TODAY IN MILITARY HISTORY
20 February
◆1521 Ponce de Leon set sail from Puerto Rico with 200 men to colonize Florida. Landing, probably at Charlotte Harbor, de Leon was wounded in an attack by the natives and the group returned to Cub where de Leon died.
◆1653 Naval Battle of Portsmouth: Tromp's Dutch defeated by Blake's English.
◆1725 In the American colonies, a posse of New Hampshire volunteers comes across a band of encamped Native Americans and takes 10 "scalps" in the first significant appropriation of this Native American practice by European colonists.★
◆1726 William Prescott, U.S. Revolutionary War hero at the Battle of Bunker Hill, is born.
◆1755 English General Edward Braddock, accompanied by two regiments of English troops, arrived in Virginia to assume the post of commander-in-chief of all the English forces in the American colonies. He arranges a conference of the royal governors of Maryland, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, New York, and Virginia in Alexandria, Virginia. The agenda is to develop a strategy for attacks on French positions at Crown Point, Dusquene, Niagra and Nova Scotia.
◆1792 President Washington signed an act creating the U.S. Post Office.
◆1809 The Supreme Court ruled the power of the federal government is greater than that of any individual state.
◆1813 Battle of Salta: Argentine Patriot forces under Manuel Belgrano defeat the Royalists
◆1815 USS Constitution, under Captain Charles Stewart, captures HMS Cyane and sloop-of-war Levant.
◆1839 Congress prohibited dueling in the District of Columbia.
◆1861 The Confederacy Dept. of Navy formed.
◆1864 In the largest battle fought in Florida during the Civil War, a Confederate force under General Joseph Finegan decisively defeats an army commanded by General Truman Seymour.★
◆1915 President Wilson opened the Panama -Pacific Expo in San Francisco to celebrate the opening of the Panama Canal.★
◆1941 The U.S. sent war planes to the Pacific. General George C. Kenney pioneered aerial warfare strategy and tactics in the Pacific theater.
◆1942 Franklin D. Roosevelt authorized the internment of Japanese Americans on the West Coast.
◆1942 Japanese drive off a carrier based task force led by the American aircraft carrier Lexington which attempts to attack Rabaul.
◆1942 Lt. Edward O'Hare takes off from the aircraft carrier Lexington in a raid against the Japanese position at Rabaul-and minutes later becomes America's first flying ace.★
◆1943 British and American units hold the German attack on Sbiba. Among the defending units is the British Guards Brigade. The attack through the Kasserine Pass, is initially held as well. However, the elements of the German 15th Panzer Division attacking here are reinforced with elements of the 10th Panzer Division and break through the Allied defenses. The British 26th Armored Brigade is moved up to resist the German breakthrough; nonetheless, the German forces advance to within 10 miles of Thala.
◆1944 American carrier aircraft from Task Group 58.1 (Admiral Reeves) attack Japanese targets in Jaluit Atoll. The fighting on Eniwetok continues. The nearby island of Parry is shelled by US naval forces.
◆1944 A ferry carrying a stock of heavy water on the first stage of a journey from the Ryukan hydroelectric plant to laboratories in Germany is sunk and her cargo lost in attack by Norwegian resistance fighters. Heavy water (or deuterium) is used in atomic research, and is the catalyzing agent in making a Hydrogen bomb.
◆1944 During World War II, U.S. bombers began raiding German aircraft manufacturing centers in a series of attacks that became known as "Big Week."
◆1945 Nuremberg is attacked by 900 American B-17 bombers with 700 escort fighters.★
◆1945 The US 20th Corps (part of US 3rd Army) continues its attacks.
◆1945 There are American landings on the island of Biri where Japanese resistance is encountered.
◆1945 Day 2 on Iwo Jima: The naval bombardment groups (US TF54 and TF52), now joined by US Task Force 58, continue to provide support to the US 5th Amphibious Corps fighting on shore.★
◆1951 General MacArthur announced that he had accepted the Air Force's position on interdiction. "Our field strategy, initiated upon Communist China's entry into the war, involving a rapid withdrawal to lengthen the enemy's supply lines with resultant pyramiding of his logistical difficulties and an almost astronomical increase in destructiveness of our airpower, has worked well."
◆1962 From Cape Canaveral, Florida, John Hershel Glenn Jr. is successfully launched into space aboard the Friendship 7 spacecraft on the first orbital flight by an American astronaut.
◆1963 Moscow offered to allow on -site inspection of nuclear testing.
◆1965 The Ranger 8 spacecraft crashed on the moon after sending back 7,000 photos of the lunar surface.
◆1966 Chester W. Nimitz (80), US admiral (WW II), died at home on Yerba Buena Island (Treasure Island) in SF Bay.
◆1967 The 378-foot high endurance cutter Hamilton, first in her class, was commissioned. This was the first class of major vessels in the U.S. government's inventory that were powered by jet turbines.◆1974 S-3A Viking ASW aircraft (carrier jet) introduced officially, given to VS-41.
◆1976 After operating for 22 years, the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization concludes its final military exercise and quietly shuts down.
◆2003 Pentagon officials said they will send over 1,700 US troops to the Philippines over the next few weeks to fight Muslim extremists.