CANADA MILITARY NEWS- 10 BADASS CANADIAN HEROES- and some women- and some valentine fun -God bless our troops

HISTORY

10 Badass Canadian War Heroes

Canadians are typically seen as some of the most peaceful and non-confrontational people on the planet. But under this layer of politeness and goodwill, Canada has produced some of the fiercest and bravest soldiers the world has ever seen.

10Ernest “Smokey” Smith

With a reputation as a hellraiser, Ernest “Smokey” Smith had a knack for annoying his superiors—he was promoted to corporal and then demoted back to private nine times. But when it came to battle, he more than earned his reputation as one of Canada’s greatest soldiers.

In October 1944, as the Allies were pushing through northern Italy against fierce German resistance, Smith and his small platoon were sent across the flooded Savio river to secure an important beachhead. After capturing the position, they came under an intense enemy counter-attack. The Germans dispatched three Panther tanks, self-propelled artillery guns, and a horde of infantry to retake the position, pinning the Canadians down near the river. Smith didn’t waste any time—he grabbed his PIAT anti-tank bazooka and sprang into action. Under intense enemy fire, he walked to within 10 meters (33 ft) of the first Panther tank and took it out with a single shot.

Once the Germans had overcome their surprise at Smith’s audacity, they sent 10 infantrymen to get rid of him. Unfazed, Smith grabbed his Tommy gun and stood his ground, killing four of the enemy and forcing the remainder to retreat. He continued to hold his position while defending a wounded comrade, forcing additional German forces to “withdraw in disorder,” before carrying his friend to safety. His platoon was so inspired by his example that they were able to hold the Germans back, securing the beachhead.

Hilariously, the army later had to lock Smokey in an Italian post office overnight, just to make sure the “wild man” wouldn’t vanish before being flown to London to meet the King and receive the Victoria Cross. Years later, he cheerfully confirmed his crazy reputation: “Oh, yeah. I didn’t take orders. I didn’t believe in them.”

9Leo Major

Leo Major’s story is so preposterous that Hollywood still hasn’t made a movie about it. A French-Canadian who saw action in the Normandy landings, Leo began his military career by capturing an armored vehicle full of communications equipment, providing the Allies with invaluable intelligence. He then single-handedly took out a group of elite Nazi SS troops, but lost his left eye after a dying enemy managed to ignite a phosphorus grenade. When a doctor tried to send him home, Leo reportedly replied that he only needed one eye to aim. He later broke several bones in his back, but again refused to be evacuated, returning to the battlefield to participate in the liberation of Holland.

During an early-morning reconnaissance mission at the Battle of the Scheldt, he spotted a German contingent in a village, most of them asleep. A typical soldier would have returned to report to a superior, but for a guy like Leo this was an opportunity. He captured the German commander, and after killing a few soldiers, the entire company of 93 men surrendered to him. He then escorted them back to the Allied lines. Seriously, you can’t make this stuff up.

But Leo’s greatest feat was still to come. In April 1945, the Canadians were tasked with liberating the Dutch city of Zwolle. Their plan was to bombard the German positions with artillery until they surrendered. Leo was once again sent on a reconnaissance mission, this time with a friend. His superiors really should’ve known better. Realizing that an artillery barrage would also kill innocent civilians, Leo and his buddy Willie decided to liberate the city all by themselves. Unfortunately, around midnight, Willie was shot and killed. Enraged, Leo grabbed his friend’s weapon and gunned down two Germans, with the others fleeing in terror. He then proceeded to capture a different German vehicle and forced the driver to bring him to an enemy officer at a nearby tavern. Leo then informed the surprised officer that the town was surrounded by an overwhelming Canadian force and that an attack was imminent, before strolling out of the tavern and disappearing into the night.

The next step was to convince the Germans that what he had told the officer was true. Leo spent the rest of the night racing around the town, gunning down Nazis and throwing grenades like a one-man army. After seeing their comrades gunned down by a mad Canadian in an eyepatch, most enemy soldiers made the smart choice and surrendered. As the night wore on, Leo kept appearing at the Allied lines with groups of confused German prisoners—before returning to the city. His final feat was to clear out the local SS headquarters. By 4:00 AM, the Germans had abandoned the town. The artillery attack was canceled, the city saved by a single man.

Leo received numerous medals for his deeds in World War II, and earned even more in Korea. Leo Major died in 2008, but his memory lives on in Zwolle, where he is regarded as a hero.

8Tommy Prince

Born into the Brokenhead Ojibwa band, Tommy Prince became a Canadian hero at a time when Aboriginal people were still discriminated against by the government. During World War II, Prince enrolled in the 1st Canadian Special Service Battalion. As the name suggests, the group was one of the first modern special forces units, performing highly dangerous missions behind enemy lines. They were arguably the closest real-world counterpart to Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds.

Prior to deployment, the team trained rigorously in stealth tactics, hand-to-hand combat, the use of explosives, amphibious assaults, and alpine warfare. Prince’s particular role was to scout forward and observe enemy movements. His unit terrified Axis soldiers, who called them “the Black Devils” because of their ability to sneak behind enemy lines and slit throats under the cover of darkness. As one of Prince’s officers recalled: “He moved like a shadow. Sometimes, instead of killing the Germans, he’d steal something from them. Other times, he’d slit their throats and not make a sound.”

One of Prince’s most famous stunts came in Italy, in 1944. Dressed as a farmer, he set up an observation post in an abandoned house only 200 meters (656 ft) from a German camp. He would report on German movements via a communications wire, and the positions would then be struck by artillery. Unfortunately, the wire eventually became damaged by the shelling. Completely unfazed, Prince grabbed his farming tools and walked out in full view of the Germans. Pretending to be a local working his field, he walked along the wire until he found the problem, which he repaired while pretending to tie his shoes. Just to seal the deal, he shook his fist at both the Germans and the Allies, to show his supposed anger toward both parties. Prince successfully fooled the Germans, and his reconnaissance resulted in the destruction of four artillery posts.

Not content with terrifying the enemy in Italy, Prince moved on to France, where he walked 70 kilometers (43 mi) across mountainous terrain behind enemy lines, going without food or sleep for three days. When he located his target—a large German camp—he led his unit straight to it, capturing over 1,000 enemy soldiers as a result.

By the end of the war, Prince was one of the most decorated soldiers in Canadian history and had also done a lot to lift the reputation of Aboriginal people in Canada. He continued to fight for Aboriginal rights upon his return home. In his own words: “All my life I wanted to do something to help my people recover their good name. I wanted to show they were as good as any white man.” And he did just that.

7Frederick Hobson

In August 1917, at the little-known Battle of Hill 70, the Canadians fought tooth and nail for control of the high ground outside of Lens, France. Although they managed to capture the hill, the Germans mounted a fierce counterattack on August 18. A 43-year-old sergeant, Frederick Hobson, was tasked with holding a recently captured German trench. As was customary in World War I, the actual infantry assault was preceded by a vicious artillery barrage. By the time it was over, most of Hobson’s unit had been wiped out, and their only remaining machine gun and its operator were buried in the mud. The position was now ripe for the taking. With no time to lose, Hobson used a shovel to dig out the operator and his gun, all while under enemy fire. Despite being wounded, he turned the gun on the advancing Germans, firing until it jammed.

At this point, Hobson could have made a last-ditch attempt to escape. Instead, he decided to buy the operator time to fix the gun. He sprang to his feet and charged straight at the enemy with nothing more than his rifle. Firing until he was out of ammo, Hobson then went to town with his bayonet, killing 14 men in his last stand. He was finally taken down in a hail of bullets, but his sacrifice was not in vain. The operator got the machine gun working, and Canadian reinforcements soon arrived. Hobson was dead, but the hill remained in Canadian hands.

6James Cleland Richardson

Most musicians use their skills to entertain people, but James Cleland Richardson had more serious goals. When World War I broke out, he immediately enlisted in Canada’s 16th Infantry Battalion as a piper. What’s more terrifying than going to war? How about going to war with Scottish bagpipes as your weapon.

Richardson’s battalion was in the thick of the Battle of the Somme—one of the largest battles in human history. On October 8, 1916, the battalion was instructed to go “over the top” and rush a fortified German position. Going “over the top” was military speak for climbing out of your trench and running head-on toward the enemy while being met with a shower of bullets, artillery, and grenades—one of the most suicidal tactics ever used in warfare. Encountering heavy fire and a line of barbed wire, the assault was halted, casualties mounted, and morale quickly dwindled. It was at this critical moment that Richardson stood up and began playing his bagpipes, walking up and down in sight of the bewildered Germans. This act of bravery so inspired his comrades that they immediately continued their assault and captured the enemy position.

Later that day, Richardson was escorting a wounded soldier and a number of German prisoners when he realized that he had left his bagpipes behind. He went back for his glorious instrument and was never heard from again. His bagpipes were lost until 2002, when a bloody, broken set of pipes were discovered in Scotland and identified as his. They are now on public display in Canada.

5Charles Smith Rutherford

In 1918, Lieutenant Charles Smith Rutherford was leading an assault on a fortified town. After deciding to personally scout forward, he came upon a large group of German soldiers near a pillbox. Instead of going back like any sane man, Rutherford waved at the enemy soldiers. When they waved back, he casually walked up to the Germans and motioned with his pistol to indicate that they were surrounded and should surrender, announcing, “You men are my prisoners.” Rutherford looked so sure of himself that the insane bluff actually worked—the dumbstruck German officers ordered their men to throw down their weapons. Rutherford had captured 45 men and three machine guns without firing a single bullet.

A sensible man would have taken his prize and marched back, but Rutherford wasn’t done yet. He told one of the German officers to order a nearby machine gunner to cease firing on his approaching men. When his men arrived on the scene, he led them to assault another pillbox, capturing a further 35 German soldiers.

Rutherford was later awarded the Victoria Cross and served as a guard for the Duke and Duchess of Windsor in the Bahamas during World War II. Living to the ripe old age of 97, Rutherford was the last living Canadian toreceive the Victoria Cross for action in World War I.

4Harcus Strachan

You know what you would do if you had a deathwish? Charge an entrenched enemy position on horseback, armed with swords rather than rifles, while being shot at with machine guns that could fire 500 rounds a minute. This is exactly what Canada’s Fort Garry Horse regiment did in World War I, one of the last cavalry units ever used.

It was November 20, 1917 at the Battle of Cambrai. A Canadian cavalry squadron was preparing for an attack when their officer was killed. Lieutenant Harcus Strachan immediately took control of the situation, leading 128 cavalrymen in a charge on an entrenched German position. Facing not just a row of machine guns, but also field artillery, his force had dwindled to just 43 men by the time they reached the enemy. Strachan proceeded to kill seven gunners himself with his sword, and his squadron was able to secure the location. However, as the expected support from the infantry and the newly developed tanks was not forthcoming, they soon found themselves surrounded by German forces. With little ammunition, Strachan came up with a bold plan—they would fool the Germans into thinking that the Allied advance was continuing. His men cut the enemy telephone cables and loosed the few remaining horses in a stampede toward the German machine gunners. The diversion allowed the men to escape back to the Allied camp.

All in all, Strachan and his men killed 100 Germans and captured another 15, showing that bravery and ingenuity could still compete with superior technology. Strachan later served in World War II, ultimately reaching the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He was such a badass that the Canadians nameda mountain and a lake in his honor.

3Leo Clarke

In 1916, Leo Clarke and his comrades were tasked with clearing out the left flank of a recently attacked German trench near the village of Pozières, France. Clarke led his men to the trench but encountered heavy resistance—he eventually found himself the only survivor. Armed only with a pistol, Clarke found himself facing around 20 German infantrymen and two officers. Undaunted, Clarke fought tooth and nail with whatever he could find, picking up enemy rifles off the ground and finally using his pistol. He killed 18 enemy soldiers, captured one, and sent the rest running home to their mothers, suffering a bayonet wound in the process.

While this should have been enough to earn the young man an early retirement, he remained on the battlefield. One month later, Clarke wasburied in a trench after an artillery shell exploded nearby. Although his fellow soldiers managed to dig him out, he had become paralyzed due to the weight of the earth crushing his spine. Sadly, he did not survive, passing away a week later.

2Hugh Cairns

After losing his brother Albert at the Battle of Cambrai, Sergeant Hugh Cairns was itching to get some revenge. One of his comrades later recalled, “he said he’d get 50 Germans for that. I don’t think he ever planned to come back after Abbie got killed.” He wasn’t kidding.

As part of a larger Canadian force, Cairns’s platoon was sent to seize the town of Valenciennes from the Germans. As they were advancing, the men came under machine gun fire from an abandoned house. Cairns single-handedly rushed into the building and killed the five Germans inside. A few moments later, his platoon encountered an even stronger enemy post. Cairns once again grabbed his Lewis machine gun and advanced on the German position, firing from the hip. Cairns took out 12 German soldiers, with the other 18 swiftly surrendering. As an army chaplain later wrote: “He simply did not know what fear was and his skill with a machine gun could not be surpassed.”

The next German position had artillery as well as machine guns, manned by over 50 soldiers. It was probably here that an officer politely suggested that Cairns should take a couple of men this time. Cairns led five soldiers tooutflank the Germans, while the rest of the platoon kept them busy. After a few casualties, the enemy surrendered to Cairns and his group. A total of 50 men, seven machine guns, three artillery guns, and a trench mortar were captured.

Sergeant Cairns was later shot and killed while capturing a group of 60 enemy soldiers. Despite suffering bullet wounds in his stomach and hand, Cairns opened fire, killing or wounding about 30 of the enemy before finally succumbing to his injuries.

In the end, Canadian forces managed to capture Valenciennes in a single day, suffering 80 dead and 300 wounded to the Germans’ 800 dead and 1,300 captured. Hugh Cairns earned a posthumous Victoria Cross and became the first non-commissioned officer to have a French street named after him.

1Robert Spall

Robert Spall wasn’t exactly the typical Hollywood vision of a badass soldier. He was only 170 centimeters (5’7″) in height, and before World War I held a quiet job as a customs broker. Yet shortly after war broke out, Spallvolunteered to serve in Canada’s 90th battalion.

Spall’s moment to shine came in October 1918, when his platoon became isolated by German troops. The enemy were rapidly advancing, and leaving the safety of the trench was suicide—but so was staying in it. Sergeant Spall made the courageous decision to give his life for his comrades. Climbing out of the trench in full sight of the Germans, Spall began mowing them down with his Lewis machine gun. The startled enemy troops had to halt their advance.

When he emptied his clip, Spall instructed his platoon to escape through a sap trench, picked up another Lewis gun, and began firing once again. Although Spall was finally overwhelmed and killed, he succeeded in holding off the enemy long enough for his comrades to escape. Men like Spall established the heroic reputation of the Canadian armed forces.

http://listverse.com/2014/08/05/10-badass-canadian-war-heroes/

CANADIAN WOMEN HEROINES

• Ann Harvey - a courageous teenager who saved immigrants shipwrecked off the coast of Newfoundland in 1828
• Fanny 'Bobbie' Rosenfeld - Olympian reputed to be the world's greatest woman athlete
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Leonora King

• Dr. Leonora Howard King - the first Canadian doctor to practice medicine in China
• Thérèse Casgrain - feminist reformer who was the first woman in Quebec to lead a provincial political party
• Elsie MacGill - the first woman in the world to design an airplane
• Anna Mae Aquash - a native rights activist from Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia, who became the most prominent woman in the American Indian Movement
• Agnes Macphail - an impressive politician who was the first woman elected to the House of Commons
• Mary Ann Shadd - leader of Black Refugee Movement and the first woman to publish a Canadian newspaper
• Dr. Margaret Newton - a brilliant scientist who made important discoveries that led to the development of rust-resistant grains
• Violet Clara McNaughton - organizer of the Women Grain Growers and proponent of a public medical care system
• Major Margaret C. Macdonald - the Matron-in-Chief of the Canadian Nursing Service during World War I
• Helen Harrison - a pioneer pilot who ferried bombers across the Atlantic during World War II 

JOHN BERRY- YOUR LOVE AMAZES ME

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1930's Valentine Wreath

To make this wreath, I took a white wire coat hanger and bent it in a circle and snipped off the hanger.  Then I wrapped it in a Bethany Lowe pink tissue paper garland.  To this I added an antique silver Christmas foil garland and a strand of antique pink mercury glass beads.

Here are the copies of 30's Valentines I used, some with glittered edges, some without.  I found the sweet center one with the cottage scene at Graphics Fairy Blog.

I originally planned to use some of my actual vintage collection, and just clip them on with clothes pins I had painted pink.

But when I clipped them on, it bent the Valentines, and I had very little control over keeping them on the plane I thought they look good.

 So I used color copies instead and glued them on with a glue gun using a spatula to keep them flat and level until the glue cooled.

I was very pleased with how it turned out.  A friend of mine, who is very antique savvy even asked if it was an antique, which I loved.

http://pollyanna-reinvents.blogspot.ca/2012/02/1930s-valentine-wreath.html

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Annie's Valentines History Page 

I designed my pages with the 640 x 480 screen size in mind. ~All information below quoted from The World Book Encyclopedia 1998~ "People in most Western countries celebrate Valentine's Day on February 14. Many schools hold Valentine's Day parties when the children make special decorations for their classrooms. Old and young alike exchange Valentine cards with their friends. The custom of exchanging greetings on Valentine's Day goes back hundreds of years. Scholars have found records of Valentine notes that date from the 1400's. Valentine's Day is a special day observed on February 14. On this day, people send greeting cards called valentines to their sweethearts, friends, and members of their families. Many valentines have romantic verses, and others have humorous pictures and sayings. Many say, "Be my valentine." For weeks before February 14, stores sell valentines and valentine decorations . Schoolchildren decorate their classrooms with paper hearts and lace for the occasion. On Valentine's Day, many people give candy, flowers, and other gifts to their friends. Valentine's Day Around the World In the United States and Canada, children exchange valentines with their friends. In some schools, the children hold a classroom party and put all the valentines into a box they have decorated. At the end of the day, the teacher or one child distributes the cards. Many children make their own valentines from paper doilies, red paper, wallpaper samples, and pictures cut from magazines. Sometimes they buy kits that include everything needed to make valentines. Many children send their largest, fanciest cards to their parents and teachers. Older students hold Valentine's Day dances and parties. They make candy baskets, gifts, and place cards trimmed with hearts and fat, winged children called cupids. Many people send flowers, a box of candy, or some other gift to their wives, husbands, or sweethearts. Most valentine candy boxes are heart-shaped and tied with red ribbon. In Europe, people celebrate Valentine's Day in many ways. British children sing special Valentine's Day songs and receive gifts of candy, fruit, or money. In some areas of England, people bake valentine buns with caraway seeds, plums, or raisins. People in Italy hold a Valentine's Day feast. In Britain and Italy, some unmarried women get up before sunrise on Valentine's Day. They stand by the window watching for a man to pass. They believe that the first man they see, or someone who looks like him, will marry them within a year. William Shakespeare, the English playwright, mentions this belief in Hamlet (1603). Ophelia, a woman in the play, sings: Good morrow! 'Tis St. Valentine's Day All in the morning betime, And I a maid at your window, To be your valentine! In Denmark, people send pressed white flowers called snowdrops to their friends. Danish men also send a type of valentine called a gaekkebrev (joking letter). The sender writes a rhyme but does not sign his name. Instead, he signs the valentine with dots, one dot for each letter of his name. If the woman who gets it guesses his name, he rewards her with an Easter egg on Easter. Some people in Great Britain also send valentines signed with dots. Different authorities believe Valentine's Day began in various ways. Some trace it to an ancient Roman festival called Lupercalia. Other experts connect the event with one or more saints of the early Christian church. Still others link it with an old English belief that birds choose their mates on February 14. Valentine's Day probably came from a combination of all three of those sources--plus the belief that spring is a time for lovers. The ancient Romans held the festival of Lupercalia on February 15 to ensure protection from wolves. During this celebration, young men struck people with strips of animal hide. Women took the blows because they thought that the whipping made them more fertile. After the Romans conquered Britain in A.D. 43, the British borrowed many Roman festivals. Many writers link the festival of Lupercalia with Valentine's Day because of the similar date and the connection with fertility. The early Christian church had at least two saints named Valentine. According to one story, the Roman Emperor Claudius II in the A.D. 200's forbade young men to marry. The emperor thought single men made better soldiers. A priest named Valentine disobeyed the emperor's order and secretly married young couples. Another story says Valentine was an early Christian who made friends with many children. The Romans imprisoned him because he refused to worship their gods. The children missed Valentine and tossed loving notes between the bars of his cell window. This tale may explain why people exchange messages on Valentine's Day. According to still another story, Valentine restored the sight of his jailer's blind daughter. Many stories say that Valentine was executed on February 14 about A.D. 269. In A.D. 496, Saint Pope Gelasius I named February 14 as St. Valentine's Day. In Norman French, a language spoken in Normandy during the Middle Ages, the word galantine sounds like Valentine and means gallant or lover. This resemblance may have caused people to think of St. Valentine as the special saint of lovers. The earliest records of Valentine's Day in English tell that birds chose their mates on that day. People used a different calendar before 1582, and February 14 came on what is now February 24. Geoffrey Chaucer, an English poet of the 1300's, wrote in The Parliament of Fowls, "For this was on St. Valentine's Day, When every fowl cometh there to choose his mate." Shakespeare also mentioned this belief in A Midsummer Night's Dream. A character in the play discovers two lovers in the woods and asks, "St. Valentine is past; Begin these woodbirds but to couple now?" Early Valentine Customs People in England probably celebrated Valentine's Day as early as the 1400's. Some historians trace the custom of sending verses on Valentine's Day to a Frenchman named Charles, Duke of Orleans. Charles was captured by the English during the Battle of Agincourt in 1415. He was taken to England and put in prison. On Valentine's Day, he sent his wife a rhymed love letter from his cell in the Tower of London. Many Valentine's Day customs involved ways that single women could learn who their future husbands would be. Englishwomen of the 1700's wrote men's names on scraps of paper, rolled each in a little piece of clay, and dropped them all into water. The first paper that rose to the surface supposedly had the name of a woman's true love. Also in the 1700's, unmarried women pinned five bay leaves to their pillows on the eve of Valentine's Day. They pinned one leaf to the center of the pillow and one to each corner. If the charm worked, they saw their future husbands in their dreams. In Derbyshire, a county in central England, young women circled the church 3 or 12 times at midnight and repeated such verses as: I sow hempseed. Hempseed I sow. He that loves me best, Come after me now. Their true loves then supposedly appeared. One of the oldest customs was the practice of writing women's names on slips of paper and drawing them from a jar. The woman whose name was drawn by a man became his valentine, and he paid special attention to her. Many men gave gifts to their valentines. In some areas, a young man gave his valentine a pair of gloves. Wealthy men gave fancy balls to honor their valentines. One description of Valentine's Day during the 1700's tells how groups of friends met to draw names. For several days, each man wore his valentine's name on his sleeve. The saying wearing his heart on his sleeve probably came from this practice. The custom of sending romantic messages gradually replaced that of giving gifts. In the 1700's and 1800's, many stores sold handbooks called valentine writers. These books included verses to copy and various suggestions about writing valentines. Commercial valentines were first made in the early 1800's. Many of them were blank inside, with space for the sender to write a message. The British artist Kate Greenaway became famous for her valentines in the late 1800's. Many of her cards featured charming pictures of happy children and lovely gardens. Esther A. Howland, of Worcester, Massachusetts, became one of the first U.S. manufacturers of valentines. In 1847, after seeing a British valentine, she decided to make some of her own. She made samples and took orders from stores. Then she hired a staff of young women and set up an assembly line to produce the cards. One woman glued on paper flowers, another added lace, and another painted leaves. Howland soon expanded her business into a $100,000-a-year enterprise. Many valentines of the 1800's were hand painted. Some featured a fat cupid or showed arrows piercing a heart. Many cards had satin, ribbon, or lace trim. Others were decorated with dried flowers, feathers, imitation jewels, mother-of-pearl, sea shells, or tassels. Some cards cost as much as $10. From the mid-1800's to the early 1900's, many people sent comic valentines called penny dreadfuls. These cards sold for a penny and featured such insulting verses as: 'Tis all in vain your simpering looks, You never can incline, With all your bustles, stays, and curls, To find a valentine. Many penny dreadfuls and other old valentines have become collectors' items. Valentine, Saint, is the name associated with two martyrs of the early Christian church. Little is known about them. The Roman history of martyrs lists two Saint Valentines as having been martyred on February 14 by being beheaded. One supposedly died in Rome and the other at Interamna, now Terni, 60 miles (97 kilometers) from Rome. Scholars have had great difficulty in finding historical fact among the Saint Valentine legends. The Saint Valentine who died in Rome seems to have been a priest who suffered death during the persecution of Claudius the Goth about A.D. 269. A basilica was built in his honor in Rome in A.D. 350, and a catacomb containing his remains was found on this location. Another history of martyrs mentions a Saint Valentine who was bishop of Interamna and who may have been martyred in Rome. By being remembered both in Rome and in Interamna, he may have come to be considered as two people, but this is not entirely certain. The custom of exchanging valentines on February 14 can be traced to the English poet, Geoffrey Chaucer. He mentioned that birds began to pair off on that day." ~Above information taken from The World Book Encyclopedia 1998~

http://www.annieshomepage.com/valhistory.html

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Valentine’s Day

Written by: The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica

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·         Last Updated 7-31-2014

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Alternate titles: Saint Valentine’s Day; St. Valentine’s Day

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Valentine’s Day, also called St. Valentine’s Day,  day (February 14) when lovers express their affection with greetings and gifts. Although there were several Christian martyrs named Valentine, the day probably took its name from a priest who was martyred about ad 270 by the emperor Claudius II Gothicus. According to legend, the priest signed a letter to his jailer’s daughter, whom he had befriended and with whom he had fallen in love, “from your Valentine.” The holiday also had origins in the Roman festival of Lupercalia, held in mid-February. The festival, which celebrated the coming of spring, included fertility rites and the pairing off of women with men by lottery. At the end of the 5th century, Pope Gelasius I replaced Lupercalia with St. Valentine’s Day. It came to be celebrated as a day of romance from about the 14th century.

Formal messages, or valentines, appeared in the 1500s, and by the late 1700s commercially printed cards were being used. The first commercial valentines in the United States were printed in the mid-1800s. Valentines commonly depict Cupid, the Roman god of love, along with hearts, traditionally the seat of emotion. Because it was thought that their mating season began in mid-February, birds also became a symbol of the day. Traditional gifts include candy and flowers, particularly red roses, a symbol of beauty and love. The day is popular in the United States as well as in Britain, Canada, and Australia, and it also is celebrated in other countries, including France and Mexico. It has expanded to expressions of affection among relatives and friends. Many schoolchildren exchange valentines with one another on this day.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/858512/Valentines-Day

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