Masada (“strong foundation or support”) is a plateau near the Dead Sea in Judea in Israel. It is 1,300 feet high. The mesa covers 840 acres. It was turned into a fortress by Herod the Great from 37 – 31 B.C. He built two palaces, a bath house, barracks, houses, Read more…
The governor’s election of 1872 created a lot of tension in Louisiana. It was marked by a lot of corruption and voter fraud. The Republicans supported black enfranchisement and the Democrats were doing their best to maintain white supremacy. Pres. Grant sent federal troops to support the Republican candidate. Read more…
The Immortals were the elite fighting unit of the Persian Empire. Most of what we know of them comes from the historian Herodotus. They were created when Cyrus the Great was emperor. Credit goes to a female named Pantea Arteshbod, the governor of Babylon. They were trained from age Read more…
Robert Smalls was born on April 5, 1839. Smalls was born a slave in 1839. His master hired him out as a deckhand on local ships and he eventually rose to pilot of a cotton transport called the Planter, based in Charleston harbor. When the Civil War broke out, Read more…
On April 2, 1801, the British fleet destroyed the Danish navy. Out of this battle came a famous phrase. In 1801, Great Britain was interested in preventing a Franco-Dutch alliance. Denmark had a powerful fleet, which if joined to the French fleet, might have changed the naval balance of Read more…
Pompeii and Herculaneum were covered by volcanic ash in 79 A.D. It was not until the 18th Century that they were uncovered by archeologists. Originally, the Pompeii site was no secret as some of the taller buildings protruded a bit, but in 471 and 512 had further eruptions that Read more…
On February 15, 1942, the port of Singapore fell to the Japanese. It was a terrible blow to the British Empire as 80,000 British, Indian, and Australian soldiers were taken prisoner. Naturally, the Allies wanted revenge. In walked a civilian named Bill Reynolds. The 61-year-old had used a Japanese Read more…
On March 29, 1849, a slave mailed himself to freedom. Henry Brown was a slave in Richmond, Virginia. He was married with three children, but his master broke his promise and sold his family away to the deep South. After that, he would pray to God and one day Read more…
Perhaps the most daring commando raid of WWII took place on March 28, 1942. The British planned Operation Chariot to help win the Battle of the Atlantic. The port of St. Nazaire was near the mouth of the Loire River in France. It was not only a major base Read more…
In 1199, Richard the Lionheart was besieging a castle in France because he heard it contained great wealth (it didn’t) and he was in need of money. On March 26, he was out scouting the castle when one of the defenders fired a crossbow at him from the Read more…