This date in history

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1990 - Mikhail S Gorbachev becomes president of the Soviet Congress.

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44 BC - Julius Caesar, Dictator of the Roman Republic, is stabbed to death by Marcus Junius Brutus, Gaius Cassius Longinus, Decimus Junius Brutus and several other Roman senators on the Ides of March.

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1968 - My Lai massacre occurs (Vietnam War); 450 die.

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Vietnamese woman and children: according to sworn court testimony they were all killed seconds after the photo was taken...estimates of the slain vary between 347 and 504. Only two persons were ever punished: Lt William Calley, sentenced to life in prison of the 'premeditated murder' of 102 civilians, was paroled Sept 1974; Major General Samuel W. Koster – commander of the 23rd Infantry Division (United States) of the United States Army, known as the Americal Division, was not involved with planning the My Lai search-and-destroy mission. However, during the operation he flew over My Lai and monitored the radio communications. Afterward, Koster did not follow up with the 11th Brigade commander on the initial investigation, and later was caught into cover-up. HE was charged by the Army with failure to obey lawful regulations, dereliction of duty, and alleged cover-up; charges dropped... and later was demoted to brigadier general and stripped of a Distinguished Service medal. He died in 2006 and is buried at Arlington. On August 19, 2009, while speaking to the Kiwanis Club of Greater Columbus, Calley issued an apology for his role in the My Lai massacre. Calley said:

"There is not a day that goes by that I do not feel remorse for what happened that day in My Lai. I feel remorse for the Vietnamese who were killed, for their families, for the American soldiers involved and their families. I am very sorry.... If you are asking why I did not stand up to them when I was given the orders, I will have to say that I was a 2nd Lieutenant getting orders from my commander and I followed them—foolishly, I guess." At least he talks about it....41 years later. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre

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1898 - John Philip Holland achieves successful test runs of the first modern submarine off Staten Island.

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1965 - Cosmonaut Aleksei Leonov, leaving his spacecraft Voskhod 2 for 12 minutes, becomes the first person to walk in space.

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1932 - The Sydney Harbour Bridge is opened.

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Originally Posted by Mapuc

My favorite war history is American civil war and WWII.

Thinking...do I have to wait until september 2039 before some great member create a thread called "100 Years Ago Today"

1863: The Confederate cruiser Georgiana, on its maiden voyage, is scuttled off Charleston South Carolina to prevent it from falling into Union hands..."Georgiana was a brig-rigged, iron hulled, propeller steamer of 120 horsepower (89 kW) with a jib and two heavily raked masts, hull and stack painted black. Georgiana was reportedly pierced for fourteen guns and could carry more than four hundred tons of cargo. She was built by the Lawrie shipyard at Glasgow- LOVE those Wegians!-perhaps under subcontract from Lairds of Birkenhead (Liverpool) - and registered at that port in December 1862 as belonging to N. Matheson's Clyde service. The U.S. Consul was rightly apprehensive of her as being "evidently a very swift vessel clearly built for speed, firepower and privateering. Due to the secrecy surrounding her construction, loading and sailing, there is considerable question as to whether the Georgiana was simply a swift merchantman or if she was intended as a privateer. A United States consular dispatch dated 6 January 1863 stated: "The steamer Georgiana, just arrived at Liverpool from the Clyde. She is new and said to be a very superior steamer. ··· Yesterday while lying here she had the Rebel flag flying at her mast." The London American took special note of her in its 28 January 1863 edition as a powerful steamer and remarked that her officers wore gold lace on their caps, considered a sure indication she was being groomed for a man-of-war. [wiki] The Georgiana was sunk after a desperate chase into Charleston Harbor; during which she came so close to the big guns aboard the USS Wissahickon that her crew even heard the orders being given on the U.S. vessel. With solid-shot passing entirely though her hull, her propeller and rudder damaged, and with no hope for escape, Capt. A. B. Davidson flashed a white light in token of surrender, thus gaining time to beach his ship in fourteen feet of water, 1200 m from shore and, after first scuttling her, escaped on the land side with all hands. This was construed as "the most consummate treachery" by the disappointed blockading crew, who would have shared in the proceeds from the prize. Underwater archaeologist E. Lee Spence, who discovered the wreck in 1965, and identified it as the Georgiana, believes that she was indeed intended as a privateer or cruiser for raiding Union commerce due to the naval guns found aboard, her deep draft hull construction, her heavier than standard iron planking, and the closer than normal, doubled up, Z-beam, framing used throughout the vessel. Oddly enough, the vessel, (photo of replica in San Diego Maritime museum) USS America, which wrested the first America's Cup from the British in 1851, had found its way into and been scuttled by the Confederate Navy. She had been seized, refloated, and converted by the Union as part of the blockade of Charleston. Intending to utilize the yacht’s immense speed, the Union armed the ship as a blockader and assigned her to patrol the approaches to Charleston harbor. America was instrumental in directing other vessels onto the chase of the CSS Georgiana...twice proving her worth of Yankee ship-building over (sadly) British shipbuilding! USS America was finally scrapped in 1945! After the Georgiana '​s loss on 19 March 1863, the United States Secretary of Navy wrote: "the destruction of the Georgiana not only touched their (the Confederate's) pockets, but their hopes. She was a splendid craft, peculiarly fitted for the business of privateering."[wiki]

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1815 - Napoleon enters Paris after escape from Elba, begins 100-day rule.

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1871 - Journalist Henry M Stanley begins his famous expedition to Africa.

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1990: A jury in Anchorage, Alaska, finds Captain Hazelwood not guilty in the Valdez oil spill. The defense argued that the blood samples were taken nearly ten hours after the incident and were mishandled. Most states, including Alaska, do not allow samples after three hours and a preservative required to halt fermentation was not added to the sample. As a result of the accident, in 1991 the United States Coast Guard suspended his masters' license for a period of nine months. Hazelwood was acquitted on all felony charges, but was convicted of a misdemeanor charge of negligent discharge of oil, fined $50,000, and sentenced to 1,000 hours of community service...picking up trash on Alaska highways. After his trial Captain Hazelwood became a teacher at a maritime academy. His reinstated license is still valid. Bottom line: the Exxon Valdez hit Bligh Reef because it departed the shipping lanes to avoid ice—a maneuver executed by the Brooklyn and the Arco Juneau just hours before—and failed to turn back into the lanes before striking the reef.
Third mate Gregory Cousins, testifying in the criminal and the civil trials, shouldered much of the blame for failing to execute the turn that Hazelwood, having routinely left the bridge, had ordered. After outlining the maneuver and asking Cousins twice if he was comfortable making the turn, Hazelwood left the bridge at 11:50 p.m. Cousins phoned Hazelwood at 11:55 to say he was beginning the turn but then failed to check that helmsman Robert Kagan followed his commands, spending precious minutes charting the ship's position. Cousins was on the phone to Hazelwood, saying, "I think we're in serious trouble," when they felt the first jolt a few minutes after midnight.
"There was no reason to do what I did that evening," Cousins testified. "I shouldn't have allowed myself to become inattentive." Hoping to secure testimony against Hazelwood, the state gave Cousins immunity against prosecution; plaintiffs in the civil suit did not press charges against him lest he complicate their case against Exxon and Hazelwood-ie the 'fall guy'; the Coast Guard cited him for negligence and suspended his license for nine months. "To the public and the press, 'third mate' has the ring of 'cabin boy,'" says Hazelwood. "Cousins was a trained, licensed navigational officer, a good man. He's still a good man."
Helmsman Kagan, when ordered to make the turn, did not execute it fully. Employment records showed that Kagan required "constant supervision." "I put a lot of it on Kagan," says Paul Larson, who led the Coast Guard investigation. "He does his job, and we're talking about something else today."
The post-grounding radio transmissions in which Hazelwood said he was trying to "extract the ship from the reef" were misleading. He only called for forward throttle—not reverse, as would have been necessary if he'd wanted to free the vessel. By keeping the ship pressed firmly against the reef, he minimized the spill and the danger to his crew....And achived immortality in the movie Waterworld as the villain's (Dennis Hopper) patron saint. The Exxon Valdez, also portrayed in the movie, was scrapped on the beach at Alang, Gujarat, India-renamed Oriental Nicety...on 30 July 2012.[wiki]. Somehow I can relate to this! Having been a lead-driver on semi-sleeper teams for a few years...eventually ya gotta let #2, often an inexperienced co-driver, steer the 80,000 lb truck at two AM in the morning at 60 odd mph. and go into the sleeper-essentially "leave the bridge"...Good help(that doesn't kill ya) is hard to find. I must have done something right; I survived to post this.

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1965 - US confirms its troops used chemical warfare against the Vietcong.

1790 - Thomas Jefferson becomes the 1st US Secretary of State under President Washington.

1888 - English Football League established.

1903 - Niagera Falls runs out of water because of a drought.

1941 - Jimmy Stewart is inducted into the Army, becoming the first major American movie star to wear a military uniform in World War II.

2014 - The US and EU impose sanctions on Russia.

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1903 - Wright brothers obtain airplane patent.

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1603 - Scottish King James VI son of Mary Queen of Scots, becomes King James I of England in succession to Elizabeth I, thus joining the English and Scottish crowns.

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1807 - British Parliament abolishes slave trade throughout the British Empire; a penalty of £120 per slave is introduced for slave ship captains.

1957 - Treaty of Rome establishes European Economic Community (Common Market).

1960 - 1st guided missile launched from nuclear powered sub (Halibut).