30 The Crucifixion [the first Friday following the first day of Passover on a Thursday]
1002 Battle of "Hocktide": Saxon women defeat Danish raiders
1097 Norman-Italian Crusaders under Bohemund & Tancred reach Constantinople
1241 Battle of Liegnitz/Wahlstadt: Mongol armies defeat the Poles & Germans
1260 Battle of Montaperti: The Sienese Ghibellines defeat the Florentine Guelfs
1388 Battle of Naefels: The Swiss defeat the Hapsburgs
1454 Peace of Lodi: ends Milanese-Venetian war
1534 Turkish corsair Khair Ed-Din -- "Barbarossa", captures Sperlonga, Italy
1621 Twelve Years' Truce (1609-1621) between Spain and the Netherlands expires
1770 Capt James Cook discovers Botany Bay, Australia
1783 Tippu Sultan expels the English from Bednore, India
1848 Battle of Sorio: The Austrians defeat Venetian Insurgents
1848 Battle of the Ponte di Goito: Piedmontese defeat the Austrians
1864 Battle of Pleasant Hill, La
1865 Appomattox: Robert E Lee & the Army of Northern Virginia pack it in.
1865 Union troops capture Ft Blakely, Alabama
1898 Lt Andrew S. Rowan leaves for Cuba with "a message for Garcia."
1913 Ebbet's Field opens
1914 Tampico Incident: US sailors arrested in Mexico
1917 After a massive mine explosion, Canadian troops storm Vimy Ridge, initiating the Battle of Arras
1918 Latvia proclaims independence from Russia
1940 Germany invades Denmark, which promptly surrenders
1940 Germany invades Norway
1942 Bataan: c. 75,000 U.S. & Filipino troops surrender to the Japanese
1942 The Japanese First Air Fleet raids waters around Ceylon, sinking 12 merchant ships & HM CV 'Hermes'
1942 Manila Bay: U.S. troops hold out on Corregidor and Ft. Drum
1942 RAdm William F. Halsey, sails from Pearl Harbor in 'Enterprise' (CV-6)
1943 Japanese DD 'Isonami' sunk south east of Celebes by USS 'Tautog" (SS-199)
1944 Japanese encircle Imphal, in northeastern India
1944 Japan offers to mediate peace between Germany and Russia.
1945 Philippines: U.S. forces land on Jolo in the Sulu Sea
1945 RAF sinks Pocket Battleship 'Admiral Scheer' in port
1959 NASA names seven astronauts for Project Mercury
1963 Congress declares Winston S. Chruchill an honorary U.S. citizen
1981 USS 'George Washington' (SSBN-598) rams Japanese freighter 'Nisso Maru'
1991 Georgia votes to secede from the USSR
1992 John Major becomes PM of the UK (1990-1997)
2003 Brooklynite CPL Edward Chin, USMC, plants the US and Free Iraq flags on the statue of Sadam Hussein in Firdos Square, Baghdad, which is then pulled down
