Portal:History

HMS New Zealand was one of three Indefatigable-class battlecruisers. Launched in 1911, the ship was funded by the government of New Zealand as a gift to Britain, and she was commissioned into the Royal Navy in 1912. She had been intended for the China Station, but was released by the New Zealand government at the request of the Admiralty for service in British waters.

During 1913, New Zealand was sent on a ten-month tour of the British Dominions, with an emphasis on a visit to her namesake nation. She was back in British waters at the start of the First World War, and operated as part of the Royal Navy's Grand Fleet, in opposition to the German High Seas Fleet. During the war, the battlecruiser participated in all three of the major North Sea battles—Heligoland Bight, Dogger Bank, and Jutland—and was involved in the response to the inconclusive Raid on Scarborough, and the Second Battle of Heligoland Bight. New Zealand contributed to the destruction of two cruisers during her wartime service and was hit by enemy fire only once, sustaining no casualties; her status as a "lucky ship" was attributed by the crew to a Māori piupiu (warrior's skirt) and hei-tiki (pendant) worn by the captain during battle. (Full article...)

The Lince (Spanish pronunciation: [ˈlinθe], meaning "Lynx") was a Spanish development programme for a proposed main battle tank that unfolded during the late 1980s and early 1990s. The intention was to replace the M47 and M48 Patton tanks that the Spanish Army had received under the U.S. Mutual Defense Assistance Act between 1954 and 1975, and to complement the AMX-30E tanks manufactured for the army during the 1970s. Companies from several nations, such as German Krauss-Maffei, Spanish Santa Bárbara, and French GIAT, made bids for the development contract. The main priorities were mobility and firepower, with secondary priority placed on protection; the Lince tank was to have been lighter and faster than its competitors. To achieve a sufficient level of firepower and protection, the Lince was to use Rheinmetall's 120 mm L/44 tank-gun and German composite armour from the Leopard 2A4.

The Spanish government decided to upgrade its fleet of AMX-30Es in the late 1980s. The focus on upgrading Spain's AMX-30E's distracted attention from the Lince plan, which was eventually shelved in 1990 after Spain acquired many M60 Patton tanks, which were no longer required by the U.S., in accordance with the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe. These tanks replaced the M47s and M48s, and fulfilled Spain's need to modernize its tank forces in the short term. No prototype of the planned Lince tank was manufactured, and no announcements were made on who would receive the contract. Four years later the Spanish government procured and locally manufactured the Leopard 2, fulfilling the long-term modernisation goal established in the Lince programme. (Full article...)

Air Marshal Sir Alister Murray Murdoch, KBE, CB (9 December 1912 – 24 October 1984) was a senior commander in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). He served as Chief of the Air Staff (CAS) from 1965 to 1969. Joining the Air Force in 1930, Murdoch trained as a seaplane pilot and participated in an Antarctic rescue mission for lost explorers in 1935. During World War II, he commanded No. 221 Squadron RAF in Europe and the Middle East, and later occupied senior positions on the staff of RAAF formations in the South West Pacific. His post-war appointments included Commandant of RAAF College from 1952 to 1953, Air Officer Commanding (AOC) Training Command from 1953 to 1955, Deputy Chief of the Air Staff from 1958 to 1959, and AOC Operational Command from 1962 to 1965.

As AOC Training Command in 1954, Murdoch headed a program to determine aircraft purchases for the RAAF; his recommendations included the C-130 Hercules transport, considered one of the most important acquisitions in the Air Force's history. His term as CAS coincided with an increased commitment to the Vietnam War, and he came into conflict with Australian Army commanders over the employment of helicopters in battle. He was also involved in assessing the readiness of the General Dynamics F-111C for RAAF service. Appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath in 1960 and Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1966, Murdoch was the fourth in a series of CASs who had been cadets at the Royal Military College, Duntroon. He retired from the Air Force in December 1969 and died in 1984. (Full article...)

The 68th New York Infantry Regiment served in the Union Army during the American Civil War. Also known as the Cameron Rifles or the Second German Rifle Regiment, the men were mostly German immigrants. Organized in July 1861, three months after the outbreak of war, the 68th saw service in the Eastern and Western theaters.
As a part of the Army of the Potomac, it was initially assigned to the defenses of Washington, D.C. Later, the 68th was transferred to the Shenandoah Valley and fought at the Battle of Cross Keys. The men of the 68th were then reassigned to central Virginia and found themselves in the thick of the fighting at Second Bull Run. After returning to the nation's capital, the regiment fought in Chancellorsville and was routed by Confederate forces. At Gettysburg, they saw battle on two of the three days and took heavy losses. (Full article...)

Cley Marshes is a 176-hectare (430-acre) nature reserve on the North Sea coast of England just outside the village of Cley next the Sea, Norfolk. A reserve since 1926, it is the oldest of the reserves belonging to the Norfolk Wildlife Trust (NWT), which is itself the oldest county Wildlife Trust in the United Kingdom. Cley Marshes protects an area of reed beds, freshwater marsh, pools and wet meadows and is part of the North Norfolk Coast Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), Special Area of Conservation (SAC), Special Protection Area (SPA), and Ramsar Site due to the large numbers of birds it attracts.

The reserve is important for some scarce breeding species, such as pied avocets on the islands, and western marsh harriers, Eurasian bitterns and bearded reedlings in the reeds, and is also a major migration stopoff and wintering site. There are also several nationally or locally scarce invertebrates and plants specialised for this coastal habitat. It has five bird hides and an environmentally friendly visitor centre and further expansion is planned through the acquisition of neighbouring land and improvements to visitor facilities. (Full article...)

The League of Nations (French: Société des Nations [sɔsjete de nɑsjɔ̃]) was the first worldwide intergovernmental organisation whose principal mission was to maintain world peace. It was founded on 10 January 1920 by the Paris Peace Conference that ended the First World War. The main organization ceased operations on 20 April 1946 when many of its components were relocated into the new United Nations. As the template for modern global governance, the League profoundly shaped the modern world.

The League's primary goals were stated in its eponymous Covenant. They included preventing wars through collective security and disarmament and settling international disputes through negotiation and arbitration. Its other concerns included labour conditions, just treatment of native inhabitants, human and drug trafficking, the arms trade, global health, prisoners of war, and protection of minorities in Europe. The Covenant of the League of Nations was signed on 28 June 1919 as Part I of the Treaty of Versailles, and it became effective with the rest of the Treaty on 10 January 1920. Australia was granted the right to participate as an autonomous member nation, marking the start of Australian independence on the global stage. The first meeting of the Council of the League took place on 16 January 1920, and the first meeting of the Assembly of the League took place on 15 November 1920. In 1919, U.S. president Woodrow Wilson won the Nobel Peace Prize for his role as the leading architect of the League. (Full article...)

The Battle of Cape Ecnomus or Eknomos (Ancient Greek: Ἔκνομος) was a naval battle, fought off southern Sicily, in 256 BC, between the fleets of Carthage and the Roman Republic, during the First Punic War (264–241 BC). The Carthaginian fleet was commanded by Hanno and Hamilcar; the Roman fleet jointly by the consuls for the year, Marcus Atilius Regulus and Lucius Manlius Vulso Longus. It resulted in a clear victory for the Romans.

The Roman fleet of 330 warships plus an unknown number of transports had sailed from Ostia, the port of Rome, and had embarked approximately 26,000 picked legionaries shortly before the battle. They planned to cross to Africa and invade the Carthaginian homeland, in what is now Tunisia. The Carthaginians were aware of the Romans' intentions and mustered all available warships, 350, off the south coast of Sicily to intercept them. With a combined total of about 680 warships carrying up to 290,000 crew and marines, the battle was arguably the single largest battle of ancient history, and was possibly the largest naval battle in history by the number of combatants involved. (Full article...)

The history of Arsenal Football Club between 1886 and 1966 covers the time from the club's foundation, through the first two major periods of success (the 1930s, and the late 1940s and early 1950s, respectively) and the club's subsequent decline in the early 1960s.

Arsenal Football Club was founded in 1886 as a munition workers' team from Woolwich, then in Kent. They turned professional in 1891 and joined The Football League two years later. They were promoted to the First Division in 1904 but in 1910 the club went into voluntary liquidation due to financial problems and were bought out by a consortium of businessmen. New majority shareholder Sir Henry Norris improved the club's financial standing and moved the team to Arsenal Stadium, Highbury, north London in 1913. In 1919, after the First World War, the club was voted into the newly expanded First Division, where they have remained ever since. (Full article...)

Jun'yō (隼鷹, "Peregrine Falcon") was a Hiyō-class aircraft carrier of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN). She was laid down as the passenger liner Kashiwara Maru (橿原丸), but was purchased by the IJN in 1941 while still under construction and converted into an aircraft carrier. Completed in May 1942, the ship participated in the Aleutian Islands Campaign the following month and in several battles during the Guadalcanal Campaign later in the year. Her aircraft were used from land bases during several battles in the New Guinea and Solomon Islands Campaigns.

Jun'yō was torpedoed in November 1943 and spent three months under repair. She was damaged by several bombs during the Battle of the Philippine Sea in mid-1944, but quickly returned to service. Lacking aircraft, she was used as a transport in late 1944 and was torpedoed again in December. Jun'yō was under repair until March 1945, when work was cancelled as uneconomical. She was then effectively hulked for the rest of the war. After the surrender of Japan in September, the Americans also decided that she was not worth the cost to make her serviceable for use as a repatriation ship, and she was broken up in 1946–1947. (Full article...)

Albert Ball, VC, DSO & Two Bars, MC (14 August 1896 – 7 May 1917) was a British fighter pilot during the First World War. At the time of his death he was the United Kingdom's leading flying ace, with 44 victories, and remained its fourth-highest scorer behind Edward Mannock, James McCudden, and George McElroy.

Born and raised in Nottingham, Ball joined the Sherwood Foresters at the outbreak of the First World War and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in October 1914. He transferred to the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) the following year, and gained his pilot's wings on 26 January 1916. Joining No. 13 Squadron RFC in France, he flew reconnaissance missions before being posted in May to No. 11 Squadron, a fighter unit. From then until his return to England on leave in October, he accrued many aerial victories, earning two Distinguished Service Orders and the Military Cross. He was the first ace to become a British national hero. (Full article...)

The Second Fitna was a period of general political and military disorder and civil war in the Islamic community during the early Umayyad Caliphate. It followed the death of the first Umayyad caliph Mu'awiya I in 680, and lasted for about twelve years. The war involved the suppression of two challenges to the Umayyad dynasty, the first by Husayn ibn Ali, as well as his supporters including Sulayman ibn Surad and Mukhtar al-Thaqafi who rallied for his revenge in Iraq, and the second by Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr.

The roots of the civil war go back to the First Fitna. After the assassination of the third caliph, Uthman, the Islamic community experienced its first civil war over the question of leadership, with the main contenders being Ali and Mu'awiya. Following the assassination of Ali in 661 and the abdication of his successor Hasan the same year, Mu'awiya became the sole ruler of the caliphate. Mu'awiya's unprecedented decision to nominate his son Yazid as his heir sparked opposition, and tensions soared after Mu'awiya's death. Husayn ibn Ali was invited by the pro-Alids of Kufa to overthrow the Umayyads but was killed with his small company en route to Kufa at the Battle of Karbala in October 680. Yazid's army assaulted anti-government rebels in Medina in August 683 and subsequently besieged Mecca, where Ibn al-Zubayr had established himself in opposition to Yazid. After Yazid died in November the siege was abandoned, and Umayyad authority collapsed throughout the caliphate except in certain parts of Syria; most provinces recognized Ibn al-Zubayr as caliph. A series of pro-Alid movements demanding revenge for Husayn's death emerged in Kufa, beginning with Ibn Surad's Penitents movement, which was crushed by the Umayyads at the Battle of Ayn al-Warda in January 685. Kufa was then taken over by Mukhtar. Though his forces routed a large Umayyad army at the Battle of Khazir in August 686, Mukhtar and his supporters were slain by the Zubayrids in April 687 following a series of battles. Under the leadership of Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan, the Umayyads reasserted control over the caliphate after defeating the Zubayrids at the Battle of Maskin in Iraq and killing Ibn al-Zubayr in the siege of Mecca in 692. (Full article...)

Hugh de Neville (died 1234) was the Chief Forester under the kings Richard I, John and Henry III of England; he was the sheriff for a number of counties. Related to a number of other royal officials as well as a bishop, Neville was a member of Prince Richard's household. After Richard became king in 1189, Neville continued in his service and accompanied him on the Third Crusade. Neville remained in the royal service following Richard's death in 1199 and the accession of King John to the throne, becoming one of the new king's favourites and often gambling with him. He was named in Magna Carta as one of John's principal advisers, and considered by a medieval chronicler to be one of King John's "evil counsellors". He deserted John after the French invasion of England in 1216 but returned to pledge his loyalty to John's son Henry III after the latter's accession to the throne later that year. Neville's royal service continued until his death in 1234, though by then he was a less significant figure than he had been at the height of his powers. (Full article...)

Operation Teardrop was a United States Navy operation during World War II, conducted between April and May 1945, to sink German U-boats approaching the Eastern Seaboard that were believed to be armed with V-1 flying bombs. Germany had threatened to attack New York with V-1 flying bombs and rocket U-boats. After the war, it was determined the submarines had not been carrying either.

Operation Teardrop was planned during late 1944 in response to intelligence reports which indicated that Germany was preparing a force of missile-armed submarines. Two large U.S. Navy anti-submarine warfare task forces were set up. The plan was executed in April 1945 after several Type IX submarines put to sea from Norway bound for North America. While severe weather conditions in the North Atlantic Ocean greatly reduced the effectiveness of the four U.S. Navy escort carriers involved, long patrol lines of destroyer escorts detected and engaged most of the German submarines. Aircraft of the Royal Canadian Air Force supported this effort. (Full article...)

Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan (Arabic: سُلَيْمَان ٱبْن عَبْد الْمَلِك ٱبْن مَرْوَان, romanized: Sulaymān ibn ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Marwān, c. 675 – 24 September 717) was the seventh Umayyad caliph, ruling from 715 until his death. He was the son of Caliph Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan (r. 685–705) and Wallada bint al-Abbas. He began his career as governor of Palestine, while his father Abd al-Malik (r. 685–705) and brother al-Walid I (r. 705–715) reigned as caliphs. There, the theologian Raja ibn Haywa al-Kindi mentored him, and he forged close ties with Yazid ibn al-Muhallab, a major opponent of al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, al-Walid's powerful viceroy of Iraq and the eastern Caliphate. Sulayman resented al-Hajjaj's influence over his brother. As governor, Sulayman founded the city of Ramla and built the White Mosque in it. The new city superseded Lydda as the district capital of Palestine. Lydda was at least partly destroyed and its inhabitants may have been forcibly relocated to Ramla, which developed into an economic hub, became home to many Muslim scholars, and remained the commercial and administrative center of Palestine until the 11th century.

After acceding as caliph, Sulayman dismissed his predecessor's governors and generals. Many had been handpicked by al-Hajjaj and had led the war efforts which brought the Caliphate to its greatest territorial extent. Among them were the conqueror of Transoxiana (Central Asia), Qutayba ibn Muslim, who was killed by his own troops in an abortive revolt in anticipation of his dismissal, and the conqueror of Sind (the western Indian subcontinent), Muhammad ibn al-Qasim, who was executed. In the west, Sulayman deposed Musa ibn Nusayr, the conqueror of the Iberian Peninsula (al-Andalus) and governor of Ifriqiya (central North Africa), and had his son Abd al-Aziz, governor of al-Andalus, assassinated. Although he continued his predecessors' militarist policies, expansion largely stopped under Sulayman, partly due to effective resistance along the Central Asian frontiers and the collapse of Arab military leadership and organization there after Qutayba's death. Sulayman's appointee over the eastern Caliphate, his confidant Yazid, invaded the southern Caspian coast in 716, but withdrew and settled for a tributary arrangement after being defeated by the local Iranian rulers. Sulayman intensified the war with the Byzantine Empire, the primary focus of his war efforts, culminating in the 717–718 siege of Constantinople, which ended in a disastrous Arab defeat. (Full article...)

The Peterloo Massacre took place at St Peter's Field, Manchester, Lancashire, England, on Monday 16 August 1819. It was the largest ever political gathering of working class people. Eighteen people died and 400–700 were injured when cavalry charged into a crowd of around 60,000 people who had gathered to demand the reform of parliamentary representation.

After the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815, there was an acute economic slump, accompanied by chronic unemployment and harvest failure due to the Year Without a Summer, and worsened by the Corn Laws, which kept the price of bread high. At that time, only around 11 percent of adult males had the vote, very few of them in the industrial north of England, which was worst hit. Reformers identified parliamentary reform as the solution, and a mass campaign to petition parliament for manhood suffrage gained three-quarters of a million signatures in 1817 but was flatly rejected by the House of Commons. When a second slump occurred in early 1819, radical reformers sought to mobilise huge crowds to force the government to back down. The movement was particularly strong in the north-west, where the Manchester Patriotic Union organised a mass rally in August 1819, addressed by well-known radical orator Henry Hunt. (Full article...)