Decidedly Grim

Today’s Honorable Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

The 20th century Japanese soldier identity was forged in a thousand-year-old system in which social hierarchy was established and sustained through martial competition. For as far back as anyone could remember, the islands’ powerful feudal lords employed private armies to wage incessant battle with each other; by the medieval times these armies had evolved into the distinctively Japanese samurai warrior class, whose code of conduct was called “bushido” (the “Way of the Warrior”). To die in the service of one’s lord was the greatest honor a samurai warrior could achieve in its lifetime. Such codes of honor were certainly not invented by Japanese culture. The Roman poet Horace first defined the debt owed by the young men of each generation to their rulers – Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. But the samurai philosophy went a giant step beyond defining military service as fitting and proper. So harsh was its code that its most notable characteristic was the moral imperative that adherents commit suicide if they ever failed to meet honorably the obligations of military service – often with the highly ceremonial and extremely painful ritual of hara-kiri, in which the warrior met death by unflinchingly disemboweling himself in front of witnesses.

Time did not erode the strength of the bushido ethic. During World War II the infamous kamikaze suicide missions, in which Japanese pilots ceremoniously trained to fly their planes directly into American ships, dramatically impressed upon the West how ready the young men of Japan were to sacrifice their lives for the emperor. But it was more than a small elite group that held to the view of death over surrender. It is striking to note that while the Allied forces surrendered at the rate of 1 prisoner for every 3 dead, the Japanese surrendered at the rate of only 1 per 120 dead.

Culled from: The Rape Of Nanking

Of course, it was this “never surrender” attitude that was used by Truman as justification for dropping the atomic bombs on Japan – to force them to surrender. I think he had a point.

Facts

Today’s Clean Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

In January, 1919, New York City forensic chemist Alexander Gettler determined that a 13-year-old girl had poisoned a baby simply by using Lysol to clean its bottle.

Culled from: The Poisoner’s Handbook

Facts

Today’s Exhumed Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

Charlemagne (742-814), Charles le Magne, King of the French and Holy Roman Emperor, was in his beloved Aix-la-Chapelle (Aachen) when he first felt a severe pain in his chest. He could not be persuaded to take any of his doctors’ remedies and, believing that abstinence would ultimately cure him, refused all food. When he realized that he was not going to recover, Charlemagne called for the Archbishop of Cologne to administer the Holy Sacrament. Though weak, he made the sign of the cross, joined his hands together in prayer and said, “Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.” The dead emperor was buried, with much pomp, in the church of St. Mary at Aix, his seven-foot frame magnificently clad in royal robes.

In 997 the Emperor Otto III had Charlemagne’s tomb at Aix opened. “Charles the Great was seated upright like a living person in a chair, and was crowned with a golden diadem; his hands were covered with gloves through which the nails had grown; in his right hand he held a sceptre, his sword was by his side, and on his knees was a manuscript of the Gospels. We paid our homage in the act of kneeling. All the limbs were in perfect preservation, but a small portion of the bridge of the nose was missing; this was replaced by gold.” Before he left, Otto removed one of Charlemagne’s teeth as a memento.

The tomb was opened again by Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, in the 12th century, when Charlemagne’s bones were placed in a silver chest. In the 19th century Empress Josephine visited Aix and was presented with Charlemagne’s scapula in which was set a piece of the true cross enclosed in a crystal as large as a turkey egg, attached to a gold chain which had once hung around the emperor’s neck.

Culled from: Death: A History Of Man’s Obsessions and Fears

Facts

Today’s Striking Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

Karla Flores was peacefully selling seafood on the street when she heard an explosion. An object hit her face, knocking her down. When she woke up she was in a hospital with a live fragmentation grenade stuck inside her face.  Eight hours later, Karla had an operation that took out the deadly device that could have killed her and everyone else within a 32-foot radius. This is how it all happened.

The 32-year-old Karla Flores, mother of three, was selling seafood under a hellish sun on a street of Culiacán, the largest city in the state of Sinaloa, in northwestern Mexico. Suddenly she heard an explosive noise. When she tried to turn around to see what it was, she was smashed by an object on her face. The impact made her fall violently on the sidewalk. All she remembers from that moment is that she felt a burning sensation on her face and, when she touched it, there was blood on her hands.  Luckily for her, an anonymous passerby took her in a car and drove her to the hospital. There, doctors saw that something was inside her head, on the right side of her face. She thought it was some kind of rock from an explosion, and tried to tell that to the doctors:  ”The doctor asked me what happened. I told him that I thought a stone hit me. Then they started to look and discovered that it was some kind of projectile, but they didn’t know what it was.”

The x-ray and the tomography showed a weird object stuck between the superior and inferior jawbones. Upon inspection, it was quickly identified by military personnel as the head of a fragmentation grenade. Apparently, the grenade was fired with a grenade launcher—the noise that Karla heard—but it didn’t explode when it hit her face.  The device, however, could have exploded at any moment, killing everyone in a 32-foot radius (10 meters). Just one wrong movement and that would be it. Quickly, the hospital personnel isolated Karla far away from the rest of the patients. At that time, she could barely breathe or swallow her own blood and saliva. The clock was ticking, it was too dangerous and many doctors didn’t want to operate her under those circumstances.

Finally, the head of the hospital, Dr. Gaxiola Meza, asked for volunteers. Four brave people said yes: Two anesthesiologists, Felipe Ortiz y Cristina Soto, the nurse Rodrigo Arredondo and Dr. Lidia Soto. Along with two explosive experts from the Mexican army, they took Karla to an open field to operate her. They took all the surgical equipment with them, including light sources. That way, in case they made a mistake, nobody but then would have been affected.  There, and only with local anesthesia, Karla had a tracheotomy so she could breathe while they extracted the explosive device. The military experts guided the doctor, who had no armor, to take it out in the right way. She couldn’t rotate it, just slowly extract it from the head. Around midnight, the operation was complete.  Karla had to go through other procedures after that. She lost half of her teeth, her face is deformed by the giant scar and, according to the doctors, she has at least three years of operations ahead.

In Mexico, they now call her the Miracle Woman.

Culled from: Gizmodo
Generously submitted by: Mike

Check out the pictures and video at the Gizmodo website.  That’s one lucky woman!  Or, I suppose, unlucky in that she was hit at all.  Perspective, you know.

Facts

Today’s Unhallowed Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

The British Royal Navy was not established until the 17th century but the practice of flogging aboard royal fighting ships or armed privateers was of long standing.  The naval ‘cat o’ nine tails’ was made from a piece of rope, about 5 ft. in length, and as thick as a man’s wrist.  The last 20 inches was separated into strands, each twisted tightly, and knotted at several points along its length.  The offender was tied to one of the gratings that covered the hatches, which was secured against the ship’s side.  A 19th century writer reported:

In the Army, the drummer who flogs stands on one spot, and delivers the lash without moving his position, his arm alone giving force to the blow; but in the Navy, the boatswain’s mate, who has this duty to perform, stands full two strides from the delinquent; he ‘combs out the cat,’ as it is termed, by running his fingers through the strands, and separating them from each other, after every lash; then waving it over his head, he takes a step forward, and, with an inflexion of his body that give his whole strength to the operation, delivers the stroke at the full sweep of his arm.  ’Tis a severe punishment thus; and I do not think any man could stand nine dozen as I have seen it ‘laid in’.  An unhallowed torture it is – bad as the rack of bygone times; and to the man that deserved such a punishment, hanging would be a more merciful dispensation.

Culled from: The History Of Torture

Facts

I went urban exploring again on Friday – this time to the Barber-Colman Factory in Rockford, Illinois.   Please click on the pic below to check out the photos on Flickr.

Sightseer

If you like flowers and skeletons, Cedric Laquieze is your man!

Flower Skeleton Sculptures

Art

I’ve featured Shain Erin’s lovely morbid art dolls on the blog previously, but Michael just sent me a link to her Etsy.Com website. Atrociousness for sale! The current selections aren’t the best, but it’s worth keeping an eye on…

Visionary Fine Art by Shain Erin

Trinkets

Michael sent me a link to a grimly retro-styled bike. I’d never want it since it has leather upholstery, but some of you might find it interesting, if a bit on the expensive side.

Epitaph

Trinkets

Another great morbid tradition falls by the wayside.

Texas Drops Special Last Meal For Death Row Inmates

News