1590: Governor of Roanoke Island colony, John White, returns from England to find no trace of the colonists he had left there 3 years earlier [or Aug 18, 1591] 1903: Joe Pulitzer donates $1 million to Columbia University & begins the Pulitzer Prizes in America 1945: Sukarno and Mohammad Hatta declare Indonesia (Dutch East Indies) independent from the Netherlands […]
1896: Gold first discovered in Klondike, found at Bonanza Creek in the Yukon, Canada by George Carmack 1930: I British Empire Games open in Hamilton, Canada 1945: Puyi, the last Chinese Emperor and ruler of Manchukuo is captured by Soviet troops 1946: Direct Action Day: Widespread riots erupt in Calcutta between Muslims and Hindus over whether Pakistan should be […]
1461: Empire of Trebizond surrenders to forces of Sultan Mehmet II – last Byzantine Empire remnant to fall. Emperor David exiled and later murdered. 1620: Mayflower sets sail from Southampton, England, with 102 Pilgrims 1900: The Boxer Rebellion: In China, the Empress, her family and court retainers flee while foreign troops move through Peking in an attempt to […]
338 BC: Macedonian army led by Philip II defeats combined forces of Athens and Thebes in the Battle of Chaeronea, securing Macedonian hegemony in Greece and the Aegean 216 BC: Second Punic War: Battle of Cannae – Carthaginian army lead by Hannibal defeats numerically superior Roman army under command consuls Lucius Aemilius Paullus and Gaius Terentius Varro […]
527: Justinian I becomes the sole ruler of the Byzantine Empire 1086: Results of the Domesday inquiry presented to William the Conqueror in Salisbury (the date of compilation and the Great Domesday are historically contestable) 1774: English chemist Joseph Priestley discovers oxygen by isolating it in its gaseous state 1834: Slavery Abolition Act 1833 comes into effect, abolishes slavery throughout the British Empire 1958: US atomic […]
30 BC: Battle of Alexandria: Mark Antony achieves minor victory over Octavian, but most of his army subsequently deserts, leading to Octavian’s invasion of Egypt 1620: Pilgrim Fathers depart Leiden, Netherlands for England on their way to America 1917: World War I: Battle of Passchendaele (Third Battle of Ypres) begins, goes on to cause approximately 500,000 casualties 1961: Israel welcomes its one […]
1178: Frederick I (Barbarossa), Holy Roman Emperor, crowned King of Burgundy 1419: First defenestration of Prague: anti-Catholic Hussites, followers of executed reformer Jan Hus, storm Prague town hall and throw the judge, mayor and several city council members out the windows. They die in the fall or killed by crowd outside. 1619: House of Burgesses Virginia forms, 1st elective […]
1588: The Battle of Gravelines – Spanish Armada damaged and scattered by the English fleet 1609: Samuel de Champlain shoots and kills two Iroquois chiefs at Ticonderoga, New York setting the stage for French-Iroquois conflicts for the next 150 years 1848: Irish Potato Famine: Tipperary Revolt – an unsuccessful nationalist revolt against British rule put down by police 1905: US […]
1794: French Revolutionary figure Maximilien Robespierre and 22 other leaders of “the Terror” guillotined to thunderous cheers in Paris 1914: Austria-Hungary decides against mediation and declares war on Serbia – first declaration of war of WWI 1917: Silent Parade organised by James Weldon Johnson of 10,000 African-Americans who march on 5th Ave in NYC to protest against lynching 1943: Operation Gomorrah: RAF bombing […]
1586: Walter Raleigh brings the 1st tobacco to England from Virginia 1689: Battle of Killicrankie: Jacobite Scottish Highlanders under Viscount Dundee defeat royalist force under General MacKay 1789: US Congress establishes Department of Foreign Affairs now referred to as the State Department 1866: transatlantic telegraph cable successfully in second attempt comes ashore at Heart’s Content, Newfoundland laid out by Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s […]
