TODAY IN MILITARY HISTORY
29 May
◆363 Battle of Ctesiphon: Emperor Julian defeats Shah Shapur II, but fails to take the city.
◆1108 Battle of Ucles: The Almoravids defeat the Castillians.
◆1167 Battle of Monteporzio: Imperialists defeat the Romans.
◆1176 Battle of Legnano: Lombards defeat Frederick Barbarossa.
◆1405 Battle of Skipton Moor: Henry IV defeats Archbishop Richard Scrope of York.
◆1416 Battle of Gallipoli: Venetian fleet annihilates the Turkish fleet.
◆1453 Byzantine Empire falls: Sultan Mehemet II captures Constantinople amid great slaughter.
◆1652 Battle of Godwin Sands: Blake's English fleet defeats Tromp's Dutch off Dover.
◆1765 Patrick Henry denounced the Stamp Act before Virginia's House of Burgesses. Henry responded to a cry of "Treason!" by saying, "If this be treason, make the most of it!"
◆1781 Frigate Alliance captures HMS Atalanta and Trepassy off Nova Scotia.
◆1787 The "Virginia Plan" was proposed.
◆1790 Rhode Island became the last of the 13 original colonies to ratify the United States Constitution. They held out for an amendment securing religious freedom. The state was largely founded by Baptists fleeing persecution in Massachusetts.
◆1843 John C. Fremont again departs from St. Louis to explore the West, having only recently returned from his first western expedition.
◆1848 Battles of Curtatone & Montanara: Tuscans & Neapolitans defeat the Austrians.
◆1849 A patent for lifting vessels was granted to Abraham Lincoln.
◆1861 Dorothea Dix offered to help set up hospitals for Union Army.
◆1862 Confederate General P.T. Beauregard retreated to Tupelo, Mississippi. He had taken command of the Trans-Mississippi area after the death of General Albert Sidney Johnson.
◆1864 Archduke Maximilian of Austria arrives in Mexico to become Emperor.
◆1864 Union troops lose another foot race with the Confederates in a minor stop on the long and terrible campaign between Ulysses S. Grant's Army of the Potomac and Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia.
◆1865 President Andrew Johnson issues general amnesty for all Confederates.
◆1903 Bob Hope (d.2003), US comedian, was born as Leslie Townes in Kent, England.
◆1916 Official flag of president of United States was adopted.
◆1916 U.S. forces invaded the Dominican Republic and stayed until 1924.
◆1917 John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States (1961-1963), was born in Brookline, Mass. He was assassinated in his first term.
◆1932 At the height of the Great Depression, the so-called "Bonus Expeditionary Force," a group of 1,000 World War I veterans seeking cash payments for their veterans' bonus certificates, arrive in Washington, D.C.
◆1943 Norman Rockwell’s portrait of “Rosie the Riveter” appeared on the cover of “The Saturday Evening Post.” Rockwell’s model was Mary Keefe (19) of Arlington, Vermont. In 2002 the painting sold at auction for $4,959,500.
◆1943 Churchill, Marshall and Eisenhower met in the Confederacy of Algiers.
◆1943 On Attu the Japanese mount a final attack on American forces established in Chicagof.
◆1944 On Biak Island, as well as Arare on the mainland, the American beachheads are heavily attacked by Japanese forces. The Japanese garrison on Biak makes use of tanks to force the US 162nd Regiment back towards its landing zone.
◆1944 The American escort carrier Block Island and a destroyer are sunk by U-549 before it is itself sunk.
◆1944 About 400 American bombers attack German synthetic fuel works and oil refineries at Polits and other locations. The damage caused sets back aircraft fuel production.
◆1944 At Anzio, the British and American troops of the US 6th Corps take Campoleone and Carroceto. The Canadian 1st Corps begins to advance up Route 6 from Caprano toward Frosinone.
◆1945 American B-29 Superfortress bombers drop incendiaries on Yokohama, burning 85 percent of the port area.
◆1953 Surface elements carried the brunt of naval operations with strikes against Pukchong and Wonsan as adverse weather temporarily suspended air operations.
◆1981 US performed a nuclear test at Nevada Test Site.
◆1982 Pentagon planned first strategy to fight a nuclear war.
◆1988 President Ronald Reagan travels to Moscow to begin the fourth summit meeting held in the past three years with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
◆1989 Student protesters in Tiananmen Square China constructed a replica of the Statue of Liberty.
◆1991 President Bush, addressing the US Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, unveiled a plan to curb “unnecessary and destabilizing weapons” in the Middle East.
◆1999 It was reported that the US Defense Dept. had ordered 9,000 Purple Hearts from Graco Industries near Houston to "replenish its supply."
◆1999 The space shuttle “Discovery” completed the first-ever docking with the international space station.