TODAY IN MILITARY HISTORY
10 March
◆241 BCE Naval Battle of the Aegates Islands: Rome defeats Carthage, to win the First Punic War.
◆1527 Battle of Kanwaha: Babur defeats the Rajputs, to conquer Northern India.
◆1624 England declares war on Spain.
◆1681 English Quaker William Penn received a charter from Charles II, making him sole proprietor of colonial American territory of Pennsylvania.
◆1769 Philadelphia merchants finally agree among themselves to support an intercolonial nonimportation movement. Effective 1 April, they ban the import of nearly all British trade goods until the Townshend Acts are repealed.
◆1775 The Transylvania Company sends Daniel Boone and 30 woodchoppers to cut the Wilderness Road from Fort Wautauga to the mouth of the Kentucky River.
◆1783 USS Alliance (CAPT John Barry) defeats HMS Sybil in final naval action of Revolution in West Indies waters. Barry, in defense of a companion ship, the Duc de Lauzun which was carrying gold to fund the US war effort, maneuvered her between Sybil and Duc De Lauzun to demand the full attention of the former so that the latter might slip away to safety. Sybil then turned her fire toward Alliance and managed to send one shot from her bow chaser into the American frigate’s cabin, mortally wounding a junior officer and scattering many splinters. Yet, Barry held Alliance’s fire until she was within a stone’s throw of her opponent. At that point, a broadside from the American warship opened some 40 minutes of close-in fighting which finally forced Sybil to flee
◆1783 An anonymous address is circulated among the officers of Washington’s main camp at Newburgh, New York. Actually written by Major John Armstrong, the first “Newburgh Address” rebukes Congress for the failure to honor its promises to Continental Army soldiers and exhorts the veterans to defy Congress if accounts are not settled equitably. A meeting of officers is called for the next day.
◆1785 Thomas Jefferson was appointed minister to France, succeeding Benjamin Franklin.
◆1806 Battle of Campo Tenese: French defeat the Neapolitans.
◆1814 Battle of Laon, Day 2: Napoleon loses to the Russo-Prussians.
◆1848 The Senate ratified the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, ending the war with Mexico.
◆1849 A riot erupts in New York where a British actor named Macready is performing at the Astor Place Opera House. Crowds are angry because of the theater’s snobbish dress requirements and because Macready makes scornful comments on the vulgarity of Americans. Twenty-two people are killed and thirty-six injured when troops are called in.
◆1864 Ulysses S. Grant became commander of the Union armies in the Civil War.
◆1865 Battle of Monroe’s Crossroads, NC.
◆1873 Battle of Yancoomassie: 4,000 Ashanti defeat c. 25,000 Fante in what is now Ghana.
◆1876 Alexander Graham Bell made what was, in effect, the first telephone call.
◆1880 The Salvation Army arrived in the United States from England. The organization had been founded in Britain in 1865 by William Booth, a street preacher. It drew on revivalism and attention-getting tactics.
◆1919 In Schenk v United States, the Supreme Court finds that the Espionage Act does not violate the First Amendment. In this case Oliver Wendel Holmes agrees with the majority that in war there exists a “clear and present danger.” In any case, he adds, free speech is always under restraint. Under this ruling Eugene V. Debs is sentenced to ten years for interfering with the draft. He will serve three.
◆1942 American aircraft launched from the American carriers Lexington and Yorktown attack Japanese vessels near Lae, New Guinea.
◆1943 Chennault is promoted and his command in China is to be enlarged and named the 14th Air Force.
◆1944 On New Britain, American forces capture Talasea.
◆1944 On Bougainville, Japanese forces capture Hill 260 but lose ground to American counterattacks in other areas.
◆1945 Patton’s 3rd Army made contact with Hodge’s 1st Army. They link up near Andernach completing the Allied hold on the west bank of the Rhine everywhere north of Koblenz. Field Marshal Kesselring arrives from Italy to take command of the German armies in the west.
◆1945 Germany blew up the Wessel Bridge on the Rhine.
◆1945 For a second day (Operation MEETINGHOUSE) 300 American bombers drop almost 2,000 tons of incendiaries on Tokyo, Japan, destroying large portions of the Japanese capital and killing 100,000 civilians.★
◆1945 Most of the US 41st Infantry Division is landed at the southwest of Mindanao near Zamboanga. General Doe commands the troops and Admiral Barbey the naval support. On Luzon fighting continues south of Laguna de Bay where the US forces are still trying to break through to the east. Organized Japanese resistance on the island of Palawan comes to an end.
◆1945 Navy and civilian nurses interned at Los Banos, Philippines flown back to U.S. Navy nurses awarded Bronze Star.
◆1945 Roosevelt informs Spanish representatives that no American aid will be forthcoming so long as the Franco dictatorship continues.
◆1947 The Big Four met in Moscow to discuss Germany.
◆1948 First use of jets assigned to operational squadron (VF-5A) on board a carrier (Boxer).
◆1949 Nazi wartime broadcaster Mildred E. Gillars, also known as “Axis Sally,” was convicted in Washington D.C. of treason. She served 12 years in prison.
◆1951 The United Nations Command gained one to two miles per day to capture Line Albany; enemy opposition began to fade.
◆1953 North Korean gunners at Wonsan fired on the USS Missouri, the ship responds by firing 998 rounds at the enemy position.
◆1954 Pres. Eisenhower called Sen. Joseph McCarthy a peril to the Republican Party.
◆1955 President Eisenhower indicates that in the event of war, the US would use nuclear weapons.
◆1966 The North Vietnamese captured a Green Beret camp at Ashau Valley.
◆1998 U.S. Air Force and Navy personnel in the Persian Gulf received vaccinations against anthrax.
◆2002 Operation Anaconda continues. In Afghanistan, U.S. troops have been working to reduce a pocket of al-Qaeda resistance for the past 24 hours.
◆2003 The US military says US and British warplanes have attacked several communications sites in Iraq after Iraqi forces fired a missile at coalition aircraft.