On This Day – 23 November 1644
Areopagitica; A speech of Mr. John Milton for the Liberty of Unlicenc’d Printing, to the Parlament of England is a 1644 prose polemical* tract by the English poet, scholar, and polemical author John Milton opposing licensing and censorship. Continue reading “1644 – John Milton publishes Areopagitica, a pamphlet decrying censorship”
4 September
The last emperor of the Western Roman Empire, is deposed when Odoacer proclaims himself “King of Italy”, thus ending the Western Roman Empire.
28 June
Edward IV (28 April 1442 – 9 April 1483) was the King of England from 4 March 1461 (crowned on this day in 1461) until 3 October 1470, and again from 11 April 1471 until his death in 1483. Continue reading “1461 – Edward IV is crowned King of England”
27 June
During the Russo-Japanese War, sailors start a mutiny aboard the Russian battleship Potemkin.
15 June
On this day in 1215, King John of England puts his seal to the Magna Carta Libertatum (commonly known as Magna Carta).
14 June
The Battle of Naseby, was a decisive engagement of the English Civil War, fought on this day in 1645 between the main Royalist army of King Charles I led by Prince Rupert (12,000 strong) and the Parliamentarian New Model Army (15,000 strong), commanded by Sir Thomas Fairfax and Oliver Cromwell.
Continue reading “1645 – English Civil War the Battle of Naseby”
13 June
The Catalina affair was a military confrontation and Cold War-era diplomatic crisis in June 1952, in which Soviet Air Force fighter jets shot down two Swedish aircraft in the Baltic Sea over international waters. Continue reading “1952 – Sweden: the Catalina affair”
6 June
The Battle of Normandy begins when Operation Overlord, commences with the landing of 155,000 Allied troops on the beaches of Normandy in France. The allied soldiers quickly break through the Atlantic Wall and push inland in the largest amphibious military operation in history. Continue reading “1944 – World War II Operation Overlord”
4 June
Emily Davison, a suffragette, runs out in front of King George V’s horse, Anmer, at the Epsom Derby. She is trampled, never regains consciousness and dies four days later.
Forces under Tokugawa Ieyasu take Osaka Castle and destroy the Toyotomi clan, eliminating the final opposition to the Tokugawa Shogunate in Japan.
3 June
Lin Tse-hsü destroys 1.2 million kg of opium confiscated from British merchants, providing Britain with a casus belli to open hostilities, resulting in the First Opium War. Continue reading “1839 – Humen, China”
The Fenian raids of the Fenian Brotherhood, an Irish Republican organization who were based in the United States, on British army forts, customs posts and other targets in Canada, were fought to bring pressure on Britain to withdraw from Ireland.
23 May
Defenestration is the act of throwing someone or something out of a window. There were two incidents in the history of Bohemia in which multiple people were defenestrated. The first occurred in 1419 and the second in 1618, although the term “Defenestration of Prague” more commonly refers to the later incident.
Continue reading “1618 – The Second Defenestration of Prague”
1963 – Kennedy gave his “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech
26 June
“Ich bin ein Berliner” (“I am a Berliner”) is a quotation from a speech given on this day in 1963, by U.S. President John F. Kennedy in West Berlin. He was saying, “I am a citizen of Berlin.” Continue reading “1963 – Kennedy gave his “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech” →