Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Manke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild. Our world is full of
Speaker 1: the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, all
Speaker 1: of these amazing tales are right there on display, just
Speaker 1: waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.
Speaker 1: Defeat it's not something any of us hope to encounter
Speaker 1: in life, but for almost all of us it is inevitable. However,
Speaker 1: for military commanders, defeat has mortal consequences. Every move, every
Speaker 1: choice on the battlefield means some men will die. Commanders
Speaker 1: just have to hope that they make enough right choices
Speaker 1: so that casualties are limited and victory is secured. In
Speaker 1: nineteen oh four, there was one naval commander who unfortunately
Speaker 1: made all the wrong choices. His defeat was so total
Speaker 1: that it changed the course of history and is still
Speaker 1: studied to this day. Admiral Zenovi mad Dog Rosesvensky was
Speaker 1: known for his strong command style. As the leader of
Speaker 1: Russia's Baltic Fleet, it was on him to oversee a
Speaker 1: huge number of ships in the oceans north of Europe.
Speaker 1: Everything changed in February of nineteen oh four, though, when
Speaker 1: Japanese Admiral togo Hehachiro led an assault on the Russian
Speaker 1: Port authority in modern day northeastern China, the Japanese were
Speaker 1: tired of the Russians encroaching on land and resources in
Speaker 1: the Yellow Sea. The Russians were used to be in
Speaker 1: the strongest power in the region, and they paid no
Speaker 1: mind to their Chinese and Japanese neighbors. But Japan was
Speaker 1: a newly industrialized nation after the Meiji Restoration in eighteen
Speaker 1: sixty eight, which brought back imperial rule. The Japanese rolled
Speaker 1: over the Russians on land and sea, overwhelming them with
Speaker 1: superior tactics and technology. As such, Russia's only hope for
Speaker 1: reinforcements was Rososvensky's Baltic Fleet. But the problem is right
Speaker 1: there in the name. The Baltic Fleet was in the
Speaker 1: Baltic Sea on the other side of Russia, over four
Speaker 1: thousand miles away by land and quite a bit farther
Speaker 1: by water, and they would have to travel all the
Speaker 1: way around the Eastern Hemisphere to reach the Yellow Sea.
Speaker 1: The Tsar renamed the Baltic Fleet the Second Pacific Fleet,
Speaker 1: and it began its long journey in October of nineteen
Speaker 1: oh four. It took seven months for the fleet to
Speaker 1: travel around Africa and across the Indian Ocean and South
Speaker 1: China Sea to reach their destination, which is why it
Speaker 1: wasn't until May of nineteen oh five that the fleet
Speaker 1: finally arrived in the Strait of Tsushima, where they were
Speaker 1: to engage the enemy. But right away the balance was
Speaker 1: not in the russians favor. The sea was incredibly foggy,
Speaker 1: and so they could barely see anything or even communicate
Speaker 1: from boat to boat with signals. Hey Hachiro meanwhile, had
Speaker 1: spent the long month since the Battle of Port Arthur
Speaker 1: outfitting his ships with Newtonis telegraph technology that allowed them
Speaker 1: to communicate wirelessly. His boats patrolled the straits watching for
Speaker 1: any sign of the Russians, and that's when Rosesvensky made
Speaker 1: a costly mistake. He kept his hospital ship lit, meaning
Speaker 1: that it could be seen through the fog. In the
Speaker 1: old ways of war, a hospital ship was lit up
Speaker 1: so that the enemy would know not to fire on it.
Speaker 1: But this was the dawn of a new age, and
Speaker 1: he Hachiro had no knowledge of Western customs. Rosesvensky's next
Speaker 1: mistake was to assume that he Hachiro would bring his
Speaker 1: ships alongside the Russians for a broadside attack. This was
Speaker 1: the traditional attack, but once again he Hachiro was only
Speaker 1: interested in new ways of war. Instead, he crossed the tee,
Speaker 1: a naval warfare tactic where a commander brings his ship
Speaker 1: in front of the enemy column instead of alongside, forming
Speaker 1: a tee shape. This allows the attacker to use all
Speaker 1: of their cannons, while the enemy can only use the
Speaker 1: few cannons on the front of their ships. Once he
Speaker 1: Hachiro caught sight of the Hospital ship, he crossed the
Speaker 1: tee and opened fire on the Russians. Rosesvensky tried to surrender,
Speaker 1: but the Japanese didn't understand the Russian signals. They completely
Speaker 1: destroyed the Russian navy, killing ten thousand Russians while only
Speaker 1: losing a thousand Japanese sailors. The Russians soon had no
Speaker 1: choice but to seede control of the Yellow Sea to Japan.
Speaker 1: It was the first time an Eastern power had defeated
Speaker 1: a Western power in battle, and it gave the Japanese
Speaker 1: the confidence to continue to grow and expand their empire.
Speaker 1: Rosesvensky was wounded, but he survived and taken to a
Speaker 1: Japanese hospital. While he was recovering, Hehachiro visited him, saying,
Speaker 1: defeat is a common fate of a soldier. There is
Speaker 1: nothing to be ashamed of in it. The even bigger
Speaker 1: lesson for Russia, though, was one of the dangers of hubris.
Speaker 1: They were not innately superior to their eastern neighbors. It
Speaker 1: was a lesson learned far too late, as Rosesvensky wasted
Speaker 1: months of his life and the actual lives of his
Speaker 1: men in his vain attempt to save his country's interests
Speaker 1: in Asia. Curiously, the Japanese would learn the same lesson
Speaker 1: decades later, when they, like the Russians, over extended themselves
Speaker 1: and foolishly attacked a different, newly industrialized power across the Pacific.
Speaker 1: But that's a curious story for another day. Why do
Speaker 1: we put people on trial? It seems like this question
Speaker 1: should have an obvious answer, but it doesn't. An idealist
Speaker 1: might say that trials exposed truth and hand out justice.
Speaker 1: A cynic might say that they exist simply to strike
Speaker 1: fear into potential criminals, hopefully preventing crime in the future.
Speaker 1: Both would agree, though that, whatever the driving motivation, criminal
Speaker 1: proceedings provide closure to the victims of a crime. If
Speaker 1: someone has wronged you, there is immense relief in theory,
Speaker 1: at least in seeing the wrongdoer condemned by an official
Speaker 1: body and punished for their ax. But what if the
Speaker 1: perpetrator of a crime has no understanding of the laws.
Speaker 1: What if human law was not designed to govern them
Speaker 1: at all. Scattered throughout history are a handful of peculiar
Speaker 1: cases where judges and juries had to determine the guilt
Speaker 1: of not a person but an animal. From the ninth
Speaker 1: to the twentieth century, there were at least one hundred
Speaker 1: and ninety six cases of animal trials conducted in civilized nations.
Speaker 1: The majority of these recorded cases were in mainland Europe France,
Speaker 1: to be precise, and while just under two hundred cases
Speaker 1: spread across ten centuries doesn't sound like a lot, it
Speaker 1: has provoked intense study among historians and has produced some
Speaker 1: fascinating stories. For example, in thirteen eighty six, the Norman
Speaker 1: city of Falaise conducted a trial for a pig who
Speaker 1: was accused of eating an infant. The pig was sentenced
Speaker 1: to maiming and death. Once the sentence was delivered, it
Speaker 1: was wounded on the head and four lane and then
Speaker 1: marched to the gallows before an enormous crowd. On the
Speaker 1: way to the rope, it was allegedly dressed in a
Speaker 1: new suit, as was customary for prisoners of the time,
Speaker 1: and pigs are famously ravenous creatures, so it's not a
Speaker 1: surprise that the filet's trial is not the only pig
Speaker 1: that has been found guilty of murder. In fourteenth century
Speaker 1: seven ye a pig and its six piglets were put
Speaker 1: on trial for the death of a five year old boy.
Speaker 1: The owner of the animal was also tried for negligence,
Speaker 1: and yet by the time the court reached its verdict,
Speaker 1: only the animal was punished. The pig was to be
Speaker 1: put to death. The piglets, by the way, were spared.
Speaker 1: Although they were also found covered in blood on the
Speaker 1: scene of the crime, it was impossible to determine whether
Speaker 1: they were also guilty. Reasonable doubts cleared the piglets of wrongdoing,
Speaker 1: and in some cases these animals on trial would not
Speaker 1: face the judge undefended. In the early fifteen hundreds, for example,
Speaker 1: a young French attorney named Bartholomew Chessenie successfully defended the
Speaker 1: rats of Utun, who had been accused of eating the
Speaker 1: bar crop. Overall, you can divide European animal trials into
Speaker 1: two categories, secular and ecclesiastical. A secular trial would pertain
Speaker 1: to domestic animals under human control, such as dogs, livestock, birds,
Speaker 1: and beasts of burden, but animals that were not under
Speaker 1: human control, such as rats and insects, would fall under
Speaker 1: the jurisdiction of the church, thus ecclesiastical. Oh And on
Speaker 1: occasion there would be an overlap with local folklore, as
Speaker 1: was the case with a rooster that in fourteen seventy
Speaker 1: four laid an egg. The court could not determine whether
Speaker 1: the egg had become a basilisk or a cockatrice, but
Speaker 1: both carried the same sentence death for the bird in question.
Speaker 1: No one seems to have considered that this was a
Speaker 1: female chicken that had been misidentified as a rooster. It's
Speaker 1: strange to consider that these sorts of trials occurred at all,
Speaker 1: and that they were not driven by hysterical mobs, but
Speaker 1: by town officials, bishops, and lawyers. From the Middle Ages
Speaker 1: into the early Renaissance, animals were considered as much of
Speaker 1: their respective communities as the people themselves. So perhaps we
Speaker 1: should not be surprised that the Middle Ages were rife
Speaker 1: with animal crime. Europe had been ravaged by the Black Death,
Speaker 1: and if they could have found the rats guilty of
Speaker 1: mass slaughter by spreading plague, they surely would have done so.
Speaker 1: After the Dark Ages, the symbolic importance of a trial
Speaker 1: mattered more than justice or deterence in a chaotic time.
Speaker 1: The trial didn't exist for the victims or the perpetrators.
Speaker 1: It was held for the community at large. Proof it
Speaker 1: seems that social order mattered, and that no one was
Speaker 1: above the law, not even an animal. I hope you've
Speaker 1: enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe
Speaker 1: for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the
Speaker 1: show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was
Speaker 1: created by me Aaron Mankey in partnership with how Stuff Works.
Speaker 1: I make another award winning show called Lore, which is
Speaker 1: a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can
Speaker 1: learn all about it over at Theworldoflore dot com. And
Speaker 1: until next time, stay curious.