TODAY IN MILITARY HISTORY
6 May
◆1333 The Ambush of San Cesario: Stefano Colonna (20) slaughters the Orsini & Savelli, a deed celebrated by Petrarch.
◆1527 Charles V's Spanish and German troops begin the "Sack of Rome."
◆1529 Battle of Ghagra: Babur defeats the Sultan of Bengal.
◆1622 Battle of Wimpfen: Imperial troops under Tilly & Cordoba defeat George Frederick of Baden-Durlach.
◆1757 Battle of Prague: Frederick the Great defeats the Austrians.
◆1848 Battle of Santa Lucia: Austrians defeat the Piedmontese.
◆1856 U.S. Army troops from Fort Tejon and Fort Miller prepared to ride out to protect Keyesville, California, from Yokut Indian attack.
◆1861 Confederate Congress passed act recognizing state of war with the United States and authorized the issuing of Letters of Marque to private vessels. President Davis issued instructions to private armed vessels, in which he defined operational limits, directed "strictest regard to the rights of neutral powers." ordered privateers to proceed "With all ... justice and humanity" toward Union vessels and crews, out-lined procedure for bringing in a prize, directed that all property on board neutral ships be exempt from seizure "unless it be contraband," and defined contraband.
◆1861 Arkansas and Tennessee becomes 9th & 10th state to secede from US.
◆1861 Members of the 5th Louisiana Volunteer Infantry, take up garrison duties in this fort protecting the entrance to Pensacola Bay.
◆1862 Union forces occupy Williamsburg, Virginia, during the Peninsular campaign
◆1864 BATTLE OF THE WILDERNESS (Day 3): Union and Confederate troops continue their desperate struggle in the Wilderness, which was the opening battle in the biggest campaign of the war.
◆1864 General Sherman began to advance on Atlanta.
◆1864 U.S.S. Eutaw, Osceola, Pequot, Shokokon, and General Putnam, side-wheelers of Rear Admiral Lee's North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, supported the landing of troops at Bermuda Hundred, Virginia.
◆1877 Chief Crazy Horse surrendered to U.S. troops in Nebraska. Crazy Horse brought General Custer to his end.
◆1898 US ships & Spanish batteries exchange fire at Havana & Santiago.
◆1915 Gallipoli: Allies attack Cape Hellas.
◆1916 Belgians capture Kigali, German East-Africa.
◆1937 The airship Hindenburg, the largest dirigible ever built and the pride of Nazi Germany, bursts into flames upon touching its mooring mast in Lakehurst, New Jersey, killing 36 passengers and crewmembers.
◆1941 Bob Hope (b. May 29, 1903) began broadcasting his first USO radio show from March Field at Riverside, Ca. The United Service Organizations (USO) began operations this year and provided free coffee, donuts, and entertainment to US military forces. The organization is supported entirely by private citizens and corporations.
◆1942 U.S. Lieutenant General Jonathan Wainwright surrenders all U.S. troops in the Philippines to the Japanese
◆1942 CAPT Milton Miles arrives in Chungking, China, to begin building an intelligence and guerilla training organization, Naval Group China.
◆1943 In Tunisia, US forces advance on three axes toward Bizerta, Ferryville and Protville.
◆1944 A Japanese troopship convoy is destroyed by the American submarine Gurnard.
◆1944 The first flight of the Mitsubishi A7M fighter (designed to replace the Zero) takes place. Technical problems and Allied bombing raids prevent mass production.
◆1945 The US 97th Division, part of US 5th Corps of the US 3rd Army, occupies Pilsen in Czechoslovakia. The US 12th Corps advances toward Prague but the army is ordered to halt the advance and allow Soviets to occupy the rest of the country as has been arranged.
◆1945 On Luzon, elements of the US 25th Division, part of US 1st Corps, capture the Kembu plateau. On Mindanao, the US 24th and 31st Divisions overrun Japanese positions north of Davao, where the Japanese 35th Army (General Morozumi) is concentrated.
◆1945 On Okinawa, the Japanese offensive loses momentum. Japanese forces have sustain losses of at least 5000 killed. Even while it has been going on, American forces have made gains near Machinto airfield and Maeda Ridge.
◆1945 Naval landing force evacuates 500 Marshallese from Jaluit Atoll, Marshall Islands.
◆1953 Planes from the carriers Princeton and Valley Forge blasted a mining area northwest of Songjin, causing numerous secondary explosions and destroying buildings and a main transformer station. The heavy cruiser Saint Paul and the destroyer Nicholas fired on coastal supply routes and storage areas.
◆1955 West Germany joined NATO.
◆1962 In the first test of its kind, the submerged submarine USS Ethan Allen fired a Polaris missile armed with a nuclear warhead that detonated above the Pacific Ocean.
◆1962 Pathet Lao broke cease fire and conquered Nam Tha Laos.
◆1972 The remnants of South Vietnam's 5th Division at An Loc continue to receive daily artillery battering from the communist forces surrounding the city as reinforcements fight their way from the south up Highway 13.
◆1993 The Bosnian Serb parliament, for the third time, rejected a U.N. peace plan for Bosnia-Herzegovina. The president of Serbia, Slobodan Milosevic, ordered a blockade of all supplies, except food and medicine, to the Bosnian Serbs.
◆1999 Russia joined NATO to back a framework for ending the conflict in Kosovo that included an international security presence to enforce peace. Electricity was restored in Belgrade as NATO air strikes continued in Yugoslavia. A main railroad bridge was destroyed near the Romanian border and oil depots in Nis were hit.
◆2004 U.S. soldiers backed by tanks and armored fighting vehicles seized control of the governor's office from Shiite militiamen in the city of Najaf.