This Day In History - May 26

Photo: Dunkirk, May, 1940

Today is Independence Day in Georgia, Mother's Day in Poland, and the feast of Saint Augustine of Canterbury who died this day in 604.

On this day in history:

1637 – Pequot War: A combined Protestant and Mohegan Indian force under the command of John Mason attacks a Pequot village in Connecticut, massacring approximately 500 Native Americans. The attack was in response to a number of raids by the Pequot Indians on Connecticut Colony towns.

1647 – Alse Young becomes the first person executed as a witch in the American colonies, when she is hanged in Hartford, Connecticut.

1940 – Battle of Dunkirk – In France, Allied forces begin a massive evacuation from Dunkirk, France.

2004 – The New York Times publishes an admission of journalistic failings, claiming that its flawed reporting and lack of skeptism towards sources during the buildup to the 2003 war in Iraq helped promote the belief that Iraq possessed large stockpiles of WMD. We are of course awaiting a similar mea culpa in relation to the election of Barack Obama.

Some famous Birthdays:

1478 – Pope Clement VII (d. 1534)

1566 – Mehmed III, Ottoman Emperor (d. 1603)

1799 – Aleksandr Pushkin, Russian author (d. 1837)

1907 – John Wayne, American actor (d. 1979)

1926 – Miles Davis, American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, and composer (d. 1991)

1951 – Sally Ride, American astronaut


Some famous Deaths:

604 – Augustine of Canterbury, Archbishop of Canterbury

1703 – Samuel Pepys, English civil servant and diarist (b. 1633)

1814 – Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, officially named the Guillotine (b. 1738)

1939 – Charles Horace Mayo, American medical practitioner (Mayo Clinic) (b. 1865)

All dates and information Historical Calendar Links.