History Awesome / SixteenThirtyTwo

* Gretchen Richter disposing of [[SociopathicSoldier Diego]]. [[spoiler:First she slits his throat, then sticks her knife into his ear and scrambles his brains for good measure]].

* Jeff Higgins' first encounter with Gretchen. It's a classic story of BoyMeetsGirl, boy protects girl from army (with only a shotgun and his three best friends to back him up), boy helps girl murder a rapist who's made advances on her sister, boy proposes to girl using a bilingual dictionary. [[spoiler:She says yes.]]

** Grantville is significantly helped by a spectacularly well-timed madman's charge of Swedish cavalry, led by a madman named Captain Gars. Which, as it turns out, is an acronym. It stands for [[spoiler:Gustavus Adolphus Rex Sueciae. Gustavus Adolphus, ''King of the Swedes'']].

** Second, when he singlehandedly [[spoiler:stops a midnight assassination attempt dead]].

** This done, Mike Stearns walks in to conduct "negotiations" with the city, ultimately [[spoiler:setting himself up as the sole overseer of the city's interim government]].

* On the other side, when the Danish Prince Ulrik and his Norwegian sidekick Baldur organize the defense of Copenhagen against warships at least a century more advanced than anything they had. Charging an ironclad in rowboat is crazy. Doing that and actually succeeding? That's SuccessThroughInsanity. [[spoiler: The battle was clearly unwinnable, but they were the first (and to date, only) people in the series to disable an ironclad, and totally destroyed a timberclad to boot.]]

* Sharon Nichols performs a Crowning ''Surgery'' of Awesome. She was a nurse up-time and after the Ring of Fire starts learning as much as she can about medicine from her doctor father. She is sent as an ambassador and medical teacher to Italy in ''1634: The Galileo Affair.'' In that book, the above Ruy Sanchez is injured in the stomach, which everyone down-time knows will result in a slow and painful death. [[spoiler: Nichols cuts him open, considers whether to stitch up the relevant organ but ultimately decides to amputate, and sews him back up, in full view of all the doctors they can find on short notice. He's on his feet again in a week or less.]] To the down-timers, modern medicine is almost literally a miracle. To Sharon, she was just a nurse up-time. The book points out that "nurses" have a lot more training up-time than they do down-time, but still, she has clearly learned a lot since the Ring of Fire.
* Anders Jönsson, Gustavus Adolphus's personal bodyguard [[spoiler: defending Gustavus from the Polish Hussars who try to kill him while he is incapacitated during battle at the end of 1635: The Eastern Front. He places his body over Gustavus's, and empties four magazines of his up-time pistol at charging Hussars. He continues doing this for a minute even after his femoral artery is severed by a lance. In the end, a hussar he didn't see drives his lance straight down through Anders trying to kill Gustavus, but even after piercing Anders' heart, killing him, there is still too much muscle mass in the way for the lance to even touch Gustavus.]] Even in death, he protected his King.
* In ''1636: The Saxon Uprising'', Ernst Wettin's decision to oppose [[spoiler:Oxenstierna's counterrevolution]] by denying [[spoiler:Banér's attempt to capture Dresden and kill Gretchen, Tata, and the rest of the [=CoC=] folk]] public legitimacy.
* The Battle of Dresden. [[spoiler:Mike Stearns launches an attack on Banér's siege lines in the middle of a snowstorm, delivering an utterly devastating victory, and ending any hope for Oxenstierna's counterrevolution to succeed.]]
* Buster Beasley's [[spoiler:{{Dying Moment Of Awesome}} during the Dreeson Incident, wading into an anti-Semitic mob and gunning down several, then switching to hand-to-hand and taking out several more before he was finally brought down.]] This ends up making his name slang for a badass among USE citizens.
** His daughter Denise is no slouch either, [[spoiler:gunning down Bryant Holloway with the rifle Buster gave her for her birthday.]]

* In ''The Devil's Opera'' "Hard" Hans, a pugilist who has incurred the wrath of his day-job employer by refusing to take a dive sets himself out as bait to draw attention away from his sister and winds up in a running battle through the streets of Magdeburg. In all three encounters he is outnumbered, in the last one by 6-1, not to mention being badly hurt from the bout that started the mess in the first place. He manages to kill or cripple everyone who comes after him [[spoiler: although he does die in the final battle he takes all six attackers down with him]]

* On the other side, when the Danish Prince Ulrik and his Norwegian sidekick Baldur organize the defense of Copenhagen against warships at least a century more advanced than anything they had. Charging an ironclad in rowboat is crazy. Doing that and actually succeeding? That's SuccessThroughInsanity. [[spoiler: The battle was clearly unwinnable, but they did manage to mission-kill an ironclad, and totally destroy a timberclad before losing, which is highly impressive under the circumstances.]]

* On the other side, when the Danish Prince Ulrik and his Norwegian sidekick Baldur organize the defense of Copenhagen against warships at least a century more advanced than anything they had. Charging an ironclad in rowboat is crazy. Doing that and actually succeeding? That's CrazyAwesome. [[spoiler: The battle was clearly unwinnable, but they did manage to mission-kill an ironclad, and totally destroy a timberclad before losing, which is highly impressive under the circumstances.]]

* In ''The Kremlin Games'', our protagonists have a problem: They have the Tsar and Tsarina in their group. Trouble is, the Tsar has accidentally sparked a [[PuppetKing power struggle]] with the Boyar Duma, and the towns people and local military detail they're entering by barge may or may not side with them. So how do they get around it? With a plan that doubles as a SugarWiki/{{Funny Moment|s}}: [[RefugeInAudacity the Tsar and Tsarina stand in plain view of the crowd, waiving to the people as they dock while the more action-oriented protagonists sneak in the back way, using the spectacle as a distraction.]]

* Jeff Higgins' first encounter with Gretchen. It's a classic story of BoyMeetsGirl, boy protects girl from army (with only a shotgun and his three best friends to back him up), boy helps girl murder a rapist who's ,ade advances on her sister, boy proposes to girl using a bilingual dictionary. [[spoiler:She says yes.]]

* Jeff Higgins' first encounter with Gretchen. It's a classic story of BoyMeetsGirl, boy protects girl from army (with only a shotgun and his three best friends to back him up), boy helps girl murder her rapist, boy proposes to girl using a bilingual dictionary. [[spoiler:She says yes.]]

* In ''The Kremlin Games'', our protagonists have a problem: They have the Tsar and Tsarina in their group. Trouble is, the Tsar has accidentally sparked a [[PuppetKing power struggle]] with the Boyar Duma, and the towns people and local military detail they're entering by barge may or may not side with them. So how do they get around it? With a plan that doubles as a CrowningMomentOfFunny: [[RefugeInAudacity the Tsar and Tsarina stand in plain view of the crowd, waiving to the people as they dock while the more action-oriented protagonists sneak in the back way, using the spectacle as a distraction.]]

* On the other side, when the Danish Prince Ulrik and his Norwegian sidekick Baldur manage to [[spoiler:mission-kill an ironclad using a small boat and a spar torpedo]].

'''Simpson:''' Something WinstonChurchill once said. I always did admire that old dinosaur. It went, "In war, resolution; in defeat, defiance; in victory, magnanimity." We may have to knock them down and stomp on them, from time to time, but when it's finished, it's ''finished'', and it's time to remember that they're human beings, too.

* In the short story "In the Navy", [[RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap the transition]] over the course of the series of ex-CEO John Simpson from {{Jerkass}} to {{Badass}} is presaged ''twice'':

* Buster Beasley's [[spoiler:{{Dying Moment Of Awesome}} during the Dreeson Incident, wading into an anti-Semitic mob and gunning down several, then switching to hand-to-hand and taking out several more before he was finally brought down.]] This ends up making his name slang for a {{Badass}} among USE citizens.

** And before that, there is the exchange concerning the political situation about Hamburg, which Gustavus Adolphus says depends on the good Admiral's answer to one question: [[AndrewJackson Is he willing to take Florida?]]

* [[GoodShepherd Father Mazzare]]'s sermon at the funeral for Irene Flannery in "Between the Armies".

* Sharon Nichols performs a Crowning ''Surgery'' of Awesome. She was a nurse up-time and after the Ring of Fire starts learning as much as she can about medicine from her father, the only MD who happened to be in Grantville at the time. She is sent as an ambassador and medical teacher to Italy in ''1634: The Galileo Affair.'' In that book, the above Ruy Sanchez is injured in the stomach, which everyone down-time knows will result in a slow and painful death. [[spoiler: Nichols cuts him open, considers whether to stitch up the relevant organ but ultimately decides to amputate, and sews him back up, in full view of all the doctors they can find on short notice. He's on his feet again in a week or less.]] To the down-timers, modern medicine is almost literally a miracle. To Sharon, she was just a nurse up-time. The book points out that "nurses" have a lot more training up-time than they do down-time, but still, she has clearly learned a lot since the Ring of Fire.

* In ''The Kremlin Games'', our protagonists have a problem: They have the Tsar and Tsarina in their group. Trouble is, the Tsar has accidentally sparked a [[PuppetKing power struggle]] with the Boyar Duma, and the towns people and local military detail they're entering by barge may or may not side with them. So how do they get around it? [[RefugeInAudacity The Tsar and Tsarina stand in plain view of the crowd, waiving to the people as they dock while the more action-oriented protagonists sneak in the back way, using the spectacle as a distraction.]] Doubles as a CrowningMomentOfFunny.

* Gretchen Richter disposing of Diego. [[spoiler:First she slits his throat, then sticks her knife into his ear and scrambles his brains for good measure]].

* Sharon Nichols performs a Crowning ''Surgery of Awesome''. She was a nurse up-time and after the Ring of Fire starts learning as much as she can about medicine from her father, the only MD who happened to be in Grantville at the time. She is sent as an ambassador and medical teacher to Italy in ''1634: The Galileo Affair.'' In that book, the above Ruy Sanchez is injured in the stomach, which everyone down-time knows will result in a slow and painful death. Nichols cuts him open, considers whether to stitch up the relevant organ but ultimately decides to amputate, and sews him back up, in full view of all the doctors they can find on short notice. To the down-timers, modern medicine is almost literally a miracle. To Sharon, she was just a nurse up-time. The book points out that "nurses" have a lot more training up-time than they do down-time, but still, she has clearly learned a lot since the Ring of Fire.

* John Simpson gets his own in ''1634: The Baltic War'' when [[DamageProofVehicle his ironclads]] go toe-to-toe with the Hamburg defenses -- [[CurbStompBattle and the Hamburg defenses come off ''distinctly'' worse for the encounter]].

* John Simpson gets his own in ''1634: The Baltic War'' when [[DamageProofVehicle his ironclads]] go toe-to-toe with the Hamburg defenses -- and the Hamburg defenses come off ''distinctly'' worse for the encounter.

* John Simpson gets his own in ''1634: The Baltic War'' when [[DamageProofVehicle his ironclads]] go toe-to-toe with the Hamburg defenses.

** And before that, there is the exchange concerning the political situation about Hamburg, which Gustovus Adolphus says depends on the good Admiral's answer to one question: [[AndrewJackson Is he willing to take Florida?]]

* During their first few days in the past, most of the town considers themselves at least a little smarter than the locals, thanks to their centuries of foreknowledge. Balthazar Abrabanel puts paid to that when he accidentally reveals that he speaks eight languages fluently and can get by in at least three more...and doesn't really consider this an accomplishment.

* In ''The Devil's Opera'' "Hard" Hans, a pugilist who has incurred the wrath of his day-job employer by refusing to take a dive sets himself out as bait to draw attention away from his sister and winds up in a running battle through the streets of Magdeburg. In all three encounters he is outnumbered, in the last one by 6-1, not to mention being badly hurt from the bout that started the mess in the first place. He manages to kill or cripple everyone who comes after him [[spoiler: although he does die in the final battle he takers all six attackers down with him]]