Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/March
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An archive of historical anniversaries that appeared on the Main Page 2023 day arrangement |
March 1: Disability Day of Mourning; Saint David's Day; Independence Day in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (1992); Yap Day in Yap State, Federated States of Micronesia
- 1870 – Paraguayan War: Marshal Francisco Solano López died at the Battle of Cerro Corá.
- 1872 – Yellowstone National Park (bison pictured), located mostly in the present-day U.S. state of Wyoming, was established by President Ulysses S. Grant.
- 1921 – The Kronstadt rebellion began following mass protests in Petrograd demanding greater freedom in Russia with sailors and citizens taking up arms against the Bolsheviks.
- 1944 – World War II: American and Australian troops won the Battle of Sio against Japanese forces in New Guinea.
- 1973 – The Pink Floyd album The Dark Side of the Moon was released.
- Thomas Campion (d. 1620)
- Théophile Delcassé (b. 1852)
- Lupita Nyong'o (b. 1983)
March 2: Beginning of the Nineteen-Day Fast (Baháʼí Faith, 2023)
- 1444 – The League of Lezhë, an alliance of regional chieftains, was established in Venetian Albania with Skanderbeg as their commander.
- 1859 – The Great Slave Auction, the largest single sale of slaves in U.S. history, with more than 400 people sold, began in Georgia.
- 1919 – Communist, revolutionary-socialist, and syndicalist delegates met in Moscow to establish the Communist International.
- 1962 – Led by General Ne Win, the Burmese military seized power in a coup d'état.
- 1978 – As a cosmonaut on Soyuz 28, Czechoslovak military pilot Vladimír Remek (pictured) became the first person from outside the Soviet Union or the United States to go into space.
- Pope Adrian VI (b. 1459)
- James A. Gilmore (b. 1876)
- Lionel Matthews (d. 1944)
March 3: Liberation Day in Bulgaria (1878); Hinamatsuri in Japan
- 1776 – American Revolutionary War: Samuel Nicholas and the Continental Marines successfully landed on New Providence in the Bahamas and began a raid of Nassau, capturing the port the next day.
- 1875 – French composer Georges Bizet's opera Carmen (poster pictured), based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, premiered at the Opéra-Comique in Paris.
- 1972 – The British rock band Jethro Tull released Thick as a Brick, a parody concept album allegedly adapted from an eight-year-old boy's epic poem.
- 2012 – Two passenger trains collided near Szczekociny, Poland, resulting in 16 deaths and 58 injuries.
- Michael Kantakouzenos Şeytanoğlu (d. 1578)
- Ghulam Kadir (d. 1789)
- Tolu Ogunlesi (b. 1982)
March 4: Feast day of Saint Casimir (Catholicism)
- 1675 – John Flamsteed (pictured) was appointed the first Astronomer Royal by King Charles II of England.
- 1804 – Irish convicts formerly involved at the Battle of Vinegar Hill during the Irish Rebellion of 1798 began an uprising against British colonial authorities in New South Wales, Australia.
- 1837 – Chicago was incorporated as a city.
- 1943 – The Holocaust: Almost all Jews in Bulgarian-occupied Western Thrace were deported to Treblinka extermination camp to be killed.
- 2012 – A series of blasts occurred at an arms dump in Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo, killing at least 300 people and injuring 2,500 others.
- Stephen III of Hungary (d. 1172)
- Miriam Makeba (b. 1932)
- Bobbi Kristina Brown (b. 1993)
March 5: Learn from Lei Feng Day in China; St Piran's Day in Cornwall, England
![Gerardus Mercator, in a c.1550 portrait by Titian](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/Workshop_of_Titian_-_Gerard_Mercator%2C_ca._1550.tif/lossy-page1-130px-Workshop_of_Titian_-_Gerard_Mercator%2C_ca._1550.tif.jpg)
- 363 – Roman–Persian Wars: Roman emperor Julian and his army set out from Antioch to attack the Sasanian Empire.
- 1279 – The Livonian branch of the Teutonic Order suffered a great loss when 71 knights died in the Battle of Aizkraukle.
- 1824 – The First Anglo-Burmese War began.
- 1966 – BOAC Flight 911 disintegrated and crashed near Mount Fuji shortly after departure from Tokyo International Airport, killing all 113 passengers and 11 crew members on board.
- Gerardus Mercator (pictured) (b. 1512)
- Alessandro Volta (d. 1827)
- Elaine Paige (b. 1948)
March 6: Fast of Esther (Judaism, 2023); National Heroes and Benefactors Day in Belize (2023)
- 1853 – Giuseppe Verdi's La traviata premiered at La Fenice in Venice, but the performance was considered so bad that it caused him to revise portions of the opera.
- 1964 – In a radio broadcast, Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad announced that American boxer Cassius Clay would change his name to Muhammad Ali (pictured).
- 1987 – The ferry Herald of Free Enterprise capsized while leaving the harbour of Zeebrugge, Belgium, killing 193 people on board.
- Ella P. Stewart (b. 1893)
- Ayn Rand (d. 1982)
- Francisco Xavier do Amaral (d. 2012)
March 7: Feast day of Saints Perpetua and Felicity (Catholicism, Anglicanism, Lutheranism)
- 1277 – Bishop Étienne Tempier promulgated a condemnation of 219 heretical propositions that were being discussed at the University of Paris.
- 1814 – War of the Sixth Coalition: Napoleon's army forced Mikhail Semyonovich Vorontsov's Russian troops to withdraw from the Chemin des Dames, but French casualties exceeded Russian losses.
- 1985 – The charity single "We Are the World" by the supergroup USA for Africa was released, and went on to sell more than 20 million copies.
- 2009 – The Kepler space telescope (depicted), designed to discover Earth-like planets orbiting other stars, was launched.
- Heraclianus (d. 413)
- Harriet Jacobs (d. 1897)
- Viv Richards (b. 1952)
March 8: International Women's Day; Aurat March in Pakistan
- 1702 – Anne (pictured) became the Queen of England, Scotland and Ireland, succeeding her brother-in-law William III.
- 1736 – Nader Shah, the founder of the Afsharid dynasty, was crowned Shah of Iran.
- 1919 – During the Egyptian Revolution, British authorities arrested rebel leader Saad Zaghloul and exiled him to Malta.
- 1978 – BBC Radio 4 began broadcasting Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a science fiction radio series that was later adapted into novels, a television series, and other formats.
- 1983 – Cold War: In a speech to the National Association of Evangelicals in Orlando, Florida, U.S. president Ronald Reagan described the Soviet Union as an "evil empire".
- 2017 – The Azure Window, a limestone natural arch in Gozo, Malta, collapsed during a storm.
- Frederic Goudy (b. 1865)
- Beatrice Shilling (b. 1909)
- José Raúl Capablanca (d. 1942)
- 1009 – The first recorded use of the name of Lithuania appeared in Latin in the Annals of Quedlinburg, written in Saxony-Anhalt, present-day Germany.
- 1842 – Nabucco, an opera by Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi that established his reputation, premiered at La Scala in Milan.
- 1847 – Mexican–American War: The Siege of Veracruz began, the first large-scale amphibious assault conducted by United States military forces.
- 1932 – Éamon de Valera (pictured), a dominant political figure in 20th-century Ireland, became President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State.
- 1959 – The popular fashion doll Barbie debuted at the American International Toy Fair in New York City.
- Mary Anning (d. 1847)
- Qayyum Chowdhury (b. 1932)
- The Notorious B.I.G. (d. 1997)
- 241 BC – The Roman Republic defeated Carthaginian forces at the Battle of the Aegates, off the western coast of Sicily, in the final battle of the First Punic War.
- 1916 – The final letter in the McMahon–Hussein Correspondence was written, agreeing that Britain would recognise Arab independence in return for the Sharif of Mecca launching a revolt against the Ottoman Empire.
- 1949 – Mildred Gillars, nicknamed Axis Sally, was convicted of treason for working with the Nazis as a broadcaster.
- 1967 – British progressive-rock band Pink Floyd released their first single, "Arnold Layne".
- 2019 – Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 (aircraft pictured) crashed shortly after take-off from Addis Ababa, with the deaths of all 157 people on board.
- Agnes Blannbekin (d. 1315)
- Amy Spain (d. 1865)
- Anita Brookner (d. 2016)
![Eta Carinae and the surrounding Homunculus Nebula](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fc/Eta_Carinae.jpg/140px-Eta_Carinae.jpg)
- 1669 – Mount Etna in Sicily began erupting, eventually producing the largest lava flow in the volcano's history, and damaging Catania and other towns.
- 1843 – During a period of activity known as the Great Eruption, Eta Carinae (pictured) briefly became the second-brightest star in the night sky.
- 1984 – The anime film Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind by Hayao Miyazaki was released.
- 2011 – A massive earthquake and tsunami struck northeastern Japan and triggered a nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.
- 2012 – U.S. Army soldier Robert Bales murdered sixteen civilians and wounded six others in Kandahar Province, Afghanistan.
- Benjamin Tupper (b. 1738)
- Jane Meade Welch (b. 1854)
- Helen Rollason (b. 1956)
- 1622 – Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier, founders of the Jesuits, were canonized by Pope Gregory XV.
- 1913 – At a ceremony at Kurrajong Hill, Lady Denman, wife of Governor-General Lord Denman, announced that Canberra would be the name of the future capital of Australia.
- 1930 – Mahatma Gandhi (pictured with Sarojini Naidu) began the Salt March, a 24-day nonviolent walk to defy the British salt tax in colonial India.
- 1934 – Supported by the Estonian army, Konstantin Päts staged a coup d'état, beginning the Era of Silence.
- 2014 – A gas leak caused an explosion in the East Harlem neighborhood of New York City, destroying two apartment buildings and causing eight deaths.
- Stefan Dragutin (d. 1316)
- Wally Schirra (b. 1923)
- Jessica Hardy (b. 1987)
March 13: Commonwealth Day in the Commonwealth of Nations (2023)
- 1781 – William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus from the garden of his house in Bath, England, initially considering it to be a comet.
- 1845 – German composer Felix Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto was performed for the first time.
- 1943 – The Holocaust: Nazi troops began the final liquidation of the Kraków Ghetto in Poland, sending about 2,000 Jews to the Płaszów labor camp (deportation pictured), with the remaining 5,000 either killed or sent to Auschwitz.
- 1988 – The Seikan Tunnel, 53.85 km (33.46 mi) in length, opened between the cities of Hakodate and Aomori, Japan.
- 2013 – Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio was elected Pope Francis, making him the first Jesuit pope, the first from the Americas, and the first from the Southern Hemisphere.
- Daniel Lambert (b. 1770)
- Mustafa Reşid Pasha (b. 1800)
- Helen Renton (b. 1931)
March 14: New Year's Day (Sikhism); White Day in parts of East Asia; Pi Day
- 1309 – On Eid al-Fitr, the citizens of Granada stormed palaces in the city, deposing Sultan Muhammad III and placing his half-brother Nasr on the throne.
- 1489 – Catherine Cornaro (pictured), Queen of Cyprus, was forced to abdicate and sell the administration of the island to the Republic of Venice.
- 1885 – The Mikado, Gilbert and Sullivan's most frequently performed Savoy opera, debuted at the Savoy Theatre in London.
- 1969 – Edward M. Burke, the longest-serving alderman in the history of the Chicago City Council, was sworn into office.
- 1984 – Gerry Adams, leader of Sinn Féin, was seriously wounded in an assassination attempt by Ulster Freedom Fighters in central Belfast, Northern Ireland.
- Matilda of Ringelheim (d. 968)
- Diane Arbus (b. 1923)
- Tony Benn (d. 2014)
- 856 – Byzantine emperor Michael III (pictured) overthrew the regency of his mother Theodora to assume power for himself.
- 1147 – Reconquista: Portuguese troops under King Afonso I captured the city of Santarém from the Almoravids.
- 1875 – John McCloskey, the archbishop of New York, was created the first cardinal from the United States.
- 1956 – The musical My Fair Lady, based on George Bernard Shaw's play Pygmalion, debuted at the Mark Hellinger Theatre in New York City.
- 1990 – Iraqi authorities hanged Iranian freelance reporter Farzad Bazoft on charges of spying for Israel.
- Ernulf (d. 1124)
- Daniele Comboni (b. 1831)
- Arthur Compton (d. 1962)
March 16: Remembrance Day of the Latvian Legionnaires
- 597 BC – Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II captured Jerusalem and installed Zedekiah as King of Judah.
- 1190 – Around 150 Jews died inside York Castle, the majority committing mass suicide to avoid being killed by a mob.
- 1322 – Despenser War: A royalist army defeated troops loyal to Thomas, 2nd Earl of Lancaster, in the Battle of Boroughbridge, which allowed King Edward II of England to hold on to power for another five years.
- 1872 – In the inaugural final of the FA Cup (trophy pictured) Wanderers defeated Royal Engineers 1–0 at The Oval in Kennington, London.
- 2001 – A series of bomb blasts in the city of Shijiazhuang, China, killed 108 people.
- Jean de Brébeuf (d. 1649)
- Anna Atkins (b. 1799)
- Manjural Islam Rana (d. 2007)
March 17: Saint Patrick's Day (Christianity); Anniversary of the Unification of Italy (1861)
- 1337 – Edward the Black Prince (pictured) was created Duke of Cornwall, becoming the first duke in English history.
- 1677 – Franco-Dutch War: France captured the town of Valenciennes in the Spanish Netherlands.
- 1917 – World War I: Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster led a force to rescue 92 prisoners of war from Bir Hakeim, killing the Sensussi guards and their families.
- 1942 – The Holocaust: The first mass killings of Jews began at Belzec extermination camp in occupied Poland, the first of the Operation Reinhard camps to begin operation.
- 1963 – An eruption of Mount Agung on Bali, Indonesia, killed at least 1,100 people.
- Gertrude of Nivelles (d. 659)
- Walter Rudolf Hess (b. 1881)
- Chuck Muncie (b. 1953)
March 18: Feast day of Saint Cyril of Jerusalem (Christianity)
- 1892 – Canadian governor general Lord Stanley of Preston pledged to donate an award to Canada's top-ranked amateur ice hockey club, now known as the Stanley Cup, the oldest professional sports trophy in North America.
- 1921 – Russian Civil War: Bolshevik forces suppressed a rebellion of sailors and civilians in Kronstadt.
- 1965 – Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov ventured outside the Soviet spacecraft Voskhod 2, becoming the first person to walk in space.
- 1985 – The first episode of the soap opera Neighbours was broadcast on the Seven Network, later becoming the longest-running drama in Australian television history.
- 1990 – Unidentified thieves stole thirteen works of art collectively valued at $500 million from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, Massachusetts.
- Matthew III Csák (d. 1321)
- Charlotte Elliott (b. 1789)
- F. W. de Klerk (b. 1936)
March 19: Saint Joseph's Day (Western Christianity); Mothering Sunday (Western Christianity, 2023)
- 1563 – The Edict of Amboise was signed, ending the first war in the French Wars of Religion and inaugurating a period of official peace that lasted until 1567.
- 1808 – King Charles IV of Spain was forced to abdicate in favour of his son Ferdinand VII as a result of the Tumult of Aranjuez.
- 1962 – Influential American musician Bob Dylan released his eponymous debut album, mainly comprising traditional folk, blues and gospel songs.
- 1979 – The American cable television network C-SPAN, covering government proceedings and public-affairs programming, was launched.
- 2008 – The gamma-ray burst GRB 080319B (artist's impression pictured), the farthest object that could be seen by the naked eye, was observed.
- Francis B. Spinola (b. 1821)
- Anna Held (b. 1872)
- Kym Bonython (d. 2011)
- 1852 – Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, which had a profound effect on attitudes toward African Americans and slavery in the United States, was published.
- 1923 – The Arts Club of Chicago hosted the opening of Pablo Picasso's first solo United States showing, entitled Original Drawings by Pablo Picasso.
- 1939 – Germany issued an ultimatum to Lithuania, demanding the return of the Klaipėda Region under threat of invasion.
- 1942 – World War II: After being forced to flee the Philippines for Australia, U.S. Army general Douglas MacArthur (pictured) announced: "I came through and I shall return."
- 1993 – The Troubles: Two children were killed by the second of two bomb attacks by the Provisional Irish Republican Army in Warrington, England.
- Benjamin Truman (d. 1780)
- Maud Menten (b. 1879)
- S. Arasaratnam (b. 1930)
March 21: Oltenia Day in Romania
- 1788 – A large fire destroyed 856 of the 1,100 structures in New Orleans.
- 1814 – War of the Sixth Coalition: At the Battle of Arcis-sur-Aube in north-central France, Napoleon suddenly realized that his French army was vastly outnumbered by Allied forces, and hurriedly ordered a retreat.
- 1952 – The Moondog Coronation Ball (poster pictured), generally considered to be the first major rock and roll concert, took place at the Cleveland Arena in Cleveland, Ohio.
- 2019 – A major explosion at a chemical plant in Yancheng, China, killed 78 people and injured 617 others.
- Salvador Lutteroth (b. 1897)
- Nobuo Uematsu (b. 1959)
- Marina Salye (d. 2012)
March 22: World Water Day; Cheti Chand begins / Ugadi in parts of India (Hinduism, 2023)
- 1508 – Ferdinand II of Aragon appointed Amerigo Vespucci to the post of Chief Navigator of Spain.
- 1784 – The Emerald Buddha, considered to be the sacred palladium of Thailand, was installed in its current location at Wat Phra Kaew on the grounds of the Grand Palace in Bangkok.
- 1913 – Phan Xích Long (pictured), the self-proclaimed emperor of Vietnam, was arrested for organising a revolt against the colonial rule of French Indochina, which was nevertheless carried out by his supporters the following day.
- 1942 – Second World War: British and Italian naval forces fought the Second Battle of Sirte in the Gulf of Sidra north of Libya.
- John Kemp (d. 1454)
- Ahmed Cevdet Pasha (b. 1822)
- Odysseas Angelis (d. 1987)
March 23: First day of Ramadan (Islam, 2023)
- 1400 – After 175 years of rule, the Trần dynasty of Vietnam was deposed by Hồ Quý Ly, a court official.
- 1775 – American Revolution: Patrick Henry made his "Give me liberty, or give me death!" speech to the House of Burgesses of Virginia, urging military action against the British Empire.
- 1905 – About 1,500 Cretans, led by Eleftherios Venizelos, met at the village of Theriso to call for the island's unification with Greece, beginning the Theriso revolt.
- 1919 – Benito Mussolini and his supporters founded the Fasci Italiani di Combattimento, the predecessor of the National Fascist Party.
- 1996 – Lee Teng-hui (pictured) was elected President of the Republic of China in the first direct presidential election in Taiwan.
- Mary of Jesus de León y Delgado (b. 1643)
- Juan Gris (b. 1887)
- Ben Hollioake (d. 2002)
March 24: World Tuberculosis Day
- 1869 – New Zealand Wars: Māori leader Tītokowaru's conflict ended with the last of his forces surrendering to the New Zealand colonial government.
- 1898 – The Winton Motor Carriage Company (ad pictured), one of the first American car companies, sold its first unit.
- 1922 – Irish War of Independence: In Belfast, two men wearing police uniforms broke into a house and murdered a Catholic family in what was believed to be a reprisal for the deaths of two policemen the day before.
- 1934 – The Tydings–McDuffie Act came into effect, which provided for self-government of the Philippines and for Filipino independence from the United States after a period of ten years.
- 1980 – One day after making a plea to Salvadoran soldiers to stop carrying out the government's repression, Archbishop Óscar Romero was assassinated while celebrating Mass in San Salvador.
- Hugh III of Cyprus (d. 1284)
- Antoine-Henri Jomini (d. 1869)
- Rudra Rajasingham (d. 2006)
March 25: Bengali Genocide Remembrance Day; Earth Hour (20:30 local time in various areas, 2023)
- 1410 – The Yongle Emperor of Ming China launched the first of his military campaigns against the Mongols, resulting in the fall of the Mongol khan Bunyashiri.
- 1655 – Dutch astronomer Christiaan Huygens discovered Titan, the largest natural satellite of Saturn.
- 1911 – The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire (pictured) in New York City killed 146 sweatshop workers, many of whom could not escape because the doors to the stairwells and exits had been locked.
- 1934 – Enrico Fermi published his discovery of neutron-induced radioactivity, for which he was later awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1938.
- 1975 – King Faisal of Saudi Arabia was shot and killed by his nephew Faisal bin Musaid.
- Novalis (d. 1801)
- Harriet Backer (d. 1932)
- Elton John (b. 1947)
- 1697 – The Safavid Empire began a four-year occupation of the Ottoman city of Basra on the Persian Gulf.
- 1885 – Perceiving that the Canadian government was failing to protect their rights, the Métis people led by Louis Riel began the North-West Rebellion.
- 1913 – First Balkan War: After a five-month siege, Bulgarian and Serbian forces (artillery pictured) captured the Ottoman city of Adrianople.
- 1975 – The Biological Weapons Convention, the first multilateral disarmament treaty banning the production of an entire category of weapons, entered into force.
- 1997 – Police in Rancho Santa Fe, California, discovered the bodies of 39 members of the religious group Heaven's Gate who had died in an apparent cult suicide.
- Jacob van Eyck (d. 1657)
- James Hutton (d. 1797)
- Guido Stampacchia (b. 1922)
March 27: Day of the Union of Bessarabia with Romania (1918)
- 1638 – The first of four strong earthquakes struck Calabria in southern Italy, which resulted in up to 30,000 combined deaths.
- 1850 – San Diego, the first European settlement in present-day California, was incorporated as a city.
- 1915 – Mary Mallon (pictured), the first person to be identified as an asymptomatic carrier of typhoid fever, was placed into quarantine in New York City, where she spent the rest of her life.
- 1977 – Two Boeing 747 airliners collided on a foggy runway at Los Rodeos Airport on the island of Tenerife, killing 583 people in the worst aircraft accident in aviation history.
- 2002 – Second Intifada: A suicide bomber killed around 30 Israeli civilians and injured about 140 others in Netanya, triggering Operation Defensive Shield, a large-scale counter-terrorist military incursion into the West Bank.
- Simon Bradstreet (d. 1697)
- Thomas Graham Brown (b. 1882)
- T. Sailo (d. 2015)
- 1802 – German astronomer Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers discovered Pallas, the second asteroid ever identified, though it was considered to be a planet at the time.
- 1842 – The Vienna Philharmonic (pictured) held its first concert, conducted by Otto Nicolai.
- 1918 – World War I: British and Australian troops soundly defeated German forces at the First Battle of Dernancourt in northern France.
- 1942 – Second World War: The port of Saint-Nazaire in occupied France was disabled by British naval forces.
- 1979 – British prime minister James Callaghan was defeated by one vote in a vote of no confidence after his government struggled to cope with widespread strikes during the Winter of Discontent.
- Flodoard (d. 966)
- Solomon Foot (d. 1866)
- John Alderdice, Baron Alderdice (b. 1955)
March 29: Boganda Day in the Central African Republic (1959); Martyrs' Day in Madagascar (1947)
- 845 – Viking expansion: Viking raiders, possibly led by the legendary Ragnar Lodbrok, plundered and occupied Paris (depicted), holding the city for a large ransom.
- 1800 – William Matthews was ordained as the first British America-born Catholic priest.
- 1807 – German astronomer Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers discovered Vesta, the brightest asteroid and second-most massive body in the asteroid belt.
- 1982 – Queen Elizabeth II granted royal assent to the Canada Act 1982, which ended any remaining constitutional dependence of Canada on the United Kingdom by a process known as patriation.
- 2010 – Islamist separatists of the Caucasus Emirate detonated two bombs on the Moscow Metro, killing 40 people and injuring 102 others.
- Santorio Santorio (b. 1561)
- March Fong Eu (b. 1922)
- Pap Cheyassin Secka (d. 2012)
March 30: Land Day in Palestinian communities (1976)
- 1822 – The United States merged East Florida and West Florida to create the Florida Territory.
- 1861 – British chemist William Crookes published his discovery of thallium using flame spectroscopy.
- 1912 – Sultan Abd al-Hafid signed the Treaty of Fes, making Morocco a French protectorate.
- 1950 – Usmar Ismail (pictured) began shooting Darah dan Doa, widely recognised as the first Indonesian film.
- 1972 – Vietnam War: North Vietnamese forces began the Easter Offensive in an attempt to gain as much territory and destroy as many South Vietnamese units as possible.
- Juan Manuel de Rosas (b. 1793)
- Nicolae Rădescu (b. 1874)
- Fred Korematsu (d. 2005)
March 31: Cesar Chavez Day in various U.S. states (1927)
- 1761 – Lisbon experienced its second major earthquake in six years, with effects felt as far north as Scotland.
- 1899 – Philippine–American War: Malolos, capital of the First Philippine Republic, was captured by American forces.
- 1942 – Second World War: Because of a mutiny by Indian soldiers against their British officers, Japanese troops captured Christmas Island without any resistance.
- 1992 – USS Missouri (pictured), the last active United States Navy battleship, was decommissioned in Long Beach, California.
- 2018 – Nikol Pashinyan began his protest walk, starting in the city of Gyumri, opening the 2018 Armenian revolution.
- Pope Benedict XIV (b. 1675)
- Edward FitzGerald (b. 1809)
- Ahmad Sayyed Javadi (d. 2013)
Selected anniversaries / On this day archive
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