History Notes this week of Sept 1

301A.D. Founding of the Principality of San Marino, by the stonecutter Marinus of Rab (Croatia). It is the third smallest micro-state in Europe (behind the Holy See and Monaco) but has the distinction of being the longest-lived republic in the world, with its 1600 constitution still in force. 

1666: The Great Fire of London breaks out and burns for three days, destroying over 10,000 buildings, including Saint Paul’s Cathedral. 

1698: In Russia, Tsar Peter I imposes a tax on beards: more hair = more tax. 

1715: Death of The Sun King, Louis XIV (b.1638), ending a reign of over 72 years.  It is probably impossible to summarize a life as consequential as his in a DLH paragraph, but here goes anyway: Louis was the personification of the concept of an absolute monarch, who believed he was put into his position by divine right, and was not subject to any standard of law other than God’s. When asked once to define the nature of the state, he responded with the famous quip,“L’etat, c’est moi.” (I am the State).  It was Louis quatorze who converted the royal hunting lodge outside of Paris into the Palais du Versailles, forcing the nobility by decree to reside in its apartments and live the Court life isolated and distant from their own power bases in Paris and the other, more remote regions of France. Versailles put the final punctuation mark on the development of a centralized, unitary state on the European continent, with its glamour and opulence seducing the nobility away from their nominal political independence from the French crown.

1774: In response to the Intolerable Acts passed by Parliament, the First Continental Congress convenes in Philadelphia to debate a collective colonial response. The naming of the acts on both sides of the Atlantic reflected the steadily growing rift between the parties. Parliament referred to the acts as the Coercive Acts, not a friendly title, but reflective of Britain’s exasperation with the independent thinking and latent violence that was infecting her expensive New World colonies, particularly as it related to paying down the debt from the recent Seven Years War. Through the burgeoning Committees of Correspondence throughout the colonies, consensus grew that these Acts had dangerous ramifications for all of British America, not just Boston. There were five of them:
        1) Boston Port Act, which closed the port to commerce until the value of the tea ruined by the Boston Tea Party was repaid in full;
        2) Massachusetts Government Act, which unilaterally changed the status of all government positions from elected to appointed by the Governor or the King and severely limited the activities of Town Meetings;
        3)  Administration of Justice Act, permitted moving trials of royal officials to a different venue- including to England at crown expense- if they could not get a fair trial in Massachusetts. George Washington called this the “Murder Act” since it allowed officials to conduct their harassment of Americans and then escape justice;
        4) Quartering Act, cited specifically in the Declaration of Independence, mandated colonial support for supporting the very soldiers who were suppressing them;
        5) Quebec Act, although not directly related to the insurrection in Boston, it defined British interests in Quebec in a way that demonstrated disregard for the interests of the British colonies already in place in America.

1777: The Stars and Stripes fly in combat for the first time at the Battle of Cooch’s Bridge, the only Revolutionary War battle fought in Delaware.

1781: A group of 44 Spanish settlers form a small ranching town named El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora La Reina de los Angeles de Porciuncula, better known today by its abbreviation, L.A. 

1781: Battle of Virginia Capes– in the sixth year of our War of Independence, a French fleet of 24 ships of the line, under the command of Rear Admiral Francois Joseph Paul le Comte de Grasse, sails out from Lynnhaven anchorage (Lynnhaven anchorage, right off of Chic’s Beach) to meet and do battle with 19 Royal Navy ships under the Command of Rear Admiral Sir Thomas Gage. The battle was a classic slugfest between two Lines of Battle. Under northerly winds the two fleets headed east, coming together just outside Cape Henry around 15:00 in the afternoon and then pounded each other until sunset. The fleets maneuvered within sight of each other for two more days; de Grasse maneuvering his ships to ease the British ever seaward in order to protect an expected French supply convoy coming up from the south, the very same convoy which Gage was tasked to find and destroy. After sighting one of the convoy ships late in the afternoon of the 7th, de Grasse abruptly after sunset, broke off contact with the British and proceeded back to the Chesapeake, where the convoy was already re-supplying George Washington and the combined Franco-American forces besieging General Cornwallis’ army at Yorktown. Although the naval battle was only a tactical victory for the French, it was a strategic victory of highest importance for the fledgling United States, as it completely isolated the British in Yorktown from any expectation of relief or re-supply.

1783: After eight year of bitter warfare, the nascent United States of America and the Kingdom of Great Britain sign the Treaty of Paris, with Britain acknowledging the independence of its former 13 colonies and ceding all of its holdings west of the Appalachian Mountains to the Mississippi River and south of the Great Lakes. Britain expects the States to become valuable trading partners with their growing territories, lands which will no longer require the expense of British arms to keep them secure.

1792: In France’s continuing descent into the anarchy of the Revolution, mobs throughout Paris go on a rampage known as the September Massacres. It began with a rumor, although the rumor had some basis in fact: the Duke of Brunswick’s Prussian army had indeed invaded France just days prior, overpowering the border fortress of Verdun before continuing on toward Paris. The Paris mobs, essentially un-led by anything resembling a functioning government, concluded that the officers at Verdun must have been secret Royalists who turned the fortress over to the Prussians. Brunswick himself was unusually blunt in publicly stating his aims to restore the monarchy and the authority of the church from the anarchy of the revolution. Fearing an uprising of the monarchists imprisoned throughout the city, the mobs surged into those prisons, most notably Saint Germaine du Pres, and began slaughtering all the “monarchists” behind the bars. For good measure, they also attacked and killed over 500 Carmelite priests and a number of other clergy. Within weeks, over 1,200 had been murdered by the mob in the name of the Revolution and Reason.

1797: With the French Revolution into its eighth year, three members of the ruling Directory stage the Coup of 18 Fructidor, forcing what’s left of a representative legislature to purge itself of lingering “royalists” and other members not fully committed to the revolution. Not surprisingly, all this resort to Reason led to yet another military confrontation between factions, the exercise of raw power being the ultimate arbiter of “truth” in this environment. Luckily for the Directory, the young Brigadier General Napoleon Bonaparte was on their side, in Paris now, after busily suppressing dissent down south in Toulon two years earlier with his famous “whiff of grapeshot.” Today’s coup sealed the triumph of the executive over the legislative branches and set the stage for eventual dictatorship.

1799: From the continuing wars of the various anti-France coalitions (in this case, the Second Coalition), a British fleet under the command of Vice Admiral Andrew Mitchell captures an entire Batavian Dutch fleet of twelve ships under the command of Rear Admiral Samuel Story without firing a shot. The victory hinged on an outstanding intelligence estimate, the Brits’ timely and correct application of diplomacy, a credible threat of devastating force, and a civil-military “strategic communications” plan that played directly into the nationalistic sentiments of Dutch sailors who served under the French-ruled Batavian Republic. The action took place near present-day Den Helder at the mouth of the Zuider Zee. A British army made a landing three days earlier on the North Sea side of the peninsula. The fleet then made its way into the Helder roadstead, flying the flag of the Hereditary Stadtholder, the Prince of Orange. The knowledge of the British landing, combined with the sight of the British fleet and the knowledge that their actual sovereign was within range, triggered a spontaneous mutiny of the Dutch sailors and most of their officers against the hated French. Admiral Story, recognizing that resistance would be fruitless, offered to surrender his fleet to the Stadtholder and himself and his men to the British as Prisoners of War.   Admiral Mitchell made a point of delaying the decision, but then took it before the French had an opportunity to re-establish their control of the fleet. British prize crews sailed the best of the ships back to England, where they were inducted into the Royal Navy. This event became known as the Vlieter Incident. It was a singular success from an otherwise disastrous 1799 Anglo-Russian Campaign, which began to unravel almost immediately after today’s startling victory.

1836: Sam Houston is elected the first President of the Republic of Texas.

1862: Confederate General Robert E. Lee takes the war to the North in the opening phases of the Maryland Campaign.

1864:  Union General William T. Sherman opens his assault on the strategic railroad crossroad of Atlanta, defended by Confederate General John Bell Hood. The crushing Union force overwhelms Hood’s defenses, forcing them to finally evacuate on September 2^nd.

1870: From the Franco-Prussian War–the Battle of Sedan, where the German army captured the entire French army, including the Emperor, Napoleon III. That was today, a mere two months after the war’s start.

1875: Birth of the automotive engineer Ferdinand Porsche (d.1951). German-Czech automotive engineer and founder of the Porsche AG. He is best known for creating the first gasoline–electric hybrid vehicle, the Volkswagen Beetle, the Auto Union racing cars, the Mercedes-Benz SS/SSK, and several other important developments and Porsche automobiles

1895:  In Latrobe, Pennsylvania, kickoff for the nation’s first professional football game. The game was contested between the Latrobe YMCA team and a team from nearby Jeannette PA.  Latrobe pays its quarterback John Brallier $10.00 for expenses.  Latrobe won, 12-0, and claimed the offered prize money.  Brailler prudently went on to a career in dentistry, but he was given lifetime passes for all National Football League games.  He died in Latrobe in 1960 at age 83.  

1897: Inventor Thomas Alva Edison patents the Kinetoscope, the world’s first movie projector.

1901: Vice President Theodore Roosevelt, speaking at the Minnesota State Fair, first uses the expression, “Speak softly, and carry a big stick.”

1905: Signing of the Treaty of Portsmouth (NH), an arbitration effort led by U.S President Theodore Roosevelt, which formally ended the Russo-Japanese war, and for which Roosevelt was recognized with a Nobel Prize.

1914: Only four weeks into WWI, the Imperial German 8^th Army of 166,000 under the command of Field Marshalls Paul von Hindenburg and Eric Ludendorff, decisively smashed the Russian 1^st and 2^nd Armies in the Battle of Tannenberg. The three-day fight in East Prussia saw Hindenburg take full advantage of the German railroad network to quickly move his forces to a position where Ludendorff could engage them as a singular unit against both Russian groups. Their adaptability and ability to concentrate against the Russian flanks* allowed them to completely dominate the battlefield, killing or wounding 78,000 and capturing 92,000 of the 416,000 total Russian force. Rather than report the loss to the Tsar, the Russian commander committed suicide. Over the next three years, Russia was never able to recover from this shattering defeat, and eventually sued for a separate peace.

1914: After retreating from the Battle of Mons, the combined Franco-British force launches its first major counter-offensive in what became known as the Battle of the Marne. The First Battle of the Marne or known in France as the Miracle on the Marne was a battle of the First World War fought from 5 to 12 September 1914. The German army invaded France with a plan for winning the war in 40 days by occupying Paris and destroying the French and British armies.

1923: First flight of the U.S. Navy’s first rigid airship, USS Shenandoah (ZR-1). The ship was a technological masterpiece that improved on both the successes and weaknesses of the German Zeppelin program. It was the first to use helium for buoyancy instead of the highly volatile hydrogen that filled all previous airships. The 680 foot long Shenandoah and her three sister ships (Los Angeles, Macon, and Akron) flew extensively in support of Navy operations, particularly by exploiting their high loiter times and relative (to ships) high speed (~70 mph) in a reconnaissance mode. Of interest too was the extent of their usefulness during periods of foul weather, which remained problematic. After two years of service Shenandoah was lost on September 3^rd, 1925, breaking apart in the air while transiting an area of thunderstorms over Ohio. 13 of her crew were killed, but 29 survived the wreck. Interestingly, 7 crew members were trapped in the bow section as it broke free from the main structure; LCDR Charles Rosendahl was able to navigate the section as a free-flying balloon, bringing it down in a controlled landing not far from the main wreckage.

1939: After finally using up all their diplomatic pretexts and having neutered their Soviet adversaries with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Non-Aggression Pact (DLH 8/23), Nazi Germany invades Poland, thus marking the start of World War II. The Poles put up a fierce resistance, but German Blitzkrieg tactics, refined in combat with the Condor Legions in Spain, overwhelmed Poland’s defenses.

1939: Two days after Germany’s invasion of Poland, and in accordance with longstanding defense treaties with that beleaguered nation, France, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia declare war on Germany. From this day until the following May, the “Allies” do virtually nothing to relieve the pressure on Poland, a period known now as the “Phony War” or “Sitzkrieg.”

1945: Birth of Sir George Ivan (Van) Morrison. The Irish singer-songwriter lived for a short time in my hometown of San Anselmo, California in the late 60s, during which he penned a piece called “Snow in San Anselmo,” which only happened in our collective imaginations.

1960: American boxer Cassius Clay wins the Gold Medal at the Olympic Games in London.

1964: Death of Alvin York (b.1887). The World War I hero was a corporal during the Meuse-Argonne campaign when his battalion began to be mowed down by 32 German machine gun nests. As the firing let up, York realized it was only him and six others who could still function. He led the men behind the German machine gun line and began to systematically pick off the Germans one by one- (“And those machine guns were spitting fire and cutting down the undergrowth all around me something awful. And the Germans were yelling orders. You never heard such a racket in all of your life. I didn’t have time to dodge behind a tree or dive into the brush… As soon as the machine guns opened fire on me, I began to exchange shots with them. There were over thirty of them in continuous action, and all I could do was touch the Germans off just as fast as I could. I was sharp shooting… All the time I kept yelling at them to come down. I didn’t want to kill any more than I had to. But it was they or I. And I was giving them the best I had.) …until the commander closest to him surrendered the remaining 132 Germans to the seven Americans. York’s actions earned him the Medal of Honor and a battlefield promotion to Sergeant. The Tennessee native later explained that it was something like picking off squirrels, he started shooting at the back of the line so the ones in front didn’t know they were being cut down until it was too late. 
 
1965: First flight of the B-377-SG/SGT Super Guppy airplane, designed to carry outsized cargo. Only one remains flying, with NASA, to haul gigantic space station parts around the country.

1969: Death of Ho Chi Minh (b.1890)–colloquially known as Uncle Ho among other aliases and sobriquets, was a Vietnamese revolutionary and politician who served as the founder and first president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam from 1945 until his death in 1969, and as its first prime minister from 1945 to 1955. 

1970: Death of football legend Vince Lombardi (b.1913). American professional football coach and executive in the National Football League. Lombardi is considered by many to be among the greatest coaches and leaders in American sports.

1972: In Reykjavik, Iceland, American chess wizard and political gadfly Bobby Fischer defeats Soviet chess master Boris Spassky to become the World Champion of Chess. Because the international chess tournament worked its way down to these two competitors, the match took on unusual levels of Cold War significance, made even more weird by the antics of both of these titanic egos making demands on the lighting, stage positioning, hours of play, food, breaks, etc.

1972: American Swimmer Mark Spitz becomes the first athlete to win 7 gold medals in a single Olympic Games.

1972: At the Olympic Village in Munich, Palestinian terrorists from the “Black September” group first take hostage, and then murder eleven Israeli athletes.

1974: The  SR-71 sets a world-record flight time NYC-London in 1 hour 54 minutes 56 seconds; an average speed of 1,435.587 mph, Mach 2.68, which includes deceleration periods for in-flight refueling. The record still stands. 

1981: Death of Hitler’s architect and industrial production wizard, Albert Speer (b.1905). After serving his full 20 year sentence in Spandau Prison, he published three books that gave a unique view of the political and bureaucratic machinations of the workings of the Third Reich. 

1983: A Soviet SU-15 fighter shoots down Korean Airlines 747 enroute from Anchorage to Seoul when it strayed into Soviet airspace over Sakhalin Island. All 269 on board, including US Congressman Lawrence McDonald, are killed.

1997: Death of Diana, Princess of Wales; from injuries sustained in a Paris tunnel automobile crash.