4

Winston Churchill Escaped From Prison With Quiet Dignity

Wiki Commons

He might look like an uncooked sausage shoved into a too-small suit, but Winston Churchill is one of the reasons this article isn't being written in German. In the context of World War II, you can't so much as mention the man's name without pouring out a little brown sauce in gratitude. But before he was teabagging Nazis, he was demonstrating the enormity of his surely unsightly balls by busting out of a South African prison.

 Imperial War Museums
This was actually during the brief skinny portion of the man's life.

The Ballsiness:

Before his political career, Churchill was a reporter in the Boer War in Dutch-settled South Africa. Being a reporter at the dawn of the century was a little different from today: Back then, there was really no such thing as "non-combatants." Reporters were armed and considered free game for any Dutchman who could level a rifle. This became readily apparent during one scouting expedition when Boer soldiers attacked the armored train Churchill rode on, slaughtering the British escort and dragging Churchill to a POW camp in Transvaal. For the next month, he buried the Boer Secretary of War in petitions for his release, but he failed to receive a single answer. Eventually, Churchill decided that his only option was to Shawshank his way out of the place.

Of course, he went about it in the most British fashion possible. First things first, he settled his accounts with the prison store. A Churchill always pays his debts and all that. Next he wrote a letter to the Boer Secretary of State politely apologizing for his escape and thanking him for his hospitality, and another to the Secretary of War explaining where he got his hat. He left both letters on his pillow, grabbed a handful of chocolates, and vaulted over the 10-foot wall into an adjacent alley. He strolled through town whistling a merry tune and greeting merchants, eventually boarding a train heading east. Before daylight, he leaped from the train and hid in a ditch, where he spent the day alternating between sleeping and eating chocolates. That's the only part of this story we can successfully imagine Winston Churchill doing.

Library of Congress
He gained 130 pounds and aged 40 years in those ditches.

3

Peter the Great Seized the Capital With a Play Army

Aleksey Kivshenko

Peter the Great, czar of Russia, was the man responsible for transforming Europe's most belligerent neighbor from a country full of vodka-swilling hobos to one full of vodka-swilling hobos with guns. He westernized the Russian army, pushed her borders to the Baltic Sea, and beat the Swedes so hard that they forgot how to war and started making furniture. But how did a man like Peter come to power? The same way Peter Pan did: with the power of make believe.

Robert Kerr Porter
Also like Peter Pan, he apparently loved fucking up pirates.

The Ballsiness:

Peter inherited the Russian throne when he was 9, so the nobility appointed Peter's half-sister, Sophia, to act as regent until Peter's testicles dropped. Unfortunately, she grew to enjoy the taste of power and couldn't stand a prepubescent Peter reminding her that one day she'd have to give it up. In order to avoid thinking about the inevitable, Sophia shipped Peter off to grow up with a bunch of Western strangers.

When Peter turned 11, he asked for gunpowder (what 11-year-old wouldn't?), and Russia, as a country full of responsible adults, approved his request. Peter formed his playmates into regiments reminiscent of Western European armies. With his "toy" army that consisted of friends, playmates, and hired soldiers, he staged war games of such realism that one battle resulted in 24 deaths. And because in Russia, any less than three dozen dead is practically a trip to Chuck E. Cheese's, they nicknamed Peter's little army the Fun Forces.

nndb.com
Other than for those 24, it was fun for everyone.

2

The Duke of Wellington Slept With Napoleon's Sister, Girlfriends

Robert Alexander Hillingford.

Sir Arthur Wellesley, First Duke of Wellington, was the man who stood up against Napoleon Bonaparte -- twice -- and kicked his ass in the Battle of Waterloo. But the rivalry between Wellesley and Napoleon went further than the battlefield. He had a more personal way of sticking it to his nemesis. By personally sticking it to Napoleon's sister.

Marie-Guillemine Benoist
He showed Pauline his Bonaparte.

The Ballsiness:

After Wellesley helped defeat Napoleon, Parliament appointed him the British ambassador to France, a move most historians refer to as "rubbing it in." Wellesley's immediate instinct was to use his new position to fuck with Napoleon like the villain in an '80s teen movie. First, he appointed Napoleon's head chef as his own -- despite having no interest in the culinary arts. Wellesley's fine palate was once described by the good Lord Ellesmere as "scarcely [able to] tell rancid butter from fresh."

Thomas Lawrence
This wasn't a dig at his taste in women. We think.

1

Caesar Demanded a Higher Ransom From His Kidnappers

Michal Manas

Julius Caesar doesn't need an introduction. But here's one anyway: He was Julius Fucking Caesar.

Lionel-Noël Royer
Bow down, bitches.

The Ballsiness:

According to Plutarch, Julius Caesar was sailing off the coast of Spain when he was waylaid by pirates and taken hostage. Evidently not realizing who their captive was, the pirates demanded 20 talents of silver for his return. This is the point at which a normal person would be peeing while adding up all the love in their life, hoping it meets or exceeds that sum. Caesar laughed at the demand and insisted that the pirates stop insulting him and raise the bounty to 50 talents. The pirates shrugged and agreed, so Caesar dispatched some of his slaves to collect the money.

But while he was waiting, he spent the next month screwing with the pirates. When Caesar went to sleep, he would demand silence; while the pirates were messing about, he would get up and start issuing orders; and when he got bored, Caesar would read them poetry. If they displayed anything less than overwhelming enthusiasm, he would "jokingly" threaten to have them crucified. The pirates thought Caesar was hilarious.

jesuskindofmusic/iStock/Getty Images
"Ha, ha, nails in my hands! Classic Julius."

After 38 days, Caesar's slaves returned with the silver and he was released. If Caesar was any other human being ever, that would be the end of the story, but unfortunately for the pirates, he was indeed Julius Fucking Caesar, and so he returned later with a full Roman fleet and crucified every single one of those guys.

Listen, when Caesar tries to rhyme "orange" with "porridge," you keep your mouth shut and clap when he's finished.

David Rheinhart is a hobbyist and storyteller unwilling to acknowledge that this thankless profession doesn't pay. He has a Twitter account and a Tumblr account where he dumps the majority of his work.

For more people with balls that could deflect bullets, check out 5 Real Life Soldiers Who Make Rambo Look Like a Pussy and 5 Soldiers Whose Horrific Injuries Only Made Them Angry.

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