June 14th ~ {continued...} 1940 – In German-occupied Poland the first inmates arrived at Auschwitz concentration camp. They were all Polish political prisoners. The Nazis opened their concentration camp at Auschwitz. 1941 – The CGC Duane rescued 46 survivors from the torpedoed SS Tresillian. 1941 – President Roosevelt freezes all German and Italian assets in the United States. 1942 – The first bazooka rocket gun, produced in Bridgeport, Ct., demolished a tank from its shoulder-held position. 1944 – The first raid by American B-29 Superfortress bombers is carried out. A total of 48 planes (of which 4 are lost) make an ineffective strike on the Yawata iron and steel works during the night from bases in China. 1944 – US naval forces conduct bombardments of Saipan and Tinian in preparation for landings on these islands. The two American naval groups, commanded by Admiral Ainsworth and Admiral Oldendorf, include 7 battleships and 11 cruisers as well as 8 escort carriers in support. The battleship USS California is hit by a Japanese shore battery. Extensive mine-sweeping operations are also conducted by American forces. 1944 – A third corps, the US 19th Corps, becomes operational between the 5th and 7th Corps. Free French leader, General de Gaulle, visits the beachhead and takes steps to restoring French civilian government in captured territory. 1945 – General Dwight D. Eisenhower was honored as a Companion of the Liberation by General Charles de Gaulle. 1945 – On Okinawa, mopping up operations proceed on the Oroku peninsula. The troops of the US 3rd Amphibious Corps and the US 24th Corps continue to eliminate fortified caves held by Japanese forces on Kunishi Ridge and on Mount Yuza and Mount Yaegu. An American regiment of the US 96th Division reaches the summit of Mount Yaegu, while the US th Division extends its control of Hills 153 and 115. 1945 – On Luzon, American forces dislodge the Japanese blocking the Orioung Pass. Elements of the US 37th Division, formed into an armored column, advance as far as Echague. From Santiago, other units advance toward Cabanatuan and Cauayan. 1945 – The US Joint Chiefs of Staff issue a directive to General MacArthur, General Arnold and Admiral Nimitz to prepare plans for the immediate occupation of the Japanese islands in the event of a sudden capitulation. This order may have been given in light of recent progress on the production of an atomic bomb but this is not stated. 1951 – A single communist Polikarpov PO-2 biplane dropped bombs on Suwon Airfield and another PO-2 bombed a motor pool at Inchon. These attacks marked the beginning of enemy night harassing missions that soon became known as “Bedcheck Charley.” 1951 – The destroyer-minesweeper USS Thompson was hit by communist shore battery fire suffering three sailors killed and three wounded. Having sustained 13 hits, the Thompson barely managed to escape out of range of the North Korean guns.
June 14th ~ {continued...} 1951 – U.S. Census Bureau dedicates UNIVAC, the world’s first commercially produced electronic digital computer. UNIVAC, which stood for Universal Automatic Computer, was developed by J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, makers of ENIAC, the first general-purpose electronic digital computer. These giant computers, which used thousands of vacuum tubes for computation, were the forerunners of today’s digital computers. The search for mechanical devices to aid computation began in ancient times. The abacus, developed in various forms by the Babylonians, Chinese, and Romans, was by definition the first digital computer because it calculated values by using digits. A mechanical digital calculating machine was built in France in 1642, but a 19th century Englishman, Charles Babbage, is credited with devising most of the principles on which modern computers are based. His “Analytical Engine,” begun in the 1830s and never completed for lack of funds, was based on a mechanical loom and would have been the first programmable computer. By the 1920s, companies such as the International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) were supplying governments and businesses with complex punch-card tabulating systems, but these mechanical devises had only a fraction of the calculating power of the first electronic digital computer, the Atanasoff-Berry Computer (ABC). Completed by John Atanasoff of Iowa State in 1939, the ABC could by 1941 solve up to 29 simultaneous equations with 29 variables. Influenced by Atanasoff’s work, Presper Eckert and John Mauchly set about building the first general-purpose electronic digital computer in 1943. The sponsor was the U.S. Army Ordnance Department, which wanted a better way of calculating artillery firing tables, and the work was done at the University of Pennsylvania. ENIAC, which stood for Electronic Numerical Integrator and Calculator, was completed in 1946 at a cost of nearly $500,000. It took up 15,000 feet, employed 17,000 vacuum tubes, and was programmed by plugging and replugging some 6,000 switches. It was first used in a calculation for Los Alamos Laboratories in December 1945, and in February 1946 it was formally dedicated. Following the success of ENIAC, Eckert and Mauchly decided to go into private business and founded the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation. They proved less able businessmen than they were engineers, and in 1950 their struggling company was acquired by Remington Rand, an office equipment company. On June 14, 1951, Remington Rand delivered its first computer, UNIVAC I, to the U.S. Census Bureau. It weighed 16,000 pounds, used 5,000 vacuum tubes, and could perform about 1,000 calculations per second. On November 4, 1952, the UNIVAC achieved national fame when it correctly predicted Dwight D. Eisenhower’s unexpected landslide victory in the presidential election after only a tiny percentage of the votes were in. UNIVAC and other first-generation computers were replaced by transistor computers of the late 1950s, which were smaller, used less power, and could perform nearly a thousand times more operations per second. These were, in turn, supplanted by the integrated-circuit machines of the mid-1960s and 1970s. In the 1980s, the development of the microprocessor made possible small, powerful computers such as the personal computer, and more recently the laptop and hand-held computers. 1952 – The USS Nautilus, the first atomic submarine, was dedicated in Groton, Connecticut. 1954 – President Eisenhower signed an order adding the words “under God” to the Pledge of Allegiance.
June 14th ~ {continued...} 1954 – Over 12 million Americans “die” in a mock nuclear attack, as the United States goes through its first nationwide civil defense drill. Though American officials were satisfied with the results of the drill, the event stood as a stark reminder that the United States–and the world-was now living under a nuclear shadow. The June 1954 civil defense drill was organized and evaluated by the Civil Defense Administration, and included operations in 54 cities in the United States, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Alaska, and Hawaii. Canada also participated in the exercise. The basic premise of the drill was that the United States was under massive nuclear assault from both aircraft and submarines, and that most major urban areas had been targeted. At 10 a.m., alarms were sounded in selected cities, at which time all citizens were supposed to get off the streets, seek shelter, and prepare for the onslaught. Each citizen was supposed to know where the closest fallout shelter was located; these included the basements of government buildings and schools, underground subway tunnels, and private shelters. Even President Dwight D. Eisenhower took part in the show, heading to an underground bunker in Washington, D.C. The entire drill lasted only about 10 minutes, at which time an all-clear signal was broadcast and life returned to normal. Civil Defense Administration officials estimated that New York City would suffer the most in such an attack, losing over 2 million people. Other cities, including Washington, D.C., would also endure massive loss of life. In all, it was estimated that over 12 million Americans would die in an attack. Despite those rather mind-numbing figures, government officials pronounced themselves very pleased with the drill. Minor problems in communication occurred, and one woman in New York City managed to create a massive traffic jam by simply stopping her car in the middle of the road, leaping out, and running for cover. In most cities, however, the streets were deserted just moments after the alarms sounded and there were no signs of panic or criminal behavior. A more cautious assessment came from a retired military officer, who observed that the recent development of the hydrogen bomb by the Soviet Union had “outstripped the progress made in our civil defense strides to defend against it.” 1964 – General Westmoreland is in Malaysia to study the methods used by the British to defeat the Communist guerrillas there. 1964 – The US military allows its own pilots operating out of Thailand to hit targets of opportunity in Laos. 1967 – The space probe Mariner 5 was launched from Cape Kennedy on a flight that took it past Venus. 1968 – A Federal District Court jury in Boston convicts Dr. Benjamin Spock of conspiring to aid draft registrants in violating the Selective Service Law. 1969 – The U.S. announces that three combat units will be withdrawn from Vietnam. They were the 1st and 2nd Brigades of the U.S. Army 9th Infantry Division and Regimental Landing Team 9 of the 3rd Marine Division–a total of about 13,000 to 14,000 men. These troops were part of the first U.S. troop withdrawal, which had been announced on June 8 by President Richard Nixon at the Midway conference with South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu. Nixon had promised that 25,000 troops would be withdrawn by the end of the year, and more support troops were later sent home in addition to the aforementioned combat forces in order to meet that number.
June 14th ~ {continued...} 1972 – US planes flying a record number of strikes over North Vietnam, 340, sever the main railway line between Hanoi and Haiphong. 1985 – TWA Flight 847 from Athens to Rome is hijacked by Shiite Hezbollah terrorists who immediately demand to know the identity of ”those with Jewish-sounding names.” Two of the Lebanese terrorists armed with grenades, axes, and a 9-mm. pistol then forced the plane to land at the Beirut Airport in Lebanon. Once on the ground, the hijackers called for passengers with Israeli passports, but there were none. Nor were there any diplomats on board. They then focused their attention on the several U.S. Navy construction divers aboard the plane. Soon after landing, the terrorists killed Navy diver Robert Stethem, and dumped his body on the runway. TWA employee Uli Dickerson was largely successful in protecting the few Jewish passengers aboard by refusing to identify them. Most of the passengers were released in the early hours of what turned out to be a 17-day ordeal, but five men were singled out and separated from the rest of the hostages. Of these five, only Richard Herzberg, an American, was Jewish. Luckily, he had told his wife early on in the attack to get rid of a ring bearing a Hebrew inscription. During the next two weeks, Herzberg maintained to his attackers that he was a Lutheran of German and Greek ancestry. Along with the others, he was taken to a roach-infested holding cell somewhere in Beirut, where other Lebanese prisoners were being held and tortured in the makeshift prison. Fortunately, however, the TWA hostages were treated fairly well-they were even given a birthday cake on one occasion. On June 30th, after careful negotiations, the hostages were released unharmed. Since the terrorists were effectively outside the law’s reach in Lebanon, it appeared as though the terrorists would go free from punishment. Yet, Mohammed Ali Hamadi, who was wanted for his role in TWA Flight 847 attack, was arrested nearly two years later at the airport in Frankfurt, Germany, with explosives. Within days of his arrest, two German citizens were kidnapped while in Lebanon in a successful attempt to discourage Germany from extraditing Hamadi to the United States for prosecution. Germany decided to try Hamadi instead, and he was convicted and sentenced to life in prison, the maximum penalty under German law. Although both German hostages had already been released by this time, three additional German citizens were kidnapped on the day of the verdict. 1991 – The space shuttle “Columbia” returned from a medical research mission. 1999 – About 15,000 NATO peacekeepers spread out across Kosovo, including a convoy of about 1200 US Marines. 2000 – In Florida George Trofimoff (73) was arrested for spying for the Soviet KGB from 1969-1995. He had served as chief of an Army unit responsible for interviewing Warsaw pact defectors. 2000 – US federal marine specialists reported that the US Navy induced underwater noise caused the death of at least a dozen whales in the Bahamas in March. Hemorrhages were found around the animals’ ears. 2000 – Pres. Kim Jong Il of North Korea and Pres. Kim Dae Jung of South Korea pledged concrete steps toward unifying their divided peninsula and signed an agreement to allow visits for some families separated for the last five decades. 2001 – President Bush ordered a stop to the Navy bombing exercises on Puerto Rico’s Vieques Island. Cleanup was estimated to cost hundreds of millions and take decades. Bombing practice was set to stop by May, 2003. 2001 – Macedonia asked for NATO troops the help disarm ethnic Albanian rebels. Nato Sec. Gen. Lord Robertson ruled out military intervention. 2002 – The US became officially free from a 1972 treaty that banned major missile defenses. In Alaska work was set to begin on missile interceptors. 2002 – In Afghanistan Pres. Hamid Karzai outlined a list of national priorities that included building a national army and police force, improving schools and health care and creating jobs. 2002 – In Pakistan suicide bomber blew up a truck at the US consulate in Karachi killed 14 people and injured many more. No Americans were believed killed. The Bush administration planned to evaluate how many U.S. personnel should be kept in Pakistan. The Lashkar-e-Omar coalition, formed in January, was blamed. 2004 – The US military released hundreds of prisoners from Abu Ghraib prison.
June 15th ~ 1607 – Colonists in North America completed James Fort in Jamestown. 1775 – The Second Continental Congress voted unanimously to appoint George Washington head of the Continental Army. 1775 – Word reached the Americans that the British intended to occupy the Charlestown peninsula. 1776 – Delaware declared independence from both England and Pennsylvania with whom it had shared a royal governor. 1779 – General Anthony Wayne captured Stony Point, New York, from the British. “I’ll storm the Gates of Hell if you will but plan the attack,” Wayne told Gen. Washington. 1836 – Arkansas was admitted into the Union as the 25th state. 1844 – Charles Goodyear received a patent for the vulcanization of rubber, his process to strengthen rubber. 1846 – Representatives of Great Britain and the United States sign the Oregon Treaty, which settles a long-standing dispute with Britain over who controlled the Oregon territory. The treaty established the 49th parallel from the Rocky Mountains to the Strait of Georgia as the boundary between the United States and British Canada. The United States gained formal control over the future states of Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Montana, and the British retained Vancouver Island and navigation rights to part of the Columbia River. In 1818, a U.S.-British agreement had established the border along the 49th parallel from Lake of the Woods in the east to the Rocky Mountains in the west. The two nations also agreed to a joint occupation of Oregon territory for 10 years, an arrangement that was extended for an additional 10 years in 1827. After 1838, the issue of who possessed Oregon became increasingly controversial, especially when mass American migration along the Oregon Trail began in the early 1840s. American expansionists urged seizure of Oregon, and in 1844 Democrat James K. Polk successfully ran for president under the platform “Fifty-four forty or fight,” which referred to his hope of bringing a sizable portion of present-day Vancouver and Alberta into the United States. However, neither President Polk nor the British government wanted a third Anglo-American war, and on June 15, 1846, the Oregon Treaty, a compromise, was signed. By the terms of the agreement, the U.S. and Canadian border was extended west along the 49th parallel to the Strait of Georgia, just short of the Pacific Ocean. 1849 – James Polk, the 11th president of the United States, died in Nashville, Tennessee. 1862 – Confederate cavalry commander J.E.B. Stuart completes a four-day ride around George B. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac in the area of the James Peninsula.
June 15th ~ {continued...} 1862 – James River Flotilla, including U.S.S. Monitor, Galena, Aroostook, Port Royal, and Naugatuck, under Commander J – Rodgers encountered obstructions sunk across the river and at close range hotly engaged sharpshooters and strong Confederate batteries, manned in part by sailors and Marines, at Drewry’s Bluff, Virginia. For his part in the ensuing action, Corporal John B. Mackie, a member of Galena’s Marine Guard, was cited for gallantry in a letter to Secretary of the Navy Welles; in Department of the Navy General Order 17, issued on 10 July 1863, Mackie was awarded the first Medal of Honor authorized a member of the Marine Corps. In the bombardment, Galena was heavily damaged but, unsupported, Rodgers penetrated the James River to within eight miles of Richmond before falling back. Rodgers stated at this time that troops were needed to take Drewry’ s Bluff in the rear. Had this been done, Richmond might well have fallen. 1863 – President Abraham Lincoln calls for help in protecting the capital. Throughout June, Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia was on the move. He had pulled his army from its position along the Rappahannock River around Fredericksburg and set it on the road to Pennsylvania. Lee and the Confederate leadership decided to try a second invasion of the North to take pressure off Virginia and to seize the initiative against the Army of the Potomac. The first invasion, in September 1862, failed when the Federals fought Lee’s army to a standstill at Antietam. Lee later divided his army and sent the regiments toward the Shenandoah Valley, using the Blue Ridge Mountains as a screen. After the Confederates took Winchester, Virginia, on June 14th, they were situated on the Potomac River, seemingly in a position to move on Washington, D.C. Lincoln did not know it, but Lee had no intention of attacking Washington. All Lincoln knew was that the Rebel army was moving en masse and that Union troops could not be certain as to the Confederates’ location. On June 15th, Lincoln put out an emergency call for 100,000 troops from the state militias of Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio, and West Virginia. Although the troops were not needed, and the call could not be fulfilled in such a short time, it was an indication of how little the Union authorities knew of Lee’s movements and how vulnerable they thought the Federal capital was. 1863 – Confederate guerrillas fired into U.S.S. Marmora, Acting Lieutenant Getty, near Eunice, Arkansas, and on the morning of the 14th, took transport Nebraska under fire. In retaliation, Getty sent a landing party ashore and destroyed the town, “including the railroad depot, with locomotive and car inside, also the large warehouse . . . The next day, June 15th, landing parties from Marmora and U.S.S. Prairie Bird, Acting Lieutenant Edward E. Brennand, destroyed the town of Gaines Landing in retaliation for a guerrilla attempt to burn the Union coal barge there and for firing on Marmora. 1864 – Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton signed an order establishing a military burial ground at Robert E. Lee’s home estate at Arlington. This became Arlington National Cemetery. 1864 – Confederate artillery opened fire in the early morning hours on wooden side-wheeler U.S.S. General Bragg, Acting Lieutenant Dominy, lying off Como Landing, Louisiana. The return fire from General Bragg forced the Southerners to move to Ratliff’s Landing where they fired on small paddle-wheel steamer U.S.S. Naiad, Acting Master Henry T. Keene. U.S.S. Winnebago, a double-turreted river monitor, alerted by the sound of gunfire, soon hove into sight, and the combined firepower of the three ships temporarily silenced the field battery. Next day, General Bragg was again taken under fire by Confederate guns on the river bank and another spirited engagement ensued, during which a shot disabled the ship’s engine.
June 15th ~ {continued...} 1864 – During the Civil War, Ulysses S. Grant’s Army of the Potomac and Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia collide for the last time as the first wave of Union troops attacks Petersburg, a vital Southern rail center 23 miles south of the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia. The two massive armies would not become disentangled until April 9, 1865, when Lee surrendered and his men went home. In June 1864, in a brilliant tactical maneuver, Grant marched his army around the Army of Northern Virginia, crossed the James River unopposed, and advanced his forces to Petersburg. Knowing that the fall of Petersburg would mean the fall of Richmond, Lee raced to reinforce the city’s defenses. The mass of Grant’s army arrived first. On June 15th, the first day of the Battle of Petersburg, some 10,000 Union troops under General William F. Smith moved against the Confederate defenders of Petersburg, made up of only a few thousand armed old men and boys commanded by General P.G.T. Beauregard. However, the Confederates had the advantage of formidable physical defenses, and they held off the overly cautious Union assault. The next day, more Federal troops arrived, but Beauregard was reinforced by Lee, and the Confederate line remained unbroken during several Union attacks occurring over the next two days. By June 18th, Grant had nearly 100,000 at his disposal at Petersburg, but the 20,000 Confederate defenders held on as Lee hurried the rest of his Army of Northern Virginia into the entrenchments. Knowing that further attacks would be futile, but satisfied to have bottled up the Army of Northern Virginia, Grant’s army dug trenches and began a prolonged siege of Petersburg. Finally, on April 2, 1865, with his defense line overextended and his troops starving, Lee’s right flank suffered a major defeat against Union cavalry under General Phillip Sheridan, and Grant ordered a general attack on all fronts. The Army of Northern Virginia retreated under heavy fire; the Confederate government fled Richmond on Lee’s recommendation; and Petersburg, and then Richmond, fell to the Union. Less than a week later, Grant’s massive army headed off the remnants of the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox Station, and Lee was forced to surrender, effectively ending the Civil War. 1877 – Some 800 Nez Perce were pursued by the US Army and began their journey to reach safety in Canada. The Nez Perce had been ordered to leave the Valley of the Winding Waters in the Northwest. They refused to be resettled and fled. 1877 – Henry Ossian Flipper, born a slave in Thomasville, Georgia, in 1856, is the first African American cadet to graduate from the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York. Flipper, who was never spoken to by a white cadet during his four years at West Point, was appointed a second lieutenant in the all-African American 10th Cavalry, stationed at Fort Sill in Indian Territory. In 1870, the first African American cadet, James Webster Smith, was admitted into the academy but never reached the graduation ceremonies. It was not until 1877 that Henry Ossian Flipper became the first to graduate, after enduring four years of prejudice and silence. In 1976, the first female cadets were admitted into West Point. The academy is now under the general direction and supervision of the department of the U.S. Army and has an enrollment of more than 4,000 students. 1888 – Wilhelm II became emperor of Germany. 1898 – The U.S. House of representatives approved the annexation of Hawaii. Some 38,000 Hawaiians signed the “Monster Petition” that was delivered to Washington by Queen Liliu’okalani. the petition was ignored. 1898 – US Marines continued attacking the Spanish off Guantanamo, Cuba.
June 15th ~ {continued...} 1916 – President Woodrow Wilson signed a bill incorporating the Boy Scouts of America. 1917 – Congress passed and President Woodrow Wilson signed into law the Espionage Act, authorizing the Treasury Secretary to assume control of U.S. ports, control ship movements, establish anchorages and supervise the loading and storage of explosive cargoes. The authority was immediately delegated to the Coast Guard and formed the basis for the formation of the Coast Guard’s Captain of the Ports and the Port Security Program. 1918 – The U.S. Post Office and the U.S. Army began regularly scheduled airmail service between Washington and New York through Philadelphia. Lieutenant George L. Boyle, an inexperienced young army pilot, was chosen to make the first flight from Washington. Even with a route map stitched to his breeches, Boyle lost his way and flew south rather than north. The second leg of the Washington–Philadelphia–New York flight, however, took off and arrived in New York on schedule–without the Washington mail. 1940 – Another Navy bill passes into law. This provides for a much expanded air corps, with 10,000 planes and 16,000 more aircrew. 1943 – Paul Blobel, an SS colonel, is given the assignment of coordinating the destruction of the evidence of the grossest of Nazi atrocities, the systematic extermination of European Jews. As the summer of 1943 approached, Allied forces had begun making cracks in Axis strongholds, in the Pacific and in the Mediterranean specifically. Heinrich Himmler, leader of the SS, the elite corps of Nazi bodyguards that grew into a paramilitary terror force, began to consider the possibility of German defeat and worried that the mass murder of Jews and Soviet prisoners of war would be discovered. A plan was devised to dig up the buried dead and burn the corpses at each camp and extermination site. Blobel certainly had some of that blood on his hands himself, as he was in charge of SS killing squads in German-occupied areas of Russia. He now drew together another kind of squad, “Special Commando Group 1,005,” dedicated to this destruction of human evidence. Blobel began with “death pits” near Lvov, in Poland, and forced hundreds of Jewish slave laborers from the nearby concentration camp to dig up the corpses and burn them-but not before extracting the gold from the teeth of the victims. 1944 – American forces began their successful invasion of Saipan during World War II. Meanwhile, B-29 Super Fortresses made their first raids on Japan. Coast Guard-manned transports that took part in the invasion included the USSs Cambria, Arthur Middleton, Callaway, Leonard Wood, LST-19, LST-23, LST-166 and LST-169. Preceded by naval gunfire and carrier air strikes, the V Amphibious Corps assaulted the west coast of Saipan, Marianas Islands. By nightfall, the 2d and 4th Marine Divisions, moving against heavy opposition, had established a beachhead 10,000 yards wide and 1,500 yards deep. 1944 – Admiral Clark leads two groups of US carrier forces raiding Iwo Jima, Chichi Jima and Haha Jima. The Japanese carriers are sighted by US patrols heading through the San Bernardino Strait while some of the Japanese battleships are seen east of Mindanao. 1944 – A fourth American corps is add to the US 1st Army. The US 8th Corps becomes operations on the Cotentin Peninsula. Meanwhile, elements of the US 7th Corps capture Quineville.
June 15th ~ {continued...} 1944 – The first B-29 Super Fortress raid on Japan is conducted. Bombers from the US 20th Air Force in China attack Yawatta on Kyushu. 1945 – American OSS units complete mopping up operations in the Shan Mountains area. 1945 – US B-29 Super Fortress bombers drop 3000 tons of bombs on Osaka. 1945 – On Okinawa, Marines suffer heavy casualties and are unable to advance on Kunishi Ridge. The US 1st Division, already short of troops, is attached to the US 2nd Marine Division. Forces of the US 24th Corps continue operations to eliminate Japanese positions on Mount Yaeju and Mount Yuza. 1945 – On Luzon, Filipino guerrillas seize Cervantes in the north. Meanwhile, the US 37th Division continues to battle forward in the Cagayan valley, eliminating a Japanese strong point about 3 miles from Santiago, near Cabanatuan. 1946 – The United States presents the Baruch Plan for the international control of atomic weapons to the United Nations. The failure of the plan to gain acceptance resulted in a dangerous nuclear arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. In August 1945, the United States dropped two atomic bombs on Japan, becoming the first and only nation to use nuclear weapons during wartime. The successful use of the bombs not only ended World War II, but also left the United States with a monopoly on the most destructive weapon known to humankind. As Cold War animosities between the United States and the Soviet Union began to develop in the months after the end of the war, a sharp discussion ensued in the administration of President Harry S. Truman. Some officials, including Secretary of War Henry R. Stimson and Secretary of Commerce Henry Wallace, argued that the United States should share its atomic secrets with the Soviets. The continuing U.S. monopoly, they argued, would only result in growing Russian suspicions and an eventual arms race. Others, such as State Department official George F. Kennan, strenuously argued against this position. The Soviets, these people declared, could not be trusted and the United States would be foolish to relinquish its atomic “ace in the hole.” The battle between these two groups was apparent in early 1946, when the United States proposed the formation of the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission (UNAEC) to establish an international control over the spread and development of nuclear weapons and technology. Bernard Baruch, a trusted adviser to U.S. presidents since the early 20th century, was tapped to formulate the American proposal and present it to the United Nations. Baruch sided with those who feared the Soviets, and his proposal reflected this. His proposal did provide for international control and inspection of nuclear production facilities, but clearly announced that the United States would maintain its nuclear weapons monopoly until every aspect of the proposal was in effect and working. The Soviets, not surprisingly, rejected the Baruch Plan. The United States thereupon rejected a Soviet counterproposal for a ban on all nuclear weapons. By 1949, any discussion of international control of nuclear weapons was a moot point. In September of that year, the Soviets successfully tested a nuclear device. During the next few years the United States and Soviet Union raced to develop an ever-more frightening arsenal of nuclear weapons, including the hydrogen bomb, MIRV missiles (missiles with multiple nuclear warheads), and the neutron bomb (designed to kill people but leave structures standing). 1946 – 10th Marines help police in Black Market Riot – Nagasaki, Japan. 1952 – U.S. Air Force Second Lieutenant James F. Low, 4th Fighter-Interceptor Wing, became the 17th ace of the Korean War with his fifth MiG kill. The most junior in grade ace of the war, Low had been in combat for only six days. 1953 – The USS Princeton launched 184 sorties and established a single-day Korean War record for offensive sorties flown from the deck of a carrier. 1963 – Launching of combat store ship, Mars (AFS-1), first of new class of underway replenishment ships.
June 15th ~ {continued...} 1964 – At a meeting of the National Security Council, McGeorge Bundy, President Lyndon B. Johnson’s national security advisor, informs those in attendance that President Johnson has decided to postpone submitting a resolution to Congress asking for authority to wage war. The situation in South Vietnam had rapidly deteriorated, and in March 1964, Secretary of State Robert McNamara reported that 40 percent of the countryside was under Viet Cong control or influence. Johnson was afraid that he would be run out of office if South Vietnam fell to the communists, but he was not prepared to employ American military power on a large scale. Several of his advisers, led by McGeorge Bundy’s brother, William, had developed a scenario of graduated overt pressures against North Vietnam, according to which the president–after securing a Congressional resolution–would authorize air strikes against selected North Vietnamese targets. Johnson rejected the idea of submitting the resolution to Congress because it would “raise a whole series of disagreeable questions” which might jeopardize the passage of his administration’s civil rights legislation. Just two months later, they revisited idea of a resolution in the wake of the Tonkin Gulf incident. In August, after North Vietnamese torpedo boats attacked U.S. destroyers in what became known as the Tonkin Gulf incident, Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara and Secretary of State Dean Rusk appeared before a joint Congressional committee on foreign affairs. They presented the Johnson administration’s arguments for a resolution authorizing the president “to take all necessary measures” to defend Southeast Asia. Subsequently, Congress passed Public Law 88-408, which became known as the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, which gave President Johnson the power to take whatever actions he deemed necessary, including “the use of armed force.” The resolution passed 82 to 2 in the Senate, where Wayne K. Morse (D-Oregon) and Ernest Gruening (D-Alaska) were the only dissenting votes; the bill passed unanimously in the House of Representatives. President Johnson signed it into law on August 10th and it became the legal basis for every presidential action taken by the Johnson administration during its conduct of the war. 1965 – U.S. planes bomb targets in North Vietnam, but refrain from bombing Hanoi and the Soviet missile sites that surround the city. On June 17, two U.S. Navy jets downed two communist MiGs, and destroyed another enemy aircraft three days later. U.S. planes also dropped almost 3 million leaflets urging the North Vietnamese to get their leaders to end the war. These missions were part of Operation Rolling Thunder, launched in March 1965, after President Lyndon B. Johnson ordered a sustained bombing campaign of North Vietnam. The operation was designed to interdict North Vietnamese transportation routes in the southern part of the North Vietnam and to slow infiltration of personnel and supplies into South Vietnam. During the early months of this campaign, there were restrictions against striking targets in or near Hanoi and Haiphong, but in July 1966, Rolling Thunder was expanded to include the bombing of North Vietnamese ammunition dumps and oil storage facilities. In the spring of 1967, it was further expanded to include power plants, factories, and airfields in the Hanoi and Haiphong areas. The White House closely controlled Operation Rolling Thunder and at times President Johnson personally selected the targets. From 1965 to 1968, about 643,000 tons of bombs were dropped on North Vietnam. The operation continued, with occasional suspensions, until President Johnson halted it entirely on October 31, 1968, under increasing domestic political pressure. 1969 – North Vietnamese forces twice attack Third Brigade headquarters of the 101st Airborne Division atop a 2,000-foot peak just east of Apbia mountain.
June 15th ~ {continued...} 1986 – Commandant ADM Paul Yost bans the wearing of beards by Coast Guard personnel. 1991 – Mount Pinatubo (4,750 feet high) erupted. Due to early warning 56,000 people were evacuated and only 450 people died. The eruption forced the closure of Clark Air Force Base in Angeles City and displaced hundreds of families of the Aeta tribe. 2 battle groups and amphibious ships evacuate dependents and Air Force personnel from Clark. 1992 – The Supreme Court ruled the government may seize criminal suspects from a foreign country for prosecution. 1994 – Former President Jimmy Carter arrived in North Korea on a private mission to try to reduce tensions with the communist nation. 1996 – UN weapons inspectors gave up after a 5-day standoff with Iraqi authorities over inspection of 4 sites for documents and other material relating to weapons of mass destruction. 1998 – US F-16 fighter jets took off as part of a 13-nation, 85 warplane NATO show of force over Albania and Macedonia. Meanwhile Serb forces attacked 4 Kosovo villages with grenades and helicopter gunships and began sealing off the border to Albania. 2000 – In Kosovo 2 Serbs were killed and another wounded when their vehicle ran over a land mine. NATO peacekeepers raided an ethnic Albanian stronghold in Drenica and seized a large quantity of weapons and ammunition. Halil Dreshaj, a member of the Democratic League of Kosovo, was shot and killed by masked men wearing uniforms of the disbanded KLA. 2001 – President Bush spoke in Poland and strongly backed the expansion of NATO into Eastern Europe. On the eve of his first meeting with Vladimir Putin, President Bush, chastised Russia for suspected nuclear commerce and encouraged the former Cold War rival to help “erase the false lines that have divided Europe.” 2001 – It was reported that the Bush administration had decided to restore some military ties with Indonesia. The Clinton administration had cut some ties during the 1999 upheavals in East Timor. 2003 – With a deadline passed for Iraqis to hand in heavy weapons, U.S. forces fanned out across Iraq to seize arms and put down potential foes. 2004 – Iraq’s interim government received a boost when its neighbors welcomed the transfer of sovereignty in that country at the end of June. 2004 – A Saudi al Qaeda group threatened to execute Paul M. Johnson Jr. within 72 hours unless fellow jihadists were released were released from prison. 2009 – Law Enforcement officers from the 14th Coast Guard District reported aboard the USS Crommelin (FFG-37) to support U.S. Coast Guard fisheries enforcement in Oceania in an operation called the “Fight for Fish” mission. It marked the first time a Navy warship was utilized “to transit the Western Pacific enforcing fishing regulations in a joint effort with the Coast Guard to stop illegal fishing in this region.” 2014 – ISIS militants captured the Iraqi city of Tal Afar in the province of Nineveh. ISIS claimed that 1,700 Iraqi soldiers who had surrendered in the fighting had been killed, and released many images of mass executions via its Twitter feed and various websites.
June 16th ~ 1745 – English fleet occupied Cape Breton on St. Lawrence River. 1755 – British captured Fort Beausejour and expelled the Acadians. The Accadians of Nova Scotia were uprooted by an English governor and forced to leave. Some 10,000 people moved to destinations like Maine and Louisiana. Some moved to Iles-de-la-Madeleine off Quebec. The Longfellow story “Evangeline” is based on this displacement. 1775 – American Col. William Prescott led 1200 men from Cambridge to dig in at Bunker’s Hill but arrived at night and dug in at Breed’s Hill. A siege on Boston by Colonial militia generals John Stark and Israel Putnam prompted the British to attack. 1775 – The post of Adjutant General was established June 16, 1775, and has been continuously in operation since that time. The Adjutant General’s Department, by that name, was established by the act of March 3, 1813, and was redesignated the Adjutant General’s Corps in 1950. 1775 – Continental Congress authority for a “Chief Engineer for the Army” was passed. A corps of Engineers for the United States was authorized by the Congress on March 11, 1779. The Corps of Engineers as it is known today came into being on March 16, 1802, when the President was authorized to “organize and establish a Corps of Engineers … that the said Corps … shall be stationed at West Point in the State of New York and shall constitute a Military Academy.” A Corps of Topographical Engineers, authorized on July 4, 1838, was merged with the Corps of Engineers on March 1863. 1775 – The Finance Corps is the successor to the old Pay Department, which was created in June 1775. The Finance Department was created by law on July 1, 1920. It became the Finance Corps in 1950. 1775 – The Quartermaster Corps, originally designated the Quartermaster Department, was established on June 16, 1775. While numerous additions, deletions, and changes of function have occurred, its basic supply and service support functions have continued in existence. 1779 – Spain, in support of the US, declared war on England. 1856 – James Strang, king of Big Beaver Island, Mich., was ambushed by Thomas Bedford and Alexander Wentworth. They shot him three times and then pistol-whipped him and fled to Mackinac on the USS Michigan. Bedfrod and Wentworth were brought before a justice of the peace and after a brief hearing were fined $1.25 for court costs and released as public heroes. Soon after, 75 vigilantes sailed to Beaver Island and cleared out the Strangite adherents. 1861 – A Union attempt to capture Charleston, South Carolina, is thwarted when the Confederates turn back an attack at Secessionville, just south of the city on James Island. 1862 – Union naval squadron under Commander S.P. Lee in U.S.S. Oneida, advancing up the Mississippi River toward Vicksburg, shelled Grand Gulf, Mississippi. 1863 – Acting Master John C. Bunner, U.S.S. New Era, obtained a report that Confederate troops “meditated an attack on either Columbus, Hickman, Island 10, or New Madrid. . . “ Bunner at once proceeded above Island No. 10, found and destroyed nine boats and flats. He reported: “I do not think the enemy can procure transportation enough to attack the island with any hope of success, but am careful that none at all shall remain at his service in this vicinity.” 1864 – Siege of Petersburg and Richmond began after a moonlight skirmish. 1864 – Battle of Lynchburg, VA. 1864 – U.S.S. Commodore Perry, Acting Lieutenant A. P. Foster, shelled Fort Clifton, Virginia, at the request of Major General Butler. Bombardment by the ship’s heavy guns was almost a daily part of continuing naval support of Army operations along the James River.
June 16th ~ {continued...} 1897 – The US government signed a treaty of annexation with Hawaii. 1898 – U.S. squadron bombards Santiago, Cuba. 1922 – Henry Berliner demonstrated his helicopter to US Bureau of Aeronautics. 1933 – The National Industrial Recovery Act became law. It was later struck down by the Supreme Court. 1941 – President Roosevelt orders that all German and Italian consulates in the country should be closed, along with the offices of other German agencies. 1941 – The 1st Provisional Marine Brigade was activated for duty in Iceland. 1943 – US fighters from Henderson Field claim to have shot down 93 Japanese aircraft from a force attacking shipping assembled for operations against New Georgia Island. 1943 – Operation Husky. The first convoys bound for the invasion of Sicily leave port. 1944 – Forces of the US 5th Army take Grosseto, Italy. 1944 – Elements of the US 1st Army, advancing westward, cross the Douvre River and capture St. Saveur in the Cotentin Peninsula. 1944 – US battleships, under the command of Admiral Ainsworth, shell Guam. The invasion of the island is deferred, however, because of the approach of the Japanese fleet. On Saipan, the elements of US 5th Amphibious Corps link the two beachheads by capturing Charan Karoa and Afetna Point. There is substantial use of artillery by the Japanese and American counter battery fire in addition to the infantry combat. 1944 – Admiral Clark leads two groups of US carrier forces raiding Iwo Jima, Chichi Jima and Haha Jima. The Japanese fleets link up and refuel. US patrols make two sightings. 1945 – On Okinawa, Mount Yuza is captured by the US 381st Infantry Regiment. Fighting continues on the south of the island. At sea, the Japanese air offensive against American ships slackens, but the Japanese still sink 1 destroyer and damage 1 escort carrier. 1947 – Pravda denounced the Marshall Plan. 1951 – The 1st Marine Division reached its objective — a line running northeast from the Hwachon Reservoir through the Punch Bowl, a gigantic volcanic crater. 1954 – China’s Chou Enlai, now negotiating for the Communists against the West, suggests that Vietminh troops withdraw from Laos and Cambodia. It is now clear that China and the Soviet Union, represented by Vyacheslav Molotov, are bringing pressure to bear on the Vietminh not to wreck the conference. Members of the Vietminh delegation will later complain that their revolution was halted on the verge of success, but without Chinese aid, they cannot be certain of expelling the French. 1955 – The U.S. House of Representatives voted to extend Selective Service until 1959.
June 16th ~ {continued...} 1961 – Following a meeting between President John F. Kennedy and South Vietnam envoy Nguyen Dinh Thuan, an agreement is reached for direct training and combat supervision of Vietnamese troops by U.S. instructors. South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem had earlier asked Kennedy to send additional U.S. troops to train the South Vietnamese Army. U.S. advisers had been serving in Vietnam since 1955 as part of the U.S. Military Assistance Advisory Group. There would be only 900 U.S. military personnel in South Vietnam at the end of 1961, but in accordance with President Kennedy’s pledge to provide American military assistance to South Vietnam, the number of U.S. personnel rose to 3,200 by the end of 1962. The number would climb until it reached 16,000 by the time of President Kennedy’s assassination in November 1963. 1965 – Navy Department schedules reactivation of hospital ship Repose (AH-16), first hospital ship activated for Vietnam Conflict. 1965 – Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara announces that 21,000 more U.S. troops are to be sent to Vietnam. He also claimed that it was now known that North Vietnamese regular troops had begun to infiltrate South Vietnam. The new U.S. troops were to join the U.S. Marines and paratroopers from the 173rd Airborne Brigade that had arrived earlier to secure U.S. airbases and facilities. These forces would soon transition from defensive missions to direct combat operations. As the war escalated, more and more U.S. combat troops were sent to South Vietnam. By 1969, there were over 540,000 American troops in Vietnam. 1967 – The Vietcong’s National Liberation Front Radio warns that captured Americans will be executed if ‘the US aggressors and their Saigon stooges’ execute ‘three Vietnamese patriots’ sentenced to death by a special military tribunal in Saigon. 1970 – Congress turns down end-the-war proposals as the Senate refuses twice to set a Vietnam troop withdrawal deadline and the House on 17 June also declines to set a pullout date. 1970 – North Vietnamese and Viet Cong attacks almost completely isolate Phnom Penh. The principal fighting raged in and around Kompong Thom, about 90 miles north of the capital. On June 17th, Cambodia’s last working railway line, which ran to the border of Thailand, was severed when communist troops seized a freight train with 200 tons of rice and other food supplies at a station at Krang Lovea, about 40 miles northwest of Phnom Penh. 1978 – President Carter and Panamanian leader Omar Torrijos exchanged instruments of ratification for the Panama Canal treaties.
June 16th ~ {continued...} 1992 – President George H.W. Bush and Russian President Boris Yeltsin capped the first day of their Washington summit by announcing their countries had agreed to slash their long-range nuclear arsenals by two-thirds. 1992 – Former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger was indicted on 5-count felony charges in connection with the Iran-Contra affair. He was later pardoned by Bush. 1993 – Six hours of fierce street battles are fought by UN troops backed by US helicopters, to capture Aidid’s headquarters. One American GI is slightly injured. 130 GIs of the 1/22 Infantry are rushed in to back the UN forces. 1998 – In Afghanistan the Taliban ordered the closing of over 100 private schools that had been educating girls. Schools would not be allowed to teach girls older than 8 and lessons were to be limited to the Koran. 1998 – North Korea admitted that it had sold missiles abroad and would continue to do so to generate needed income. 1998 – In Serbia President Milosevic agreed to allow monitors into Kosovo and to begin talks with Kosovo Albanian leaders, but not to withdraw his military forces until “terrorist activities subside.” 1999 – Kathleen Ann Soliah, a fugitive member of the Symbionese Liberation Army, was captured in St. Paul, Minnesota, where she had made a new life under the name Sara Jane Olson. 1999 – The US decided to support a British and Dutch proposal to partially lift oil sanctions on Iraq in exchange for answers on weapons programs and a new group of UN arms inspectors. Iraq rejected the proposal. 1999 – US Marines in Kosovo disarmed 116 members of the KLA. 2001 – President Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin, face to face for the first time, pledged during a meeting in Slovenia to deepen their nations’ bonds and to explore the possibility of compromise on U.S. missile defense plans. Putin warned Bush against Nato expansion and “unilateral action” on missile defense, but they promoted their new friendship and planned economic cooperation. 2002 – The Bush administration revealed a secret plan to for the CIA to undermine and possibly kill Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. 2002 – Philippine troops shot dead one Muslim rebel and wounded an unknown number in their first clash with the guerrillas since an American hostage was killed in a rescue operation more than a week ago. 2003 – Abid Hamid Mahmud al-Tikriti, No. 4 on the wanted list, surrendered at a private home in Tikrit following informants’ tips. Nearby US soldiers found two boxes, each counting $4 million in bundled hundred-dollar bills, along with hundreds of pieces of jewelry, a sniper rifle and two pounds of plastic explosive. 2004 – Saboteurs blasted a southern pipeline for the 2nd time in as many days, shutting down Iraq’s oil exports. Gunmen killed a security chief for the state-run Northern Oil Co. Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his Shiite militias out of Najaf and Kufa. 2004 – A Jordanian military court convicted 15 men, only one of whom was in custody, for a terror conspiracy targeting U.S. and Israeli interests. 2007 – Operation Phantom Thunder began when Multi-National Force-Iraq launched major offensive operations against al-Qaeda and other extremist terrorists operating throughout Iraq. Operation Phantom Thunder was a corps level operation, including Operation Arrowhead Ripper in Diyala Province, Operation Marne Torch and Operation Commando Eagle in Babil Province, Operation Fardh al-Qanoon in Baghdad, Operation Alljah in Anbar Province, and continuing special forces actions against the Mahdi Army in southern Iraq and against Al-Qaeda leadership throughout the country. The operation was one of the biggest military operations in Iraq since the U.S. invasion in 2003. On 14 August, it was announced that the operation ended. Coalition and Iraqi security forces pushed into areas previously not under their control, and they also ejected insurgent groups from their strongholds in Northern Babil, eastern Anbar and Diyala provinces and on the southern outskirts of Baghdad. During the operation, Iraqi and Coalition forces conducted intelligence raids against al Qaeda in Iraq and the Iranian-backed cells nationwide, with a heavy emphasis on cells in Baghdad, Diyala, and central and northern Iraq. Operation Arrowhead Ripper continued for another five days until 19 August with more intense street fighting in Baquba. The operations continued into operation Phantom Strike. 2007 – Operation Marne Torch began in the Arab Jabour and Salman Pak area, conducted by the new Multinational Division Central. Arab Jabour, being only 20 kilometers southeast from Baghdad, is a major transit point for insurgent forces in and out of Baghdad. By 14 August, 2,500 Coalition and Iraqi forces had detained more than five dozen suspected extremists, destroyed 51 boats, killed 88 terrorists and discovered and destroyed 51 weapons caches. 2007 – Operation Alljah was being conducted by Multi-National Forces West.
June 17th ~ 1579 – During his circumnavigation of the world, English seaman Francis Drake anchors in a harbor just north of present-day San Francisco, California, and claims the territory for Queen Elizabeth I. Calling the land “Nova Albion,” Drake remained on the California coast for a month to make repairs to his ship, the Golden Hind, and prepare for his westward crossing of the Pacific Ocean. On December 13th, 1577, Drake set out from England with five ships on a mission to raid Spanish holdings on the Pacific coast of the New World. After crossing the Atlantic, Drake abandoned two of his ships in South America and then sailed into the Straits of Magellan with the remaining three. A series of devastating storms besieged his expedition in the treacherous straits, wrecking one ship and forcing another to return to England. Only the Golden Hind reached the Pacific Ocean, but Drake continued undaunted up the western coast of South America, raiding Spanish settlements and capturing a rich Spanish treasure ship. Drake then continued up the western coast of North America, searching for a possible northeast passage back to the Atlantic. Reaching as far north as present-day Washington before turning back, Drake paused near San Francisco Bay in June 1579 to repair his ship and prepare for a journey across the Pacific. In July, the expedition set off across the Pacific, visiting several islands before rounding Africa’s Cape of Good Hope and returning to the Atlantic Ocean. On September 26, 1580, the Golden Hind returned to Plymouth, England, bearing its rich captured treasure and valuable information about the world’s great oceans. In 1581, Queen Elizabeth I knighted Drake during a visit to his ship. 1742 – William Hooper, signer of the Declaration of Independence, was born. 1745 – American New Englanders captured Louisburg, Cape Breton, from the French. The ragtag army captured France’s most imposing North American stronghold on Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia. 1775 – During the American Revolution, British General William Howe lands his troops on the Charlestown peninsula overlooking Boston and leads them against Breed’s Hill, a fortified American position just below Bunker Hill. As the British advanced in columns against the Americans, Patriot General William Prescott reportedly told his men, “Don’t one of you fire until you see the whites of their eyes!” When the Redcoats were within 40 yards, the Americans let loose with a lethal barrage of musket fire, cutting down nearly 100 enemy troops and throwing the British into retreat. After reforming his lines, Howe attacked again, with much the same result. However, Prescott’s men were now low on ammunition, and when Howe led his men up the hill for a third time, they reached the redoubts and engaged the Americans in hand-to-hand combat. The outnumbered Americans were forced to retreat. The British had won the so-called Battle of Bunker Hill, and Breed’s Hill and the Charlestown peninsula fell firmly under British control. Despite losing their strategic positions, the battle was a morale-builder for the Americans, who had suffered far fewer casualties than their enemy while demonstrating that they could conduct war effectively against the British. 1832 – The practice of utilizing “surplus” naval officers as officers of the Revenue Marine was discontinued. Revenue officer vacancies were henceforth filled by promotion from within the service. 1833 – USS Delaware enters drydock at Gosport Navy Yard in Norfolk, VA, the first warship to enter a public drydock in the United States.
June 17th ~ {continued...} 1837 – Strong Vincent is born in Waterford, Pennsylvania. After working as a lawyer, he went on to become a hero at the Battle of Gettysburg, where he was mortally wounded defending Little Round Top. When hostilities erupted in April 1861, Vincent left the law to become an officer in the Erie Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers. By early 1862, he rose to commander of the 83rd Pennsylvania. Vincent served in several campaigns with the Army of the Potomac, fighting at Yorktown, Fredericksburg, and Chancellorsville. He was promoted to colonel after Yorktown, and prior to Gettysburg, Vincent was given command of the Third Brigade, First Division, of the Fifth Corps. On the night of July 1st, 1863, Vincent and his men were hurrying toward the battlefield under a bright moon. When the soldiers passed through a small town near Gettysburg, the regiment bands began to play and residents came to their doors to cheer the Yankee troops. Vincent remarked to an aide that there could be a worse fate than to die fighting in his home state with the flag overhead. The next day, as Vincent and his brigade were arriving behind the Union lines, General Gouverneur K. Warren frantically summoned Vincent’s force to the top of Little Round Top, a rocky hill at the end of the Federal line. Warren observed that the Confederates could turn the Union left flank by taking the summit, which was occupied by only a Yankee signal corps at the time. So Vincent and his men hurried up the hill, arriving just ahead of the Rebels. The brigade held the top, but just barely. Vincent was mortally wounded in the engagement and died on July 7th. He was promoted posthumously to brigadier general. 1863 – On the way to Gettysburg, Union and Confederate forces skirmished at Point of Rocks, Maryland. 1862 – Joint expedition including U.S.S. Sebago, Lieutenant Murray, and U.S.S. Currituck, Acting Master Shankland, with troops embarked on transport Seth Low, at the request of General McClellan ascended the Pamunkey River to twenty-five miles above White House. Confederates burned seventeen vessels, some loaded with coal and commissary stores. The river was so narrow at this point that the Union gunboats were compelled to return stern foremost for several miles. General McClellan reported that the ”expedition was admirably managed, and all concerned deserve great credit.” 1863 – Battle of Aldie: Confederates failed to drive back Union in Virginia. 1863 – C.S.S. Atlanta, Commander Webb, with wooden steamers Isondiga and Resolute, engaged U.S.S. Weehawken, Captain J. Rodgers, and U.S.S. Nahant, Commander Downes, in Wassaw Sound. A percussion torpedo was fitted to the ram’s bow, “which,” Webb wrote, “I knew would do its work to my entire satisfaction, should I but be able to touch the Weehauken. . . Atlanta grounded coming into the channel, was gotten off, but repeatedly failed to obey her helm. Weehawken poured five shots from her heavy guns into the Confederate ram, and Nahant moved into attacking Position. With two of his gun crews out of action, with two of three Pilots severely injured, and with his ship helpless and hard aground, Webb was compelled to surrender. His two wooden escorts had returned upriver without engaging. Captain Rodgers reported: “The Atlanta was found to have mounted two 6-inch and two 7-inch rifles, the 6-inch broadside, the 7-inch working on a Pivot either as broadside or bow and stern guns. There is a large supply of ammunition for these guns and other stores, said to be of great value by some of the officers of the vessel. There were on board at the time of capture, as per muster roll, 21 officers and 124 men, including 28 marines.” 1864 – A 640 meter long pontoon bridge over the James River in Virginia was finished. 1864 – General John B. Hood replaced General Johnston as head of CSA troops around Atlanta. 1870 – USS Mohican burns Mexican pirate ship Forward.
June 17th ~ {continued...} 1876 – Sioux and Cheyenne Indians score a tactical victory over General Crook’s forces at the Battle of the Rosebud, foreshadowing the disaster of the Battle of Little Big Horn eight days later. General George Crook was in command of one of three columns of soldiers converging on the Big Horn country of southern Montana that June. A large band of Sioux and Cheyenne Indians under the direction of Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, and several other chiefs had congregated in the area in defiance of U.S. demands that the Indians confine themselves to reservations. The army viewed the Indians’ refusal as an opportunity to dispatch a massive three-pronged attack and win a decisive victory over the “hostile” Indians. Crook’s column, marching north from Fort Fetterman in Wyoming Territory, was to join with two others: General Gibbon’s column coming east from Fort Ellis in Montana Territory, and General Terry’s force coming west from Fort Abraham Lincoln in Dakota Territory. Terry’s force included the soon-to-be-famous 7th Cavalry under the command of George Custer. The vast distances and lack of reliable communications made it difficult to coordinate, but the three armies planned to converge on the valley of the Big Horn River and stage an assault on an enemy whose location and size was only vaguely known. The plan quickly ran into trouble. As Crook approached the Big Horn, his Indian scouts informed him they had found signs of a major Sioux force that must still be nearby. Crook was convinced that the Sioux were encamped in a large village somewhere along the Rosebud Creek just east of the Big Horn. Like most of his fellow officers, Crook believed that Indians were more likely to flee than stand and fight, and he was determined to find the village and attack before the Sioux could escape into the wilderness. Crook’s Indian allies–262 Crow and Shoshone warriors–were less certain. They suspected the Sioux force was under the command of Crazy Horse, thee brilliant war chief. Crazy Horse, they warned, was too shrewd to give Crook an opportunity to attack a stationary village. Crook soon learned that his allies were right. Around 8 a.m. on this day in 1876, Crook halted his force of about 1,300 men in the bowl of a small valley along the Rosebud Creek in order to allow the rear of the column to catch up. Crook’s soldiers unsaddled and let their horses graze while they relaxed in the grass and enjoyed the cool morning air. The American soldiers were out in the open, divided, and unprepared. Suddenly, several Indian scouts rode into the camp at a full gallop. “Sioux! Sioux!” they shouted. “Many Sioux!” Within minutes, a mass of Sioux warriors began to converge on the army. A force of at least 1,500 mounted Sioux warriors caught Crook’s soldiers by surprise. Crazy Horse had kept an additional 2,500 warriors in reserve to finish the attack. Fortunately for Crook, one segment of his army was not caught unprepared. His 262 Crow and Shoshone allies had taken up advanced positions about 500 yards from the main body of soldiers. With astonishing courage, the Indian warriors boldly countercharged the much larger invading force. They managed to blunt the initial attack long enough for Crook to regroup his men and send soldiers forward to support his Indian allies. The fighting continued until noon, when the Sioux-perhaps hoping to draw Crook’s army into an ambush-retreated from the field. The combined force of 4,000 Sioux warriors had outnumbered Crook’s divided and unprepared army by more than three to one. Had it not been for the wisdom and courage of Crook’s Indian allies, Americans today might well remember the Battle of the Rosebud as they do the subsequent Battle of the Little Big Horn. As it was, Crook’s team was badly bloodied–28 men were killed and 56 were seriously wounded. Crook had no choice but to withdraw and regroup. Crazy Horse had lost only 13 men and his warriors were emboldened by their successful attack on the American soldiers. Eight days later, they would join with their tribesmen in the Battle of the Little Big Horn, which would wipe out George Custer and his 7th Cavalry. 1898 – Navy Hospital Corps established. 1913 – U.S. Marines set sail from San Diego to protect American interests in Mexico. 1916 – American troops under the command of Gen. Jack Pershing marched into Mexico. US Gen’l. Pershing led an unsuccessful punitive expedition against Francisco “Pancho” Villa. 1926 – Spain threatened to quit the League of Nations if Germany was allowed to join.
June 17th ~ {continued...} 1930 – The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Bill became law, placing the highest tariff on imports to the U.S. An international trade war began with the US passage of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act. By the spring of 1930, it was all too clear that America would not be able to shake off the fiscal impact of the Great Crash of 1929. And so, President Herbert Hoover stepped into the breach and signed the controversial Smoot-Hawley Tariff on this day in 1930. Smoot-Hawley raised duties on imports to astronomical heights in hopes of preserving the domestic market for American-made goods. Along with forwarding the protectionist cause, the legislation also embodied Hoover’s belief that a revived American economy would aid global fiscal health. Needless to say, Smoot-Hawley was a fast hit with protectionist forces, still licking their wounds from the crash. However, economists and international business leaders blasted Smoot-Hawley as an overly aggressive bill that would hurt and perhaps ultimately alienate foreign markets; a month before Hoover signed the bill, over one thousand economists signed a petition that protested the tariff. Fears that foreign governments would view Smoot-Hawley as a bellicose bill proved to be all too well-founded: a raft of foreign nations retaliated by enacting their own hefty tariffs, as well as quotas on imports and other measures that not only made international trade all that more difficult, but that also exacerbated America’s fiscal woes. 1932 – The U.S. Senate defeated the bonus bill as 10,000 veterans massed around the Capitol. 1938 – Japan declared war on China. 1940 – Chief of Naval Operations asks Congress for money to build two-ocean Navy. 1942 – Yank a weekly magazine for the U.S. armed services, began publication. Hartzell Spence, executive editor of Yank, a new US Army publication, soon introduced the term “pinup” for the photo inserts of beautiful women and added the “Sad Sack” cartoon strip. 1942 – Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Fleet directed the organization of coastal pickets to combat submarine menace of Atlantic Coast. This became known as the “Corsair Fleet.” 1943 – Operation Husky. The first units of the naval support for the invasion of Sicily set sail from the British Home Fleet base at Scapa Flow. 1944 – The US 1st Army cuts off the Contentin Peninsula. The US 9th Division (part of US 7th Corps) reaches the west coast to the north and south of Barneville. German divisions isolated to the north are not permitted to attempt to break out. Hitler meets with Rundstedt, Commander in Chief (West), and Rommel, commanding Army Group B. Both Field Marshals seek a withdrawal to more defensible positions inland. Hitler refuses to allow a retreat in Normandy. He suggests that the V1 bombing of Britain will force it out of the war. 1944 – The US 27th Infantry Division lands on Saipan to reinforce the American beachhead. 1944 – The carriers led by Admiral Clark and the rest of the main US carrier forces sail for a rendezvous to the west of the Mariana Islands.
June 17th ~ {continued...} 1945 – On Okinawa, reinforced American units advance in the Kuishi Ridge area which has been stubbornly defended by forces of the Japanese 32nd Army. Along the line of the US 24th Corps, the last Japanese defensive line is broken. The US 7th Division completes the capture of Hills 153 and 115. The commander of the Japanese naval base on Okinawa, Admiral Minoru Ota, is found dead, having committed suicide. 1945 – On Luzon, elements of the US 37th Division, US 1st Corps, captures Naguilian after making a forced crossing of the Cagayan river, near the town of Cagayan. 1945 – General Arnold orders General Chennault to be replaced by General Stratemeyer as Commander in Chief of the US air forces operating in China. Japanese troops in southern China begin withdrawing northward in five long columns between the Yellow and Yangtze rivers. 1953 – A revised demarcation line was settled at Panmunjom. 1953 – Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas stayed the executions of spies Julius & Ethel Rosenberg scheduled for next day, their 14th wedding anniversary. They were put to death June 19th. 1953 – The Soviet Union orders an entire armored division of its troops into East Berlin to crush a rebellion by East German workers and antigovernment protesters. The Soviet assault set a precedent for later interventions into Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968. The riots in East Berlin began among construction workers, who took to the streets on June 16, 1953, to protest an increase in work schedules by the communist government of East Germany. By the next day, the crowd of disgruntled workers and other antigovernment dissidents had grown to between 30,000 and 50,000. Leaders of the protest issued a call for a general strike, the resignation of the communist East German government, and free elections. Soviet forces struck quickly and without warning. Troops, supported by tanks and other armored vehicles, crashed through the crowd of protesters. Some protesters tried to fight back, but most fled before the onslaught. Red Cross officials in West Berlin (where many of the wounded protesters fled) estimated the death toll at between 15 and 20, and the number of wounded at more than 100. The Soviet military commanders declared martial law, and by the evening of June 17, the protests had been shattered and relative calm was restored. In Washington, President Dwight D. Eisenhower declared that the brutal Soviet action contradicted Russian propaganda that the people of East Germany were happy with their communist government. He noted that the smashing of the protests was “a good lesson on the meaning of communism.” America’s propaganda outlet in Europe, the Voice of America radio station, claimed, “The workers of East Berlin have already written a glorious page in postwar history. They have once and for all times exposed the fraudulent nature of communist regimes.” These criticisms had little effect on the Soviet control of East Germany, which remained a communist stronghold until the government fell in 1989. 1965 – For the first time, 27 B-52s fly from Guam to bomb a Vietcong concentration in a heavily forested area of Binhduong Province. Such flights, under the aegis of the Strategic Air Command, are known as Operation Arc Light. 1967 – China detonated its 1st hydrogen bomb and became the world’s 4th thermonuclear power.
