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September
in History
September 1, 1715 - The "Sun King" (King Louis XIV of France) died. He
had ruled since the age of five and was succeeded by his 5-year-old great
grandson Louis XV.
September 1, 1939 - At 5.30 a.m., Hitler's armies invaded Poland
starting World War II in Europe.
September 1, 1969 - Military officers overthrew the Libyan government.
The Libyan Arab Republic was then proclaimed under Colonel Muammar
Gaddafi.
September 1, 1983 - Korean Air Lines Flight 007 was shot down by a
Soviet fighter plane while en route from New York to Seoul, killing all
269 persons on board. The Boeing 747 reportedly strayed 100 miles off
course over secret Soviet military installations on the Kamchatka
Peninsula and Sakhalin Island. It crashed in the Sea of Japan.
September 2, 1666 - The Great Fire of London started; it destroyed
13,000 buildings in four days. Today you can still climb the large
memorial column that was erected shortly after the fire. The column is
near the Billingsgate Fish Market, and close to the site of the bakery
where the fire started. "Pish! A woman might piss it out." -The Lord Mayor
of London awakened from sleep on the morning of 2 September 1666. He then
went back to bed.
September 2, 1752 - The British ended their use of the Julian
calendar, switching instead to the Gregorian calendar, resulting in a
major adjustment as Wednesday, September 2, was followed by Thursday,
September 14. The correction resulted in rioting by people who felt
cheated and demanded the missing eleven days back.
September 2, 1789 - The third presidential cabinet department, the
U.S. Treasury, was established by Congress.
September 2, 1864 - During the U.S. Civil War, Atlanta was captured by
Sherman's Army. "Atlanta is ours, and fairly won," Gen. William T. Sherman
telegraphed President Lincoln.
September 2, 1923 - The first elections were held in the Irish Free
State after achieving independence from Britain.
* September 2, 1930 - French aviators Dieudonne Coste and Maurice
Bellonte made the first non-stop flight from Europe to the USA.
September 2, 1945 - President Harry Truman declared V-J Day (Victory
over Japan Day) commemorating the formal Japanese surrender to the Allies
aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay.
September 2, 1945 - Ho Chi Minh proclaimed the independence of Vietnam
and the establishment of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.
September 2, 1962 - The Soviet Union agreed to send arms to Cuba,
leading to the October Missile Crisis after the shipments were discovered
by the U.S.
September 2, 1963 - Alabama governor George Wallace forcibly halted
public school integration by encircling Tuskegee High School with state
troopers.
* September 3, 1189 - Following the death of his father Henry II
Richard I "The Lionheart" was crowned King of England at Westminster Abbey
in London. Before his coronation, he knew little of England since he had
spent most of his life in France. Even while King of England he spent the
vast majority of his ten-year reign abroad, devoting himself to the
Crusades.
September 3, 1783 - The Treaty of Paris was signed by John Adams, Ben
Franklin and John Jay, formally ending the American Revolutionary War
between Britain and the United States.
September 3, 1833 - The New York Sun newspaper first appeared, marking
the beginning of the 'penny press,' inexpensive newspapers sold on
sidewalks by newspaper boys. The paper focused on human interest stories
and sensationalism and by 1836 was the largest seller in America with a
circulation of 30,000.
September 3, 1838 - Anti-slavery leader Frederick Douglass began his
escape from slavery by boarding a train in Baltimore dressed as a sailor.
He rode to Wilmington, Delaware, where he caught a steamboat to the free
city of Philadelphia, then took a train to New York City where he came
under the protection of the underground railway network.
September 3, 1939 - England and France declared war on Germany after
its invasion of Poland two days earlier.
September 3, 1943 - Italy signed an armistice with the Allies during
World War II in Europe as the British Eighth Army, commanded by General
Bernard Montgomery, invaded the Italian mainland from Sicily.
September 4, 1609 - English navigator Henry Hudson, working for the
Dutch East India Company, arrived at the island of Manhattan, before
sailing up the river that now bears his name. In making his trip up the
river, Hudson claimed the area for the Dutch and opened the land for the
settlers who followed.
September 4, 1781 - Los Angeles was founded by the Spanish governor of
California, Felipe de Neve, near the site of the Indian village of Yang-na.
The original name was El Pueblo de la Reina de Los Angeles (The Town of
the Queen of the Angels).
September 4, 1886 - The last major U.S.-Indian war came to an end as
Geronimo was captured. He died of natural causes in 1909 at Fort Sill,
Oklahoma.
September 5, 1666 - The Fire of London was finally extinguished after
two days. It had destroyed over 80 churches, historic guild halls, houses
and valuable archives.
September 5, 1664 - After days of negotiation, the Dutch settlement of
New Amsterdam surrendered to the British, who renamed it New York.
September 5, 1698 - Russia's Peter the Great imposed a tax on beards.
September 5, 1774 - The First Continental Congress assembled in
Philadelphia with 56 delegates, representing every colony, except Georgia.
Attendants included Patrick Henry, George Washington, Sam Adams and John
Hancock.
* September 5-6, 1972 - Eleven members of the Israeli Olympic Team
were killed during an attack on the Olympic Village in Munich by members
of the Black September faction of the Palestinian Liberation Army. Israeli
jets then bombed Palestinian positions in Lebanon and Syria in retaliation
on September 8, 1972.
September 5, 1975 - The first of two September assassination attempts
on President Gerald Ford occurred as a woman pointed a gun at the
president in Sacramento, California. Two weeks later, a second attempt
occurred as another woman fired a shot at Ford in San Francisco. Ford was
not harmed in either incident.
September 6, 1522 - Ferdinand Magellan's 17 surviving crewmembers
reached the Spanish coast aboard the Vittoria, having completed the first
circumnavigation of the world.
September 6, 1781 - The Battle of New London CT. Benedict Arnold
proved his loyalty to the crown with a ferocious attack on a small patriot
fort in Connecticut, near the town of his birth. The massacre served no
purpose other than to quell his desire for revenge against an ungrateful
and undeserving nation.
September 6, 1852 - Britain's first free lending library opened in
Manchester.
September 6, 1991 - Leningrad was renamed Saint Petersburg by Russian
legislators following the collapse of the Soviet Union. Russia's second
largest city had been known as Leningrad for 67 years in honor of Vladimir
Lenin, founder of the Soviet Union.
September 7, 1630 - The town of Trimontaine (Tremont) was renamed
Boston, and became the capital of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
September 7, 1813 - The earliest known printed reference to the United
States by the nickname "Uncle Sam" occurred in the Troy Post.
September 7, 1940 - The German Luftwaffe began its Blitz bombing
campaign against London during World War II.
September 7, 1986 - Bishop Desmond Tutu became Archbishop of Cape
Town, South Africa, the first black head of South Africa's Anglicans.
September 7, 1994 - The U.S. Army closed its headquarters in Berlin,
ending the American military presence in the once-divided city after
nearly half a century.
September 8, 1565 - Spanish explorers led by Pedro Menendez de Aviles
founded St. Augustine in Florida, the first permanent European settlement
in North America. St. Augustine was founded 42 years before the English
settlement of Jamestown in Virginia, and 55 years before the founding of
Plymouth in Massachusetts.
September 8, 1664 - The Dutch colony of New Amsterdam was surrendered
to the British who renamed it New York in 1669.
September 8, 1883 - The Northern Pacific Railroad across the U.S. was
completed.
September 8, 1900 - A hurricane with winds of 120 mph struck
Galveston, Texas, killing over 8,000 persons, making it the worst disaster
in U.S. history. The hurricane and tidal wave that followed destroyed over
2,500 buildings.
September 8, 1935 - Louisiana Senator Huey P. Long was shot and
mortally wounded while attending a session of the state House of
Representatives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He died two days later.
September 8, 1941 - The German army began its blockade of Leningrad,
lasting until January 1944, resulting in the deaths of almost one million
civilians.
September 8, 1974 - A month after resigning the presidency in disgrace
as a result of the Watergate scandal, Richard Nixon was granted a full
pardon by President Gerald R. Ford for all offenses committed while in
office.
September 9, 1776 - The USA came into existence as the Continental
Congress changed the name of the new American nation from the United
Colonies to the United States.
September 9, 1948 - Following the withdrawal of Soviet forces from
North Korea, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea was proclaimed with
Pyongyang as its capital.
September 9, 1976 - Leader of Communist China, Chairman Mao Zedong,
died. As a Chinese revolutionary soldier and statesman, he had proclaimed
the People's Republic of China in 1949 in Beijing.
September 9, 1993 - Israel and the PLO (Palestine Liberation
Organization) agreed to recognize each other, paving the way for a
possible peaceful end to the hundred year old conflict between Arabs and
Jews in the Mideast.
September 10, 1588 - Thomas Cavendish returned to England, becoming
the third man to circumnavigate the globe.
September 10, 1623 - Lumber and furs were the first cargo to leave
Plymouth in North America for England.
September 10, 1813 - The nine-ship American flotilla under Oliver
Hazard Perry wrested naval supremacy from the British on Lake Erie by
capturing or destroying a force of six English vessels.
September 10, 1846 - Elias Howe of Boston patented the first practical
sewing machine in the United States.
September 10, 1850 - California joined the US as the thirty-first
state, only two years after the population boom of the California Gold
Rush. As part of the North-South Compromise of 1850, California was
admitted as a free state.
September 10, 1943 - German troops occupied Rome and took over the
protection of Vatican City.
September 11, 1777 - Battles at Birmingham Meeting House and Chadd's
Ford, near Brandywine Creek PA. After Howe's army pulled out of New
Jersey, the fleet dropped anchor off the Chesapeake and marched to conquer
Philadelphia. Washington built fortifications to stop them at Brandywine
Creek, but the British successfully pushed through. Philadelphia was in
British hands by the end of the month.
* September 11, 2001 - The worst terrorist attack in U.S. History
occurred as four large passenger jets were hijacked then crashed, killing
over 3,000 persons. Four separate teams of Mideast terrorists operating
from inside the U.S. boarded morning flights posing as passengers, then
forcibly commandeered the aircraft. Two fully-fueled jumbo jets were
diverted by the hijackers to New York City where they were piloted into
the twin towers of the World Trade Center. The impact and subsequent fire
caused both 110-story towers to collapse, killing 2,801 persons including
hundreds of rescue workers and people employed in the towers. In addition,
Flight 77 with 64 people on board was diverted to Washington, D.C. then
piloted into the Pentagon building, killing everyone on board and 125
military personnel inside the building. Flight 93 with 44 people on board
was also diverted toward Washington but crashed into a field in
Pennsylvania after passengers attempted to overpower the terrorists on
board.
September 12, 1609 - Henry Hudson sailed the sloop Half Moon into New
York Bay and up to Albany to discover the river named after him.
September 12, 1943 - Former Italian dictator Benito Mussolini was
rescued by German paratroopers on orders from Adolf Hitler. Mussolini was
being held prisoner by Italian authorities following the collapse of his
Fascist regime.
* September 12, 1953 - John F. Kennedy, 36, married Jacqueline Bouvier,
24, in a ceremony before 750 invited guests at St. Mary's Church in
Newport, Rhode Island, conducted by Archbishop Richard Cushing of Boston.
September 12, 1953 - Nikita Khrushchev was elected first secretary of
the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the USSR.
September 12, 1974 - Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia, was deposed
by an army coup after 44 years as ruler.
September 12, 1977 - Steve Biko, the South African black civil rights
leader, died while he was in police detention.
September 12, 1990 - A treaty was signed by East and West Germany and
the World War II Allies allowing for the restoration of sovereignty to a
re-united Germany.
September 13, 1783 - The Treaty of Paris ended the Revolutionary War
September 13, 1788 - The U.S. Congress chose New York as the federal
capital of the new American government (until 1789).
September 13, 1814 - As the evening of approached, Francis Scott Key,
a young lawyer who had come to negotiate the release of an American
friend, was detained in Baltimore harbor on board a British vessel.
Throughout the night and into the early hours of the next morning, Key
watched as the British bombed Fort McHenry with military rockets. As dawn
broke, he was amazed to find the Stars and Stripes, tattered but intact,
still flying above Fort McHenry. Key's experience inspired him to pen the
words to The Star-Spangled Banner. He adapted his lyrics to the tune of a
popular drinking song, "To Anacreon in Heaven," and the song soon became
the de facto national anthem of the United States of America, though
Congress did not officially recognize it as such until 1931.
September 13, 1971 - State police and National Guardsmen stormed
Attica prison in New York State ending a five-day prisoners' revolt.
Thirty one prisoners and 11 guards were killed.
* September 14, 1638 - John Harvard, a 31-year-old clergyman from
Charlestown, died, leaving his library and half of his estate to a local
college. The young minister's bequest allowed the college to firmly
establish itself. In honor of its first benefactor, the school adopted the
name Harvard College. Founded by the General Court of Massachusetts in
1636, Harvard is America's oldest institution of higher learning. From a
college of nine students and one instructor, it has grown into a
world-renowned university with over 18,000 degree candidates and 2,000
faculty members, including numerous Nobel laureates. With an endowment of
$11 billion, the university is now the country's wealthiest.
September 14, 1741 - Composer George Frederick Handel finished Messiah
after working on it nonstop for 23 days.
September 14, 1812 - Napoleon and his troops first entered Moscow as
the retreating Russians set the city on fire. Napoleon found it was
impossible to stay through the winter in the ruined city. He then began a
retreat from Moscow which became one of the great disasters of military
history. Fewer than 20,000 of the original 500,000 men with him survived
the Russian campaign.
September 14, 1901 - Eight days after being shot, President William
McKinley died from wounds suffered during an assassination attempt in
Buffalo, New York. He was succeeded by Theodore Roosevelt.
* September 14, 1927 - In Nice, France, famed ballet dancer Isadora
Duncan was killed in a freak accident as the long scarf she was wearing
became caught in the moving wheel of the car in which she was riding,
strangling her.
September 14, 1930 - The Nazi Party became the second largest party in
Germany following a stunning election triumph.
September 14, 1960 - The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries
(OPEC) was formed by representatives of oil-producing countries meeting in
Baghdad.
September 14, 1975 - Elizabeth Ann Seton became the first American
saint.
September 14, 1982 - Princess Grace of Monaco died following an
accident in which her car plunged off a mountain road in Monte Carlo. Her
daughter Stephanie, also in the car, survived and was treated for shock
and bruises. Princess Grace (Grace Kelly) was a Hollywood actress who met
Prince Rainier III of Monaco during filming of the Hitchcock film To Catch
a Thief. She then gave up a successful acting career and married him in
1956.
September 15, 1776 - British forces under General William Howe
captured New York during the American Revolution.
September 15, 1784 - The first ascent in a hydrogen balloon in England
was made by the Italian aeronaut Vincenzo Lunardi.
September 15, 1916 - Tanks were first used in combat, during the
Allied offensive at the Battle of the Somme, in World War I.
September 15, 1935 - Nazis enacted the Nuremburg Laws depriving Jews
of their rights of citizenship.
September 15, 1830 - George Stephenson's Manchester and Liverpool
railway was opened in England by the Duke of Wellington. During the
ceremony, William Huskisson, MP, became the first person to be killed by a
train. Mr. Huskisson, less active from the effects of age and ill health,
bewildered too, by the frantic cries of 'Stop the engine! Clear the
track!' that resounded on all sides, completely lost his head, looked
helplessly to the right and left, and was instantaneously prostrated by
the fatal machine, which dashed down like a thunderbolt on him...
[A passenger describes the death of William Huskisson MP, the first person
to be killed by a train.]
September 16, 1498 - "No-one expects the Spanish Inquisition…" Tomás
de Torquemada died in Avila. As the first Spanish Grand Inquisitor, he
displayed a ruthless efficiency and zeal. His name has become synonymous
with bigotry and hatred. Through his ministrations, the Jews were expelled
from Spain in 1492. The Inquisition lasted from 1478 through 1834.
* September 16, 1620 - The Mayflower ship departed from England bound
for America with 102 passengers and a small crew. The ship weathered
dangerous Atlantic storms and reached Provincetown, Massachusetts on
November 21. The Pilgrims disembarked at Plymouth on December 26.
September 16, 1776 - The battle of Harlem Heights NY. Harlem Heights
was the one ray of light in an otherwise bleak couple of months for the
American army during the British invasion of New York. Their victory
during this small skirmish helped improve diminished American morale.
September 16, 1908 - General Motors was founded by entrepreneur
William Crapo "Billy" Durant in Flint, Michigan
September 16, 1982 - Beginning of a two day massacre in Palestinian
refugee camps in West Beirut as Christian militiamen (the Phalangists)
entered Sabra and Shatila and began shooting hundreds of Palestinians,
including elderly men, women and children.
September 17, 1630 - The Massachusetts village of Shawmut changed its
name to Boston. It was founded by John Winthrop as an extension of the
colony at Salem and was named after the town of the same name in
Lincolnshire, England.
September 17, 1787 - At the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia,
delegates from twelve states voted unanimously to approve the proposed
U.S. Constitution.
September 17, 1796 - President George Washington delivered his
"Farewell Address" to Congress before concluding his second term in
office.
* September 18, 1793 - President Washington laid the cornerstone of
the U.S. Capitol.
September 18, 1830 - Tom Thumb, the first locomotive built in the
United States, lost a nine-mile race in Maryland to a horse.
September 18, 1851 - The New York Times was first published.
September 17, 1862 - The bloodiest day in U.S. military history
occurred as Gen. Robert E. Lee and the Confederate armies were stopped at
Antietam in Maryland by Gen. George B. McClellan and numerically superior
Union forces. By nightfall 26,000 men were dead, wounded, or missing.
September 17, 1908 - The first fatality involving powered flight
occurred as a biplane piloted by Orville Wright fell from a height of 75
feet, killing Lt. Thomas E. Selfridge, his 26-year-old passenger. A crowd
of nearly 2,000 spectators at Fort Myer, Virginia, observed the crash of
the plane which was being tested for possible military use. Orville Wright
was seriously injured.
September 17, 1939 - The Soviets invaded Eastern Poland, meeting
little resistance and taking over 200,000 Poles prisoner. This was done in
accordance with the Nazi-Soviet Pact in which the Nazis and Soviets had
predetermined how they would divide up Poland.
September 18, 1947 - The U.S. Air Force was established as a separate
military service.
September 19, 1676 - Jamestown, Virginia, was attacked and burned
during a rebellion led by Nathaniel Bacon against the royal governor, Sir
William Berkeley.
September 19, 1692 - During the Salem Witchcraft Trials, Giles Corey
was pressed to death for standing mute and refusing to answer charges of
witchcraft brought against him. He is the only person in America to have
suffered this punishment.
September 19, 1783 - The Montgolfier brothers sent up the first
balloon with live creatures aboard; passengers included a sheep, a
rooster, and a duck.
September 19, 1893 - New Zealand became the first country to grant
women the right to vote.
September 19-20, 1985 - Mexico City earthquakes killed an estimated
5,000 to 20,000 persons and left more than 100,000 homeless, causing $4
billion in damage. The quakes registered 8.1 and 7.5 on the Richter Scale.
September 19, 1994 - U.S. troops invaded Haiti, with the stated goal
of restoring democracy.
September 20, 1519 - Ferdinand Magellan, with a fleet of five small
ships, sailed from Seville on his expedition around the world.
September 20, 1873 - The New York Stock Exchange was forced to close
for the first time in its history as a result of a banking crisis during
the financial panic of 1873.
September 20, 1973 - The much-hyped "Battle of the Sexes" took place
in the Houston Astrodome as tennis player and women's rights activist,
Billie Jean King, defeated self-styled male chauvinist Bobby Riggs in
three straight sets. Riggs, a retired tennis champion, had been critical
of the quality of women's tennis.
September 20, 1989 - F.W. De Klerk was sworn in as president of South
Africa. He began an era of reform aimed at ending apartheid and was
succeeded by Nelson Mandela.
September 21, 1529 - The Turkish army under Suleiman the Magnificent
was defeated at Vienna. Viennese bakers created pastries in the shape of
the Muslim crescent. These proved to be popular, and are today known in
the French for crescent, or 'croissant'.
September 21, 1673 - James Needham returned to Virginia after
exploring the land to the west, which would become Tennessee.
September 21, 1784 - The Pennsylvania Packet and General Advertiser,
the first successful US daily newspaper, was published.
September 21, 1938 - A hurricane struck parts of New York and New
England, causing widespread damage, flooding downtown Providence, and
claiming more than 600 lives.
September 21, 1949 - The People's Republic of China was proclaimed by
Communist leaders in China.
September 22, 1792 - France was declared a Republic.
September 22, 1776 - During the American Revolution, Nathan Hale was
executed without a trial after he was caught spying on British troops on
Long Island, his last words, "I only regret that I have but one life to
lose for my country."
September 22, 1828 - Shaka, chief of the Zulus and founder of the Zulu
empire, was killed by his two half-brothers.
September 22, 1862 - President Abraham Lincoln issued a preliminary
Emancipation Proclamation freeing the slaves in territories held by
Confederates as of January 1, 1863.
* September 23 - Autumn (Sept. 23-Dec. 21) begins in the Northern
Hemisphere with the autumnal equinox, at 1:37 a.m. EDT. In the Southern
Hemisphere today is the beginning of spring.
September 23, 1779 - The American warship "Bonhomme Richard" defeated
the HMS "Serapis" off Flamborough Head. The American commander, John Paul
Jones, is said to have declared, "I have not yet begun to fight!"
September 23, 1780 - British spy John Andre was captured along with
papers revealing Benedict Arnold's plot to surrender West Point to the
British.
September 23, 1806 - The Lewis and Clark expedition returned to St.
Louis.
September 23, 1952 - Vice-presidential candidate Richard Nixon
delivered his Checkers Speech on television and radio to address
accusations of financial misdeeds.
September 23, 1991 - Armenia declared its independence from the Soviet
Union.
* September 24, 1692 - The infamous "Salem Witch Trials" came to an
end when eight women accused of witchcraft were hanged in Salem. The
trials took place at a time when any person who behaved outside of the
"norm" was accused of being an instrument of the devil, a crime punishable
by death. While most of those killed were women, a few men (generally
relatives of the accused) also suffered the same fate.
September 24, 1957 - President Dwight Eisenhower ordered the National
Guard to enforce racial integration of schools in Little Rock, Arkansas.
September 24, 1980 - War erupted between Iran and Iraq as Iraqi troops
crossed the border and encircled Abadan, then set fire to the world's
largest oil refinery.
September 25, 1513 - Vasco Balboa, Spanish explorer, became the first
European to sight the Pacific Ocean after crossing the Isthmus of Panama.
He named it the South Sea, claiming it in the name of the King of Spain.
September 25, 1690 - The first newspaper in what is now the US was
published, and after its first edition, colonial authorities suppressed
it. Benjamin Harris's "Publick Occurrences Both Foreign and Domestick,"
published in Boston, was considered improper for further publication
because it criticized the British Crown. Newspapers in Britain fared
little better.
September 25, 1775 - British troops captured Ethan Allen, the hero of
Ticonderoga, when he and a handful of Americans tried to invade Canada.
September 25, 1789 - The first U.S. Congress proposed 12 amendments to
the Constitution, ten of which, comprising the Bill of Rights, were
ratified.
September 25, 1818 - The first blood transfusion using human blood, as
opposed to earlier attempts with animal blood, took place at Guy's
Hospital in London.
September 25, 1956 - One century after the first transatlantic
telegraph cable was laid, the first transatlantic telephone cable began
operation. How far we have come! The cable provided a princely 35 lines
from Britain to Canada and the USA.
September 26, 1580 - Sir Francis Drake, aboard The Golden Hind
returned to England after a 33-month voyage to circumnavigate the globe.
September 26, 1779 - John Adams was named to negotiate the
Revolutionary War's peace terms with Britain.
September 26, 1829 - Scotland Yard, the British police CID (Criminal
Investigation Department) was formed. Scotland Yard was formerly the site
of a house belonging to the Scottish king.
September 26, 1960 - The first-ever televised presidential debate
occurred between presidential candidates John F. Kennedy and Richard M.
Nixon. Many who watched were inclined to say Kennedy 'won' the debate,
while those who listened only to the radio thought Nixon did better.
Nixon, who declined to use makeup, appeared somewhat haggard looking on TV
in contrast to Kennedy.
September 26, 1984 - Britain agreed to allow Hong Kong to revert to
Chinese sovereignty in 1997.
September 27, 1791 - Jews in France were granted French citizenship
September 27, 1826 - The Stockton and Darlington Railway, the first
passenger rail service, opened in England, with its first steam locomotive
traveling at 10 mph.
September 27, 1964 - After a 10-month investigation, the Warren
Commission Report was issued stating a lone gunman had been responsible
for the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas on November
23, 1963. Warren Commission Report online at the University of Rostock
September 27, 1995 - The Israeli cabinet agreed to give Palestinians
control of much of the West Bank which had been occupied by Israel for 28
years.
September 28, 1542 - Portuguese navigator Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo
arrived at present-day San Diego.
September 28, 1781 - American forces in the Revolutionary War, backed
by a French fleet, began their siege of Yorktown. The arrival of the
French fleet secured the fate of Cornwallis's army. With the Chesapeake
blockaded and his men outnumbered two-to-one, a joint Franco-American
attack on Yorktown captured over 8,000 British soldiers and effectively
ended the Revolution. America was officially recognized as a free and
independent nation, and England fought to keep its head above water in
what was a world war against France and Spain.
September 28, 1794 - Britain, Russia, and Austria formed the Alliance
of St Petersburg against France.
September 28, 1850 - Flogging was abolished as a form of punishment in
the US Navy.
September 28, 1995 - Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and
Palestine Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat signed an accord at
the White House establishing Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank.
September 29, 1789 - Congress created the United States Army,
consisting of 1,000 enlisted men and officers.
September 29, 1829 - England's "bobbies" made their first public
appearance. Greater London's Metropolitan Police force was established by
an act of Parliament at the request of Home Secretary, Sir Robert Peel,
after whom they were nicknamed. The force later became known as Scotland
Yard, the site of their first headquarters.
September 29, 1941 - Nazis killed 33,771 Jews in the Babi Yar massacre
near Kiev.
September 30, 1630 - John Billington, one of the first pilgrims to
arrive at the American colonies, was hanged for murder in Plymouth. This
was the first criminal execution during the colonial period of what is
today the USA.
September 30, 1777 - The Congress of the United States, which had been
forced to flee in the face of advancing British forces, moved to York PA.
September 30, 1846 - Dentist William Morton used ether as an
anesthetic for the first time on a patient in his Boston office.
September 30, 1938 - British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain
returned to England declaring there would be "peace in our time," after
signing the Munich Pact with Adolf Hitler. The Pact ceded the
Czechoslovakian Sudetenland to the Nazis. Chamberlain claimed the
agreement meant peace however, Hitler seized all of Czechoslovakia in
March of 1939.
September 30, 1949 - The Berlin Airlift concluded after 277,264
flights carrying over 2 million tons of supplies to the people of West
Berlin, blockaded by the Soviets.
* September 30, 1955 - Actor James Dean was killed in a car crash in
California at age 24. Although he made just three major films, Rebel
without a Cause, East of Eden and Giant, he remains one of the most
influential actors.
September 30, 1966 - Nazi war criminals Albert Speer and Baldur von
Schirach were released from Spandau prison after serving 20 years. The
prison, originally built for 600 inmates, was left with only one prisoner,
former Deputy Fuehrer Rudolf Hess.
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