On This Day In History
March 13th
624 Battle of Badr: Muhammad’s Muslim forces win significant victory over Meccan army
1591 Battle at Tondibi: Moroccan army under Judar [Jawdar] defeats Sultan Askia Ishaq II of Songhai
1781 William Herschel sees what he thinks is a “comet” but is actually the discovery of the planet Uranus
1884 Siege of Khartoum, Sudan begins by Mahdist forces, lasts 10 months
1903 Fall of the Sokoto Caliphate in Northern Nigeria, the British claim supremacy on over 500,000 square miles
1930 Clyde Tombaugh announces discovery of Pluto at Lowell Observatory
2003 The journal Nature reports that 350,000-year-old footprints of an upright-walking human have been found in Italy
2019 US grounds all Boeing 737 Max aircraft after bans by others countries following the plane type’s second crash in Ethiopia
Did You Know?
Uncle Sam cartoon figure made its debut in the New York Lantern weekly
Today in History in 1852
Would You Believe?
Brooklyn Robins manager Wilbert Robinson tries to catch a baseball dropped from an airplane, but the pilot substitutes a grapefruit
Today in History in 1915
March 14th
1590 Battle of Ivry: French King Henry IV beats Catholic League during French Wars of Religion
1794 Eli Whitney patents the cotton gin machine revolutionizing the cotton industry in the southern US states
1900 Dutch botanist Hugo de Vries rediscovers Gregor Mendel‘s laws of heredity and genetics
1900 US currency goes on gold standard after Congress passes the Currency Act
1943 World War II: Kraków Ghetto is “liquidated”
2013 Xi Jinping named the new President of the People’s Republic of China
Did You Know?
FBI’s “10 Most Wanted Fugitives” program begins
Today in History in 1950
Would You Believe?
South African Supreme Court declares that marriages not celebrated according to Christian rites and/or not registered by the Registrar of Marriages, are invalid; all Muslim and Hindu marriages are therefore declared invalid
Today in History in 1913
March 15th
44 BC Julius Caesar is stabbed to death by Brutus, Cassius and several other Roman senators on the Ides of March in Rome
221 Liu Bei, a Chinese warlord and member of the Han royal house, declares himself Emperor of Shu-Han, claiming legitimate succession to the Han Dynasty
1493 Christopher Columbus returns to Spain after his first voyage to the New World
1783 In an emotional speech in Newburgh, New York, George Washington asks his officers not to support the Newburgh Conspiracy. The plea is successful and the threatened coup d’etat never takes place.
1917 Nicholas II, the last Russian Tsar abdicates and nominates his brother Grand Duke Michael to succeed him [OS Mar 2]
1962 Five research groups announce the discovery of anti-matter
2019 Climate change strikes held by school children take place around the world inspired by Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg
Did You Know?
The first Internet domain name, symbolics.com is registered
Today in History in 1985
Would You Believe?
Hermann Goering says 100-200 church bells enough for Germany, smelt the rest
Today in History in 1940
March 16th
597 BC Babylonians capture Jerusalem, replace Jehoiachin with Zedekiah as king
1527 Battle of Khanua: Mughal Emperor Babur defeats Rajput forces led by Rana Sanga consolidating Mughal power
1660 English Long Parliament disbands
1792 King gustav iii of Sweden is shot by Count Jacob Johan Anckarström at a masked ball at the Opera; he dies on March 29
1867 First publication of an article by Joseph Lister outlining the discovery of antiseptic surgery, in “The Lancet”
1935 Adolf Hitler orders German rearmament in violation of The Treaty of Versailles
Did You Know?
Sir Arthur Evans rediscovers the bronze age city of Knossos in Crete, home of the legendary Minotaur
Today in History in 1900
Would You Believe?
General Motors produces its 100 millionth automobile, the Oldsmobile Toronado
Today in History in 1968
March 17th
432 Saint Patrick, aged about 16 is captured by Irish pirates from his home in Great Britain and taken as a slave to Ireland (traditional date)
1521 Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan reaches the Philippines
1861 Italy is unified into a single kingdom under Victor Emmanuel II following the campaigns led by Giuseppe Garibaldi
1905 Albert Einstein finishes his scientific paper detailing his Quantum Theory of Light, one of the foundations of modern physics
1939 Battle of Nanchang between the Kuomintang and the Japanese breaks out (Sino-Japanese War 1937-1945)
1942 Bełżec Concentration Camp opens with the transport of 30,000 Lublin Polish Jews
Did You Know?
John Philip Holland achieves successful test run for the first modern submarine off Staten Island, submerging for 1 hour 40 minutes
Today in History in 1898
Would You Believe?
Rubber band patented by Stephen Perry of London
Today in History in 1845
March 18th
1123 First Council of the Lateran (9th ecumenical council) opens in Rome, agreements of the Concordat of Worms ratified
1314 Jacques de Molay, the 23rd and the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, is burned at the stake by King Philip IV of France
1325 According to legend, Tenochtitlan is founded on this date on an island in what was then Lake Texcoco in the Valley of Mexico
1890 German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck resigns after 19 years after disagreement with German Emperor Wilhelm II
1900 Japan uses its influence over Korea to deny Russia’s efforts to obtain a naval station at Korean Port of Masampo, the lead up to the Russo-Japanese war
1922 British magistrates in India sentence Mahatma Gandhi to 6 years imprisonment for disobedience
1940 Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler meet at Brenner Pass where the Italian dictator agrees he will, in due course, join Germany’s impending war effort in the west
1965 Cosmonaut Alexey Leonov, leaving his spacecraft Voskhod 2 for 12 minutes, becomes the first person to walk in space
Did You Know?
Largest art robbery in US history: 13 works of art worth over $500 million are stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston
Today in History in 1990
Would You Believe?
Six farm labourers from Tolpuddle, Dorset, England are sentenced to be transported to Australia for forming a trade union
Today in History in 1834
March 19th
1279 A Mongolian victory at the naval Battle of Yamen ends the Song Dynasty in China
1644 200 members of Peking imperial family and court commit suicide in loyalty to the Emperor
1863 Confederate cruiser SS Georgiana destroyed on her maiden voyage with a cargo of munitions, and medicines then valued over $1,000,000. Wreck discovered exactly 102 years later by teenage diver and pioneer underwater archaeologist E. Lee Spence.
1920 US Senate rejects Treaty of Versailles for 2nd time refusing to ratify League of Nations’ covenant (maintaining isolation policy)
1932 The Sydney Harbour Bridge is opened in Sydney, Australia
2003 Airstrikes by an American and British-led coalition signal the beginning of the Invasion of Iraq, without United Nations support and in defiance of world opinion