Today In Alternate History

June 6

In 1799, on this day master orator, attorney, planter and anti-monarchist politician Patrick Henry died on his five hundred and twenty acre plantation at Red Hill near Brookneal, Virginia in Charlotte County.

American Heroes: Patrick HenryA Founding Father, he served as the first and sixth post-colonial Governor of Virginia, from 1776 to 1779 and from 1784 to 1786. Henry led the opposition to the Stamp Act of 1765 and is remembered for his "Give me Liberty, or give me Death!" speech. Along with Samuel Adams and Thomas Paine, he is remembered as one of the most influential exponents of Republicanism, promoters of the American Revolution and independence, especially in his defense of historic rights.

Understandably, Henry became one of the fiercest opponents to the elevation of General Washington to King George the First of America. A barnstorming speech at the Virginia Ratification Convention ended with the erodite remark "Our Cincinnatus has become our Julius Caesar". But his eloquence was no match for the General's popularity and prestige and Henry was unable to stop the Royal House of Washington. However the lack of a suitable male heir brought the Monarchist experiment to a crashing halt just six months later. Perhaps his fellow Virginian himself accepted the brutal judgement of history for his last words were uncharacteristically philosophical "Tis well". Disgusted by the indecision and chaos of the Continental Congress, and the Articles of the Confederation, Washington had only accepted the throne in an attempt to steer the infant American state into early maturity.
This post is an article from our alternative American Heroes thread.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Click on the hyperlinked metadata to surf the site!

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: American Heroes Source: Wikipedia Labels: Patrick Henry, George Washington, America, King, Presidency.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in this post we repurpose content from Wikipedia.

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2012-06-07 00:21:10 ~ Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the whole point of the American Revolution to get AWAY from kingdoms? ;) Well, pragmatism and expedience rather than dogma were the keys to Washington's unique success. In this AH he is forced to compromise earlier due to political squabbling although his demise suggests he regrets this choice to accept the monarchy.

Readers Comment Jackie Rose commented on 2012-06-07 00:53:07 ~ Well, hmm, let's see. Following the British example, a king's eldest daughter could be crowned, but Washington's daughters were actually Martha's by her first husband. His vice president, John Adams, was vehemently anti-monarchist, and Thomas Jefferson had written a scathing denunciation of the "tinsel aristocracy." So it's hard to understand how any new king could have been crowned. Perhaps Washington was aware of that, when he refused the crown.

Readers Comment Jared Myers commented on 2012-06-07 00:57:32 ~ @Chris: Yes, it was -- and in spite of all that, some folks (especially in the Continental Army) wanted to turn GW into King George I. Ironic enough, seeing as we had just gotten away from King George III. If anyone HAD to be King in America, I would have wanted it to be Washington as he was the one man who very well may have given the power back to the Continental Congress after he had stabilized the continent. That said, I'll take republicanism over monarchism any day. I'm surprised this AH doesn't mention Jefferson as being a leading republican.....

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2012-06-07 15:44:48 ~ On the point of guiding America into maturity, Washington could take the position knowing fully that he didn't have an heir. That way, upon his death (or, hopefully, resignation), elections could be held and (more hoping) a smooth transition of power. We've seen some of that with Juan Carlos of Spain since the '70s.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-06-07 17:15:11 ~ There'd have been a lot of opposition to crowning Washington, not least from Washington himself.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-06-07 23:40:27 ~ Eric Oppen is right. However, much of the oppositon to King George's rule (and Parliament's) ws that th rulers were so far removed from America and Americans. An American-born king might have found support. It wouldn't have been Washington, though; I doubt he'd ever have accepted the crown.

Readers Comment Jackie Rose commented on 2012-06-08 23:44:07 ~ Eric, you are completely right. He was offered the crown and did not accept it.

comments powered by Disqus

In 1942 / 1944, on two occasions two years apart during the Second World War, the sixth of June proved to be a day of disaster. The first was in the Pacific Theater as the Imperial Japanese Navy looked to take Midway Island and push American control 1,200 miles backward. Since the war in the Pacific had begun for the Americans with the Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, it had been mostly a calculated retreat.

June 6, 1942 and 1944 - A Cursed Day for the AlliesFDR ordered General Douglas MacArthur to relocate from the Philippines to Australia in February, 1942, prompting the famous "I shall return" speech. The Japanese swept through the Dutch East Indies until finally being stopped at the Battle of Coral Sea. While the Allies took heavier losses, they hindered the Japanese enough to stop their invasion of southern New Guinea.

In the next weeks, Yamamoto collected a massive fleet to make an attack on Midway Island, America's most forward holding in the northern Pacific. The attack had been expected by command since the 1930s, but there seemed no way to beat Japanese numbers with victory at Coral Sea being granted by superb American flight crews since ships did not even sea one another. Code-breakers attempted to trick the code for Midway out of the Japanese naval code JN-25 by falsely broadcasting in May that the Midway water distillation plant had broken and requesting supplies. While Japanese radio-operators were preparing to pass along word that "AF" (Midway) was short of water, command stopped them, having been suspicious over the American carriers seeming to appear exactly in the right place and time at Coral Sea. Yamamoto, who had spread his fleet widely to avoid detection, decided Americans were already suspicious and reordered his ships into a tighter pack that struck Midway and the few American reinforcements there. Most of the American Pacific fleet was in Hawaii, with the U.S.S. Lexington carrier under extensive repair.

After the fall of Midway, the Japanese and Americans fought endlessly between Midway and Hawaii, with the Americans finally pushing the Japanese back in November of 1942. They had allowed the Japanese to dig in at places such as the Eastern Solomons and Guadalcanal, but the full industrial might of America finally outpaced early Japanese advantages. With the loss of nearly 1000 pilots over the month-long Battle of Hawaii, the Japanese were unable to replace their crews, and the navy became impotent, relying on the army to hold the islands conquered early in the war. The Second Battle of Midway in 1944 restored it to American hands at the cost of thousands of Marines' lives. By December 1945, the Americans had overtaken outlying Japanese bases at Okinawa and Iwo Jima, making routine firebombing of the mainland possible.

June 6 was also the day of the disastrous attempt at an amphibious landing on the north coast of France. Weather had delayed the attack from June 5, but the Allies made an eager assault at Normandy on the morning of June 6, 1944, without full air support. While many of the German High Command were absent (Hitler was reported to have slept late that day) or more fearful of attack at Calais, communications broken up by Allied paratroopers ironically inspired reserve commanders to act on their own initiative. The Allies held the beach for a time, but Panzers under Rommel drove the troops back into the sea by afternoon (thanks to winning out before Hitler in an argument with Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt about mobile defense).

Eisenhower and the Allies retreated to prepare for another amphibious invasion, but the "worst channel storm in 40 years" delayed them through June. Instead, the Allies determined to feint at Calais and made an assault Marseille in the South, for which Churchill had long campaigned. Italy had been occupied by the Germans after capitulating, slowing advance up the Italian peninsula into a stalemate. Operation Dragoon created a fresh front through southern France, causing the Germans to move their attention southward. Shortly afterward, the Allies struck at Brittany, finally establishing a lasting beachhead at Brest. Meanwhile, on the Eastern Front, Stalin began ferocious counterattacks, pushing westward and catching whole German armies in pincer movements. By May of 1945, Russians had marched into Bavaria, taking as much ground as possible as the Western forces attempted to catch up for the Battle of Berlin a month later.

The war in Europe ended on May 28 with the Soviets controlling almost the whole of Germany. Issues immediately began to arise with occupation zones as French demanded an area of Germany. At Potsdam that July, the quickly fracturing Allies determined that the Soviets could control Germany as long as it followed the Potsdam Agreement and Russia would declare war on Japan to end the Pacific theater. President Truman's use of the atomic bomb and the Soviet invasion of Manchuria led to VJ Day on January 14/15. Again, the Soviets made great leaps in occupation, taking Korea and the northern islands of Japan while the beleaguered American forces worked to disarm southern islands still held by imperial forces.

With so much Soviet influence in the East, refused to give up Manchuria to the Chinese as a result of the ongoing Chinese Civil War, explaining they needed secure railways to support the occupational forces in Korea. Both Nationalist and Communist Chinese balked at the invasion and called another truce as they had during Japanese invasion, although each was willing to injure the other whenever possible. The occupation of Manchuria began the Sino-Soviet War, which dragged on as Western powers watched. With the development of Russian atomic weapons in 1949, the West finally acted with a NATO ultimatum banning the use of atomic weapons.

NATO-Soviet relations continued to crumble until the death of Stalin in 1956 ignited revolutions beginning in Hungary and spreading throughout Europe. Already stretched thin with fighting in China and occupation in Central Asia, the stress was enough to break the Soviet Bloc and bring the experiment of Russian Communism crashing down. War in China continued until NATO influence finally brought Kai-shek's Nationalists into power, spreading capitalism into other former Soviet nations such as Korea and Xinjiang.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Jeff Provine

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: D-Day, D Day, France, Britain, World War 2.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality the US had broken the Japanese naval code and was able to appear at Midway with reinforcements, including the Yorktown, which had been repaired round-the-clock in Hawaii over 72 hours at Nimitz's urging. German High Command, however, was not as able and delayed counterattacks on D-Day until much too late to reverse Allied advances into Normandy.

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2012-06-06 17:16:00 ~ Thank goodness this nightmare scenario remained only that...

Readers Comment Jared Myers commented on 2012-06-06 17:44:58 ~ In the long-term, this might have been somewhat preferable with Soviet Communism being just a memory by 1960. We may only have had to worry about the Chinese (if that). This could potentially have meant a different ending for the Vietnam War (assuming that even happened under this scenario), since Ho Chi Minh and General Giap relied heavily on Soviet munitions that in this scenario don't exist.

Readers Comment Matthew Dattilo commented on 2012-06-06 19:32:02 ~ bagpipelover, great point! And, Jeff, great AH writeup!

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-06-06 22:55:37 ~ This is a good scenario, and could have happened.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-06-07 00:20:27 ~ How come Stalin lives till 1956 in ths timeline insead of dying in'53 in our history? That alters things still further. What if this scenario hjad started just as depicted but Stalin had died in 1953?

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-06-07 00:22:24 ~ How come Stalin lives till 1956 in ths timeline insead of dying in'53 as in our history? That alters things still further. What if this scenario had started just as depicted but Stalin had died in 1953?

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-06-07 10:59:20 ~ Midway part works better than Normandy. Even if the reserves are released it is doubtful they can drive the Allies into the sea.

Readers Comment Mahanfan commented on 2012-06-07 10:59:20 ~ Anyone can try to spin Midway any way they like it. In the end, Japan loses. Badly.

comments powered by Disqus

In 1963, on this day US President John F. Kennedy was assassinated on a visit to the United States Navy's First Fleet off San Diego, California.

Vision of Victory By Ed and Scott PalterA subsequent FBI report determined the facts

1) The fatal bullets were fired into the motorcade from the top floor of the Marine Recruit Depot
2) Sharpshooter Lee Harvey Oswald had used his security pass as a former US Marine Corp serviceman to gain entry to the Depot
3) His motive was a grudge dating back to 1962 when the Kennedy Administration had turned down a reconsideration of an dishonourable discharge from the service

Kennedy had been accompanied in the vehicle by the Governor of California Richard Nixon. Within three months, he would announce his intention to campaign for the Presidency as a Democrat Candidate. Along with his running mate Robert Kennedy they would complete JFK's vision of victory in Vietnam.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: JFK Library Labels: John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon, Assassination, Premature Death, Presidency.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in this post we explore an original idea received with many thanks from Scott Palter.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2011-11-06 14:15:31 ~ Not to mention that elephants would mate with donkeys sooner than Richard Nixon would run for president as a Democrat with Bobby Kennedy as his running mate.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2011-11-06 19:06:16 ~ I take it that in this TL Nixon was a Democrat? I've always thought that JFK would have fit the Repub stereotype better than Nixon did, and Nixon would have fit the Demo idea of what they're really all about.

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2011-11-06 21:04:34 ~ If JFK is visiting the fleet OFFSHORE how is he killed in a motorcade? Idea is to substitute Nixon for Connolly and just reverse the party switch. Essentially Nixon decides the Goldwater people are loco and that the GOP is no longer home. He leads a mass defection of the traditional GOP into the Dem party.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2011-11-07 00:23:20 ~ LBJ would fight to the bitter end.

comments powered by Disqus

In 1972, "peace candidate" George McGovern shocks the Democratic Party's leadership by winning the California primary, narrowly defeating Hubert H. Humphrey. Until then, party elders fearful of McGovern's "extreme" liberalism had hoped he could be decisively beaten before the national convention. It now appears that will not happen.McGoverns Shocks by Eric Lipps
The party establishment is particularly afraid of McGovern because, with all of North Vietnams major cities now under U.S. and ARVN military control, Republicans are claiming that victory is within reach. "There remains only the task of cleaning out the countryside," asserts a confident Vice-President Spiro Agnew during a speech in France commemorating the 1944 D-Day landings there. "All that remains of the enemy is a small cadre of dead-enders, and once they?re beaten, the people of North Vietnam will gratefully accept the gift of freedom we have given them, just as did the people of France in '44". Showing his instinct for the jugular, Agnew continues, "And when that happens, they will remember who fought for them, and who in this country preferred to leave them under Communist tyranny".
Unfortunately for Agnew, the media will quickly point out that his reference to "this country" appears to be a blooper, given that he is addressing a French audience and not an American one. The Nixon White House will issue a "clarification" the next day.

	In 1984, at ceremonies marking the 40th anniversary of the Allied landings in Normandy during World War II, President Ronald Reagan called on the Soviet government to end hostilities with the United States.

Ronald Reagan


But with the Kremlin in political chaos following Yuri Andropov's death, the Soviet Union was in no shape to even maintain tranquility within its own borders, let alone open cease-fire negotiations with the West.

In 1989, the Revolutionary Committee of Tiananmen Square declares itself the True People's Republic of China, and appeals for recognition from the various foreign emissaries who had come to Beijing for a conference with the old government. The foreign powers are reluctant to recognize them, giving the old-guard Communists a chance to regroup.

In 1976, former Governor Ronald Reagan secures the Republican presidential nomination from President Gerald Ford, and goes on to win in the general election against another former governor, Jimmy Carter of Georgia. His presidency is only one term long, due in large part to a hostage crisis in Iran at the end of his presidency.

In 1968, Pete Best, international sensation from Liverpool, announces that he will no longer be touring after his current tour is over. He claims that since the fans scream so much during the concerts, no one hears anything, anyway. Millions of disappointed fans sell out his remaining venues, prompting critics to cry that it was all just a publicity scheme.

In 1944, the desperate push by the Allies to invade Europe and end Hitler's control of the continent is begun at Calais, France, under the command of General George Patton. Despite Patton's brilliant leadership, the Allies are defeated, and Nazi control of the continent is solidified.

In 1910, Thomas Edison is introduced to Carla Lambert, beginning a lifelong relationship with her that many felt was unseemly, given Edison's married status and the vast difference in their ages.

In 1720, the alien race known as the Mlosh land on earth. They announce to the human populations they interact with that they only wish to join earth and its cultures, and be treated as equals among us. After some initial panic, they are welcomed, (begrudgingly in some quarters), into the company of man.

In 1999, Queen Gwen communicates the locations of several influential Illuminati cells to Sir Lance du Lac and tells him, 'Crush them completely, my brave knight.' In a series of dazzling attacks, du Lac's Round Table Corps smashes cell after cell. Very few manage to escape, and they assemble to call Queen Gwen on a secure channel to get her to call off du Lac before he finds them, too. 'I'm sorry,' she says to the Illuminati leader who calls her, 'but you obviously have me mistaken with someone who takes your orders. I am Gwen the First, Queen of all the Britons, and I shall be your doom.' The pitiful few Illuminati realize that they made a horrendous mistake by giving their most ambitious agent control of their greatest enemy.

In 1891, Topeka is set upon by a rebel force led by 'Sockless' Jerry Simpson, and General Theodore Monteith finds himself outnumbered almost 2 to 1. The civilian population of Topeka is also unsympathetic towards him, and aids the rebels tremendously. By nightfall, Monteith has been forced to abandon all but the eastern third of the city, and has endured heavy casualties to keep that much.A scout brings him word that Colonel Wainwright won't be riding to the rescue this time - the rebels in Kansas City, in coordination with the attack on Topeka, began an uprising designed to keep his forces pinned there. General Monteith sent a messenger under a white flag to Simpson, hoping that negotiating would buy him some time to regroup.

On this day in 1944, the German army high command received reports of Allied troop landings on Frances Normandy coast. Adolf Hitler dismissed these landings as a diversionary tactic, insisting that the real Allied invasion attempt would be made at Pas de Calais.

The Normandy assault WAS a diversion, but not in the way Hitler imagined - while his generals were trying to figure out where the Allies main blow would fall on Normandy or Pas de Calais, the real Allied invasion, aimed at France`s Mediterranean coast, would come ashore nearly unopposed. By the time the Germans figured out what was happening, the Allies had already gained a foothold on French soil and were squeezing the Wehrmacht divisions in France in the largest pincer maneuver in military history. Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, then in command of German defenses along France's northern coast, had been home on leave when the invasion hit and was caught off guard; he was later reported to say to his wife: `Wie dumm von mir! (How stupid of me!)`

In 1949, Comrade Eric Blair's horrific vision of a dystopic future society, The Last Man In Europe, is published in the Soviet States of America, where he had settled after fighting in the Canadian Civil War on the Socialist side. Although it was hailed as a masterpiece by American literary critics, the reactionaries of the European monarchies made arguments that the novel's dictatorship could as easily be based on certain aspects of life in Soviet America. Since Comrade Blair himself dismissed these speculations as 'wishful thinking,' it is still read widely in the SSA, and serves a vital social purpose: when a society begins to enact measures that might make it resemble the fictional Oceania, it quickly comes under attack as Last Man-like, and most such measures have failed because of the novel's impact.

In 1944, Operation Overlord, the long-awaited Allied invasion of mainland Europe, began at Normandy, France. Unfortunately, one of the ruses that the Allies had used to trick Germany, the rumor that General George Patton would be landing east of their position, had been seen through by German commanders who were able, with great difficulty, to convince Hitler to commit more forces to the Normandy beaches. The casualties of this battle were horrendous on the Allied side, although they still managed to take the coast by the end of the day. Over 26,000 men gave their lives in the invasion, and their sacrifice is honored today as having been integral to ending the war in 1947.

In 1991, on this day Western news agencies reported a coup d'etat in Bosnia led by an as yet unnamed military atheist seeking to preserve the country from religious/ethnic civil war. It is widely known that Bosnia was overeepresented amongst special forces of former JNA.

In 666, a young woman, a member of the oldest profession, gave birth to a son in Babylon. A Christian midwife saw a strange birthmark on the child's forehead, and remembering her lessons, associated the child with The Beast of Revelation. She attempted to dash the baby boy against the floor, but the young mother wrestled the child from her grasp and fled into the wilderness. The midwife told this story to all of her Christian fellows, and soon there was a hunt for the baby that they considered a harbinger of the end of the world. The young mother made her way slowly to Rome, feeling that there might be more safety in the old, great city than among the provincial Christians of her homeland. The child she carries is surprisingly little trouble to her, and she delights in his company along the way.

In 2001, former President John F. Kennedy passes away quietly, in his sleep. The 2-term president was 84 years old.

June 5

In 1876, on this day General William Tecumseh Sherman accepted the presidential nomination of the Union Party.

Sherman accepts the nominationSherman was a reluctant candidate, but had finally been persuaded to run by his friend and fellow commander in the War of the States, General George H. Thomas, who warned that the U.S. had become dangerously politically unstable in the decade following Southern secession and needed "a strong hand in these times of trial". Sherman was one of the few prominent Union commanders to escape disgrace in defeat, despite having been involved in the debacle of April 6-7, 1862 at Shiloh, Tennessee. Badly wounded in the Confederate assault on the 6th, he was unable to function effectively the next day, when what might have been an orderly Union retreat turned into a full-scale rout. Historians would later identify Shiloh as a crucial turning-point in the war, but it would be Sherman's junior, Hiram Ulysses Grant - more commonly known as Ulysses S. Grant - who would take the bulk of the blame for the disaster.

Grant's reputation would never recover, and after the war he would prove unsuccessful in private life, slowly sinking into alcoholism. By contrast, Sherman would find powerful patrons among wealthy businessmen who, surviving the postwar financial panic and the disgrace of the Republican Party, would organize the Union Party in 1873. But until the 1876 presidential race, Sherman had resisted entering politics; not only did he find the field appalling for its corruption, but in addition he feared the commingling of military and civilian authority a presidential general might produce in a humiliated United States desperate for a strong authority figure. "Rome begged Caesar to become its emperor, and he obliged her, and that was the end of the republic," he observed. "I have no wish to play a similar role in these United States".

And yet in the end he did, swayed by Thomas's warning that if he did not there was no one else who could prevent the civil unrest plaguing the beaten nation from exploding into full-scale insurrection. "Better to take what measures need be taken now," Thomas had written in a letter to Sherman, "than wait, and hope someone else does what I am confident you will do as president while there is still time". Addressing Sherman's fears of "the end of the republic," Thomas wrote, "These United States have already been disunited in part, by the late war; if things proceed as they are going, our Union may be shattered altogether".

On Nov. 7, 1876, Sherman would become the first candidate from the Union Party to be elected U.S. president, easily defeating Democrat Samuel J. Tilden, who carried only his home state. Tilden would be the last Democratic nominee; already near ruin due to charge of treason hung on it because of the large number of Southern Democrats and Northern so-called "Copperheads" who had supported the Confederate cause and what many saw as its excessive willingness to accept the verdict of the war and deal with the newly-independent CSA on friendly terms, the Democratic Party would splinter after the Tilden debacle; in the 1880s, most of its former membership would join the new People's Party, a rural-based party favoring high tariffs, nationalization of the railroads and bimetallism, the use of silver as well as gold as currency. The Populists would remain largely opposed to the burgeoning urbanization and industrialization of the United States well into the twentieth century, and would win no presidential elections until the upset victory of Massachusetts governor Eugene R. Foss in 1912. Perhaps not coincidentally, Foss would win as the leader of the party's emerging pro-urban wing, which argued for making common cause between agricultural and industrial interests.

In office, Sherman would struggle with the legacy of Southern secession. Only five years before his run, California had tried to break away in its ill-fated second Bear Flag Rebellion (the first, in 1846, had been against Mexico), and separatist sentiment continued to run high in that state and elsewhere, particularly as the economy struggled to right itself. Some of the measures the Sherman administration would take would be viewed as extreme, and anger against, for example, the use of the military to "maintain order" in particularly rebellious areas and the employment of private detective agencies as de facto secret police ferreting out dissent would play a role in Sherman"s defeat for renomination in 1880. During his term,. however, the foundations were laid for the later recovery which by the 1890s would produce the prosperous period known as the Gilded Age.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Eric Lipps

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Generals Source: Wikipedia Labels: Sherman, United States, Presidency, America, Civil War.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in our history, on this date Sherman delivered his famous rejection of presidential candidacy: "If nominated, I will not run. If elected, I will not serve," rejecting the Republican nomination.

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2012-06-07 14:59:12 ~ I'd like to hear more about this second Bear Flag rebellion...

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-06-07 23:36:21 ~ It figures in my (God willing, someday to be completed) novel The Gettysburg Conspiracy, as an 1871 rebellion in California aimd at making that state an independent natioon, taking advantage of U.S. disarray after Southern secession. I don't have details yet, though.

Yahoo! Discussion Group Comments Please click hyperlink for Yahoo! Groups Discussion comments.

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-06-08 09:11:11 ~ In a defeated north Billy Sherman would just be the younger brother of a Senator who had gone crazy and been relieved of command in 1861. He had also worshiped as a Catholic which was political death. Sherman's shot at the White House comes from the victorious war.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-06-08 11:49:51 ~ I'm assuming that in defeat the North would have canonized its generals as the South did in our history. The Catholicis issue might have been more serious, but could perhaps be overcome; with the dead weight of Southern Protestantism removed from U.S. politics, Irish and other immigrant Americans would have had a larger proportion of the vote.

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-06-08 12:01:37 ~ @Eric -I can see a reverse of the Lost Cause but Sherman as you present him was a nobody at First Bull Run, had a breakdown and got his head handed to him at Shiloh. More likely someone like Rosecrans or McClellan. The former for a couple of minor victories in West Virginia. The latter because the eastern armies loved him.

Readers Comment Jackie Rose commented on 2012-06-08 12:44:58 ~ But wouldn't Sherman then have been free to fight the Indian wars, under his famous motto, "The only good Indian is a dead Indian"? Of course it was one of his deliberately outrageous sayings, like "If I owned Hell and Texas, I would rent out Texas and live in Hell"...but it is the one that survived. Anyway, with him in the White House, might the Indians not have mounted a more successful resistance? Or might he, on the other hand, have sent another successful general to deal with them, such as General Grant?

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-06-08 12:59:21 ~ @Jackie - play the hand out. North loses. Republicans are discredited by the lost war. Sherman was the brother of a Republican Senator. His brother got him his star and he was a failure. Why would the regular army keep him after the war, much less give him a serious command fighting anyone. The new President after the war would be a Democrat and the Republican generals would not have been kept on.

Readers Comment Jackie Rose commented on 2012-06-08 13:13:55 ~ OH, dear! Scott, I am afraid I pushed that "submit" button too fast. I do proofread my entries, honest I do, but this was one that got away. I meant to say, "WOULD Sherman then have been free to fight the Indian wars"...since, as president, he would have other fish to fry. Sorry about that. Anyway, my point was that the Indians might have done much better if he had not been fighting them, perhaps even winning a negotiated truce.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2012-06-08 15:19:26 ~ A very different world. An expansionistic CSA might cripple itself with wars in banana republics and an antiquated agriculture economy. The next next US-CS war could be all the shorter.

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-06-08 15:49:02 ~ South was industrialized. Just less so than the north. South had a lot of small steam engines and factories. Their problem on industrial cities was that except for Richmond they lost them all in the first year. Baltimore, Louisville, St. Louis, New Orleans.

Readers Comment Matthew Dattilo commented on 2012-06-08 17:28:40 ~ I believe Sherman as President would soon have become Sherman as Overlord. He was not well-disposed towards politics in terms of his personality. The best comparison I can think of comes from the new "Battlestar Galactica" (forgive me) and Tigh Saul. When Adama was shot and on death's door, Saul was placed in command. He was a decent enough military officer, but his personal skills lacked a certain....well, he didn't have any personal skills. He was soon banning the press and running a dictatorship, not because of a thirst for power, but because he couldn't do anything else.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-06-08 17:30:41 ~ Sherman was a very good general who might have been a disastrously bad President.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-06-09 00:33:47 ~ Re Scott Palter: I envision Sherman winning a personal redemption by playing a key role in defeating California's 1871 Bear Flag Rebellion after havng been essentially banished to the West in the postwar years. A substantial military victory against a new attempt at secession would have made him a hero despite Shiloh.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-06-09 00:48:34 ~ Als, bear in mnd that in this scenario BOTH prewar parties are disgraced. In the full scenario I icture, theSouth wins months before the 1864 election, Lincoln is forced to resign and Hannibal Hamlin becomes a caretaker president until he is defeated by McClellan in November (well, technically, until the following March 4).

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-06-09 03:43:02 ~ 1. How did a Republican like Sherman acquire a major command in a Democratic administration in 1871? 2. How would the Democrats be disgraced by Lincoln losing the war?

Google Discussion Group Comments Please click hyperlink for Google Groups Discussion comments.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-06-09 13:51:38 ~ In order: I envision Sherman as having bee "exiled" to what was considered an unimportant command out West soon after the end of the war (as Grant was at its beginning) only to find himself Billy-on-the-spot, as it were, when the secessionist uprising broke out in California (which, remember, was not then the big-deal state it is today). As for the Democrats being disgraced, it's not Lincoln losing the war which is the probem for them, but the defeatism and even outright pro-Confederate sentiment of significant numbers of Democrats--including Gen. George McClellan, who constantly failed to take advantage of mlitary opportunities because he insisted on seeing his forces as outnumbered when they were not. As I see it, McClellan wins in 1864 only because the Republicans were even more disgraced than the Democrata--but four years of his administration, marked by an economic crash and continuing political instability, would do away with what was left of the Ds' credibility.

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-06-09 16:55:14 ~ If I understand your ATL the war ends in 1864. I presume this is a variant of the northern public rebelling against the endless casualty lists [came close to happening in 1864] and / or Northern financial credit is exhausted [North was getting REAL close to the ragged edge by the spring of 1865 - war was costing somewhere north of $1M/day]. How does this discredit the peace Democrats who said a war of reunion would bankrupt the nation, drown us in blood and wasn't worth the candle? Seems like vindication to me. Buchanan was a classic example. He was in theory opposed to secession but saw any possible counteractions as destructive of republican liberties and ultimately futile. Getting past that point army would be radically downsized with the peace. Why would Sherman [to the public eyes a failure and a partisan Republican general] be left in the California command in this shrunken army? Why would he chose to remain in the army at all as unlike Grant Sherman had been a success as a civilian?

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-06-09 20:44:15 ~ (1) The peace Democrats are discredited because they are blamed, fairly or not, for losing a third of the country. Somehow I doubt that would play as a plus, particularly as other parts of the U.S. begin making secessionst noises. And the war Democrats are collateral damage, forced to repudiate theior former party to escape guilt by association. The "bloody shirt" has even mre political force in this scenario. (2) Again, given the severe postwar economic dislocation and political instability I posit, there wouldn't have been such a radical demobilization and a high-ranking military officer might prefer to stay in the Army rather than take his chances as a civilian, even if he had been successful before the war. And the California command might well have been seen as a form of exile for such an officer--until evets allowed him to distinguish himself there. With the military platying a major role in holding what was left of the Union together after Southern secession, the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, passed with the aid of Southerners newly readmitted to the Union and still raging over the use of troops in Reconstruction, might have no counterpart.

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-06-09 21:28:47 ~ Your ATL, your choices. I disagree but...

Readers Comment Jean Lamb commented on 2012-06-16 21:35:23 ~ What isn't mentioned is the scandalous behavior of his Vice President, George Armstrong Custer, who was in the habit of shooting off his mouth about foreign affairs (and a few of his friends who profited mightily from the Bureau of Indian Affairs). No doubt this was caused by Custer's frustration with the reality of being Vice President and having to live a civilian life, which he never found congenial (however, his wife was delighted to live in civilization again, instead of in Army Post Hell). This worked in President Sherman's favor, however; no doubt the possibility of Custer becoming President might have been all that restrained unhappy Southerners from completing any assassination attemps.

comments powered by Disqus

On 1832, on this day in France the June Revolution Ousts July Monarchy (pictured). Political turmoil that had begun with the French Revolution over forty years before continued as France once again rebelled against a ruler, King Louis Philippe.

June Revolution Ousts July MonarchyAfter experimenting with Republicanism and suffering the Reign of Terror, France had finally become unified behind the Emperor Napoleon. Napoleon proved too ambitious, however, and the congress of Europe finally defeated him in 1816. France was restored to a monarchy under Louis XVIII, pushing for a return to absolute rule and even dispatching the expeditionary force known as the "Hundred Thousand Sons of Saint Louis" to put down liberal government in revolutionary Spain in 1823. The growing bourgeoisie struggled against the return of an unquestionable king, finally leading to the overthrow of Charles X with the July Revolution of 1830 after years of economic trouble in France. Louis-Philippe, Duke of Orléans and cousin to the king, was instated as a constitutional monarch determined by popular sovereignty.

Not everyone was pleased with the balance of power, however. Conservatives known as "Legitimists" wanted a return to the House of Bourbon, and they began their own schemes at overthrowing Louis-Philippe, whom they saw as illegitimate to the throne. An attempt at kidnapping the royal family out of Paris failed, as did a rebellion led by Princess Caroline of Naples and Sicily to install her son and would-be heir to Charles X, Henry V, as king in Marseilles. The insurrection was put down, and the Legitimists determined not to fight again, rather to argue their side through the press.

Meanwhile, the bourgeoisie had grown to great stature in France, much of which was at the cost of the petit bourgeoisie, "small businessmen" such as shop keepers, restaurateurs, and craftsmen. In Lyon, the second-largest city in France, there was an uprising of the canut (silk workers) in 1831. They called for a fixed price on silk goods to stop the drop in wages by those employed by large silk manufacturers and earnings among those who owned their own loom workshops. Manufacturers determined a fixed price would undermine free enterprise and reminded the local prefect of laws banning guilds and strikes. Outraged by the dismissal of their demands, the workers rose up in an enforced strike, barricaded the town, and defeated the national guard, many of whom were affiliated with the canut anyway and eagerly joined the cause. The king and his government, particularly Casimir Perier, President of the Council of Ministers, responded by dispatching a 20,000 man army to put down the insurrection. The soldiers arrived without bloodshed, and the uprising ended with only a few arrests, all of whom were acquitted.

Republicans in Paris saw the near-success of the workers and determined a sense of camaraderie with them, setting up linked secret societies. The workers had already been in touch with Catholic royalists, but the republicans had their own network known as The Rights of Man Society. Since it was illegal to have meetings larger than twenty people, the society was organized into a militaristic system of 20-man groups headed by a president, who met with the next level of twenty, who had their own leaders up a chain of command. A cholera epidemic with rumors of poisoning by the wealthy spread unrest, and leaders determined to begin an uprising at the funeral of respected General Jean Maximilien Lamarque, who was a benefactor to the poor (hated Casimir Perier had died a month before, also victim to the plague). A new republic was declared, and rebels quickly seized the city, setting up barricades and arming themselves. Five thousand national guard backed by twenty-five thousand soldiers marched into Paris to end them.

However, the republicans had learned about the key to the canut's temporary success: winning over the guard. Using their societies, the leftists had gotten into contact with likeminded thinkers among the army who supported Lamarque's philosophy. As the soldiers entered the city, many of them disbanded and joined the barricades, turning the battle into a stalemate. The show of weakness from Louis-Philippe inspired cities all over France to join the rebellion, particularly Lyon, whose model for societies based on skilled laborers acted as conduit for revolution. Without enough soldiers to put out all the fires, Louis-Philippe abdicated, and many of the bourgeoisie found their industrial empires broken up.

The next few years in France proved happy as crops at last gave good harvests and the economy rebounded. Fixed prices and firm laws on how far businesses could expand forced the benefit to be shared by the widest number of hands. France seemed to become a model for republican revolutionaries, who began a wave of uprisings demanding economic as well as civil constitutions. Eventually, however, economies turned downward again in the late 1840s. Fixed prices meant that many luxury items simply were not purchased rather than being purchased at a lower rate, and shop owners and manufacturers found themselves with warehouses of useless goods. Black markets and bartering surged across Europe, calling into question the worth of economic intervention. While laws in royal countries were overturned quickly, France's republican government debated endlessly. Finally, in 1848, Henry V was made regent of France by Legitimists working alongside Orleanists, who eagerly awaited the coming-of-age of Louis-Philippe's ten-year-old grandson, Philippe I, who would rule until 1894 as an outspoken democrat, often chaffing his longtime prime minister, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Jeff Provine

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: June Revolution, July Monarchy, France, Louis Philippe, Napoleon.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality the French National Guard and Army surrounded the June Rebellion, crushing it at the Battle of Cloitre Saint-Mercy. The rebellion was witnessed firsthand by a hapless Victor Hugo, who would use it as a basis for his famed novel Les Miserables, idealizing the revolution.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-06-06 22:20:07 ~ No Les Miz?

comments powered by Disqus

In 1803, on this day the Jacobin sympathizer Thomas Jefferson (pictured) famously remarked that the wheel of the American Revolution must have turned full circle for British Redcoats to march into Philadelphia and New York City to protect the beleagured Northern Federalist Bloc.
This post is an article from the Midshipman George Washington thread.

Midshipman George Washington #3Because not long after the Constitutional Convention ended in farcical acrimony, New England, Ontario, Quebec, Maritimes seceded from the Union. Lofty Republican dreams turned into terrifying nightmare as the Executive Council under Hamilton, Morgan et al began to fear for the continued existence of their own mini state.

To their dismay, the bonds of Union had been fatally loosened during those heady days of Liberty which followed the end of the interregnum. Most significantly by the perfectly understandable sense of reluctance to maintain a Standing Army. The aversion to militaristic discipline during a team of peace was created during the War of Independence. Empowered with supreme authority by the Second Continental Congress, Commander-in-Chief Benedict Arnold had won the day at Yorktown but only after the loyalist Admiral George Washington crashed to defeat at Chesapeake Bay. He then used the un-disbanded Continental Army to rule the nation with a rod of iron for the next twenty years.

Perhaps the return of British power was driven by imperatives other than revenge for Yorktown. Certainly there was a strong desire in London to punish the Jeffersonians for aiding French privateers. But the simple truth was that America had imploded in the two years since the death of Benedict Arnold and Alexander Hamilton for one was starting to gain support as a possible successor. A Republican King, if you will.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Midshipman Washington Source: Wikipedia Labels: George Washington, Royal Navy, Admiral Vernon, America, Britain.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in this article we explore some original ideas from Steve Fisher and Scott Palter.

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2012-05-19 18:04:57 ~ "Republican King"...isn't that what it says on Rush Limbaugh's business card? :D

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-05-20 04:15:46 ~ The more extreme Federalists [Hamilton et al] would have been happy with Washington as king and a US House of Lords [with themselves as members]. They knew they could never sell it even to their own supporters. Hence the constitution we did get. It was barely adopted and can thus be taken as the outer boundary of the possible.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-05-21 12:09:20 ~ It would have been spelled "Bloc", not "Block" (though spelling was a chancy thing in eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century English). Fixed - thanks Surely a dictarorial Benedict Arnold would have provoked a ddomestic insurrection. After all, in the early 1790s western farmers rose in armed revolt against no more than a federal tax on whiskey.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2012-05-21 14:34:51 ~ Arnold could be busy running up and down the seaboard stomping out rebellious fires, or he could set up his capital and let things roll (those pro or opposed to slavery) as long as taxes come in okay to keep his army fueled. Looks like this TL has an America unable to purchase Louisiana, tho, which will be a major problem for cash-strapped France (provided Napoleon's a thing).

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-05-21 18:42:11 ~ This would make the French revolution a lot less likely; the US would not look like a success to be emulated, to put it mildly. And at this time, slavery was not a big deal---ISTR that most Northern states had it as, at least, legal.

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2012-05-21 21:30:13 ~ @Eric O - depends on your theory of the French Revolution - the war of revenge by France that began after Saratoga bankrupted the French monarchy. If this caused the revolution it happens anyway. Ditto if it was just the decay of the regime. The Jacobins looked to England as much as the US for examples of republican virtue. @Jeff- no instead Arnold unites with England and has the RN ferry American troops to New Orleans, Pensacola, St. Augustine and Havana. What we call the Undeclared War against France becomes the US entering the war in alliance with UK

comments powered by Disqus

In 1968, on this day Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles just hours after winning the California Democratic Primary Elections.Midnight at the Ambassador Hotel by Todayinah Ed., Eric Lipps & Chris Oakley

Assured of the Democratic nomination if not the Presidency itself, Senator Kennedy delivered a famous victory speech in the hotel ballroom at midnight.

Tragically, after entering the hotel's kitchen to greet supporters, Kennedy was shot in a crowded passageway by the 36-year-old American-Israeli Orthodox rabbi Meir Kahane.

As Kennedy lay wounded (pictured in this iconic photograph), 24-year-old Palestinian immigrant Sirhan Sirhan cradled the Senator's head. Kennedy asked Sirhan, "Is everybody safe, OK?" and Sirhan responded, "Yes, yes, everything is going to be OK".

Rushed to The Good Samaritan Hospital, the Senator died early the next morning without regaining consciousness.

According to Kahane's Mother, he killed Kennedy because of his Jewish nationalism. She said, "What he did, he did for his country"..

Kennedy's father Joe was a notorious anti-semite¹. Despite living in New York until the age of ten, Robert was deeply uncomfortable in Jewish company. On a walking tour of a Jewish neighbourhood in Brooklyn on Rosh Hashanah in September 1964, Kennedy "was so nervous he looked like he was going to have a heart attack" recalled Albert Blumenthal. Later at an Orthodox Jewish Delicatessen, he wondered aloud why he couldn't get a glass of milk. And advised to wear a hat on a visit to a rabbi, he refused, mumbling to a reporter that he didn't "want to look like f**king Calvin Coolidge" after the famous photograph of the President looking uncomfortable in an Indian war bonnet.

His opponent in the senate race Kenneth Keating accused Kennedy of signing off on too-generous settlements of some claims against the General Aniline and Film Corporation whilst serving as Attorney General. Describing Aniline as a cartel that made Hitler's chemicals in World War II, Keating hinted that Kennedy was fronting for the Nazis².

Increasingly a fierce supporter of the under-dog, it was the revelation of the crewmen on the USS Liberty, that swung Kennedy behind the Palestinian cause in late 1967³. Responding to the accidental death of 34 US Sailors and the wounding of 170 more when Israeli jets mistook the Belmont-class technical research vessel for the Egyptian cargo ship El Quseir, US Secretary of State Dean Rusk said he "was never satisfied with the Israeli explanation. . . . Through diplomatic channels we refused to accept their explanations. I didn't believe them then, and I don't believe them to this day. The attack was outrageous". In fact, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson had secretly agreed on day four of the Six Day War that Liberty would be sunk with complete loss of life. The attack would be blamed on Egypt, allowing the U.S. in turn to attack Egypt, thus helping out Israel.⁴

Kennedy's outspoken criticism of Israel would ultimately cost him his life at the hands of Meir Kahane.

Kahane⁵ was an editor of an American-Jewish weekly, Brooklyn's The Jewish Press and yet his faith in the cause dated back to his teenage years⁶. Kahane had joined the Betar (Brit Trumpeldor) youth wing of Revisionist Zionism, after becoming an ardent admirer of Ze'ev Jabotinsky, a frequent guest in his parents' home. He was active in protests against Ernest Bevin, the British Foreign Secretary who blocked emigration of Nazi death camp survivors to the Jewish Homeland and opposed Israel's independence in favour of creating a Hashemite Arab monarchy dependent on British power. Kahane also organized and launched noisy public demonstrations in the USA against the Soviet Union's policy of persecuting Zionist activists and curbing Jewish emigration to Israel. He was active in the Free Soviet (Russian) Jewry movement and advocated policies designed to increase emigration of Russian refuseniks to Israel.

Kahane died at California State Prison, Corcoran in 1990.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor Watch the Video

© Robert Kennedy, His Life by Evan Thomas (2000) and Peter Hounam, Operation Cyanide: How the Bombing of the USS Liberty Nearly Caused World War III (2003).
Story Tags Click on the hyperlinked metadata to surf the site!

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Beasts Source: Wikipedia Labels: Robert Kennedy, Assassination, Los Angeles, America, 1968 Presidential Race.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, In this scenario - a team effort from Today in Alternate History - we examine Robert Kennedy`s support for Israeli, and in a reversal, imagine he is instead assassinated for his pro-Palestinian views.
¹Source - Robert Kennedy, His Life by Evan Thomas (2000), page 298.
²Source - Robert Kennedy, His Life by Evan Thomas (2000), page 300.
³Guest Historian Mr Eric Lipps originated this point of divergence.
⁴Conspiracy Theory on Wikipedia referencing Peter Hounam, Operation Cyanide: How the Bombing of the USS Liberty Nearly Caused World War III (2003).
⁵Source Wikipedia
⁶Guest Historian Mr Chris Oakley chose the identity of the assassin.

Readers Comment David Atwell commented on 2008-11-16 03:08:05 ~ Now this is an interesting twist on things. The aftermath could make a huge impact on US-Isreali relations & cause Isreal all sorts of troubles when the Yom Kippur War comes along...

Readers Comment Robbie Taylor commented on 2008-11-16 03:32:51 ~ Virulent anti-Semites quite often support Israel, paradoxically enough. Look at the number of rabid right-wing preachers who think all Jews are going to hell, but who need Israel to exist in order to fulfill their prophecies of Armageddon. Rabbi Kahane should've given Kennedy a chance...

Readers Comment Gerry Shannon commented on 2008-11-16 04:27:35 ~ Agree with David. Would have been a crazy turn of events, and definitely would have set off a whole new course for the Middle East. Would sympathy swing towards the Arab socities more? One would imagine a distinct rise in anti-Semite feeling in the States.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2008-11-16 05:04:29 ~ This is a really interesting twist. I have often wondered just what would have happened if the US people had been fully informed about the Liberty incident. My own guess is that LBJ kept it quiet because he wanted the Democrats to win the White House in '68, and didn't want to drive American Jews "into the arms of the Republicans" by openly condemning Israel.

comments powered by Disqus

Soviet Premier	On this day in 1968, hundreds of demonstrators braved searing heat and KGB threats of arrest (or even execution) to hold an anti-nuclear and anti-Brezhnev rally in Moscow's Red Square. The demonstration became a riot when Soviet security forces attacked the protestors, killing twenty and provoking the rest to lash out in an orgy of violent unrest the likes of which Moscow hadn't seen since the 1917 October Revolution.

Leonid Brezhnev

On this day in 1967, the provisional Egyptian government, led by National Assembly chairman Anwar Sadat, asked Israel for peace terms.

	Anwar Sadat

In 2001, FBI agents arrest several Saudi Arabians who had been planning to hijack several passenger jets and smash them into buildings in New York and Washington. President Gore commends them for their work; the Republican Congress condemns it as showboating, since terrorism is not a real problem facing America.

in 1994, Elvis Presley is shot by a deranged lunatic at his home in Graceland. The man claimed that Elvis should have died in 1977. Presley, in spite of immediate medical attention, dies from the wound that night. Fans throughout the world begin mourning; a cult of Elvis springs up around Graceland as many fans claim to see the resurrected Presley that very night.

In 1978, Afghanistan breaks away from Soviet influence. In the course of remodeling its society, the Afghani people become a model to the East of how post-Soviet democracy can work. The Soviet Union, in spite of initial hardliner insistence that Afghanistan be invaded to be brought back into the fold, lets them go, and over the course of the next decade, copies many of their reforms.

In 1968, Democratic Presidential candidate Robert Kennedy is narrowly missed by an assassin's bullet. Football player Rosie Grier saw the assassin, Sirhan Sirhan, and tackled him just in time to prevent another horrible tragedy in the Kennedy family. Kennedy went on to win the presidency against Republican Richard Nixon.

In 1894, Thomas Edison has a dream where his Eddies have a small movie screen on them that let the users preview what is being input. It takes 8 years of development, but this dream is realized with the Vidalia model of the Eddie.

In 4561, the Chinese army regroups after the horrific Sun Bomb attack and hits Hanoi hard, causing over 10,000 casualties in one day of fighting.

	On this day in 1983, Charles Barkley graduated from high school in Leeds, Alabama as the state's all-time scholastic football passing yardage leader.

Charles Barkley

In 1999, Queen Gwen quietly begins taking King Arthur's place at a couple of official meetings, giving the excuse that His Majesty isn't feeling well. When the ministers attempt to reschedule to a time when the king can attend, she tells them, 'I have my husband's full authority to act in his name, gentlemen. There is no need to postpone your business.' Although uncomfortable about this mild usurpation of authority, the ministers see no need to make a fuss about it, and Queen Gwen makes a few decisions in Arthur's name.

In 1891, with his occupation force reduced considerably, General Theodore Monteith is worried that the Kansans created havoc in Kansas City simply to weaken him. When he receives word that the rebels are attacking the Concordia fort in large numbers, he is forced to reduce the number of men he has in Topeka even further. He sends 5,000 men to Concordia, hoping that will be enough to ward off the rebels. He now has a little more than 30,000 men guarding Topeka, and is acutely aware that he is vastly outnumbered.

In 1931, the Greater Zionist Resistance captures Moscow. At this point, they control an area from Moscow in the east to the Danube in the west, and their secret Nazi backers begin wondering how they can be stopped.

In 1914, the Confederate state of Texas is invaded by Mexico. In a bloody 3-year war in which it is aided by the United States, Mexico wrests Texas from the Confederacy.

In 11-5-12-9-1, King Chihuehue, eventual ruler of the Incan/Mayan people, is born.

In 2004, Comrade Ronald Reagan finally succumbs to the Alzheimer's disease that has afflicted him for many years. Comrade Reagan had been a superb propagandist for the Soviet States of America during the Great Patriotic War, and had endeared himself to millions through his comic films of the 1950's and television series of the 1960's. He became somewhat outspoken about moral degeneracy in Hollywood and Washington in the 1980's, and many of his speeches during this era became the basis of the People's Republic movement in the Pacific Northwest that led to the civil war in 2000. It was a sad legacy for this patriotic actor's final years, since his affliction made him unable to comment one way or the other on the civil war while it was raging to the north of his home in California.

In 1968, with the California presidential primary won, Senator Robert Kennedy decided to give a brief speech to his campaign staff at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles before going back to Washington. But, a young staff member caught his eye, and he delayed the speech for several minutes while he got to know her better. While he was engaged in this meeting, hotel security found a Palestinian man acting suspiciously and approached him. The suspicious young man opened fired on them, killing one guard and wounding several people who had been waiting around for Kennedy to speak. The angry crowd subdued and disarmed him, then held him for the police. Senator Kennedy had to break off his meeting with the staffer and rush down to the lobby to help restore order and calm. The scene reminded so many people of the Senator's brother's assassination that a great groundswell of support hit his campaign, and after easily winning the Democratic nomination, he won the general presidential election in a landslide against Republican Richard Nixon.

June 4

In 1801, less than eighteen months after the death of General Washington, his successor Frederick Muhlenberg passed away at the age of fifty-one.

President Muhlenberg passes awayDespite the war-time inefficiencies of Congressional Government, Washington never once wavered from his Republican convictions. He voluntarily surrendered his post as C-in-C, only reluctantly agreeing to serve as President and of course he outright refused to be crowned King.

During his two terms of office circumstances forced him to adopt an authoritarian leadership style bordering on monarchism. Whilst he could be trusted, his Vice President John Adams patently could not (some even feared he would crown himself King and name his son John Quincy as successor). He ludicrously suggested to Senate that Washington be addressed "His Majesty" inviting nicknames such as the "Duke of Braintree" and "His Rotundity". More significantly, he was prevented from addressing the Senate. It was Speaker of the House Frederick Muhlenberg that suggested that the title of the President of the United States should be "Mr. President" instead of "His High Mightiness" or "His Elected Majesty", as John Adams had suggested [1].

In his Farewell Address, Washington shocked the nation by announcing not only his retirement, but the dissolution of his office in favour of a unified position of Speaker-President. Of course Muhlenberg was an interesting character, being a Pennsylvanian Lutheran pastor and a German speaker. But as matters transpired, he only served in office for two years and could not have taken steps on either language or religion as his detractors feared.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Frederick Muhlenberg, George Washington, John Adams, Frederick Muhlenberg, Presidency.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, thanks to Jeff Provine and Mike McIlvain for their contributions to the development of this article.
[1] an unconfirmed legend that he said this.

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2012-12-19 15:51:51 ~ I don't know beans about Muhlenberg.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2012-12-19 15:55:15 ~ Hamilton would be furious! Further down the road, Henry Clay would be able to consolidate his power since he wouldn't have to overcome the obstacles of national election. It'd be a much less federated America.

Readers Comment Mike McIlvain commented on 2012-12-19 16:00:16 ~ Muhlenberg, though in the speaker spot for a short time in reality, could have seriously altered things as we know them today. But, fate intervened, and he became just an interesting character. Muhlenberg also had a military background that could have had some long-term consequences, too.

Readers Comment Jackie Rose commented on 2012-12-19 16:40:24 ~ John Adams, a monarchist? First I've ever heard of that...and I saw "1776" several times.

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2012-12-20 16:04:36 ~ Washington would not have had the power to unilaterally dissolve the presidency in favor of anything. That would have taken a consitutional amendment or a new constitutional convention. Correcto I had forgotten to add my presumption that the Amendment is passed before his term of office expires, which also is a probability only so I left out that detail sir

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-12-22 00:39:42 ~ With the government composed so differently, our whole history would be unimaginably different.

Readers Comment Allen W. McDonnell commented on 2012-12-22 12:35:45 ~ The one thing most of the country agreed upon was the balance of power struck by the Constitution. The Presidency was specifically created to keep the House of Representatives from having too much power. I don't believe your amendment has much chance of passing the required 3/4ths of the states to become part of the Constitution.

comments powered by Disqus

In 1941, on this day Wilhelm Hohenzollern died in Windsor Castle at the ripe old age of eighty-two. In a glorious forty-year reign he had unified Germany and added it to the British crown as a still more United Kingdom.
This post is an article from the Good Old Willie thread.

Good Old Willie #6Of course this Germany was significantly smaller than the Prussian-dominated militaristic Imperium which his grandfather had dreamt of. This was because the Prussians were not the only race hoping to form a new state to give fuller expression to their national identity. Backed by the France, the January Uprising developed into a full scale Polish insurgency. The Poles defeated the Prussians in a miracle battle before they were overcome by the Tsarist Armies.

Prussia was saved, but the prestige of the dynasty was seriously damaged, The Hohenzollern were soon overthrown by the Junkers who opted to be a separate crown under the Russian Czar. A Prussian Diet with teeth was established, the military dismantled, and Otto Bismark made Chancellor of the new Russian Prussian state.

Although Wilhelm the Older was deposed as President of the now defunct North German Confederation, the Hohenzollerns were thrown a lifeline by Queen Victoria I. Alarmed by the prospect of a French-dominated Western Europe, she modified the line of succession so that the eldest child of either gender could ascend to the throne. And so six months after her own death, her daughter Queen Victoria II also perished, and Wilhelm became King of the United Kingdom and also Hanover. War with France over the Fashoda Crisis placed British troops in the Prussian Western territories up to the Ruhr. And following the death of Bismarck in 1898, many progressive German thinkers decided that they preferred Westminister to the Czar.

The final shape of the Fashoda War was a Catholic league in the south allied to Austria, a greater Russia up to (but excluding Berlin) and a greater Hanover whose representatives replace most of the Irish after Home Rule. The union of that greater Hanover and Great Britain (less Ireland) forced the United Kingdom eastwards and onto the continent of Europe. In a very real sense it was the realisation of centuries of Anglo-Saxon convergence.
This is the end of the Good Old Willie thread.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Good Old Willie Source: Wikipedia Labels: Queen Victoria II, Wilhelm II, Hohenzollern, Prince Albert, Saxe-Coburg Gotha.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in this article we repurpose significant amounts of content from Wikipedia and relied upon helpful suggestions from Jackie Rose, Scott Palter and Jeff Provine to guide this essentially unlikely timeline to a meaningful climax.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2012-07-09 15:27:45 ~ Looks like it was either that or gradually be absorbed into the British Empire. Better to have the hordes of the Czar at your back with you.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2012-07-09 17:01:30 ~ So how did Victoria's son (OTL's Edward VII, if memory serves) feel about being disinherited?

comments powered by Disqus

In 1989, the site at Tiananmen Square has been crucial to political change in China since its establishment as the foundation for the Tiananmen Gate by the Ming Dynasty. The gate was rebuilt with an added square after damage during the violent shift from Ming to Qing, and it served as the landmark near where European troops camped in the invasion of 1860 that forced the opening of China. When the Boxer Rebellion of 1900 besieged many of the compounds in Beijing, the square was again used to organize European troops who had fought putting down the uprising.

Soldiers Join Tiananmen Square Protest Just as it had been representative of changes in China for hundreds of years, the shift to Communism also showed its impact. Leader Mao Zedong demolished the gate in 1950 and pushed the expansion of the square in 1958, which in ten months of construction become the largest place of public gathering in the world, capable of holding up to 500,000 people. Around the square, the Ten Great Buildings were built, creating a center for museums, hotels, the hall for the National People's Congress, a rail station, and the Workers' Stadium. In 1976, shortly after the Mao's death, his body was embalmed to be placed in a mausoleum, which was built over where the Gate had stood decades before.

A new story by Jeff ProvineOnce again, the square would be crucial to the alteration of China as young people gathered there in 1989 and protested government control. Through the past twenty years of communism, liberalizing agents had suggested methods of loosening government and encouraging democracy and free enterprise. While there had been some successful policies, many had been suppressed forcefully. The greatest had been in 1987, when Hu Yaobang, General Secretary of the Communist Party of China for five years and member of the NPC since 1954, was ousted for encouraging too much liberalization. He died two years later, and a group gathered in Tiananmen Square in his memory. The commemoration became a demand for recognition for his ideals in freedom of speech and freedom of the press, and some 50,000 students marched to the square to attend the funeral while delivering a petition to the premier, Li Peng.

Li was not moved by the display, and the protestors decided to stay until the call for reform was understood. Their numbers swelled over 100,000, and the government worked toward dispelling the protestors with editorials and leaflets. Riots broke out in various places, but the protest at the square remained peaceful. Rather than fight back overtly, the protestors began hunger strikes and directed their voice against policies and never the Party. On May 20, with the crowd still unmoved, Li declared martial law. Rather than quelling the protest, the declaration seemed to solidify it, and much of the city joined in with the protest. It seemed as if the students were emulating the successes of revolutions past such as the Young Turks and China's own May Fourth Movement of 1919.

Finally, as the philosophy of the protestors went further from free media toward democracy, the CPC leaders agreed to clear the square. Soldiers from the 27th and 38th Armies were brought to Beijing. Word spread about the movement of troops, and Beijing became a city on edge. On June 3, the commander of the 27th (a relative of the Chinese President Yang Shangkun) fell ill, and the 38th was brought up into the lead. In the early hours of June 4, the troops moved into Beijing, which was bristling with barricades and rioters. When they reached the outskirts, however, an unknown figure nicknamed "Tank Man" for hopping on top of one of the tanks while in motion waved a banner and proclaimed, "The military has come to join us!"

The unfounded rumor spread quickly through the city, and local elements of the People's Liberation Army who supported the protest hurried to join in. Overwhelmed by support, the 38th was escorted to the square as if on parade. There, the troops disbanded and did in fact join the protest. The 27th followed behind shortly thereafter, and soldiers began to refuse orders for live fire to clear the streets.

With the army divided and protests increasing throughout China, the CPC broke into factionalism. Hard communists demanded display of force while others wanted to see the liberalization through. Inevitably, the chaos broke into violence, but the Tiananmen Revolution would see victory with its numbers, passion for the cause, and military allies. It would be many more months before the renewed Chinese government assembled for a nation of mixed socialism and widespread free enterprise. China would grow to become the fourth largest world economy over the next decades, and attempts to track billions of dollars worth of money that disappeared during the uprising would ultimately be given up as the price of change.

Entry posted by Guest Historian

Jeff Provine

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Jeff Provine Blog Source: Jeff Provine’s Blog Labels: China, Communism, Tiananmen , Beijing, 1989.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in reality the 27th Army entered Beijing first, and tear gas and live fire was used to clear rioters, who fought with Molotov cocktails and improvised weapons. The protestors in the square left voluntarily but were still pursued by violent soldiers. Though the protest would be put down, the demand for freedom continued, as seen by the famous stand of the Tank Man halting at column of tanks from leaving the square on June 5.

Readers Comment Robbie Taylor commented on 2011-06-07 05:02:32 ~ Only the fourth largest economy over the next few decades? Dictatorship pays, after all.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2011-06-07 06:01:19 ~ I wonder what Taiwan would do?

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2011-06-07 15:30:17 ~ Shades of the Egyptian spring...

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2011-06-07 20:38:52 ~ Isn't it eerie? The more things change...

comments powered by Disqus

In 1958, on this day in Memphis, Tennessee officers of the U.S. Army informed Gladys Love Presley that the 3rd Armored Division had listed her twenty-three year old son Elvis "missing in action" serving in combat against the Red Army in defence of the River Rhine.

Return to SenderAn unopened letter marked "Return to Sender" was also accompanied by photographs of a children's concert in which Elvis had delivered the song "Wooden Heart" in near perfect German.
Listen to "Wooden Heart"

Tragically only three months later his mother would die of hepatitis at the age of only forty-six but Elvis had survived and returned to the States at the conclusion of the Dropshot War. A great advocate of peace, he would help to rebuild a nation shattered by war. And find lifelong happiness with his wife Priscilla and daughter Lisa Marie.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Music Source: Wikipedia Labels: Premature Death, Elvis Presley, America, Dropshot, War.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2011-06-04 19:29:35 ~ Fighting in a real war, up at the front lines, would have shut up a lot of Elvis' critics. And the experience might have matured him considerably...I got the impression in his later years of one of the more decadent Roman emperors; he was basically in a position where nobody dared tell him "no." Maybe the Colonel could have gone too, and died a heroic death?

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2011-06-05 00:22:20 ~ I suspect Elvis woould have been sheltered from actual combat, as other celebrities were. Ronald Reagan, for instance, never left the continental USA during World War II: his service, making propaganda films, has been described as "in costume, not in uniform." Bob Hope did better, but traveling with the USO to entertain the troops isn't the same as being one of them. Elvis would likely have gotten similar treatment at the urging of his show-business handlers.

Readers Comment Stan Brin commented on 2011-06-05 01:30:30 ~ Actually, there were a lot of combat veterans among Hollywood-types. Clark Gable was a bomber crewman. Jimmy Stewart's military career is well known, and he became one of the most respected generals in the Air Force. There were many more.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2011-06-06 16:16:06 ~ Great alt history. I wonder if he'd have a serious film career out of it, too.

Readers Comment Chris Oakley commented on 2011-11-04 15:27:03 ~ So do I.

comments powered by Disqus

In 1781, informed that the Virginia legislature was temporarily in session General Cornwallis sent Colonel Banastre Tarleton and some infantry into Charlottesville to capture the rebel leadership, but they exceed their orders, burning wagons loaded with uniforms for Nathanael Greene's troops and in the smoke-filled confusion Governor Thomas Jefferson was shot and killed before he could flee to safety.

The Redcoats Are Coming!In death he would join the growing ranks of revolutionaries murdered by British redcoats. Most prominent amongst them was Samuel Adams and John Hancock who had also failed to receive a similiar warning when Paul Revere was thrown from his horse on his ill-fated "midnight ride".

That Jefferson too could be deprived of his inalienable right to "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" was a grim irony of the anarchist charter he had authored just five years before. A hypocritical slave-owner and misogynist who failed to live up to his own standards, he had also proven ineffectual at implementing them. During his two years as Governor, he had become hugely unpopular in office. And having failed to mobilize the militia, he had already announced his intention to step down and handover effective power to the Continental Army. Serious historians would judge him as a "philanthropic cock" that lacked the substance and depth of thought as a political scientist.

Instead of becoming the revolutionary thinker he had always imagined, his martrydom led to the elevation of his status as a fighting patriot icon. A colossal neoclassical sculpture standing astride New York Harbour.

Entry posted by Todayinah Editor

Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: George Washington, Baron Von Steuben, Marquis de Lafette, Sexuality, Homophobia.

Todayinah Editor Editor says, in our timeline Jefferson just made it out of Monticello with the oncoming British clearly in sight.

Readers Comment Kirk Edwards commented on 2011-03-19 15:15:16 ~ Good evaluation of possible divergence. Leaves much room for conjecture.

Readers Comment Jeff Provine commented on 2011-03-19 15:51:46 ~ Federalists take a huge gain in twenty years, provided Madison climbs the ladder enough without Jefferson's ongoing patronage.

Readers Comment Eric Oppen commented on 2011-03-19 18:35:00 ~ This would have made subsequent events extremely different...I wonder if Burr would have made it to the White House-equivalent?

Readers Comment Scott Palter commented on 2011-03-19 19:32:00 ~ Does Madison leave the Federalist camp without Jefferson's influence?

Readers Comment Eric Lipps commented on 2011-03-19 23:33:28 ~ Surely the British were "in sight," not "in site." Fixed. Thanks -Ed. With Jefferson gone, does the Anti-Federalist Party, later known as the Democratic Party, get off the ground? If not, what happens to U.S. politics? (A hint is offered by the reference to that "colossal neoclassical sculpture": it's the kind of thing monarchies and autocracies like to build.)

Readers Comment Robbie Taylor commented on 2011-03-20 03:10:23 ~ So, they still won. Ben Franklin had to carry the intellectual weight of the new republic on his own...

comments powered by Disqus

Older Posts

Related posts from the same era that you may also like

"Tower of the Flock"	"Two Chinas" triumphs and Taiwan remains in the UN.	"VP Jefferson" Impeached over Kentucky Resolutions
"Crazy Heads" in allied command order a premptive strike on Soviet oil supplies.	"Daniel Ellsberg" Released	"Francis Xavier" Vows an Eternal Portuguese Empire
"Jesus" saviour of Rome	"The Black-Eyed Airline Passenger" becomes the central suspect in the September 11 investigations.	Agent Obama tracked from "Nairobi To Shenzhen"
Accursed "Enoch"	A master manipulator ensures that "911" backfires on al-Qaeda.	Asian actor "Toshiro Mifune" is chosen by George Lucas for the role of Obi-Wan Kenobi in the movie Star Wars.

	Blog Roll
•	Althistory Multiply
•	Bull Spec
•	Everything Is History
•	History Blog
•	History is Funny
•	John Reilly's Alternate History
•	Old is the New New
	Editor's Recommendations
•	Alt Hist Magazine
•	Althistory Wiki
•	Bloggapedia
•	Changing the Times
•	Editor's Postbag
•	Etys Artwork
•	For and Against It
•	Headlines
•	Iconic Photos
•	John Reilly's Blog
•	King and Country
•	MLK Memorial
•	New Statesman (What If..)
•	On This Friday
•	Selected Threads
•	This Day in AH
•	Today in History
•	Truth be Told
•	Voice Christian Worker
•	Zach Timmons AH
	Reader's Favourites
•	Top 100 Ranked Stories
	Site Construction
•	Archive Navigator
•	Clean DB
•	Community Journal
•	Facebook
•	Get Blogs
•	Newsfeed Update
•	Survey
•	Twitter

	Andrew Beane
•	Andrews Posts
	Chris Oakley
•	Apollo 1	•	Arnold Hiller
•	Axis Spain	•	Baltimore Colts
•	Barbaro 2006	•	Barbarossa 41
•	Battle Alaska	•	Belgium 1940
•	Biti Letter	•	Blackpool 40
•	British X Files	•	Ceaucescu 90
•	Chance Encounter	•	Charles Barkley
•	Chicago19	•	Cimino
•	Cleopatra	•	CSI
•	Cuba '62	•	Curt Flood
•	D.B. Cooper	•	Double Jeopardy
•	Eternal City	•	Falklands
•	France 44	•	Francis Urquhart
•	Giant Surprise	•	God Save Queen
•	Grey Cup	•	GZ Murmansk
•	Hirohito@100	•	Houston 57
•	Ice Bowl	•	Ill Wind
•	Iraq NEO Impact	•	Jamaica Bay
•	Japan45	•	Jay Sebring
•	Johnny Damon	•	Kirk Prime
•	Korea 53	•	Koufax 35
•	Last Broadcast	•	Lusitania '15
•	McCain 09	•	Middle East 67
•	Moore 911	•	Necessary Evil
•	New York Knights	•	O Tempora, ..
•	Omega Man	•	Oswald63
•	Parley	•	Roswell '47
•	Salems Lot	•	Shirers WW2
•	Shock	•	SL Rangers
•	Surprise Attack	•	The Devourer
•	Titanic 13	•	Tom Brady
•	Tommies	•	Tommy Rich
•	Trek49	•	Valkyrie
•	Weebls	•	Worlds Collide
	David Atwell
•	Action Jackson	•	Hells Doors
•	Hell on Earth	•	House Cromwell
	David Cryan
•	Swine Flu
	Dirk Puehl
•	Dirks Blog
	Eric Lipps
•	49th State	•	Bonaparte 2
•	Cuba War	•	Da Vinci Engine
•	Ford Killed	•	Gore Wins
•	JFK Impeached	•	Liberty Fails
•	Lifeterm	•	Linebacker
•	No Chappaquiddick
•	Whig Revolution
	Eric Oppen
•	Malcolm X	•	No Tolkien
•	Trotsky's War
	Gerry Shannon
•	CSA Today	•	Godfather IV
•	Hero Oswald	•	JFK Lives
•	Seinfeld Movie
	Jackie Rose
•	Happy Endings
	Jeff Provine
•	Jeff Provine Blog
	John J. Reilly
•	John Reilly Blog
	Jackie Speel
•	Conjoined Crisis
	Kwame Dallas
•	African Holocaust
	Mike Stone
•	WJ Bryan
	Raymond Speer
•	Cuba War 62	•	Fall of Britain
•	Fascist Flight
•	Gettysburg Prayer
•	Pacific and Dixie
	Robbie Taylor
•	2nd Coming	•	Canadian Rev
•	Chdo Democracy	•	King Arthur II
•	Lucifer Falls	•	Pete Best Story
•	Protocols	•	Richard Tolman
•	Sockless	•	Soviet America
•	Speakers Line	•	The Sheridans
•	The Baron	•	The Claw
•	Warp	•	Welsh Wizards
	Scott Palter
•	WW2 Alt
	Todayinah Ed.
•	1860 Crisis	•	20c Rome
•	American Heroes	•	Anschluss
•	Bomber Harris	•	Business Plot
•	Canadian Heroes	•	China 4ever
•	Communist GB	•	Communist Israel
•	Comrade Hiller	•	Comrade Stalin
•	Co presidency	•	Deepwater
•	Fed Lost Cause	•	Flugzeugtrager
•	Glorious45	•	Good Old Willie
•	Gor Smugglers	•	Happy Hitler
•	Hitler Waxwork	•	Intrepid
•	Iron Mare	•	Islamic America
•	Israel's 60th	•	Jewish Hitler
•	Kaiser Victory	•	Liberty Beacon
•	Lloyd George	•	LOTR
•	Madagscar Plan	•	Manhattan '46
•	McBush	•	Midshipman GW
•	Moonbase	•	No Apollo 1 Fire
•	Obama	•	Peace City One
•	POTUS TedK	•	POTUS Nathaniel
•	Puritan World	•	Resource War
•	Sitka	•	Southern Cross
•	The Miracles	•	Tudor B*stards
•	Tyrants	•	US is Born Again
•	US Heroes	•	War on Terror +
•	WhiteHouse Wimp	•	Wolfes Legacy
•	Zoroastria
	Zach Timmons
•	Alt Indiana Jones
•	Brett as 007

•	All Postbag Items
•	Reader's Favourites
•	Siege of Siena Lifted
•	Fall of Aquileia
•	President Bentsen
•	President Ferraro
•	Baron Jean de Batz
•	Upper Carolina
•	Tokhtamysh Victorious
•	Comrade Stalin 3
•	Defenestration of Prague
•	Margaret of Anjou
•	Comrade Stalin 4
•	Nova Roma
•	Nixon killed
•	President Heston dies
•	Happy Endings 20
•	POTUS Howard Baker
•	King Arthur II
•	Haunting Ruin
•	Concert of Europe
•	King Henry IXth
•	Farthest West
•	Battle of Nafels
•	Happy Endings 26c
•	Cosmonaut Leonov
•	Space Age and Dog Years
•	Jack Cash lives
•	Birth of the Duke
•	Xavier's Vows
•	Jesus of Rome
•	Happy Endings 26b
•	Manassas Junction
•	World War Expands
•	Fed Lost Cause 4
•	Fed Lost Cause 3
•	Happy Endings 26
•	James Bond
•	Happy Endings 25
•	American Napoleon
•	Nieuw Zwolle
•	Steve Jobs, Google CEO
•	Battle of Lincoln
•	VP Herter
•	Plessy v. Ferguson
•	Malcolm X
•	Council of Pisa
•	Happy Endings 24
•	President Seward II
•	Breckinridge dies
•	President Seward
•	Fed Lost Cause 8
•	Mayor for Life
•	President Fonda
•	Fed Lost Cause 10
•	Madeleine Albright
•	Fed Lost Cause 7
•	Fast Heinz
•	Lewis and Clark
•	Fed Lost Cause 6
•	The Candyman
•	Fed Lost Cause 9
•	PM Beckett
•	Ellsberg Sentenced
•	PM Halifax
•	FBI Dir Burns
•	Fed Lost Cause 5
•	Sic semper tyrannis!
•	Lavoisier Survives
•	Monty in Berlin
•	Ethiopia Falls
•	3-term Truman
•	Fed Lost Cause 2
•	Orson Welles born
•	Happy Endings 23
•	The Oyster
•	Happy Endings Part 22

A Daily Updating Blog of Important Events In History That Never Occurred Today.
Imagine what would be, if history had occurred a bit differently. Who says it didn't, somewhere? These fictional news items explore that possibility.

Quick Links

Selected threads

Archive Navigator

Editor's Postbag | Feed

•	January	•	February	•	March
•	April	•	May	•	June
•	July	•	August	•	September
•	October	•	November	•	December

A Daily Updating Blog of Important Events In History That Never Occurred Today. Imagine what would be, if history had occurred a bit differently. Who says it didn't, somewhere? These fictional news items explore that possibility.

Quick Links

Selected threads

Archive Navigator

Editor's Postbag | Feed

A Daily Updating Blog of Important Events In History That Never Occurred Today.
Imagine what would be, if history had occurred a bit differently. Who says it didn't, somewhere? These fictional news items explore that possibility.