On this date...

General William Sherman

In 1637, the English and their Mohegan allies slaughtered as many as 600 Pequot Indians [in the area of Connecticut]. The survivors were parceled out to other tribes. Those given to the Mohegans eventually became the Mashantucket Pequots. American settlers in New England massacred a Pequot Indian village.

In 1776, Washington was traveling from Philadelphia to New York, returning from consultations with Congress. In New York, rumors swirl that he has gone to Philadelphia to resign, but the truth is the opposite: He is hurrying back to resume command of the army. 

In 1776, to the south, the war was gathering force. Commodore Sir Peter Parker, the British naval commander, and Major General Henry Clinton, the British army commander, have arrived off the coast of Charleston, opening a southern theater that may soon test Patriot defenses.

In 1794, Congress passed the Neutrality Act, which prohibited Americans from taking part in any military action against a country that was at peace with the United States.

In 1794, the Third Congress authorized an additional 10 revenue cutters and gave the Treasury Department the responsibility for lighthouses, beacons, buoys, and piers.

In 1794, the first officers of the U.S. Navy under the Constitution were appointed. The first 6 captains appointed to superintend the construction of new ships were John Barry, Samuel Nicholson, Silas Talbot, Joshua Barney, Richard Dale, and Thomas Truxtun.

In 1805, the first recorded tornado occurred in “Tornado Alley” in southern Illinois

In 1837, Houston was incorporated by the Republic of Texas.

In 1851, Uncle Tom’s Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly began to appear in serial form in The National Era [column 1], an abolitionist weekly published in Washington, D.C. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s anti-slavery story was published in forty installments over the next ten months. For her story, Mrs. Stowe was paid $300.

In 1884, Civil War hero General William T. Sherman refused the Republican presidential nomination, saying, “I will not accept if nominated and will not serve if elected.”

In 1888, President Grover Cleveland vetoed a bill that would have given a pension to war widow Johanna Loewinger, whose husband died 14 years after being discharged from the army.

In 1888, US Democrats nominated Grover Cleveland for president.

In 1920, the first rivet was driven on the Bank of Italy headquarters at 1 Powell in San Francisco (later Bank of America).

In 1933, the US repealed the domestic gold standard.

In 1937, Henry Ford initiated a 32-hour work week.

In 1940, a synthetic rubber tire was exhibited in Akron, Ohio, by Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company.

In 1940, the American Negro Theater was organized.

In 1944, more than 1,000 British bombers dropped 5,000 tons of bombs on German gun batteries placed at the Normandy assault area, while 3,000 Allied ships crossed the English Channel in preparation for the invasion of Normandy—D-Day.

In 1947, in an address at Harvard University, U.S. Secretary of State George C. Marshall advanced the idea of the Marshall Plan, a European self-help program to be financed by the United States.

In 1950, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Henderson v. United States, struck down racially segregated railroad dining cars traveling across state lines.

In 1952, the first nationally televised sporting event was Jersey Joe Walcott's 15-round victory over Ezzard Charles for the heavyweight boxing title at Municipal Stadium in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

In 1956, in an appearance on "The Milton Berle Show," Elvis Presley set his guitar aside and put every part of his being into a blistering, scandalous performance of “Hound Dog.”

In 1956, A US district court ruled that bus segregation was unconstitutional, a direct result of the Montgomery Bus Boycott. The case was filed two days after segregationists bombed the home of boycott leader Dr. Martin Luther King.

In 1968, Bobby Kennedy was shot at a campaign rally and died the next day.

In 1969, U.S. troops abandoned Ap Bia Mountain. A spokesman for the 101st Airborne Division said that the U.S. troops “have completed their search of the mountain and are now continuing their reconnaissance-in-force mission throughout the A Shau Valley.”

In 1976, 11 people were killed when the Teton Dam in Idaho failed, releasing 80 billion gallons of water.

In 1981, AIDS was reported for the first time, following the detection of a rare form of pneumonia in five homosexual men in Los Angeles.

In 1981, MLB Houston Astros pitcher Nolan Ryan passed Early Wynn as the all-time walk leader (1,777)

In 1986, A federal jury in Baltimore convicted Ronald W. Pelton of selling secrets to the Soviet Union. (Pelton was sentenced to three life prison terms plus 10 years.)

In 1991, the space shuttle “Columbia” blasted off with seven astronauts on a nine-day mission.

In 1996, the Howard Stern Radio Show premiered in Memphis, Tennessee, on WMFS 92.9 FM.

In 1998, a strike began at the General Motors parts factory in Flint, Michigan, that quickly spread to five other assembly plants (the strike lasted seven weeks).

In 2001, Tropical Storm Allison made landfall on the upper Texas coastline as a strong tropical storm and dumped large amounts of rain over Houston, causing $5.5 billion in damage, the then costliest tropical storm in US history.

In 2001, US Senator Jim Jeffords of Vermont left the Republican Party, which shifted control of the United States Senate from the Republican to the Democratic Party

In 2002, Elizabeth Smart, 14, was kidnapped from her bedroom in her family’s Salt Lake City home. (She was rescued in March 2003.)

In 2007, Vice President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison for lying and obstructing the CIA leak investigation. (President George W. Bush later commuted the prison sentence.)

In 2012, an American gubernatorial recall election was held in Wisconsin. Governor Scott Walker wins and becomes the first governor to survive a recall election.

In 2012, the Conservative political nonprofit organization Turning Point USA was founded by Charlie Kirk and Bill Montgomery to advocate for conservatism on high school, college, and university campuses

On June 5, 2013, Americans learned that their government was spying broadly on its own people when Edward Snowden, a National Security Agency contractor leaded documents to The Guardian, and later The Washington Post,

In 2018, film producer Harvey Weinstein pleaded not guilty to rape and sexual assault charges in court in New York City.

In 2018, the US President Donald Trump administration’s policy of separating immigrant children from their families violated international law, according to the UN.