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18141776 Club

British storm Fort Erie in the dark; a powder magazine answers for the Americans

Three columns crossed the Niagara frontier after midnight; one bastion never made it to dawn.

Three weeks after retreating from Lundy's Lane, Lieutenant General Gordon Drummond decided the Americans holed up at Fort Erie could still be broken by force. After dark on August 15, 1814, he sent three British columns forward: 1,300 men under Victor Fischer toward Snake Hill, 700 under Hercules Scott against the Douglass Battery, and 360 under William Drummond straight at the fort itself. Pickets had already spotted the British columns moving, and the garrison stood ready when they came. William Drummond's men briefly seized the Northeast Bastion before a powder magazine beneath them detonated, killing as many as 250 men and breaking the attack for good…

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More from August 15
1824

The last French general of the Revolution steps ashore in New York Harbor

Invited by President Monroe to mark fifty years of independence, Lafayette begins a journey that will cover all 24 states.
1962

GI dodges court martial by walking across a minefield into North Korea

Three hours before he was due to answer for forged paperwork, Dresnok chose the DMZ instead.
1945

Emperor's voice reaches the Japanese people for the first time: Japan surrenders

A phonograph record, smuggled past mutinous officers overnight, carries Hirohito's words into homes across the country at noon.
19441776 Club
French and American forces hit three beaches near Saint-Tropez while a German army thinned out by Normandy barely holds the shore.
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More from Revolution & Founding
1789

Washington signs the Judiciary Act; the Supreme Court gets a chief justice and five associates

The same law creates federal district and circuit courts, and a new office called Attorney General.
1789

Congress sends twelve amendments to the states, ten of them the Bill of Rights

Two other amendments ride along, one on congressional pay that would wait two centuries to become law.
1789

Washington names Jefferson to head a department that does not yet exist in practice

The Virginia planter fresh off five years in Paris becomes the nation's first Secretary of State.
1780

256 settlers sign a constitution at French Lick; judges' pay set in animal skins

Robertson and Donelson lead the compact at Fort Nashborough, electing a twelve-judge council the people may remove from office.
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