February 23
303 | Emperor Diocletian orders the general persecution of Christians in Rome. | |
1516 | The Hapsburg Charles I succeeds Ferdinand in Spain. | |
1540 | Spanish explorer Francisco Vasquez de Coronado begins his unsuccessful search for the fabled Seven Cities of Gold in the American Southwest. | |
1574 | The 5th War of Religion breaks out in France. | |
1615 | The Estates-General in Paris is dissolved, having been in session since October 1614. | |
1778 | Baron von Steuben joins the Continental Army at Valley Forge. | |
1821 | Poet John Keats dies of tuberculosis at the age of 25. | |
1836 | The Alamo is besieged by Santa Anna. | |
1846 | The Liberty Bell tolls for the last time, to mark George Washington's birthday. | |
1847 | Forces led by Zachary Taylor defeat the Mexicans at the Battle of Buena Vista. | |
1854 | Great Britain officially recognizes the independence of the Orange Free State. | |
1861 | Texas becomes the seventh state to secede from the Union. | |
1885 | John Lee survives three attempts to hang him in Exeter Prison, as the trap fails to open. | |
1898 | Writer Emile Zola is imprisoned in France for his letter J'accuse in which he accuses the French government of anti-semitism and the wrongful imprisonment of army captain Alfred Dreyfus. | |
1901 | Britain and Germany agree on a boundary between German East Africa and Nyasaland. | |
1904 | Japan guarantees Korean sovereignty in exchange for military assistance. | |
1916 | Secretary of State Lansing hints that the U.S. may have to abandon the policy of avoiding "entangling foreign alliances". | |
1921 | An airmail plane sets a record of 33 hours and 20 minutes from San Francisco to New York. | |
1926 | President Calvin Coolidge opposes a large air force, believing it would be a menace to world peace. | |
1936 | In Russia, an unmanned balloon rises to a record height of 25 miles. | |
1938 | Twelve Chinese fighter planes drop bombs on Japan. | |
1942 | A Japanese submarine shells an oil refinery near Santa Barbara, California, the first Axis bombs to hit American soil. | |
1944 | American bombers strike the Marianas Islands bases, only 1,300 miles from Tokyo. | |
1945 | Eisenhower opens a large offensive in the Rhineland. | |
1945 | U.S. Marines plant an American flag atop Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima. | |
1946 | Japanese General Tomoyuki Yamashita is hanged in Manila, the Philippines, for war crimes. | |
1947 | Several hundred Nazi organizers are arrested in Frankfurt by U.S. and British forces. | |
1950 | New York's Metropolitan Museum exhibits a collection of Hapsburg art. The first showing of this collection in the U.S. | |
1954 | Mass innoculation begins as Salk's polio vaccine is given to children for first time. | |
1955 | Eight nations meet in Bangkok for the first SEATO council. | |
1960 | Whites join Negro students in a sit-in at a Winston-Salem, N.C. Woolworth store. | |
1964 | The U.S. and Britain recognize the new Zanzibar government. | |
1967 | American troops begin the largest offensive of the war, near the Cambodian border. | |
1972 | Black activist Angela Davis is released from jail where she was held for kidnapping , conspiracy and murder. | |
1991 | French forces unofficially start the Persian Gulf ground war by crossing the Saudi-Iraqi border. |
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