemetery was made into a permanent military cemetery after the war, and 21 of the murdered heroes of the Battle of the Bulge are still buried there. A stone wall has been erected as a memorial in honor of all the victims of the Malmedy Massacre near the site of the tragedy.

Additional Sources:

ardenne44.free.fr
www.xs4all.nl/~hulsmann
http://users.skynet.be/bulgecriba/malmedy.html
www.qmmuseum.lee.army.mil
The FReeper Foxhole Remembers The Malmedy Massacre (12/17/1944) - Sep. 2nd, 2003

In the second day of the World War II German Counter Offensive (known as the Battle of the Bulge) elements of the 1st SS Panzer Division moving through Belgium captured and subsequently killed nearly 80 US prisoners of war. Victims of the "Malmedy Massacre" were left unattended under a shroud of new-fallen snow for weeks until mortuary affairs troops could arrive.

During the week of 13-18 January 1945 the 4th Platoon, 3060th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company set up a collection point nearby and carefully combed the killing fields for remains and personal effects.

Although many in the unit were former combat soldiers, and had received little mortuary training, seasoned NCOs led the way -- showing them how to use laundry markings and other items for identification, do fingerprinting, fill out the necessary forms, and so on.

In the end, despite the almost complete absence of dog tags, 100 percent of the victims recovered were positively identified, and buried with all due honor -- as befitted United States soldiers who paid the ultimate price in the name of freedom.

Veterans for Constitution Restoration is a non-profit, non-partisan educational and grassroots activist organization.

Actively seeking volunteers to provide this valuable service to Veterans and their families.

Thanks to quietolong for providing this link.

NOW UPDATED THROUGH JULY 31st, 2004
Categorized by PAR35

The FReeper Foxhole. America's History. America's Soul

Click on Hagar for
"The FReeper Foxhole Compiled List of Daily Threads"

The SS were some of the most inhuman scum to have soiled the face of the Earth with their presence.

"FALL IN" to the FReeper Foxhole!

It's Friday. Good Morning Everyone.

If you want to be added to our ping list, let us know.

If you'd like to drop us a note you can write to:

The Foxhole
19093 S. Beavercreek Rd. #188
Oregon City, OR 97045

Late Night, Early Morning Bump for the Freepr Foxhole

Unintended consequence of the Malnedy Massacre was that when the GIs found out about the "Massacre" they fought that much harder to avoid the fate of being gunned down by the NAZIs

Regards

alfa6 ;>}

SS Lt. Col. Jochen Peiper on the Eastern front

Who knows how many other countless, helpless victims this miserable SS bastard along with those he commanded butchered all over the Eastern Front, as well as nations on the Western Front.

Of the convicted German SS war criminals in the Malmedy Massacre case all of of these killers were released from Landsberg prison, including Col. Peiper who was freed on December 22nd, 1956. I wonder if the family members of the murdered GI's at Malmedy have any say in allowing these SS savages out of prison only after 10 years

Reciprocity for premeditated mass murderers is not always immediate. In Col Peiper's case payback came on July 14th, French Bastille Day, the equivalent of 4th of July. A group of Frenchmen, wearing ski masks were photographed as they announced "We got Peiper." This photo was published on November 7th, 1976 in the New York Times Magazine.

A real good older friend of mine, who passed on, was one of the first American troops to actual see the indescribable horror of one of the Nazi's death camps. He stated to me, he & other GI's opened a railroad car and saw people, twisted dead people piled on top of each other, mostly the sickening remains of what was Jewish people, even little children & old ladies. He knew because of the Star of David patch on the rags the wore as clothing he saw.

My friend said he & the other GI's began to throw up, all crying. For some of these battle hardened veterans the horror was too much. He told me they had entered Hell.

A survivor stokes smoldering human remains in a crematorium oven that is still lit. Dachau, Germany, April 29th-May 1st, 1945.

Todays version of the SS are Islamic death cult terrorist gangs such as Hamas, al-Qaida, Hizballah, Iranian homicide bombers in Iraq plus scores of others Muslim fanatics who look at Hitler as a hero, as did the Muslim Grand Mufti during the war.

First I thought it was "Peiper" (sounds like apple "Pie-per") then "Pieper" (sounds like "peep-er"). Looks from the photos that the first is correct.

Malmedy was rough, but the Pacific was much worse. Myself, an American not killed is a good deal if the price is a hundred of the the other guys. A thousand.

I spent some years growing up in Japan, 1954 to '58. Smoochy huggy kissy would not have got the job done.

Speaking of today's politics, notice that the Chinese are still afraid of the Japanese. Hmmm.

Good morning Snippy. Happy new year!

Happy New Year from Southwest Oklahoma.

Sad story.

Good morning. My enterway project is complete. It looks rather nice. Had to apply the grout twice..the second time was a touch up. I left the house for an errand after I laid it the first time. Came back to Rocket's toe nail prints set in my new laid grout. So I had to put on another layer to fix that problem. All total it cost a whopping $24.91. IF it doesn't rain I want to do some outside things like paint the small porch today or this weekend.

December 31, 2004

Past, Present, & Future

Read: Philippians 3:15-21

I press toward the goal . . . . Brethren, join in following my example. —Philippians 3:14,17

Bible In One Year: Malachi 1-4; Revelation 22

In his painting "An Allegory of Prudence," 16th-century Venetian artist Titian portrayed Prudence as a man with three heads. One head was of a youth facing the future, another was of a mature man eyeing the present, and the third was of a wise old man gazing at the past. Over their heads Titian wrote a Latin phrase that means, "From the example of the past, the man of the present acts prudently so as not to imperil the future."

We need that kind of wisdom to overcome the anxiety created by our past failures and the fear of repeating them in the future—an anxiety that keeps us from living to the fullest now.

Paul was able to "forget" his past and anticipate his future (Philippians 3:13-14). This doesn't mean his memory was erased; it means that Paul was free of any guilt or pride he may have felt from his past actions, because God had forgiven him. This attitude enabled him to live in the present and "press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus" (v.14). So he had one driving passion—to know Christ better.

As we close the chapter of 2004, let's rededicate ourselves to Christ. Jesus will enable us to live fully in the present as we gain wisdom from the past and face the future with courage. —Dennis De Haan

Standing at the portal
Of the opening year,
Words of comfort meet us,
Hushing every fear. —Havergal

Never let a bleak past overshadow a bright future.

On This Day In History

Birthdates which occurred on December 31:
1378 Callistus III [Alfonso the Borja] Pope (1455-58)
1540 Silvio Antoniano Italian cardinal/theologist (Tre libri)
1550 Henri Guise [le Balafré] French duke/leader (Catholic League)
1720 [Bonnie Prince] Charles Edward Stuart English pretender to throne
1738 Charles Lord Cornwallis solider/statesman
1815 George Gordon Meade Major General (Union Army), died in 1872
1825 Francis Trowbridge Sherman Brigadier-General (Union volunteers), died in 1905
1863 Alfredo Panzini Italian author (Dizionario Moderno)
1864 Robert G Aitken US astronomer (Binary Stars)
1869 Henri Matisse France, impressionist painter (Odalisque)
1880 George C Marshall Uniontown PA, authored Marshall Plan (Nobel 1953)
1881 Colin G Fink US chemist (electro chemistry)
1882 Ben Jones Missouri, horse trainer (Citation, Whirlaway)
1904 Nathan Milstein Odessa Russia, concert violinist (Philadelphia Orchestra 1942)
1905 Guy Mollet (Socialist) French premier (1956-57)
1908 Simon Wiesenthal Polish/Austrian nazi hunter (Wiesenthal Center)
1914 Pat Brady Toledo OH, actor (Roy Rogers Show)
1921 Rocky Graziano New York NY, boxer (Middleweight champion)/actor (Miami Undercover)
1922 Rex Allen Wilcox AZ, cowboy singer (Dr Baxter-Frontier Doctor)
1928 Hugh McElhenny NFL halfback (San Francisco, Minnesota, New York Giants, Detroit)
1929 Sidney Greenbaum grammarian
1930 Odetta [Holmes] Birmingham AL, folk singer/actress (Sanctuary)
1931 Bob Shaw UK, sci-fi author (Orbitsville, Ragged Astronauts, Vertigo)
1932 George Schlatter TV producer (Laugh-in)
1937 [Philip] Anthony Hopkins Port Talbot West Glamorgan Wales, actor (Elephant Man, QB VII, Magic, Bounty)
1940 Oleg Anatolyevich Yakovlev Russian cosmonaut
1941 Sarah Miles Essex England, actress (Ryan's Hope, Big Sleep, Venom)
1943 Ben Kingsley Scarborough England, actor (Gandhi, Betrayal, Maurice)
1943 John Denver [Henry John Deutschendorf Jr] Roswell NM, singer/songwriter/actor
1946 Diane von Furstenberg Brussels Belgiums, fashion designer
1946 Patti Smith Chicago IL, singer (the wild mustang of rock)
1947 Burton Cummings rock guitarist (Guess Who-These Eyes)
1947 Tim Matheson California, actor (Animal House, Fletch, Up the Creek)
1948 Donna Summer Boston MA, singer (Love to Love You Baby, On the Radio)
1949 Claude Daniel Marks Buenos Aires Argentina, FALN member (FBI most wanted)
1959 Bebe Neuwirth Princeton NJ, actress (Lilith-Cheers, Damn Yankees)
1959 Paul Westerberg singer (The Replacements)
1972 Joe [Joseph Mulrey] McIntyre rocker (New Kids on the Block-Lovin You Forever)
1977 Ildiko Kecan Miss Hungary Universe (1997)

Deaths which occurred on December 31:
0192 Lucius Aurelius Commodus Emperor of Rome (180-192), murdered at 31
0406 Godagisel king of the Vandals, dies in battle
0439 Melania the Younger Roman monastery founder/saint, dies at about 56
1382 Daigaku Zen teacher/46th head of Engakuji, dies in Kamakura Japan
1384 John Wycliffe English religious reformer/bible translator, dies
1616 Jacques Le Maire pirate/explorer (Lemaire Strait), dies at 31
1775 General Richard Montgomery dies fighting the British
1802 Francis Lewis Welsh/US merchant/signer (Declaration of Independence), dies at 89
1862 James Edward Rains lawyer/Confederate Brigadier-General, dies in battle at 29
1862 Joshua Woodrow Sill US Union Brigadier-General, dies in battle at 31
1889 Ion Creanga Romanian (fairy tales) author, dies at 52
1936 Miguel de Unamuno Jugo Spanish philosopher/poet (Cancionero), dies at 72
1936 William F Ellison Irish clergyman/astronomer, dies at 72
1966 Chief Nipo Strongheart Native American actor (Pony Soldier), dies at 75
1966 Pieter C A Geyl historian (History of Dutch Race), dies
1971 Peter Deuel actor (Gidget, Love on a Rooftop), commits suicide at 31
1972 Roberto Clemente Pittsburgh Pirate slugger, dies in a plane crash at 38
1980 Marshall McLuhan Canadian cultural philosopher, dies at 69
1980 Raoul Walsh US director (High Sierra), dies at about 88
1985 Rick Nelson singer/actor (Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet), dies at 45
1990 George Allen US football coach (Los Angeles Rams, Washington Redskins), dies
1993 Thomas J Watson Jr president of IBM (1956-71)/diplomat, dies at 79
1993 Zviad Gamsachurdia President of Georgia SSR (1991-1993), suicide at 54
1995 Calvin/Hobbes (comic strip), dies
1996 61 law enforcement officers killed by felons in US this year
1997 76 law enforcement officers killed by felons in US this year
1997 Floyd Cramer pianist (Nashville Sound), dies of cancer at 64
1997 Michael Kennedy son of Robert Kennedy, dies in ski accident at 39

Reported: MISSING in ACTION

1964 COOK DONALD G.---NEW YORK NY.
[12/01/67 ON THE PRG DIC LIST]
1964 DODGE EDWARD R.---NORFOLK VA.
[LAST SEEN TURNING AC IN VALLEY]
1964 MC DONALD KURT C.---BELLVIEW WA.
[LAST SEEN TURNING AC IN VALLEY]
1967 BELCHER GLENN ARTHUR---FESSENDEN ND.
[REMAINS RETURNED 12/30/97]
1967 PEACE JOHN D.---HUDSON OH.
1967 PERISHO GORDON S.---QUINCY IL.
1971 DUGGAN WILLIAM Y.---EL PASO TX.
1971 SUTTER FREDERICK J.---LEAWOOD KS.

POW / MIA Data & Bios supplied by
the P.O.W. NETWORK. Skidmore, MO. USA.

On this day...
0335 St Silvester I ends his reign as Catholic Pope
0406 80,000 Vandels attack the Rhine at Mainz
0870 Skirmish at Englefield: Ethelred of Wessex beats Danish invasion army
1492 100,000 Jews expelled from Sicily
1502 Cesare Borgia (son of pope Alexander VI) occupies Urbino
1564 Willem van Orange demands freedom of conscience/religion
1600 British East India Company chartered
1669 France & Brandenburg sign secret treaty
1670 France & England sign Boyne-treaty
1687 1st Huguenots depart France to Cape of Good Hope
1688 Pro-James II-earl of Devonshire occupies Nottingham
1711 Duke of Marlborough fired as English army commander
1744 James Bradley announces discovery of Earth's motion of nutation (wobble)
1745 Bonnie Prince Charlies army meets with de Esk
1762 Mozart family moves from Vienna to Salzburg
1775 Battle of Québec; Americans unable to take British stronghold
1776 Rhode Island establishes wage & price controls to curb inflation: Limit is 70¢ a day for carpenters, 42¢ for tailors
1781 Bank of North America, 1st US bank opens
1783 Import of African slaves banned by all of the Northern states
1805 End of French Republican calendar; France returns to Gregorianism
1841 Alabama becomes 1st state to license dental surgeons
1857 Queen Victoria chooses Ottawa as new capital of Canada
1859 Dutch colony in Dutch Indies counts 4,800 slaves
1861 22,990 mm of rain falls in Cherrapunji Assam in 1861, world record
1862 President Lincoln signs act admitting West Virginia to the Union
1862 Battle of Stone's River TN (Stone River, Murfreesboro)
1879 Edison gives 1st public demonstration of his incandescent lamp
1879 Gilbert/Sullivan's "Pirates of Penzance" premieres in New York NY
1890 Ellis Island (New York NY) opens as a US immigration depot
1896 25th auto built in US
1897 Brooklyn's last day as a city, it incorporates into NYC (1/1/1898)
1902 Boers & British army sign peace treaty
1907 For the 1st time a ball drops at Times Square to signal the new year
1910 US tobacco industry produced 9 billion cigarettes in 1910
1911 Marie Curie receives her 2nd Nobel Prize
1914 Colonel Jacob Ruppert & Cap Huston purchase New York Yankees for $460,000
1923 1st transatlantic radio broadcast of a voice, Pittsburgh-Manchester
1923 BBC begins using Big Ben chime ID
1924 Edwin Hubble announces existence of distant galactic systems
1929 Pope Pius XI publishes encyclical Divini illius magistri
1930 Pontifical encyclical Casti connubii against mixed marriages
1930 US tobacco industry produced 123 billion cigarettes in 1930
1934 Helen Richey becomes 1st woman to pilot an airmail transport
1935 Charles Darrow patents Monopoly
1938 Dr R N Harger's "drunkometer", 1st breath test, introduced in Indiana
1939 25 U boats sunk this month (81,000 ton)
1942 60 U boats sunk this month (330,000 ton)
1943 NYC's Times Square greets Frank Sinatra at the Paramount Theater
1944 48 people die in a train accident in Ogden UT
1945 Ratification of UN Charter completed
1946 French troops leave Lebanon
1946 President Truman officially proclaims end of WWII
1951 1st battery to convert radioactive energy to electrical announced
1953 Hulan Jack sworn in as Manhattan Borough president
1953 Willie Shoemaker shatters record, riding 485 winners in a year
1958 International Geophyscial Year ends
1958 Cuban dictator Batista flees
1961 1st performance of the Beach Boys
1961 Marshall Plan expires after distributing more than $12 billion
1962 Katanga becomes part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
1962 "Match Game" debuts on NBC with host Gene Rayburn
1963 Chicago Bears win NFL championship
1963 Dear Abby show premieres on CBS radio (runs 11 years)
1963 Jerry Garcia & Bob Weir played music together for the 1st time (like wow man)
1964 Donald Campbell (UK) sets world water speed record (276.33 mph)
1966 Monkee's "I'm a Believer" hits #1 & stays there for 7 weeks
1966 Pirate Radio 390 (Radio Invicata) off England, resumes transmitting
1968 1st supersonic airliner flown (Russian Tupolev TU-144)
1970 Congress authorizes the Eisenhower dollar coin
1970 President Allende nationalizes Chilean coal mines
1974 41st Sugar Bowl: Nebraska 13 beats Florida 10
1974 Popular Electronics displays Altair 8800 computer
1977 Ted Bundy escapes from jail in Colorado
1977 Amir Sheikh Jabir al-Ahmad al-Jabir Al Sabah becomes leader of Kuwait
1977 Cambodia drops diplomatic relations with Vietnam
1978 Taiwan's final day of diplomatic relations with the US
1978 CIA director, Admiral Stansfield Turner retires from the Navy
1978 Iran shah names Chapour Bakhtiar premier
1981 CNN Headline News debuts
1981 Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings stages coup in Ghana, suspends constitution
1984 NYC subway gunman Bernhard Goetz surrenders to police in New Hampshire
1984 Rajiv Gandhi takes office as India's 6th PM succeeds his mom, Indira
1984 US leaves UNESCO
1989 Fog Bowl: Heavy fog rolls in on Bears 20-12 victory over Eagles
1990 Iraq begins a military draft of 17 year olds
1990 The Sci-Fi Channel on cable TV begins transmitting
1991 Dow Jones closes at record high 3168.83
1991 USSR, last day of existence
1993 Barbra Streisand does her 1st live public concert in 20 years
1995 Cartoonist Bill Watterson ends his "Calvin & Hobbes" comic strip
1997 Intel cuts price of Pentium II-233 MHz from $401 to $268
1997 Microsoft buys Hotmail E-mail service
1997 More Swedes died than were born in 1997, 1st time since 1809
1998 Europe's leaders proclaimed a new era as 11 nations merged currencies to create the euro.
1999 Control of Panamá Canal reverts to Panamá

Holidays
Note: Some Holidays are only applicable on a given "day of the week"
Austria : Imperial Ball
Bangladesh, Brunei, India, México, Philippines, Sri Lanka : Bank Holiday
Benin : Feed Yourself Day
Congo : National Day
Indians at Mitla, Oaxaca : Noche de Pedimento/Wishing Night
Japan : Omisoka Day/Grand Purification
Lebanon : Evacuation Day (1946)
Mauritania : People's Party Day
Scotland : Hogmanay Day
World : New Year's Eve/Watch Night
US : Kuumba-Creativity Day (6th Day of Kwanzaa)
US : Make Up Your Mind Day
US : New Years Eve
US : No Resolution Day
International Calendar Awareness Month

Religious Observances
Roman Catholic : Memorial of St Sylvester I, 33rd pope (314-35) (optional)

Religious History
1687 The first shipload of emigrating Huguenots (French Protestants) left France for South Africa.
1712 Birth of Peter Bohler, the Moravian missionary who, at age 25, influenced the religious spirit of John Wesley. Bohler taught the founder of Methodism the joys of personal conversion and self_surrendering faith, and Wesley later incorporated these spiritual emphases within Methodist theology.
1823 Birth of William O. Cushing, American clergyman. He penned over 300 hymns, among them "When He Cometh," "Under His Wings" and "Hiding in Thee."
1837 Birth of John R. Sweney, American sacred chorister. He composed over 1,000 gospel tunes, including SUNSHINE ("There is Sunshine in My Soul Today") and SWENEY ("More About Jesus Would I Know").
1900 Birth of Stephen C. Neill, British clergyman and biblical scholar. A prolific writer, some of Neill's better_known titles are "A History of Christian Missions" (1964), "The Interpretation of the New Testament: 1871_1961" (1966) and "The Modern Reader's Dictionary of the Bible" (1966).

Source: William D. Blake. ALMANAC OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1987.

Thought for the day :
"We should all be concerned about the future because we will have to spend the rest of our lives there."

Can't really blame the Chinese considering the wholesale slaughter the Jap armies inflicted on China's population.</p>

Morning Army Air Corps.

The world vowed "never again" after WWII. So much for vows.

Morning Snippy.

Morning alfa6.

Nothing PO's an American soldier more than hearing about an atrocity like this.

Morning M. Espinola.