S. J. Perelman Quotes

Campbell carried out the order although many MacDonalds escaped in the highlands. The particular massacre has always taken on an even greater infamy because the Campbell murderers had been given food and hospitality by the MacDonalds. This began the most bitter of the Scottish clan feuds that persists into modern times.

The woman was kidnapped from her home and shot.

Peter was the first Russian Ruler to ever leave Russia. While he was gone, there was a rebellion of the Streltsi—the Muscovite Guard. Peter was the most urbane and sophisticated of the Russian rulers, but he was also capable of a traditional response of force. True to his word, he hung over 500 Streltsi from the Kremlin walls.

The “stake” refers to burning at the stake, one of the methods of murder used in the South to intimidate Negroes and whites who might hold anti-slavery sentiments.

Secession was not a new concept just before the Civil War. Southerners had threatened in early America, not to join the Union unless they could maintain the evil of slavery. After the union and the Constitutional ratification, whenever there was any discussion of slavery attempted in the Congress, some Southerners would threaten secession.

The quotation is text uttered by one of her characters.

The king was found guilty and was decapitated, but not wearing a crown.

1000 Spanish prisoners of war were over a 4 day period beheaded. This infamous order has been a black mark on his general democratic and humane public life. Some apologists for his war crimes point out that the Spaniards were making an all-out assault on his revolutionary troops who were very badly outnumbered. It took many revolutionary solders to guard the prisoners and if Bolivar lost the upcoming battle, it would have been the end of his revolution and Spain might still be in control of much of South America. With the additional soldiers freed up from guard duty, Bolivar barely survived the battle and the Revolution was not crushed.

The Stoning coincidence for adultery between the Old Testament in Europe and the Middle East and the Aztecs of Mexico was probably nothing more. There is no evidence of any kind that the Aztecs of this period knew anything about the Bible.

Note that the fact that she had suffered sposal abuse. She poisoned her husband who repeadedly beat her and her children. Althoughh the evidence was heard, there was nothing that could in the then German legal system used to justify the killing of a husband. Germany was not then the only country which would not allow violent spousal abuse as a defense or a mitigating factor in the sentence. The German punishment for a woman murdering her husband was then beheading. Even as late as the mid 19th century, they were still decapitating trangressors of their laws. The Germans actually developed a special kind of sword with no point just for beheadings.

A number of the American soldiers refused to obey Calley's illegal order. Some helped some villagers to escape, and a helicopter pilot landed betreen Callery's men and the villagers they were shooting at, and ordered his helicopter machine gun crew to fire on the soldiers if they did back off. The soldiers stopped firing at the civillians. However, his and other reports of the massacre were covered up by the military for a few years. Mai Lai was not the only major war crime perpetrated by Americans in the Vietnam War; there had been a few others. But given the years of fighting and the many opportunities war crimes violations under orders were quite rare. The Viet Cong had many more war crimes that they perpetrated, and our South Vietnamese allies repeatedly committed war crimes against their own people.