A Sad Englishman

A rather unfortunate English soldier was captured by an employee of a Turkish tobacco company who sent one of his ears to the Consul at Monastir, ordering a ransom be paid for him. Interestingly enough, this tobacco company is still around today–in a sense. The company was the Ottoman Empire’s largest foreign investment. It was called “Tekel” in 1825, but is actually still called “Regie” in Lebanon. I found it interesting that the company selling Lebanese tobacco is the same company which cut off an English soldier’s ear way back in 1905.