February 11, 2020 • 28 mins
It sounds like something straight out of a Tarantino film -- a bloodthirsty, eccentric soldier welding a longbow and claymore against Nazis, then celebrating his exploits by wailing on some bagpipes. Oddly enough, this is a true story: John 'Mad Jack' Churchill was a real-life World War II soldier known for his love of anachronistic weapons and his near-suicidal attitude on the battlefield. Join the guys as they explore the strange story of Mad Jack in part one of this two-part episode.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Any
(00:27):
officer who goes into action without his sword is improperly dressed.
Thanks so much for tuning in Ridiculous Historians. Welcome to
the show. My name is Ben. And that was a quote.
I'm sorry, I don't know why I like that makes
me laugh. Um, I thought I was hoping it was
just coming directly from you, and that was you just
chastising people who are not properly accessorized with their sword
(00:51):
oddestly enough yet. Know you and I have forgotten our
swords today, but our super producer, Casey Pegram is probably
still strapped. He's got two of them like across his
back like a ninja turtle at all times for sure.
So okay, Ben, I'm gonna we're gonna need a little
context about that. But that's that that quote there, that's true.
(01:12):
That is that is not a quotation from me, it's
not one from Casey, it's not one from you. It's
just a quote that we all three happen to agree with.
The source of this quote is a man named Lieutenant
Colonel John mad Jack Churchill, and he was not referring
to a sword in a metaphorical sense, was he No,
(01:35):
he wasn't. He was referring to you know, ceremonial military sword.
You know, that's part of the whole get up, um
it was. It really is more ceremonial than anything. I
don't know, there was too much sword play going on
in the battlefield, But this is a man who was very,
very concerned with tradition. Yeah, and his sword was a
(01:58):
little bit less ceremonial the old and most right. He
was Scottish and he had a Scottish broadsword that he
took with him to battle in World War Two. This
is a guy who is somehow not a character in
a Quentin Tarantino film yet. And today on this episode,
(02:21):
we're going to learn a little bit about Lieutenant Colonel Churchill,
and we're gonna learn a little bit about why people
called him mad Jack. And spoiler, this is not uh
an ironic nickname like little John or something. No, I mean,
this really does have little hints of like the Inglorious
Bastards uh in it. For sure. You mentioned in Tarantino connection.
(02:45):
It's because this was a man whose job it was
to hunt down and kill Nazis, and he did it
in a pretty creative way, as some of the bastards
did in that uh in that Tarantino picture. Let's let's
i've into Churchill's life. We know he was born in
nineteen o six. His father was in the Colonial service.
(03:09):
He had engineering post and he worked in admin and
this meant that the family moved around. They had been
in Sri Lanka or President day Sri Lanka, they had
been in Hong Kong, and when Jack was born, the
family was located in England. But there's still a little
bit of disagreement there. Some historians will stay he was
(03:31):
in the colony in Sri Lanka and some will say
he was in Hong Kong. Anyhow, his father's family came
from Oxfordshire and his name reflects their inherited geography, their
ancestry because they're on the Anglo Scottish border in the Highlands.
So he actually had his His full birth name is
(03:53):
much longer than just John Churchill. Oh, absolutely, Mr Boland
a long name. Indeed, he was christened John on Malcolm
Thorpe Fleming Churchill. See I miss those days. You know
how many people get five names from the jump. I mean,
it's certainly on the table, you know, it's just not
really done, but I think we should bring that back.
(04:17):
It has an air of gravitas to it, sort of
setting up your child for success as some sort of
dictator or at the very least a minor political player.
It also it gives you a moment to pause, you know,
when your name is officially announced. Now it's this parade
of ideas if you Most people in the States have
(04:39):
what I would say, on average, three names, first, middle,
and last. All I'm saying is it's a it's good
to have options. Oh yeah, that you know, think about
that too. Like we've all had friends, I imagine, who
later in life choose one of their names to be
their go to name. Like you might have a guy
whose name is Fergus Jeremy vander Schmidt, and growing up
(05:00):
he doesn't want to be called Fergus, so he's Jeremy
in school. But then he gets into like his college age,
and he's like in to beat poetry and stuff, and
he's like, now I'm Fergus or Fergie perhaps and joins
the black eyed piece. But see, here's the thing, though,
where does Jack come in. We've got John Malcolm Thorpe,
Fleming Churchill and then he ends up with Jack. Was
Jack short for uh? Jack must be short for John?
(05:25):
That makes no sense, the same number of syllables, I
don't under It's like Dick and Richard. Where did that
come from? No idea? You know, because rich was right there,
Riches in the front. Somebody went out of their way
to call their child at Dick. I would agree with that. Uh,
you know that the child probably had a bad attitude. Um.
You know. But here's the thing. Jack's father had a
(05:46):
had a very pithy, a little simple to the point name.
It was Alec. And when Jack was for Alec became
the director of public works in Hong Kong um and uh,
they moved. He moved his family to Asia and they
lived there for several years until nineteen seventeen. UM. And
that is when young Jack became fascinated by exploration. He
(06:13):
was kind of given free reign to just roam the
city at will um. And when he finally went back
to England, he wanted to keep that going. You know,
he he had already he had this thirst for exploration
that he um could not easily quench. Yeah, and we
don't know too much about the life and adventures of
(06:35):
young mad Jack Churchill. But we know a few things.
He graduated from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in nine
six and after that, when he was only twenty years old,
he was shipped off to Burma with the Manchester Regiment,
and he also took some time to do some road trips.
(06:55):
He drove his motorcycle around the region. Uh. And while
he was there, we know that he learned to play
the bagpipes, perhaps got a little bit obsessed with them.
I mean, there's really no way to just be casually
interested in the bagpipes. Ben, That's at least how I
feel about it. You know, once you go, once you
get in with the bagpipes, you really got to become
(07:16):
a total pipehead. Baghead maybe baghead just because uh, piper
doesn't work and pipe head has some sort of drug connotation.
I think you're probably right. What's the name of the
the thing that you blow into the the tamo, the shant,
the shanter, the tamos. I don't know, is that a hat?
That's the hat? These sound? These sound legit. I know
(07:37):
you don't blow into the bag. The bag just takes
them the air. I do also know that bagpipes can
sound good, but uh, only in the hands of a professional.
That's my point. It's sort of like playing the harp
or something. You can't be a casual harpist or the
oboe is really difficult. It's also you gotta have your
own masure, which is the way you hold your mouth
to to make the blows. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean
(08:00):
been in the Even the violin can sound ugly in
the hands of a novice. Trust me, dude, I mean
as a as a as a young violinist myself, I
have been around many Uh we did group lessons for violin,
like that's with all the little kids up to the
older kids, the little kids who that was hard? Is
it like t ball versus Little League? Did the little
kids have special violins? You know? It's funny the very
(08:22):
little kids, before they even get a violin, they get
a little box with a ruler taped to it and
like a stick and they just learned how to like
bow and like, you know, do the positions and all
that stuff. Do you still have yours? I don't know
my stick box now. I do have my violin in
a closet. It's covered in duct tape because I was
in like sort of a punky piraty band for a while,
(08:43):
and I had a pickup that I just kind of
taped onto it in the very d I y Tom
Morello e kind of way um, But anyway, um the
bagpipes it really called to young Jack. And during his
motorcycle exploration days he also got into our tree. Um.
And in the thirties he spent some time in Kenya
(09:04):
and Nairobi and Kenya. He was a newspaper editor, he
was a male model. UM. He again used his archery
skills to get spots in films like The Thief of Baghdad,
which is quite famous, and a Yank at Oxford where
he served as an extra right. And there's a little
bit of context we have to paint here because Churchill
(09:25):
ended up in Kenya in nine six because he left
the army, and he left the army because he was bored.
Historians speculate at the lack of conflict there was two
peaceful in the army, for he was living a lot
of these stories that people would dream about living or
(09:46):
or he was he was actually doing things that people
would write about and fantasize about. In the lack of
military conflict, he became obsessed with his two great loves.
He instead of spending his time killing people for the
(10:06):
British Empire, he spent his time practicing the bagpipes and
getting better and better at archery. In fact, he became
an award winning bagpipeist and an award winning archer. That's right.
In nineteen thirty eight there was a military bagpipe competition.
Because let's not forget we we kind of buried this
(10:26):
a little bit. Uh. The bagpipes were to the Scottish
sort of the way like marching drums and beauty life
and the fife or whatever. It's like what you would
lead the charge with, you know, because you can hear
it for miles and it's a very specific sound. And
like you said, Benn, it really is. When done correctly,
like our boy Jonathan Davis from the band corn Um
(10:48):
so skillfully does, it can be a very interesting sound. Actually,
my one of my favorite eighties musical breaks is in
the song Under the Milky Way by the Church and
it's it's got a bagpipe solo, and I think it's
really cool. They pull it off, they pull it off,
and and I think you're being very generous and diplomatic
by saying it is an interesting sound, because some people
(11:12):
might get mad at me here, folks, but I will
advance to you that a good At least one out
of five times you hear bagpipes in the wild, they're
not gonna sound great. You're probably right, ben, I do
love the name of the place where this, uh, this
military piping competition took place in nineteen thirty eight. It
was called alder Shot tattoo Um and it actually set
(11:33):
off a bit of a scandal um because he was,
in fact an Englishman and he was better at the
bagpipes than many of the Scotsman that were in the competition.
He was a real upset, yeah, he was. He was
a surprise second place winner, a bit of a dark
horse candidate. And then the next year, nineteen thirty nine,
(11:56):
he entered an archery competition, the World Archery Championship in Oslo, Norway,
and he also got second place there. Keep in mind,
he's still he's still a young guy when this is
all happening. He's in his twenties. He seems set to
live this life of a Roman adventurer until nine, the
(12:18):
dawn of World War Two. Indeed, the infamous invasion of
Poland by the German forces um, at which point he
was forced to go back to his post uh in
the British Army and become a part of the war effort,
where he joined the British Expeditionary Force to France. And
(12:40):
he I don't know how this worked, like because you
would think, you know, the military super regimented, and they
kind of you know, there's everything's issued and the everything
from the uniform to the weapons, and but they let
him use his archery skills on patrol, which I think
is really fascinating. He must have really showed them what
he could do and convey to them that hey, this
(13:00):
is my weapon of choice and it can be a
very deadly one. Yeah, and that's correct, and you're not
mishearing us. He was literally using a bow in war.
As odd as that might sound, the bow actually held
up pretty well against the contemporaneous firearms at the time.
(13:21):
Let's remember a bow and arrow is absolutely silent, and
there's an article in history dash uk dot com that
cites the stat that it is highly accurate as well
up to two hundred yards, so it's essentially like you know,
a silent sniper rifle and Vice dot com has this
(13:42):
great article about mad Jack that describes some of his
guerrilla tactics. So, right after the Allied retreat to Dunkirk
in mid mad Jack starts practicing his shooting, move, stick
and move guerrilla tactics he has. He stages raids, he
gets awards for his bravery, he gets clipped by machine
(14:06):
gun fire and survives, and this is okay, I mean, Casey,
maybe you can help us out with some Tarantino esque
sound cues that will pop up here whenever we say
there's a Tarantino moment, here's a Tarantino moment. One time
mad Jack is watching German forces moved from a tower
(14:26):
in a tiny village Lepinette, and mad Jack when he
when he sees the group moving, he takes his longbow
and he pulls it back and then plump, he shoots
a Nazi sergeant straight through the chest with a barbed arrow.
And then after that arrow, right after that arrow, his
infantrymen who are hanging with him just mow the place
(14:50):
down with bullets light them up. And I guess a
barbed arrow would make it impossible to pull it out
without just absolutely doing irreparable damage to your gun parts.
YEA not a nice way to go. I mean, think
about how painful that would be. Uh. He then was
able to rejoin his company and lead them across enemy
(15:10):
lines under cover of night. Um, even though he was
nursing that that shoulder shot. Yeah. Yeah, And this is
the thing. Earlier I said he had been clipped with
machine gun fire. But there's something you have to understand
in anybody who is unfortunate enough to have been shot
and survived, who's listening in the audience today, you know
exactly what I mean when I say that the movies
(15:33):
are lying to you. Everyone, every single person alive, is
genuinely startled by even a flesh wound from a quote
unquote flesh wound from a machine gun or a firearm.
It hurts, it's dangerous. Uh. And the weird thing is sometimes,
and I think this explains Matt Jack, sometimes, when people
(15:56):
are shot, the adrenaline that they're experiencing that's flooding their
body keeps them from noticing the pain until much later.
So he might have not even noticed he had been
shot until much later. But Uh, this famous longbow incident
makes him the only British soldier to have felled an
(16:17):
enemy with a longbow during World War Two. That for
most people, that's enough. Now you're in the history books
right now, you can retire, go back to being a
male model, play bagpipes in uh An Orientalist films top
of your your motorcycle, you know, I mean, really really
interesting guy for sure. So advancing a little bit of
(16:37):
the timeline when Churchill Um actually put himself forth as
a volunteer for this new elite squad of British commandos,
um he actually helped launch a raid, very successful raid
on um a Nazi garrison uh and and some of
(17:00):
their supply stores, and they had a fish oil factories
as well at Vagsy in Vay. I imagine that this
is one of these little um what do you call
little accents that I'm unfamiliar with in in the Norwegian
language of the tiny tiny oh. And then also the
O with an X through it, which I love, So
(17:20):
I don't quite know how those how those add to
the pronunciation. So we we always try to do our best, um.
And this was an island, right, so this Nazi garrison
was on the island of Vagsy in Norway, and uh
so his commando group, British number three battalion landed on
December in nineteen one, and it was to the sound
(17:45):
of those those iconic bagpipes. Yes, it's the drone that
really sets them apart. Let's let's just break down really
quick the components of a bagpipe. You've got the bag
that you have to keep pumping because as you're pumping it,
that's what's uh, you know, circular lating air to create
that drone, and then you are blowing into it in
between playing on the flutie part, which I think is
(18:07):
called the it's called the blowstick. Is it really called
the blow really called the blowstick? What's the other part?
I swears? So that's the part that uh there. But
then there's the again, the flutie bit that makes sort
of the melody, while the drone is created by inflating
(18:28):
and deflating the giant bag um. So you have that
combination of almost just that drone of doom, you know
on the low end that just keeps going. It's just endless,
and then you have that kind of creepy melody up top. Correction,
the blowstick is its own thing. The chanter is separate, right.
The chanter, I believe is the flutie part. The chanter
(18:49):
is the flutie part that that produces the melody notes,
and they're also there's also the tuning slide. Not to
be confused. The blow stick, I believe is what you
have to continuously, you know, switch over to you and
inflate to get the bag before. So he's doing this
(19:10):
in the middle of a war. Important part. It is
very important part bagpipe mechanics aside um. So you know,
the Nazis heard that, and as far as they are concerned,
that's the sound of their own demise, the sound of doom. Right. Uh,
the Casey, if we can, let's let's play a clip
if we can, of the song that mad Jack played.
(19:35):
It's it's called the March of the Cameron Men. So
so Casey off, Mike, you said something interesting about that
while we were playing it. What's your take, Well, I
(19:57):
just said, it sounds like every other bagpipe composition I've
ever heard in my life. And I said, because of
that drone, right, Because it's it's it's the the elements
are just really there's really no way around it and
hard to escape it. And I feel like I should
just be watching like a parade in a movie where
something's going on, people are glaring at each other. Maybe
that's right, And then Mel Gibson is in the background
(20:19):
going freedom exactly, So something like that does kind of happen.
This is another Tarantino moment, if we, if we ever
managed to get that sound cute. As he hits the shore,
he stops playing the bagpipes he throws. He throws them somewhere,
probably touched him behind his back, I don't know, and
he jumps out of the boat. He lobs a grenade
(20:41):
at the German forces. He draws his freaking broadsword, screams,
and then runs into the battle. Yeah. Ironically this was
known as Operation Archery. He didn't seem to employ his
his ninja silent bow skills in this one. You want
to go straight into the fray, And I mean it
(21:02):
really was kind of almost like a Kama Kaze mission.
You know, he was just blasting his way into the
you know, the fray without any sense of self preservation
at all. It's really in the screaming, you know, I mean,
good lord. The image here is very, very visceral, and
we're not exaggerating because it turns out there's actually some
film footage that you can find of the raid and
(21:24):
then of Jack himself playing his bagpipes on deck after
the whole she bank. It's a very fact. Let's let's
just play. I know we're clip heavy this episode. What
do you guys want to hear this? I'm loving it? Yeah,
as all I look back to sew. The tell tale
fires plays a victory message that never can be told
or written, victory with a capital B, and one that
(21:45):
will be recorded in tulibly and all history. The intrepid
bagpiper who led the commandos in battle, now leads them
in a dance of joy. It's a well earned a version.
They seek a deck of cads in a friendly game. Alright, okay,
(22:05):
so here's what's going on this. This is an old
propaganda video. It's it's definitely worth your time to watch.
You some of you perfect strangers fans in the audience
may have caught the phrase dance of joy. You can
see the soldiers there, I would say, for for the era,
what they're doing is you know, you could call that
getting down. They're getting down. Yeah. What they're actually doing
(22:27):
is dancing a Highland fling, which is a very popular
dance um in Scottish culture. You know, your lock elbows,
you go around in a circle, a lot of fancy footwork,
famously portrayed in the Highlander films. Yes I'm kidding, not really,
but in the franchise. I think it's it's a subtext.
(22:47):
It may well be. Yeah, there can only be one
Highland fling. We also know that this crazy, semi suicidal
action earned Churchill the Military Cross. He did have another
close call and another semi serious injury during this time,
(23:09):
but it was at the it was at the party
after the battle. It's funny. There's a and then the
Vice article that we've been we've been citing. Um, they
put the word demolition expert in quotes because apparently a
during this party, Um, when uh, when Jack was drinking
a bottle of wine, this demolition quotation fingers expert accidentally
(23:31):
set off a charge. I wonder if he was drunkenly
showing off or something, bragging, bragging about his his expertise.
And yeah, that bottle of wine got got exploded and
shards of it were lodged in his forehead. But I mean,
as we know, it's it's gonna take a lot more
than a few wine shards in the skull to uh
(23:52):
to to get old Jack down. So he was back
to piping and slicing and you know, archering. Um. Very
quickly by he was in Italy for another campaign. Arching archering.
They're both sounds fun. Yeah, I don't know, bowe bowman.
You know he could be I don't know. I think
(24:13):
I think it would be arch archering. Yeah, arch, that
doesn't matter an archers, right, I don't know. Man. We
gotta to look this up. In that, let's move forward.
We'll just make up a fun make up a fun
phrase describing that, and and give us your pitch. So, yes,
you're correct. In nineteen forty three, he is back on
the road seeking blood and treasure in the Great War.
(24:35):
He has a reputation for being crazy at this point.
There's no other way to say it. He is incredibly
bellicose and aggressive. He is known for going on unofficial
raids and counterattacks. I think something just got his dander
up or his blood up, and he would he would
literally go through his crew or the people who are
(24:56):
around him. He would say things like you know you
you and you come with me. So we would pick
a few soldiers that he thought had grit uh and
a willingness to die. And these practices continue even when
he becomes a commanding officer leading commandos. And this is
(25:17):
where we get the iconic image of mad Jack. He's
got his broadsword around his waist, he's got his longbow,
and he's got arrows. He's carrying the bagpipe still, and
people who serve with him start to see him as
an icon. You know, he is like a superhero to
that word gets around when you charge screaming into battle
(25:39):
brandishing a broadsword when that is very much the nachronistic
weapon in those times, and like he's, oh yeah, he's
the he's the crazy nut that that shoots Nazis with arrows,
you know, I mean, like really, his reputation absolutely preceded him.
So let's pause there. Let's make this, as a matter
of fact, part one of the story of mad Jack.
(26:00):
I like the idea of holding him for a moment
beyond time, just this image of a real life superhero,
a source of inspiration, uh, something that that rallied people.
Just seeing this guy on the battlefield probably kept some
people going, you know, oh absolutely, I mean, you know,
(26:20):
he he didn't. It wasn't the kind of madness that
you know, caused people to not want to be around him.
It was the kind of madness that would rally other
people around his absolute courage and bravado and just he
was a real character, as we were going to hear
much more about in part two. Well, Germans didn't want
to be around him. No, Germans didn't want to be
around him, but he wanted to be around them, and
(26:42):
he wanted to give him a good slice, which they
clearly had come in. So what exactly happened to mad Jack?
What did he tell his followers to scream on the battlefield?
And what are the other Tarantino moments of his strange,
bloody career. There's going to be quite a few, my friends,
and you'll find out when you tune in for our
(27:04):
next episode. In the meantime, Huge thanks super producer Casey Pegram,
Alex Williams who composed our theme, research associate Gabe Loser
for hipping us to this incredible story of blood, treasure
and bravado. Big big thanks of course due Christopher Hasiotis
to Eve's Jeff Coach. Huge thanks as always, too Young
(27:25):
Quizzles a k a. The Quizzerino a k. The Quizmeister,
also known in some circles as Jonathan Stricklett. I hear
he's buying a franchise of quizz Nos sub shops. Finally good.
You know what I like about them is they they
heat the sandwich as like the de Factos starting point.
It's toasted. There's no option. You can't get an untoasted
sandwich a quiz Nos. They'd ask you to leave. Yeah, well,
(27:48):
you know they should, They really should. It's barbaric. Well, Jonathan,
if you're listening, don't screw that up for me. Seriously.
We'll see you next time foix. For more podcasts from
My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Any
(00:27):
officer who goes into action without his sword is improperly dressed.
Thanks so much for tuning in Ridiculous Historians. Welcome to
the show. My name is Ben. And that was a quote.
I'm sorry, I don't know why I like that makes
me laugh. Um, I thought I was hoping it was
just coming directly from you, and that was you just
chastising people who are not properly accessorized with their sword
(00:51):
oddestly enough yet. Know you and I have forgotten our
swords today, but our super producer, Casey Pegram is probably
still strapped. He's got two of them like across his
back like a ninja turtle at all times for sure.
So okay, Ben, I'm gonna we're gonna need a little
context about that. But that's that that quote there, that's true.
(01:12):
That is that is not a quotation from me, it's
not one from Casey, it's not one from you. It's
just a quote that we all three happen to agree with.
The source of this quote is a man named Lieutenant
Colonel John mad Jack Churchill, and he was not referring
to a sword in a metaphorical sense, was he No,
(01:35):
he wasn't. He was referring to you know, ceremonial military sword.
You know, that's part of the whole get up, um
it was. It really is more ceremonial than anything. I
don't know, there was too much sword play going on
in the battlefield, But this is a man who was very,
very concerned with tradition. Yeah, and his sword was a
(01:58):
little bit less ceremonial the old and most right. He
was Scottish and he had a Scottish broadsword that he
took with him to battle in World War Two. This
is a guy who is somehow not a character in
a Quentin Tarantino film yet. And today on this episode,
(02:21):
we're going to learn a little bit about Lieutenant Colonel Churchill,
and we're gonna learn a little bit about why people
called him mad Jack. And spoiler, this is not uh
an ironic nickname like little John or something. No, I mean,
this really does have little hints of like the Inglorious
Bastards uh in it. For sure. You mentioned in Tarantino connection.
(02:45):
It's because this was a man whose job it was
to hunt down and kill Nazis, and he did it
in a pretty creative way, as some of the bastards
did in that uh in that Tarantino picture. Let's let's
i've into Churchill's life. We know he was born in
nineteen o six. His father was in the Colonial service.
(03:09):
He had engineering post and he worked in admin and
this meant that the family moved around. They had been
in Sri Lanka or President day Sri Lanka, they had
been in Hong Kong, and when Jack was born, the
family was located in England. But there's still a little
bit of disagreement there. Some historians will stay he was
(03:31):
in the colony in Sri Lanka and some will say
he was in Hong Kong. Anyhow, his father's family came
from Oxfordshire and his name reflects their inherited geography, their
ancestry because they're on the Anglo Scottish border in the Highlands.
So he actually had his His full birth name is
(03:53):
much longer than just John Churchill. Oh, absolutely, Mr Boland
a long name. Indeed, he was christened John on Malcolm
Thorpe Fleming Churchill. See I miss those days. You know
how many people get five names from the jump. I mean,
it's certainly on the table, you know, it's just not
really done, but I think we should bring that back.
(04:17):
It has an air of gravitas to it, sort of
setting up your child for success as some sort of
dictator or at the very least a minor political player.
It also it gives you a moment to pause, you know,
when your name is officially announced. Now it's this parade
of ideas if you Most people in the States have
(04:39):
what I would say, on average, three names, first, middle,
and last. All I'm saying is it's a it's good
to have options. Oh yeah, that you know, think about
that too. Like we've all had friends, I imagine, who
later in life choose one of their names to be
their go to name. Like you might have a guy
whose name is Fergus Jeremy vander Schmidt, and growing up
(05:00):
he doesn't want to be called Fergus, so he's Jeremy
in school. But then he gets into like his college age,
and he's like in to beat poetry and stuff, and
he's like, now I'm Fergus or Fergie perhaps and joins
the black eyed piece. But see, here's the thing, though,
where does Jack come in. We've got John Malcolm Thorpe,
Fleming Churchill and then he ends up with Jack. Was
Jack short for uh? Jack must be short for John?
(05:25):
That makes no sense, the same number of syllables, I
don't under It's like Dick and Richard. Where did that
come from? No idea? You know, because rich was right there,
Riches in the front. Somebody went out of their way
to call their child at Dick. I would agree with that. Uh,
you know that the child probably had a bad attitude. Um.
You know. But here's the thing. Jack's father had a
(05:46):
had a very pithy, a little simple to the point name.
It was Alec. And when Jack was for Alec became
the director of public works in Hong Kong um and uh,
they moved. He moved his family to Asia and they
lived there for several years until nineteen seventeen. UM. And
that is when young Jack became fascinated by exploration. He
(06:13):
was kind of given free reign to just roam the
city at will um. And when he finally went back
to England, he wanted to keep that going. You know,
he he had already he had this thirst for exploration
that he um could not easily quench. Yeah, and we
don't know too much about the life and adventures of
(06:35):
young mad Jack Churchill. But we know a few things.
He graduated from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in nine
six and after that, when he was only twenty years old,
he was shipped off to Burma with the Manchester Regiment,
and he also took some time to do some road trips.
(06:55):
He drove his motorcycle around the region. Uh. And while
he was there, we know that he learned to play
the bagpipes, perhaps got a little bit obsessed with them.
I mean, there's really no way to just be casually
interested in the bagpipes. Ben, That's at least how I
feel about it. You know, once you go, once you
get in with the bagpipes, you really got to become
(07:16):
a total pipehead. Baghead maybe baghead just because uh, piper
doesn't work and pipe head has some sort of drug connotation.
I think you're probably right. What's the name of the
the thing that you blow into the the tamo, the shant,
the shanter, the tamos. I don't know, is that a hat?
That's the hat? These sound? These sound legit. I know
(07:37):
you don't blow into the bag. The bag just takes
them the air. I do also know that bagpipes can
sound good, but uh, only in the hands of a professional.
That's my point. It's sort of like playing the harp
or something. You can't be a casual harpist or the
oboe is really difficult. It's also you gotta have your
own masure, which is the way you hold your mouth
to to make the blows. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean
(08:00):
been in the Even the violin can sound ugly in
the hands of a novice. Trust me, dude, I mean
as a as a as a young violinist myself, I
have been around many Uh we did group lessons for violin,
like that's with all the little kids up to the
older kids, the little kids who that was hard? Is
it like t ball versus Little League? Did the little
kids have special violins? You know? It's funny the very
(08:22):
little kids, before they even get a violin, they get
a little box with a ruler taped to it and
like a stick and they just learned how to like
bow and like, you know, do the positions and all
that stuff. Do you still have yours? I don't know
my stick box now. I do have my violin in
a closet. It's covered in duct tape because I was
in like sort of a punky piraty band for a while,
(08:43):
and I had a pickup that I just kind of
taped onto it in the very d I y Tom
Morello e kind of way um, But anyway, um the
bagpipes it really called to young Jack. And during his
motorcycle exploration days he also got into our tree. Um.
And in the thirties he spent some time in Kenya
(09:04):
and Nairobi and Kenya. He was a newspaper editor, he
was a male model. UM. He again used his archery
skills to get spots in films like The Thief of Baghdad,
which is quite famous, and a Yank at Oxford where
he served as an extra right. And there's a little
bit of context we have to paint here because Churchill
(09:25):
ended up in Kenya in nine six because he left
the army, and he left the army because he was bored.
Historians speculate at the lack of conflict there was two
peaceful in the army, for he was living a lot
of these stories that people would dream about living or
(09:46):
or he was he was actually doing things that people
would write about and fantasize about. In the lack of
military conflict, he became obsessed with his two great loves.
He instead of spending his time killing people for the
(10:06):
British Empire, he spent his time practicing the bagpipes and
getting better and better at archery. In fact, he became
an award winning bagpipeist and an award winning archer. That's right.
In nineteen thirty eight there was a military bagpipe competition.
Because let's not forget we we kind of buried this
(10:26):
a little bit. Uh. The bagpipes were to the Scottish
sort of the way like marching drums and beauty life
and the fife or whatever. It's like what you would
lead the charge with, you know, because you can hear
it for miles and it's a very specific sound. And
like you said, Benn, it really is. When done correctly,
like our boy Jonathan Davis from the band corn Um
(10:48):
so skillfully does, it can be a very interesting sound. Actually,
my one of my favorite eighties musical breaks is in
the song Under the Milky Way by the Church and
it's it's got a bagpipe solo, and I think it's
really cool. They pull it off, they pull it off,
and and I think you're being very generous and diplomatic
by saying it is an interesting sound, because some people
(11:12):
might get mad at me here, folks, but I will
advance to you that a good At least one out
of five times you hear bagpipes in the wild, they're
not gonna sound great. You're probably right, ben, I do
love the name of the place where this, uh, this
military piping competition took place in nineteen thirty eight. It
was called alder Shot tattoo Um and it actually set
(11:33):
off a bit of a scandal um because he was,
in fact an Englishman and he was better at the
bagpipes than many of the Scotsman that were in the competition.
He was a real upset, yeah, he was. He was
a surprise second place winner, a bit of a dark
horse candidate. And then the next year, nineteen thirty nine,
(11:56):
he entered an archery competition, the World Archery Championship in Oslo, Norway,
and he also got second place there. Keep in mind,
he's still he's still a young guy when this is
all happening. He's in his twenties. He seems set to
live this life of a Roman adventurer until nine, the
(12:18):
dawn of World War Two. Indeed, the infamous invasion of
Poland by the German forces um, at which point he
was forced to go back to his post uh in
the British Army and become a part of the war effort,
where he joined the British Expeditionary Force to France. And
(12:40):
he I don't know how this worked, like because you
would think, you know, the military super regimented, and they
kind of you know, there's everything's issued and the everything
from the uniform to the weapons, and but they let
him use his archery skills on patrol, which I think
is really fascinating. He must have really showed them what
he could do and convey to them that hey, this
(13:00):
is my weapon of choice and it can be a
very deadly one. Yeah, and that's correct, and you're not
mishearing us. He was literally using a bow in war.
As odd as that might sound, the bow actually held
up pretty well against the contemporaneous firearms at the time.
(13:21):
Let's remember a bow and arrow is absolutely silent, and
there's an article in history dash uk dot com that
cites the stat that it is highly accurate as well
up to two hundred yards, so it's essentially like you know,
a silent sniper rifle and Vice dot com has this
(13:42):
great article about mad Jack that describes some of his
guerrilla tactics. So, right after the Allied retreat to Dunkirk
in mid mad Jack starts practicing his shooting, move, stick
and move guerrilla tactics he has. He stages raids, he
gets awards for his bravery, he gets clipped by machine
(14:06):
gun fire and survives, and this is okay, I mean, Casey,
maybe you can help us out with some Tarantino esque
sound cues that will pop up here whenever we say
there's a Tarantino moment, here's a Tarantino moment. One time
mad Jack is watching German forces moved from a tower
(14:26):
in a tiny village Lepinette, and mad Jack when he
when he sees the group moving, he takes his longbow
and he pulls it back and then plump, he shoots
a Nazi sergeant straight through the chest with a barbed arrow.
And then after that arrow, right after that arrow, his
infantrymen who are hanging with him just mow the place
(14:50):
down with bullets light them up. And I guess a
barbed arrow would make it impossible to pull it out
without just absolutely doing irreparable damage to your gun parts.
YEA not a nice way to go. I mean, think
about how painful that would be. Uh. He then was
able to rejoin his company and lead them across enemy
(15:10):
lines under cover of night. Um, even though he was
nursing that that shoulder shot. Yeah. Yeah, And this is
the thing. Earlier I said he had been clipped with
machine gun fire. But there's something you have to understand
in anybody who is unfortunate enough to have been shot
and survived, who's listening in the audience today, you know
exactly what I mean when I say that the movies
(15:33):
are lying to you. Everyone, every single person alive, is
genuinely startled by even a flesh wound from a quote
unquote flesh wound from a machine gun or a firearm.
It hurts, it's dangerous. Uh. And the weird thing is sometimes,
and I think this explains Matt Jack, sometimes, when people
(15:56):
are shot, the adrenaline that they're experiencing that's flooding their
body keeps them from noticing the pain until much later.
So he might have not even noticed he had been
shot until much later. But Uh, this famous longbow incident
makes him the only British soldier to have felled an
(16:17):
enemy with a longbow during World War Two. That for
most people, that's enough. Now you're in the history books
right now, you can retire, go back to being a
male model, play bagpipes in uh An Orientalist films top
of your your motorcycle, you know, I mean, really really
interesting guy for sure. So advancing a little bit of
(16:37):
the timeline when Churchill Um actually put himself forth as
a volunteer for this new elite squad of British commandos,
um he actually helped launch a raid, very successful raid
on um a Nazi garrison uh and and some of
(17:00):
their supply stores, and they had a fish oil factories
as well at Vagsy in Vay. I imagine that this
is one of these little um what do you call
little accents that I'm unfamiliar with in in the Norwegian
language of the tiny tiny oh. And then also the
O with an X through it, which I love, So
(17:20):
I don't quite know how those how those add to
the pronunciation. So we we always try to do our best, um.
And this was an island, right, so this Nazi garrison
was on the island of Vagsy in Norway, and uh
so his commando group, British number three battalion landed on
December in nineteen one, and it was to the sound
(17:45):
of those those iconic bagpipes. Yes, it's the drone that
really sets them apart. Let's let's just break down really
quick the components of a bagpipe. You've got the bag
that you have to keep pumping because as you're pumping it,
that's what's uh, you know, circular lating air to create
that drone, and then you are blowing into it in
between playing on the flutie part, which I think is
(18:07):
called the it's called the blowstick. Is it really called
the blow really called the blowstick? What's the other part?
I swears? So that's the part that uh there. But
then there's the again, the flutie bit that makes sort
of the melody, while the drone is created by inflating
(18:28):
and deflating the giant bag um. So you have that
combination of almost just that drone of doom, you know
on the low end that just keeps going. It's just endless,
and then you have that kind of creepy melody up top. Correction,
the blowstick is its own thing. The chanter is separate, right.
The chanter, I believe is the flutie part. The chanter
(18:49):
is the flutie part that that produces the melody notes,
and they're also there's also the tuning slide. Not to
be confused. The blow stick, I believe is what you
have to continuously, you know, switch over to you and
inflate to get the bag before. So he's doing this
(19:10):
in the middle of a war. Important part. It is
very important part bagpipe mechanics aside um. So you know,
the Nazis heard that, and as far as they are concerned,
that's the sound of their own demise, the sound of doom. Right. Uh,
the Casey, if we can, let's let's play a clip
if we can, of the song that mad Jack played.
(19:35):
It's it's called the March of the Cameron Men. So
so Casey off, Mike, you said something interesting about that
while we were playing it. What's your take, Well, I
(19:57):
just said, it sounds like every other bagpipe composition I've
ever heard in my life. And I said, because of
that drone, right, Because it's it's it's the the elements
are just really there's really no way around it and
hard to escape it. And I feel like I should
just be watching like a parade in a movie where
something's going on, people are glaring at each other. Maybe
that's right, And then Mel Gibson is in the background
(20:19):
going freedom exactly, So something like that does kind of happen.
This is another Tarantino moment, if we, if we ever
managed to get that sound cute. As he hits the shore,
he stops playing the bagpipes he throws. He throws them somewhere,
probably touched him behind his back, I don't know, and
he jumps out of the boat. He lobs a grenade
(20:41):
at the German forces. He draws his freaking broadsword, screams,
and then runs into the battle. Yeah. Ironically this was
known as Operation Archery. He didn't seem to employ his
his ninja silent bow skills in this one. You want
to go straight into the fray, And I mean it
(21:02):
really was kind of almost like a Kama Kaze mission.
You know, he was just blasting his way into the
you know, the fray without any sense of self preservation
at all. It's really in the screaming, you know, I mean,
good lord. The image here is very, very visceral, and
we're not exaggerating because it turns out there's actually some
film footage that you can find of the raid and
(21:24):
then of Jack himself playing his bagpipes on deck after
the whole she bank. It's a very fact. Let's let's
just play. I know we're clip heavy this episode. What
do you guys want to hear this? I'm loving it? Yeah,
as all I look back to sew. The tell tale
fires plays a victory message that never can be told
or written, victory with a capital B, and one that
(21:45):
will be recorded in tulibly and all history. The intrepid
bagpiper who led the commandos in battle, now leads them
in a dance of joy. It's a well earned a version.
They seek a deck of cads in a friendly game. Alright, okay,
(22:05):
so here's what's going on this. This is an old
propaganda video. It's it's definitely worth your time to watch.
You some of you perfect strangers fans in the audience
may have caught the phrase dance of joy. You can
see the soldiers there, I would say, for for the era,
what they're doing is you know, you could call that
getting down. They're getting down. Yeah. What they're actually doing
(22:27):
is dancing a Highland fling, which is a very popular
dance um in Scottish culture. You know, your lock elbows,
you go around in a circle, a lot of fancy footwork,
famously portrayed in the Highlander films. Yes I'm kidding, not really,
but in the franchise. I think it's it's a subtext.
(22:47):
It may well be. Yeah, there can only be one
Highland fling. We also know that this crazy, semi suicidal
action earned Churchill the Military Cross. He did have another
close call and another semi serious injury during this time,
(23:09):
but it was at the it was at the party
after the battle. It's funny. There's a and then the
Vice article that we've been we've been citing. Um, they
put the word demolition expert in quotes because apparently a
during this party, Um, when uh, when Jack was drinking
a bottle of wine, this demolition quotation fingers expert accidentally
(23:31):
set off a charge. I wonder if he was drunkenly
showing off or something, bragging, bragging about his his expertise.
And yeah, that bottle of wine got got exploded and
shards of it were lodged in his forehead. But I mean,
as we know, it's it's gonna take a lot more
than a few wine shards in the skull to uh
(23:52):
to to get old Jack down. So he was back
to piping and slicing and you know, archering. Um. Very
quickly by he was in Italy for another campaign. Arching archering.
They're both sounds fun. Yeah, I don't know, bowe bowman.
You know he could be I don't know. I think
(24:13):
I think it would be arch archering. Yeah, arch, that
doesn't matter an archers, right, I don't know. Man. We
gotta to look this up. In that, let's move forward.
We'll just make up a fun make up a fun
phrase describing that, and and give us your pitch. So, yes,
you're correct. In nineteen forty three, he is back on
the road seeking blood and treasure in the Great War.
(24:35):
He has a reputation for being crazy at this point.
There's no other way to say it. He is incredibly
bellicose and aggressive. He is known for going on unofficial
raids and counterattacks. I think something just got his dander
up or his blood up, and he would he would
literally go through his crew or the people who are
(24:56):
around him. He would say things like you know you
you and you come with me. So we would pick
a few soldiers that he thought had grit uh and
a willingness to die. And these practices continue even when
he becomes a commanding officer leading commandos. And this is
(25:17):
where we get the iconic image of mad Jack. He's
got his broadsword around his waist, he's got his longbow,
and he's got arrows. He's carrying the bagpipe still, and
people who serve with him start to see him as
an icon. You know, he is like a superhero to
that word gets around when you charge screaming into battle
(25:39):
brandishing a broadsword when that is very much the nachronistic
weapon in those times, and like he's, oh yeah, he's
the he's the crazy nut that that shoots Nazis with arrows,
you know, I mean, like really, his reputation absolutely preceded him.
So let's pause there. Let's make this, as a matter
of fact, part one of the story of mad Jack.
(26:00):
I like the idea of holding him for a moment
beyond time, just this image of a real life superhero,
a source of inspiration, uh, something that that rallied people.
Just seeing this guy on the battlefield probably kept some
people going, you know, oh absolutely, I mean, you know,
(26:20):
he he didn't. It wasn't the kind of madness that
you know, caused people to not want to be around him.
It was the kind of madness that would rally other
people around his absolute courage and bravado and just he
was a real character, as we were going to hear
much more about in part two. Well, Germans didn't want
to be around him. No, Germans didn't want to be
around him, but he wanted to be around them, and
(26:42):
he wanted to give him a good slice, which they
clearly had come in. So what exactly happened to mad Jack?
What did he tell his followers to scream on the battlefield?
And what are the other Tarantino moments of his strange,
bloody career. There's going to be quite a few, my friends,
and you'll find out when you tune in for our
(27:04):
next episode. In the meantime, Huge thanks super producer Casey Pegram,
Alex Williams who composed our theme, research associate Gabe Loser
for hipping us to this incredible story of blood, treasure
and bravado. Big big thanks of course due Christopher Hasiotis
to Eve's Jeff Coach. Huge thanks as always, too Young
(27:25):
Quizzles a k a. The Quizzerino a k. The Quizmeister,
also known in some circles as Jonathan Stricklett. I hear
he's buying a franchise of quizz Nos sub shops. Finally good.
You know what I like about them is they they
heat the sandwich as like the de Factos starting point.
It's toasted. There's no option. You can't get an untoasted
sandwich a quiz Nos. They'd ask you to leave. Yeah, well,
(27:48):
you know they should, They really should. It's barbaric. Well, Jonathan,
if you're listening, don't screw that up for me. Seriously.
We'll see you next time foix. For more podcasts from
My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Ridiculous History News
Hosts And Creators
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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