This week is purely unhinged.

No matter what you think of politics, Angie’s story covers the worst way for them to die. She tackles the Erfurt Latrine Disaster, or that time when tons of politicians and leaders meet on the third floor of this building. Unfortunately, this violated the building’s weight limits. The floor gives way.

Both floors.

Almost everyone attending falls into the cesspit below. Over 100 people would pass away in a foul way.

Theresa pivots into the chaos of battle as she regales us with the tale of Dan Daly, the Marine who earned the Medal of Honor three times, despite only receiving two of them.

Transcript

Theresa: Hello and welcome to the Unhinged History Podcast, the podcast where two absolute nut jobs are going to mainline history, stories, memes, and research compulsively the throwaway line said in one audiobook or one passing phrase from a documentary. And then we’re going to regale our co-host with the story we’ve only recently learned. I’m host one. I’m Teresa, and that is host two.

Angie: I’m Angie, and I did actually recently am reading an audio or listening to an audio book and told my husband, I’m gonna need the Kindle version too, because there’s like 45 things I need to learn about in these first nine chapters.

Theresa: I love this for me. Mm-hmm. Me

Angie: too.

Theresa: I’ll be putting my uh monthly donation into his uh therapy fund. And yeah.

Angie: And his Kindle fun.

Theresa: Uh I feel like those two feed into each other, right? At some point, he just happy wife, happy life.

Angie: That is his motto in life.

Theresa: But anyhow, you’re going first, right?

Angie: I sure am. Alright. Um, so here’s the thing. I’m either A, going to need you to take your headphones off for the sources section, or B, I can tell them at the end your choice.

Theresa: Headphones coming off. Alright.

Angie: Mm. Good. Good morning, friends. Good afternoon, friends. My sources are the Erfurt Lutrine Disaster, Everything Everywhere podcast, The Collector, how the 1184 Airfritt Latrine Disaster drowned German noble nobility. Uh in 1184, a grotesque tragedy claimed the lives of dozens of German nobles by Greg Bayer from November 5th of 2026. History Extra has a what was the Airfurt Latrine disaster by Danny Byrd, published September 5th of 24. Amazing oh, excuse me, amusingplanet.com uh has has a lovely little write-up by Kashyy Padaway from September 1, Padawari, excuse me, from September 1 of 2020. And then historyco.uk has an article called The Airfoot Latrine Disaster. History’s grossest tragedy. So there are my sources. Have fun with that. And getting a rack. She there you go. She can see me now.

Theresa: Headphones on.

Angie: Headphones on. I just want to start my story out by telling you that I made some really wild and fun connections by the end of the story and was like, whoa, I can’t believe we’ve never done it before. So our story starts with a bit of a land dispute between the land grave, Louis III of Thuringia,

Theresa: Zeringia,

Angie: Thuringia, it’s smack dab in the middle of Germany.

Theresa: Okay, so it’s one of those old lost kingdoms.

Angie: Yeah. Uh so it’s 1184. This at this particular time, it’s divided up into like a ton of littler principalities and and dukedoms and things like that, right? Okay, so Therengia is like right in the middle of this area. And there is a dispute between the landgrave of this area and the Archbishop Conrad of Mainz.

Theresa: Um, can I pause you real quick? You’re saying land graves.

Angie: He’s called a landgrave. A land grave is like um it’s a historical noble title for part of the Homan Holy Roman Empire. It corresponds to account, but he answers directly to the Holy Roman Emperor.

Theresa: So

Angie: he doesn’t follow the chain. Like of normal nobility. Right, does that make sense?

Theresa: Yeah, okay,

Angie: I’m thinking now. So this this land dispute is between these two fellows, right? Arguably fairly high-ranking individuals. And this whole thing had started around 1180. Um, but as I said, it’s 1184. It’s 1184 now, but what you need to know is back in 1180, the Duke Henry the Lion, which sounds like a completely badass name, but I’m pretty sure.

Theresa: pretty sure. It’s not the lion heart, because that’s Richard the Lionheart.

Angie: Okay. Right. Henry so I guess the lion is his family crest. So he’s just Henry the Lion. That’s that’s my understanding. I think this guy did absolutely everything he did just for the plot, but basically, he doesn’t support the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbosa all that much during his failed expeditions into the Lombardy region. And this leads him into a trial to be tried in Absentina.

Theresa: Oh. The

Angie: Epstincia or whatever.

Theresa: For insubordination, for insubordination. Um so he’s got a court of bishops and princes, and they as a result, he gets banished in 1180, and his lands are taken.

Angie: And his lands are the lands these two guys are going over. Um it is worth mentioning that Henry the Lion is going to be banished and allowed back and banished again because for the plot, I guess.

Theresa: He’s he’s kind of like that kid in fifth your fifth grade class that was always kicked out, just had a revolving door to the principal’s office.

Angie: Yeah, yeah, he’s that guy. Um so the the Landrev Louis III and the Archbishop, they’re fighting over his land and the benefits of the lands, like the tides that come from it. And apparently, this sort of all comes to a head when the archbishop starts building a castle on a hill very near the landgrave’s border. And so he sees this as a threat, right? So this is problematic. Now, you can imagine that this little incident has the possibility of upsetting the balance and the stability in this region that, like I said before, is dotted with all sorts of little dominions. And so, um things escalate up the chain all the way to the ears of Emperor Barbosa, so he’s like, ugh. Okay, we need to do something about this. And so he sends his 18-year-old son, King Henry the Sixth, to handle the situation.

Theresa: 18-year-old?

Angie: Yeah. Okay. I mean So he Sokay, so Barbosa’s the Holy Roman Emperor, right? So Henry the Sixth has been the king of something since he was like four years old. His statecraft and his military campaign skills are like astronomical because he has literally been on the march with dad his whole life.

Theresa: You know, and I’m just gonna call out if we had said his daughter, Queen Such and Such, who’d been ruling since four, I’d have been like, get it, Queen. 18-year-old boy.

Angie: You’re not even 25 yet.

Theresa: Your brain hasn’t developed all the way. Yeah.

Angie: Yeah. So um, oh, I gotta find my spot in my notes. Okay. Henry Six happens, he’s the king of Germany, and is he’s later gonna become the Holy Roman Emperor and the King of Italy. But for now, and the purposes of this story, he is his father’s son, and he has been sent to do a job, and that job is to solve or mediate this really stupid land dispute. He is supposed to be on campaign.

Theresa: Pause. He’s

Angie: supposed to be on his way to Poland when he finds out that he’s got to divert his travel and make it to this place called Erfurt. Erfurt sits right in the middle of Germany, as I said, because it’s it’s part of the Thrangian area.

It’s about 200 miles southwest of Berlin. Harry calls, or excuse me, Henry calls for a Hoftag, and this is basically an assembly of nobles. It’s uh informal or irregular, it’s not like your regular council meeting, basically.

Theresa: It’s like we’re we’re calling an audible here.

Angie: And um, this is something that can be called by the King of the Romans, the Holy Roman Emperor, or a Prince of the Empire. They can also be called diets or Reichstags. Most of the time, this is going to be held in an Imperial Palace. But in this case, it’s

Theresa: held Let’s say, um, I’m just gonna try to get this all out.

Angie: As I said, most of the time the assemblies are held in the Imperial Palace.

Theresa: But according to the amusing plan article that I read, quote, it took the upper floor of the rectory of the Peter Scarch, the Church of St.

Angie: Peter’s Monastery, the oldest building in the Petersburg Citadel. It’s on July 26th, 1184. So there’s been some argument as to whether or not it was in the building, like attached to the cathedral or next to the cathedral, but the gist is this in the heart of the city.

Theresa: Okay. Okay.

Angie: You have all of these people gathered to attend these talks. There’s there’s more than a hundred individuals, and they have it’s like it’s picking up traction, right? Because news spreads, and people have chosen sides. And so you’ve got way more than a hundred individuals walking into this room, and they’re gonna sort this out one way or the other.

But remember, this event is taking place on the upper level, and either this building is not designed to hold this many people, or it’s fallen into disrepair, or it’s likely rotten and the support beams break. Oh.

Theresa: Hm hmm.

Angie: The floors being, you know, absolutely just demolished here, they collapse. And then the second floor falls into the first floor, and the first floor also gives way to a cesspit.

Theresa: You know, as soon as you said that, I was like, cess pit. So I think I might have heard just this much of the story.

Angie: So upwards of a hundred nobles have fallen into a cesspit. Several of the vent of the individuals fall straight through both floors and right into this pit of raw sewage. I was a little morbidly curious about cesspits, so here’s some information that Wikipedia gave me just for the gross factor because I needed to know. A cess pit, cesspool, and a soap pit in some contests, which sounds so much prettier than this is.

Theresa: I don’t know. After you tell me this, the concept of soaking in this refuse is not gonna be on my menu.

Angie: Me either, yeah. Um they’re terms of various meanings, but they are used to describe either an underground holding tank that’s sealed at the bottom, or a soak pit that’s not sealed at the bottom. A cesspit can be used for the temporary collection and storage of feces, excreta, or fecal sludge as part of an on-site sanitation system that has some similarity to like a septic tank or or to like the soak pit. Traditionally, it is a deep cylindrical chamber that is dug into the ground, having approximate dimensions of like three and a half feet by six to nine point eight feet. So I’m assuming in this case it’s much bigger. But that’s the generality of a cesspit.

Theresa: Its appearance is similar to that of a hand dug well. So just keep that in mind. A well full of things you don’t want to bring up. Yes.

Angie: So this pit could be lined with bricks or concrete, it might be covered with a slab, and it needs to be empty emptied frequently when it’s in use as an underground holding tank. In other cases, if the soil and groundwater conditions allow, it is not constructed water tight, and this allows the leakwood to like leech out, right?

Theresa: And then you get cholera out of breaks. Yeah.

Angie: In this case, my guess is the cesspit they all fall into is more like a pit latrine. But um good.

Theresa: Yeah.

Angie: The um the men fall in are dealing with a quicksand like consistency that was.

Theresa: Quicksand like

Angie: quicksand like.

Theresa: So remember when we were a kid and we were told quicksand was gonna be a real problem. And then now that’s the same. But it works the stories like this.

Angie: Yeah, okay. So um, quicksand like consistency, it’s full of parasites and some really gross bacteria, and according to some of one of my sources, some of the fallen try to swim. Not sure where they’re gonna go, because it’s a pit.

And in the end, they drowned a horrible death of choking on years of excreta or bodily wastes, which is now number three on my list of ways I don’t want to die.

Theresa: Would this mean that everybody who picked a side and joined this one automatically fail?

Angie: I feel like this just crossed out an entire line on multiple choice. Okay, so hold please. Um, it’s possible that up to a hundred individuals died from this event. Sixty for sure, and they were nobles. Some didn’t die directly in the pit, but were rather crushed by the debris, because you know, two four floors fell through, right? So if the pit didn’t get you, the beams might.

Theresa: Right.

Angie: In the case of the two men who caused the whole thing, they both survived.

Theresa: The landgrave fell, but he survived, and the archbishop was sitting near the young King Henry the Sixth on a stone windowsill. They did have to hold on for like dear lives from falling themselves while they waited for rescuers to bring a ladder. So they’re like stuck in the window frame. Wow.

Angie: The collector uh article points out quote the loss of so many nobles would have seriously affected family networks, control of land holdings, and military followings, though the exact nature of the shift of power and structures would have varied from individual to individual. So, yeah.

Theresa: So I think that’s a good thing. So it doesn’t affect the lines of succession.

Angie: For sure. King Henry, he’s like, deuces, I am out, and he leaves immediately. Like, he leaves the dispute unresolved, could care less, return to sender, bye dad.

Theresa: Like I gotta go change my armor.

Angie: Pretty much, yeah. Uh the two who started the whole thing, they’re gonna go on to continue fighting little board border skirmishes, raiding and burning villages, destroying crops, and finding other ways to drain each other’s resources and pocketbooks. Like

Theresa: they’re just

Angie: petty as hell. Like they’re just trying to make things inconvenient for everybody. But eventually it’s gonna simmer down a bit when they are both called to arms against call to arms again against their mutual enemy that started it all, Henry the Lion. He’s back in the picture and he has renewed his rebellion, but now it’s with Henry the Sixth.

And it is hilarious to me that the guy who started it all in a roundabout way accidentally ends it and gets the easy way out because Henry the Sixth defeats him again, and in like 1194, he makes peace with the Emperor. Like he realizes it’s I’m gonna be heading home to the good lord not too far off, I’m sure of it. So he goes home to the very small lands that he now has around the Brunswick area, and he’s all peaceful and stuff, and he’s supporting things like the art and the architecture.

Theresa: Okay, so he’s in his legacy building era.

Angie: Absolutely, and in August of 1195, he dies, possibly after falling off a horse. Now, for a fun placement in time, his like these are some fun facts. His first wife had a daughter called Gertrude. Gertrude married King Canute 6 of Denmark, who is a descendant of Big Taddy Canute.

Theresa: Okay,

Angie: this is how Angie loves him. We covered him in episode 178. Uh Hi, I’m the Unready, have you met me? His second wife was the daughter of Henry II of England and the Duchess Eleanor of Aquitaine from Story 77. This one talks, this one talks, this one listens. Teresa covers the Mong, so eviting the Vietnam War. Um, go listen to that. It’s a really good episode.

So he’s got he’s got this interesting pedigree that ties in with like a ton of our other stories, and I’m a sucker for that stuff. But back to the feud. The feud would as a whole cease to exist when the landgrave Louis III takes up his cross and he joins the third crusade, which just happens to be the one with Richard the Lionhearted and my guy Saladon from episode 170. He dies at sea in near Cyprus in 1190. So, like, Henry the Lion literally did everything he did for the plot, and somehow never really got in much trouble.

Theresa: But the other guys spent the whole of their lives duking it out with each other. Wow.

Angie: So that’s my story of the Airfort Latrine disaster, and I’m shocked we’ve never done it.

Theresa: Honestly, that does feel like a misstep on our part.

Angie: Because it is gross. It’s so gross.

Theresa: Yeah.

Angie: Not how I want to go, that’s for sure.

Theresa: I have got a wildly different tale for you.

Angie: I’m shook. Um weird of you to pick the same one today.

Theresa: Right, I know. Um, I am gonna tell you the story of Daniel Joseph Daly.

Angie: Okay, the name

Theresa: does it not ring a phone. We don’t know. Um, I am going to give a hat tip to a listener of ours who’s on TikTok. Originally, their handle was peanut butter yeater. Unclear what their handle currently is, couldn’t find them. I

Angie: like

Theresa: peanut butter yeeter. Let’s go. Uh my sources, the ancient order of the Hibernarians, Daniel Daly, the Marine who earned two medals of honor and deserved a third by Neil Cosgrove, Congressional Medal of Honor, Haitian Campaign, 1915, U.S. Marine Corps, Joseph. Nope, Daniel, Joseph Daly, Department of War, Medal of Honor Monday, Marine Corps Sergeant, Major Daniel J. Daly by Katie Lang. Are you ready?

Angie: Yes. Okay.

Theresa: Daniel Daly, he’s born November 11th, 1873, in Brooklyn, New York. His parents, uh, John and Ellen Daly. They have well, he has a sister named Mary and a brother named David. The family eventually moves to Long Island to a place called Glen Cove. And our man is a short king. He is 5’6.

Angie: I’ve loved this.

Theresa: Slight as I’ll get out, because this boy only weighs 132 pounds.

Angie: Okay.

Theresa: Uh, but to make up for it, he has the reputation of a fighter, which this matches to me. This my sister is much shorter than I am, and she is full of spit and vinegar, which is saying something coming from me.

Angie: Who is also full of spit and vinegar?

Theresa: I am mild-mannered in comparison.

Angie: That is hilarious. Remind me not to take your sister off at Thanksgiving dinner. Yep.

Theresa: I mean, she’s the kind of person who will chew her own arm off just so she has a weapon to beat you with.

Angie: Love that for her.

Theresa: Now, Daniels, as a young man, he spends his time working as a struggling newsboy in Manhattan, and this is before he enlists in the Marines in 1899 at the age of 26.

Angie: Okay.

Theresa: Now I feel like there is a discrepancy between those two thoughts, because to me, per news boys seem perpetually 12.

Angie: I was just thinking that, like, where the year what was he doing in the years between.

Theresa: I unclear. This is the source I have.

Angie: So

Theresa: theoretically, he could have just been an elder newsboy.

Angie: Respect your elders, boy.

Theresa: But either way, he uh when he joins the Marines, he finishes his training and he is shipped off to China to serve in Peking during the Boxer Rebellion.

Angie: Okay. Now

Theresa: I had heard of the Box Rebellion. I hadn’t done an thing about it previously, hadn’t looked into it. Um I had a feeling it was not going to be as pugilistic as I thought, you know, like Boxer Rebellion, I have very specific images, and I had a feeling it wasn’t that.

Angie: I hate it when that happens.

Theresa: But the Boxer Rebellion, uh, when you look it up, it’s 1899 to 1901. It’s in China. It’s an anti foreign, anti-Christian uprising in the northern parts of China, and it’s held by they have the best name. The Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists.

Angie: I kinda love that.

Theresa: I do too. Righteous and Harmonious Fists is just there’s such a juxtaposition there that I think beautiful.

Angie: This one’s harmonious, let’s go. Right.

Theresa: Let me introduce you to some harmony. And

Angie: Play a sweet melody off your skull. I like it. Let’s go.

Theresa: By early August 1900, his unit is stationed on the Tartar Wall, which is a defensive position south of the American diplomatic compound. And knowing that this they were trying to expel Westerners, Christians, hid where their position near basically the console makes sense to me. Uh now, towards the middle of the month, there’s intense enemy gunfighter that gun fire that forces them from the fortification. At this point in time, Daly’s a private, and his captain, Newt Hall, manages to crawl back to the wall to mount a defense. So two humans versus.

Angie: Well, it is a badass name.

Theresa: Isn’t it? In one of the more memorable acts of the war, you have the boxers that are surrounding the compound of foreign legations in Peking, and they laid siege. They were laying siege to this place for 55 days. At one point, the German Marines of the German mis assembly or embassy were forced back, and Daly by himself took position in a bastion on the Tartar Wall and remained there throughout the night. He’s subjected to sniper fire, numerous attacks, and then when he’s relieved in the morning, Private Daly is still holding his positions with bodies of numerous attackers surrounding his position.

Angie: Okay.

Theresa: For this move, he’s awarded his first Medal of Honor. And I can only imagine that it’s dark dark, and when sun rises, it looks like a video game scene beneath him.

Angie: I Yeah, that’s what I’m imagining.

Theresa: So he has a very storied career. Uh he goes to all kinds of places. His service is includes, you know, sea duty, several ships. He’s going to Panama, Cuba, Mexico, Puerto Rico. And then in March 1911, he’s stationed on the USS Springfield when he managed to put out the flames of gasoline that had caught fire before the general alarm could be sounded. Which is some fast action.

Angie: Yeah.

Theresa: If that fire had continued, there’s powder magazines on the ship that could have exploded.

Angie: So he receives Yeah, just a little bit of bad news bears there. Yeah.

Theresa: He received a commendation from his commanding officer and the secretary of the Navy for this quick thinking. And then in 1915, he’s at the revolt in the Republic of Haiti that had begun to jeopardize American lives and property. We kinda I kinda touch on some of this when I went over Francois de Valier, the Haitian dictator, and kind

Angie: of talked about the lead up that gave him his staying power.

Theresa: So

Angie: the US was heavily invested in Haiti.

Theresa: And so this is where we’re at. Um, so the the Marine Expeditionary Forces had been sent in to preserve order and then began what they referred to as Bush Warfare, as Marine historians would later call it.

Angie: Okay.

Theresa: So Daly serving with the 15th Company mounted, the 2nd Marine Regiment, and they are ordered to carry out extensive patrols in the country’s interior to seek out these revolutionary fighters known as the Cacao Bandits.

Angie: Huh, okay.

Theresa: That looked like it raised a bell for you.

Angie: Yeah, and I don’t know, I don’t because you’re um Duvalier’s men were not they were called something else, right?

Theresa: The Tatan Mc Tantan Makut.

Angie: Okay. I’m I don’t know why that I’ll have to think on it anyway, carry on.

Theresa: Okay. But at one point in this campaign, I for lack of better terms, several of Daly’s comrades had been taken prisoner. He tunneled under the walls of the prison where they were being held, killed the guards, set the men free. And however, the craziest part of this is what earns him his second medal of honor is what happened in October during a reconnaissance mission from Fort Liberte.

Angie: Wait, so that wasn’t what earned him his second medal of honor?

Theresa: No, that didn’t do it. That didn’t push him over the.

Angie: Yeah, it seems like Wednesday for him, huh?

Theresa: Right. Okay.

Angie: This boy was just bored and lonely, so he went to break his buddies out. You know what? Actually b uh both of my sons would do would do that. They’d be like, oh well, let’s go then. Right.

Theresa: I mean, just me and a shovel, I guess I can dig.

Angie: Are you in there? Yeah. Yeah.

Theresa: Brian, is it you? You still owe me fifty bucks.

Angie: Oh my god, that’s exactly how it would go, too. I’m

Theresa: so on your sorry. Because you owe me.

Angie: I need you to t you know, your sister’s pretty cute.

Theresa: Can you write to her about me?

Angie: Could you could you put

Theresa: in

Angie: a good word? No.

Theresa: Then

Angie: I’m just gonna leave you here until you change your mind. I’m gonna go down the way and get get the present. I’ll help Dave. Bye.

Theresa: Yeah. But either way, now he this man is a gunnery sergeant, and he’s in Hay She or Hayeshi. He’s in Haiti

Angie: fighting

Theresa: the the cacao’s. And of the reconnaissance company of thirty-eight men that Daly belonged to, he’s ambushed by over four hundred members of the enemy while attempting to ford a river at night.

Angie: Wow.

Theresa: So the odds are not in their favor.

Angie: And among the ever in your favor, is that how it goes? Yeah.

Theresa: May the alts be ever in your favor.

Angie: That’s how it goes.

Theresa: So among the casualties that they encounter, they a mule is taken out, and this mule’s carrying the company’s machine gun. I

Angie: just know that was his favorite mule. I just know it. Yeah. It had a name. They’d probably made its own custom patches. Yeah. Of course they did.

Theresa: So he gets his guys to a secure location, and then he returned alone and under enemy fire back to the river and search for the gun. He found it and is able to bring the gun and the ammo back to the marine position.

Angie: Is this guy d okay.

Theresa: This guy doesn’t qualify for life insurance.

Angie: Yeah, at all five six, 132 pounds.

Theresa: Yeah, they’re like, you know what? You are worth your weight in gold, and that’s about what it’ll cost to cover you.

Angie: Sorry, what? Yeah.

Theresa: Liberty Mutual just picks up and goes, oh, sorry. Wrong number. Click.

Angie: Bye.

Theresa: I don’t even know if Liberty does health insurance or life insurance,

Angie: but they do.

Theresa: Either way, Daly then goes on to take part of one of a three-prong assault on the rebel position. This would go on to kill seventy-five rebels and scatter the rest. As one of the two officers present noted, had one squad failed, not a man in the party would have lived to tell the tale. Gunnery Sergeant Daly of the 15th Company during the operations was the most conspicuous figure among the enlisted men.

Angie: You know, my guy has been working his whole life just to be seen. Okay.

Theresa: I mean, at his height, he’s gotta make an impact, because you will just look right over him unless he does something to im impress you.

Angie: Yeah. This

Theresa: may not surprise you, he’s not finished yet.

Angie: Yeah, not even a little bit surprised.

Theresa: Um there’s an incident that he is best remembered for in the Marines, and that is June of 1918. This is at the Battle of Bellew Wood during World War One. The Marines are under some heavy artillery barrage and they’re penned down, and they’re realizing that if they stay where they’re at, that’s going to lead to certain death.

Angie: Ooh, okay.

Theresa: This guy is forty-four years old and still doing the war games. Okay. He goes on to

Angie: like it.

Theresa: I mean, honestly, hearing that made my knees hurt,

Angie: but I don’t think this guy feels pain. I think he just is doing doing his thing, you know.

Theresa: Uh you know, I I f I yeah, you’re probably right. I think that was probably why he is so petite and slim is because anything that feels pain was removed at some point in his life somehow.

Angie: Just cut it out.

Theresa: Yeah, don’t need it. Uh but he goes on to lead a counterattack, and this is his battle cry. This battle cry would just ingrave itself into marine lore. You ready? Mm-hmm. Come on. You sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?

Angie: He’s the do you want to live forever, guy?

Theresa: Yes. Yes.

Angie: That’s awesome. Okay.

Theresa: So later on in this same battle, Daly single handedly eliminated a machine gun nest with nothing more than his 45 pistol and grenades. And a fork.

Angie: I’m sure he had like a eating implement, like a coffee cup, something.

Theresa: Right. You know. Yeah. Something real small. And then it’s I should mention on the course of this battle, he’s wounded three times.

Angie: So you might be on to something that he cannot feel pain. Um he Yeah, I 44 and already done the things he’s done. Bro can’t feel pain.

Theresa: No.

Angie: Or he lives for it. Like it’s fun.

Theresa: Yeah. Or he sits

Angie: down and it’s hours later and he’s like, huh. I have been shot. Oh.

Theresa: How curious.

Angie: That would be me. I have a I’m bleeding from my I don’t know what.

Theresa: Why did my uniform get red here? Oh, that’s mine.

Angie: Yeah. Yep. And I think this is why my husband might have a coronary.

Theresa: Honestly, I do the same thing where I’m, yeah. We’re not allowed to have mandolins in the house because apparently I am not coordinated enough to do that without going to a emergency or urgent care.

Angie: Yeah, I feel bad.

Theresa: Um, Daly, for his actions, not my heroics, which are not. Um, he’s commended for his third medal of honor, and the New Yorker Times reports it a certainty. It’s a foregone conclusion in their eyes.

Angie: Okay.

Theresa: But there’s some bureaucratic politics that come into play, and uh they make a capricious decision that the Medal of Honor can only be awarded twice, no matter how deserving subsequent actions of valor are.

Angie: That’s stupid.

Theresa: It’s petty. It’s petty. And I don’t know what politics were going on behind the scenes that somebody just wanted to piss off somebody else, and Daly’s at the bottom of it.

Angie: And it’s a patty main. Like the whole part of the whole reason he hasn’t received his Victoria Cross was because of Petty.

Theresa: Honestly, I think there’s probably a lot of politics that go into the awarding of medals.

Angie: Yeah, that’s so silly. They did something fabulous. Give them their trinket.

Theresa: Yeah, but you gotta piss off somebody five rows above you on the ladder. That’s you know, that’s

Angie: how this works.

Theresa: Uh his third medal of honor is denied basically on this technicality, but instead he gets awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Navy Cross, and France’s Medel Mitelier m medal of military, whatever that translates to in French.

Angie: I looked at it, I thought, I can do this, and then my tongue went, no. Nah, I’m out.

Theresa: Listen,

Angie: white girl, you know. No.

Theresa: Now, the greatest tribute that gets paid to him is by General Smite Smeatley D. Butler, the other Marine to be rewarded the two Congressional Medals of Honor for separate acts of valor. He calls Daly the finest Marine I ever knew. Which I love.

Angie: Yeah.

Theresa: Daly would get offered promotion several times, and he once remarked, I would rather be an outstanding sergeant than just another officer.

Angie: Yeah, he’s in it for the plot. I like I’m I’m here to Yeah, okay.

Theresa: Yeah, I want to be on the front lines. I’m here for a good time, not a long time. That’s basically his whole ethos.

Angie: Yeah. And

Theresa: he survives World War One. The war ends, and he would remain active duty until September 1919. He’s transferred to the Fleet Marine Corps Reserve, and then he goes on to take a Wall Street. Nope. It takes a job on Wall Street as a bank guard.

Angie: Okay. Well,

Theresa: five foot six of them. All five foot six, but I feel like you don’t realize he’s that short. I feel like he projects at a greater height. He probably has an extremely commanding presence because he’s used to projecting power and authority.

Angie: Yeah, no, I listen. If I were a bank robber and I saw him, I would be like, you know what? There’s a reason he’s here. Mm-hmm.

Theresa: Yeah.

Angie: Bye. Yeah.

Theresa: Um, he would hold his position for 17 years there and officially tired from the Marine Corps on February 6th, 1929, and was advanced the rank of sergeant major.

Angie: Okay.

Theresa: Now he’s known to talk about his exploits of others who fought bravery, but when it came to talking about himself, he’s always pretty tight-lipped, which I kind of expected from him. Now the Marine Corps University biography of Daly said that while he was a natural for publicity, he disdained it and disliked all the fuss made over him.

Angie: They’re always like that, aren’t they? Yeah. Yeah.

Theresa: He never married. Go ahead.

Angie: Of course he didn’t. I was just thinking, it’s always the ones don’t talk don’t talk about my don’t talk about me. Don’t don’t make me be in front of the camera that are the most badass.

Theresa: Then it’s the ones that did absolutely bump us that are like, and then And then I’ll take my picture. Right. But you know, when we had Jason Bell, the author a while back who wrote Operation Sparrow, he talked about his group, like that he covered for that entire thing. And the main guy leading it all, just extremely humble, wouldn’t really

Angie: brag about himself, and that made his own memoir

Theresa: very

Angie: It’s really hard.

Theresa: Yeah. But okay, so Dan Daly, he, according to the 1932 article of the Daily, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Daly’s hospitalized that year after having a heart attack, and on April 27, 1937, he died of heart disease at his sister’s home in the Glendale area of Queens.

Angie: He would go on to be that’s what got him.

Theresa: Heart disease.

Angie: You know, I it just to prove he had one. He didn’t cut that out.

Theresa: No. Um he’s buried in Cypress Hills National Cemetery in Brooklyn. Both of his medals of honor are housed at the National Museum of the U.S. Marine Corps in Quantico, Virginia. And I’ve got pictures.

Angie: I love it. Yep. Okay. Um, I love him already. The top photo is him in uniform. He’s older. He’s got the the quintessential 1918 Marine uniform with his his medals, the two that are um, I forget what it’s called when they’re the necklace ties style.

Theresa: Don’t don’t ask me. I don’t know.

Angie: But anyway, they’re like collared metals. Yep. And then the breast metal and all of his stripes. Oh, he’s fabulous. He’s looking straight at the camera and has some things to say you can just tell.

Theresa: And everything about it, yeah.

Angie: Like I’m not, I’m not dealing with your shit. A hundred percent. In the lower photo, he looks like someone I absolutely want to have hot chocolate with. Yeah.

Theresa: He’s got the trench coat on. He’s kind of grinning, like that sly little grin.

Angie: Um looking

Theresa: very avuncular. Yeah,

Angie: very unclear. him. I I want to have hot chocolate with him. Okay, this is younger him getting all of his see, he’s again in full uniform. He is getting his entire shirt pinned in metals. Holy cow. He’s got all of them.

Theresa: Yeah. He

Angie: basically was playing Pokemon and collecting them all. Yeah, I like the guy on the left looking at him, like.

Theresa: Right.

Angie: Ugh, this guy again.

Theresa: Like it how many metals this guy need? I’ve been standing at attention for an hour and a half.

Angie: Yeah, that’s exactly what it looks like. I I love that. Come on, you sons of bitches. Do you want to live forever? I am so glad you shared the story. That looks like the face of the man that would say that. It’s just an up close of his face. He’s looking off, he’s not looking at the camera. He’s got the short cropped hair. He’s plotting. Yeah.

Theresa: That’s the face he’s making. And he’s seen a thing or two.

Angie: Yeah, he has.

Theresa: This is the face of somebody who walks into the room knowing how he’s walking out and knowing how many bodies lie in his stead if he needs to go that way. Indeed.

Angie: Yes. I love him. Whoa. He’s fabulous. I’d Love it.

Theresa: But yeah, that’s my story.

Angie: I’m glad your story came after my story because my story was so gross.

Theresa: You know, it takes some time, right? Like, and I think that we, you know, I didn’t realize that I was gonna deliver a palette cleanser with a marine, but here we go.

Angie: You know. A marine is kind of always a palate cleanser when you think of their stories.

Theresa: Truth. Truth. They they’re going to be braggadocious la well, I mean, he didn’t brag, but very

Angie: stories

Theresa: are braggadocious.

Angie: Yes.

Theresa: Yes. So if you are enjoying the braggadocious nature of this and now have a wealth of information to drop off in the next time you’re trapped in an elevator, starting with politicians dying in cesspools and marines leading charges and doing incredible heroics. Rate, review, subscribe, and send this to somebody else who would shout, come on to you, sons of bitches. Do you want to live forever?

Angie: Yeah. Heck yeah.

Theresa: And on that note, goodbye.

Angie: Bye.