Today in history: 1783: Last British soldiers leave New York On this day in 1783, nearly three months after the Treaty of Paris was signed ending the American Revolution, the last British soldiers withdraw from New York City, the last British military position in the United States. After the last Redcoat departed New York, U.S. General George Washington entered the city in triumph to the cheers of New Yorkers. The city had remained in British hands since its capture in September 1776. Four months after New York was returned to the victorious Patriots, the city was declared to be the capital of the United States. In 1789, it was the site of Washingtons inauguration as the first U.S. president and remained the nations capital until 1790, when Philadelphia became the second capital of the United States under the U.S. Constitution. New Yorkers shaped the history of two new nations. The British evacuated their New York Loyalists to remaining British territories, mainly in Canada. These families had been dispossessed of their land and belongings by the victorious Patriots because of their continued support of the British king and were able to regain some financial independence through lands granted to them by the British in western Quebec (now Ontario) and Nova Scotia. Their arrival in Canada permanently shifted the demographics of what had been French-speaking New France until 1763 into an English-speaking colony, and later nation, with the exception of a French-speaking and culturally French area in eastern Canada that is now Quebec. In 1784, one year after their arrival, the new Loyalist population spurred the creation of New Brunswick in the previously unpopulated (by Europeans, at least) lands west of the Bay of Fundy in what had been Nova Scotia. In 1785, the Loyalists yet again made their mark on Canadian history when their combined settlements at Parrtown and Carleton of approximately 14,000 people became British North America’s first incorporated city under the name City of Saint John. The division between the Anglophile and Francophile sections was ultimately recognized by creating the English-dominant province of Ontario, west of Quebec, in 1867. 1863: Yankees rout Rebels at the Battle of Missionary Ridge On this day in 1863, Union General Ulysses S. Grant breaks the siege of Chattanooga, Tennessee, in stunning fashion by routing the Confederates under General Braxton Bragg at Missionary Ridge. For two months following the Battle of Chattanooga, the Confederates had kept the Union army bottled up inside a tight semicircle around Chattanooga. When Grant arrived in October, however, he immediately reversed the defensive posture of his army. After opening a supply line by driving the Confederates away from the Tennessee River in late October, Grant prepared for a major offensive in late November. It was launched on November 23 when he sent General George Thomas to probe the center of the Confederate line. This simple plan turned into a complete victory, and the Rebels retreated higher up Missionary Ridge. On November 24, the Yankees captured Lookout Mountain on the extreme right of the Union lines, and this set the stage for the Battle of Missionary Ridge. The attack took place in three parts. On the Union left, General William T. Sherman attacked troops under Patrick Cleburne at Tunnel Hill, an extension of Missionary Ridge. In difficult fighting, Cleburne managed to hold the hill. On the other end of the Union lines, General Joseph Hooker was advancing slowly from Lookout Mountain, and his force had little impact on the battle. It was at the center that the Union achieved its greatest success. The soldiers on both sides received confusing orders. Some Union troops thought they were only supposed to take the rifle pits at the base of the ridge, while others understood that they were to advance to the top. Some of the Confederates heard that they were to hold the pits, while others thought they were to retreat to the top of Missionary Ridge. Furthermore, poor placement of Confederate trenches on the top of the ridge made it difficult to fire at the advancing Union troops without hitting their own men, who were retreating from the rifle pits. The result was that the attack on the Confederate center turned into a major Union victory. After the center collapsed, the Confederate troops retreated on November 26, and Bragg pulled his troops away from Chattanooga. He resigned shortly thereafter, having lost the confidence of his army. The Confederates suffered some 6,600 men killed, wounded, and missing, and the Union lost around 5,800. Grant missed an opportunity to destroy the Confederate army when he chose not to pursue the retreating Rebels, but Chattanooga was secured. Sherman resumed the attack in the spring after Grant was promoted to general in chief of all Federal forces. 1876: U.S. Army retaliates for the Little Bighorn massacre U.S. troops under the leadership of General Ranald Mackenzie destroy the village of Cheyenne living with Chief Dull Knife on the headwaters of the Powder River. The attack was in retaliation against some of the Indians who had participated in the massacre of Custer and his men at Little Bighorn. Although the Sioux and Cheyenne won one of their greatest victories at Little Bighorn, the battle actually marked the beginning of the end of their ability to resist the U.S. government. News of the massacre of Custer and his men reached the East Coast in the midst of nationwide centennial celebrations on July 4, 1876. Outraged at the killing of one of their most popular Civil War heroes, many Americans demanded an intensified military campaign against the offending Indians. The government responded by sending one of its most successful Indian fighters to the region, General Ranald Mackenzie, who had previously been the scourge of Commanche and Kiowa Indians in Texas. Mackenzie led an expeditionary force up the Powder River in central Wyoming, where he located a village of Cheyenne living with Chief Dull Knife. Although Dull Knife himself does not appear to have been involved in the battle at Little Bighorn, there is no question that many of his people were, including one of his sons. At dawn, Mackenzie and over 1,000 soldiers and 400 Indian scouts opened fire on the sleeping village, killing many Indians within the first few minutes. Some of the Cheyenne, though, managed to run into the surrounding hills. They watched as the soldiers burned more than 200 lodges-containing all their winter food and clothing-and then cut the throats of their ponies. When the soldiers found souvenirs taken by the Cheyenne from soldiers they had killed at Little Bighorn, the assailants felt justified in their attack. The surviving Cheyenne, many of them half-naked, began an 11-day walk north to the Tongue River where Crazy Horses camp of Oglalas took them in. However, many of the small children and old people did not survive the frigid journey. Devastated by his losses, the next spring Dull Knife convinced the remaining Cheyenne to surrender. The army sent them South to Indian Territory, where other defeated survivors of the final years of the Plains Indian wars soon joined them. 1941: A war warning is sent to commanders in the Pacific On this day in 1941, Adm. Harold R. Stark, U.S. chief of naval operations, tells Adm. Husband E. Kimmel, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, that both President Roosevelt and Secretary of State Cordell Hull think a Japanese surprise attack is a distinct possibility. We are likely to be attacked next Monday, for the Japs are notorious for attacking without warning, Roosevelt had informed his Cabinet. We must all prepare for trouble, possibly soon, he telegraphed British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. Kimmels command was specifically at the mid-Pacific base at Oahu, which comprised, in part, Pearl Harbor. At the time he received the warning from Stark, he was negotiating with Army Lt. Gen. Walter C. Short, commander of all U.S. forces at Pearl Harbor, about sending U.S. warships out from Pearl Harbor in order to reinforce Wake and Midway Islands, which, along with the Philippines, were possible Japanese targets. But the Army had no antiaircraft artillery to spare. War worries had struck because of an intercepted Japanese diplomatic message, which gave November 25 as a deadline of sorts. If Japanese diplomacy had failed to convince the Americans to revoke the economic sanctions against Japan, things will automatically begin to happen, the message related. Those things were becoming obvious, in the form of Japanese troop movements off Formosa (Taiwan) apparently toward Malaya. In fact, they were headed for Pearl Harbor, as was the Japanese First Air Fleet. Despite the fact that so many in positions of command anticipated a Japanese attack, especially given the failure of diplomacy (Japan refused U.S. demands to withdraw from both the Axis pact and occupied territories in China and Indochina), no one expected Hawaii as the target. 1963: Kennedy laid to rest at Arlington On this day in 1963, President John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated three days earlier, is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. It was his sons third birthday. Kennedys coffin had lain in state in the rotunda of the Capitol building the previous day. Approximately 250,000 people streamed by the closed flag-draped coffin in a massive outpouring of respect. The next day, television and movie cameras rolled while Kennedys wife Jackie, his brothers Robert and Ted, political leaders and foreign dignitaries formed a solemn funeral procession behind Kennedys coffin as it was transferred atop a horse-drawn caisson to St. Matthews Cathedral. Observers noted the only sounds that could be heard were the cadence of drum beats and horses hooves and muffled sobs from the approximately 1 million people who lined the route between the Capitol and the cathedral. At one point, Kennedys son, John Jr., who turned three that day, was filmed saluting his fathers coffin. After the state funeral at St. Matthews--the family had held a private mass at the White House on November 23--the mourners proceeded to Arlington National Cemetery by car where Kennedy, a decorated World War II hero, was buried with military honors. Kennedy was the second president to be buried at Arlington; President William Howard Taft had been interred there in 1930. Although Kennedy had not specified where he wanted to be buried, most assumed his gravesite would be in his home state of Massachusetts. In March 1963, though, President Kennedy had made an unscheduled tour of Arlington and had reportedly remarked to a friend on the view of the Potomac River from the cemeterys Custis-Lee Mansion, saying it was so magnificent I could stay forever. After the assassination, Kennedys brother-in-law, Sargent Shriver, suggested Arlington be Kennedys final resting place. Jackie toured the site on November 24 and made the final decision, saying he belongs to the people. 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Posted on: Tue, 25 Nov 2014 08:25:06 +0000
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