Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/March

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March 1: Disability Day of Mourning; Saint David's Day; Independence Day in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (1992); Yap Day in Yap State, Federated States of Micronesia

• 1870 – Paraguayan War: Marshal Francisco Solano López died at the Battle of Cerro Corá.
• 1872 – Yellowstone National Park (bison pictured), located mostly in the present-day U.S. state of Wyoming, was established by President Ulysses S. Grant.
• 1921 – The Kronstadt rebellion began following mass protests in Petrograd demanding greater freedom in Russia with sailors and citizens taking up arms against the Bolsheviks.
• 1944 – World War II: American and Australian troops won the Battle of Sio against Japanese forces in New Guinea.
• 1973 – The Pink Floyd album The Dark Side of the Moon was released.

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March 2: Beginning of the Nineteen-Day Fast (Baháʼí Faith, 2023)

• 1444 – The League of Lezhë, an alliance of regional chieftains, was established in Venetian Albania with Skanderbeg as their commander.
• 1859 – The Great Slave Auction, the largest single sale of slaves in U.S. history, with more than 400 people sold, began in Georgia.
• 1919 – Communist, revolutionary-socialist, and syndicalist delegates met in Moscow to establish the Communist International.
• 1962 – Led by General Ne Win, the Burmese military seized power in a coup d'état.
• 1978 – As a cosmonaut on Soyuz 28, Czechoslovak military pilot Vladimír Remek (pictured) became the first person from outside the Soviet Union or the United States to go into space.

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March 3: Liberation Day in Bulgaria (1878); Hinamatsuri in Japan

• 1776 – American Revolutionary War: Samuel Nicholas and the Continental Marines successfully landed on New Providence in the Bahamas and began a raid of Nassau, capturing the port the next day.
• 1875 – French composer Georges Bizet's opera Carmen (poster pictured), based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, premiered at the Opéra-Comique in Paris.
• 1972 – The British rock band Jethro Tull released Thick as a Brick, a parody concept album allegedly adapted from an eight-year-old boy's epic poem.
• 2012 – Two passenger trains collided near Szczekociny, Poland, resulting in 16 deaths and 58 injuries.

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March 4: Feast day of Saint Casimir (Catholicism)

• 1675 – John Flamsteed (pictured) was appointed the first Astronomer Royal by King Charles II of England.
• 1804 – Irish convicts formerly involved at the Battle of Vinegar Hill during the Irish Rebellion of 1798 began an uprising against British colonial authorities in New South Wales, Australia.
• 1837 – Chicago was incorporated as a city.
• 1943 – The Holocaust: Almost all Jews in Bulgarian-occupied Western Thrace were deported to Treblinka extermination camp to be killed.
• 2012 – A series of blasts occurred at an arms dump in Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo, killing at least 300 people and injuring 2,500 others.

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March 5: Learn from Lei Feng Day in China; St Piran's Day in Cornwall, England

• 363 – Roman–Persian Wars: Roman emperor Julian and his army set out from Antioch to attack the Sasanian Empire.
• 1279 – The Livonian branch of the Teutonic Order suffered a great loss when 71 knights died in the Battle of Aizkraukle.
• 1824 – The First Anglo-Burmese War began.
• 1966 – BOAC Flight 911 disintegrated and crashed near Mount Fuji shortly after departure from Tokyo International Airport, killing all 113 passengers and 11 crew members on board.

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March 6: Fast of Esther (Judaism, 2023); National Heroes and Benefactors Day in Belize (2023)

• 1853 – Giuseppe Verdi's La traviata premiered at La Fenice in Venice, but the performance was considered so bad that it caused him to revise portions of the opera.
• 1964 – In a radio broadcast, Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad announced that American boxer Cassius Clay would change his name to Muhammad Ali (pictured).
• 1987 – The ferry Herald of Free Enterprise capsized while leaving the harbour of Zeebrugge, Belgium, killing 193 people on board.

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March 7: Feast day of Saints Perpetua and Felicity (Catholicism, Anglicanism, Lutheranism)

• 1277 – Bishop Étienne Tempier promulgated a condemnation of 219 heretical propositions that were being discussed at the University of Paris.
• 1814 – War of the Sixth Coalition: Napoleon's army forced Mikhail Semyonovich Vorontsov's Russian troops to withdraw from the Chemin des Dames, but French casualties exceeded Russian losses.
• 1985 – The charity single "We Are the World" by the supergroup USA for Africa was released, and went on to sell more than 20 million copies.
• 2009 – The Kepler space telescope (depicted), designed to discover Earth-like planets orbiting other stars, was launched.

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March 8: International Women's Day; Aurat March in Pakistan

• 1702 – Anne (pictured) became the Queen of England, Scotland and Ireland, succeeding her brother-in-law William III.
• 1736 – Nader Shah, the founder of the Afsharid dynasty, was crowned Shah of Iran.
• 1919 – During the Egyptian Revolution, British authorities arrested rebel leader Saad Zaghloul and exiled him to Malta.
• 1978 – BBC Radio 4 began broadcasting Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a science fiction radio series that was later adapted into novels, a television series, and other formats.
• 1983 – Cold War: In a speech to the National Association of Evangelicals in Orlando, Florida, U.S. president Ronald Reagan described the Soviet Union as an "evil empire".
• 2017 – The Azure Window, a limestone natural arch in Gozo, Malta, collapsed during a storm.

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March 9

• 1009 – The first recorded use of the name of Lithuania appeared in Latin in the Annals of Quedlinburg, written in Saxony-Anhalt, present-day Germany.
• 1842 – Nabucco, an opera by Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi that established his reputation, premiered at La Scala in Milan.
• 1847 – Mexican–American War: The Siege of Veracruz began, the first large-scale amphibious assault conducted by United States military forces.
• 1932 – Éamon de Valera (pictured), a dominant political figure in 20th-century Ireland, became President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State.
• 1959 – The popular fashion doll Barbie debuted at the American International Toy Fair in New York City.

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March 10

• 241 BC – The Roman Republic defeated Carthaginian forces at the Battle of the Aegates, off the western coast of Sicily, in the final battle of the First Punic War.
• 1916 – The final letter in the McMahon–Hussein Correspondence was written, agreeing that Britain would recognise Arab independence in return for the Sharif of Mecca launching a revolt against the Ottoman Empire.
• 1949 – Mildred Gillars, nicknamed Axis Sally, was convicted of treason for working with the Nazis as a broadcaster.
• 1967 – British progressive-rock band Pink Floyd released their first single, "Arnold Layne".
• 2019 – Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 (aircraft pictured) crashed shortly after take-off from Addis Ababa, with the deaths of all 157 people on board.

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March 11

• 1669 – Mount Etna in Sicily began erupting, eventually producing the largest lava flow in the volcano's history, and damaging Catania and other towns.
• 1843 – During a period of activity known as the Great Eruption, Eta Carinae (pictured) briefly became the second-brightest star in the night sky.
• 1984 – The anime film Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind by Hayao Miyazaki was released.
• 2011 – A massive earthquake and tsunami struck northeastern Japan and triggered a nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.
• 2012 – U.S. Army soldier Robert Bales murdered sixteen civilians and wounded six others in Kandahar Province, Afghanistan.

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March 12

• 1622 – Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier, founders of the Jesuits, were canonized by Pope Gregory XV.
• 1913 – At a ceremony at Kurrajong Hill, Lady Denman, wife of Governor-General Lord Denman, announced that Canberra would be the name of the future capital of Australia.
• 1930 – Mahatma Gandhi (pictured with Sarojini Naidu) began the Salt March, a 24-day nonviolent walk to defy the British salt tax in colonial India.
• 1934 – Supported by the Estonian army, Konstantin Päts staged a coup d'état, beginning the Era of Silence.
• 2014 – A gas leak caused an explosion in the East Harlem neighborhood of New York City, destroying two apartment buildings and causing eight deaths.

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March 13: Commonwealth Day in the Commonwealth of Nations (2023)

• 1781 – William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus from the garden of his house in Bath, England, initially considering it to be a comet.
• 1845 – German composer Felix Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto was performed for the first time.
• 1943 – The Holocaust: Nazi troops began the final liquidation of the Kraków Ghetto in German occupied Poland, sending about 2,000 Jews to the Płaszów labor camp (deportation pictured), with the remaining 5,000 either killed or sent to Auschwitz.
• 1988 – The Seikan Tunnel, 53.85 km (33.46 mi) in length, opened between the cities of Hakodate and Aomori, Japan.
• 2013 – Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio was elected Pope Francis, making him the first Jesuit pope, the first from the Americas, and the first from the Southern Hemisphere.

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March 14: New Year's Day (Sikhism); White Day in parts of East Asia; Pi Day

• 1309 – On Eid al-Fitr, the citizens of Granada stormed palaces in the city, deposing Sultan Muhammad III and placing his half-brother Nasr on the throne.
• 1489 – Catherine Cornaro (pictured), Queen of Cyprus, was forced to abdicate and sell the administration of the island to the Republic of Venice.
• 1885 – The Mikado, Gilbert and Sullivan's most frequently performed Savoy opera, debuted at the Savoy Theatre in London.
• 1969 – Edward M. Burke, the longest-serving alderman in the history of the Chicago City Council, was sworn into office.
• 1984 – Gerry Adams, leader of Sinn Féin, was seriously wounded in an assassination attempt by Ulster Freedom Fighters in central Belfast, Northern Ireland.

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March 15: Ides of March

• 856 – Byzantine emperor Michael III (pictured) overthrew the regency of his mother Theodora to assume power for himself.
• 1147 – Reconquista: Portuguese troops under King Afonso I captured the city of Santarém from the Almoravids.
• 1875 – John McCloskey, the archbishop of New York, was created the first cardinal from the United States.
• 1956 – The musical My Fair Lady, based on George Bernard Shaw's play Pygmalion, debuted at the Mark Hellinger Theatre in New York City.
• 1990 – Iraqi authorities hanged Iranian freelance reporter Farzad Bazoft on charges of spying for Israel.

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March 16: Remembrance Day of the Latvian Legionnaires

• 597 BC – Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II captured Jerusalem and installed Zedekiah as King of Judah.
• 1190 – Around 150 Jews died inside York Castle, the majority committing mass suicide to avoid being killed by a mob.
• 1322 – Despenser War: A royalist army defeated troops loyal to Thomas, 2nd Earl of Lancaster, in the Battle of Boroughbridge, which allowed King Edward II of England to hold on to power for another five years.
• 1872 – In the inaugural final of the FA Cup (trophy pictured) Wanderers defeated Royal Engineers 1–0 at The Oval in Kennington, London.
• 2001 – A series of bomb blasts in the city of Shijiazhuang, China, killed 108 people.

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March 17: Saint Patrick's Day (Christianity); Anniversary of the Unification of Italy (1861)

• 1337 – Edward the Black Prince (pictured) was created Duke of Cornwall, the first English dukedom.
• 1677 – Franco-Dutch War: France captured the town of Valenciennes in the Spanish Netherlands.
• 1917 – World War I: Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster led a force to rescue 92 prisoners of war from Bir Hakeim, killing the Senussi guards and their families.
• 1942 – The Holocaust: The first mass killings of Jews began at Belzec extermination camp in occupied Poland, the first of the Operation Reinhard camps to begin operation.
• 1963 – An eruption of Mount Agung on Bali, Indonesia, killed at least 1,100 people.

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March 18: Feast day of Saint Cyril of Jerusalem (Christianity)

• 1892 – Canadian governor general Lord Stanley of Preston pledged to donate an award to Canada's top-ranked amateur ice hockey club, now known as the Stanley Cup, the oldest professional sports trophy in North America.
• 1921 – Russian Civil War: Bolshevik forces suppressed a rebellion of sailors and civilians in Kronstadt.
• 1965 – Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov ventured outside the Soviet spacecraft Voskhod 2, becoming the first person to walk in space.
• 1985 – The first episode of the soap opera Neighbours was broadcast on the Seven Network, later becoming the longest-running drama in Australian television history.
• 1990 – Unidentified thieves stole thirteen works of art collectively valued at $500 million from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (pictured) in Boston, Massachusetts.

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March 19: Saint Joseph's Day (Western Christianity); Mothering Sunday (Western Christianity, 2023)

• 1563 – The Edict of Amboise was signed, ending the first war in the French Wars of Religion and inaugurating a period of official peace that lasted until 1567.
• 1808 – King Charles IV of Spain was forced to abdicate in favour of his son Ferdinand VII as a result of the Tumult of Aranjuez.
• 1962 – Influential American musician Bob Dylan released his eponymous debut album, mainly comprising traditional folk, blues and gospel songs.
• 1979 – The American cable television network C-SPAN, covering government proceedings and public-affairs programming, was launched.
• 2008 – The gamma-ray burst GRB 080319B (artist's impression pictured), the farthest object that could be seen by the naked eye, was observed.

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March 20: Nowruz (2023)

• 1852 – Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, which had a profound effect on attitudes toward African Americans and slavery in the United States, was published.
• 1923 – The Arts Club of Chicago hosted the opening of Pablo Picasso's first solo United States showing, entitled Original Drawings by Pablo Picasso.
• 1939 – Germany issued an ultimatum to Lithuania, demanding the return of the Klaipėda Region under threat of invasion.
• 1942 – World War II: After being forced to flee the Philippines for Australia, US Army general Douglas MacArthur (pictured) announced: "I came through and I shall return."
• 1993 – The Troubles: Two children were killed by the second of two bomb attacks by the Provisional Irish Republican Army in Warrington, England.

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March 21: Oltenia Day in Romania

• 1556 – Former Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer (pictured), one of the founders of Anglicanism, was burnt at the stake for heresy in Oxford, England.
• 1814 – War of the Sixth Coalition: During their march on Paris, Coalition forces defeated Napoleon's French army on the final day of the Battle of Arcis-sur-Aube.
• 1918 – First World War: The German Army opened the Spring Offensive with Operation Michael, attempting to break through the Allied lines and to seize ports on the English Channel.
• 1960 – Police in Sharpeville, South Africa, opened fire on a group of unarmed black demonstrators who were protesting pass laws, killing 69 people and wounding 180 others.
• 2019 – A major explosion at a chemical plant in Yancheng, China, killed 78 people and injured 640 others.

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March 22: World Water Day

• 1312 – Pope Clement V issued a bull dissolving the Order of the Knights Templar.
• 1784 – The Emerald Buddha (pictured), considered to be the sacred palladium of Thailand, was installed in its current location at Wat Phra Kaew on the grounds of the Grand Palace in Bangkok.
• 1942 – Second World War: British and Italian naval forces fought the Second Battle of Sirte in the Gulf of Sidra north of Libya.
• 1992 – USAir Flight 405 crashed in Flushing Bay shortly after takeoff from New York City's LaGuardia Airport, killing 27 people, and leading to studies into the effects of ice on aircraft.
• 2014 – A massive landslide in Oso, Washington, killed 43 people after engulfing a rural neighborhood, the largest death toll for a standalone landslide in U.S. history.

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March 23: First day of Ramadan (Islam, 2023)

• 1400 – After 175 years of rule, the Trần dynasty of Vietnam was deposed by Hồ Quý Ly, a court official.
• 1839 – An earthquake struck central Burma, causing significant damage and killing an estimated 300 to 400 people.
• 1862 – American Civil War: General Stonewall Jackson of the Confederate States Army lost the First Battle of Kernstown, but was still able to prevent the Union Army from reinforcing the Peninsula campaign.
• 1919 – Benito Mussolini and his supporters founded the Fasci Italiani di Combattimento, the predecessor of the National Fascist Party.
• 1993 – The demolition of Kowloon Walled City (pictured), a densely crowded slum in Hong Kong, began.

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March 24: World Tuberculosis Day

• 1603 – James VI of Scotland (pictured) succeeded to the thrones of England and Ireland as James I, uniting the realms under a single monarch.
• 1860 – Japanese chief minister Ii Naosuke was assassinated by rōnin samurai upset with his role in opening Japan to foreign powers.
• 1946 – The British Cabinet Mission arrived in New Delhi to discuss the transfer of power from the colonial government to Indian leadership.
• 1980 – One day after making a plea to Salvadoran soldiers to stop carrying out the government's repression, Archbishop Óscar Romero was assassinated while celebrating Mass in San Salvador.
• 2008 – Led by Jigme Thinley, the Bhutan Peace and Prosperity Party won 45 of 47 seats in the country's first National Assembly election.

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March 25: Bangladesh Genocide Remembrance Day; Earth Hour (20:30 local time, 2023)

• 717 – Byzantine emperor Theodosius III abdicated in favour of Leo the Isaurian after he captured Theodosius's son.
• 1410 – The Yongle Emperor (pictured) of Ming China launched the first of his military campaigns against the Mongols, resulting in the fall of the Mongol khan Bunyashiri.
• 1807 – The Slave Trade Act became law, abolishing the Atlantic slave trade in the British Empire.
• 1903 – The Scottish National Antarctic Expion anchored in the South Orkney Islands with the intention of establishing the first weather station in Antarctic territory.
• 1934 – Enrico Fermi published his discovery of neutron-induced radioactivity, for which he was later awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics.

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March 26

• 1484 – William Caxton (pictured) printed the first English translation of Aesop's Fables.
• 1873 – A Dutch military expion was launched to bombard Banda Aceh, the capital of the Aceh Sultanate in present-day Indonesia, beginning the Aceh War.
• 1896 – An explosion at the Brunner Mine in New Zealand killed 65 coal miners in the country's deadliest mining accident.
• 1917 – First World War: Attempting to advance into Palestine, the British were defeated by Ottoman troops at the First Battle of Gaza.
• 1953 – Jonas Salk announced the successful test of his polio vaccine on a small group of adults and children.

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March 27: Day of the Union of Bessarabia with Romania (1918)

• 1638 – The first of four destructive earthquakes struck southern Italy, destroying an estimated 10,000 homes.
• 1836 – At least 425 Texian prisoners of war were executed in the Goliad massacre, under orders from Mexican president Antonio López de Santa Anna.
• 1941 – World War II: A group of Serbian-nationalist officers of the Royal Yugoslav Air Force carried out a coup d'état after Yugoslavia joined the Axis powers.
• 2009 – A failure of the dam holding Situ Gintung, an artificial lake in Tangerang, Indonesia, caused floods that killed at least 100 people.
• 2015 – Himeji Castle (pictured), the largest and most visited Japanese castle, re-opened after five years of restoration work.

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March 28

• 193 – The Praetorian Guard assassinated Roman emperor Pertinax and sold the imperial office in an auction to Didius Julianus (coin pictured).
• 1802 – German astronomer Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers discovered Pallas, the second asteroid ever identified, although it was considered to be a planet at the time.
• 1933 – After an on-board fire that may have been the first incident of airliner sabotage, the Imperial Airways biplane City of Liverpool broke apart in mid-air, killing fifteen people.
• 1997 – In the Tragedy of Otranto, the Italian Navy vessel Sibilla collided with the Albanian civilian vessel Kateri i Radës, causing the latter to sink and leading to dozens of deaths.
• 2015 – A siege of a hotel in Mogadishu by al-Shabaab militants, which began the previous day and killed at least 20 people, ended with the Somali Armed Forces recapturing the premises.

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March 29: Boganda Day in the Central African Republic (1959); Martyrs' Day in Madagascar (1947)

• 1430 – After an eight-year siege, the Ottoman Empire captured the city of Thessalonica from the Republic of Venice.
• 1461 – During the Wars of the Roses, Yorkist troops defeated Lancastrian forces at the Battle of Towton in Yorkshire, England, one of the largest land battles ever fought in England.
• 1951 – The King and I, a musical about Mongkut of Siam, by Rodgers and Hammerstein premiered on Broadway.
• 1974 – A group of farmers in Shaanxi province, China, discovered a vast collection of terracotta statues (pictured) depicting the armies of the first Emperor of China Qin Shi Huang.
• 2017 – British prime minister Theresa May invoked Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union, formally beginning the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union.

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March 30: Land Day in Palestinian communities (1976)

• 1861 – British chemist William Crookes published his discovery of thallium using flame spectroscopy.
• 1867 – U.S. secretary of state William H. Seward negotiated the purchase of Alaska from Russia for US$7.2 million.
• 1921 – The Australian Air Corps was disbanded, to be replaced the following day by the Australian Air Force.
• 1950 – Usmar Ismail began shooting Darah dan Doa, widely recognised as the first Indonesian film.
• 1981 – John Hinckley Jr. shot and wounded U.S. president Ronald Reagan and three others outside the Washington Hilton (immediate aftermath pictured).

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March 31: Cesar Chavez Day in various U.S. states (1927); International Transgender Day of Visibility

• 1146 – French abbot Bernard of Clairvaux preached a sermon to a crowd at a council in Vézelay, with King Louis VII in attendance, urging the necessity of a Second Crusade.
• 1521 – Ferdinand Magellan and members of his crew participated in the first Catholic Mass in the Philippines.
• 1800 – After fighting through the night, the French Navy ship of the line Guillaume Tell surrendered to a British squadron in the Malta Channel.
• 1930 – To avoid government censorship, Hollywood movie studios instituted their own set of industry censorship guidelines, popularly known as the Hays Code.
• 1942 – Second World War: Because of a mutiny by Indian soldiers against their British officers, Japanese troops captured Christmas Island without any resistance.

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