TODAY IN MILITARY HISTORY
5 July
◆46 BCE Caesar returns to Rome following victory in the African War.
◆1044 Battle of Menfo: The Germans defeat the Magyars.
◆1187 Saladin captures the citadel of Tiberias.
◆1775 The Olive Branch Petition was adopted by the Continental Congress and professed the attachment of the American people to George III. It expressed hope for the restoration of harmony and begged the king to prevent further hostile actions against the colonies. The following day, Congress passed a resolution written by Thomas Jefferson and John Dickinson, a "Declaration of the Causes and Necessities of Taking Up Arms," which rejected independence but asserted that Americans were ready to die rather than be enslaved. King George refused to receive the Olive Branch Petition on August 23 and proclaimed the American colonies to be in open rebellion.
◆1776 The Declaration of Independence was first printed by John Dunlop in Philadelphia. 200 copies were prepared July 5-6 and distributed to the states.
◆1801 David G. Farragut (d.1870), American naval hero, was born in Knoxville, Tenn.
◆1806 Spanish defeat a British attempt to take Buenos Aires.
◆1811 Venezuela declares independence from Spain.
◆1814 U.S. troops under Jacob Brown defeated a superior British force at Chippewa, Canada.
◆1814 Sloop-of-war Peacock captures British Stranger, Venus, Adiona, and Fortitude.
◆1815 Commodore Stephen Decatur's squadron arrives at Tripoli to collect reparations for seizure of American merchant ships in violation of Treaty of 1805.
◆1861 The first large-scale engagement of the Civil War is fought in southwestern Missouri, signaling an escalation in the hostilities between the North and South.★
◆1863 Federal troops occupied Vicksburg, Mississippi, and distributed supplies to the citizens. The battles of Jackson and Birdsong Ferry, were fought in Mississippi.
◆1943 US invasion fleet (96 ships) sailed to Sicily.
◆1943 On New Georgia, American force of regimental strength lands in the north at Rice Anchorage. Fighting on the Zanana-Munda track continues. During the night (July 5-6) Japanese destroyers bring nearly 3000 more troops to Vila. Admiral Ainsworth, with 3 cruisers and 4 destroyers, engages elements of the Japanese force and sinks one destroyer while losing the cruiser Helena.
◆1944 The Japanese garrison on Numfoor, New Guinea, tried to counterattack but was soon beaten back by U.S. forces.
◆1944 Elements of US 1st Army capture La Haye du Puits.
◆1945 It is announced that General Spaatz will lead the US Strategic Air Force in the campaign against Japan.
◆1945 Britain and the United States recognize a new Polish government of National Unity. Mikolajczyk, former leader of the London based Polish government in exile, is one of the deputy premiers.
◆1945 US General Douglas MacArthur announced that the liberation of the Philippines from its Japanese occupiers was complete.
◆1946 THE BIKINI INTRODUCED: French designer Louis Reard unveils a daring two-piece swimsuit at the Piscine Molitor, a popular swimming pool in Paris. Parisian showgirl Micheline Bernardini modeled the new fashion, which Reard dubbed "bikini," inspired by a news-making U.S. atomic test that took place off the Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean earlier that week.★
◆1947 Rancher Mac Brazel found unusual debris 75 miles northwest of Roswell, NM, scattered over an area 300 years wide and ¾ of a mile long. This led to rumors of an alien crash. The military said it was a crashed weather balloon.★
◆1950 Task Force Smith, B and C Companies of the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment, and A Battery, 52nd Field Artillery Battalion, all of the 24th Infantry Division, met a large tank and infantry element of the North Korean 4th Division just north of Osan. After seven hours of brisk action, battered by the T-34 tanks' fire and flanked by overwhelming numbers of infantry, the Task Force Smith withdrew under fire. Of the 520 infantry and artillery men of the Task Force, only 185 made it to friendly lines. A North Korean soldier who came on the scene just after the battle recorded in his diary, "We met vehicles and American PWs. We also saw some American dead. We found four of our destroyed tanks. Near Osan there was a great battle."
◆1950 Near Sojong, South Korea, Private Kenneth Shadrick, a 19-year-old infantryman from Skin Fork, West Virginia, becomes the first American reported killed in the Korean War.
◆1952 Kentucky’s 623rd Field Artillery Battalion, armed with eighteen 155mm towed howitzers, moves into this area in support of X Corps in holding operations against Communist Chinese assaults. During this period it will earn a Republic of Korea Unit Citation for its fire support of South Korea troops in repelling an enemy assault. In October the battalion, the last Guard artillery unit deployed to Korea, will see hard fighting and earns a Navy Unit Commendation embroidered PANMUNJOM for firing missions in support of the 1st Marine Division. The unit served again overseas in Operation Desert Storm in 1991.
◆1954 The B-52A bomber made its maiden flight.★
◆1966 National Guard was mobilized in Omaha, NE after a 3rd night of rioting.
◆1966 First full day of operation "MACON", Vietnam (4 July - 28 October).
◆1990 NATO leaders opened a two-day meeting in London to revise the alliance’s strategy in light of easing East-West tensions in Europe and the unraveling of the Warsaw Pact.
◆1997 NASA scientists brainstormed to fix problems that left Mars Pathfinder's robot rover stuck aboard the lander.
◆1999 NATO and Russia resolved their differences and cleared the way for some 3,600 Russian troops to arrive in Kosovo.
◆2001 The US spy plane from China arrived at Dobbins Air Reserve Base in Georgia aboard a Russian Antonov-124 transport plane.
◆2004 US-led coalition forces launched an air strike in the restive city of Fallujah on a suspected safe house used by followers of al-Zarqawi. The attack killed 15 insurgents.