This Date in Military History:

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1901 – In the town of Beaumont, Texas, a 100-foot drilling derrick named Spindletop produced a roaring gusher of black crude oil. The oil strike took place at 10:30 a.m. on this day in 1901, coating the landscape for hundreds of feet around in sticky oil. The first major oil discovery in the United States, the Spindletop gusher marked the beginning of the American oil industry. Soon the prices of petroleum-based fuels fell, and gasoline became an increasingly practical power source. Without Spindletop, internal combustion might never have replaced steam and battery power as the automobile power plant of choice, and the American automobile industry might not have changed the face of America with such staggering speed.

1912 – The World’s first flying-boat airplane, designed by Glenn Curtiss, made its maiden flight at Hammondsport. Curtis was the 1st licensed pilot and Orville Wright was the 2nd. The first airplane purchased by the U.S. Navy was a Curtiss Model E hydroaeroplane and was given the Navy designation A-1 in early 1911. The Navy purchased a second Model E in July 1911, with a more powerful 80-horsepower Curtiss OX engine, and designated it the A-2. It was also known as the OWL, standing for Over Water and Land. Modifications of the A-2 by the Navy led to re-designations of E-1 and later AX-1. These modifications, done at the Curtiss plant at Hammondsport, New York, included moving the seats from the lower wing to the float and enclosing the crew area with a fabric-covered framework, giving the aircraft the appearance of a short-hull flying boat. The OWL, with its modified float, was developed into a true flying boat (the entire fuselage being a hull as opposed to mounting the aircraft on a separate float) by Curtiss in 1912, first with the Model D Flying Boat, and then a refined version, the Model E. The Model E Flying Boat was the first truly practical flying boat. It was powered by either a 60- or a 75-horsepower Curtiss V8 engine. Both the U.S. Army and Navy purchased Curtiss Model E Flying Boats, the Navy designating it the C-1.

1916 – In an attempt to embroil the US in turmoil with Mexico, Francisco “Pancho” Villa and his troupe of bandits stopped a train at Santa Ysabel. The bandits removed a group of 18 Texas business men (mining engineers) invited by the Mexican government to reopen the Cusihuiriachic mines below Chihuahua City and executed them in cold blood. However, one of those shot feined death and rolled down the side of the embankment and, crawling away into a patch of brown mesquite bushes, escaped. The train moved on, leaving the corpses at the mercy of the slayers, who stripped and mutilated them. After the escapee arrived back at Chihuahua City, a special train sped to Santa Ysabel to reclaim the bodies. When the people of El Paso heard of the massacre, they went wild with anger. El Paso was immediately placed under martial law to prevent irate Texans from crossing into Mexico at Juarez to wreak vengeance on innocent Mexicans.Despite outrage in the United States and Washington over the Santa Ysabel massacre, President Wilson refused to intervene and send troops into Mexico. Two months later, Villa would decide to strike again.

1917 – The Navy places its first production order for aerial photographic equipment.

1920 – League of Nations formally comes into being when the Covenant of the League of Nations, ratified by 42 nations in 1919, takes effect. In 1914, a political assassination in Sarajevo set off a chain of events that led to the outbreak of the most costly war ever fought to that date. As more and more young men were sent down into the trenches, influential voices in the United States and Britain began calling for the establishment of a permanent international body to maintain peace in the postwar world. President Woodrow Wilson became a vocal advocate of this concept, and in 1918 he included a sketch of the international body in his 14-point proposal to end the war. In November 1918, the Central Powers agreed to an armistice to halt the killing in World War I. Two months later, the Allies met with conquered Germany and Austria-Hungary at Versailles to hammer out formal peace terms. President Wilson urged a just and lasting peace, but England and France disagreed, forcing harsh war reparations on their former enemies. The League of Nations was approved, however, and in the summer of 1919 Wilson presented the Treaty of Versailles and the Covenant of the League of Nations to the U.S. Senate for ratification.

Wilson suffered a severe stroke soon in the fall of that year, which prevented him from reaching a compromise with those in Congress who thought the treaties reduced U.S. authority. In November, the Senate declined to ratify both. The League of Nations proceeded without the United States, holding its first meeting in Geneva on November 15, 1920. During the 1920s, the League, with its headquarters at Geneva, incorporated new members and successfully mediated minor international disputes but was often disregarded by the major powers. The League’s authority, however, was not seriously challenged until the early 1930s, when a series of events exposed it as ineffectual. Japan simply quit the organization after its invasion of China was condemned, and the League was likewise powerless to prevent the rearmament of Germany and the Italian invasion of Ethiopia. The declaration of World War II was not even referred to by the then-virtually defunct League. In 1946, the League of Nations was officially dissolved with the establishment of the United Nations. The United Nations was modeled after the former but with increased international support and extensive machinery to help the new body avoid repeating the League’s failures.

1923 – Four years after the end of World War I, President Warren G. Harding orders U.S. occupation troops stationed in Germany to return home. In 1917, after several years of bloody stalemate along the western front, the entrance of America’s well-supplied forces into World War I was a major turning point in the conflict. When the war ended in November 1918, more than two million American soldiers had served on the battlefields of Western Europe, and more than 50,000 of them had lost their lives. As part of the Treaty of Versailles, signed the next year, U.S. troops, along with other Allied forces, were to occupy the defeated Central Powers nations to enforce the terms of the peace agreement. In Germany, Allied occupation and stiff war reparations levied against the country were regarded with increasing bitterness, and in 1923, after four years of contending with a resentful German populace, the American troops were ordered home.

1927 – 2nd Bn 5th Marines landed in Nicaragua. A civil war had erupted between liberal rebels under General Jose Maria Moncada (1868-1945) and the government under Diaz, who requested and received military assistance from the United States.

1934 – Six Consolidated P2Y-1s of Patrol Squadron 10F, Lieutenant Commander Knefler McGinnis commanding, made a nonstop formation flight from San Francisco, Calif., to Pearl Harbor, T.H. He made the trip in 24 hours 35 minutes, thereby bettering the best previous time for the crossing, exceeding the best distance of previous mass flights, and breaking a nine-day- old world record for distance in a straight line for Class C seaplanes with a new mark of 2,399 miles.

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1941 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Lend-Lease program is brought before the U.S. Congress for consideration. Roosevelt devised the Lend-Lease program as a means of aiding Great Britain in its war effort against the Germans. The program gave the chief executive the power to “sell, transfer title to, exchange, lease, lend, or otherwise dispose of” any military resources he deemed in the ultimate interest of the defense of the United States. The idea was that if Britain were better able to defend itself, the security of the U.S. would be enhanced. The program also served to bolster British morale, as they would no longer feel alone in their struggle against Hitler. Congress authorized the program on March 11th. By November, after much heated debate, Congress extended the terms of Lend-Lease to the Soviet Union, even though Stalin’s USSR had already been the recipient of American military weapons and had been promised $1 billion in financial aid. By the end of the war, more than $50 billion in funds, weapons, aircraft, and ships were distributed to 44 countries through the program. After the war, the Lend-Lease program morphed into the Marshall Plan, which allocated funds for the revitalization of “friendly” democratic nations.

1942 – The Ford Motor Company signed on to make Jeeps, the new general-purpose military vehicles desperately needed by American forces in World War II. The original Jeep design was submitted by the American Bantam Car Company. The Willys-Overland company won the Jeep contract, however, using a design similar to Bantam’s, but with certain improvements. The Jeep was in high demand during wartime, and Ford soon stepped in to lend its huge production capacity to the effort. By the end of the war, the Jeep had won a place in the hearts of Americans, and soon became a popular civilian vehicle. And that catchy name? Some say it comes from the initials G.P., for “General Purpose.” Others say it was named for Jeep the moon dog, the spunky and durable creature who accompanied Popeye through the comics pages.

1943 – On Guadalcanal, an new American offensive begins with heavy air and artillery bombardment. The Japanese-held Gifu strongpoint is attacked by the US 35th Infantry Regiment. The Americans have over 50,000 troops on the island; the Japanese have less than 15,000 ill-supplied troops defending. During the night eight Japanese destroyers attempt to deliver supplies. One of the destroyers is damaged by American PT boats.

1944 – The GI Bill of Rights, first proposed by the American Legion, was passed by Congress. The Bill, more formally known as the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, was intended to smooth demobilization for America’s almost 16 million servicemen and women. Postwar college and vocational school attendance soared as more than 50 percent of honorably discharged veterans took advantage of education benefits of up to $500 a year for tuition, plus a living allowance. When they returned home to marry and start families in record numbers, veterans faced a severe housing shortage. The home loan provisions of the GI Bill provided more than 2 million home loans and created a new American landscape in the suburbs. In 1990, President George Bush summed up the impact of the GI Bill: “The GI Bill changed the lives of millions by replacing old roadblocks with paths of opportunity.”

1944 – On New Britain, Americans send reinforcements to Arawe. There is a small advance by US regimental forces along the Aogiri Ridge, despite Japanese resistance.

1945 – In the Ardennes, American forces are engaged near Laroche. The British 30th Corps is advancing on the town from the west, capturing Bure and Samree. German forces are withdrawing, in good order, from the western tip of the salient. St. Hubert, 15 miles west of Bastogne, has been evacuated by the Germans under pressure from Allied forces.

1945 – The US forces continue to come ashore on Luzon. Their beachhead is now several miles wide and deep.

1946 – Chiang Kai-shek and the Yenan Communist forces halt fighting in China.

1946 – Establishment of first Navy nuclear power school at Submarine Base, New London, CT.

1946 – The first General Assembly of the United Nations, comprising 51 nations, convenes at Westminster Central Hall in London, England. One week later, the U.N. Security Council met for the first time and established its rules of procedure. Then, on January 24, the General Assembly adopted its first resolution, a measure calling for the peaceful uses of atomic energy and the elimination of atomic and other weapons of mass destruction. In 1944, at the Dumbarton Oaks conference in Washington, D.C., the groundwork was laid by Allied delegates for an international postwar organization to maintain peace and security in the postwar world. The organization was to possess considerably more authority over its members than the defunct League of Nations, which had failed in its attempts to prevent the outbreak of World War II. In April 1945, with celebrations of victory in Europe about to commence, delegates from 51 nations convened in San Francisco to draft the United Nations Charter. On June 26, the document was signed by the delegates, and on October 24 it was formally ratified by the five permanent members of the Security Council and a majority of other signatories.

1946 – The United States Army Signal Corps successfully conducts Project Diana, bouncing radio waves off the moon and receiving the reflected signals. This was the first experiment in radar astronomy and the first attempt to actively probe another celestial body. It was the inspiration for later EME (Earth-Moon-Earth) communication techniques. At a laboratory at Camp Evans (part of Fort Monmouth), in Wall Township, New Jersey, a large transmitter, receiver and antenna array were constructed for this purpose. The transmitter, a highly modified SCR-271 radar set from World War II, provided 3,000 watts at 111.5 MHz in 1/4 second pulses, applied to the antenna, a “bedspring” reflective array antenna composed of an 8×8 array of half wave dipoles in front of a reflector which provided 24 dB of gain. Reflected signals were received about 2.5 seconds later, the time required for the radio waves to make the 477,000 mile round-trip journey from the Earth to the Moon and back.

The receiver had to compensate for the Doppler shift in frequency of the reflected signal due to the Moon’s orbital motion relative to the Earth’s surface, which was different each day, so this motion had to be carefully calculated for each trial. The antenna could be rotated in azimuth only, so the attempt could be made only as the moon passed through the 15 degree wide beam at moonrise and moonset, as the antenna’s elevation angle was horizontal. About 40 minutes of observation was available on each pass as the Moon transited the various lobes of the antenna pattern. The first successful echo detection came at 11:58am local time by John H. DeWitt and his chief scientist E. King Stodola. Project Diana marked the birth of radar astronomy later used to map Venus and other nearby planets, and was a necessary precursor to the US space program. It was the first demonstration that terrestrial radio signals could penetrate the ionosphere, opening the possibility of radio communications beyond the earth for space probes and human explorers. It also established the practice of naming space projects after Roman gods, e.g., Mercury and Apollo.

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1951 – Continued severe winter weather forced Fifth Air Force to cancel close air support missions, and Far East Air Forces flew the lowest daily total of sorties since July 1950. Brig. Gen. James E. Briggs, USAF, replaced General O’Donnell as commander of FEAF Bomber Command. From now on, Strategic Air Command changed commanders of the Bomber Command every four months to provide wartime experience to as many officers as possible.

1951 – Major General John T. Seldon succeeded Major General Gerald C. Thomas as commander of the 1st Marine Division.

1953 – Seventeen B-29s kicked off an air campaign against the Sinanju communications complex by bombing rail bridges at Yongmi-dong, antiaircraft gun positions near Sinanju, and two marshalling yards at Yongmi-dong and Maejung-dong. Fighter-bombers followed up the B-29 night attacks with a daylight 158-aircraft raid against bridges, rail lines, and gun positions.

1962 – NASA announces plans to build the C-5 rocket launch vehicle. It became better known as the Saturn V Moon rocket, which launched every Apollo Moon mission.

1964 – President Johnson held a meeting with Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara after which he approved covert operations against North Vietnam.

1964 – Panama broke ties with the U.S. and demanded a revision of the canal treaty.

1967 – President Johnson, in his annual State of the Union message to Congress, asks for enactment of a 6 percent surcharge on personal and corporate income taxes to help support the Vietnam War for two years, or “for as long as the unusual expenditures associated with our efforts continue.” Congress delayed for almost a year, but eventually passed the surcharge. The U.S. expenditure in Vietnam for fiscal year 1967 would be $21 billion.

1989 – As part of an arrangement to decrease Cold War tensions and end a brutal war in Angola, Cuban troops begin their withdrawal from the African nation. The process was part of a multilateral diplomatic effort to end years of bloodshed in Angola-a conflict that, at one time or another, involved the Soviet Union, the United States, Portugal, and South Africa. Angola officially became an independent nation in 1975, but even before the date of independence, various groups within the former Portuguese colony battled for control. One group, the National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA), received support from the United States; another, the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), got much of its support from the Soviet Union and Cuba; and a third group, National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), pragmatically took aid from whatever source was available, including South Africa and China. The United States, the Soviet Union, and China each believed Angola was a critical battlefield for political dominance in mineral-rich and strategically important southern Africa.

By September 1975, South African troops were assisting UNITA forces in Angola. In November, Cuba – which became involved in Angola as part of Fidel Castro’s aggressive foreign policy to assert Cuba’s role in anticolonial struggles – responded by flying in thousands of troops to aid the MPLA. Their powerful assistance caused South African forces to withdraw. In 1981, the South Africans, who saw an MPLA regime in Angola as threatening to its political control of neighboring Namibia, again invaded Angola and increased their aid to UNITA. UNITA’s leader, Jonas Savimbi courted U.S. assistance and visited with President Ronald Reagan in 1986. The United States responded with military aid for UNITA’s forces and demanded that the Cuban troops depart Angola. As fighting escalated, Castro dispatched 15,000 additional troops to Africa. Throughout 1987 and 1988, UNITA and MPLA forces and their respective allies fought increasingly bloody battles.

Sensing that the situation was spiraling out of control, the United States helped broker an agreement in December 1988 between Angola, Cuba, and South Africa, whereby the three nations vowed to remove all foreign forces from Angola. All three nations had expended vast amounts of manpower and money in the seemingly endless conflict and Cuba, in particular, was eager to negotiate a graceful exit. The Cuban troops began their withdrawal a few weeks later, and by 1991 they were gone. The situation in Angola was another indication that, particularly in the 1970s and 1980s, Africa was coming to play a more significant role in the Cold War geopolitics. Additionally, the Cuban intervention in the conflict was yet another event that served to chill relations between the United States and Cuba.

1991 – Five days before a UN deadline for Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait, peace efforts intensified, with UN Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar setting off on a mission aimed at averting war.

1993 – Marines kill 3 Somali gunmen when they attack their platoon.

1995 – The Pentagon announced that 2,600 U.S. Marines would be deployed to Somalia for Operation United Shield to assist in the final withdrawal of UN peacekeeping troops from Somalia. The decision came in response to a UN request for American protection of its peacekeeping forces serving in the war-torn African nation.

2002 – A CIA report said China, North Korea and Iran will probably have long-range missile capable of reaching the US by 2015.

2002 – An F-16 crashed near the Garden State Parkway in New Jersey. The pilot ejected safely.

2002 – In Afghanistan gunmen attacked the Kandahar airport as a US military transport took off carrying al Qaeda and Taliban prisoners to the US Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba.

2003 – North Korea announced that it was pulling out of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.

2004 – A US anti-terror team arrived in Mauritania. The US had received information of threats against American interests in the West African nations of Mauritania and Senegal.

2005 – CBS issued a damning independent review of mistakes related to a “60 Minutes Wednesday” report, aired by Dan Rather, on President Bush’s National Guard service and fired three news executives and a producer for their “myopic zeal” in rushing it to air.

2007 – In a televised address to the US public, Bush proposed 21,500 more troops for Iraq, a job program for Iraqis, more reconstruction proposals, and $1.2 billion for these programs.

2010 – Ahead of the Iraqi parliamentary election, 2010, the De-Ba’athification Commission recommends banning the leaders of the Iraqi National Dialogue Front, the Coalition for Iraqi National Unity and 13 other parties for links to Saddam Hussein’s banned Ba’ath Party.

2015 – SpaceX successfully launches a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida, as part of boosting its Dragon spacecraft into space for a Monday arrival at the ISS in the SpaceX CRS-5 resupply mission. However, an experimental recovery attempt of the first stage fails when it crash-lands on a floating platform possibly due to insufficient hydraulic fluid, resulting in damage to the platform.

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Congressional Medal of Honor Citations for Actions Taken This Day

HELMS, JOHN HENRY
Rank and organization: Sergeant, U.S. Marine Corps. Born: 16 March 1874, Chicago, Ill. Accredited to: Illinois. G.O. No.: 3 5, 23 March 1901. Citation: Serving on board the U.S.S. Chicago, for heroism in rescuing Ishi Tomizi, ship’s cook, from drowning at Montevideo, Uruguay, 10 January 1901.

BERTOLDO, VITO R.
Rank and organization: Master Sergeant, U.S. Army, Company A, 242d Infantry, 42d Infantry Division. Place and date: Hatten, France, 9-10 January 1945. Entered service at: Decatur, 111. Born: 1 December 1916, Decatur, 111. G.O. No.: 5, 10 January 1946. Citation: He fought with extreme gallantry while guarding 2 command posts against the assault of powerful infantry and armored forces which had overrun the battalion’s main line of resistance. On the close approach of enemy soldiers, he left the protection of the building he defended and set up his gun in the street, there to remain for almost 12 hours driving back attacks while in full view of his adversaries and completely exposed to 88-mm., machinegun and small-arms fire. He moved back inside the command post, strapped his machinegun to a table and covered the main approach to the building by firing through a window, remaining steadfast even in the face of 88-mm. fire from tanks only 75 yards away. One shell blasted him across the room, but he returned to his weapon. When 2 enemy personnel carriers led by a tank moved toward his position, he calmly waited for the troops to dismount and then, with the tank firing directly at him, leaned out of the window and mowed down the entire group of more than 20 Germans.

Some time later, removal of the command post to another building was ordered. M/Sgt. Bertoldo voluntarily remained behind, covering the withdrawal of his comrades and maintaining his stand all night. In the morning he carried his machinegun to an adjacent building used as the command post of another battalion and began a day-long defense of that position. He broke up a heavy attack, launched by a self-propelled 88-mm. gun covered by a tank and about 15 infantrymen. Soon afterward another 88-mm. weapon moved up to within a few feet of his position, and, placing the muzzle of its gun almost inside the building, fired into the room, knocking him down and seriously wounding others. An American bazooka team set the German weapon afire, and M/Sgt. Bertoldo went back to his machinegun dazed as he was and killed several of the hostile troops as they attempted to withdraw. It was decided to evacuate the command post under the cover of darkness, but before the plan could be put into operation the enemy began an intensive assault supported by fire from their tanks and heavy guns.

Disregarding the devastating barrage, he remained at his post and hurled white phosphorous grenades into the advancing enemy troops until they broke and retreated. A tank less than 50 yards away fired at his stronghold, destroyed the machinegun and blew him across the room again but he once more returned to the bitter fight and, with a rifle, single-handedly covered the withdrawal of his fellow soldiers when the post was finally abandoned. With inspiring bravery and intrepidity M/Sgt. Bertoldo withstood the attack of vastly superior forces for more than 48 hours without rest or relief, time after time escaping death only by the slightest margin while killing at least 40 hostile soldiers and wounding many more during his grim battle against the enemy hordes.

*FOURNIER, WILLIAM G.
Rank and organization: Sergeant, U.S. Army, Company M, 35th Infantry, 25th Infantry Division. Place and date: Mount Austen, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, 10 January 1943. Entered service at: Winterport, Maine. Birth: Norwich, Conn. G.O. No.: 28, 5 June 1943. Citation: For gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty. As leader of a machinegun section charged with the protection of other battalion units, his group was attacked by a superior number of Japanese, his gunner killed, his assistant gunner wounded, and an adjoining guncrew put out of action. Ordered to withdraw from this hazardous position, Sgt. Fournier refused to retire but rushed forward to the idle gun and, with the aid of another soldier who joined him, held up the machinegun by the tripod to increase its field action. They opened fire and inflicted heavy casualties upon the enemy. While so engaged both these gallant soldiers were killed, but their sturdy defensive was a decisive factor in the following success of the attacking battalion .

*HALL, LEWIS
Rank and organization: Technician Fifth Grade, U.S. Army, Company M, 35th Infantry, 25th Infantry Division. Place and date: Mount Austen, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, 10 January 1943. Entered service at: Obetz, Rural Station 7, Columbus, Ohio. Born: 1895, Bloom, Ohio. G.O. No.: 28, 5 June 1943. Citation: For gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty. As leader of a machinegun squad charged with the protection of other battalion units, his group was attacked by a superior number of Japanese, his gunner killed, his assistant gunner wounded, and an adjoining gun crew put out of action. Ordered to withdraw from his hazardous position, he refused to retire but rushed forward to the idle gun and with the aid of another soldier who joined him and held up the machinegun by the tripod to increase its field of action he opened fire and inflicted heavy casualties upon the enemy. While so engaged both these gallant soldiers were killed, but their sturdy defense was a decisive factor in the following success of the attacking battalion.

SASSER, CLARENCE EUGENE
Rank and organization: Specialist Fifth Class (then Pfc.), U.S. Army, Headquarters Company, 3d Battalion, 60th Infantry, 9th Infantry Division. Place and date: Ding Tuong Province, Republic of Vietnam, 10 January 1968. Entered service at: Houston, Tex. Born: 12 September 1947, Chenango, Tex. Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty. Sp5c. Sasser distinguished himself while assigned to Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 3d Battalion. He was serving as a medical aidman with Company A, 3d Battalion, on a reconnaissance in force operation. His company was making an air assault when suddenly it was taken under heavy small arms, recoilless rifle, machinegun and rocket fire from well fortified enemy positions on 3 sides of the landing zone. During the first few minutes, over 30 casualties were sustained. Without hesitation, Sp5c. Sasser ran across an open rice paddy through a hail of fire to assist the wounded. After helping 1 man to safety, was painfully wounded in the left shoulder by fragments of an exploding rocket.

Refusing medical attention, he ran through a barrage of rocket and automatic weapons fire to aid casualties of the initial attack and, after giving them urgently needed treatment, continued to search for other wounded. Despite 2 additional wounds immobilizing his legs, he dragged himself through the mud toward another soldier 100 meters away. Although in agonizing pain and faint from loss of blood, Sp5c. Sasser reached the man, treated him, and proceeded on to encourage another group of soldiers to crawl 200 meters to relative safety. There he attended their wounds for 5 hours until they were evacuated. Sp5c. Sasser’s extraordinary heroism is in keeping with the highest traditions of the military service and reflects great credit upon himself, his unit, and the U.S. Army.

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11 January

1775 – Francis Salvador, the first Jew to be elected in the Americas, takes his seat on the South Carolina Provincial Congress. In June 1776, Salvador, a Patriot, became known as the “Southern Paul Revere” when he warned Charleston, South Carolina, of the approaching British naval fleet. Thanks to Salvador’s intelligence information, Fort Sullivan in Charleston harbor was able to prepare for the British attack, and the half-completed fort successfully repelled an attack by a British fleet under Sir Peter Parker. On August 1 of the same year, while leading a militia group under the general command of Major Wilkinson, Salvador and his men were ambushed by a group of Cherokees and Loyalists near present-day Seneca, South Carolina. Salvador was wounded and then scalped by the Cherokees. He was the first recorded Jewish soldier killed in the American War for Independence.

1782 – French troops begin a siege of a British garrison on Brimstone Hill in Saint Kitts in a bid to weaken and distract British forces in the American War of Independence. After landing on Saint Kitts, the French troops of the Marquis de Bouillé stormed and besieged Brimstone Hill, and after a month of siege the heavily outnumbered and cut-off British garrison surrendered. The Comte de Grasse, who delivered de Bouillé’s troops and supported the siege, was outmaneuvered and deprived of his anchorage by Admiral Hood. Even though Hood’s force was inferior by one-third, de Grasse was beaten off when he attempted to dislodge Hood.[4] Hood’s attempts to relieve the ongoing siege were unsuccessful, and the garrison capitulated after one month. About a year later, the Treaty of Paris restored Saint Kitts and adjacent Nevis to British rule.

1785 – The Confederation Congress reconvenes in New York City having previously convened in Trenton, New Jersey. The Congress of the Confederation, or the Confederation Congress, formally referred to as the “United States in Congress Assembled”, was the governing body of the United States of America that existed from March 1, 1781, to March 4, 1789.

1805 – The Michigan Territory is created. The Territory of Michigan was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from June 30, 1805, until January 26, 1837, when the final extent of the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Michigan. Detroit was the territorial capital.

1861 – Alabama secedes from the Union. Alabama becomes the fourth state to secede from the Union when a convention votes 61 to 39 in favor of the measure. Alabama had a much closer vote than other states, due to strong Unionist sentiment in the northern part of the state.

1861 – U.S. Marine Hospital two miles below New Orleans was occupied by Louisiana State troops.

1863 – Union General John McClernand and Admiral David Porter capture Arkansas Post, a Confederate stronghold on the Arkansas River. The victory secured central Arkansas for the Union and lifted northern morale just three weeks after the disastrous Battle of Fredericksburg. Arkansas Post was a massive fort 25 miles from the confluence of the Arkansas and Mississippi rivers. It was designed to insure Confederate control of the White and Arkansas rivers, and to keep pressure off Vicksburg, the last major Rebel city on the Mississippi River. The sides of the square fort were each nearly 200 feet long and the structure was protected by a moat. It sat on a bluff 25 feet above the river. The post was a major impediment to Yankee commerce on the Arkansas. McClernand gathered his Army of the Mississippi at Milliken’s Bend, just north of Vicksburg. He had 32,000 men in two corps commanded by Generals George Morgan and William T. Sherman.

McClernand’s main objective was Vicksburg, but he decided to capture Arkansas Post first to secure Yankee commerce on the rivers north of Vicksburg. McClernand was accompanied by Porter’s flotilla. The plan was to steam up the Arkansas River and land the troops below the post, then have Sherman’s men swing around behind the fort while Morgan approached from downriver. Porter began bombing the fort on the night of January 10. The bombardment continued the following afternoon. Through the afternoon, Union infantry moved towards the fort while the ships passed in front and began firing from the other side of the fort. The Confederate garrison was surrounded, and offered a white flag before the day was out. The Yankees lost 134 men and suffered 898 wounded, but they captured 5,000 Confederates and preserved Union commerce on the Arkansas and White rivers.

1861 – Alabama secedes from the United States.

1863 – The Confederate ship Alabama under Captain Semmes flew a British flag and lured the USS Hatteras out of Galveston harbor. The Hatteras was quickly sunk.

1863 – Battle of Arkansas Post – General John McClernand and Admiral David Dixon Porter capture the Arkansas River for the Union. Also known as the Battle of Fort Hindman, was fought near the mouth of the Arkansas River at Arkansas Post, Arkansas, as part of the Vicksburg Campaign of the American Civil War.

1917 – The Kingsland munitions factory explosion occurs as a result of suspected sabotage. The charge is never borne out. A fire started in Building 30 of the Canadian Car and Foundry Company in Kingsland (now Lyndhurst), Bergen County, New Jersey. In 4 hours, probably 500,000 pieces of 76 mm (3″) -high explosive shells were cooked off. The entire plant was destroyed.

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1928 – Leon Trotsky, a leader of the Bolshevik revolution and early architect of the Soviet state, is deported by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin to Alma-Ata in remote Soviet Central Asia. He lived there in internal exile for a year before being banished from the USSR forever by Stalin. Born in the Ukraine of Russian-Jewish parents in 1879, Trotsky embraced Marxism as a teenager and later dropped out of the University of Odessa to help organize the underground South Russian Workers’ Union. In 1898, he was arrested for his revolutionary activities and sent to prison. In 1900, he was exiled to Siberia. In 1902, he escaped to England using a forged passport under the name of Leon Trotsky (his original name was Lev Davidovich Bronshtein). In London, he collaborated with Bolshevik revolutionary Vladimir Ilyich Lenin but later sided with the Menshevik factions that advocated a democratic approach to socialism. With the outbreak of the Russian Revolution of 1905, Trotsky returned to Russia and was again exiled to Siberia when the revolution collapsed. In 1907, he again escaped.

During the next decade, he was expelled from a series of countries because of his radicalism, living in Switzerland, Paris, Spain, and New York City before returning to Russia at the outbreak of the revolution in 1917. Trotsky played a leading role in the Bolsheviks’ seizure of power, conquering most of Petrograd before Lenin’s triumphant return in November. Appointed Lenin’s secretary of foreign affairs, he negotiated with the Germans for an end to Russian involvement in World War I. In 1918, he became war commissioner and set about building up the Red Army, which succeeded in defeating anti-Communist opposition in the Russian Civil War. In the early 1920s, Trotsky seemed the heir apparent of Lenin, but he lost out in the struggle of succession after Lenin fell ill in 1922. In 1924, Lenin died, and Joseph Stalin emerged as leader of the USSR. Against Stalin’s stated policies, Trotsky called for a continuing world revolution that would inevitably result in the dismantling of the Soviet state. He also criticized the new regime for suppressing democracy in the Communist Party and for failing to develop adequate economic planning.

In response, Stalin and his supporters launched a propaganda counterattack against Trotsky. In 1925, he was removed from his post in the war commissariat. One year later, he was expelled from the Politburo and in 1927 from the Communist Party. In January 1928, Trotsky began his internal exile in Alma-Ata and the next January was expelled from the Soviet Union outright. He was received by the government of Turkey and settled on the island of Prinkipo, where he worked on finishing his autobiography and history of the Russian Revolution. After four years in Turkey, Trotsky lived in France and then Norway and in 1936 was granted asylum in Mexico. Settling with his family in a suburb of Mexico City, he was found guilty of treason in absentia during Stalin’s purges of his political foes. He survived a machine-gun attack on his home but on August 20, 1940, fell prey to a Spanish Communist, Ramon Mercader, who fatally wounded him with an ice-ax. He died from his wounds the next day.

1941 – Adof Hitler orders forces to be prepared to enter North Africa to assist the Italian effort, marking the establishment of the Afrika Korps. Hitler’s first choice to command the DAK (Deutcshes Afrika Korps-German Afrika Korps) was Maj. General Hans von Funk, a Prussian aristocrat, who’s negative report that Libya was lost led him to be dissmissed. Hitler considered Lt. General Erich von Manstein, who devised the invasion of France, but he was a too valuable component of Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of Russia. Hitler settled for Erwin Rommel. The beginning of the DAK was simply the 5th Light Division, but was doubled when a full panzer division arrived. Rommel would arrive in Tripoli on February 12, 1941.

1942 – Japan invades the Dutch East Indies at Borneo. The Japanese had three specific objectives in their military thrust – the rich oil fields of the Dutch East Indies, particularly Borneo; the Philippines and the associated mainland areas of Southeast Asia. Japan was determined to control the natural resources of these areas, including the world’s largest supply of tin and rubber.

1942 – The American carrier Saratoga is severely damaged by Japanese submarine I.6 near Hawaii.

1943 – The United States and United Kingdom give up territorial rights in China.

1943 – On Guadalcanal, US forces take the “Sea Horse” position. The Japanese Gifu strongpoint continues to resist American pressure.

1944 – Aircraft from Escort Carrier USS Block Island make first aircraft rocket attack on German submarine. Departing San Diego in May 1943 Block Island steamed to Norfolk, Va., to join the Atlantic Fleet. After two trips from New York to Belfast, Ireland, during the summer of 1943 with cargoes of Army fighters, she operated as part of a hunter-killer team. During her four anti-submarine cruises Block Island’s planes sank two submarines. At 2013, 29 May 1944, Block Island was torpedoed by U-549 which had slipped undetected through her screen. The German submarine put one and perhaps two more torpedoes into the stricken carrier before being sunk herself by the avenging Eugene E. Gilmore (DE-686) and Ahrens (DE-575). Block Island (CVE-21) received two battle stars for her service.

1944 – The US 8th Air Force carries out a fighter escorted daylight raid on Oschersleben. A quarter of the 238 bombers are lost. The attrition effect on the defending German fighters is not reflected in this loss.

1944 – President Roosevelt asks Congress for a new national service law to prevent damaging strikes and to mobilize the entire adult population for war.

1944 – Elements of the US 32nd Division, at Saidor, complete repairs to the airfield.

1944 – Franz Kettner, a private in the German army and a prisoner of war at Camp Hearne in Texas, is killed by a Nazi kangaroo court. Internment camps for German prisoners of war were dominated by Nazi enforcers, who killed as many as 150 of their fellow prisoners during World War II. Only seven were officially considered murder. Kettner’s wrists were slashed so that his death would be recorded as a suicide. Even the smallest infraction could put German prisoners at risk. Those who talked to guards, spoke English, or refused to parrot the Nazi line were often beaten or killed. American camp officials generally looked the other way because they appreciated the discipline and order that the Nazis provided in the camps. Prisoners who were not ethnically German and had been conscripted into service were particularly in danger from their fellow prisoners.

In the later part of 1943, a rash of murders were committed at camps all across America. When Corporal Johann Kunze was beaten to death in an Oklahoma camp for allegedly providing Americans with information, five Nazi sergeants were charged with his murder. They were hanged in 1945 and became the first foreign prisoners of war to meet that fate in the United States. Hans Geller, a prisoner in Arkansas, was killed by his fellow soldiers despite a stellar war record as a paratrooper for the German army. His only mistake was his fluency in English. Eventually, American officials began separating the Nazis from the anti-Nazi Germans, and three camps were set aside for those who opposed Hitler. Despite Nazi threats that those who opposed them would be in bad shape when the war was over, anti-Nazi prisoners were often put in positions of power by Americans when they were repatriated. The Nazis, on the other hand, were widely scorned after Hitler’s defeat.

1945 – On Luzon, the US 25th Division and an armored group land at Lingayen to reinforce the American beachhead. The first serious fighting begins ashore. There are more Kamikaze attacks on the American ships. Many smaller craft are damaged.

1945 – Aircraft from the US 3rd Fleet (Halsey) sink 25 ships and damage 13 others off the coast of Indochina in attacks on four Japanese convoys.

1945 – Units of the US 3rd Army and the British 30th Corps join up near St. Hubert as the German salient in the Ardennes is further reduced. To the south, the fighting in the US 7th Army around Bitche is also continuing but German attacks are being held.

1949 – Surrender talks in China between the Nationalists and Communists opened as Tientsing was virtually lost to the Communists.

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1949 – On Connecticut Avenue in Washington, D.C., the cornerstone is laid at the first mosque of note in the United States. Intended to serve as a national mosque for all American Muslims, the Islamic Center was built in a traditional Arabic architectural style, complete with a 160-foot minaret from which prayers were to be announced. A colonnade cloister joined the mosque to two wings containing a library, classrooms, a museum, and administrative offices. In the basement of the mosque was an auditorium built to accommodate several hundred people. The Islamic Center’s first director was Dr. Mahmoud Hoballah.

1949 – The first “networked” television broadcasts take place as KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania goes on the air connecting the east coast and mid-west programming.

1951 – With improved weather, Fifth Air Force and FEAF Bomber Command resumed close air support missions for X Corps in north central South Korea.

1953 – 307th BW B-29s bombed Sonchon and Anju marshalling yards. Enemy searchlights illuminated a B-29 apparently betrayed by its contrails, and fighters shot it down.

1956 – South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem issues Ordinance No. 6, allowing the internment of former Viet Minh members and others “considered as dangerous to national defense and common security.” The Viet Minh was a largely communist organization that overthrew French colonial rule in Vietnam and assumed control of the government in North Vietnam in October 1954. Diem’s internment of former Viet Minh members was an attempt to consolidate his control of South Vietnam. He had already subdued opposition from various religious sects and had launched a drive against Viet Minh who remained in the South. Although by the end of 1956, Diem had smashed 90 percent of the former Viet Minh insurgent agents in the Mekong Delta, his ruthless drive against all dissidents did little to enhance his popularity, and he lost many potential allies. He managed to stay in power until November 1963, when he was assassinated during a coup by South Vietnamese army generals.

1963 – Senior White house aide Michael V. Forrestal advises President Kennedy to expect a long and costly war. ‘No one really knows how many of the 20,000 “Vietcong” killed last year were only innocent, or at least, persuadable, villagers, whether the strategic hamlet program is providing enough government services to counteract the sacrifices it requires, or how the mute class of villagers react to the charges against Diem of dictatorship and nepotism.’ he points out that Vietcong recruitment in South Vietnam is effective enough to continue the war without any infiltration from the North.

1965 – Major cities–especially Saigon and Hue–and much of central Vietnam are disrupted by demonstrations and strikes led by Buddhists. Refusing to accept any government headed by Tran Van Huong, who they saw as a puppet of the United States, the Buddhists turned against U.S. institutions and their demonstrations took on an increasingly anti-American tone. Thich Tri Quang, the Buddhist leader, and other monks went on a hunger strike. A Buddhist girl in Nha Trang burned herself to death (the first such self-immolation since 1963). Although Huong tried to appease the Buddhists by rearranging his government, they were not satisfied.

In the end, Huong was unable to put together a viable government and, on January 27, the Armed Forces Council overthrew him in a bloodless coup and installed Gen. Nguyen Khanh in power. Khanh was ousted by yet another coup on February 18, led by Air Commodore Nguyen Cao Ky and Maj. Gen. Nguyen Van Thieu. A short-lived civilian government under Dr. Phan Huy Quat was installed, but it lasted only until June 12, 1965. At that time, Thieu and Ky formed a new government with Thieu as the chief of state and Ky as the prime minister. Thieu and Ky would be elected as president and vice-president in general elections held in 1967.

1988 – World War II flying ace Gregory “Pappy” Boyington died in Fresno, Calif., at age 75.

1991 – The United States and Iraq intensified their rhetoric, with Secretary of State James A. Baker III telling Air Force pilots in Saudi Arabia, “We pass the brink at midnight January 15,” and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein boasting of his army’s readiness. Congress empowered Bush to order attack on Iraq.

1993 – In Somalia, Operation Nutcracker. 900 Marines sweep through the Bakara bazaar. No casualties on either side.

1996 – STS-72 launches from the Kennedy Space Center marking the start of the 74th Space Shuttle mission and the 10th flight of Endeavour on a mission to capture and return to Earth a Japanese microgravity research spacecraft known as Space Flyer Unit (SFU). The mission launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida.

1999 – US planes fired missiles at 2 Iraqi defense installations after determining that they were about to be attacked by surface to air missiles.

1999 – Iraq rejects a proposal by Saudi Arabia to ease United Nations trade sanctions imposed on Iraq for its 1990 invasion of Kuwait. The initiative would recommend that Iraq be allowed to buy and sell all goods, except military equipment or materials that could be used for military purposes.

2001 – The US Army premiered its new slogan “An Army of One” on the TV sitcom “Friends.”

2002 – First group of 20 detainees arrives at Guantanamo Bay’s Camp X-Ray.

2004 – U.S. paratroopers captured Khamis Sirhan al-Muhammad, a former regional Baath Party chairman and militia commander a former Baath Party official who was No. 54 on the list of 55 most-wanted figures from Saddam Hussein’s regime.

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2004 – Danish and Icelandic troops reported a cache of 36 shells buried in the Iraqi desert, and preliminary tests showed they contained a liquid blister agent. The 120mm mortar shells are thought to be left over from the eight-year war between Iraq and neighboring Iran, which ended in 1988.

2006 – In Georgia, Vladimir Arutinian is convicted of the attempted assassination of U.S. President George W. Bush and terrorist charges and sentenced with life imprisonment.

2007 – The U.S. Defense Department reports that United States Department of Defense contractors, while traveling through Canada, have had Canadian coins with radio transmitters inside planted on them by unknown people. The transmitters could be used to track the locations of the contractors.

2014 – The United States State Department issues a warning to those going to the host city of Sochi, informing that local medical facilities are “untested” and that there are threats of terrorist activity.


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Congressional Medal of Honor Citations for Actions Taken This Day

*GAMMON, ARCHER T.
Rank and organization: Staff Sergeant, U.S. Army, Company A, 9th Armored Infantry Battalion, 6th Armored Division. Place and date: Near Bastogne, Belgium, 11 January 1945. Entered service at: Roanoke, Va. Born: 11 September 1918, Chatham, Va. G.O. No.: 18, 13 February 1946. Citation: He charged 30 yards through hip-deep snow to knock out a machinegun and its 3-man crew with grenades, saving his platoon from being decimated and allowing it to continue its advance from an open field into some nearby woods. The platoon’s advance through the woods had only begun when a machinegun supported by riflemen opened fire and a Tiger Royal tank sent 88mm. shells screaming at the unit from the left flank. S/Sgt. Gammon, disregarding all thoughts of personal safety, rushed forward, then cut to the left, crossing the width of the platoon’s skirmish line in an attempt to get within grenade range of the tank and its protecting foot troops. Intense fire was concentrated on him by riflemen and the machinegun emplaced near the tank.

He charged the automatic weapon, wiped out its crew of 4 with grenades, and, with supreme daring, advanced to within 25 yards of the armored vehicle, killing 2 hostile infantrymen with rifle fire as he moved forward. The tank had started to withdraw, backing a short distance, then firing, backing some more, and then stopping to blast out another round, when the man whose single-handed relentless attack had put the ponderous machine on the defensive was struck and instantly killed by a direct hit from the Tiger Royal’s heavy gun. By his intrepidity and extreme devotion to the task of driving the enemy back no matter what the odds, S/Sgt. Gammon cleared the woods of German forces, for the tank continued to withdraw, leaving open the path for the gallant squad leader’s platoon.

HOWARD, JAMES H. (Air Mission)
Rank and organization: Lieutenant Colonel, U.S. Army Air Corps. Place and date: Over Oschersleben, Germany, 11 January 1944. Entered service at: St. Louis, Mo. Birth: Canton, China. G.O. No.: 45, 5 June 1944. Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty in action with the enemy near Oschersleben, Germany, on 11 January 1944. On that day Col. Howard was the leader of a group of P51 aircraft providing support for a heavy bomber formation on a long-range mission deep in enemy territory. As Col. Howard’s group met the bombers in the target area the bomber force was attacked by numerous enemy fighters. Col. Howard, with his group, and at once engaged the enemy and himself destroyed a German ME110. As a result of this attack Col. Howard lost contact with his group, and at once returned to the level of the bomber formation. He then saw that the bombers were being heavily attacked by enemy airplanes and that no other friendly fighters were at hand.

While Col. Howard could have waited to attempt to assemble his group before engaging the enemy, he chose instead to attack single-handed a formation of more than 30 German airplanes. With utter disregard for his own safety he immediately pressed home determined attacks for some 30 minutes, during which time he destroyed 3 enemy airplanes and probably destroyed and damaged others. Toward the end of this engagement 3 of his guns went out of action and his fuel supply was becoming dangerously low. Despite these handicaps and the almost insuperable odds against him, Col. Howard continued his aggressive action in an attempt to protect the bombers from the numerous fighters. His skill, courage, and intrepidity on this occasion set an example of heroism which will be an inspiration to the U.S. Armed Forces.

SHOMO, WILLIAM A. (Air Mission)
Rank and organization: Major, U.S. Army Air Corps, 82d Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron. Place and date: Over Luzon, Philippine Islands, 11 January 1 945. Entered service at: Westmoreland County, Pa. Birth: Jeannette, Pa. G.O. No.: 25, 7 April 1945. Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty. Maj. Shomo was lead pilot of a flight of 2 fighter planes charged with an armed photographic and strafing mission against the Aparri and Laoag airdromes. While en route to the objective, he observed an enemy twin engine bomber, protected by 12 fighters, flying about 2,500 feet above him and in the opposite direction Although the odds were 13 to 2, Maj. Shomo immediately ordered an attack. Accompanied by his wingman he closed on the enemy formation in a climbing turn and scored hits on the leading plane of the third element, which exploded in midair. Maj. Shomo then attacked the second element from the left side of the formation and shot another fighter down in flames.

When the enemy formed for counterattack, Maj. Shomo moved to the other side of the formation and hit a third fighter which exploded and fell. Diving below the bomber he put a burst into its underside and it crashed and burned. Pulling up from this pass he encountered a fifth plane firing head on and destroyed it. He next dived upon the first element and shot down the lead plane; then diving to 300 feet in pursuit of another fighter he caught it with his initial burst and it crashed in flames. During this action his wingman had shot down 3 planes, while the 3 remaining enemy fighters had fled into a cloudbank and escaped. Maj. Shomo’s extraordinary gallantry and intrepidity in attacking such a far superior force and destroying 7 enemy aircraft in one action is unparalleled in the southwest Pacific area.

FRITZ, HAROLD A.
Rank and organization: Captain, U.S. Army, Troop A, 1st Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment. Place and date: Binh Long Province, Republic of Vietnam, 11 January 1969. Entered service at: Milwaukee, Wis. Born: 21 February 1944, Chicago, 111. Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty. Capt. (then 1st Lt.) Fritz, Armor, U.S. Army, distinguished himself while serving as a platoon leader with Troop A, near Quan Loi. Capt. Fritz was leading his 7-vehicle armored column along Highway 13 to meet and escort a truck convoy when the column suddenly came under intense crossfire from a reinforced enemy company deployed in ambush positions. In the initial attack, Capt. Fritz’ vehicle was hit and he was seriously wounded. Realizing that his platoon was completely surrounded, vastly outnumbered, and in danger of being overrun, Capt. Fritz leaped to the top of his burning vehicle and directed the positioning of his remaining vehicles and men.

With complete disregard for his wounds and safety, he ran from vehicle to vehicle in complete view of the enemy gunners in order to reposition his men, to improve the defenses, to assist the wounded, to distribute ammunition, to direct fire, and to provide encouragement to his men. When a strong enemy force assaulted the position and attempted to overrun the platoon, Capt. Fritz manned a machine gun and through his exemplary action inspired his men to deliver intense and deadly fire which broke the assault and routed the attackers. Moments later a second enemy force advanced to within 2 meters of the position and threatened to overwhelm the defenders. Capt. Fritz, armed only with a pistol and bayonet, led a small group of his men in a fierce and daring charge which routed the attackers and inflicted heavy casualties. When a relief force arrived, Capt. Fritz saw that it was not deploying effectively against the enemy positions, and he moved through the heavy enemy fire to direct its deployment against the hostile positions. This deployment forced the enemy to abandon the ambush site and withdraw. Despite his wounds, Capt. Fritz returned to his position, assisted his men, and refused medical attention until all of his wounded comrades had been treated and evacuated. The extraordinary courage and selflessness displayed by Capt. Fritz, at the repeated risk of his own life above and beyond the call of duty, were in keeping with the highest traditions of the U.S. Army and reflect the greatest credit upon himself, his unit, and the Armed Forces.

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12 January

1777 – American Brigadier General Hugh Mercer died as a result of his wounds received at the Battle of Princeton and became a fallen hero and rallying symbol of the American Revolution. Mercer (January 17, 1726 – January 12, 1777) was a soldier and physician. He initially served with British forces during the Seven Years’ War but later became a brigadier general in the Continental Army and a close friend to George Washington. There are rumors that Mercer exclusively originated Washington’s daring plan to cross the Delaware River and surprise the Hessians at the Battle of Trenton on December 26, 1776, and he was certainly a major contributor to its execution. Because of the win at Trenton (and a small monetary bonus), Washington’s men agreed to a ten-day extension to their enlistment. When Washington decided to face off with Cornwallis during the Second Battle of Trenton on January 2, 1777, Mercer was given a major role in the defense of the city.

The next day, January 3rd, Washington’s army was en route to Princeton, New Jersey. While leading a vanguard of 350 soldiers, Mercer’s brigade encountered two British regiments and a mounted unit. A fight broke out at an orchard grove and Mercer’s horse was shot from under him. Getting to his feet, he was quickly surrounded by British troops who mistook him for George Washington and ordered him to surrender. Outnumbered, he drew his saber and began an unequal contest. He was finally beaten to the ground, then bayoneted repeatedly – seven times – and left for dead. When he learned of the British attack and saw some of Mercer’s men in retreat, Washington himself entered the fray. Washington rallied Mercer’s men and pushed back the British regiments, but Mercer had been left on the field to die with multiple bayonet wounds to his body and blows to his head.

(Legend has it that a beaten Mercer, with a bayonet still impaled in him, did not want to leave his men and the battle and was given a place to rest on a white oak tree’s trunk, while those who remained with him stood their ground. The tree became known as “the Mercer Oak” and is the key element of the seal of Mercer County, New Jersey.) When he was discovered, Mercer was carried to the field hospital in the Thomas Clarke House (now a museum) at the eastern end of the battlefield. In spite of medical efforts by Benjamin Rush, Mercer was mortally wounded and died nine agonizing days later.

1813 – US Frigate Chesapeake captures British Volunteer.

1819 – Congress fails to endorse a report sponsored by Senator Henry Clay, condemning Andrew Jackson for his conduct in the First Seminole War in Florida.

1828 – The US and Mexico agree to a common border along the Sabine River.

1846 – John Slidell’s report on his unsuccessful attempt to negotiate with the President of Mexico reaches President Polk. The following day Polk orders General Zachary Taylor to move from the Nueces River to a position on or near the left bank of the Rio Grande. Taylor’s “Army of Observation” now has nearly 3500 troops, about half the US Army.

1861 – Fort Barrancas and the Pensacola Navy Yard, Captain James Armstrong, USN, were seized by Florida and Alabama militia. Union troops escaped across the Bay to Fort Pickens on Santa Rosa Island, a position which remained in Union hands throughout the war.

1865 – General Hugh Judson Kilpatrick is promoted to major general in the Union army. Kilpatrick served in both the eastern and western theaters of war and earned a reputation as a fearless-and, many would say, reckless – leader. Kilpatrick was born in New Jersey in 1836. He attended West Point and graduated in 1861 alongside fellow cavalryman George Custer. He joined the 5th New York Infantry and became one of the first officers wounded in the war when he was shot at the Battle of Big Bethel, Virginia, in June 1861. By 1863, Kilpatrick was a brigadier general in the Army of the Potomac’s cavalry division. His aggressive battlefield tactics were often dangerous for his troops and he earned the nickname “Kill cavalry.” When the Battle of Gettysburg was winding down after Pickett’s Charge on July 3, 1863, Kilpatrick ordered General Elon Farnsworth of his command to charge the Confederate’s right flank. Farnsworth informed Kilpatrick that the position was too strong, but Kilpatrick did not relent. Farnsworth was killed in the failed attack.

In early 1864, Kilpatrick led a poorly conceived raid on Richmond that was also repulsed. Despite these blemishes on his record, Kilpatrick was selected by General William T. Sherman to command a cavalry division during the Atlanta campaign in 1864. Sherman wanted an aggressive leader to harass the Confederates. Kilpatrick attacked the Confederate supply line at Lovejoy’s Station, but he did not succeed in cutting the railroad. He was wounded later at Dalton, Georgia, but he returned in time to participate in Sherman’s March to the Sea and the campaign in the Carolinas in the winter and spring of 1864 and 1865. After the war, Kilpatrick was appointed U.S. minister to Chile. He returned to the U.S. in 1868, but he resumed the post in 1880. He died in 1881 and is buried at West Point.

1848 – Attack on Sloop Lexington, San Blas, Mexico. She landed a party at and captured several of the enemy guns.

1864 – Under cover of U.S.S. Yankee, Currituck, Anacostia, Tulip, and Jacob Bell, commanded by Acting Lieutenant Edward Hooker, Union cavalry and infantry under General Gilman Marston landed on the peninsula between the Potomac and Rappahannock Rivers, capturing “a small body of the enemy and a large number of cavalry horses.” The small gunboats supported the Army operations on the 13th and 14th, and covered the reembarkation of the soldiers on the 15th.

1872 – Russian Grand Duke Alexis goes on a gala buffalo hunting expedition with Gen. Phil Sheridan and Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer.

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1893 – Hermann Goering, Nazi leader, commander of the Luftwaffe, is born. The son of a judge who had been sent by Bismarck to South-West Africa as the first Resident Minister Plenipotentiary, Goering entered the army in 1914 as an Infantry Lieutenant, before being transferred to the air force as a combat pilot. Goering distinguished himself as an air ace, credited with shooting down twenty-two Allied aircraft. Awarded the Pour le Merite and the Iron Cross (First Class), he ended the war with the romantic aura of a much decorated pilot and war hero. After World War I he was employed as a show flier. Goering’s aristocratic background and his prestige as a war hero made him a prize recruit to the infant Nazi Party and Hitler appointed him to command the SA Brown Shirts in December 1922.

In 1923 he took part in the Munich Beer-Hall putsch, in which he was seriously wounded and forced to flee from Germany for four years until a general amnesty was declared. Returning to Germany in 1927, he rejoined the NSDAP and was elected as one of its first deputies to the Reichstag a year later. Following Hitler’s appointment as Chancellor on 30 January 1933, Goering was made Prussian Minister of the Interior, Commander-in-Chief of the Prussian Police and Gestapo and Commissioner for Aviation. As the creator of the secret police, Goering, together with Himmler (q.v.) and Heydrich (q.v.), set up the early concentration camps forpolitical opponents, showing formidable energy in terrorizing and crushing all resistance.

On 1 March 1935 he was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force and was responsible for organizing the rapid build-up of the aircraft industry and training of pilots. Goering identified with Hitler’s territorial aspirations, playing a key role in bringing about the Anschluss in 1938 and the bludgeoning of the Czechs into submission. Appointed Reich Council Chairman for National Defence on 30 August 1939 and officially designated as Hitler’s successor on 1 September, Goering directed the Luftwaffe campaigns against Poland and France, and on 19 June 1940 was promoted to Reich Marshal. In August 1940 he confidently threw himself into the great offensive against Great Britain, Operation Eagle, convinced that he would drive the RAF from the skies and secure the surrender of the British by means of the Luftwaffe alone. Goering, however, lost control of the Battle of Britain and made a fatal, tactical error when he switched to massive night bombings of London. This move saved the RAF sector control stations from destruction and gave the British fighter defenses precious time to recover.

The failure of the Luftwaffe caused the abandonment of Operation Sea Lion, the planned invasion of England, and began the political eclipse of Goering. 9 May 1945, Goering was captured by forces of the American Seventh Army and put on trial at Nuremberg in 1946. Goering was found guilty on all four counts: of conspiracy to wage war, crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity. No mitigating circumstances were found and Goering was sentenced to death by hanging. On 15 October 1946, two hours before his execution was due to take place, Goering committed suicide in his Nuremberg cell.

1908 – A wireless message is sent long-distance for the first time from the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

1913 – Kiel and Wilhelmshaven become submarine bases in Germany.

1918 – The Distinguished Service Cross was established by President Woodrow Wilson. General Pershing, Commander-in-Chief of the Expeditionary Forces in France, had recommended that recognition other than the Medal of Honor, be authorized for the Armed Forces of the United States for service rendered, in like manner, to that awarded by the European Armies. The request for establishment of the medal was forwarded from the Secretary of War to the President in a letter dated December 28, 1917. The Act of Congress establishing this award (193-65th Congress) dated July 9, 1918 is contained in Title 10 United States Code (USC) 3742. The establishment of the Distinguished Service Cross was promulgated in War Department General Order No. 6, dated January 12, 1918.

1918 – The Distinguished Service Medal, authorized by Presidential Order January 2, 1918, and confirmed by Congress July 9, 1918, was announced by War Department General Order No. 6, January 12, 1918, with the following information concerning the medal: “A bronze medal of appropriate design and a ribbon to be worn in lieu thereof, to be awarded by the President to any person who, while serving in any capacity with the Army shall hereafter distinguish himself or herself, or who, since April 6, 1917, has distinguished himself or herself by exceptionally meritorious service to the Government in a duty of great responsibility in time of war or in connection with military operations against an armed enemy of the United States.” The Act of Congress on July 9, 1918, recognized the need for different types and degrees of heroism and meritorious service and included such provisions for award criteria. The current statutory authorization for the Distinguished Service Medal is Title 10, United States Code, Section 3743. Among the first awards of the Distinguished Service Medal for service in World War I, were those to the Commanding Officers of the Allied Armies: Marshals Foch and Joffre, General Petain of France, Field Marshal Haig of Great Britain, General Diaz of Italy, General Gillain of Belgium, and General Pershing.

1927 – U.S. Secretary of State Frank Kellogg claims that Mexican President, former rebel, Plutarco Calles is aiding a bolshevist plot in Nicaragua.

1942 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt creates the National War Labor Board under the chairmanship of William Hammatt Davis. It became a tripartite body and was charged with acting as an arbitration tribunal in labor-management dispute cases, thereby preventing work stoppages which might hinder the war effort. It administered wage control in national industries such as automobiles, shipping, railways, airlines, telegraph lines, and mining. The Board was originally divided into 12 Regional Administrative Boards which handled both labor dispute settlement and wage stabilization functions for specific geographic regions. The National Board further decentralized in 1943, when it established special tripartite commissions and panels to deal with specific industries on a national base. It ceased operating in 1946, and labor disputes were afterwards handled by the National Labor Relations Board, originally set up in 1935.

1943 – In the Aleutians, Amchitka Island is occupied by a small US force led by General Jones. The destroyer Warden is lost in an accident.

1944 – US 5th Army forces (particularly 34th Division) capture Cervaro and advance toward Monte Cassino.

1945 – There are air attacks from the planes of the carriers of Task Force 38 against Japanese installations at the naval base at Camranh Bay and others areas in Indochina. TG 38.5 continues the attacks from its specially trained carriers. Japanese losses to the attacks amount to 29 ships of 116,000 tons. Eleven small warships are also sunk.

1949 – Under-Secretary of State-designate Dean Acheson reaffirms the United Nations’ responsibility to provide military security to Pacific area nations. He does not consider Korea to be within the US defense perimeter.

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1951 – After Wonju fell to communist forces, 98th BG sent ten B-29s to attack the occupied city. For the first time, B-29s dropped 500-pound general purpose bombs fused to burst in the air and shower enemy troops with thousands of steel fragments. The innovation slowed the enemy advance. To improve bombing precision, Far East Air Forces installed shoran (a short-range navigation system) on a B-26 for the first time.

1952 – F-84s caught three supply trains at Sunchon, racing for the shelter of a tunnel. They blasted the tunnel mouth shut, trapping the trains in the open, then destroyed the boxcars and at least two locomotives.

1953 – Landings tested on board USS Antietam, first angled deck carrier USS Antietam, a 27,100 ton Ticonderoga class aircraft carrier built at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, Pennsylvania, was commissioned in January 1945. She transited the Panama Canal to the Pacific in June and was en route to the Western Pacific war zone when Japan capitulated in August 1945. Antietam operated in Far Eastern waters during the first years of the post-war era, returning to the United States in 1949, when she was decommissioned and placed in the Reserve Fleet. Re-commissioned in January 1951, in response to Korean War requirements, the carrier made one combat deployment, between September 1951 and March 1952. In September-December 1952, after joining the Atlantic Fleet, Antietam was modified to receive the U.S. Navy’s first angled flight deck.

During the next few years, she served as the test platform for this feature, which was to revolutionize carrier flight operations. After being rated as an attack aircraft carrier (CVA-36) from October 1952 to August 1953, she was thereafter classified as an antisubmarine support aircraft carrier, with the hull number CVS-36. In that role, Antietam made Sixth Fleet cruises in the Mediterranean Sea in 1955 and in 1956-57. She was then assigned to carrier flight training duty, generally operating in waters near Pensacola, Florida. Relieved as training carrier in October 1962, she was decommissioned for the last time in May 1963. Following a decade in the Reserve Fleet, USS Antietam was sold for scrapping in February 1974.

1954 – In a speech at a Council on Foreign Relations dinner in his honor, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles announces that the United States will protect its allies through the “deterrent of massive retaliatory power.” The policy announcement was further evidence of the Eisenhower administration’s decision to rely heavily on the nation’s nuclear arsenal as the primary means of defense against communist aggression. Dulles began his speech by examining communist strategy that, he concluded, had as its goal the “bankruptcy” of the United States through overextension of its military power. Both strategically and economically, the secretary explained, it was unwise to “permanently commit U.S. land forces to Asia,” to “support permanently other countries,” or to “become permanently committed to military expenditures so vast that they lead to ‘practical bankruptcy.'” Instead, he believed a new policy of “getting maximum protection at a bearable cost” should be developed. Although Dulles did not directly refer to nuclear weapons, it was clear that the new policy he was describing would depend upon the “massive retaliatory power” of such weapons to respond to future communist acts of war.

The speech was a reflection of two of the main tenets of foreign policy under Eisenhower and Dulles. First was the belief, particularly on the part of Dulles, that America’s foreign policy toward the communist threat had been timidly reactive during the preceding Democratic administration of President Harry S. Truman. Dulles consistently reiterated the need for a more proactive and vigorous approach to rolling back the communist sphere of influence. Second was President Eisenhower’s belief that military and foreign assistance spending had to be controlled. Eisenhower was a fiscal conservative and believed that the U.S. economy and society could not long take the strain of overwhelming defense budgets. A stronger reliance on nuclear weapons as the backbone of America’s defense answered both concerns – atomic weapons were far more effective in terms of threatening potential adversaries, and they were also, in the long run, much less expensive than the costs associated with a large standing army.

1962 – Operation Chopper, the first American combat mission in the Vietnam War, takes place. In December 1961, the USNS Core (T-AKV-41) docked in Saigon with 82 US Army Piasecki H-21 helicopters. A little more than 12 days later, Operation Chopper commenced. The helicopters transported over 1,000 South Vietnamese paratroopers for an assault on a suspected Viet Cong stronghold 10 miles west of Saigon. The Viet Cong were surprised and soundly defeated, but they gained valuable combat experience they would later use with great effect against US troops. The paratroopers also captured a sought-after underground radio transmitter. This operation heralded a new era of air mobility for the U.S. Army, which had been slowly growing as a concept since the Army formed twelve helicopter battalions in 1952 as a result of the Korean War. These new battalions eventually formed a sort of modern day cavalry for the Army.

1962 – The United States Air Force launches Operation Ranch Hand, a “modern technological area-denial technique” designed to expose the roads and trails used by the Viet Cong. Flying C-123 Providers, U.S. personnel dumped an estimated 19 million gallons of defoliating herbicides over 10-20 percent of Vietnam and parts of Laos between 1962-1971. Agent Orange – named for the color of its metal containers – was the most frequently used defoliating herbicide. The operation succeeded in killing vegetation, but not in stopping the Viet Cong.

The use of these agents was controversial, both during and after the war, because of the questions about long-term ecological impacts and the effect on humans who either handled or were sprayed by the chemicals. Beginning in the late 1970s, Vietnam veterans began to cite the herbicides, especially Agent Orange, as the cause of health problems ranging from skin rashes to cancer to birth defects in their children. Similar problems, including an abnormally high incidence of miscarriages and congenital malformations, have been reported among the Vietnamese people who lived in the areas where the defoliating agents were used.

1971 – The Harrisburg Seven,a group of religious anti-war activists, led by Philip Berrigan, were charged in a failed conspiracy case in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, located at Harrisburg. The “Seven” were Berrigan, Sister Elizabeth McAlister, Rev. Neil McLaughlin, Rev. Joseph Wenderoth, Eqbal Ahmad, Anthony Scoblick, and Mary Cain Scoblick. The group was unsuccessfully prosecuted for alleged criminal plots during the Vietnam War era. Six of the seven were Roman Catholic nuns or priests. The seventh, Ahmad, was a Pakistani journalist, American-trained political scientist, and self-described “odd man out” of the group. Haverford College physics professor William C. Davidon was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the case. In 1970, the group attracted government attention when Berrigan, then imprisoned, and McAlister were caught trading letters that alluded to kidnapping National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger and blowing up steam tunnels.

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1986 – Congressman Bill Nelson (D-FL) lifts off from Kennedy Space Center aboard Columbia on mission STS-61-C as a Mission Specialist. STS-61-C was the twenty-fourth mission of NASA’s Space Shuttle program, and the seventh mission of Space Shuttle Columbia. It was the first time that Columbia, the first operational orbiter to be constructed, had flown since STS-9. The mission launched from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center on 12 January 1986, and landed six days later on 18 January. STS-61-C’s seven-person crew included the second African-American shuttle pilot, future NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, the first Costa Rican-born astronaut, Franklin Chang-Diaz, as well as the second sitting politician to fly in space. It was the last shuttle mission before the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, which occurred just ten days after STS-61-C’s landing.

1991 – After a two day debate, a deeply divided Congress gave President Bush the authority to wage war in the Persian Gulf. The Senate voted 52-to-47 to empower Bush to use armed forces to expel Iraq from Kuwait; the House followed suit on a vote of 250-to-183. The 5th MEB embarked and arrived in the North Arabian Sea in support of Desert Shield.

1993 – First US KIA in Somalia. Marine killed while on patrol in Mogadishu.

1995 – In Port-au-Prince, Haiti, an American soldier, Sgt. 1st Class Gregory D. Cardott, assigned to A Company, 3rd Battalion, Third Special Forces Group, was killed and another wounded during a shootout with a former Haitian army officer who also was killed.

1997 – Two recently enrolled female cadets at The Citadel announced they were not returning for the spring semester, citing harassment by male cadets.

1998 – Iraq authorities said they would block a UN inspection team led by former US Marine captain Scott Ritter.

1999 – In Iraq a US F-16 jet encountered an active radar site and fired a HARM anti-radiation missile at it.

2002 – The United States intensified its anti-terror campaign in eastern Afghanistan, dropping bombs on suspected al-Qaida and Taliban hideouts.

2002 – Malaysia announced the arrests of 2 more suspected militants tied to al Qaeda and linked to a cell in Singapore.

2002 – Pakistan’s Pres. Musharraf vowed to crack down on militant Islamists using Pakistan as a base of operations in Kashmir. Musharraf also announced new regulations on education criteria for the estimated 6,000 madrassas, the Islamic schools.

2004 – The US Supreme Court refused to hear on appeal by civil liberties groups seeking access to basic data of individuals detained indefinitely by the government after the September 11th, 2001, attacks.

2005 – NASA launched its Deep Impact spacecraft from Cape Canaveral, Fla. It was scheduled to launch an 820-pound impactor vehicle at Comet Tempel-1 on July 4th.

2005 – United States intelligence officials confirm that its search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq ended last month. The claim that Iraq had an active WMD program was one of a laundry list of justifications by the White House for the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

2007 – United States armed forces raid the office of the Iranian Consulate General in Arbil, a city in Iraqi Kurdistan.

2007 – Terrorists fire an anti-tank missile at the Embassy of the United States in Athens. No one is injured or killed.

2009 – CGC Boutwell departed Alameda, CA, on an around-the-world cruise as part of the USS Boxer Expeditionary Strike Group.

2010 A devastating earthquake struck Haiti. CGCs Forward, Mohawk and Tahoma were the first U.S. assets to arrive on scene at Port au Prince, with Forward arriving the morning of 13 January 2010 and Mohawk arriving in the afternoon. These units provided air traffic control for military aircraft, conducted damage assessments of the port, and ferried supplies and injured people with embarked boats and helicopters. Other Coast Guard assets began arriving soon thereafter to assist in the recovery efforts, including the CGC Oak and aircraft from AIRSTA Clearwater.

2015 – Apparent Islamic State computer hackers hack the feeds for the United States Central Command for Twitter and Youtube.

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Congressional Medal of Honor Citations for Actions Taken This Day

DAVIS, CHARLES W.
Rank and organization: Major, U.S. Army, 25th Infantry Division. Place and date: Guadalcanal Island, 12 January 1943. Entered service at: Montgomery, Ala. Birth: Gordo, Ala. G.O. No.: 40, 17 July 1943. Citation: For d1stinguishing himself conspicuously by gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty in action with the enemy on Guadalcanal Island. On 12 January 1943, Maj. Davis (then Capt.), executive officer of an infantry battalion, volunteered to carry instructions to the leading companies of his battalion which had been caught in crossfire from Japanese machineguns. With complete disregard for his own safety, he made his way to the trapped units, delivered the instructions, supervised their execution, and remained overnight in this exposed position. On the following day, Maj. Davis again volunteered to lead an assault on the Japanese position which was holding up the advance. When his rifle jammed at its first shot, he drew his pistol and, waving his men on, led the assault over the top of the hill. Electrified by this action, another body of soldiers followed and seized the hill. The capture of this position broke Japanese resistance and the battalion was then able to proceed and secure the corps objective. The courage and leadership displayed by Maj. Davis inspired the entire battalion and unquestionably led to the success of its attack.

LAWS, ROBERT E.
Rank and organization: Staff Sergeant, U.S. Army, Company G, 169th Infantry, 43d Infantry Division. Place and date: Pangasinan Province, Luzon, Philippine Islands, 12 January 1945. Entered service at: Altoona, Pa. Birth: Altoona, Pa. G.O. No.: 77, 10 September 1945. Citation: He led the assault squad when Company G attacked enemy hill positions. The enemy force, estimated to be a reinforced infantry company, was well supplied with machineguns, ammunition, grenades, and blocks of TNT and could be attacked only across a narrow ridge 70 yards long. At the end of this ridge an enemy pillbox and rifle positions were set in rising ground. Covered by his squad, S/Sgt Laws traversed the hogback through vicious enemy fire until close to the pillbox, where he hurled grenades at the fortification. Enemy grenades wounded him, but he persisted in his assault until 1 of his missiles found its mark and knocked out the pillbox. With more grenades, passed to him by members of his squad who had joined him, he led the attack on the entrenched riflemen. In the advance up the hill, he suffered additional wounds in both arms and legs, about the body and in the head, as grenades and TNT charges exploded near him.

Three Japs rushed him with fixed bayonets, and he emptied the magazine of his machine pistol at them, killing 2. He closed in hand-to-hand combat with the third, seizing the Jap’s rifle as he met the onslaught. The 2 fell to the ground and rolled some 50 or 60 feet down a bank. When the dust cleared the Jap lay dead and the valiant American was climbing up the hill with a large gash across the head. He was given first aid and evacuated from the area while his squad completed the destruction of the enemy position. S/Sgt. Laws’ heroic actions provided great inspiration to his comrades, and his courageous determination, in the face of formidable odds and while suffering from multiple wounds, enabled them to secure an important objective with minimum casualties.

*NININGER, ALEXANDER R., JR.
Rank and organization: Second Lieutenant, U.S. Army, 57th Infantry, Philippine Scouts. Place and date: Near Abucay, Bataan, Philippine Islands, 12 January 1942. Entered service at: Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Birth: Gainesville, Ga. G.O. No.: 9, 5 February 1942. Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty in action with the enemy near Abucay, Bataan, Philippine Islands, on 12 January 1942. This officer, though assigned to another company not then engaged in combat, voluntarily attached himself to Company K, same regiment, while that unit was being attacked by enemy force superior in firepower. Enemy snipers in trees and foxholes had stopped a counterattack to regain part of position. In hand-to-hand fighting which followed, 2d Lt. Nininger repeatedly forced his way to and into the hostile position. Though exposed to heavy enemy fire, he continued to attack with rifle and handgrenades and succeeded in destroying several enemy groups in foxholes and enemy snipers. Although wounded 3 times, he continued his attacks until he was killed after pushing alone far within the enemy position. When his body was found after recapture of the position, 1 enemy officer and 2 enemy soldiers lay dead around him.

ROSSER, RONALD E.
Rank and organization: Corporal, U.S. Army, Heavy Mortar Company, 38th Infantry Regiment, 2d Infantry Division. Place and date: Vicinity of Ponggilli, Korea, 12 January 1952. Entered service at: Crooksville, Ohio. Born: 24 October 1929, Columbus, Ohio. G.O. No.: 67, 7 July 1952. Citation: Cpl. Rosser, distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry above and beyond the call of duty. While assaulting heavily fortified enemy hill positions, Company L, 38th Infantry Regiment, was stopped by fierce automatic-weapons, small-arms, artillery, and mortar fire. Cpl. Rosser, a forward observer was with the lead platoon of Company L, when it came under fire from 2 directions. Cpl. Rosser turned his radio over to his assistant and, disregarding the enemy fire, charged the enemy positions armed with only carbine and a grenade. At the first bunker, he silenced its occupants with a burst from his weapon. Gaining the top of the hill, he killed 2 enemy soldiers, and then went down the trench, killing 5 more as he advanced. He then hurled his grenade into a bunker and shot 2 other soldiers as they emerged.

Having exhausted his ammunition, he returned through the enemy fire to obtain more ammunition and grenades and charged the hill once more. Calling on others to follow him, he assaulted 2 more enemy bunkers. Although those who attempted to join him became casualties, Cpl. Rosser once again exhausted his ammunition obtained a new supply, and returning to the hilltop a third time hurled grenades into the enemy positions. During this heroic action Cpl. Rosser single-handedly killed at least 13 of the enemy. After exhausting his ammunition he accompanied the withdrawing platoon, and though himself wounded, made several trips across open terrain still under enemy fire to help remove other men injured more seriously than himself. This outstanding soldier’s courageous and selfless devotion to duty is worthy of emulation by all men. He has contributed magnificently to the high traditions of the military service.

*PORT, WILLIAM D.
Rank and organization: Sergeant (then Pfc.), U.S. Army, Company C, 5th Battalion, 7th Cavalry, 1st Air Cavalry Division. Place and date: Que Son Valley, Heip Duc Province, Republic of Vietnam, 12 January 1968. Entered service at: Harrisburg, Pa. Born: 13 October 1941, Petersburg, Pa. Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty. Sgt. Port distinguished himself while serving as a rifleman with Company C, which was conducting combat operations against an enemy force in the Que Son Valley. As Sgt. Port’s platoon was moving to cut off a reported movement of enemy soldiers, the platoon came under heavy fire from an entrenched enemy force. The platoon was forced to withdraw due to the intensity and ferocity of the fire.

Although wounded in the hand as the withdrawal began, Sgt. Port, with complete disregard for his safety, ran through the heavy fire to assist a wounded comrade back to the safety of the platoon perimeter. As the enemy forces assaulted in the perimeter, Sgt. Port and 3 comrades were in position behind an embankment when an enemy grenade landed in their midst. Sgt. Port, realizing the danger to his fellow soldiers, shouted the warning, “Grenade,” and unhesitatingly hurled himself towards the grenade to shield his comrades from the explosion. Through his exemplary courage and devotion he saved the lives of his fellow soldiers and gave the members of his platoon the inspiration needed to hold their position. Sgt. Port’s selfless concern for his comrades, at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty are in keeping with the highest tradition of the military service and reflect great credit on himself, his unit, and the U.S. Army.

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13 January

1776 – In the early morning hours of January 13, 1776, British forces raid Prudence Island, Rhode Island, in an effort to steal a large quantity of sheep. But, upon landing on the island’s southern beaches, the British were ambushed by fifteen Minutemen from Rhode Island’s Second Company led by Captain Joseph Knight, who had been tipped off to the Brits’ plans and rowed across Narragansett Bay from Warwick Neck the previous morning. A brief but deadly battle ensued before the British were forced to retreat. Three British marines were killed and seven injured during the ambush. Two Minutemen were wounded; one died and the other was taken prisoner. Afraid of further violence, residents abandoned the island between 1776 and 1777, and the island’s homes and windmill were burned.

1807 – Union General Napoleon Bonaparte Buford is born in Woodford, Kentucky. Buford held many commands in the west and was a hero at the Battle of Belmont early in the war. Buford attended West Point and graduated in 1827, sixth out of 38 in his class. After a stint with the frontier military, he was given leave to study law at Harvard. He taught at West Point before leaving the service to become a businessman. He was an engineer and banker in Illinois during the 1840s and 1850s. When the war began, the 54-year-old Buford raised his own regiment, the 27th Illinois. He was commissioned as a colonel, and his unit was sent to Cairo, Illinois, and placed in General Ulysses S. Grant’s army. On November 7, 1861, Grant attacked a Confederate camp at Belmont, Missouri, and quickly drove the Rebels away. But Grant’s men became preoccupied with plundering the area, and a Confederate counterattack nearly turned to disaster for the Yankees. Buford’s regiment was nearly cut off from the main Union force. He rallied his men and they fought their way out of the Confederate trap. Buford was commended for his bravery. After Belmont, Buford participated in the capture of Island No. 10, a Confederate stronghold in the Mississippi River, and Buford was left in command after its capture. Buford and his regiment fought at Corinth in October 1862, but the colonel fell seriously ill from sunstroke. He left field command and sat on the court martial of General Fitz John Porter in Washington.

Buford returned to the west and was promoted to Brigadier General in charge of the District of Eastern Arkansas. He remained there for the remainder of the war, although his main military action came in chasing off Confederate raiders in the area. Buford generated controversy in his dealings with black troops. He had drawn earlier criticism for not helping refugee slaves, and now he proclaimed his preference for commanding white troops. He justified it by saying that black troops were not as well trained and they were more likely to fall prey to drawn attention from southern bushwackers. He silenced some of the criticism by implementing programs for freed slaves in Arkansas that generally succeeded in taking care of their immediate needs. Poor health forced his resignation in March 1865, just before the end of the war. He was brevetted to major general following his retirement. He worked in a variety of businesses after the war and died in Chicago in 1883. Napoleon Bonaparte Buford was the older half-brother of John Buford, a Union General who commanded the Union force that first engaged the Confederates at Gettysburg in 1863.

1813 – Captain Oliver Hazard Perry arrives in Presque Isle (Pennsylvania) where he will supervise the construction of a flotilla. Two brigs, a schooner, and three gunboats will be constructed from materials transported overland and by inland waterway from Philadelphia, by way of Pittsburgh, in preparation for the naval battle for Lake Erie.

1815 – British troops capture Fort Peter in St. Marys, Georgia, the only battle of the War of 1812 to take place in the state. The Battle of Fort Point Peter was a successful attack by a British force on St. Marys, Georgia, and a smaller force of American soldiers at a fort on Point Peter on the Georgia side of the St. Marys River. The river was part of the international border between the US and British-allied Spanish Florida. Occupying coastal Camden County allowed the British to blockade American transportation on the Intracoastal Waterway. The attack on Fort Peter occurred after the signing of the Treaty of Ghent, which would end the War of 1812, but before the treaty’s ratification. The attack on Fort Peter occurred at the same time as the siege of Fort St. Philip in Louisiana and was part of the British occupation of St. Marys and Cumberland Island.

1833 – President Andrew Jackson writes to Vice President Martin Van Buren expressing his opposition to South Carolina’s defiance of federal authority in the Nullification Crisis. The Nullification Crisis was a sectional crisis during the presidency of Andrew Jackson created by South Carolina’s 1832 Ordinance of Nullification. This ordinance declared by the power of the State that the federal Tariffs of 1828 and 1832 were unconstitutional and therefore null and void within the sovereign boundaries of South Carolina. The controversial and highly protective Tariff of 1828 (known to its detractors as the “Tariff of Abominations”) was enacted into law during the presidency of John Quincy Adams. The tariff was opposed in the South and parts of New England. Its opponents expected that the election of Jackson as President would result in the tariff being significantly reduced.

In July of 1832, Jackson signed into law the Tariff of 1832. This compromise tariff received the support of most northerners and half of the southerners in Congress. The reductions were too little for South Carolina, and in November 1832 a state convention declared that the tariffs of both 1828 and 1832 were unconstitutional and unenforceable in South Carolina after February 1, 1833. Military preparations to resist anticipated federal enforcement were initiated by the state. In late February both a Force Bill, authorizing the President to use military forces against South Carolina, and a new negotiated tariff, the Compromise Tariff of 1833, satisfactory to South Carolina were passed by Congress. The South Carolina convention reconvened and repealed its Nullification Ordinance on March 11, 1833.

1838 – Canadian rebels surrender their arms to US militamen along the Canadian frontier. Many rebels took refuge in the northern United States, where, with the help of American supporters, they formed secret friends called Hunters’ Lodges to renew the rebellion. The lodges will conduct several raids across the border, leading to another short-lived rising in Lower Canada (Quebec).

1846 – President James Polk dispatched General Zachary Taylor and 4,000 troops to the Texas Border as war with Mexico loomed. Mexico had severed relations with the United States in March 1845, shortly after the U.S. annexation of Texas. In September President Polk sent John Slidell on a secret mission to Mexico City to negotiate the disputed Texas border, settle U.S. claims against Mexico, and purchase New Mexico and California for up to $30,000,000. Mexican officials, aware in advance of Slidell’s intention of dismembering their country, refused to receive him. When Polk learned of the snub, he ordered troops to occupy the disputed area between the Nueces and the Rio Grande rivers.

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1862 – The Federal army fitted out a steamer with five guns and made a descent upon the Cedar Keys. The attack was not expected, and so only a 23 man Confederate force on the Island. It was too small to do more than burn the cotton and turpentine in the face of an attack from an overwhelming Union force. Confederate Brigadier General J. H. Trapier, CS army, had transferred the bulk of his forces (two Florida companies) to meet an expected attack at Fernandina on Amelia Island. While some Confederate soldiers were taken prisoner, were all returned. The 80 to 100 civilians on the island, according to Trapier’s report “were required to sign an oath not to take up arms against the Government of the (so-called) United States during the present war.” None of the three old rebel cannon were saved as they weren’t worth the effort. The Union assault was a successful one.

1865 – After the failure of his December expedition against Fort Fisher, Maj. Gen. Benjamin Butler was relieved of command. Maj. Gen. Alfred Terry was placed in command of a ‘Provisional Corps,’ including Paine’s Division of U.S. Colored Troops, and supported by a naval force of nearly 60 vessels, to renew operations against the fort. After a preliminary bombardment directed by Rear Adm. David D. Porter on January 13, Union forces landed and prepared an attack on Maj. Gen. Robert Hoke’s infantry line. On the 15th, a select force moved on the fort from the rear. A valiant attack late in the afternoon, following the bloody repulse of a naval landing party carried the parapet. The Confederate garrison surrendered, opening the way for a Federal thrust against Wilmington, the South’s last open seaport on the Atlantic coast.

1893 – U.S. Marines land in Honolulu, Hawaii from the USS Boston to prevent the queen from abrogating the Bayonet Constitution.

1910 – Lee De Forest, the American inventor of the vacuum tube, broadcasts a live performance of Enrico Caruso from the Metropolitan Opera. The broadcast over a telephone transmitter could be heard only by the small number of electronics hobbyists who had radio receivers. De Forest started regular nightly concerts in 1915, increasing interest in radio receivers, which at the time depended on the vacuum tubes manufactured by De Forest’s company. Many discoveries in the field of electricity led to the development of radio. In 1873, British physicist James Clerk Maxwell published his theory of electromagnetic waves. Inventor David Edward Hughes discovered that if one passed those waves through the junction of a steel point and a carbon block, it would conduct a current. In 1879, he showed how radio signals could be received from a transmitter hundreds of yards away. People had already been transmitting long-distance messages with light rays through a heliograph, but radio was more versatile because its waves could travel farther and could be amplified. Italian electrical engineer and inventor Guglielmo Marconi is traditionally recognized as the inventor of the radio for his 1896 invention, which transmitted signals over more than a mile.

The following year, he transmitted signals from land to a ship that was sailing nearly 20 miles off shore. Soon, France and England began using the invention to communicate with each other, even during rainstorms, and by 1905 ships often used radios to communicate with stations on shore. Marconi’s work earned him a share of the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics. Radio developed quickly after World War I, and amateur operators using short-wave radios made the first transatlantic radio transmission in 1921. Short-wave radio is still used today during emergencies when other modes of communication are rendered useless, and more than 1.5 million people around the world are licensed ham-radio operators. Development in radio (from high-tech equipment to extremely high frequency communication systems) has made space exploration possible, including the Apollo lunar-landing missions. Radio waves of different lengths have diverse characteristics and are identified by their frequencies (for instance, shorter waves have higher frequencies, or numbers of cycles per second). One cycle per second is called a hertz, in honor of German radio genius Heinrich Hertz. Commercial radio stations are broadcast on frequency modulation (FM) or amplitude modulation (AM) and are assigned bandwidths by the Federal Communications Commission.

1929 – Frontiersman Wyatt Earp died in LA, Ca., after an illustrious life in the West. Cowboy stars William S. Hart and Tom Mix served as pallbearers. Born in Illinois in 1848, he served as a lawman in Wichita and Dodge City, Kansas, as well as Tombstone, Arizona Territory, where Wyatt and his brothers Morgan and Virgil were notorious for violent clashes with outlaws. Western historians have disagreed about the particulars of Wyatt Earp’s life, but he is said to have been a freighter-teamster, railroad construction worker, policeman, prisoner, saloon keeper and horse farmer, and he was involved in several gunfights – for reasons that may or may not have been related to law enforcement. When Morgan was killed, Wyatt avenged his death by killing Frank Stilwell, an outlaw he had previously arrested. Wyatt Berry Stapp Earp was buried in Colma, Ca.

1937 – The United States bars US citizens from serving in the Spanish Civil War.

1942 – German U-Boats begin operations of the US East Coast. The move is called operation Paukenschlag (Drum Roll). Admiral Doenitz has faced arguments from his superiors in the German Navy who do not favor the operation, and he has had the difficulty that only the larger 740-ton U-Boats are really suitable for such long range patrols. When Doenitz gives the order for the attack to begin there are 11 U-Boats in position and 10 more en route. Together they sink more than 150,000 tons during the first month. Intelligence sources have given reasonable warning of the attack but the U-Boats find virtually peace-time conditions in operation. Ship sail with lights on at night; lighthouses and bouys are still lit; there is no radio discipline – merchant ships often give their positions in plain text; there are destroyer patrols (not convoys with escorts) but these are regular and predictable and their crews are naturally inexperienced.

1942 – Japanese attacks on Bataan continue and, although they make progress on the east side of the peninsula, they are still held on the west.

1942 – Allied representatives meeting in London announce that Axis war criminals will be punished after the war.

1943 – US forces on Guadalcanal further develop their offensive, advancing westward along the north coast as well as attacking parallel to this advance further inland.

1943 – General Eichelberger, an American, is given overall command of the fighting troops on New Guinea.

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1945 – Near the Philippines the escort carrier Salamaua is badly damaged in a Kamikaze attack. These are now becoming rare, however, because most of the Kamikaze aircraft have been lost and the rest withdrawn. Ashore, the US bridgehead is being extended and Damortis is taken.

1945 – In the Ardennes, units of the US First Army and the British XXX Corps from the west reach the Ourthe River between Laroche and Houffalize. Third Army forces are also moving on Houffalize.

1950 – For the second time in a week, Jacob Malik, the Soviet representative to the United Nations, storms out of a meeting of the Security Council, this time in reaction to the defeat of his proposal to expel the Nationalist Chinese representative. At the same time, he announced the Soviet Union’s intention to boycott further Security Council meetings. Several days before the January 13 meeting, Malik walked out to show his displeasure over the United Nations’ refusal to unseat the Nationalist Chinese delegation. The Soviet Union had recognized the communist People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the true Chinese government, and wanted the PRC to replace the Nationalist Chinese delegation at the United Nations. Malik returned on January 13, however, to vote on the Soviet resolution to expel Nationalist China. Six countries–the United States, Nationalist China, Cuba, Ecuador, Cuba, and Egypt–voted against the resolution, and three–the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, and India–voted in favor of it. Malik immediately left the meeting, declaring that the United States was “encouraging lawlessness” by refusing to recognize the “illegal presence” of the Nationalist Chinese representatives. He concluded that “even the most convinced reactionaries” had to recognize the justness of the Soviet resolution, and he vowed that the Soviet Union would not be bound by any decisions made by the Security Council if the Nationalist Chinese representative remained.

Hoping to forestall any future Security Council action, Malik announced that the Soviet Union would no longer attend its meetings. The remaining members of the Security Council decided to carry on despite the Soviet boycott. In late June 1950, it became apparent that the Soviet action had backfired when the issue of North Korea’s invasion of South Korea was brought before the Security Council. By June 27, the Security Council voted to invoke military action by the United Nations for the first time in the organization’s history. The Soviets could have blocked the action in the Security Council, since the United States, Soviet Union, China, Britain, and France each had absolute veto power, but no Russian delegate was present. In just a short time, a multinational U.N. force arrived in South Korea and the grueling three-year Korean War was underway.

1951 – Far East Air Forces flew the first effective tarzon mission against an enemy-held bridge at Kanggye, dropping a six-ton radio-guided bomb on the center span, destroying fifty-eight feet of the structure.

1951 – President Truman told General MacArthur to withdraw his forces if continued resistance was no longer militarily possible, and even then, if practicable, continue to resist from islands off Korea’s coast. “In the worst case,” said Truman, “it would be important that, if we must withdraw from Korea, it be clear to the world that that course is forced upon us by military necessity, and that we shall not accept the result politically or militarily until the aggression has been rectified.”

1952 – Ten Okinawa-based Superfortresses dropped 396 high explosive 500-pound bombs on the railroad bridge east of Sinanju across the Chongchong River, rendering the bridge unserviceable.

1953 – Some twelve enemy fighters shot down a B-29 on a psychological warfare, leaflet-drop mission over North Korea. The crew included Col. John K. Arnold, Jr., USAF, Commander, 581st ARCW.

1962 – In the first Farm Gate combat missions, T-28 fighter-bombers are flown in support of a South Vietnamese outpost under Viet Cong attack. By the end of the month, U.S. Air Force pilots had flown 229 Farm Gate sorties. Operation Farm Gate was initially designed to provide advisory support to assist the South Vietnamese Air Force in increasing its capability. The 4400th Combat Crew Training Squadron arrived at Bien Hoa Airfield in November 1961 and began training South Vietnamese Air Force personnel with older, propeller-driven aircraft. In December, President John F. Kennedy expanded Farm Gate to include limited combat missions by the U.S. Air Force pilots in support of South Vietnamese ground forces. By late 1962, communist activity and combat intensity had increased so much that President Kennedy ordered a further expansion of Farm Gate.

In early 1963, additional aircraft arrived and new detachments were established at Pleiku and Soc Trang. In early 1964, Farm Gate was upgraded again with the arrival of more modern aircraft. In October 1965, another squadron of A-1E aircraft was established at Bien Hoa. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara approved the replacement of South Vietnamese markings on Farm Gate aircraft with regular U.S. Air Force markings. By this point in the war, the Farm Gate squadrons were flying 80 percent of all missions in support of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN). With the build up of U.S. combat forces in South Vietnam and the increase in U.S. Air Force presence there, the role of the Farm Gate program gradually decreased in significance. The Farm Gate squadrons were moved to Thailand in 1967, and from there they launched missions against the North Vietnamese in Laos.

1964 – USS Manley evacuates 54 American and 36 allied nationals after Zanzibar government is overthrown.

1965 – Two U.S. planes were shot down in Laos while on a combat mission.

1968 – The U.S. reported shifting most air targets from North Vietnam to Laos.

1972 – President Nixon announces that 70,000 U.S. troops will leave South Vietnam over the next three months, reducing U.S. troop strength there by May 1 to 69,000 troops. Since taking office, Nixon had withdrawn more than 400,000 American troops from Vietnam. With the reduction in total troop strength, U.S. combat deaths were down to less than 10 per week. However, Nixon still came under heavy criticism from those who charged that he was pulling out troops but, by turning to the use of air power instead of ground troops, was continuing the U.S. involvement in Vietnam rather than disengaging from the war. The last American troops would be withdrawn in March 1973 under the provisions of the Paris Peace Accords.

1980 – The United States offered Pakistan a two-year aid plan to counter the Soviet threat in Afghanistan.

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1991 – UN Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar met with Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in a bid to avoid war in the Persian Gulf.

1993 – American and allied warplanes raided southern Iraq.

1993 – Space Shuttle program: Endeavour heads for space for the third time as STS-54 launches from the Kennedy Space Center. STS-54 was a Space Transportation System (NASA Space Shuttle) mission using orbiter Endeavour. This was the third flight for Endeavour.

1996 – President Clinton paid a front-line visit to American forces in Bosnia, praising the troops as “warriors for peace.”

1997 – Seven black soldiers received the Medal of Honor for World War II valor; the lone survivor, former Lt. Vernon Baker, received his medal from President Clinton at the White House.

1998 – Iraq blocked a UN weapons inspection tem led by an American.

1999 – A KC-135 refueling tanker crashed while landing near Geilenkirchen, Germany, and 4 US airmen were killed. They were attached to an Air National Guard unit based in Spokane.

1999 – As many oil-producing countries try to cut excess global production, Iraq announces plans to raise its oil output to 3 million barrels per day from its current 2.5 million barrels per day, and then to 3.5 million barrels per day within two years. Faleh al-Khayat, the Iraqi Oil Ministry’s Director-General of Planning, says that the increases are contingent upon receiving spare parts for the country’s ailing oil industry, which has been under United Nations trade sanctions for more than eight years.

2000 – In Vitina, Kosovo, Merita Shabiu, an 11-year-old Albanian girl, was raped and murdered. On January 16th American soldier, Staff Sgt. Frank J. Ronghi (35), was charged for the rape and murder. Ronghi later confessed and was sentenced to life in prison.

2003 – US warplanes struck an anti-ship missile launcher in southern Iraq. US planes also dropped leaflets over An Najaf, about 85 miles southeast of Baghdad. It was the 14th drop in 3 months.

2003 – Protesters waved Puerto Rican flags and shouted “Navy get out!” as fighter jets dropped inert bombs over Vieques in what the Navy says will be its last round of training on the island.

2004 – A US soldier at Abu Ghraib prison reported US abuses of Iraqi prisoners. Criminal charges were lodged against 6 soldiers on March 20th.

2006 – The U.S. CIA attempts to kill Ayman al-Zawahiri by bombing Damadola, Pakistan, a village near the Afghanistan border. Anonymous U.S. government sources claim he was invited to a feast in the village, but did not attend.

2011 – The Wiki Leaks website honors a pledge made in July by offering financial aid to the legal team of Bradley Manning, a soldier accused by the United States of providing secret U.S. embassy cables for international public consumption.


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Congressional Medal of Honor Citations for Actions Taken This Day

BESSEY, CHARLES A.
Rank and organization: Corporal, Company A, 3d U.S. Cavalry. Place and date: Near Elkhorn Creek, Wyo., 13 January 1877. Entered service at: – – – . Birth: Reading, Mass. Date of issue: 15 May 1890. Citation. While scouting with 4 men and attacked in ambush by 14 hostile Indians, held his ground, 2 of his men being wounded, and kept up the fight until himself wounded in the side, and then went to the assistance of his wounded comrades.

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14 January

1639 – In Hartford, Connecticut, the first constitution in the American colonies, the “Fundamental Orders,” is adopted by representatives of Wethersfield, Windsor, and Hartford. The Dutch discovered the Connecticut River in 1614, but English Puritans from Massachusetts largely accomplished European settlement of the region. During the 1630s, they flocked to the Connecticut valley from the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and in 1638 representatives from the three major Puritan settlements in Connecticut met to set up a unified government for the new colony. Roger Ludlow, a lawyer, wrote much of the Fundamental Orders, and presented a binding and compact frame of government that put the welfare of the community above that of individuals. It was also the first written constitution in the world to declare the modern idea that “the foundation of authority is in the free consent of the people.” In 1662, the Charter of Connecticut superseded the Fundamental Orders; though the majority of the original document’s laws and statutes remained in force until 1818.

1741 – Benedict Arnold was born in Norwich, Connecticut; died in London, England, 14 June, 1801. His ancestor, William Arnold (born in Leamington, Warwickshire, in 1587), came to Providence in 1636, and was associated with Roger Williams as one of the fifty-four proprietors in the first settlement of Rhode island. His son Benedict moved to Newport, and was governor of the colony from 1663 to 1666, 1669 to 1672, 1677 to 1678, when he died. His son Benedict was a member of the assembly in 1695. His son Benedict, third of that name, moved to Norwich in 1730; was cooper, ship-owner, and sea-captain, town surveyor, collector, assessor, and selectman. He married, 8 Nov., 1733, Hannah, daughter of John Waterman, widow of Absalom King. Of their six children, only Benedict and Hannah lived to grow up. Benedict received a respectable school education, including some knowledge of Latin. He was romantic and adventurous, excessively proud and sensitive, governed rather by impulse than by principle. He was noted for physical strength and beauty, as well as for bravery. He possessed immense capacity both for good and for evil, and circumstances developed him in both directions. At the age of fifteen he ran away from home and enlisted in the Connecticut army, marching to Albany and Lake George to resist the French invasion; but, getting weary of discipline, he deserted and made his way home alone through the wilderness. He was employed in a drug shop at Norwich until 1762, when he moved to New Haven and established himself in business as druggist and bookseller. He acquired a considerable property, and engaged in the West India trade, sometimes commanding his own ships, as his father had done. He also carried on trade with Canada, and often visited Quebec.

On 22 Feb., 1767, he married Margaret, daughter of Samuel Mansfield. They had three sons, Benedict, Richard, and Henry. She died 19 June, 1775. On one of his voyages, being at Honduras, he fought a duel with a British sea-captain who called him a “Damn Yankee”; the captain was wounded and apologized. He occasionally visited England. At noon of 20 April, 1775, the news of the Battle of Lexington reached New Haven, and Arnold, who was captain of the governor’s guards, about 60 in number, assembled them on the college green and offered to lead them to Boston. Gen. Wooster thought he had better wait for regular orders, and the selectmen refused to supply ammunition; but, upon Arnold’s threatening’ to break into the magazine, the selectmen yielded and furnished the ammunition, and the company marched to Cambridge. Arnold immediately proposed the capture of Ticonderoga and Crown Point, and the plan was approved by Dr. Warren, chairman of the Committee of Safety. Arnold was commissioned as colonel by the provincial congress of Massachusetts, and directed to raise 400 men in the western counties and surprise the forts. The same scheme had been entertained in Connecticut, and troops from that colony and from Berkshire, with a number of “Green Mountain Boys,” had already started for the lakes under command of Ethan Allen. On meeting them Arnold claimed the command, but when it was refused he joined the expedition as a volunteer and entered Ticonderoga side by side with Allen. A few days later Arnold captured St. John’s. Massachusetts asked Connecticut to put him in command of these posts, but Connecticut preferred Allen. Arnold returned to Cambridge early in July, proposed to Washington the expedition against Quebec by way of the Kennebec and Chaudiere rivers, and was placed in command of 1,100 men and started from Cambridge September 11th.

The enterprise, which was as difficult and dangerous as Hannibal’s crossing of the Alps, was conducted with consummate ability, but was nearly ruined by the misconduct of Col. Enos, who deserted and returned to Massachusetts with 200 men and the greater part of the provisions. After frightful hardships, to which 200 more men succumbed, on 13 Nov., the little army climbed the heights of Abraham. As Arnold’s force was insufficient to storm the city, and the garrison would not come out to fight, he was obliged to await the arrival of Montgomery, who had just taken Montreal. In the great assault of 31 Dec., in which Montgomery was slain, Arnold received a wound in the leg. For his gallantry he was now made brigadier-general. He kept up the siege of Quebec till the following April, when Wooster arrived and took command. Arnold was put in command of Montreal. The British, being now heavily reinforced, were able to drive the Americans from Canada, and early in June Arnold effected a junction with Gates at Ticonderoga. During the summer he was busily occupied in building a fleet with which to oppose and delay the advance of the British up Lake Champlain. On 11 Oct. he fought a terrible naval battle near Valcour Island, in which he was defeated by the overwhelming superiority of the enemy in number of ships and men; but he brought away part of his flotilla and all his surviving troops in safety to Ticonderoga, and his resistance had been so obstinate that it discouraged Gen. Carleton, who retired to Montreal for the winter. This relief of Ticonderoga made it possible to send 3,000 men from the northern army to the aid of Washington, and thus enabled that commander to strike his great blows at Trenton and Princeton.

Among Allen’s men concerned in the capture of Ticonderoga in the preceding year was Lieut. John Brown, of Pittsfield, who on that occasion had some difficulty with Arnold. Brown now brought charges against Arnold of malfeasance while in command at Montreal, with reference to exactions of private property for the use of the army. The charges were investigated by the board of war, which pronounced them “cruel and groundless” and entirely exonerated Arnold, and the report was confirmed by congress. Nevertheless, some members of the congress found common ground in hostility toward Arnold. Gates had already begun to intrigue against General Schuyler, and Charles Lee had done his best to ruin Washington. The cabal or faction that afterward took its name from Conway was already forming. Arnold was conspicuous as an intimate friend of Schuyler and Washington, and their enemies began by striking at him. This petty persecution of the commander-in-chief by slighting and insulting his favorite officers was kept up until the last year of the war, and such men as Greene, Morgan, and Stark were almost driven from the service by it.

On 19 Feb., 1777, congress appointed five new major-generals–Stirling, Mifflin, St. Claire, Stephen, and Lincoln–thus passing over Arnold, who was the senior brigadier. None of these officers had rendered services at all comparable to his, and, coming as it did so soon after his heroic conduct on Lake Champlain, this action of congress naturally incensed him. He behaved very well, however, and expressed his willingness to serve under the men lately his juniors, while at the same time he requested congress to restore him to his relative rank. The last week in April 2,000 British troops under Gov. Tryon invaded Connecticut and destroyed the military stores at Danbury. They were opposed by Wooster with 600 men, and a skirmish ensued, in which that general was slain. By this time Arnold, who was at New Haven, on a visit to his family, arrived on the scene with several hundred militia, and there was a desperate fight at Ridgefield, in which Arnold had two horses shot from under him. The British were driven to their ships, and narrowly escaped capture. Arnold was now promoted to the rank of major-general and presented by congress with a fine horse, but his relative rank was not restored. While he was at Philadelphia inquiring into the reasons for the injustice that had been done him, the country was thrown into consternation by the news of Burgoyne’s advance and the fall of Ticonderoga. At Washington’s suggestion, Arnold again joined the northern army, and by a brilliant stratagem dispersed the army of St. Leger, which, in cooperation with Burgoyne, was coming down the Mohawk valley, and had laid siege to Fort Stanwix. After Schuyler had been superseded by Gates, Arnold was placed in command of the left wing of the army on Bemis heights.

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1741 – Benedict Arnold {continued}:

In the battle of 19 Sept., at Freeman’s farm, he frustrated Burgoyne’s attempt to turn the American left, and held the enemy at bay till nightfall. If properly reinforced by Gates, he would probably have inflicted a crushing defeat upon Burgoyne. But Gates, who had already begun to dislike him as a friend of Schuyler, was enraged by his criticisms on the battle of Freeman’s farm, and sought to wreak his spite by withdrawing from his division some of its best troops. This gave rise to a fierce quarrel. Arnold asked permission to return to Philadelphia, and Gates granted it. But many officers, knowing that a decisive battle was imminent, and feeling no confidence in Gates, entreated Arnold to remain, and he did so. Gates issued no order directly superseding him, but took command of the left wing in person, giving the right wing to Lincoln. At the critical moment of the decisive battle of 7 Oct., Arnold rushed upon the field without orders, and in a series of magnificent charges broke through the British lines and put them to flight. The credit of this great victory, which secured for us the alliance with France, is due chiefly to Arnold, and in a less degree to Morgan. Gates was not on the field, and deserves no credit whatever. Just at the close of the battle Arnold was severely wounded in the leg that had been hurt at Quebec. He was carried on a litter to Albany, and remained there disabled until spring. On 20 Jan., 1778, he received from congress an antedated commission restoring him to his original seniority in the army.

On 19 June, as he was still too lame for field service, Washington put him in command of Philadelphia, which the British had just evacuated. The Tory sentiment in that city was strong, and had been strengthened by disgust at the alliance with France, a feeling which Arnold seems to have shared. He soon became engaged to a Tory lady, Margaret, daughter of Edward Shippen, afterward chief justice of Pennsylvania. She was celebrated for her beauty, wit, and nobility of character. During the next two years Arnold associated much with the Tories, and his views of public affairs were no doubt influenced by this association. He lived extravagantly, and became involved in debt. He got into quarrels with many persons, especially with Joseph Reed, president of the executive council of the state. These troubles wrought upon him until he made up his mind to resign his commission, obtain a grant of land in central New York, settle it with some of his old soldiers, and end his days in rural seclusion. His request was favorably entertained by the New York legislature, but a long list of charges now brought against him by Reed drove the scheme from his mind. The charges were investigated by a committee of congress, and on all those that affected his integrity he was acquitted. Two charges — first, of having once in a hurry granted a pass in which some due forms were overlooked, and, secondly, of having once used some public wagons, which were standing idle, for saving private property in danger from the enemy–were proved against him; but the committee thought these things too trivial to notice, and recommended an unqualified verdict of acquittal. Arnold then, considering himself vindicated, resigned his command of Philadelphia.

But as Reed now represented that further evidence was forthcoming, congress referred the matter to another committee, which shirked the responsibility through fear of offending Pennsylvania, and handed the affair over to a court-martial. Arnold clamored for a speedy trial, but Reed succeeded in delaying it several months under pretence of collecting evidence. On 26 Jan., 1780, the court-martial rendered its verdict, which agreed in every particular with that of the committee of congress; but for the two trivial charges proved against Arnold, it was decided that he should receive a reprimand from the commander-in-chief. Washington, who considered Arnold the victim of persecution, couched the reprimand in such terms as to convert it into eulogy, and soon afterward offered Arnold the highest command under himself in the northern army for the next campaign. But Arnold in an evil hour had allowed himself to be persuaded into the course that has blackened his name forever. Three years had elapsed since Saratoga, and the fortunes of the Americans, instead of improving, had grown worse and worse. France had as yet done but little for us, our southern army had been annihilated, our paper money had become worthless, our credit abroad had hardly begun to exist. Even Washington wrote that “he had almost ceased to hope.” The army, clad in rags, half-starved and unpaid, was nearly ripe for the mutiny that broke out a few months later, and desertions to the British lines averaged more than 100 a month. The spirit of desertion now seized upon Arnold, with whom the British commander had for some time tampered through the mediation of John Andre and an American loyalist, Beverley Robinson.

Stung by the injustice he had suffered, and influenced by historic surroundings, Arnold made up his mind to play a part like that which Gen. Monk had played in the restoration of Charles II. to the British throne. By putting the British in possession of the Hudson river, he would give them all that they had sought to obtain by the campaigns of 1776-’77; and the American cause would thus become so hopeless that an opportunity would be offered for negotiation. Arnold was assured that Lord North would renew the liberal terms already offered in 1778, which conceded everything that the Americans had demanded in 1775. By rendering a cardinal service to the British, he might hope to attain a position of such eminence as to conduct these negotiations, end the war, and restore America to her old allegiance, with her freedom from parliamentary control guaranteed. In order to realize these ambitious dreams, Arnold resorted to the blackest treachery. In July, 1780, he sought and obtained command of West Point in order to surrender it to the enemy. When his scheme was detected by the timely capture of Andre, he fled to the British at New York, a disgraced and hated traitor. Instead of getting control of affairs, like Gen. Monk, he had sold himself cheaply, receiving a brigadier-general’s place in the British army and a paltry sum of money.

In the spring of 1781 he conducted a plundering expedition into Virginia. In September of the same year he was sent to attack New London, in order to divert Washington from his southward march against Cornwallis. In the following winter he went with his wife to London, where he was well received by the king and the Tories, but frowned upon by the Whigs. In 1787 he moved to St. John’s, New Brunswick, and entered into mercantile business with his sons Richard and Henry. In 1791 he returned to London and settled there permanently. In 1792 he fought a bloodless duel with the earl of Landerdale, for a remark which the latter had made about him in tile House of Lords. His last years were embittered by remorse.

1766 – The English Parliament convenes and immediately begins to reconsider the repercussions of the Stamp Act. Former Chancellor of the Exchequer Greenville advocates enforcement of the act by military force, while William Pitt supports the repeal of the Stamp Act, citing the principle of taxation without representation.

1784 – The United States ratified a peace treaty with England, the Treaty of Paris, ending the Revolutionary War.

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1860 –Unable to agree on anything else, the Committee of Thirty Three submits a proposed constitutional amendment protecting slavery in all areas where it already existed. The proposed measure was not enough to stem the tide of seceding states. After the election of Republican Abraham Lincoln as president in November 1860, the states of the south began to talk of secession. The Republican Party was committed to restricting slavery in the western territories, and southerners feared an eventual campaign to eradicate the institution entirely from the country. As the new administration prepared to take over, attempts were made by many politicians in Washington to alleviate southern fears. The House of Representatives appointed the Committee of Thirty Three, one from each state, to investigate avenues of compromise that would keep the South from seceding. Most of the compromises involved the Republicans forfeiting their plan to keep slavery out of the western territories.

This was, however, the entire reason for the existence of the party. As a result, many northern Congressmen would not agree to any such move. Finally, on January 14, committee chair Thomas Corwin of Ohio submitted a plan calling for an amendment to protect slavery, enforce the fugitive slave laws, and repeal state personal liberty laws. In the 1850s, the South was increasingly concerned with slaves escaping to the North; the personal liberty laws made it difficult to get slaves back, and this was a motivating factor behind secession. South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, and Alabama had already seceded by the time Corwin made his proposal. The plan died, and the nation continued on the road to war.

1861 – Union troops garrison Fort Taylor in Key West, Florida. In reaction to Florida’s secession, Capt. John Brannon occupied the fort, placing it in Union hands. Key West was an important outpost for the Union because numerous blockade-running ships were detained at Key West harbor and guarded by Fort Taylor’s cannons. The 10-inch Rodman and Columbiad cannons at the fort had a range of three miles. This was an impressive deterrent to the Confederate navy, preventing them from attempting to take the fort or the island of Key West. Proving to be a severe loss for the South, Fort Taylor remained in Union hands throughout the Civil War. By the time the three-story fort was finally finished in 1866 (21 years after it was begun), there were many impressive features included. Items such as sanitary facilities flushed by the tide and a desalination plant which produced drinking water from the sea were available as early as 1861. A total of 198 guns and a large supply of ammunition were on hand to secure the fort.

1864 – Confederate President Jefferson Davis writes to General Joseph E. Johnson, observing that troops may need to be sent to Alabama or Mississippi.

1861 – Union forces under General William T. Sherman occupy Meridian, Mississippi. His forces destroy supplies, bridges and railroads.

1891 –General Nelson Miles, commander of the U.S. Army troops in South Dakota, reports that the rebellious Sioux are finally returning to their reservation following the bloody massacre at Wounded Knee. Since the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876, Miles fought to force resistant Indians all across the nation to give up their traditional ways and accept life on government-controlled reservations. His winter campaign in 1876-77 used force and diplomacy to win the surrender of many of the remnants of the Sioux and Cheyenne Indian party, including Crazy Horse and his followers, that had destroyed Custer’s forces in Montana. In 1877, Miles intercepted Chief Joseph and his Nez Perce people as they attempted to flee to Canada and Miles forced them to surrender. A decade later, he played a key role in convincing the last rebellious Apache warrior, Geronimo, to accept confinement on a Florida reservation. By 1890, Miles had good reason to believe that he had succeeded in bringing an end to the last remnants of Indian resistance in the United States. Therefore, it was with growing alarm and consternation that he received reports of the Ghost Dance movement among his old enemy, the Sioux, on their reservations in South Dakota.

Primarily a spiritual movement, many Anglo-Americans felt threatened by the Ghost Dance because it promised that if the Sioux returned to their traditional ways their white oppressors would be eliminated. As commander of the vast military division of the Missouri, Miles was responsible for any threat posed by the Ghost Dance movement. He reacted by concentrating his troops near the Sioux reservation in South Dakota to maintain control of the situation while simultaneously working to find a peaceful way to diffuse the growing tensions. Unfortunately, Miles’ decision to order the arrest of the old Sioux leader, Sitting Bull, only exacerbated the situation when it resulted in the respected chief’s death. News of Sitting Bulls’ death fanned the fears of some Sioux that the army was preparing to wipe them out in a massive campaign of genocide. Hundreds fled the reservation, and Miles dutifully dispatched troops to bring them back. When the 7th Cavalry under Colonel James Forsyth attempted to disarm one band of Sioux near Wounded Knee on December 19, 1890, a brutal massacre erupted, which left nearly 150 Indians dead, many of them women and children.

Had he actually been present at Wounded Knee that day (Miles commanded these events from his headquarters in Rapid City), the general might well have been able to resolve the confrontation peacefully. Miles viewed Wounded Knee as a foolish and avoidable blunder. Trying to salvage the situation, Miles increased both his military and diplomatic pressures. On January 14, 1891, the Sioux submitted to his authority and returned to their reservation. Nearly a quarter century after the Battle of Little Bighorn, the general had crushed the last significant Indian uprising in American history.

1895 – Employees of the trolley railroad in Brooklyn, New York go on strike. Riots ensue which are eventually suppressed by the New York and Brooklyn militias.

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1911 – The USS Arkansas, the largest U.S. battleship, is launched from the yards of the New York Shipbuilding Company. A 26,000 ton Wyoming class battleship, she was built at Camden, New Jersey. Commissioned in September 1912, she spent her first seven years of service with the Atlantic Fleet. In 1913, Arkansas cruised in the Mediterranean, and in 1914 she participated in the U.S. intervention in Mexico. During July-December 1918, she operated with the British Grand Fleet as World War I approached and reached its conclusion. Transiting the Panama Canal in July 1919, Arkansas joined the Pacific Fleet, remaining there for two years before returning to the Atlantic. She carried Naval Academy midshipmen on cruises to Europe in 1923 and 1924, and to the west coast in 1925. After the latter voyage, the battleship underwent extensive modernization, receiving new oil-fired boilers, additional deck armor and a changed appearance, with only one smokestack and “basket” mast in place of the previous two of each.

Through the next two decades, Arkansas primarily served in the Atlantic area, making annual Midshipmen’s cruises to Europe in 1929-31 and 1934-37. In 1932-34, she operated along the west coast on training operations, a mission that largely occupied her through the 1930s. After war broke out in Europe in 1939, Arkansas continued her training duties, and, as relations with Germany deteriorated, took part in “operations short of war”. In the summer of 1941, she escorted occupation forces to Iceland and was present when President Roosevelt met Prime Minister Churchill at the Atlantic Charter Conference. Once the United States formally entered the war in December 1941, Arkansas was employed escorting Atlantic convoys, as well as continuing her training work. An overhaul in March-June 1942 again changed her appearance, with a new tripod foremast replacing the previous “basket” type.

Her combat experience began in June 1944, when she used her twelve-inch guns to support the Normandy invasion and in bombardments of German defenses at Cherbourg. In August, she participated in the invasion of Southern France. Arkansas went to the Pacific in November 1944 and crossed the ocean to the war zone early in the next year. In February-May 1945, she supported the conquests of Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Once Japan had surrended, she transported veterans home from bases in the Pacific. By now thoroughly obsolete, the old battleship was assigned a final mission, to serve as a target ship for atomic bomb tests at Bikini, in the Marshalls. She survived the initial test, an air-burst, but was anchored in close proximity to the bomb used in the 25 July 1946 underwater shot. Arkansas was engulfed in the column of water driven up by the powerful blast and quickly sank. She remains on the bottom of Bikini Atoll to this day.

1920 – Caco insurrectionists were defeated in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

1940 – Eighteen members of the pro-Nazi Bund organization are arrested for conspiracy.

1942 – The United States and Great Britain agree to have the British Chiefs of Staff and the U.S. Joint Chiefs work together, either through meetings or representatives, to advise the leaders of both nations on military policy during the war. During the Arcadia Conference, which began on December 22, 1941, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill met with President Franklin D. Roosevelt in Washington, D.C., to discuss a unified Anglo-American war strategy and a future peace. Toward this end, the Combined Chiefs of Staff was created. The British Chiefs of Staff, composed of the three service heads (army, navy, air force), and their U.S. counterparts, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, were made into one office, with the Combined Staff Planners and the Combined Secretariat offering administrative support.
1942 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered all U.S. aliens to register with the government.

1942 – A small group of Japanese reinforcements lands near Cape Esperance, Guadalcanal, to prepare positions in that area to cover the planned evacuation.

1943 – Prime Minister Winston Churchill and President Franklin D. Roosevelt meet in Casablanca, Morocco, along with the Combined Chiefs of Staff, to discuss strategy and study the next phase of the war. This meeting marked the first time an American president left American soil during wartime. Participants also included leaders of the French government-in-exile, Gen. Charles de Gaulle and Gen. Henri Giraud, who were assured of a postwar united France. The success of the North Africa invasion, which resulted in the defeat of Vichy French forces, compelled President Roosevelt to meet with Prime Minister Churchill (Joseph Stalin, president and dictator of the USSR, declined an invitation to attend) to confer on how best to push forward an end to the war. Top priority was given to destroying German U-boat patrols in the Atlantic and launching combined bombing missions. Most important, in a controversial declaration, they announced that the Allies would accept only unconditional surrender from the Axis powers, a decision that caused consternation on all sides as too extreme and allowing too little room for political maneuvering. The meeting was kept secret–even by newspapers that knew about it–until the participants left Morocco on January 27th.

1943 – World War II: Franklin D. Roosevelt becomes the first President of the United States to travel by airplane while in office when he travels from Miami to Morocco to meet with Winston Churchill.

1944 – On New Britain, the fighting around the Cape Gloucester bridgehead continues. While the Japanese can score no positive success, they do manage to hold up the US advance.

1944 – The major rail unions accept terms suggested by President Roosevelt, avoiding a threatened strike. The railroads have, in fact, been run under the authority of Secretary of War Stimson since 27 December. They will be returned to private ownership and operation on 18 January.

1945 – The US 1st Army achieves an advance 2 miles toward St. Vith in continuing attacks. British forces attacking southward from Laroche link up with elements of US 3rd Army advancing northwest from Bastogne.

1945 – The US 8th Air Force resumes strategic operations after a month-long pause caused by the Battle of the Bulge. Some 600 B-17 and B-24 bombers strike oil targets and encounter heavy resistance from Luftwaffe fighters.

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1950 – Ho Chi Minh declares that the only true legal government is his Democratic Republic of Vietnam. The Soviet Union and China extend recognition, and China will start supplying the Vietminh with modern weapons.

1951 – Chinese Communist forces reached their furthest extent of advance into South Korea with the capture of Wonju.

1953 – Fifth Air Force F-86 Sabres destroyed eight MiG-15s, the most since Sept. 4, 1952. Fighters and light bombers continued to pound Sinanju while B-29s hit the rail yard at Chonguyong-ni and an ore processing area at Kajanbaeji.

1960 – Elvis Presley was promoted to Sergeant in the U.S. Army.

1964 – Lt. Gen. William Westmoreland is appointed deputy to Gen. Paul Harkins, chief of U.S. Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV). It was generally accepted that Westmoreland would soon replace Harkins, whose insistently optimistic views on the progress of the war had increasingly come under criticism. On June 20, 1964, Harkins departed and Westmoreland did assume command of MACV. His initial task was to provide military advice and assistance to the government of South Vietnam. However, with the commitment of U.S. ground troops, General Westmoreland assumed the added responsibility of commanding America’s armed forces in combat in Vietnam. One of the Vietnam War’s most controversial figures, Westmoreland received many honors (including being named Time Man of the Year in 1965) when the fighting was going well, but many Americans blamed him for the problems in Vietnam when the war turned sour. Having provided continually optimistic reports about the war, Westmoreland came under particularly heavy criticism in 1968, when the communists launched the massive surprise Tet Offensive on January 30. In July 1968, Westmoreland was appointed Chief of Staff of the Army, and General Creighton W. Abrams Jr. replaced him as commander of MACV.

1968 – U.S. joint-service Operation Niagara is launched to support the U.S. Marine base at Khe Sanh. The Khe Sanh base was the westernmost anchor of a series of combat bases and strongholds that stretched from the Cua Viet River on the coast of the South China Sea westward along Route 9 to the Laotian border. Intelligence sources revealed that the North Vietnamese Army was beginning to build up its forces in the area surrounding Khe Sanh. Operation Niagara was a joint U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps air campaign launched in support of the marines manning the base. Using sensors installed along the nearby DMZ and reconnaissance flights to pinpoint targets, 24,000 tactical fighter-bomber sorties and 2,700 B-52 strategic bomber sorties were flown between the start of the operation and March 31, 1968, when it was terminated. This airpower played a major role in the successful defense of Khe Sanh when it came under attack on January 21 and was subsequently besieged for 66 days until finally broken on April 7th.

1969 – 25 crew members of the U.S. aircraft carrier Enterprise were killed and 85 injured in an explosion that ripped through the ship off Hawaii.

1980 – In a diplomatic rebuke to the Soviet Union, the U.N. General Assembly votes 104 to 18 to “deplore” the Russian intervention in Afghanistan. The resolution also requested the “immediate, unconditional and total withdrawal of the foreign troops from Afghanistan.” The immense margin of victory for the resolution indicated the worldwide disapproval for the December 1979 Soviet invasion and installation of a pro-communist puppet regime in Afghanistan. The General Assembly’s resolution had no direct impact on the Soviet Union’s actions. Russia had earlier vetoed a similar resolution introduced in the Security Council. However, the size of the General Assembly vote and the nations that voted for the resolution indicated that Cold War world politics might be changing. Non-aligned nations (nations in the United Nations that claimed “non-alignment” with either the West or the communist bloc) and other Third World nations voted 78 to 9 in favor of the resolution (28 others abstained or were absent). Even the fiery rhetoric of the Cuban delegate (Cuba presided over the non-aligned nations) failed to sway many voters to defeat the proposal. “We know,” he declared, “the historic role of the Soviet Union and of United States imperialism.”

Several representatives from Asian, African, and Latin American nations-nations that had traditionally maintained a more or less neutral attitude toward the East-West conflict-did condemn the Soviet action in Afghanistan. The resolution was a victory for U.S. diplomats, who had been pushing for a statement from the international organization denouncing the Soviet invasion. The successful and overwhelming passage of the resolution indicated that Cold War alignments were perhaps undergoing an important and far-reaching alteration. Many of the so-called non-aligned nations and Third World countries were appalled by the Soviet action and drew closer to the United States. With the Cold War itself destined to last another decade, U.S. relations with such nations would take on more significance than ever before.

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1991 – With time running out before a United Nations deadline for Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait, Iraq’s National Assembly voted to give President Saddam Hussein full authority over the Persian Gulf crisis.

1992 – Historic Mideast peace talks continued in Washington, with Israel and Jordan holding their first-ever formal negotiations, and the Israelis continuing exchanges with Palestinian representatives.

1993 – Operation Condor Ratchet. 6 UH-60 Blackhawks from the 10th Mountain Division, carrying Alpha Co. 2nd Battalion, 87th Infantry, Air-Assaults in and surrounds Abu Airfield next to village of Afgoy, Somalia.

1998 – In a show of support for Richard Butler, chairman of the U.N. Special Commission on Iraq, the U.N. Security Council unanimously approves a statement deploring Iraq’s recent actions to impede inspections by U.N. weapons monitors.

1998 – Iraq begins exporting crude oil under the third phase of the United Nations sponsored “Oil-for-Food” program. First loadings are filling the million barrel tanker White Sea for French oil company Elf Aquitaine. Other companies expected to lift Iraqi crude in January include France’s Total, Italy’s Agip, Russia’s Lukoil, and China’s Sinochem.

1999 – The U.S. proposed the lifting of the U.N. ceilings on the sale of oil in Iraq. The restriction being that the money be used to buy medicine and food for the Iraqi people.

2002 – US warplanes began to seal caves near Khost, Afghanistan.

2003 – Hundreds of American soldiers arrived in Israel for joint maneuvers with anti-missile defenses, aimed at protecting against any Iraqi strikes if the United States attacks Iraq.

2003 – North Korea said that it was running out of patience and warned it was prepared to exercise “options” in its dispute with the United States over its nuclear activities.

2004 – Pres. Bush proposed a new space program that would send humans back to the moon by 2015 and establish a base to Mars and beyond. Bush said he would seek $12 billion for the initial stages of the plan.

2004 – The US Army launched an inquiry into conditions at Abu Ghraib prison a day after photos of abused prisoners were passed up the chain of command.

2004 – A UN agency said Libya has ratified the nuclear test ban treaty. The treaty is 12 nations short of the 44 ratifications needed for it to enter into force. Once it comes into force, the treaty bans any nuclear weapon test explosion in any environment.

2004 – The crew of the CGC Thetis rescued three shrimp fishermen from the fishing vessel Dona Nelly after they were in the water for 45 minutes after their vessel sank 15 miles off the coast of Brownsville, Texas.

2005 – Army SPC Charles Graner Jr., the reputed ringleader of a band of rogue guards at the Abu Ghraib prison, was convicted at Fort Hood, Texas, of abusing Iraqi detainees. He was later sentenced to 10 years in prison.

2005 – The Huygens probe lands on Saturn’s moon Titan near the Xanadu region. This was the first landing ever accomplished in the outer solar system. It touched down on land, although the possibility that it would touch down in an ocean was also taken into account in its design. The probe was designed to gather data for a few hours in the atmosphere, and possibly a short time at the surface. It continued to send data for about 90 minutes after touchdown. It remains the most distant landing of any man-made craft.

2008 – MESSENGER, a NASA mission, flies by Mercury, the second spacecraft to do so and the first in thirty-three years. MESSENGER (an acronym of MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging) is a robotic NASA spacecraft orbiting the planet Mercury, the first spacecraft ever to do so. The 485-kilogram (1,069 lb) spacecraft was launched aboard a Delta II rocket in August 2004 to study Mercury’s chemical composition, geology, and magnetic field. The instruments carried by MESSENGER were used on a complex series of flybys – the spacecraft flew by Earth once, Venus twice, and Mercury itself three times, allowing it to decelerate relative to Mercury using minimal fuel. When MESSENGER entered orbit around Mercury on March 18, 2011, it then reactivated its science instruments on March 24, returning the first photo from Mercury orbit on March 29.

2009 – U.S. Federal Judge Richard J. Leon orders the release of 21-year-old Guantánamo Bay detainee Muhammad Hamid Al Qarani, who was imprisoned in 2002. Release was ordered because the evidence that he was an enemy combatant was mostly limited to statements from two other detainees whose credibility had been called into question by US government staff.

2011 – The Obama administration in the United States eases travel and other restrictions on Cuba.

2011 – The United States Treasury Department says “no” to calls by enraged American politicians to have Julian Assange and the WikiLeaks website added to its economic blacklist or sanctions list like so-called “terrorist groups”. The Treasury Department cites a lack of “evidence at this time”.

2011 – A court in America sentences Abdel Nur of Guyana to 15 years imprisonment after charging him with participation in a plot to blow up fuel tanks at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City.

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Congressional Medal of Honor Citations for Actions Taken This Day

ANDERSON, EVERETT W.
Rank and organization: Sergeant, Company M, 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry. Place and date: At Crosbys Creek, Tenn., 14 January 1864. Entered service at: Philadelphia, Pa. Birth: Louisiana. Date of issue: 3 December 1894. Citation: Captured, single-handed, Confederate Brig. Gen. Robert B. Vance during a charge upon the enemy.

ELISE, WILLIAM
Rank and organization: First Sergeant, Company K, 3d Wisconsin Cavalry. Place and date: At, Ark., 14 January 1865. Entered service at: Little Rock, Ark. Birth: England. Date of issue: 8 March 1865. Citation: Remained at his post after receiving three wounds, and only retired, by his commanding officer’s orders, after being wounded the fourth time.

HOWARD, SQUIRE E.
Rank and organization: First Sergeant, Company H, 8th Vermont Infantry. Place and date: At Bayou Teche, La., 14 January 1863. Entered service at: Townshend, Vt. Birth: Jamaica, Vt. Date of issue: 29 January 1894. Citation: Voluntarily carried an important message through the heavy fire of the enemy to bring aid and save the gunboat Calhoun.

PALMER, WILLIAM J.
Rank and organization. Colonel, 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry. Place and date: At Red Hill, Ala., 14 January 1865. Entered service at. Philadelphia, Pa. Born. 16 September 1836, Leipsic, Kent County, Del. Date of issue. 24 February 1894. Citation: With less than 200 men, attacked and defeated a superior force of the enemy, capturing their fieldpiece and about 100 prisoners without losing a man.

*WARREN, JOHN E., JR.
Rank and organization: First Lieutenant, U.S. Army, Company C, 2d Battalion, (Mechanized), 22d Infantry, 25th Infantry Division. Place and date: Tay Ninh Province, Republic of Vietnam, 14 January 1969. Entered service at: New York, N.Y . Born: 16 November 1946, Brooklyn, N.Y. Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty. 1st Lt. Warren, distinguished himself at the cost of his life while serving as a platoon leader with Company C. While moving through a rubber plantation to reinforce another friendly unit, Company C came under intense fire from a well-fortified enemy force. Disregarding his safety, 1st Lt. Warren with several of his men began maneuvering through the hail of enemy fire toward the hostile positions.

When he had come to within 6 feet of one of the enemy bunkers and was preparing to toss a hand grenade into it, an enemy grenade was suddenly thrown into the middle of his small group. Thinking only of his men, 1st Lt. Warren fell in the direction of the grenade, thus shielding those around him from the blast. His action, performed at the cost of his life, saved 3 men from serious or mortal injury. First Lt. Warren’s ultimate action of sacrifice to save the lives of his men was in keeping with the highest traditions of the military service and reflects great credit on him, his unit, and the U.S. Army.

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15 January

1776 – The British Crown contracts with the German state of Hesse-Cassel for the services of 12,000 mercenaries to assist British forces in the rebellious colonies.

1777 – New Connecticut (present day Vermont) declares its independence. The term Vermont Republic has been used by later historians for the government of what became modern Vermont from 1777 to 1791. In July 1777, partly in response to the Westminster massacre, delegates from 28 towns met and declared independence from jurisdictions and land claims of both British colonies and American states in New Hampshire and New York. They also abolished slavery within their boundaries. The people of Vermont took part in the American Revolution and considered themselves Americans, even if Congress did not recognize the jurisdiction. Because of vehement objections from New York, which had conflicting property claims, the Continental Congress declined to recognize Vermont, then called the New Hampshire Grants. Vermont’s overtures to join the British Province of Quebec failed. In 1791, Vermont was admitted to the United States as the 14th state.

1782 – Superintendent of Finance Robert Morris goes before the U.S. Congress to recommend establishment of a national mint and decimal coinage.

1811 – In a secret session, Congress planned to annex Spanish East Florida.

1815 – During the War of 1812, American frigate USS President, commanded by Commodore Stephen Decatur, is captured by a squadron of four British frigates. After running aground before the engagement, the frigate President, now severely damaged, tried to break out of New York Harbor, but was intercepted by a British squadron of four frigates and was forced to surrender after a battle with HMS Endymion.

1823 – Matthew Brady was born in Warren County, in about 1823 (the exact place and year is not known). As a young man Brady moved to New York City and became a jewel-case manufacturer. Soon afterwards Brady met the inventor Samuel Morse who taught him about the daguerreotype process. In 1843 Brady began making special cases for daguerreotypes and the following year opened the Daguerreotype Miniature Gallery in New York. In 1844 Brady opened a gallery in Washington and began his Illustrious Americans project. This included taking the portraits of people such as Abraham Lincoln, Stephen Douglass, Thaddeus Stevens, John Calhoun, Daniel Webster, Horace Greeley, Edwin Stanton, Charles Sumner and William Seward. Brady sent twenty of these daguerreotypes to the Great Exhibition in London, where he won a medal for his achievements. Brady toured Europe in 1851 but when he returned he found his failing eyesight made taking photographs very difficult. He began to rely heavily on his chief assistant, Alexander Gardner, who was a leading expert in the new collodion (wet-plate process) that was rapidly displacing the daguerreotype. In the 1850s Brady’s eyesight began to deteriorate and began to rely heavily on Alexander Gardner to run the business. In February, 1858, Gardner was put in charge of Brady’s gallery in Washington. He quickly developed a reputation as an outstanding portrait photographer.

A supporter of the Republican Party, Brady made 35 portraits of Abraham Lincoln during the 1860 presidential campaign. After his victory Lincoln told friends that “Brady and the Copper Union speech made me President.” On the outbreak of the American Civil War there was a dramatic increase in the demand for work at Brady’s studios as soldiers wanted to be photographed in uniform before going to the front-line. The following officers in the Union Army were all photographed at the Matthew Brady Studio: Nathaniel Banks, Don Carlos Buell, Ambrose Burnside, Benjamin Butler, George Custer, David Farragut, John Gibbon, Winfield Hancock, Samuel Heintzelman, Joseph Hooker, Oliver Howard, David Hunter, John Logan, Irvin McDowell, George McClellan, James McPherson, George Meade, David Porter, William Rosecrans, John Schofield, William Sherman, Daniel Sickles, George Stoneman, Edwin Sumner, George Thomas, Emory Upton, James Wadsworth and Lew Wallace. In July, 1861 Brady and Alfred Waud, an artist working for Harper’s Weekly, travelled to the front-line and witnessed Bull Run, the first major battle of the war. The battle was a disaster for the Union Army and Brady came close to being captured by the enemy.

Soon after arriving back from the front Brady decided to make a photographic record of the American Civil War. He sent Alexander Gardner, James Gardner, Timothy O’Sullivan, William Pywell, George Barnard, and eighteen other men to travel throughout the country taking photographs of the war. Each one had his own travelling darkroom so that that collodion plates could be processed on the spot. This included Gardner’s famous President Lincoln on the Battlefield of Antietam and Home of a Rebel Sharpshooter (1863). Brady spent most of the time organizing his cameramen from his office in Washington. However, Brady did take photographs at Bull Run. One observer claimed that Brady at Bull Run showed “more pluck than many of the officers and soldiers who were in the fight.” He photographed the retreat and another witness pointed out that Brady “has fixed the cowards beyond the possibility of a doubt.”

During the American Civil War Brady spent over $100,000 in obtaining 10,000 prints. He expected the government to buy the photographs when the war ended. When the government refused to do this he was forced to sell his New York City studio and go into bankruptcy. Congress granted Brady $25,000 in 1875 but he remained deeply in debt. Depressed by his financial situation, Matthew Brady became an alcoholic and died the charity ward of Presbyterian Hospital in New York on 15th January, 1896.

1865 – Fort Fisher in North Carolina falls to Union forces, and Wilmington, the Confederacy’s most important blockade-running port, is closed. When President Lincoln declared a blockade of southern ports in 1861, Rebel engineers began construction on a fortress at the mouth of New Inlet, which provided access to Wilmington. Fort Fisher was constructed of timber and sand, and it posed a formidable challenge for the Yankees. The walls were more than 20 feet high and they bristled with large cannon. Land mines and palisades made from sharpened logs created even more obstacles for potential attackers. Union leadership did not make Fort Fisher a high priority until the last year of the war. After the Federals closed Mobile Bay in August 1864, attention turned to shutting down Wilmington.

Union ships moved into place in December and began a massive bombardment on Christmas Eve. The next day, a small force failed to capture the fort but the attempt was renewed in January. On January 13, a massive three-day bombardment began. On the third day, 9,000 Yankee infantry commanded by General Alfred Terry hit the beach and attacked Fort Fisher. The Confederates could not repulse the attack. The damage was heavy on both sides: the Union suffered more than 900 Army casualties and 380 Navy casualties, and the Confederates suffered 500 killed or wounded and over 1,000 captured. After the loss of this last major Confederate port, it was only three months before the war concluded.

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1865 – At the request of Major General William T. Sherman, Rear Admiral John A. Dahlgren, commanding the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, issued orders to prepare for a combined naval and military demonstration before Charleston in order to draw attention from General Sherman’s march to the north. Before making the demonstration, it was necessary to locate and mark the numerous obstructions in the channel of Charleston harbor. Accordingly, this date orders were issued charging the commanders of the monitors with this duty. That evening, while searching for the Confederate obstructions, U.S.S. Patapsco, Lieutenant Commander Stephen P. Quackenbush, struck a torpedo (mine) near the entrance of the lower harbor and sank instantly with the loss of 64 officers and men, more than half her crew. She was the fourth monitor lost in the war, the second due to enemy torpedoes. Thereafter, only small boats and tugs were used in the search for obstructions and the objective of the joint expedition was changed to Bull’s Bay, a few miles northeast of Charleston.

1908 – Edward Teller was born on January 15, 1908 in Budapest, Hungary. He left his homeland in 1926 to study in Germany. In 1930 he got his Ph.D. in Theoretical Physics from the University of Leipzig. With Hitler’s rise to power in Germany, Teller emigrated to the United States to take a teaching position at George Washington University in 1935. Teller, along with Leo Szilard and Eugene Wigner, persuaded Albert Einstein to warn President Roosevelt of a potential Nazi atomic bomb. Teller was among the first scientists recruited to work on the Manhattan Project. During the Manhattan Project, Teller first worked with Szilard at the University of Chicago. In 1943, he headed a group at Los Alamos in the Theoretical Physics division, however his obsession with the H-bomb caused tensions with other scientists, particularly Hans Bethe, the division leader.

Teller left Los Alamos at the end of the war, returning to the University of Chicago. But when the Soviet Union conducted its first test of an atomic device in August 1949, he did his best to drum up support for a crash program to build a hydrogen bomb. When he and mathematician Stanislaw Ulam finally came up with an H-bomb design that would work, Teller was not chosen to head the project. He left Los Alamos and soon joined the newly established Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, a rival nuclear weapons lab in California. It was Oppenheimer’s security clearance hearings in 1954 that was the occasion for the final rift between Teller and many of his scientific colleagues.

At Oppenheimer’s hearings, Teller testified that “I feel I would prefer to see the vital interests of this country in hands that I understand better and therefore trust more.” Teller has continued to be a tireless advocate of a strong defense policy, calling for the development of advanced thermonuclear weapons and continued nuclear testing. He was a vigorous proponent of an anti-ballistic missile shield. Teller was Director Emeritus at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and died in 2003.

1916 – Details of the activities of Germany’s military attaché in Washington, Franz von Papen, go public generating widespread outrage. Sent to New York City in 1915, von Papen worked at the German Consulate. He was assigned to act as a spymaster, overseeing agents assigned to disrupt the conveyance of military supplies from American manufacturers to Britain (the United States was a neutral party at the time while Britain was at war with Germany). Under his direction, agents set up phony American armaments firms and contracted with Allied countries to provide them with arms. With the Allies hopelessly waiting, the agents would make excuses for continuous delays, with the arms never being delivered. Other schemes he set into place had firms buying up gunpowder in huge quantities which preventing it from becoming available for the Allies. After being saddled with a number of incompetent and reckless agents, Papen was directed to oversee numerous sabotage efforts against U.S. interests. He set up a scheme to blow up part of the Canadian Pacific Railway in order to thwart the efforts of Canadian troops to reach England to fight on behalf of the British. The scheme failed and the saboteurs were captured. Papen also attempted to recruit German nationals living in the United States and persuading them to return to Germany to fight on behalf of their mother country. When this came to the attention of U.S. authorities, Papen was ordered to leave the United States.

1920 – The United States approved a $150 million loan to Poland, Austria and Armenia to aid in their war with the Russian communists.

1929 – The U.S. Senate ratifies the Kellogg-Briand anti-war pact. It was signed Aug. 27, 1928, condemning “recourse to war for the solution of international controversies.” It is more properly known as the Pact of Paris. In June, 1927, Aristide Briand, foreign minister of France, proposed to the U.S. government a treaty outlawing war between the two countries. Frank B. Kellogg, the U.S. Secretary of State, returned a proposal for a general pact against war, and after prolonged negotiations the Pact of Paris was signed by 15 nations—Australia, Belgium, Canada, Czechoslovakia, France, Germany, Great Britain, India, the Irish Free State, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Poland, South Africa, and the United States. The contracting parties agreed that settlement of all conflicts, no matter of what origin or nature, that might arise among them should be sought only by pacific means and that war was to be renounced as an instrument of national policy. Although 62 nations ultimately ratified the pact, its effectiveness was vitiated by its failure to provide measures of enforcement.

The Kellogg-Briand Pact was given an unenthusiastic reception by many countries. The U.S. Senate, ratifying the treaty with only one dissenting vote, still insisted that there must be no curtailment of America’s right of self-defense and that the United States was not compelled to take action against countries that broke the treaty. The pact never made a meaningful contribution to international order, although it was invoked in 1929 with some success, when China and the USSR reached a tense moment over possession of the Chinese Eastern RR in Manchuria. Ultimately, however, the pact proved to be meaningless, especially with the practice of waging undeclared wars in the 1930s (e.g., the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931, the Italian invasion of Ethiopia in 1935, and the German occupation of Austria in 1938).

1936 – In London, Japan quits all naval disarmament talks after being denied equality. The London Naval Conference. (1908–9), composed of delegates of 10 powers, resulted in the influential Declaration of London (see London, Declaration of). After World War I, U.S. President Harding called the Washington Conference. (1921–22). Several treaties resulted. The Five-Power Treaty limited tonnage of aircraft carriers and capital ships and arranged for the United States, Great Britain, and France to scrap a number of ships. Agreement was reached on a ratio of capital ships for Great Britain, the United States, Japan, France, and Italy; the ratio was set at 5:5:3:1.67:1.67. Another five-power treaty made the rules of warfare applying to surface ships applicable also to submarines and outlawed the use of poison gas. In the Four-Power Treaty, France, Japan, Great Britain, and the United States agreed to respect each other’s possessions in the Pacific.

The status quo of naval fortifications in the West Pacific was to be maintained. Japan was to return Shandong to China, which was guaranteed territorial integrity and greater control over its tariff by two Nine-Power Treaties. The Washington Conference treaties were to remain in force until Dec. 31, 1936. The Geneva Conference. (1927) failed to reach agreement on more comprehensive limits for warships. At the London Conference. (1930), Japan won a 7:10:10 ratio with the United States and Great Britain in small cruisers and destroyers, remained at a 3:5:5 ratio with them in large cruisers, and won parity in submarines. France and Italy refused to take part in the new ratios, but, with the other three powers, agreed to defer further construction of capital ships. An escalator clause provided for naval expansion in case of any threat to national security by the naval building of a non-signatory nation.

The announcement in 1934 of Japan’s intention to withdraw from the Washington Conference treaties resulted in another London Conference. (1935). Japan withdrew from the conference when refused naval parity with the United States and Great Britain. These two powers and France signed (Mar. 25, 1936) an agreement to limit cruisers and destroyers to 8,000 tons and capital ships to 35,000 tons. Reports of Japanese building in excess of 35,000 tons led to a revision (1938) of the treaty limits on the size of capital ships, and with the outbreak of World War II in 1939 the treaties were completely abandoned.

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1942 – Marine Brigadier General H. R. Larsen is named first Military Governor of American Samoa.

1942 – The first “blackout” Cadillacs were completed. Due to restrictions on materials necessary to the war effort, these cars had painted trim rather than chrome. They also lacked spare tires and other luxuries.

1943 – The Pentagon, headquarters of the U.S. Department of Defense, was dedicated. Before the Pentagon was built, the United States Department of War was headquartered in the Greggory Building, a temporary structure erected during World War I along Constitution Avenue on the National Mall. The War Department, which was a civilian agency created to administer the U.S. Army, was spread out in additional temporary buildings on the National Mall, as well as dozens of other buildings in Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia. In the late 1930s a new War Department Building was constructed at 21st and C Streets in Foggy Bottom but, upon completion, the new building did not solve the department’s space problem and ended up being used by the Department of State. When World War II broke out in Europe, the War Department rapidly expanded in anticipation that the United States would be drawn into the conflict. Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson found the situation unacceptable, with the Munitions Building overcrowded and the department spread out. Stimson told President Franklin D. Roosevelt in May 1941 that the War Department needed additional space.

On July 17, 1941, a congressional hearing took place, organized by Virginia congressman Clifton Woodrum, regarding proposals for new War Department buildings. Woodrum pressed Brigadier General Eugene Reybold, who was representing the War Department at the hearing, for an “overall solution” to the department’s “space problem” rather than building yet more temporary buildings. Reybold agreed to report back to the congressman within five days. The War Department called upon its construction chief, General Brehon Somervell, to come up with a plan. Government officials agreed that the War Department building should be constructed across the Potomac River, in Arlington, Virginia. Requirements for the new building were that it be no more than four stories tall, and that it use a minimal amount of steel. The requirements meant that, instead of rising vertically, the building would be sprawling over a large area.

Possible sites for the building included the Department of Agriculture’s Arlington Experimental Farm, adjacent to Arlington National Cemetery, and the obsolete Washington Hoover Airport site. The site originally chosen was Arlington Farms which had a roughly pentagonal shape, so the building was planned accordingly as an irregular pentagon. Concerned that the new building could obstruct the view of Washington, D.C. from Arlington Cemetery, President Roosevelt ended up selecting the Hoover Airport site instead. The building retained its pentagonal layout because a major redesign at that stage would have been costly, and Roosevelt liked the design. Freed of the constraints of the asymmetric Arlington Farms site, it was modified into a regular pentagon.

1943 – Captain Joe Foss bagged three Japanese planes for a record total of 26 kills.

1944 – The forces of US 2nd Corps (Keyes) capture Monte Trocchio. This completes the US 5th Army advance to the German defenses of the Gustav Line. In part, the operations serve to keep engaged German forces that might otherwise be available to respond to the planned landing at Anzio (January 22).

1945 – On Luzon, the US 14th Corps continues to advance south from the beachhead and has now crossed the Agno River. The US 1st Corps is attacking north and east but fails to reach its objective of Rosario.

1945 – American forces encounter heavy resistance in attacks toward St. Vith. US 1st Army troops have reached Houffalize, cutting off remaining German forces to the west in the Ardennes salient.

1949 – Chinese Communists occupy Tientsin after a 27-hour battle with Nationalist forces.

1951 – Ilse Koch, wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, is sentenced to life imprisonment in a court in West Germany. Ilse Koch was nicknamed the “Witch of Buchenwald” for her extraordinary sadism. Born in Dresden, Germany, Ilse, a librarian, married SS. Col. Karl Koch in 1936. Colonel Koch, a man with his own reputation for sadism, was the commandant of the Sashsenhausen concentration camp, two miles north of Berlin. He was transferred after three years to Buchenwald concentration camp, 4.5 miles northwest of Weimar; the Buchenwald concentration camp held a total of 20,000 slave laborers during the war. Ilse, a large woman with red hair, was given free reign in the camp, whipping prisoners with her riding crop as she rode by on her horse, forcing prisoners to have sex with her, and, most horrifying, collecting lampshades, book covers, and gloves made from the skin of tattooed camp prisoners.

A German inmate gave the following testimony during the Nuremberg war trials: “All prisoners with tattooing on them were to report to the dispensary…. After the prisoners had been examined, the ones with the best and most artistic specimens were killed by injections. The corpses were then turned over to the pathological department, where the desired pieces of tattooed skin were detached from the bodies and treated further.” Karl Koch was arrested, ironically enough, by his SS superiors for “having gone too far.” It seems he had a penchant for stealing even the belongings of wealthy, well-placed Germans. He was tried and hanged in 1944. Ilse Koch was tried for crimes against humanity at Nuremberg and sentenced to life in prison, but the American military governor of the occupied zone subsequently reduced her sentence to four years. His reason, “lack of evidence,” caused a Senate investigation back home. She was released but arrested again, tried by a West German court, and sentenced to life. She committed suicide in 1967 by hanging herself with a bed sheet.

1951 – Operation WOLFHOUND commenced as a combined task force of infantry, armor, artillery and engineers mounted an attack towards the Suwon-Osan area. The principal component of this task force was the 25th Infantry Division’s 27th Infantry Regiment.

1953 –Testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee prior to taking office as the new secretary of state, John Foster Dulles argues that U.S. foreign policy must strive for the “liberation of captive peoples” living under communist rule. Though Dulles called for a more vigorous anticommunist policy, he remained vague about exactly how the “liberation” would take place. When asked during the hearing whether he supported the policy of containment, which sought to restrain the further expansion of communist power, Dulles responded by declaring, “We shall never have a secure peace or a happy world so long as Soviet communism dominates one-third of all of the peoples.” Despite the vague specifics of the original declaration, Dulles’s call for action was soon put into practice. The Eisenhower administration conceived a wide-ranging program of political and psychological warfare, and overseas propaganda-produced and disseminated by the new United States Information Agency-became an important Cold War weapon. In Iran, Guatemala, and later, Cuba, the United States resorted to covert operations directed by the Central Intelligence Agency to destabilize foreign governments perceived to be a communist threat. In 1956, however, Dulles’s oft-repeated calls for the liberation of captive peoples backfired badly when Hungarian citizens rose up in revolt against the Soviet presence in their country. As the Russians crushed the uprising, the United States did nothing while Hungarian rebels pleaded helplessly for assistance.

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1962 – Asked at a news conference if U.S. troops are fighting in Vietnam, President Kennedy answers “No.” He was technically correct, but U.S. soldiers were serving as combat advisers with the South Vietnamese army, and U.S. pilots were flying missions with the South Vietnamese Air Force. While acting in this advisory capacity, some soldiers invariably got wounded, and press correspondents based in Saigon were beginning to see casualties from the “support” missions and ask questions.

1962 – Because there were few signs of improvement in South Vietnam, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara convened a conference to assess the deteriorating situation and develop options. He wanted to move fast to beef up the U.S. effort in Vietnam. McNamara concluded that a new command at the operational level was needed that could achieve unity of efforts and get things moving in the right direction. On February 8, the administration established the U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam. MACV, which was a unified subordinate command of the Commander in Chief, Pacific, was assigned responsibility for all American military activities in Vietnam. Advisers began to flow into South Vietnam to exercise McNamara’s new options and reverse the VC tide.

1967 – Some 462 Yale faculty members called for an end to the bombing in North Vietnam.

1970 –Muammar al-Qaddafi, the young Libyan army captain who deposed King Idris in September 1969, is proclaimed premier of Libya by the so-called General People’s Congress. Born in a tent in the Libyan desert, Qaddafi was the son of a Bedouin farmer. He attended university and the Libyan military academy and steadily rose in the ranks of the Libyan army. An ardent Arab nationalist, he plotted with a group of fellow officers to overthrow the Libyan monarchy, which they accomplished on September 1, 1969. Blending Islamic orthodoxy, revolutionary socialism, and Arab nationalism, Qaddafi established a fervently anti-Western dictatorship. In 1970, he removed U.S. and British military bases and expelled Italian and Jewish Libyans. In 1973, he nationalized foreign-owned oil fields. He reinstated traditional Islamic laws, such as prohibition of alcoholic beverages and gambling, but liberated women and launched social programs that improved the standard of living in Libya. As part of his stated ambition to unite the Arab world, he sought closer relations with his Arab neighbors, especially Egypt.

However, when Egypt and then other Arab nations began a peace process with Israel, Libya was increasingly isolated. Qaddafi’s government financed a wide variety of terrorist groups worldwide, from Palestinian guerrillas and Philippine Muslim rebels to the Irish Republican Army. During the 1980s, the West blamed him for numerous terrorist attacks in Europe, and in April 1986 U.S. war planes bombed Tripoli in retaliation for a bombing of a West German dance hall. Qaddafi was reportedly injured and his infant daughter killed in the U.S. attack. In the late 1990s, Qaddafi sought to lead Libya out of its long international isolation by turning over to the West two suspects wanted for the 1988 explosion of an airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland. In response, Europe lifted sanctions against Libya. After years of rejection in the Arab world, Qaddafi also sought to forge stronger relations with non-Islamic African nations such as South Africa, remodeling himself as an elder African statesman.

1973 – President Nixon suspends all U.S. offensive action in North Vietnam. Citing “progress” in the Paris peace negotiations between National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho of North Vietnam, President Richard Nixon halts the most concentrated bombing of the war, as well as mining, shelling, and all other offensive action against North Vietnam. The cessation of direct attacks against North Vietnam did not extend to South Vietnam, where the fighting continued as both sides jockeyed for control of territory before the anticipated cease-fire. On December 13, North Vietnamese negotiators had walked out of secret talks with Kissinger. President Nixon issued an ultimatum to Hanoi to send its representatives back to the conference table within 72 hours “or else.” The North Vietnamese rejected Nixon’s demand and the president ordered Operation Linebacker II, a full-scale air campaign against the Hanoi area. This operation was the most concentrated air offensive of the war. During the 11 days of the attack, 700 B-52 sorties and more than 1,000 fighter-bomber sorties dropped roughly 20,000 tons of bombs, between Hanoi and Haiphong. On December 28, after 11 days of intensive bombing, the North Vietnamese agreed to return to the talks. When the negotiators met again in early January, they quickly worked out a settlement.

1973 – Citing “progress” in the Paris peace negotiations between National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho of North Vietnam, President Richard Nixon halts the most concentrated bombing of the war, as well as mining, shelling, and all other offensive action against North Vietnam. The cessation of direct attacks against North Vietnam did not extend to South Vietnam, where the fighting continued as both sides jockeyed for control of territory before the anticipated cease-fire. On December 13, North Vietnamese negotiators had walked out of secret talks with Kissinger. President Nixon issued an ultimatum to Hanoi to send its representatives back to the conference table within 72 hours “or else.” The North Vietnamese rejected Nixon’s demand and the president ordered Operation Linebacker II, a full-scale air campaign against the Hanoi area. This operation was the most concentrated air offensive of the war. During the 11 days of the attack, 700 B-52 sorties and more than 1,000 fighter-bomber sorties dropped roughly 20,000 tons of bombs, mostly over the densely populated area between Hanoi and Haiphong. On December 28, after 11 days of intensive bombing, the North Vietnamese agreed to return to the talks. When the negotiators met again in early January, they quickly worked out a settlement. The Paris Peace Accords were signed on January 23 and a cease-fire went into effect five days later.

1974 – The first group of women ever enlisted as “regulars” in the U.S. Coast Guard began their 10-weeks of basic training at the Coast Guard Training Center in Cape May. Thirty-two women were in the initial group and formed Recruit Company Sierra-89.

1976 – Gerald Ford’s would-be assassin, Sara Jane Moore, is sentenced to life in prison.

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1991 – With hours remaining before a United Nations deadline for Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait, UN Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar made a final appeal to Saddam Hussein to remove his troops.

1993 – 20 men from 10th Mountain Divisions Echo Company, 2nd Battalion, 87th Infantry kill 6 Somalis in Bale Dogle. No US casualties are reported.

1998 – President Clinton presented the Presidential Medal of Freedom to 15 honorees.

1998 – The US and Singapore announced an agreement for US ships to use a planned $35 million naval base beginning in 2000.

1999 – In Iraq the US again fired at an air-defense site.

1999 – The United States proposes allowing Iraq to sell unlimited amounts of oil – but only if the proceeds go to buy food and other humanitarian supplies for the Iraqi people. The United Nations Security Council barred Iraq from freely exporting oil, its most valuable commodity, after its invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Concerned that sanctions were creating devastating hardships for Iraq’s 22 million people, the Council agreed in 1995 to let Iraq sell limited amounts of oil to pay for humanitarian supplies.

2000 – Madeleine Albright stopped in Colombia to discuss a $1.2 billion emergency aid package that included $400 million for 30 US Blackhawk helicopters to help in the drug war.

2002 – John Walker Lindh of Marin, Ca., was charged with conspiring to kill Americans as a Taliban member in Afghanistan.

2002 – Operation Enduring Freedom – Philippines (OEF-P) begins. Special Operations Command-Pacific (SOCPAC) troops are the core of OEF-P, an operation which supports the Government of the Republic of the Philippines counterterrorism efforts. Deployment involved more than 1,200 members of SOCPAC, headed by Brig. Gen. Donald C. Wurster. SOCPAC’s deployable joint task force HQ, Joint Task Force 510 (JTF 510), directed and carried out the operations. The mission was to advise the Armed Forces of the Philippines in combating terrorism in the Philippines. Much of the mission (Exercise Balikatan 02-1) took place on the island of Basilan, a stronghold of al-Qaeda afilliate, Abu Sayyaf. Within OEF-Philippines was another project called Operation Smiles, an extensive program to provide medical care for local civilians of Basilan where the fighting had occurred. Operation Smiles included personnel from the Philippine Government as well as the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), JTF 510 and non governmental organizations. Among the results of this operation was the creation of 14 schools, seven clinics, three hospitals and over 20 fresh water wells. From the beginning of the project it had provided care and assistance to an estimated 18,000 Filipinos.

2004 – Iraqi bank notes bearing Saddam Hussein’s portrait became obsolete as a three-month period to exchange old bills for new ones came to an end. The new currency required 27 flights of 747 planes for delivery.

2005 – A military court at Fort Hood, Texas, sentenced Army SPC Charles Graner Jr. to 10 years behind bars for physically and sexually mistreating Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison.

2005 – Sami Mohammed Ali Said al-Jaaf, also known as Abu Omar al-Kurdi, was arrested during a raid in Baghdad. On Jan 24 authorities announced the arrest of Al-Jaaf, an al-Qaida figure allegedly behind the vast majority of the car bombings in Baghdad.

2005 – Savo Todovic (52), a Bosnian Serb wanted by the U.N. war crimes tribunal for crimes he allegedly committed during the 1992-95 war, surrendered to Bosnian Serb police.

2006 – The Stardust spacecraft has successfully landed in the Dugway Proving Ground after collecting dust samples from the comet Wild 2. It is the first time extraterrestrial samples other than of the moon have been collected and the Stardust spacecraft is the fastest man-made object to re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere.

2008 – The Pentagon announces plans to send 3,200 additional Marines to Afghanistan.

2012 – The Russian tanker Renda, accompanied by the US Coast Guard icebreaker USCGC Healy, prepares to deliver fuel to Nome, Alaska. A fall storm had blocked an earlier fuel delivery, leaving the city facing fuel shortages.

2015 – After contributing more than 650 search hours to the Indonesian-led search effort for AirAsia flight QZ8501, USS Sampson (DDG 102) and USS Fort Worth (LCS 3) concluded their assistance.


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Congressional Medal of Honor Citations for Actions Taken This Day

ANDERSON, BRUCE
Rank and organization: Private, Company K, 142d New York Infantry. Place and date: At Fort Fisher, N.C., 15 January 1865. Entered service at: Ephratah, N.Y. Born: Mexico, Oswego County, N.Y., 9 June 1845. Date of issue: 28 December 1914. Citation: Voluntarily advanced with the head of the column and cut down the palisading.

BARNUM, JAMES
Rank and organization: Boatswain’s Mate, U.S. Navy. Born: 1816 Massachusetts. Accredited to: Massachusetts. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: Barnum served on board the U.S.S. New Ironsides during action in several attacks on Fort Fisher, 24 and 25 December 1864; and on 13, 14, and 15 January 1865. The ship steamed in and took the lead in the ironclad division close in shore and immediately opened its starboard battery in a barrage of well_directed fire to cause several fires and explosions and dismount several guns during the first 2 days of fighting. Taken under fire as she steamed into position on 13 January, the New Ironsides fought all day and took on ammunition at night despite severe weather conditions. When the enemy came out of his bombproofs to defend the fort against the storming party, the ship’s battery disabled nearly every gun on the fort facing the shore before the cease-fire orders were given by the flagship. Barnum was commended for highly meritorious conduct during this period.

BARTER, GURDON H.
Rank and organization: Landsman, U.S. Navy. Born: 1843, Williamsburgh, N.Y. Accredited to: New York. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Minnesota in action during the assault on Fort Fisher, 15 January 1865. Landing on the beach with the assaulting party from his ship, L/man Barter advanced to the top of the sandhill and partly through the breach in the palisades despite enemy fire which killed and wounded many officers and men. When more than two-thirds of the men became seized with panic and retreated on the run, he remained with the party until dark, when it came safely away, bringing its wounded, its arms, and its colors.

BASS, DAVID L.
Rank and organization: Seaman, U.S. Navy. Born: 1843, Ireland. Accredited to: New York. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Minnesota in action during the assault on Fort Fisher, 15 January 1865. Landing on the beach with the assaulting party from his ship, S/man Bass advanced to the top of the sand hill and partly through the breach in the palisades despite enemy fire which killed and wounded many officers and men. When more than two-thirds of the men became seized with panic and retreated on the run, he remained with the party until dark, when it came safely away, bringing its wounded, its arms, and its colors.

BAZAAR, PHILIP
Rank and organization: Ordinary Seaman, U.S. Navy. Born: Chile, South America. Accredited to: Massachusetts. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Santiago de Cuba during the assault on Fort Fisher on 15 January 1865. As one of a boat crew detailed to one of the generals on shore, O.S. Bazaar bravely entered the fort in the assault and accompanied his party in carrying dispatches at the height of the battle. He was 1 of 6 men who entered the fort in the assault from the fleet.

BINDER, RICHARD
Rank and organization: Sergeant, U.S. Marine Corps. Born: 1840, Philadelphia, Pa. Accredited to: Pennsylvania. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Ticonderoga during the attacks on Fort Fisher, 24 and 25 December 1864, and 13 to 15 January 1865. Despite heavy return fire by the enemy and the explosion of the 100-pounder Parrott rifle which killed 8 men and wounded 12 more, Sgt. Binder, as captain of a gun, performed his duties with skill and courage during the first 2 days of battle. As his ship again took position on the 13th, he remained steadfast as the Ticonderoga maintained a well-placed fire upon the batteries on shore, and thereafter, as she materially lessened the power of guns on the mound which had been turned upon our assaulting columns. During this action the flag was planted on one of the strongest fortifications possessed by the rebels.

BOWMAN, EDWARD R.
Rank and organization: Quartermaster, U.S. Navy. Born: 1828, Eastport, Maine. Accredited to: Maine. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Ticonderoga during attacks on Fort Fisher 13 to 15 January 1865. Despite severe wounds sustained during the action Bowman displayed outstanding courage in the performance of duty as his ship maintained its well-placed fire upon the batteries on shore, and thereafter, as she materially lessened the power of guns on the mound which had been turned upon our assaulting columns. During this battle the flag was planted on one of the strongest fortifications possessed by the rebels.

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BURTON, ALBERT
Rank and organization: Seaman, U.S. Navy. Born: 1838, England. Accredited to: New York. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: Served on board the U.S.S. Wabash in the assault on Fort Fisher, 15 January 1865. Advancing gallantly through the severe enemy fire while armed only with a revolver and cutlass which made it impossible to return the fire at that range, Burton succeeded in reaching the angle of the fort and going on, to be one of the few who entered the fort. When the rest of the body of men to his rear were forced to retreat under a devastating fire, he was forced to withdraw through lack of support, and to seek the shelter of one of the mounds near the stockade from which point he succeeded in regaining the safety of his ship.

CAMPBELL, WILLIAM
Rank and organization: Boatswain’s Mate, U.S. Navy. Born: 1838, Indiana. Accredited to: Indiana. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Ticonderoga during attacks on Fort Fisher, 24 and 25 December 1864; and 13 to 15 January 1865. Despite heavy return fire by the enemy and the explosion of the 100-pounder Parrott rifle which killed 8 men and wounded 12 more, Campbell, as captain of a gun, performed his duties with skill and courage during the first 2 days of battle. As his ship again took position on the line of the 13th, he remained steadfast as the Ticonderoga maintained a well-placed fire upon the batteries on shore, and thereafter, as she materially lessened the power of guns on the mound which had been turned upon our assaulting columns. During this action the flag was planted on one of the strongest fortifications possessed by the rebels.

CHAPIN, ALARIC B.
Rank and organization: Private, Company G, 142d New York Infantry. Place and date: At Fort Fisher, N.C., 15 January 1865. Entered service at: Pamelia, N.Y. Birth: Ogdensburg, N.Y. Date of issue: 28 December 1914. Citation: Voluntarily advanced with the head of the column and cut down the palisading.

CONNOR, THOMAS
Rank and organization: Ordinary Seaman, U.S. Navy. Born: 1842, Ireland. Accredited to: Maryland. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Minnesota, in action during the assault on Fort Fisher, 15 January 1865. Landing on the beach with the assaulting party from his ship, Connor charged up to the palisades and, when more than two-thirds of the men became seized with panic and retreated on the run, risked his life to remain with a wounded officer. With the enemy concentrating his fire on the group, he waited until after dark before assisting in carrying the wounded man from the field.

CURTIS, NEWTON MARTIN
Rank and organization: Brigadier General, U.S. Volunteers. Place and date: At Fort Fisher, N.C., 15 January 1865. Entered service at: De Peyster, N.Y. Born: 21 May 1835, De Peyster, N.Y. Date of issue: 28 November 1891. Citation: The first man to pass through the stockade, he personally led each assault on the traverses and was 4 times wounded.

DEMPSTER, JOHN
Rank and organization: Coxswain, U.S. Navy. Born: 1839, Scotland. Accredited to: Pennsylvania. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: Dempster served on board the U.S.S. New Ironsides during action in several attacks on Fort Fisher, 24 and 25 December 1864; and 13, 14, and 15 January 1865. The ship steamed in and took the lead in the ironclad division close inshore and immediately opened its starboard battery in a barrage of well-directed fire to cause several fires and explosions and dismount several guns during the first 2 days of fighting. Taken under fire as she steamed into position on 13 January, the New Ironsides fought all day and took on ammunition at night despite severe weather conditions. When the enemy came out of his bombproofs to defend the fort against the storming party, the ship’s battery disabled nearly every gun on the fort facing the shore before the cease-fire orders were given by the flagship.

DUNN, WILLIAM
Rank and organization: Quartermaster, U.S. Navy. Born: Maine. Accredited to: Maine. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Monadnock in action during several attacks on Fort Fisher, 24 and 25 December 1864; and 13, 14, and 15 January 1865. With his ship anchored well inshore to insure perfect range against the severe fire of rebel guns, Dunn continued his duties when the vessel was at anchor, as her propellers were kept in motion to make her turrets bear, and the shooting away of her chain might have caused her to ground. Disdainful of shelter despite severe weather conditions, he inspired his shipmates and contributed to the success of his vessel in reducing the enemy guns to silence.

ENGLISH, THOMAS
Rank and organization: Signal Quartermaster, U.S. Navy. Born: 1819, New York, N.Y. Accredited to: New York. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: English served on board the U.S.S. New Iron sides during action in several attacks on Fort Fisher, 24 and 25 December 1864; and 13, 14, and 15 January 1865. The ship steamed in and took the lead in the ironclad division close inshore and immediately opened its starboard battery in a barrage of well-directed fire to cause several fires and explosions and dismount several guns during the first 2 days of fighting. Taken under fire as she steamed into position on 13 January, the New Ironsides fought all day and took on ammunition at night despite severe weather conditions. When the enemy came out of his bombproofs to defend the fort against the storming party, the ship’s battery disabled nearly every gun on the fort facing the shore before the cease-fire orders were given by the flagship.

FOY, CHARLES H.
Rank and organization: Signal Quartermaster, U.S. Navy. Birth: Portsmouth, N.H. Accredited to: New Hampshire. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: Served on board the U.S.S. Rhode Island during the action with Fort Fisher and the Federal Point batteries, 13 to 15 January 1865. Carrying out his duties courageously during the battle, Foy continued to be outstanding by his good conduct and faithful services throughout this engagement which resulted in a heavy casualty list when an attempt was made to storm Fort Fisher.

FREEMAN, WILLIAM H.
Rank and organization: Private, Company B, 169th New York Infantry. Place and date: At Fort Fisher, N.C., 15 January 1865. Entered service at: Troy, N.Y. Birth: Troy, N.Y. Date of issue: 27 May 1905. Citation: Volunteered to carry the brigade flag after the bearer was wounded.

FRY, ISAAC N.
Rank and organization: Orderly Sergeant, U.S. Marine Corps. Accredited to: Pennsylvania. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Ticonderoga during attacks on Fort Fisher, 13 to 15 January 1865. As orderly sergeant of marine guard, and captain of a gun, Orderly Sgt. Fry performed his duties with skill and courage as the Ticonderoga maintained a well-placed fire upon the batteries to the left of the palisades during the initial phases of the 3-day battle, and thereafter, as she considerably lessened the firing power of guns on the mount which had been turned upon our assaulting columns. During this action the flag was planted on one of the strongest fortifications possessed by the rebels.

GRIFFITHS, JOHN
Rank and organization: Captain of the Forecastle, U.S. Navy. Born: 1835, Wales. Accredited to: Massachusetts. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Santiago de Cuba during the assault on Fort Fisher on 15 January 1865. As one of a boatcrew detailed to one of the generals on shore, Griffiths bravely entered the fort in the assault and accompanied his party in carrying dispatches at the height of the battle. He was one of 6 men who entered the fort in the assault from the fleet.

HAFFEE, EDMUND
Rank and organization: Quarter Gunner, U.S. Navy. Born: 1832, Philadelphia, Pa. Accredited to: Pennsylvania. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: Haffee served on board the U.S.S. New Ironsides during action in several attacks on Fort Fisher, 24 and 25 December 1864; and 13, 14, and 15 January 1865. The ship steamed in and took the lead in the ironclad division close inshore, and immediately opened its starboard battery in a barrage of well-directed fire to cause several fires and explosions and dismount several guns during the first 2 days of fighting. Taken under fire, as she steamed into position on 13 January, the New Ironsides fought all day and took on ammunition at night despite severe weather conditions. When the enemy came out of his bombproof to defend the fort against the storming party, the ship’s battery disabled nearly every gun on the fort facing the shore before the cease-fire orders were given by the flagship.

HARCOURT, THOMAS
Rank and organization: Ordinary Seaman, U.S. Navy. Born: 1841, Boston, Mass. Accredited to: Massachusetts. G.O. No.: 59, 22 June 1865. Citation: On board the U.S.S. Minnesota in action during the assault on Fort Fisher, 15 January 1865. Landing on the beach with the assaulting party from his ship, Harcourt advanced to the top of the sandhill and partly through the breach in the palisades despite enemy fire which killed and wounded many officers and men. When more than two-thirds of the men become seized with panic and retreated on the run, he remained with the party until dark when it came safely away, bringing its wounded, its arms and its colors.

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