August; August

Posted in Date with Destiny

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august1This month was originally named Sextili in Latin, because it was the sixth month in the original ten-month Roman calendar under Romulus in 753 BC, when March was the first month of the year.
In 8 BC it was renamed in honor of Augustus (despite common belief, he did not take a day from February). According to a Senatus consultum quoted by Macrobius, he chose this month because it was the time of several of his great triumphs, including the conquest of Egypt.
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 Slavery was abolished throughout the British Empire today in 1834.


William S. Burroughs, US writer (The Naked Lunch) died today in 1997.


In 1858, Lake Victoria, the source of the Nile, was discovered by the English explorer John Speke


1578 and the Portuguese were defeated by the Berbers at the Battle of Alccer Quibir.


Richard Burton, diamond buying husband of Elizabeth Taylor and brilliant Welsh actor died today in 1984.


William Kemmler a murderer, became the first to be executed in the electric chair, in Auburn Prison, New York in 1890.


Britain's first motor racing Grand Prix was held at Brooklands in 1926; the winning car averaged 71.61 mph.


Hadrian became emperor of Rome in AD 117; following the death of his father Trajan.


In 1996, Boris Yeltsin was inaugurated as the first democratically elected Russian head of state.


Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completed his popular Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (A Little Night Music) this day in 1787.


Phobos & Deimos the satellites or 'moons' of Mars, were discovered by US astronomer Asaph Hall in 1877:


The Quagga in Amsterdam Zoo died in 1883, it was the last of this species in the world.


HG Wells, English science fiction writer (War of the Worlds) died today in 1946.


The Boxer Rebellion was ended and Beijing captured by an international punitive force today in 1900.


In 1914 the Opening of the Panama Canal took place; about 6,000 workers died during its construction.


A female gorilla, Binju Jua, rescued a three-year-old boy after he fell 18ft/5m into her enclosure in a Chicago zoo in 1996. The gorilla, with her 18-month-old daughter on her back, picked the boy up, cradled him in her arms and carried him to a doorway where zoo workers retrieved him.


In 1998, US president Bill Clinton testified in front of a grand jury about his alleged affair with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky. In a televised speech after his testimony, he admitted that he did have an 'inappropriate relationship' with Lewinsky but denied that he told anyone to lie about it.


Australia and New Zealand announced the withdrawal of their forces from Vietnam in 1971, as the Americans were coming in, and they didn't want to lose all their men.


It's 1991. and communist hardliners stage a Showdown, staged a coup in the USSR against President Gorbachev, who is placed under house arrest in the Crimea; radio and television stations were shut down and military rule was imposed in many cities.


Russian troops invaded Czechoslovakia in 1968as they tried a little shot of democracy only to get shot up themselves.



It was in 1911, that Leonardo da Vinci's painting Mona Lisa was Stolen from the Louvre Museum in Paris it was recovered two years later.


In 1788, the British settlement in Sierra Leone was founded, the purpose of which was to secure a home in Africa for freed slaves from England.


Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, two Italian-American anarchists, were falsely accused of robbery and murder, and were sent to the electric chair in 1927. Detals of the case can br read in The Sacco-Vanzetti Case.


Long time ago in AD 79, Mount Vesuvius erupted and buried the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in hot volcanic ash.


A very bad day for Russians in 1530, as Ivan the terrible, Tsar of Russia born.


The French Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of man in 1789 (Tom Paine was a busy boy).


Algiers, then a refuge for Barbary Pirates, was bombarded by Lord Exmouth in 1816.


The massive (200,000 people) civil rights march from the South ended in Washington DC where Martin Luther King delivered his famous 'I have a dream' speech in 1963.


At Candlestick Park, San Francisco, the Beatles played their last live concert in 1966:


1999: US software company Microsoft was forced it shut down its free e-mail service, Hotmail, when Hackers hit Hotmail allowing users to access the messages of any of its 40 million users.


1888: The body of Mary Ann 'Polly' Nichols


Got any Interesting Dates that might fit in? If you have, email them to me and perhaps I can turn these pages into one of the best reference pages on the Webb

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