1802 – Congress empowers President Jefferson to arm United States ships in order that they may protect themselves against Tripolitan pirates.
1815 – The state of New Jersey issued the first American railroad charter to John Stevens, who proposed a rail link between Trenton and New Brunswick. The line, however, was never built.
1832 – Battle of Quallah Batto, Sumatra. On Feb. 7 1831, the merchant ship Friendship was attacked in Sumatra by pirates who killed 3 of the ship’s crew and plundered her cargo. The USS Potomiac, disguised as a merchant man, was dispatched on a punitive raid. On Feb. 4 1832 she arrived at Quallah Batto. A landing party of Marines and sailors attacked one fort, carried it and proceeded inland to reduce the remaining two forts. The first was stiffly defended until Marine Lt. Edson finally seized the drawbridge and gained entrance for the assaulting troops. All the defenders were either killed or retreated into the surrounding jungle. The Marines then assisted in the assault on the remaining position. Shortly thereafter, the remaining pirates escaped into the jungle with the Marines in pursuit. After inflicting casualties upon the sea rovers, the Marines and sailors withdrew to the ships which began shelling the remaining strong point until it’s surrender.
1838 – Samuel Morse first publicly demonstrated his telegraph, in Morristown, N.J.
1861 – The 1st meeting of Provisional Congress of Confederate States of America.
1862 – General Ulysses S. Grant provides the first major Union victory of the war when he captures Fort Henry on the Tennessee River. Ten days later, he captured Fort Donelson on the Cumberland River, which gave the Yankees control of northern Tennessee and paved the way for the occupation of Nashville.
1863 – Union General S.F. Heintzelman is put in charge of the Federal Department of Washington.
1865 – Confederate General John Pegram is killed at the Battle of Dabney’s Mill, Virginia. Pegram graduated from West Point in 1854, 10th in a class of 46. He served in various posts in the west before resigning his commission at the start of the Civil War. Pegram then received an appointment as a lieutenant colonel in the Confederate army. Sent to fight in western Virginia during the summer of 1861, he was captured by General George McClellan’s men at the Battle of Rich Mountain. Pegram was exchanged in April 1862 and sent to serve with General Pierre G. T. Beauregard in Mississippi. He fought in Tennessee and Kentucky and earned a promotion to brigadier general. After the Battle of Chickamauga in September 1863, Pegram was transferred to General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia. He was wounded at the Battle of the Wilderness in May 1864, but recovered to fight with General Jubal Early during the Shenandoah Valley campaign in the summer of 1864. That fall, he was sent to defend his native city of Petersburg. On January 19, Pegram married Hetty Cary, a prominent Richmond socialite who many called the “handsomest women in the Southland.” Even in the gloom of the ongoing siege, the ceremony was a grand affair attended by nearly all of the high-ranking Confederates, including President Jefferson Davis and his wife, Varina. The bride, commented onlookers, was a vision of beauty and one said that the “happy gleam of her beautiful brown eyes seemed to defy all sorrow.” Just three weeks later, Pegram’s body was returned to the same church, St. Paul’s Episcopal, and his young widow knelt beside his coffin as the minister who married them presided over the dashing general’s funeral.
1869 – Harper’s Weekly published the 1st picture of Uncle Sam with chin whiskers.
1899 – The Spanish-American War ends. After a protracted struggle between imperialists and anti-imperialists, the Senate ratifies the Treaty of Paris , 57 to 27. The argument for ratification is lead by Henry Cabot Lodge who contends that it will enhance national prestige, prevent foreign annexation of the formerly Spanis possiession of the Philippines, Puerto Rico and Guam, and constitute economic, strategic and “civilizing” advantages. The case against ratification is that it is contrary to US tradition to acquire territory outside the continental area; that people of alien races will not be easily assimilated into the American way of life; that the treaty is against the spirit of the Monroe Doctrine and will weaken the American belief in self-government. Anti-imperialists also contend that “the Constitution follows the flag,” but imperialists argue that the people of these new acquisitions, even while being nationals, are not automatically endowed with the privileges of US citizenship. This sets the stage for a series of Supreme Court cases known collectively as the Insular Cases that have never fully settled the issues.
