It must be said that each of us is unlikely to realize what we are capable of if at some point an extreme life situation arises. And not just a one-time powerful surge of adrenaline, thanks to which a person can, fleeing from a predator, immediately climb an inaccessible rock, and a fragile granny can send a hefty robber flying with a single handbag.Such cases occur relatively often - and we are surprised when reading or hearing about them in the media. But no less surprising are situations when a person in a difficult circumstances shows unprecedented fortitude and composure - when 99 out of 100 would probably give up in the face of the problem. Andthis thread in the AskReddit communityis dedicated to various similar cases from world history, a selection of whichBored Pandahas collected specially for you.More info:RedditThis post may includeaffiliate links.
It must be said that each of us is unlikely to realize what we are capable of if at some point an extreme life situation arises. And not just a one-time powerful surge of adrenaline, thanks to which a person can, fleeing from a predator, immediately climb an inaccessible rock, and a fragile granny can send a hefty robber flying with a single handbag.
Such cases occur relatively often - and we are surprised when reading or hearing about them in the media. But no less surprising are situations when a person in a difficult circumstances shows unprecedented fortitude and composure - when 99 out of 100 would probably give up in the face of the problem. Andthis thread in the AskReddit communityis dedicated to various similar cases from world history, a selection of whichBored Pandahas collected specially for you.
More info:Reddit
This post may includeaffiliate links.
Rotmistrz Witold Pilecki. He purposely made himself be caught and thrown into death camp in Auschwitz to infiltrate it and organize underground resistance and do general recon. He then escaped with another prisoner to fight in Warsaw uprising.
Scientists still haven’t definitively determined how it all works - one person, finding themselves in extreme conditions, may literally fall into a stupor, while another suddenly becomes the Hulk and Captain America combined - and when the wave of adrenaline recedes, they’re back to the same ordinary person, often perplexed: “how the hell did I manage to do all this?” And some of the stories told in this collection are precisely from this area. But this, as you understand, is not all…
Joe Medicine Crow, the last Warchief of the Crow. He completed all the ritual rights to become Warchief while fighting in WW2. Which included taking an enemies weapon, touching an enemy without killing him, leading a war party and stealing an enemies horse (he stole 50 from the SS ).
My Grandpa Liberatus,Was working solo on his farm in the 1950’s, when both hands were sucked into an auger slicing them up right to the shoulders. Was able to kick the controls to reverse the blades and get himself out, then drove himself in a grainery truck 45 minutes to the hospital, steering and shifting gears with his knees. Doctors were able to save one arm above the elbow but none of the other.Still worked another 40 years with hooks for arms, Fathered 9 children, 6 after his accident and harvested 1000 acres on a hundred year old family farm. Smoked like a chimney, drank like a fish, ate red meat 3 times a day, passed away in his sleep 2 days before his 99th birthday.He was a hard man, but absolutely devoted to his family and was a great Grandfather to over 20 grandkids. He taught me about resiliency, resourcefulness and mental toughness. Every grandkid, on their first birthday, got a rocking horse that he built in his workshop using hand tools that he built custom attachments for his prosthetics. I still have mine, from 56 years ago, as a reminder of him when times are tough.
Any enslaved person who said f**k this and ran for freedom.
A lot of unknown women
Human memory is a strange thing. We can remember for years some insignificant detail, like the chorus of a song we heard once in our youth - and we can completely forget about an incredibly important work meeting that we planned just the day before yesterday. In the same way, different people leave our memory. Just yesterday you were sitting on your grandmother’s lap, today she’s just a photo in a frame on the chest of drawers, and tomorrow the old lady will disappear forever, leaving only a couple of lines and numbers in documents…
Khutulun, a Mongolian Princess, insisted that any man who wished to marry her must defeat her in wrestling, forfeiting horses to her if they lost.She gained 10,000 horses defeating prospective suitors.
Giles “More weight” Corey was pretty bad**s. Refused to testify at the Salem witch trials, so they “pressed” him- ie. They piled rocks on top of him as torture to force him to testify that his wife was a witch. They piled rock after rock on top of him. His last words were “more weight”, then he died.
Alas, this is an objective process - we simply cannot remember everything. Even if some people have made tremendous efforts to help us simply live, or live well. Let it be at the cost of their own well-being, at the cost of their health or even life. This and similar threads are an attempt to bring back to our memory some outstanding persons who may have been ordinary people, who may even have been jerks for most of their lives - but at some point became true heroes.
I think that Terry Fox has to be up there. To run a marathon every day on the Marathon of Hope, on one leg (and a crappy prosthesis), while riddled with cancer is beyond anything I can understand. Imagine the courage and determination that required.
My grandmother. Her husband died of heart disease in 1948, leaving her to raise 8 children between the ages of 9 months and 13 years old. She was a saint.
For your consideration…..He was 26 years old, 5-foot-4, weighed 130 pounds and came from Albany, New York.And on the night of May 15, 1918, Pvt. Henry Johnson, a member of the all-black 369th Infantry Regiment, found himself fighting for his life against 20 German Soldiers out in front of his unit’s trenchline.He fired the three rounds in his French-made rifle, tossed all his hand grenades and then grabbed his Army-issue bolo knife and started stabbing. He buried the knife in the head of one attacker and then disemboweled another German soldier.“Each slash meant something, believe me,” Johnson said later. “There wasn’t anything so fine about it,” he said. “Just fought for my life. A rabbit would have done that.“By the time what a reporter called “The Battle of Henry Johnson” was over, Johnson had been wounded 21 times and become the first American hero of World War I.
Shih Ching. After marrying a pirate, she was a Chinese [escort] who inherited his fleet upon his death. She took no s**t, ruled her ships with an iron grip, and was so effective that the Chinese government dispatched an armada to put an end to her. She took 63 of their ships and kicked their bums. After two years of fighting, during which they even forced Dutch and British ships to surrender, they offered her and her 17,000 crew members amnesty. She lived to be 69 years old, kept ALL of her winnings, and spent her latter years operating a casino and brothel.
Also worthy of consideration: Goyaałé (Geronimo.)“One day he came into my quarters at Fort Sill in a most peculiar mood. He told me no one could kill him, nor me either, if he willed it so. Then he bared himself to the waist. I was dumbfounded to see the number of bullet holes in his body. I knew he had been in many battles and had been fired on dozens of times, but I had never heard of anyone living with at least fifty bullet wounds on his body. Geronimo had that many scars.Some of these bullet holes were large enough to hold small pebbles that Geronimo picked up and placed in them. Putting a pebble in a bullet wound he would make a noise like a gun, then take the pebble out and throw it on the ground. Jokingly I told him he was probably so far away that the bullets didn’t penetrate him, but that if he had been nearer they probably would have killed him. ‘No, no,’ he shouted. ‘Bullets cannot kill me!'"- Charles F. Lummis
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Maybe not in a traditional sense, but Stephen Hawking. Dude wouldn’t let something as trivial as ALS stop him from becoming an accomplished physicist. He essentially had to do all the math in his head, without the ability to write down notes as he worked.
Simo Hayha(The famousFinnish sniperwho defended the independence of Finland from the USSR in 1939 - 1940. Having received a serious wound that almost deprived him of half of his face, Simo partly regained his health and returned to duty. -BP)
Léo Major.Canadian sniper/reconnaissance, lost an eye, was told you’re going home..replied with why? I only need 1 eye to snipe…liberated an entire town in holland, took over a dozen prisoners, all single handedly after his fire team partner was killed
My mom. Having to deal with my raging abusive alcoholic c**t of a father yet always being there for me.
Charles Upham was a NZ soldier who won 2 Victoria Crosses. He had a reputation of carrying a flour sack full of grenades instead of a rifle. If you read thewiki, it goes through the whole saga that led to his awarding of the first VC and then casually mentions that he was suffering from Dystentary at the time.
There are a lot of good people mentioned in here for various reasons but I’ll throw out two more people.First the unknown viking at Stamford Bridge, he held off the entire English army until they floated a soldier under the bridge to stab the viking in the testicles. Dude was straight stacking bodies before getting stabbed in the no no spot.Second is Norman Borlaug, Norman was not a great warrior but a scientist, he developed a variant of wheat that had a higher yield and wouldn’t fall over so harvests would be greater. He has saved countless lives from dying of starvation.
Jack Churchill. Went into battle armed with a broadsword, a bow and arrow, and bag pipes. In WW2.
My grandmother was definitely born in the wrong generation. She was bad a*s. She was the oldest of 8, basically helped raised her siblings. Married my grandfather (an absolute man-child) and had 7 kids.She basically had to drag my grandfather to get a job in the 50’s. She was an excellent seamstress, making clothes for quite a few well known people in her community, even some outfits for a couple of films.She dragged my grandfather around the world for holidays for them to enjoy, and she was wicked smart! In middle school I used to go to their house for lunch and watch the Price Is Right. Almost every time she was within $500 of the final showcases. Mad skills! If she had been born in my generation she would have been some sort of CEO, Lawyer, or Doctor.
Earnest Shackleton(FamousAntarctic explorer, one of the main figures in the heroic age of Antarctic exploration. The member of four Antarctic expeditions, three of which he commanded. -BP)
Teddy Roosevelt was a bada**
Josef Broz Tito, leader of Post-WW2 Yugoslavia. He broke with Stalin and the USSR in the mid-1940s. Stalin repeatedly tried to have Tito killed. When Stalin died a private letter from Tito to Stalin was found in Stalin’s bedside table: “Stop sending people to kill me… If you don’t stop sending killers, I’ll send one to Moscow, and I won’t have to send a second.” By the 1960s he was an influential world leader organizing the non-aligned pact of nations against both NATO and the USSR,
Alexander the Great
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