First Confidential

THIS DAY IN HISTORY - MARCH 15th

This Day in History

March 15th, 221

China: the world's most populous country, covering approximately 9.6 million square kilometres, second-largest country by land area (China from NASA Wordwind Satellite; Great Wall China, credit National Geographic; LongJi Terrace, credit National Geographic; Great Bear Rainforest, credit Paul Nicklen, National Geographic; Platoons of clay soldiers were buried with China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang Di, (required a labor force of 700,000 to build), credit O. Louis Mazzatenta, National Geographic)

China:
221 - Liu Bei a Chinese warlord and member of the Han royal house, declares himself emperor of Shu-Han and claims his legitimate succession to the Han Dynasty.
280 - Sun Hao of Eastern Wu surrenders to Sima Yan which begins the Jin Dynasty.

Wikipedia  Photo: China from NASA Wordwind Satellite; © Great Wall of China, credit National Geographic; LongJi Terrace, credit National Geographic; Great Bear Rainforest, credit Paul Nicklen, National Geographic; Platoons of clay soldiers were buried with China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang Di, (required a labor force of 700,000 to build), credit O. Louis Mazzatenta, National Geographic.

March 15th, 1311

Greece satellite image, credit NASA; Acrocorinth, looking north towards the Gulf of Corinth; Temple of Apollo Ancient Corinth; Early morning lightning illuminates the sky over the 2,500-year-old Ancient Parthenon temple, at the Acropolis hill during a heavy rainfall in Athens

Greek War of Independence:
1311 - Battle of Halmyros; The Catalan Company defeats Walter V of Brienne to take control of the Duchy of Athens a Crusader state in Greece.

Wikipedia  Image: Greece satellite image, credit NASA; Acrocorinth, looking north towards the Gulf of Corinth; The Acrocorinth in the background, behind the Temple of Apollo; Temple of Apollo Ancient Corinth; Early morning lightning illuminates the sky over the 2,500-year-old Ancient Parthenon temple, at the Acropolis hill during a heavy rainfall in Athens.

March 15th, 1493

Christopher Columbus' fleet of three ships sets sail from Spain in 1492, credit Kean Collection / Hulton Archive / Getty Images

1493 - Christopher Columbus returns to Spain after his first trip to the Americas.

Wikipedia  Paintings: Christopher Columbus' fleet of three ships sets sail from Spain in 1492. credit Kean Collection / Hulton Archive / Getty Images; Christopher Columbus pointing to land in the New World; Romantic Painting of Christopher Columbus arriving to the Americas Primer desembarco de Cristóbal Colón en América, by Dióscoro Puebla 1862.

March 15th, 1564

Council of Trent: The Council, depicted by Pasquale Cati (Cati da Iesi)

Mughal Emperor Akbar (Akbar the Great) abolishes jizya (per capita tax).

Wikipedia  Painting: The court of young Akbar, age 13, showing his first imperial act: the arrest of an unruly courtier, who was once a favorite of Akbar's father. Illustration from a manuscript of the Akbarnama.

March 15th, 1672

English Civil War: (1642–1651) was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians (Roundheads) and Royalists (Cavaliers)

English Civil War:
1672 - Charles II of England issues the Royal Declaration of Indulgence.

Wikipedia  Painting: English Civil War (1642–1651) was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians (Roundheads) and Royalists (Cavaliers);
John Milton publishes Areopagitica; Battle of Naseby, victory of the Parliamentarian New Model Army; Battle of Marston Moor, 1644; "Cromwell at Dunbar", by Andrew Carrick Gow; Oliver Cromwell; King Charles I, painted by Van Dyck; "And when did you last see your father?" by William Frederick Yeames.

March 15th, 1781

American Revolutionary War Collage American Revolutionary War, Grand Union - Stars and Stripes Flag

American Revolutionary War:
1781 - Battle of Guilford Courthouse; Near present-day Greensboro, North Carolina, 1,900 British troops under General Charles Cornwallis defeat an American force numbering 4,400.
1783 - In an emotional speech in Newburgh, New York, George Washington asks his officers not to support the Newburgh Conspiracy. The plea is successful and the threatened coup d'état never takes place.

Wikipedia  Paintings: Washington Crossing the Delaware, by Emanuel Leutz; Battle of the Chesapeake, French (left) and British (right) lines; Battle of Bunker Hill, The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker Hill by John Trumbull; The Defeat of the Floating Batteries at Gibraltar, September 13, 1782, by John Singleton Copley; Washington and the Comte de Rochambeau at Yorktown, 1781; "The surrender at Saratoga" shows General Daniel Morgan in front of a French de Vallière 4-pounder; Surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown by (John Trumbull, 1797).
Grand Union - Stars and Stripes Flag

March 15th, 1820

Maine becomes the 23rd U.S. state on March 15th, 1820

Maine becomes the 23rd U.S. state.

Wikipedia  Photo: Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost portion of New England. It is known for its scenery—its jagged, mostly rocky coastline, its low, rolling mountains, its heavily forested interior and picturesque waterways.

March 15th, 1933

World War II: Second firestorm raid on Germany, the Royal Air Force conducts an air raid on the town of Kassel, killing 10,000 and rendering 150,000 homeless World War II: Battle of Leyte Gulf; Battle of Leyte Gulf; The first kamikaze attack: A Japanese plane carrying a 200-kilogram (440 lb) bomb attacks HMAS Australia off Leyte Island World War II: German V1 flying-bomb and V2 Rockets - Preparations for a Salvo Launch of V-2 Rockets in the Heidelager near Blizna (Poland) (1944) World War II: Eastern Front (World War II); was a theatre of World War II between the European Axis powers and co-belligerent Finland against the Soviet Union, Poland, and some other Allies which encompassed Northern, Southern and Eastern Europe from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945

Pre-World War II:
1933 - Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss keeps members of the National Council from convening, starting the austrofascist dictatorship. World War II:
1939 - German troops occupy the remaining part of Bohemia and Moravia; Czechoslovakia ceases to exist.
1939 - Carpatho-Ukraine declares itself an independent republic, but is annexed by Hungary he next day.
1943 - Third Battle of Kharkov; the Germans retake the city of Kharkov from the Soviet armies in bitter street fighting.
1945 - Upper Silesian Offensive; Soviet forces begin an offensive to push Germans from Upper Silesia.

Wikipedia  Photo: Bombing of Dresden in World War II; August Schreitmüller's sculpture 'Goodness' surveys Dresden after a firestorm started by Allied bombers in 1945. USS Bunker Hill was hit by kamikazes piloted by Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa and another airman on 11 May 1945. 389 personnel were killed or missing from a crew of 2,600; Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa, who flew his aircraft into the USS Bunker Hill during a Kamikaze mission on 11 May 1945; Kamikaze Missions - Lt Yoshinori Yamaguchi's Yokosuka D4Y3 (Type 33 Suisei) "Judy" in a suicide dive against USS Essex. The dive brakes are extended and the non-self-sealing port wing tank is trailing fuel vapor and/or smoke 25 November 1944.
German V1 flying-bomb and V2 Rockets - Preparations for a Salvo Launch of V-2 Rockets in the Heidelager near Blizna (Poland) (1944), credit German History in Documents and Images GHDI.

Eastern Front (World War II); Germans race towards Stalingrad. August 1942; Soviet children during a German air raid in the first days of the war, June 1941, by RIA Novosti archive; Soviet sniper Roza Shanina in 1944. About 400,000 Soviet women served in front-line duty units Caucasus Mountains, winter 1942/43; Finnish ski patrol: the invisible enemy of the Soviet Army with an unlimited supply of skis; Men of the German Engineers Corps cross a river which is swollen after the first autumn rains, to strengthen bridges linking the German positions on the central front in Russia. by Keystone / Getty Images. October 1942; Russian snipers fighting on the Leningrad front during a blizzard. Photo by Hulton Archive / Getty Images, 1943; German soldiers surrendering to the Russians in Stalingrad, the soldier holding the white flag of surrender is dressed in white so that there could be no doubt of his intentions, a Russian soldier is on the right of the photograph. by Keystone / Getty Images, January 1943.

March 15th, 1956

My Fair Lady: Original Broadway Poster by Al Hirschfeld ● Julie Andrews as the transformed Eliza, Broadway 1956

My Fair Lady premiered on Broadway at the Mark Hellinger Theatre.

Wikipedia  Image: My Fair Lady; Original Broadway Poster by Al Hirschfeld ● Julie Andrews as the transformed Eliza, Broadway 1956

March 15th, 1978

Battle of Amba Sel: Imam Ahmad ibn Ibrihim al-Ghazi again defeats the army of Lebna Dengel, Emperor of Ethiopia

Ethiopia:
1978 - Ethiopian-Somali War; Somalia and Ethiopia signed a truce ending the war.

Wikipedia  Photo: Blue Nile Falls; Ethiopia a magical and timeless land; credit Oklahoma State University, University of California - San Diego School of Medicine, National Geographics.

March 15th, 1990

Iraq hangs British journalist Farzad Bazoft for spying

Iraq hangs British journalist Farzad Bazoft for spying.

Wikipedia  Photo: Protest outside the Iraqi Embassy in London following the announcement of Bazoft's execution. Photograph: Bill Cross / Daily Mail / Rex Features.