Western Civilization is now The Irish-American Chronicle, An historical byway lightly traveled

When a real-estate agent has less foot traffic than desired, he remodels the house, paints it, gets rid of the clutter, adds features the competition doesn’t have, and reduces the price.

That’s what happened to Western Civilization. It endured a title change, a new cover, a price reduction, and new features to educate while telling an interest-gripping story.

The concise, Irish American Chronicle takes the reader down an historical road few know exist. The section on the Kennedys—describing four days I’ll never forget, is based on November 1963 newspaper columns, excerpts from the Warren Report, and excerpts from Doctor Humes’s autopsy report. The conclusion belongs to the author, which evolved only after he weighted all the cognitive facts.

Selected stories from Smith’s books and blog, http://www.theirish-americanstory.com, describe little-known events and people whose deeds greatly impacted the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, WWI and WWII. The segment on the Ancient Celts and the megaliths erected by followers of a prehistoric religion is more than worth the price of admission.

Everyone with a smidgen of Irish blood and all who have even the slightest interest in American History should own and read it. Due to contractual obligations, The Irish American Chronicle—priced ridiculously low at 99-cents—is available only on Kindle; however it can be purchased to read on a computer after a free “Kindle for PC” is downloaded.

Author James Francis Smith

The First Christmas on the Western Front

The First Christmas

on the Western Front

 

        To prepare his parishioners for the upcoming Christmas season, Father Mike mentioned that to honor the Birth of Christ in World War I, the German and English halted the fighting along a 20-mile front.

This brought to mind a short story I wrote for Western Civilization. Both sides stopped the needless slaughter and celebrated together as fellow Christians. This occurred early in the hostilities that I term, “The War of the Cousins.”

        I highlighted this heartwarming respite in a war during which 8,000,000 were killed—eight million and over 21,000,000—twenty-one million wounded. A respite occurring before either side employed poison gas, tanks, or even supplied metal helmets.

Christmas came in 1914 at a time when both sides still believed the war would be short. As Barbara Tuchman put it in The Guns of August, her Pulitzer Prize winner:

 “… over before the leaves began to fall.”

Instead of charging the dug-in Germans and initiating the Battle of Messines Ridge, with Christmas in the offing, Field Marshal French wanted to retreat, reorganize, and rest his troops. He was, however, ordered by British War Secretary Henry Kitchener to continue on the attack. Instead of resting … in that one battle, 13,000 Englishmen sacrificed their lives—thirteen thousand.

        When I write narrative history, I always include historical characters, as well as fictional ones. Within months after enjoying the Christmas tranquility, County Cork’s Michael O’Leary earned the Victoria Cross at Cuinchy France when he captured eight Germans and killed one. O’Leary was an unusual Irishman. He had already immigrated. While living in Canada, O’Leary became acquainted with Germans, went to Mass with them, and became their friend. Now drafted into the English Army, he found himself killing them.

        Frankly, despite all my reading on the matter, I still can’t discern why The Cousins, England’s King George, Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany, and Russia’s Czar Nicholas couldn’t’ve flipped a coin instead of killing and wounding 30-million men—thirty million.

A tragedy that haunts the world to this very day.

Lee Harvey Oswald Did Not Kill Kennedy

I was writing Western Civilization, when I watched a 2011 National Geographic television presentation, regarding Kennedy’s assassination. The gist of the program consisted of building a platform attached to the Dallas Book Depository and using a skilled expert to prove that Lee Harvey Oswald could have easily killed John Fitzgerald Kennedy. Their effort involved the possibility of a bullet ricocheting off a light standard. I had already written two different versions of Kennedy’s assassination, one in Rory O’Donnell and the Kennedys, the other in Unholy Conspiracies. Therefore, I seized the banner for one last try to get it right.

This time, I examined in their entirety the Warren Commission’s Report and Doctor Humes’s autopsy report. Studied many of the conspiracy theories, and viewed pictures of the assassination available on the internet. I ignored the irrelevant conspiracy theories, such as, the magic bullet that wounded Governor Connelly and of shots ricocheting hither and yon, to concentrate on the “Killing” itself.

Two facts immediately became eminently clear. Kennedy was struck by two bullets and two bullets only. One I termed “The Neck Shot”, and the other, “The Kill Shot.”

Oswald may have been involved in firing the Neck Shot. According to the initial coroner, Dallas’s Doctor Perry, “the Neck Shot’s point of exit was below the point of entry.” Surgeons believe Kennedy would have survived if this was the only wound.

Therefore, everything hinges on the position of JFK’s head when the Kill Shot hit. If his head was in the prone position as was illustrated in the Warren Committee’s exhibit 387, it would be in the realm of possibility for LHO to have fired both shots. Therefore, the position of Kennedy’s head is crucial.

But first let’s consider the autopsy report by Philadelphia’s Doctor Humes who in 1992 reconfirmed his findings:

The second wound (Kill Shot) was found in the right posterior of the scalp … situated 2.5 centimeters to the right and slightly above the external protuberance, which is a bony prominence situated in the posterior portion of everyone’s skull. … was a huge defect over the right side of the skull. … traversing a line from the wound in the occiput to just above the right eye.”

Humes mentions the importance of the relative position of the President’s head in relation to the flight of the missile … “influenced by how far his head was bent.”

Kennedy’s head was erect. We know this from Secret Service Agent Hickey’s testimony and a review of the many internet videos of the assassination.

When my head is erect, a tangential angle to an exit above my right eye is slightly upward. As we can see from the above evidence available at the time of the commission’s inquiry, the President’s head was erect. Therefore, it stands to reason that the Kill shot could not have come from six floors above the Presidential limousine.

For greater detail, including testimony of what occurred within the presidential limousine; purchase my digitally published Western Civilization, available on Kindle, Nook, and other eReading devices for only $1.99.

The question that should haunt every red-bloodied American is this: “Why did our government lie?”