Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/April

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April 1: April Fools' Day; Iranian Islamic Republic Day (1979)

• 1871 – The Duke of Buckingham (pictured) opened the first section of the Brill Tramway, a short railway line to transport goods between his lands and the national rail network.
• 1952 – Israel enacted a citizenship law, prior to which the country technically had no citizens.
• 1969 – The Hawker Siddeley Harrier, the first operational fighter aircraft with V/STOL capabilities, entered service with the Royal Air Force.
• 2001 – Same-sex marriage in the Netherlands was legalised, with the country becoming the first to do so.

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April 2: World Autism Awareness Day; feast day of Saint Francis of Paola (Catholicism); Malvinas Day in Argentina (1982)

• 1863 – About 5,000 people in Richmond, Virginia, mostly poor women, rioted in protest of the high price of bread (depicted).
• 1979 – Spores of anthrax were accidentally released from a military research facility near the city of Sverdlovsk, causing at least 68 deaths.
• 1982 – Argentine special forces invaded the Falkland Islands, sparking the Falklands War against the United Kingdom.
• 1992 – Bosnian War: At least 48 civilians were massacred in the town of Bijeljina in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
• 2012 – A gunman shot at people inside Oikos University, a Korean Christian college in Oakland, California, leaving seven people dead and three injured.

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April 3

• 1043 – Edward the Confessor, usually considered to be the last king of the House of Wessex, was crowned King of England.
• 1984 – Aboard Soyuz T-11, Rakesh Sharma (pictured) became the first Indian to be launched into space.
• 1996 – A U.S. Air Force CT-43 crashed into a mountainside while attempting an instrument approach to Dubrovnik Airport in Croatia, killing all 35 people on board, including Secretary of Commerce Ron Brown.
• 2009 – A gunman opened fire at the American Civic Association in Binghamton, New York, U.S., killing thirteen and wounding four before committing suicide.
• 2013 – The northeastern section of Buenos Aires Province, Argentina, experienced several flash floods that killed at least 100 people.

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April 4: Hansik in Korea (2024); Qingming Festival (traditional Chinese, 2024)

• 503 BC – Roman consul Agrippa Menenius Lanatus celebrated a triumph for a military victory over the Sabines.
• 1081 – The Komnenos dynasty came to full power with the coronation of Alexios I Komnenos (pictured) as Byzantine emperor.
• 1859 – Bryant's Minstrels premiered the minstrel song "Dixie" in New York City as part of their blackface show.
• 1949 – Twelve nations signed the North Atlantic Treaty, establishing NATO, an international military alliance whereby its member states agree to mutual defense in response to an attack by any external party.

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April 5: Feast day of Saint Vincent Ferrer (Catholicism)

• 919 – The Fatimid Caliphate began a second unsuccessful invasion of Egypt, then under Abbasid rule.
• 1614 – Pocahontas (pictured), a Native American woman, married English colonist John Rolfe, leading to a period of peace between the Powhatan people and the inhabitants of Jamestown, Virginia.
• 1944 – Siegfried Lederer, a Czech Jew, escaped from Auschwitz with the aid of an SS officer who opposed the Holocaust.
• 1986 – The Libyan secret service bombed a discotheque in West Berlin, resulting in three deaths and 229 others injured.
• 2009 – The North Korean satellite Kwangmyŏngsŏng-2 was launched from the Tonghae Satellite Launching Ground and passed over Japan, sparking concerns it may have been a trial run of technology that could be used to launch intercontinental ballistic missiles.

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April 6: Tartan Day

• 1776 – American Revolutionary War: Ships of the Continental Navy unsuccessfully attempted to capture HMS Glasgow near Block Island.
• 1808 – John Jacob Astor founded the American Fur Company, the profits from which made him the first multi-millionaire in the United States.
• 1974 – ABBA (pictured) won the Eurovision Song Contest representing Sweden with the song "Waterloo".
• 1994 – The aircraft carrying Rwandan president Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundian president Cyprien Ntaryamira was shot down in Kigali; the event became the catalyst for the Rwandan genocide.
• 2008 – Egyptian workers staged an illegal general strike, two days before key municipal elections.
• 2009 – Mass protests began across Moldova against the results of the parliamentary election.

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April 7: National Beer Day in the United States

• 1862 – American Civil War: Union forces defeated Confederate troops at the Battle of Shiloh, the bloodiest battle in U.S. history at the time, in Hardin County, Tennessee.
• 1949 – The Rodgers and Hammerstein musical South Pacific, based on Tales of the South Pacific by James Michener, opened on Broadway.
• 1964 – Reverend Bruce W. Klunder was killed by a bulldozer while he was protesting the construction of a segregated school in Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.
• 1994 – Rwandan Civil War: The Rwandan genocide began a few hours after the assassination of President Juvénal Habyarimana, with hundreds of thousands killed in the following 100 days.
• 2001 – NASA's 2001 Mars Odyssey (artist's conception pictured), the longest-surviving continually active spacecraft in orbit around a planet other than Earth, launched from Cape Canaveral.

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April 8

• 1271 – Crusades: The Knights Hospitaller surrendered the Krak des Chevaliers, a castle in present-day Syria, to the army of the Mamluk sultan Baybars.
• 1904 – France and the United Kingdom signed the Entente Cordiale, agreeing to a peaceful coexistence after centuries of intermittent conflict.
• 1911 – American cartoonist Winsor McCay released the silent short film Little Nemo (featured), one of the earliest animated films.
• 1933 – The Australian state of Western Australia voted to secede from the federation, but efforts to implement the result proved to be unsuccessful.
• 1973 – The Progress Party was founded in a movie theater in Oslo, Norway.

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April 9: Vimy Ridge Day in Canada (1917); Day of Valor in the Philippines (1942)

• 193 – Year of the Five Emperors: Septimius Severus was proclaimed Roman emperor by his troops at Carnuntum in modern-day Austria.
• 1388 – Despite being vastly outnumbered, forces of the Old Swiss Confederacy defeated an Austrian army at the Battle of Näfels.
• 1939 – After being denied permission to perform at Constitution Hall by the Daughters of the American Revolution, African-American singer Marian Anderson gave an open-air concert on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.
• 1967 – The Boeing 737 took its maiden flight, eventually becoming the most produced commercial passenger jet airliner in the world.
• 2003 – Invasion of Iraq: Coalition forces captured Baghdad and the statue of Saddam Hussein in Firdos Square was toppled.

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April 10: Eid al-Fitr (Islam, 2024)

• 1809 – Napoleonic Wars: The War of the Fifth Coalition began with the Austrian invasion of Bavaria, then a client state of France.
• 1925 – The novel The Great Gatsby by American author F. Scott Fitzgerald was first published by Scribner's.
• 1970 – In the midst of business disagreements with his bandmates, Paul McCartney announced his departure from the Beatles.
• 1973 – In the deadliest aviation accident in Swiss history, Invicta International Airlines Flight 435 crashed into a hillside near Hochwald, killing 108 people of 145 on board.
• 2019 – Scientists from the Event Horizon Telescope project released the first image of a black hole (depicted), located at the center of the galaxy M87.

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April 11

• 1689 – William III and Mary II (both pictured) were crowned joint sovereigns of England in a ceremony at Westminster Abbey.
• 1809 – Napoleonic Wars: A hastily assembled Royal Navy fleet launched an assault against the main strength of the French Atlantic Fleet; an incomplete victory led to political turmoil in Britain.
• 1951 – U.S. president Harry S. Truman relieved General of the Army Douglas MacArthur of his commands for making public statements about the Korean War that contradicted the administration's policies.
• 2001 – In a FIFA World Cup qualifying match, Australia defeated American Samoa 31–0, the largest margin of victory recorded in international football.

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April 12: Cosmonautics Day in Russia (1961); Yuri's Night

• 1807 – The Froberg mutiny of Greek and Albanian troops in British service ended with the explosion of the gunpowder magazine at Fort Ricasoli, Malta.
• 1831 – The Broughton Suspension Bridge near Manchester, England, collapsed reportedly because of mechanical resonance induced by troops marching in step across it.
• 1993 – Bosnian War: NATO forces began Operation Deny Flight (aircraft pictured) to enforce a no-fly zone over Bosnia and Herzegovina ordered by the United Nations Security Council.
• 2012 – The Guinea-Bissau military seized control in a coup amid a presidential election, later handing power to a transitional administration under Manuel Serifo Nhamadjo.
• 2013 – Four Chadian soldiers were killed in a suicide bombing by jihadist rebels in Kidal, Mali.

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April 13: Vaisakhi (Sikhism, 2024)

• 1742 – The first performance of George Frideric Handel's celebrated oratorio Messiah took place in Dublin.
• 1943 – The Neoclassical Jefferson Memorial (pictured) in Washington, D.C., was formally dedicated on the 200th anniversary of Thomas Jefferson's birth.
• 1946 – Nakam, a Jewish organization seeking revenge for the Holocaust, attempted to poison thousands of SS prisoners at Langwasser internment camp, but did not kill anyone.
• 2009 – Andrew Hussie's webcomic Homestuck debuted, and concluded on the same day in 2016.
• 2017 – War in Afghanistan: In an airstrike in Nangarhar Province, the U.S. military dropped the most powerful conventional bomb used in combat.

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April 14: Tamil New Year and other New Year festivals in South and Southeast Asia (2024); Day of the Georgian Language (1978)

• 43 BC – War of Mutina: Despite initial success, troops loyal to Mark Antony were defeated near the Via Aemilia in northern Italy by legions loyal to the Roman Senate.
• 1944 – The freighter Fort Stikine, carrying cotton bales, gold and ammunition, exploded in the harbour of Bombay, India, sinking surrounding ships and causing about 800 deaths.
• 1970 – After an oxygen tank aboard Apollo 13 exploded, disabling the spacecraft's electrical and life-support systems, astronaut Jack Swigert reported: "Houston, we've had a problem here" (audio featured).
• 1983 – Let's Dance, English musician David Bowie's best-selling album, was released.
• 1994 – Iraqi no-fly zones conflict: In a friendly-fire incident during Operation Provide Comfort, two U.S. Air Force aircraft mistakenly shot down two U.S. Army helicopters over northern Iraq, killing 26 people.

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April 15: Patriots' Day in some states in the United States (2024); Day of the Sun in North Korea; Jackie Robinson Day and Tax Day in the United States

• 1632 – Thirty Years' War: A Swedish–German army defeated the forces of the Catholic League at the Battle of Rain, mortally wounding their commander Johann Tserclaes, Count of Tilly.
• 1923 – Ten Japanese-American children were killed in a racially motivated arson attack on a school in Sacramento, California.
• 1936 – Two Jews were killed near Tulkarm in Mandatory Palestine, an act widely viewed as the beginning of violence within the Arab revolt.
• 1989 – The Hillsborough disaster (memorial pictured), a human crush that caused 97 deaths in the worst disaster in British sporting history, occurred during an FA Cup match between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest in Sheffield.
• 2019 – A fire severely damaged Notre-Dame de Paris, destroying the cathedral's timber spire and much of the roof.

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April 16

• 1520 – A revolt of citizens in Toledo, Castile, opposed to the rule of the foreign-born Charles I began when the royal government attempted to unseat radical city councilors.
• 1862 – Slavery in Washington, D.C., ended when the District of Columbia Compensated Emancipation Act became law.
• 1945 – Second World War: British and Canadian forces concluded the Liberation of Arnhem in the Netherlands from German occupation.
• 1948 – The Organisation for European Economic Co-operation, headquartered in Paris, was founded.
• 2014 – The ferry MV Sewol (pictured) capsized and sank off Donggeochado, South Korea, killing 306 people, mainly students from Danwon High School.

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April 17: Evacuation Day in Syria (1946)

• 1362 – Lithuanian Crusade: After a month-long siege, forces of the Teutonic Order captured and destroyed Kaunas Castle (reconstruction pictured), which was defended by troops of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
• 1783 – The Mechanical Turk, a fraudulent chess-playing "machine" by Wolfgang von Kempelen that was secretly controlled by a hidden human, began a tour of Europe.
• 1809 – Napoleonic Wars: After a three-day chase, the French ship D'Hautpoul was captured off Puerto Rico by a British squadron under Alexander Cochrane.
• 1973 – George Lucas began writing a 13-page film treatment that later formed the basis of Star Wars.
• 1984 – Metropolitan Police officer Yvonne Fletcher was shot and killed while on duty during a protest outside the Libyan embassy in London, resulting in an 11-day police siege of the building and a breakdown of Libya–United Kingdom relations.

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April 18

• 1775 – American Revolutionary War: Colonists Paul Revere and William Dawes, later joined by Samuel Prescott, began a midnight ride to warn residents of Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, about the impending arrival of British troops.
• 1938 – Superman, created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster of DC Comics, made his debut in Action Comics #1, the first true superhero comic book.
• 1946 – The final session of the League of Nations concluded in Geneva, with delegates agreeing to transfer much of its assets to the United Nations.
• 1980 – Robert Mugabe (pictured) became the first prime minister of Zimbabwe, beginning a 37-year period in power.
• 2007 – A ladle spilled 30 tonnes (33 tons) of molten steel in a factory in Liaoning, China, killing 32 workers.

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April 19: Feast day of Saint Alphege of Canterbury (Catholicism, Anglicanism), Education and Sharing Day in the United States (2024), Primrose Day in London

• 1773 – The Polish Partition Sejm met to discuss the First Partition of Poland, carried out the previous year by Russia, Prussia and Austria.
• 1809 – War of the Fifth Coalition: French general Louis-Nicolas Davout defeated an Austrian force in Lower Bavaria, allowing him to rejoin the main French army.
• 1927 – American actress Mae West (pictured) was sentenced to ten days in jail for "corrupting the morals of youth" with her play Sex.
• 1989 – A gun turret exploded on board the United States Navy battleship Iowa, killing 47 sailors.

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April 20: First day of Ridván (Baháʼí Faith, 2024); 420 (cannabis culture)

• 1535 – Sun dogs were observed over Stockholm, Sweden, inspiring the painting Vädersolstavlan (depicted), the oldest coloured depiction of the city.
• 1818 – Four days after the Court of King's Bench upheld an English murder suspect's right to a trial by battle in Ashford v Thornton, the plaintiff declined to fight, allowing the defendant to go free.
• 1942 – World War II: German and Italian forces began a large-scale counter-insurgency operation in occupied Yugoslavia.
• 1968 – South African Airways Flight 228 crashed shortly after take-off from Windhoek in South West Africa, resulting in 123 deaths.
• 2010 – An explosion on Deepwater Horizon, an offshore rig in the Gulf of Mexico, resulted in the largest marine oil spill in history.

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April 21

• 900 – A debt was pardoned by the chief of Tondo on the island of Luzon and recorded on the Laguna Copperplate Inscription, the earliest known calendar-dated document found in the Philippines.
• 1615 – The Wignacourt Aqueduct (pictured) in Malta was inaugurated and was used to carry water to Valletta for about 300 years.
• 1836 – Forces of the Republic of Texas led by Sam Houston defeated the Mexican troops of General Antonio López de Santa Anna in the Battle of San Jacinto, the decisive and final battle of the Texas Revolution.
• 1975 – South Vietnamese president Nguyễn Văn Thiệu resigned on hearing of the fall of Xuân Lộc, the last battle of the Vietnam War.
• 2021 – The Indonesian Navy submarine Nanggala sank, resulting in the deaths of all 53 people on board.

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April 22

• 1500 – A fleet commanded by Pedro Álvares Cabral (pictured) anchored off present-day Brazil; he later claimed the land for the Portuguese Empire.
• 1885 – The first meeting of the Colonial Defence Committee, a standing committee of the British Colonial Office, was held to discuss the defence of Barbados.
• 1918 – The short-lived Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic was established on territory formerly part of the Russian Empire.
• 1951 – Korean War: The Chinese People's Volunteer Army attacked positions occupied mainly by Australian and Canadian forces, starting the Battle of Kapyong.
• 2016 – The Paris Agreement, an international treaty on climate change, opened for signature and was signed by 175 parties.

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April 23: First day of Passover (Judaism); National Sovereignty and Children's Day in Turkey; the Third Month Fair begins in Dali City, China (2024)

• 1467 – Ottoman wars in Europe: Albanian leader Skanderbeg defeated an Ottoman army under Ballaban Badera to raise the siege of Krujë.
• 1945 – World War II: The US Army's 90th Infantry Division liberated Flossenbürg concentration camp (pictured) in Germany, freeing 1,500 prisoners.
• 1976 – The American band the Ramones released their debut album, which became highly influential on the emerging punk rock movement.
• 1979 – Blair Peach, a New Zealand teacher, was fatally injured after being knocked unconscious during an Anti-Nazi League demonstration against a National Front election meeting in Southall, London.
• 2018 – A man intentionally struck pedestrians with a van on Yonge Street in Toronto, Canada, leading to 11 deaths.

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April 24: Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day (1915); Administrative Professionals Day in various countries (2024)

• 1837 – A fire broke out in Surat, India, which went on to destroy about 75% of the city.
• 1914 – The Franck–Hertz experiment, the first electrical measurement to clearly demonstrate quantum mechanics, was presented to the German Physical Society.
• 1916 – Irish republicans led by Patrick Pearse began the Easter Rising against British rule in Ireland, and proclaimed the Irish Republic an independent state.
• 1990 – The Hubble Space Telescope (pictured) was launched aboard STS-31 by Space Shuttle Discovery.
• 1993 – The Provisional Irish Republican Army detonated a truck bomb in London's financial district in Bishopsgate, killing one person, injuring forty-four others, and causing damage that cost £350 million to repair.

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April 25: Liberation Day in Italy (1945)

• 1643 – First English Civil War: Despite being vastly outnumbered, a Parliamentarian force under James Chudleigh defeated a Royalist army near Okehampton, Devon, at the Battle of Sourton Down.
• 1915 – First World War: The Australian and New Zealand Army Corps landed at Anzac Cove while British and French troops landed at Cape Helles to begin the Allied invasion of the Gallipoli peninsula in the Ottoman Empire.
• 1960 – The U.S. Navy submarine Triton (pictured) completed the first submerged circumnavigation of the world.
• 1983 – The first issue of The Jakarta Post was published in Indonesia.
• 2015 – Nepal was struck by a magnitude-7.8 earthquake, killing more than 8,000 people.

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April 26

• 1478 – In a conspiracy to replace the Medici family as rulers of the Republic of Florence, the Pazzi family attacked Lorenzo de' Medici (pictured) and killed his brother Giuliano at Florence Cathedral.
• 1915 – First World War: Britain, France and Russia signed a secret treaty promising territory to Italy if it joined the war on their side.
• 1933 – The Gestapo, the official secret police force of Nazi Germany, was established.
• 1989 – A tornado struck the Manikganj District of Bangladesh and killed an estimated 1,300 people, making it the deadliest tornado in history.
• 1994 – Just before landing at Nagoya Airport, Japan, the copilot of China Airlines Flight 140 inadvertently triggered the takeoff/go-around switch, causing the aircraft to crash and killing 264 of the 271 people on board.

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April 27: Koningsdag in the Netherlands

• 630 – Shahrbaraz usurped the throne of the Sasanian Empire from Ardashir III, but was himself killed six weeks later.
• 1650 – Wars of the Three Kingdoms: Covenanter forces defeated the Royalists at the Battle of Carbisdale near the village of Culrain, Scotland.
• 1945 – World War II: The photograph Raising the Flag on the Three-Country Cairn (pictured) was taken after German troops withdrew to Norway at the end of the Lapland War.
• 1965 – Indonesia–Malaysia confrontation: British forces repelled a surprise Indonesian attack on a base at Plaman Mapu in Sarawak.
• 2005 – The Airbus A380, the world's largest passenger airliner, made its maiden flight from Toulouse, France.

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April 28: Workers' Memorial Day

• 1253 – The Japanese monk Nichiren declared the mantra Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō, now a central part of Nichiren Buddhism.
• 1789 – Fletcher Christian, the acting lieutenant on board the Royal Navy ship Bounty, led a mutiny against the commander William Bligh in the South Pacific.
• 1923 – The FA Cup final (crowd and police pictured) between Bolton Wanderers and West Ham United was held on the opening day of the Empire Stadium in London.
• 1945 – World War II: Benito Mussolini, the deposed fascist dictator of Italy, was executed by partisans in Giulino.
• 1983 – The West German news magazine Stern published excerpts from the purported diaries of Adolf Hitler, later revealed to be forgeries.

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April 29

• 1770 – On his first voyage, British explorer James Cook and the crew of HMS Endeavour (pictured) landed at Botany Bay, making the first recorded European landfall on the eastern coast of Australia.
• 1903 – A rockslide buried part of the Canadian mining town of Frank under 110 million tonnes of rock, killing around 70 people.
• 1944 – Second World War: British agent Nancy Wake parachuted into Auvergne, France, becoming a liaison between the Special Operations Executive and the local Maquis group.
• 1968 – The controversial Broadway musical Hair, a product of the counterculture of the 1960s, opened, with its songs becoming anthems of the anti-Vietnam War movement.
• 2006 – Cyclone Mala made landfall near Thandwe, Myanmar, causing 37 deaths.

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April 30

• 311 – The Diocletianic Persecution of Christians officially ended in the eastern Roman Empire.
• 1943 – Second World War: The Royal Navy submarine HMS Seraph began Operation Mincemeat to deceive Germany about the upcoming invasion of Sicily.
• 1963 – A refusal by the Bristol Omnibus Company and the Transport and General Workers' Union to permit the employment of black bus crews led to a bus boycott in Bristol, England.
• 1975 – American forces completed a helicopter evacuation (aircraft and evacuees pictured) of U.S. citizens, South Vietnamese civilians and others from Saigon, just before North Vietnamese troops captured the city and ended the Vietnam War.
• 2021 – A crowd crush killed 45 people during the annual pilgrimage to the tomb of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai in Israel.

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