September 8
1380. The Battle of Kulikovo. The Russians of Muscovy defeat a much larger force of Tartars in order to throw off the shackles of the Mongolian Golden Horde to which they had been paying tribute ever since they had been conquered by Batu Khan, grandson of Genghis.
1504. Michelangelo's David is unveiled in Florence.
1565. The Knights Hospitaller (a/k/a Knights of Malta) lift the Ottoman Turk siege of Malta, one of the longest, most grueling and famous in history. The event marks the end of the aura of invincibility that had surrounded the Ottoman Empire (though it had suffered setbacks before).
1888. Early in the morning of this date, 1888, Annie Chapman was plying her trade in the Whitechapel area of London. AT this point in her life Ms. Chapman was a heavy drinker, but it had not always been so. Once she had been married, and had three children. But one died of meningitis at the age of 12, and another had been born disabled. As a result of their troubles, she and her husband had become heavy drinkers, and then separated. She received an alimony of 10 shillings a week until 1886, when they abruptly stopped. When she inquired why, she learned her husband had died. Seemingly as a result, the man she had been living with abruptly left her, taking his income away as well.
She earned an income by crochet work, selling flowers and, occassionally, prostitution. She lived in common boarding houses, had a lung condition, and was generally regarded as inoffensive and a more accomplished woman than most of her fellow Whitechapel residents. Beign without money for her lodging this day, she went to earn some on the street.
At about 5:30 a.m. a woman saw a person that she believed to be Ms. Chapman talking with a gentlemen described as over 40, of dark complexion, and of foreign "shabby-genteel" appearance. At 5:55 she was found lying near a doorway in teh backyard of 29 Hanbury Street.
Her throat had been cut from left to right, and she had been disemboweled, with her intestines thrown over each of her shoulders. Part of her uterus had been removed as well.
Jack the Ripper had struck again.
1892. The Pledge of Allegiance is first recited.
1923. The Honda Point Disaster, the worst peacetime disaster in US Naval history. Nine US Navy Destroyers -- all less than five years old -- run aground off California, with seven ships and 23 crewmen lost.
1930. 3M begins marketing transparent scotch tape.
1943. General Eisenhower announces an armistice with Italy.
1966. Star Trek premiers.
1974. President Ford pardons former President Nixon for any crimes committed while in office.
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Originally Posted by Voltaire
Nothing is more well known than the siege of Malta
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