25 FEBRUARY
WOMEN SLAUGHTERED WHILE CLINGING TO THEIR HUSBANDS
[ 25 February 1858 ]
Today in 1858, Major Harcourt Anson, of the Queen’s Ninth Royal Lancers, wrote to his wife describing the chilling revenge the British inflicted on an Indian village, where the population was thought to have been sympathetic to the rebellion the previous year against British rule.
‘A number of women… (were) killed,’ the Major recalled, ‘while clinging to and trying to hide their delinquent husbands… and many, too, were burnt in a house that they could not be induced to leave. Their moans were most pitiable. However their fate was preferable to that of two unfortunates who were ravished to death. What beasts men are when their passions are in a blaze.’1
BRITISH FORCES IN IRAQ IMPLICATED IN US RENDITION AND TORTURE OF DETAINEES
[ 25 February 2008 ]
On 25 February 2008, former SAS soldier Ben Griffin revealed, during a conference hosted by the Stop the War Coalition, that he had been ordered to detain Iraqis who were then handed over to the Americans to be illegally rendered and subsequently subjected to torture.
FOOTNOTE
- Major Octavius H. S. G. Anson, With HM 9 Lancers During the Indian Mutiny: Letters from an officer of the “Delhi spearmen” on campaign in India, 1857-58,’ Leonaur, Driffield, Yorkshire, 2011. Also Major Harcourt Anson cited in John Newsinger, The Blood Never Dried: A People’s History of the British Empire, Bookmark, 2013, London, p. 89.
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