Part 43

1724. A party of volunteers at Oyster river, in New Hampshire, discovered an Indian ambush, which they attacked, killed one, and wounded two others, who made their escape, though pursued and tracked by their blood to a considerable distance. The slain Indian was a person of distinction, and wore a kind of coronet of scarlet-dyed fur, with an appendage of four small bells, by the sound of which the others might follow him through the thickets. His hair was remarkably soft and fine, and he had about him a devotional book and a muster-roll of 180 Indians. His scalp produced a bounty.

1726. ANTHONY ALSOP, an English prelate and poet, died.

1735. THOMAS HEARNE, an English antiquary, died. He edited nearly forty works, some of them classics, but principally relative to ancient English history and antiquities.

1739. Grosvenor square centre house valued at £10,000, was raffled for and won by Mrs. Hunt, a grocer's wife in Piccadilly.

1761. Indian battle; the Cherokees defeated by the British under colonel Grant, and their town Etchoe utterly destroyed, together with their magazines and cornfields.

1768. Riot in Boston, headed by captain Malcom, on account of the seizure of the sloop Liberty, belonging to Mr. Hancock, by the commissioners of the king's customs.

1772. The Gaspee, an armed British schooner, having exacted some degrading terms of the American vessels entering the port of Providence, a body of the inhabitants boarded her, put the officers and crew ashore, and burnt the vessel with all her stores.

1792. Russians attacked a detachment of Poles, under general Judycki, between Mire and Swierza; but were defeated, with the loss of 500 dead on the field.

1798. BONAPARTE attacked Valetta, in Malta, and in a sortie the Maltese lost the standard of their order.

1800. Battle of Montebello, in Italy, in which the Austrians were defeated, and compelled to retire to Voghera.

1801. The pasha of Tripoli declared war against the United States of America.

1806. The British house of lords resolved to abolish the slave trade.

1807. Battle of Heilsburg, in Prussia. The French, under Bonaparte, defeated the Russians, who fell back into their entrenchments. About 4,000 Russians were taken prisoners. Roussel had his head carried off by a cannon ball, and Murat had two horses shot under him. The Russians retreated the next night.

1809. Pope PIUS VII excommunicated Bonaparte.

1811. Lord WELLINGTON raised the siege of Badajos. The French governor, Phillipon made a brave and noble defence.

1831. FRANCIS ABBOT, the _Hermit of Niagara Falls_, drowned while bathing in the river. He was a native of England, of quaker parentage. He arrived at the falls in June, 1829, on foot, in a very singular costume, and after a week's residence became so fascinated with the place that he determined on fixing his abode on Goat island. He sought seclusion, and wished to erect a hut, but the proprietor not thinking proper to grant his request, he took a small room in the only house, where he was occasionally furnished with bread and milk by the family, but more generally providing, and always cooking his own food. In the second winter of his residence, the house changed tenants, at which he quitted the island and built himself a small cottage on the main shore, about thirty rods below the fall. He was a person of highly cultivated mind and manners, a master of languages, and deeply read in the arts and sciences, and performed on various musical instruments with great taste; his drawings were also very spirited. He had traveled over Europe, and parts of the East, and possessed great colloquial powers when inclined to be sociable. On entering his hut, his guitar, violin, flutes, music books and port folio were scattered round in profusion; but not a single written paper of any kind was found to throw the least light on this extraordinary character.

1831. General DIEBITSCH, commander of the Russian forces in Poland, died, by the official accounts of cholera; it is supposed by poison.

1836. JEAN MARIE AMPERE, famed as a mathematician and natural philosopher, died. Near the close of his life he busied himself with a classification of the sciences, a work from which great minds before him had shrunk.

1837. The plague at Smyrna committed great ravages; about 300 died daily for some time.

1839. JOHN RIDGE, a Cherokee, murdered. He was educated at the Cornwall school in Connecticut, where he married a respectable white woman. He was a practicing attorney among the Cherokees, and a man of talents.

1851. ROBERT DUNDAS, viscount Melville, British statesman, died, aged 80. He was for many years in the ministry, especially as first lord of the admiralty.

1854. The Crystal palace at Sydenham, England, was opened by the queen, Victoria; 40,000 persons being present.

JUNE 11.

1656 A. M. The tops of the mountains were seen, 73 days after the waters of the deluge began to subside, 1st of 10th month, answering to this day.

1184 B. C. The destruction of Troy is placed commonly by English chronologists in the night of this day; an event which Homer has invested with unrivaled importance, and a gorgeous immortality. (See April 24.)

534 B. C. SERVIUS TULLIUS, sixth king of Rome, assassinated. He is celebrated for his laws on the subjects of rank and property. He was murdered by his son-in-law, the second Tarquin.

90 B. C. The consul RUTILIUS LUPUS was destroyed with his forces, by an ambuscade, near the river Livis, during the social war.

816. LEO III, pope, died. A conspiracy was formed against him in 799, and it was only through the power of Charlemagne that he was enabled to keep the pontifical chair. He was an able pontiff.

1183. Prince HENRY, son of Henry II of England, died, aged 27. He is sometimes called Henry III, on account of his rebellion against his father.

1258. The great council of reform, called the mad parliament, assembled at Oxford. Every member was sworn to allow no consideration, "neither of gift nor promise, profit nor loss, love nor hatred, nor fear," to influence him in the discharge of his duty.

1289. Battle of Campaldino, in Italy, in which the Florentines defeated the people of Arezzo. The poet Dante, then in his 24th year, was present, and served in the foremost troop of cavalry. He says, "the Uberti, Lamberti and Abati, with all the ex-citizens of Florence who adhered to the Ghibelline interest, were with Aretini; while those inhabitants of Arezzo, who, owing to their attachment to the Guelph party, had been banished from their own city, were ranged on the side of the Florentines."

1294. ROGER BACON, an eminently learned monk of the Franciscan order, died, aged 80. He was a miracle of the age in which he lived, and the greatest genius, perhaps, for mechanical knowledge, that ever appeared in the world since Archimedes. (1292 by some authorities.)

1381. WAT TYLER assembled his followers at Blackheath, amounting to 100,000 men.

1520. A grand tournament between Henry VIII of England and Francis I of France, at Guines. "At the houre assigned," says Holinshed, "the two kings, armed at all peeces, mounted on horssebacke, and with their companies, entered the field; the French king on a courser barbed, covered with purple sattin, broched with gold, and embroidered with corbin's feathers. All the parteners of the French king's chalenge were in like apparell, everie thing correspondent in cloath of silke embrodered. On his person were attendant on horssebacke noble persons, and on foot foure persons, all apparelled in purple sattin."

1526. Holy league against the emperor Charles V.

1543. NICHOLAS COPERNICUS, the astronomer, died on this day, according to Lalande, who says, in his _History of Astronomy for 1798_, "The death of the great Copernicus was, till lately, a problem. I resolved it in my tour. Copernicus died on the 11th of June, 1543, although Gassendi and Weidler date this circumstance on the 24th May, and Planche the 11th of July." (See May 24.)

1567. Flight of MARY, queen of Scots, and her husband, Bothwell, from Borthwick castle to Dunbar.

1576. ANTHONY COOKE, preceptor of Edward VI, died. He also educated his own daughters, who were "learned above their sex in Greek and Latin."

1576. MARTIN FROBISHER was despatched with three pinnaces to discover a northwest passage, but compelled by the ice to return. He was the first navigator who attempted to find a northwest passage to China.

1578. Queen ELIZABETH granted letters patent to Humphrey Gilbert for the discovery and settlement of "barbarous lands in America, undiscovered by any Christian prince or people." This was the first charter granted by the crown of England to a colony.

1665. KENELM DIGBY, an eminent English philosopher, died. He was also in the employ of the government as a soldier and a statesman. He was brave, learned and eloquent, but somewhat visionary.

1685. The duke of MONMOUTH landed at Lyme, Dorsetshire with men and arms in opposition to James II.

1693. An expedition fitted out in England against Canada and Martinique, arrived in Boston. During the voyage, 1,300 out of 2,100 sailors, and 1,800 out of 2,400 soldiers, had died of a malignant disease. On the arrival of the fleet the disease spread into the town, and proved more malignant than any other epidemic which had ever been known in the country.

1695. ANDREW FELIBIEN, counselor and historiographer to the king of France, died. He was also celebrated for his taste and judgment in the fine arts, and his _Dialogues upon the Lives of the Painters_ has done him great honor.

1698. BALTHAZAR BEKKER, a Dutch divine, died. His writings got him into trouble with the church, which was alarmed at some very harmless notions he entertained about spirits and devils.

1712. LEWIS JOSEPH, duke de Vendome, died. He was a descendant of Henry IV of France, and distinguished himself under Philip V of Spain, whom he succeeded in raising to the throne, in opposition to the claims of Charles III, archduke of Austria.

1719. A terrible earthquake happened at Pekin, in China, throwing down houses and burying more than 1,000 inhabitants in the ruins.

1727. GEORGE I, king of England, died in his carriage near Osnabruck, in Germany, aged 68. He was the first king of England of the house of Brunswick, and had reigned 13 years.

1756. CÆSAR CHESNEAU DU MARSAIS, a French grammarian, died. He was engaged in the _Encyclopedie_, and his articles on grammar are drawn up with great precision, correctness and judgment.

1776. Congress appointed Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin and Robert R. Livingston, a committee to prepare a Declaration of Independence.

1783. Great eruption of the Scaptar Jokul, in Iceland, commenced, and continued several days (see 18th).

1792. The first bank in New Hampshire commenced discounting at Portsmouth.

1792. Battle of Mire; the Polish general Judycki, surrounded by the Russians, defeated, and compelled to retreat.

1793. N. GOUVION, a French officer, killed at Maubeuge, on the Sambre. He served in America in the war of the revolution, and at the time of his death was a general in the army of the north.

1793. WILLIAM ROBERTSON, the Scottish historian, died. His works are popular, and the _History of Charles V_ will be long read with admiration.

1796. St. Vincent, Grenada, and St. Lucia islands in the West Indies were taken by the British.

1798. BONAPARTE seized Malta, the key of the Mediterranean, which he garrisoned, and proceeded with the fleet, carrying 20,000 regular troops, to the Egyptian coast.

1800. SAMUEL IRELAND, an ingenious English mechanic, died. He distinguished himself by his skill in drawing and engraving. He was unjustly accused of an attempt to impose upon the world a spurious volume of letters and papers in the name of Shakspeare. (See April 17th, 1835.)

1812. A great skirmish of cavalry in Estremadura, Spain, between the English under general Slade, and the French under general Lallemand.

1825. DANIEL D. TOMPKINS, a distinguished New York statesman, died, aged 51. He was vice-president of the United States under Mr. Monroe, and governor of the state of New York.

1828. DUGALD STEWART, an eminent Scottish philosopher and writer, died. His philosophical works are well known.

1829. Battle of Schoumla; the Turks under the grand vizier defeated by the Russians under general Diebitsch, with the loss of 6,000 killed, 1,500 prisoners, and 60 pieces of cannon. Russian loss, 1,400 killed, 600 wounded.

1842. ALEXANDER CROMBIE died at London. As a scholar and a critic, a metaphysician and a theologian, his name stands high among the first writers of the age.

1845. THEODORE DWIGHT, secretary of the Hartford convention, died, aged 81. He was editor of the _Connecticut Mirror_, published at Hartford, and in 1815 established the _Albany Daily Advertiser_, the first daily paper in that city. In 1817 he became editor of the _New York Daily Advertiser_.

1849. Great excitement at Paris, and a proposition to impeach the president for his aiding the cause of the pope, signed by Ledru Rollin and 141 others.

1849. Ancona capitulated to the Austrians after a very destructive bombardment.

1853. GUERAZZI, ex-minister of Tuscany, tried for high treason at Florence, and found guilty, was sentenced to fifteen years' imprisonment, which was subsequently commuted to perpetual exile.

1854. THOMAS H. BOTTS died at Fredericksburg, Va., aged 54; a lawyer, and one of the leading men of his profession.

JUNE 12.

456 B. C. HERODOTUS recited his celebrated _History_ at Athens, during the Olympic games, in his 29th year, on the 12 Hecatombæon. He had traveled with his work from Caria. Thucydides was then a boy; Æschylus died in that year; Cimon was recalled from exile, and the Athenians completed their long walls.

455. MARCUS CLODIUS PUPIENUS MAXIMUS, emperor of Rome, murdered by the soldiery, after a reign of 15 months. He was of humble birth, but rose by his merits to the most eminent posts of the state, and was raised to the imperial dignity on the death of Gordian. He made salutary laws and reformed abuses.

1099. The army of crusaders who had encamped before Jerusalem, made a furious attack on this city, and amid a storm of arrows and fire balls, burst the first barrier, and strove to surmount the walls by escalade. The want of proper instruments rendered the assault abortive, and the followers of the cross were driven back with shame and slaughter to their camp. This defeat was followed by suffering and privations, from the scarcity of provisions and water.

1211. Battle of Tolosa, in Spain, between the Christians and Moors. Mohammed Abu Abdallah, at the head of a powerful army, one of the five divisions of which, according to the Arabic and Spanish historians, amounted to 160,000 men, made a descent from Africa, with the design of conquering the whole Spanish peninsula. Such was the terror which this vast armament inspired among the Christians, that Innocent III, proclaimed a crusade, and several bishops went from town to town to rouse the Christian princes. The kings of Castile, Arragon and Navarre, with a numerous body of foreign volunteers, advanced to stop the progress of the Moslems. The two armies met in Las Navas de Tolosa, between Castile and Andalusia. The result of the engagement was so complete a victory over the Africans, that Mohammed had a narrow escape, and left no less than 170,000 men in the field; the rest fled for safety.

1268. BILBARS, the sultan of Syria, took possession of Antioch. The Latin principality was extinguished, and the whole existence of the Franks was now confined to the city of Ptolemais.

1402. Battle of Melienydd, in Radnorshire, Wales, in which Owen Glendour, the last of the native Welsh princes, defeated and captured sir Edmund Mortimer.

1418. Massacre at Paris, at night, by the direction, if not under the eye of John, duke of Burgundy, called the fearless. In the course of three days, 3500 persons were sacrificed.

1488. JAMES III, king of Scotland, killed. He put his brother John to death, and attempted the life of his other brother, Alexander; he escaped, however, and levied war against the tyrant, who had rendered himself odious by his cruelties. James was defeated in battle, and put to death in a mill, by the daggers of his own subjects.

1565. ADRIAN TURNEBUS, a French critic, died. Great encomiums have been passed upon his genius and learning, as well as the amiability of his private character.

1630. JOHN WINTHROP, the first governor of Massachusetts, arrived at Salem, with the charter of the colony. He settled at Shawmut, which was finally determined upon for the metropolis, and named Boston.

1647. THOMAS FARNABY, an English grammarian, died. His works display great erudition.

1660. WILLIAM OUGHTRED, an English divine and mathematician, died. He was disturbed in his retirement by the partisans of Cromwell, and escaped sequestration only by the interference of influential friends. His works were small, but of great value to subsequent mathematicians.

1665. The city of New York incorporated by governor Nichols; a mayor, 5 aldermen and a sheriff were appointed. Prior to this, it had been governed by a schout, burgomasters and schepens.

1672. The French under Louis XIV, crossed the Rhine. The prince de Conde was wounded for the first and only time during all his campaigns; but the young duke de Longueville was killed.

1672. The government of England issued a proclamation to restrain the spread of false news and licentious talking of matters of state and government.

1676. Attack on Hadley by the Indians, to the number of 700, who were resolved on a grand effort to carry this post. The attack was commenced at day-light, with great spirit; they gained possession of a house, and fired a barn; but were in a short time driven back with loss. The attack was renewed on other points, the enemy appearing to be determined on carrying the place; but the discharge of a piece of ordnance cooled their ardor, and they drew off; and on assistance coming from Northampton, the foe was driven into the woods, with a loss of two or three of the English. It is supposed to have been on this occasion that general Goffe, one of the judges of Charles I, who was at that time concealed with the minister at Hadley, made his appearance in so mysterious a manner. At a moment when the people were in the greatest consternation, there appeared a man of venerable aspect, differing from them in his apparel, who assumed the command, put them in order for defence, and by advice and example animated them throughout the attack. When the scene was over, on looking about for the stranger, he had disappeared, and was seen no more--leaving the inhabitants to form the strangest conjectures.

1683. The Rye house plot discovered. It was headed by Monmouth, Essex, and lord John Russell, and their object seems to have been to oppose the succession of the duke of York. Russell and many others suffered on the scaffold, Essex was found with his throat cut in prison, and Monmouth was in a short time reconciled to the king.

1734. JAMES, duke of Berwick, killed by a cannon shot at the siege of Phillipsburgh, in Germany, while standing between his two sons. No general of his time excelled him in the art of war, except his uncle, the duke of Marlboro'.

1759. WILLIAM COLLINS, an English poet, died. He was entirely neglected, and his _Odes_, which possessed great merit, failed to attract any attention during his life time.

1775. General GAGE, issued a proclamation at Boston, offering the king's pardon to all who would lay down their arms and return to their peaceable occupations, excepting Samuel Adams and John Hancock, and at the same time he proclaimed martial law.

1778. PHILIP LIVINGSTON, a signer and a strenuous advocate for the declaration of independence, died. He was a New York merchant, and became a prominent character in that city before the revolution.

1788. Settlement made at Sierra Leone by blacks from England. The town lots were drawn for and apportioned this day.

1794. Couthon reported, and the French convention decreed, the organization of the revolutionary tribunal, consisting of a president, 3 vice-presidents, a public accuser, 4 deputies, 12 judges and 50 jurors.

1796. Battle between the Chinese and Eleuths, in a desert which the Chinese had attempted to penetrate in pursuit of the retreating army. The Tartars under Kaldan, taking advantage of the exhausted state of their enemy, gave them battle; but were defeated and totally routed, with the loss of 2000 killed, and all their women, children, baggage and cattle, taken by the Chinese.

1798. The French troops took possession of the fortifications of Malta, and the fleet anchored in the ports. They found two line of battle ships belonging to the Maltese, a frigate, three galleys, two galliots, and several guard boats; 1500 pieces of artillery, 35,000 stand of small arms, 12,000 barrels of powder, and a large quantity of shot and shell. The order of knights from this day became virtually extinct; from a position of political importance it fell to the level of an obscure association, and such, as far as human foresight goes, it is destined to remain.

1798. The Irish rebels defeated with great slaughter at Ballynahinch by general Nugent. This quelled the insurrection in the north.

1799. A division of the French army, under Olivier, took Modena, and drove the Austrians beyond the river Po.

1805. American ship Atahualpa, captain Porter, treacherously attacked by the Indians while bartering for skins in Sturgis's cove. Captain Porter and 8 of the crew were killed, and 11 wounded.

1812. Putnam county in New York erected.

1813. Major CHAPIN and other American prisoners taken at the head of the lake, and sent in boats for Kingston, when arrived near York rose upon the guard, and after a short struggle took the boats and returned to Niagara.

1816. PIERRE FRANCOIS CHARLES AUGEREAU, duke of Castiglione and marshal of France, died. He was the son of a fruit merchant, and served as a carabineer in the French army. He first distinguished himself in 1794, after which his career for a number of years was brilliant, and full of honor and glory.

1829. A large body of Turkish cavalry and infantry defeated near Kuganoff, and 600 killed.

1843. HENRY R. CLEVELAND, aged 34, died at St. Louis, Mo. He was an elegant and graceful writer, and the author of the well written life of Henry Hudson, in Sparks' Biography.

1843. SAMUEL KIDD, professor of oriental and Chinese literature in University college, London, died, aged 42.

1846. More than 6000 persons driven from their houses by a disastrous fire in St. Johns, Newfoundland.

1848. GEORGE POZER, a wealthy merchant of Quebec, died, aged 95.

1848. Insurrection at Prague; the princess of Windichgratz shot by the insurgents.

JUNE 13.

1483. ANTHONY WIDVILLE, earl Rivers, beheaded at Pontefract.

1502. OLIVER MAILLARD, a French divine of the order of Cordeliers, died. He was an eminent preacher, and published several volumes of Latin sermons.

1584. JOHN SAMBUCUS, a learned German physician, died. His learning attracted the attention of the emperor Maximilian II, and he was appointed counselor of state and historiographer of the German empire. He wrote several learned and useful works.

1605. Riot at Moscow, when Fedor Godonoff, the reigning czar, who had been but two months on the throne, was dragged with his family from the palace, and shut up in one of his own private houses, where he was murdered a few days after.

1633. Lord Baltimore obtained a grant for a tract of land in America, now the state of Maryland, which was first settled by a colony of catholics.

1666. Second charter granted to South Carolina by Charles II. It was an enlargement of the previous charter, making the colony independent of any other province.