Georgetown, founded to be Catholic, with slaves 1791`

Georgetown University’s 1791 opening marked the start of the first Catholic institution of higher learning in the United States, made possible by the American Revolution’s removal of colonial restrictions on Catholic education and public worship.

Before 1791: Background and Planning

Under English colonial rule, especially after the Glorious Revolution and penal laws, Catholics in Maryland and elsewhere faced severe restrictions: public celebration of Mass was limited or banned, Catholic schools were forbidden, and political rights were curtailed. Maryland had been founded as a Catholic refuge in 1634, but by the 18th century those freedoms had largely eroded. Families seeking a Catholic education often sent sons abroad.

John Carroll (1735–1815) was the central figure. Born in Upper Marlboro, Maryland, into a prominent Catholic family (his cousin Charles Carroll of Carrollton signed the Declaration of Independence; his brother Daniel signed both the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution), he was educated at a small local Jesuit school then at St. Omer in French Flanders. He entered the Society of Jesus in 1753, was ordained in 1761, and taught in Europe. When Pope Clement XIV suppressed the Jesuits in 1773, Carroll returned to Maryland in 1774.

He supported the Revolution (joining a 1776 diplomatic mission to Canada with Benjamin Franklin and others) and, after independence, became the organizational leader of the American Catholic Church. In 1784 Rome appointed him Superior of the American Missions (Apostolic Prefect); in 1790 he was consecrated the first Bishop of Baltimore, with a diocese covering the entire United States. Carroll saw education as essential for the Church’s survival and growth in the new republic. From at least 1783 he planned an academy that would combine classical liberal-arts training in the Jesuit tradition with the values of the American experiment. He wanted it “open to students of every religious profession.”

In 1786–87 clergy meetings at White Marsh appointed directors (including Carroll, Robert Molyneux, and John Ashton). Carroll issued a prospectus, “Proposals for Establishing an Academy at George-Town, Patowmack-River, Maryland.” Construction of the first building (later called Old South or the South Building) began in 1788 on a hilltop overlooking the tobacco port of Georgetown (then in Maryland). On 23 January 1789, Carroll and colleagues secured the deed to the initial land (roughly one to one-and-a-half acres) from William Deakins Jr. and John Threlkeld for £75—the date the university traditionally treats as its founding. The site’s proximity to the emerging federal capital (selected nearby in 1790) was an unexpected advantage.

The 1791 Opening and Early Figures

The academy formally began receiving students in late 1791. William Gaston (1778–1844) of New Bern, North Carolina—then 13—became the first enrolled student on 22 November 1791. His father, a doctor and Revolutionary patriot, had been killed by Tories in 1781; his Catholic mother, Margaret Sharpe, arranged his education. Gaston stayed only briefly (health issues led him to leave by spring 1793), later graduated first in his class from the College of New Jersey (Princeton), became a lawyer, Federalist congressman (1813–1817), and Chief Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court. As a congressman he helped secure Georgetown’s federal charter. Gaston Hall is named for him. (He was also a large slaveholder—research has identified at least 163 enslaved people in his estate.)

Rev. Robert Plunkett (1752–1815), an English priest educated at St. Omer, Bruges, and Douai who arrived as a missionary in 1790, was persuaded by Carroll to serve as the first president (1791–1793). He oversaw the division into elementary, preparatory, and college levels and the admission of the first students. The first teacher was Jean-Edouard de Mondésir. Classes proper began on campus in January 1792. The second student was Philemon Charles Wederstrandt (enrolled December 1791). Early enrollment reached roughly 40–70 students in the first year or so, including non-Catholics and early international students (e.g., from the West Indies). The first prospectus was issued in English, French, and Spanish. Early faculty included former Jesuits and Sulpician refugees from the French Revolution.

The vision was deliberately ecumenical and republican: a place that would give consistency to Catholic life in America while educating citizens of the new nation.

After 1791: Growth, Challenges, and Transformation

President George Washington visited in August 1797. In 1805, after partial restoration of the Jesuits, the Society assumed fuller direction. On 1 March 1815, President James Madison signed the congressional charter empowering the college to grant degrees (Gaston helped steer it). The first Bachelor of Arts degrees were awarded in 1817. Carroll, elevated to Archbishop of Baltimore in 1808, died in December 1815.

The college relied on enslaved labor from its earliest years. In June 1838, the Maryland Jesuits (under figures including Thomas Mulledy) sold approximately 272 enslaved men, women, and children (the “GU272,” with some counts higher) to Louisiana planters Henry Johnson and Jesse Batey for $115,000 to pay debts and stabilize the college. Families were separated; many were transported south. This episode, and the broader reliance on slavery until the 13th Amendment, has been the subject of extensive modern research, apologies by the university and Jesuits, and efforts involving descendants.

The Civil War nearly emptied the campus (enrollment fell from over 300 to 17); buildings served as a temporary hospital, and more than 1,100 students and alumni served on both sides. In 1876 the school adopted blue and gray as official colors to symbolize post-war reconciliation.

Patrick Francis Healy, S.J. (president 1873–1882), a Jesuit of mixed African and Irish ancestry (legally enslaved at birth in Georgia), was the first African American to earn a Ph.D. and the first to head a major predominantly white U.S. university. He modernized the curriculum (emphasizing history and sciences), expanded facilities, and began construction of the landmark Healy Hall. Medical and law schools had already opened (1851 and 1870). Later expansions included the School of Foreign Service (1919). Women entered the College in 1969. The university became a major research institution with international reach; notable alumni include U.S. Presidents Bill Clinton and Lyndon B. Johnson, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, and many diplomats, politicians, and scholars.

From a modest academy on a Maryland hillside, open by design to students of every faith and shaped by the revolutionary generation, Georgetown grew into the oldest Catholic and Jesuit university in the United States, still headquartered on the same hilltop in Washington, D.C.

Significant early figures also include early presidents such as Robert Molyneux and Louis William Valentine DuBourg (who helped start the library), and the network of Carroll family members and Maryland clergy who supplied the institutional foundation.

= November 15th

These events cluster around mid-November (primarily 14–15 November in the sources), spanning imperial succession, decisive medieval battles, the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire, early modern conflicts, institutional openings, and the founding documents of the United States.

565 – Justin II succeeds Justinian I

Justinian I (r. 527–565), the emperor who reconquered much of the western Mediterranean, codified Roman law, and built Hagia Sophia, died childless on the night of 14/15 November 565. His nephew Justin II (son of Justinian’s sister Vigilantia and husband of Sophia, niece of Empress Theodora) was proclaimed emperor. The chamberlain Callinicus claimed a deathbed designation; modern historians note the succession was managed by palace officials amid potential rival claims from another nephew. Justin II’s reign (565–578) faced fiscal strain from Justinian’s wars and building, Persian and Avar pressures, and his own later mental illness; he elevated Tiberius as co-emperor before dying in 578.

655 – Battle of the Winwaed

On 15 November 655, King Oswiu of Bernicia (Northumbria) defeated and killed the powerful pagan Mercian king Penda near a river called the Winwaed (possibly Cock Beck near Leeds). Penda had previously killed Oswald of Northumbria at Maserfield (642) and dominated much of England. Oswiu’s smaller force caught the larger Mercian-led army (including East Anglian allies) as it withdrew; heavy rain flooded the river and drowned many. Bede presents the victory as ending effective Anglo-Saxon pagan political dominance and accelerating Christianisation in Mercia (under Penda’s son Peada and later rulers).

1315 – Battle of Morgarten

On 15 November 1315, infantry from the Swiss forest cantons (especially Schwyz, with Uri and Unterwalden) ambushed a Habsburg army under Leopold I, Duke of Austria, along the shore of Lake Ägeri near the Morgarten Pass. The Swiss used terrain, logs/rocks, and halberds against the constrained Austrian knights and infantry. The result was a decisive rout with heavy Austrian losses. It secured the early Swiss Confederacy (formalised further by the Pact of Brunnen weeks later) and demonstrated the effectiveness of disciplined common infantry against feudal cavalry—an early milestone in Swiss military reputation.

1532 – Pizarro’s forces meet Atahualpa near Cajamarca

In mid-November 1532 (sources place Spanish arrival in Cajamarca on the 15th), Francisco Pizarro’s small force (roughly 160–170 men, including horsemen under Hernando de Soto) made contact with Inca ruler Atahualpa outside Cajamarca. Atahualpa, having just prevailed in a civil war against his half-brother Huáscar, was camped nearby with a large army. The Spaniards arranged a meeting for the following day in the town plaza. On 16 November, in the Battle (or massacre) of Cajamarca, they ambushed Atahualpa’s largely unarmed retinue, killed thousands, and captured the emperor. The ransom of gold and silver that followed, and Atahualpa’s later execution, opened the way for the conquest of the Inca Empire.

1533 – Pizarro arrives in Cuzco

On 15 November 1533—exactly a year after the Cajamarca events—Pizarro entered Cuzco, the Inca capital and religious/political centre. Atahualpa had been executed in July 1533 after the ransom was collected. The Spanish advanced with limited opposition amid the civil-war fallout and local alliances; they installed a puppet ruler (Manco Inca) and began extracting further treasure while consolidating control. Cuzco’s fall symbolised the collapse of central Inca authority, though resistance continued for years.

1705 – Battle of Zsibó

On 15 November 1705 (some traditional accounts give 11 November), during Rákóczi’s War of Independence, Habsburg forces under Marshal Ludwig Herbeville, supported by Danish and Serbian contingents, defeated the Kuruc (Hungarian rebel) army of Francis II Rákóczi near Zsibó (Jibou, in present-day Romania/Transylvania). Forces were roughly equal in number, but superior Habsburg discipline, training, and artillery prevailed. The defeat allowed the Habsburgs to occupy Transylvania and seriously set back the independence movement, which ultimately failed by 1711.

1760 – Inauguration of the Castellania in Valletta

The second (and surviving) Castellania—the Baroque courthouse and prison of the Order of St John in Valletta, Malta—was formally inaugurated around mid-November 1760 (chapel of the Sorrows consecrated 15 November). Built 1757–1760 under Grand Master Manuel Pinto de Fonseca to designs by Francesco Zerafa (completed by Giuseppe Bonici) on the site of an earlier 16th-century building, it served as the island’s main courts until the mid-19th century. It later housed public health offices and remains the Maltese Ministry of Health; the ornate limestone façade, marble details, and allegorical figures of Justice and Truth survive.

1777 – Continental Congress approves the Articles of Confederation

After roughly 16 months of debate, the Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union on 15 November 1777 (while meeting in York, Pennsylvania, during the Revolutionary War). The document created a loose “league of friendship” among the thirteen sovereign states, with a unicameral Congress holding limited powers (foreign affairs, war, but no direct taxation or strong executive). Full ratification by all states took until 1 March 1781; the Articles governed until replaced by the 1787 Constitution (effective 1789) because of their weaknesses in finance, commerce, and enforcement.

1791 – Georgetown University opens

The first Catholic institution of higher learning in the United States began operations in 1791 (first student, William Gaston, enrolled 22 November; formal instruction started early 1792). Founded by Bishop John Carroll (later first Archbishop of Baltimore) on land acquired in what was then Maryland (now Washington, D.C.), it was conceived as an academy open to students of all faiths after the Revolution removed colonial restrictions on Catholic education. It later became a Jesuit university and remains the oldest Catholic university in the country.

These moments range from dynastic transitions and the Christianisation of Anglo-Saxon England, through Swiss independence and the dramatic collapse of the Inca state, to institutional foundations in Malta, the early American republic, and Catholic education in the new United States. The two Pizarro entries form a clear sequence in the conquest of Peru; the 1777 and 1791 American events mark early steps in the political and educational life of the independent United States.

Links Dem to Ancient Egypt

The first recorded labor strike in history took place in Year 29 of Pharaoh Ramesses III’s reign (c. 1158–1155 BC; often cited around 1152 or 1157 BC) at the workers’ village of Deir el-Medina (ancient name Set Maat, “Place of Truth”) on the west bank of the Nile near Thebes (modern Luxor).

The Workers and the Village

Deir el-Medina housed a specialized community of skilled artisans—stonemasons, painters, sculptors, and other craftsmen—who built and decorated the royal tombs in the nearby Valley of the Kings and Valley of the Queens. They were not slaves but state employees, paid primarily in grain rations (emmer wheat and barley), along with fish, vegetables, oil, clothing, and other supplies. The village had its own administrative system, including scribes, foremen, and a local court for internal disputes. At its peak it contained roughly 40–120 households.

What Happened

Delays in grain deliveries—caused by the heavy costs of Ramesses III’s wars, poor harvests, administrative breakdowns, and possible corruption—left the workers unpaid for weeks. Records show complaints had been building; in one case the scribe Amennakht noted that 20 days had already passed without rations.

In Year 29 the workers stopped work. Contemporary accounts (chiefly the Turin Strike Papyrus, Cat. 1880, written in hieratic script) describe them passing the five guard posts of the necropolis while shouting “We are hungry!” They staged sit-ins at symbolic sites, including the unfinished mortuary temple of Ramesses III at Medinet Habu and the temple of Thutmose III. There were multiple stoppages over a period of months, both by day and by night (some with torches). Officials negotiated; partial grain payments were released from temple stores, and the workers returned temporarily, but the problems recurred.

The episode is widely regarded as the earliest well-documented collective labor action because we have direct contemporary records naming the workforce, the grievance (delayed rations), the actions taken, and the authorities’ responses.

Significant Figures

• Ramesses III (r. c. 1186–1155 BC): Second pharaoh of the 20th Dynasty and often called the last great New Kingdom ruler. He successfully repelled major invasions by the Sea Peoples (Year 8) and Libyans, and he built the great temple complex at Medinet Habu. His reign, however, was marked by growing economic strain. He was later assassinated in the “Harem Conspiracy” (a plot involving one of his wives, Tiye, and their son Pentaweret to place Pentaweret on the throne instead of the designated heir). CT scans of his mummy in 2012 confirmed a deep, fatal cut to the throat.
• Amennakht (Amennakhte): The scribe who recorded the strike events in the Turin Strike Papyrus and earlier complaints. He acted as a key intermediary between the workers and higher officials.
• Foremen and crew leaders (names such as Nekhenmut and Khonsu appear in related records) who organized or represented the two main work gangs.
• The vizier and local temple administrators who eventually authorized the release of grain.

Context Before the Strike

Deir el-Medina was established earlier in the New Kingdom (around the time of Amenhotep I and Thutmose I) to house the tomb builders in a controlled, relatively secure settlement. Egypt under the 18th and early 19th Dynasties (Thutmose III, Amenhotep III, Ramesses II) had been at the height of its imperial power. Ramesses III himself began his reign with notable military victories that preserved Egyptian independence at a time when many other eastern Mediterranean societies collapsed under the Sea Peoples’ migrations. Those campaigns, however, were expensive and contributed to the fiscal pressures that later affected the ration system.

Aftermath

The strikes secured temporary payments and demonstrated that the highly skilled tomb workers understood their leverage. Systemic supply problems continued, however. Within a few years Ramesses III was assassinated (c. Year 32), and he was succeeded by Ramesses IV. The later 20th Dynasty saw further economic and political decline, increased tomb robbery (sometimes by the workers themselves), and growing insecurity. By around 1069 BC, as central authority weakened, the Deir el-Medina community was largely abandoned; residents relocated for safety (including to the Medinet Habu temple area). The Valley of the Kings ceased to be the primary royal necropolis, and Egypt entered the more fragmented Third Intermediate Period.

In short, the event is remarkable because it is the first time in recorded history that we see organized workers collectively withhold their labor, document their grievances in their own words, and force the state to respond—while still operating within the religious and political framework of New Kingdom Egypt.

= November 14th

Here is a list of significant historical events recorded on November 14 from antiquity through 1800:

Ancient & Early Medieval

• c. 1152 BC — The first recorded labor strike in history occurs in Egypt. Artisans working on the royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings under Pharaoh Ramses III stop work to protest delayed wages.
• 332 BC — Alexander the Great is recognized/crowned as pharaoh of Egypt at Memphis. This marks the end of Persian rule in Egypt and the beginning of the Hellenistic (Ptolemaic) period.
• 565 AD — Byzantine Emperor Justinian I dies. His nephew Justin II succeeds him as emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire (coronation and public announcement occur around this date).
• 684 — The 14th Council of Toledo opens in Visigothic Hispania (modern Spain).

Medieval & Early Modern

• 1380 — Charles VI of France is crowned king at the age of 12.
• 1493 — Christopher Columbus lands on an island in the Lesser Antilles during his second voyage and names it Santa Cruz (Saint Croix).
• 1501 — Arthur, Prince of Wales (eldest son of Henry VII), marries Catherine of Aragon at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. Both are 15 years old. Arthur dies the following year, leading to Catherine’s later marriage to his brother Henry VIII.
• 1524 — Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro begins his first major expedition toward South America (operating in the region of present-day Colombia).
• 1532 — According to the chronicler Edward Hall, King Henry VIII of England secretly marries Anne Boleyn on St. Erkenwald’s Day shortly after their return from Calais. (Their public/official marriage took place on 25 January 1533; the earlier ceremony is disputed but widely noted by historians.)

17th–18th Centuries

• 1666 — English diarist Samuel Pepys records the first known written account of a blood transfusion experiment (performed between dogs).
• 1680 — German astronomer Gottfried Kirch discovers the Great Comet of 1680 (also called Kirch’s Comet or Newton’s Comet). It is the first comet discovered using a telescope.
• 1715 — The Battle of Preston ends with the unconditional surrender of Jacobite forces to government troops under General Charles Wills. This effectively ends the Jacobite rising of 1715 in England (the last battle fought on English soil until the 20th century).
• 1716 — Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, the German philosopher, mathematician, and co-inventor of calculus, dies in Hanover.
• 1770 — Scottish explorer James Bruce reaches the spring he believes to be the source of the Blue Nile in Ethiopia (at Gish Abay).
• 1776 — The St. James’s Chronicle in London reports that Benjamin Franklin has joined the American rebellion, confirming his leadership role in the fight for independence.
• 1792 — British explorer Captain George Vancouver becomes the first Englishman to enter San Francisco Bay.

These events are drawn from reliable historical compilations (including Wikipedia’s selected anniversaries, OnThisDay, and specialized sources on the Tudors, Byzantium, and exploration). Exact dates for the earliest events can be approximate or traditional, as is common with ancient records.

Lady Jane Grey executed at 17

Before the trials: the succession crisis of 1553

Edward VI (reigned 1547–1553), Henry VIII’s only legitimate son, was a committed Protestant. As he lay dying in the spring and summer of 1553 (probably of tuberculosis), he and his leading councillor, John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland, sought to prevent the succession of Edward’s Catholic half-sister Mary. Edward drew up “My Devise for the Succession,” which excluded both Mary and Elizabeth on grounds of their earlier illegitimacy under Henry VIII’s succession legislation and named as heir his Protestant cousin Lady Jane Grey (great-granddaughter of Henry VII through his younger daughter Mary Tudor, Queen of France).

Northumberland strengthened the plan by arranging Jane’s marriage (25 May 1553) to his fourth son, Guildford Dudley. Edward died on 6 July 1553. Jane was informed she was queen, reluctantly accepted, and was proclaimed on 10 July when she entered the Tower of London. Mary, already in East Anglia, proclaimed herself queen, gathered armed support, and advanced. Northumberland led a force against her but found little backing. On 19 July the Privy Council switched sides, proclaimed Mary, and Jane’s nine-day reign ended. Northumberland was arrested, tried at Westminster Hall in mid-August, and executed on 22 August 1553. Many others involved were initially treated more leniently; Jane’s father, Henry Grey, Duke of Suffolk, was pardoned for the time being.

The trials of 13 November 1553

Mary’s government still needed to deal with the principal remaining participants. On the morning of 13 November, five prisoners were taken on foot from the Tower to the Guildhall in the City of London under escort, with an axe carried ahead of them (blade turned away, the traditional sign that they had not yet been condemned). Those tried by a special commission chaired by Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, were:

• Lady Jane Grey (styled in the proceedings as Jane Dudley, wife of Guildford)
• Lord Guildford Dudley (her husband)
• Ambrose Dudley and Henry Dudley (Guildford’s brothers)
• Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury

Charges centred on high treason: Jane’s assumption of the royal title and authority, the taking and holding of the Tower, proclamations in her name, and the levying or preparation of forces against Mary. Documents Jane had signed as “Jane the Quene” were produced as evidence. Cranmer was charged both for supporting the proclamation of Jane and for related actions (including involvement in the attempt to seize Mary). All five ultimately pleaded guilty and were sentenced to death. Jane’s sentence was the standard treason penalty of being burned or beheaded “as the Queen pleases.” Contemporary diarist Henry Machyn recorded the event and Jane’s appearance in black clothing, carrying prayer books.

The trial was a foregone conclusion under the circumstances; the defendants had openly participated in the attempt to set Jane on the throne.

After the trials: Wyatt’s Rebellion and the executions

Mary was initially inclined to spare Jane. The decisive change came with Wyatt’s Rebellion (January–February 1554), an armed rising primarily against Mary’s planned marriage to Philip of Spain. Jane’s father, the Duke of Suffolk, joined the rebels. Although Jane and Guildford had been imprisoned in the Tower since July 1553 and played no part in the rising, Mary and her advisers concluded that a living Protestant claimant was too dangerous as a potential figurehead. On 12 February 1554 Guildford Dudley was beheaded on Tower Hill; Jane was beheaded on Tower Green the same day. Contemporary accounts describe Jane’s composure on the scaffold: she acknowledged the unlawfulness of the “fact” against Mary while denying she had sought the crown, then asked for help locating the block after she was blindfolded. Her father was executed later that month.

Cranmer’s case was different. He had been condemned for treason in November 1553, but Mary’s government pursued him primarily for heresy. In 1555 he was tried in Oxford (University Church of St Mary the Virgin) on charges including denial of papal authority and of transubstantiation. He was degraded from his offices, made several recantations under pressure, and was nevertheless burned at the stake in Oxford on 21 March 1556 (one of the Oxford Martyrs, alongside Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley). On the day of his execution he repudiated his recantations, thrust the hand that had signed them into the flames first, and died affirming Protestant positions. Mary had particular animus toward him because he had annulled her mother’s marriage to Henry VIII.

Significant figures in brief

• Edward VI: the dying Protestant king whose devise attempted to alter the succession.
• John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland: the dominant political figure who engineered Jane’s marriage and brief elevation; executed in August 1553.
• Lady Jane Grey: the teenage Protestant claimant, great-granddaughter of Henry VII; nine-day queen; executed February 1554.
• Guildford, Ambrose and Henry Dudley: Northumberland’s sons; Guildford married Jane and shared her fate; the other two were tried alongside them.
• Thomas Cranmer: architect of the English Reformation under Henry VIII and Edward VI; tried for treason in 1553 and burned for heresy in 1556.
• Mary I: the successful Catholic claimant who ordered the trials and later executions; her reign began a short Catholic restoration.
• Henry Grey, Duke of Suffolk: Jane’s father; initially pardoned, then executed after joining Wyatt’s Rebellion.

The episode illustrates the extreme instability of the mid-Tudor succession, the interplay of dynastic legitimacy and religious allegiance, and the lethal consequences of failed political plots in that era.

= November 13th

These events all took place on 13 November in their respective years. Here’s a concise overview of each:

1002 – St. Brice’s Day Massacre

King Æthelred II (“the Unready”) ordered the killing of Danes living in England. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records that this was done because the king had been warned of a Danish plot to kill him and seize the kingdom.

Contemporary and near-contemporary sources (including a 1004 charter for St Frideswide’s in Oxford) describe Danes being attacked, with some seeking sanctuary in churches that were then set on fire. Archaeological finds support significant violence: a mass grave of at least 35 young males with weapon injuries and signs of burning was excavated in Oxford (dated roughly 960–1020), and another site at Ridgeway Hill in Dorset yielded remains of men who appear to have been executed, with isotopic evidence suggesting Scandinavian origins.

The order appears to have targeted more recent Danish settlers and mercenaries rather than the long-settled population of the Danelaw. It failed to end the Viking threat; Sweyn Forkbeard of Denmark launched major invasions in the following years. Modern historians debate the scale and whether it was a centrally directed action or more localised.

1093 – Battle of Alnwick

Scottish king Malcolm III (Malcolm Canmore) and his son Edward were killed near Alnwick in Northumberland. Malcolm had invaded northern England and was besieging or threatening Alnwick Castle. Robert de Mowbray, Earl of Northumbria, led a smaller English force that surprised the Scots on 13 November (also St Brice’s Day).

Malcolm and Edward were slain in the fighting (or immediately afterward). The Scottish army, leaderless and hindered by a swollen River Aln after heavy rain, withdrew. Malcolm’s wife, St Margaret of Scotland, died three days later in Edinburgh. Their deaths triggered a succession crisis in Scotland. A later memorial (Malcolm’s Cross) marks the traditional site of the king’s death.

1160 – Marriage of Louis VII and Adela of Champagne

Louis VII of France married Adela (also called Adèle or Alix) of Champagne on 13 November 1160. She was his third wife; his previous wives were Eleanor of Aquitaine (marriage annulled) and Constance of Castile (who had died in childbirth earlier that year). Louis still lacked a male heir.

Adela was the daughter of Theobald II, Count of Champagne (and Blois). The match helped reconcile Louis with a powerful and previously troublesome vassal family. She was crowned the same day. In 1165 she gave birth to the long-awaited son, Philip II Augustus (“Dieudonné”), who later became one of France’s most effective medieval kings. She also had a daughter, Agnes (who became Byzantine empress). Adela later served as regent for her son.

1553 – Treason trials of Cranmer, Lady Jane Grey and others

On 13 November 1553, after the collapse of the attempt to place Lady Jane Grey on the throne and the suppression of early resistance to Mary I, a special commission tried several people for high treason at Guildhall in London. Those tried included:

• Archbishop Thomas Cranmer
• Lady Jane Grey (referred to as Jane Dudley)
• Lord Guildford Dudley (Jane’s husband)
• Ambrose Dudley and Henry Dudley

All were found guilty and sentenced to death. Jane’s formal offence was having assumed the royal title and authority; documents she had signed as queen were used as evidence. The executions were not carried out immediately. Lady Jane Grey and Guildford Dudley were beheaded in February 1554 after her father joined Wyatt’s Rebellion. Cranmer was later tried for heresy and burned in Oxford in 1556.

1642 – Battle of Turnham Green

During the First English Civil War, King Charles I’s Royalist army (roughly 12,000–13,000 men) faced a much larger Parliamentarian force (about 24,000, including London Trained Bands under Philip Skippon) at Turnham Green, west of London. The Parliamentarians were commanded by the Earl of Essex.

After the Royalists had taken Brentford the previous day, the two armies confronted each other. There was only limited fighting (light casualties, around 50 killed in total). Outnumbered and low on ammunition, Charles withdrew rather than risk a full engagement so close to London. The standoff effectively ended the Royalist advance on the capital in 1642 and is often described as the defence of London. Charles never again came as close to the city until his trial in 1649.

1775 – Occupation of Montreal

In the American Revolutionary War, Brigadier General Richard Montgomery’s Continental Army occupied Montreal on 13 November 1775 without resistance. Montgomery had already captured Fort St. Jean after a long siege. British Governor Guy Carleton had fled the city (disguised, according to some accounts) toward Quebec.

Articles of capitulation were negotiated with local citizens. Montgomery treated the inhabitants and captured British personnel relatively leniently, which caused some friction with his own troops. He then advanced to Quebec City to join Benedict Arnold’s force. Montgomery was killed leading an assault on Quebec on 31 December 1775; the invasion of Canada ultimately failed.

These six events span Anglo-Saxon, Anglo-Norman, Capetian, Tudor, English Civil War, and American Revolutionary history, all falling on the same calendar date.