On This Day … 17 October

Events

  • 1346 – The English capture King David II of Scotland at Neville’s Cross and imprison him for eleven years.
  • 1448 – An Ottoman army defeats a Hungarian army at the Second Battle of Kosovo.
  • 1660 – The nine regicides who signed the death warrant of Charles I of England are hanged, drawn and quartered.
  • 1662 – Charles II of England sells Dunkirk to Louis XIV of France for 40,000 pounds.
  • 1713 – Great Northern War: Russia defeated Sweden in the Battle of Kostianvirta in Pälkäne.
  • 1777 – American Revolutionary War: British General John Burgoyne surrenders his army at Saratoga, New York.
  • 1781 – American Revolutionary War: British General Charles, Earl Cornwallis surrenders at the Siege of Yorktown.
  • 1800 – War of the Second Coalition: Britain takes control of the Dutch colony of Curaçao (refer to French Revolutionary Wars).
  • 1806 – Former leader of the Haitian Revolution, Emperor Jacques I, is assassinated after an oppressive rule.
  • 1912 – Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia declare war on the Ottoman Empire, joining Montenegro in the First Balkan War.
  • 1941 – World War II: The USS Kearny becomes the first US Navy vessel to be torpedoed by a U-boat.
    • 1943 – The Burma Railway (Burma-Thailand Railway) is completed.
    • 1943 – Nazi Holocaust in Poland: Sobibór extermination camp is closed.
  • 1952 – Indonesian Army elements surrounded the Merdeka Palace demanding President Sukarno disband the Provisional People’s Representative Council.
  • 1970 – October Crisis: FLQ terrorists murder Quebec Vice-Premier and Minister of Labour Pierre Laporte.
  • 1973 – OPEC imposes an oil embargo against countries they deem to have helped Israel in the Yom Kippur War.
  • 1994 – Russian journalist Dmitry Kholodov is assassinated while investigating corruption in the armed forces.
  • 2017 – Syrian civil war: The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) capture the last foothold of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Raqqa, marking the end of the Battle of Raqqa.

People (Births)

  • 1833 – José E. Días, Paraguayan general (d. 1867).
  • 1876 – Hippolyte Aucouturier, French cyclist (d. 1944).
  • 1882 – Haritina Korotkevich, Russian war heroine (d. 1904).
  • 1883 – Thaddeus Shideler, American hurdler (d. 1966).
  • 1892 – Theodor Eicke, German SS general (d. 1943).
  • 1903 – Andrei Grechko, Soviet general (d. 1976).
  • 1913 – Faik Türün, Turkish general (d. 2003).
  • 1919 – Violet Milstead, Canadian World War II aviator and bush pilot (d. 2014).
  • 1924 – Anton Geiser, Croatian SS officer (d. 2012).
  • 1933 – William Anders, Hong Kong-American general and astronaut.
  • 1948 – Robert Jordan, American soldier and author (d. 2007).
  • 1983 – Junichi Miyashita, Japanese swimmer.
  • 1989 – Oleksandr Isakov, Ukrainian swimmer.

People (Deaths)

  • 1586 – Philip Sidney, English courtier, poet, and general (b. 1554).
  • 1660 – Adrian Scrope, English colonel and politician (b. 1601).
  • 1781 – Edward Hawke, 1st Baron Hawke, English admiral (b. 1705).
  • 1806 – Jean-Jacques Dessalines, Haitian commander and politician, Governor-General of Haiti (b. 1758).
  • 1868 – Laura Secord, Canadian war heroine (b. 1775).
  • 1893 – Patrice de MacMahon, Duke of Magenta, French general and politician, 3rd President of France (b. 1808).
  • 1966 – Sidney Hatch, American runner and soldier (b. 1883).
  • 1978 – Giovanni Gronchi, Italian educator, soldier, and politician, 3rd President of the Italian Republic (b. 1887).
  • 2001 – Rehavam Ze’evi, Israeli historian, general, and politician, Tourism Minister of Israel (b. 1926).
  • 2008 – Ben Weider, Canadian businessman, co-founded the International Federation of BodyBuilding & Fitness (b. 1923).
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