02 Nov History: This Date

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Events, deaths, births, of NOV 02
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On a November 02:
2001 The US Labor Department reports that businesses eliminated 415'000 jobs in October 2001, the worst since May 1980, and that the US unemployment rate rose from 4.9% in September to to 5.4%, the highest since December 1996. This means that the US is in an economic recession.

2001 Trimble voted out by North Ireland parliament.
David Trimble narrowly fails to be re-elected as leader of Northern Ireland's unity government, a result that threatens the Catholic-Protestant coalition at the heart of the province's 1998 peace accord. Trimble, leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, couldn't rally enough support from the Protestant side of the 108-seat legislature, which must approve the selection of Cabinet ministers. While Catholics unanimously backed Trimble, fellow Protestants vote 30-29 against him - fatal in a voting system that requires majority support from both camps. The long-delayed vote, much feared by supporters of the landmark Good Friday peace pact, could throw peacemaking efforts into disarray. Trimble offered himself for re-election following last week's breakthrough on Irish Republican Army disarmament, when the outlawed group got rid of an undisclosed amount of weaponry in cooperation with disarmament officials. He resigned in July over the IRA's refusal to start scrapping weapons as the 1998 pact envisioned. But many Protestants viewed the secrecy-shrouded start to IRA disarmament with suspicion, and refused to vote for continuing to run a four-party government that includes the IRA-linked Sinn Fein. Trimble accused two members of his party who voted against him of behaving "dishonorably" and called them part of "a small, unrepresentative clique" that sought to "frustrate the wishes of the community as a whole." But Trimble, who shared the 1998 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to steer Protestants toward compromise, insisted he will rally sufficient Protestant support to win a future vote, though he didn't forecast when. — MORE

2001 One more coup attempt in Anjouan.
Troops loyal to a former president seized the state radio and port in a coup attempt in Anjouan. Troops backing Lt. Col. Said Abeid Abderemanein, who himself was ousted in a 09 August 2001 coup, take over the state radio station and port late in the day. But forces loyal to the current junta of Halidy Harif, Mohamed Bakar and Hassane Ali Toilhat mainain control of Anjouan's airport,
The three, all officers in the national police or gendarmerie, have survived two previous coup attempts by disgruntled officers in the previous three months.
between Mozambique and Madagascar

      Jumhuriyat al-Qumur al-Itthadiyah al-Islamiyah (République Fédérale Islamique des Comores) is an archipelago located in the Indian Ocean between Mozambique and Madagascar. It was administered by France until independence on 06 July 1975. One of its islands, Mayotte, with a Christian majority, voted to remain in the French Community. Nevertheless it is claimed by Comoros. The other 3 main islands are Grande Comore (Njazidja), Anjouan (Nzwani), and Moheli (Mwali).
      Anjouan (and Moheli) declared independence in August 1997, complaining that it was not receiving its fair share of export revenues. The government sent troops to Anjouan, and dozens of people died in the fighting.
      The impoverished archipelago, with an estimated population of 710'000, lives on revenue from exports of cloves and ylang-ylang flowers for perfume and remittances from thousands of Comorians living abroad, mainly in France. It has been plagued by coups, military rule and attempted secession ever since independence from France. No wonder the capital of Comoros is called Moroni. [Anjouan ne change pas de gouvernement en jouant.]

2001 By a vote of 87-4 (Norway, Russia, Turkey, Venezuela) with 15 abstentions (Brazil, Colombia, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Guinea-Bissau, Iceland, Israel, Netherlands, Paraguay, Sweden, Switzerland, UK, Uruguay) the 31st General Conference of UNESCO adopts the Convention on the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage, which took experts four years to finalize. The convention would enter into force once 20 countries ratify it. It bans treasure hunters from underwater archaeological sites, overriding objections from commercial salvage operators. The convention provides for sanctions against violations of the new code and gives states powers to seize any illegally recovered underwater treasures that enter their territory. Treasure hunters have been reaping hundreds of millions of dollars from underwater gold mines at the expense of the world's cultural heritage. But the International Salvage Union and maritime law organizations say that the wording of the Convention is at odds with existing treaties, including the 1982 Law of the Sea, that they say enshrine laws of ownership and age-old rights of salvage. — Text of the Convention in English (also available in French — Spanish — Arabic — Chinese — Russian) [virulent opposition by New Jersey Council of Diving Clubs 29 May 2002]
2001 At 23:00 Nixon B. Saldanha approaches a National Guard Private First Class outside Manhattan's Grand Central Station and shows him two envelopes which he says that he found on top of a nearby telephone booth. One of the envelopes is addressed to Tom Brokaw, the NBC news anchorman, and the other to the editor of the New York Post tabloid. Both news organizations previously received anthrax-laced letters postmarked on 18 September 2001. The soldier tells Saldanha to put the envelopes on the ground and they are removed by law enforcement officers trained to handle hazardous materials. They are then sent to the Department of Health for analysis. Saldanha would repeat the same to three FBI agents at 00:30 (already 03 November). But on 04 November he would admit to detectives that he decided to get himself arrested so he would be deported to his country, India (he is from Mumbai, had come to the US on a visitor's visa in June 1999 and was unemployed since August 2001). He downloaded and printed copies of the letters sent to NBC and the New York Post that he found on a media organization's Web site. He then prepared letters and addressed envelopes imitating the ones that he downloaded, and put talcum powder in the envelopes. He would be charged with 2 violations (false statements on 2 different days) of 18 USC Section 1001, which could get him five years in prison and a $250'000 fine on each of the two counts.
2000 El ajedrecista ruso Vladimir Kramnik acaba con los quince años de reinado de Anatoly Evgenievich Kárpov.
1997 French truck drivers began a weeklong strike, blockading major roads and ports.
1996 Britain announced a plan to ban ownership of large-caliber handguns.
1995 The US Justice Department indicted the Japanese-owned Daiwa Bank on conspiracy and fraud charges after an investigation reveals that it has let one of its bond traders continue to make unauthorized deals even after he had racked up $1.1 billion in debt on bad trades and that Daiwa had worked with the trader to cover up his losses.
1990 Nueva Constitución para Mozambique, que consagra el multipartidismo y la economía de mercado.
1989 Carmen Fasanella, a taxicab driver from Princeton, New Jersey, retires after 68 years and 243 days of service, a record. Fasanella, was continuously licensed as a taxicab owner and driver in the Borough of Princeton, New Jersey, since 01 February 1921..
1985 The Hunt brothers had tried to corner the silver market. But, faced with a mountain of debt, they quietly sell off "substantially all" of their $350 million silver holdings (59 million ounces). The Hunts lose roughly $1 billion on the sale.

1988 Computer virus shuts down major computers
A computer virus raced across networks and shut down computers at Pentagon, SDI research lab, NASA, at 6 universities including the University of California at Berkeley and MIT, and other sites on this day in 1988. In 1989, a federal grand jury indicted Cornell University student Robert Morris, 24, for releasing the computer virus. Morris was the first person to be prosecuted under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986. In 1990, a jury found Morris guilty of federal computer tampering, and the student was sentenced to three years of probation, a $10,000 fine, and 400 hours of community service.

1988 Shamir Likud wins election in Israel
1986 Lucio Aguinagalde Aizpurua es liberado por la Policía Autónoma Vasca, después de estar 18 días secuestrado por la banda terrorista ETA (Euskadi Ta Askatasuna) .
1983 Archbishop Hickey conducts papal investigation of Archbishop Hunthausen, Seattle

1983 Martin Luther King holiday declared
President Ronald Reagan signs a bill in the White House Rose Garden designating a federal holiday honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., for observance on the third Monday of January. King, the most effective and important leader in the African-American civil rights movement, was assassinated in 1968 by a sniper's bullet while standing on a hotel balcony in Memphis, Tennessee. During the 1950s and 1960s, King, a Baptist minister and acclaimed orator, challenged segregation and racial prejudice in the South through his movements of passive resistance. In 1964, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. — MORE

1982 US unemployment reported at 7.4%
The economy struggled through the first few years of Ronald Reagan's presidency, choking on rising levels of debt and inflation. While a recovery seemed to be slowly taking hold by 1982, the unemployment rate, for one, refused to budge. According to a report released by the Labor Department on this day, 7.4% of the workforce remained unemployed. And, the jobs being created were increasingly in the service industry, reinforcing America's steady drift away from its manufacturing base. The result was a rising number of jobs that offered less security and lower pay than factory-based work.

1976 Former Georgia Governor Jimmy (James Earl) Carter (D) is elected the 39th president of the United States, defeating incumbent Gerald R Ford (R), who was never elected president or vice-president. Carter is the first candidate from the Deep South since the Civil War to be elected President — El demócrata James Earl “Jimmy” Carter es elegido 39º presidente de EE.UU.
1976 La primera ministra india Indira Gandhi Shrimati obtiene plenos poderes dictatoriales, merced a las reformas constitucionales aprobadas por la Asamblea Nacional.
1971 Reaparece el semanario Triunfo, después de cuatro meses de suspensión decretada por el gobierno franquista.
1968 España es elegida miembro del Consejo de Seguridad de la ONU.

1967 Johnson meets with "the Wise Men" on Vietnam
President Johnson holds a secret meeting with some of the US's most prestigious leaders, who were collectively called "the Wise Men." This group included former Secretary of State Dean Acheson, General of the Army Omar Bradley, Ambassador-at-Large Averell Harriman, and former Ambassador to South Vietnam Henry Cabot Lodge.
Johnson asked them for advice on how to unite the US in the Vietnam War effort. They reached the conclusion that the administration needed to offer "ways of guiding the press to show the light at the end of the tunnel." In effect, they decided that the American people should be given more optimistic reports. When Johnson agreed, the administration, which included senior US military commander in Saigon Gen. William Westmoreland, began to paint a more positive picture of the situation in South Vietnam. In early 1968, this decision came back to haunt Johnson and Westmoreland when the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese launched a major surprise attack on January 30, the start of the Tet New Year holiday. Stunned by the scope of the Communist attack after the administration had painted such an upbeat picture of Allied progress in the war, many people in the US began to question the credibility of the president and antiwar sentiment increased significantly.

1966 El ejército estadounidense, en el transcurso de la Guerra de Vietnam, destruye rampas de lanzamiento cerca de Hanoi y Haiphong.
1964 El príncipe Faysal Ibn Abd Al-Aziz es proclamado rey de Arabia Saudí tras la abdicación de su hermano Saud.

1962 US President Kennedy announces end of Cuban Missile Crisis.
     Speking on television at 17:30 from the Fish Room at the White House, President John F. Kennedy says:.
My fellow citizens:
      I want to take this opportunity to report on the conclusions which this Government has reached on the basis of yesterday's aerial photographs which will be made available tomorrow, as well as other indications, namely, that the Soviet missile bases in Cuba are being dismantled, their missiles and related equipment are being crated, and the fixed installations at these sites are being destroyed.
      The United States intends to follow closely the completion of this work through a variety of means, including aerial surveillance, until such time as an equally satisfactory international means of verification is effected. While the quarantine remains in effect, we are hopeful that adequate procedures can be developed for international inspection of Cuba-bound cargoes. The International Committee of the Red Cross, in our view, would be an appropriate agent in this matter.
      The continuation of these measures in air and sea, until the threat to peace posed by these offensive weapons is gone, is in keeping with our pledge to secure their withdrawal or elimination from this hemisphere. It is in keeping with the resolution of the OAS, and it is in keeping with the exchange of letters with Chairman Khrushchev of October 27th and 28th.
      Progress is now being made towards the restoration of peace in the Caribbean, and it is our firm hope and purpose that this progress shall go forward. We will continue to keep the American people informed on this vital matter. — Thank you.

*1960 Lady Chatterley's Lover* acquitted** A landmark obscenity case over Lady Chatterley's Lover, by D.H. Lawrence, ends in the acquittal of Penguin Books. The publisher had been sued for obscenity in publishing an unexpurgated version of Lawrence's novel, which deals with the affair between the wife of a wealthy, paralyzed landowner and his estate's gamekeeper. The book had been published in a limited English-language edition in Florence in 1928 and Paris the following year. An expurgated version was published in England in 1932. In 1959, the full text was published in New York, then in London the following year. Lawrence was born to a poor coal-mining family in Eastwood, Nottinghamshire, in 1885. His mother struggled to teach her children refinement and a love of education. She depended heavily on Lawrence for emotional support and nurturing. He won a scholarship to Nottingham High School, worked as a clerk, and attended University College in Nottingham, where he earned a teaching certificate. His first novel, The White Peacock, was published in 1911. The following year, Lawrence fell in love with Frieda Weekley, the German wife of a fellow teacher. The pair fled to Germany and wed after Frieda divorced her husband. In 1913, Lawrence published his first major novel, Sons and Lovers, an autobiographical novel set in a coal town. The couple returned to England, and Lawrence's next novel, The Rainbow (1915), was banned for indecency. After World War I, Lawrence traveled to Italy, Australia, and Mexico and wrote several more novels, including Women in Love (1921). He died of tuberculosis in France in 1930, at the age of 44. David Herbert Lawrence was born on September 11, 1885 at Eastwood in Nottinghamshire, the son of a coalminer and a woman who had been a teacher. He spend much of his childhood ill and confined to his bed, on one occasion due to contracting tuberculosis. His parents would argue constantly and Lawrence tended to side with his mother, to whom he grew very close. Living in near poverty his mother was determined that he should not become a miner like his father. Instead she encouraged him academically and Lawrence was persuaded to work hard at Nottingham High School until the age of fifteen when he had to seek employment in a surgical goods factory. This period of his life and his friendship with Jessie Chambers is reflected in Sons and Lovers, a novel published in 1913 and its character Miriam. Saving the necessary £20 fee, Lawrence attained a scholarship to University College, Nottingham where he worked to get a teacher's certificate from 1906 onward. At this time he began writing and produced a first novel, The White Peacock (1911) and the follow-up, The Trespasser (1912). However, his teaching career was soon destroyed by the death of his mother which predictably shook him up terribly. He became extremely ill and was encouraged to give up teaching whereupon he wrote and published one of his most famous novels, the autobiographical Sons and Lovers (1913). Initally, though, it was rejected by Heinemann and Lawrence wrote to his friend Edward Garnett, "Curse the blasted, jelly-boned swines, the slimy, the belly-wriggling invertebrates, the miserable sodding rutters, the flaming sods, the sniveling, dribbling, dithering, palsied, pulse-less lot that make up England today. They've got the white of egg in their veins and their spunk is that watery it's a marvel they can breed". In all his rage, he had clearly not foreseen the incredible publishing hurdles to come. His fine letters were edited by Aldous Huxley himself. In 1912 he had eloped to the continent with the German wife of his old Nottingham professor, Frieda Weekley, and he married her in 1914. However, this was by far the worst time for a British subject to marry a German and the Lawrences unsurprisingly despised the First World War and became very unhappy until its end in 1918. The couple moved continually and Lawrence wrote four very personal travel books as a result. The Lawrences were, however, very poor and their relationship was often marred by tempestuous spririts. At least during the war they had stayed put in England, unfit for service, making friends in literary circles such as Huxley, Mansfield and Russell. In 1913 he published Love Poems. The next novel, The Rainbow (1915), began Lawrence's troubles with the censor. His descriptions of sex and usage of swear words left him with his first difficulties with the law. A volume of poems, Look! We Have Come Through! was published in 1917 and two years later he and Frieda left for Italy. With continued difficulties with publishers, Lawrence managed to release Sons and Lovers, the sequel to The Rainbow. Other novels such as Aaron's Rod (1922) appeared with new subject matter and the influence of Nietzsche. A year later his Australian novel, Kangaroo was published along with a critical book about Classic American Literature. Lawrence travelled around the world, in New Mexico producing The Plumed Serpent (1926) along with many short stories and poems. Difficulties and arguments with Frieda continued and after she left for Europe alone he followed her to England. Miserable at the experience they moved to South America again then to England again, Germany and Italy. More trouble was to come with his last novel, Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928), which was initially only printed privately in Florence. It caused a furore when it was pronounced obscene. Only thirty years later did it appear uncensored in the United Kingdom and America. In his dying last years, Frieda took Lawrence to Germany and the South of France looking for cures but he died at Vence, near Nice, on March 2, 1930. It is hard to see in many cases why Lawrence's works caused such an uproar, and are tame compared to much that has come since. His brutal honesty, realism, and often didactic sense of man's potential to experience life with true sensitivity keep his works in the literary canon however. Unusually for an author, except perhaps Thomas Hardy, his poems, short-stories and novels are all almost equally respected and studied. His eight plays have never received much attention at all, however, and three were only published in the 1960s. Lawrence had this to say on the subject: “I always say, my motto is, 'Art for my sake'”. D.H. LAWRENCE ONLINE:
Lady Chatterley's Lover Amores New Poems	Sons and Lovers Sons and Lovers Rex	Women in Love Studies in Classic American Literature co-author of Some Imagist Poets: An Anthology

1956 Hungary appeals for UN assistance against Soviet invasion — El Ejército Soviético reprime la insurrección húngara de octubre e Imre Nagy es detenido.
1956 Israel captures Gaza and Sheham — La Asamblea General de la ONU exige la inmediata retirada de Israel del Sinaí, así como la paralización de los combates francobritánicos contra Egipto.
1955 Los investigadores estadounidenses Carlton-Schwerdt y Schaffer obtienen en forma cristalina el virus que causa la poliomielitis.
1955 Retorno al poder de David Ben Gurión en Israel.
1954 J.S. Thurmond becomes the first US senator elected by write-in vote (SC)

1948 Truman defeats Dewey in US presidential election
      In the greatest upset in presidential history, Democratic incumbent Harry S. Truman defeats his Republican challenger, Governor Thomas E. Dewey of New York, by just over two million popular votes. In the days preceding the vote, political analysts and polls were so behind Dewey that on election night, long before all the votes were counted, the Chicago Tribune published an early edition with the banner headline "DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN."
      Approaching the 1948 presidential election, Harry S. Truman, who had become the 33rd president of the United States on Franklin D. Roosevelt's unexpected death in 1945, seemed to stand a slim chance of retaining the White House. Despite demonstrating effective leadership at the end of World War II, and a sound vision in the confused postwar world, many voters still viewed Truman as an ineffectual shadow of his predecessor. Truman also antagonized southern Democrats with his civil rights initiatives, and it seemed certain that Dewey would take the White House.
      However, in the last weeks before the election, Truman embarked on a "whistle-stop" campaign across the US in defiance of consistent poor showings in the polls. Truman traveled to America's cities and towns, fighting to win over undecided voters by portraying himself as an outsider contending with a "do-nothing" Congress. Truman, a one-time farmer who was elevated to the pinnacle of American politics because of his reputation for honesty and integrity, won the nation's affection.

1948 La junta militar peruana declara fuera de la ley a los partidos Comunista y Aprista.
1947 Firma del Tratado de Río de Janeiro, donde se establece la asistencia recíproca militar entre los estados americanos. El mayor hidroavión del mundo, propiedad de Howard Robard Hughes, realiza los primeros vuelos de prueba.
1947 1947 Howard Hughes pilots his 200-ton flying boat Spruce Goose on its only flight, at Long Beach, California.
1943 The Battle of Empress Augusta Bay in Bougainville ends in US Navy victory over Japan
1942 Montgomery (Br) defeats Rommel (Ger) in battle of Alamein (WW II)
1942 Lieutenant General Dwight D. Eisenhower arrives in Gibraltar to set up an American command post for the invasion of North Africa.
1940 El presidente F. D. Roosevelt, en el transcurso de la Segunda Guerra Mundial , ofrece ayuda a todas las naciones contra los agresores.

1939 Dr. Goebbels prescribes "surgery" for "the Jewish sickness" of Poland
      Hitler's Minister of Propaganda, Josef Goebbels, visits Lodz, Poland. His words about the city's 200'000 Jews foreshadow their bleak fate in the months to come: "It is indescribable," Goebbels writes back to SS headquarters. "They are no longer people, but beasts. There is therefore not a humanitarian, but a surgical task. Here one must make a radical incision. Otherwise Europe will be ruined by the Jewish sickness."
      Within the week, twenty-one Jews—ages 17 to 55—are executed at the Buchenwald concentration camp. A week later, in Lublin, the books from the town's Jewish Religious Academy are taken to the market place and burned. The fire, which destroys the entirety of the greatest Talmudic Library in Poland, lasts twenty-four hours. A week later, a directive issued by Hans Frank in Cracow requires all Polish Jews over the age of ten, male and female, to wear armbands marked with the star of Zion.
      Jews are not the only victims of Germanization. In late November, Albert Foster declares the Germanization of Poles in Bydgoszcz: "I have been appointed by the Führer, as a trustee of the German cause in this country, with the express order to Germanize it afresh. It will therefore be my task to do everything possible to remove every manifestation of Polonism within the next few years, no matter what the kind."
      Intellectuals and soldiers were common targets of this grand plot. Within the month of November, 96 Polish schoolteachers from Rypin were shot in their school building and the nearby woods, 1000 Polish intellectuals were arrested in Warsaw, and 50 Polish officers were led through the streets of Ciechocinek with their hands above their heads and subsequently shot.

1936 1st high-definition TV broadcast service, by BBC in London
1930 Ras Tafari is crowned as Haile Selassie I, 225th emperor of Solmonic Dynasty
1926 In the US, the Air Commerce Act is passed, providing federal aid for airlines and airports.
1926 Se produce la detención, por parte de la policía francesa, de la expedición revolucionaria armada capitaneada por Francesc Macià i Llusa.
1923 US Navy aviator H.J. Brown sets new world speed record of 417 km/h in a Curtiss racer.

1920 El ingeniero, inventor y escritor Leonardo Torres Quevedo ingresa en la Real Academia Española de la Lengua.

1920 Westinghouse begins broadcasting, reporting the presidential election returns.
The company had received its radio broadcast license in October 1920. Westinghouse decided to launch its own station, radio station KDKA in Pittsburgh, after employee Frank Conrad started broadcasting phonograph music and live performances from an amateur transmitter in his garage. The broadcasts became popular after a local department store began advertising radio receivers for as little as $10. Hoping to capitalize on the fledgling market for radio receivers, Westinghouse encouraged Conrad to build a powerful transmitting station at its plant

1920 Warren G Harding elected President — Charlotte Woodward, who signed the 1848 Seneca Falls Declaration calling for female voting rights, casts her ballot in the election.

1917 Déclaration de Balfour
      En pleine guerre mondiale, le ministre britannique des Affaires étrangères, le comte de Balfour, publie une lettre où il indique que son gouvernement est disposé à créer en Palestine un "foyer national juif". Cette lettre ouverte, adressée au baron de Rothschild, a été en fait rédigée en étroite concertation avec ce dernier.
      Le banquier préside aux destinées du "sionisme", un mouvement politique et religieux né au XIXe siècle à l'initiative de différents rabbins. Il prône le retour des juifs à Sion, c'est-à-dire en Palestine, alors possession du sultan d'Istanbul. Certains rabbins assurent que ce retour est un préalable à l'accomplissement des promesses divines et à l'arrivée sur terre du Messie.
      Le sionisme reçoit une impulsion décisive avec l'engagement du journaliste autrichien Theodor Herzl, choqué par la vague d'antisémitisme qui a balayé la France, "pays des droits de l'Homme", au moment de l'affaire Dreyfus. Dans les vingt ans qui précédent la première guerre mondiale, quelques colonies agricoles sont fondées en Palestine avec le concours financier des Rothschild. La population juive passe de 50'000 à 85'000 personnes, soit 12% de la population totale de la province.
Le sionisme dans la guerre de 14-18
      Au début du conflit, les juifs combattent loyalement dans les armées de leur pays respectif. Toutefois, aux Etats-Unis, pays neutre, les juifs ne cachent pas leur sympathie pour les puissances centrales, l'Allemagne et l'Autriche, plus tolérantes que la Russie et même la France.
      A mesure que l'Europe s'enfonce dans la guerre, chaque camp tente de rallier un maximum de soutiens, au prix parfois de tractations secrètes que la morale réprouve. Il en va ainsi du traité de Londres avec l'[[!!bad link!!>>] Italie.
      En 1916, les Français et les Anglais concluent les accords secrets Sykes-Picot, du nom de leurs signataires, en vue de se partager les futures dépouilles de l'empire turc, allié des puissances centrales, notamment la Syrie, la Palestine et l'Irak.
      Dans le même temps, les Britanniques n'ont pas de scrupule à promettre au chérif Hussein qui gouverne La Mecque tous les territoires arabes sous occupation turque,... y compris Palestine et Syrie. Le colonel T.E. Lawrence, animé par son amour de l'Orient arabe, fait son possible pour mettre en oeuvre cette promesse. Il y gagnera le surnom de Lawrence d'Arabie.
      Le summum de l'hypocrisie est atteint avec la déclaration Balfour destinée à rallier les communautés juives en leur promettant de façon vague, non pas un Etat mais un "foyer national juif" en Palestine. Six semaines après, le 9 décembre 1917, le général britannique Robert Allenby entre à Jérusalem sans coup férir. Son armée, venue d'Egypte, compte trois bataillons juifs. C'en est donc fini de cinq siècles de domination musulmane sur la Ville Sainte, arabe puis turque.
      Avec la fin de la guerre, les Alliés ont comme prévu le plus grand mal à réaliser leurs promesses. Fayçal, fils du défunt chérif de La Mecque et compagnon d'armes de T.E. Lawrence, ne voit pas d'inconvénient à une cohabitation avec les colons juifs. Il signe dans ce sens un accord avec le représentant des sionistes, Chaïm Weizmann, le 3 janvier 1919 à Paris. Mais il exige en parallèle que soit reconnue sa souveraineté sur le monde arabe. Ce ne sera pas le cas. La France le chasse de Syrie et il doit se contenter du trône d'Irak, sous la tutelle britannique. Les Arabes commencent dès lors de s'en prendre aux implantations juives. Le conflit ne semble pas près de cesser 80 ans après.
Le texte de la déclaration
      Voici la déclaration d'intentions adressée par le comte Arthur de Balfour, ministre des Affaires étrangères dans le gouvernement de Lloyd George, à lord Rothschild, vice-président du Board of Jewish Deputies:
      Foreign Office
      November 2nd, 1917
Dear Lord Rothschild,
           I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty's Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet.
      "His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."
      I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.
           Yours sincerely,      Arthur James Balfour

1917 Lansing-Ishii Agreement; US recognizes Japan's privileges in China
1916 Las tropas francesas ocupan el fuerte de Verdún tras evacuarlo los alemanes.
1914 Russia declares war on Turkey (not very smart).

1912 XIT Ranch sells its last head of cattle
The XIT Ranch of Texas, once among the largest ranches in the world, sells its last head of cattle. Despite the popular image of the cattle rancher as an independent and self-reliant pioneer, big-city capitalists and stockholders owned many of the most important 19th century ranches. The Chicago capitalists behind the XIT — also known as the Capitol Syndicate Ranch — were trying to get rich by catering to the growing American passion for fresh western beef. They received the land in exchange for financing a state capitol building in Texas. Given the aridity of the region, the Chicago capitalists determined that ranching would be the only profitable use for their new land. They quickly built up a massive but highly efficient cattle-raising operation that stretched over parts of nine Texas counties. At its peak, the XIT had more than 160,000 head of cattle, employed 150 cowboys, and encompassed nearly 3 million acres of the Texas panhandle — an unusually large tract of land even by western standards. As land prices increased in Texas and cattle prices fell, the owners of the XIT realized they could make more money by selling their land. By 1912, the XIT abandoned ranching altogether with the sale of its last herd of cattle. The corporate managers gradually sold the remainder of their property to farmers and smaller ranchers throughout the first half of the 20th century. By 1950, the once-mighty XIT had control of only 20,000 acres.

1912 Battle of Lulé Burgas enters its sixth day, as Bulgarians are close to overcoming stiff Turkish resistance, continuing to subject the Turkish infantry to murderous artillery barrages. The next day the Turks would be in full retreat toward the lines of Tchataldja, the last line of defense before Constantinople 30 km to the south.
1909 Tratado de rectificación de fronteras entre Brasil y Uruguay, favorable a este último.
1907 Joseph Rudyard Kipling es galardonado con el Premio Nobel de Literatura.
1906 León Trotski es condenado a la deportación de por vida a Siberia.
1889 North Dakota becomes 39th & South Dakota becomes the 40th US state
1880 James A Garfield (R) is elected the 20th president of the United States. During the Civil War, Garfield had been a commander at the bloody fight at Chickamauga.
1864 Affair at Hazen's Farm near Devall's Bluff, Arkansas
1862 Mrs. Lincoln writes to her husband Abraham recommending that he "put a fighting general in the place of McClellan."
1861 General John C. Frémont sacked by President Lincoln as commander of the Western Department
1835 2nd Seminole War begins in Osceola
1824 Popular presidential vote 1st recorded; Jackson beats J.Q. Adams
1814 El periódico londinense The Times es el primero en utilizar máquinas en su edición.
1789 During the chaos of the French Revolution, the property of the Church in France was taken over by the state. — Après bref débat, par 508 voix contre 346, l'Assemblée Constituante décrète la mise à disposition de la nation des biens ecclésiastiques. L'État révolutionnaire prendra en charge les fondations pieuses et les salaires des curés. En deux mots, il commence le boulot, mais ne vont pas jusqu'au bout par peur inavoué de l'ailleurs. C'est sur la proposition de l'évêque d'Autun, Talleyrand, que cette loi a été adoptée. L'abbé Maury s'est indigné : “Si nous sommes dépouillés, vous le serez à votre tour.” L'avocat Thouret lui a répliqué que seules les personnes et non les corps constitués ont un droit inaliénable à la propriété.
1783 General George Washington makes his "Farewell Address to the Army" near Princeton, N.J.

1776 First traitor to the American Revolution
During the Revolutionary War, William Demont, an adjutant to American Colonel Robert Magraw, deserts from the Fifth Pennsylvania Battalion and offers the British intelligence information concerning the Patriot defense of New York. Demont, the first traitor to the American cause in the War for Independence, reveals to the British the location of Fort Washington in New York, thus enabling Lieutenant General Wilhelm von Knyphausen to conquer the fort with a force of 3000 Hessians. Three years later, Patriot General Benedict Arnold becomes the most famous American traitor of the war when he offers to betray the garrison at West Point to the British in exchange for ten thousand pounds.

1772 The first Committees of Correspondence are formed in Massachusetts under Samuel Adams.
1769 El explorador español Gaspar de Portolá descubre el Golfo de San Francisco (California).

1721 Peter the Great changes title from czar to emperor of Russia
Peter I, the ruler of Russia, abandons the traditional Russian title of czar in favor of the European-influenced title of emperor. The reign of Peter I, who became sole czar in 1696, was characterized by a series of sweeping military, political, economic, and cultural reforms based on Western European models. Peter the Great, as he became known, led his country into major conflicts with Persia, the Ottoman Empire, and Sweden. Russian victories in these wars greatly expanded Peter's empire and the defeat of Sweden in the Great Northern War won Russia direct access to the Baltic Sea. Here, Peter founded the new Russian capital of St. Petersburg, and Russia was now a major European power — politically, culturally, and geographically. Peter died four years after becoming Russian emperor, and was succeeded by his wife, Catherine I.

1648 12'000 Jews massacred by Chmielnicki hordes in Narol, Podlia
1327 Alfonso IV de Aragón, el Benigno, es proclamado rey a la muerte de su padre Jaime II.
1164 Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Becket, 45, began a six_year self_imposed exile in France. Once a close friend of England's Henry II, Thomas had more recently become an outspoken opponent of the king's royal policies.
0676 Donus begins his reign as Pope.

TO THE TOP

Deaths which occurred on a November 02:
2003 Fifteen US Army soldiers in a Chinook CH-47 helicopter which is shot down near the village Hasai, a few kilometers south of Fallujah, Iraq, by a ground-to-air missile. 21 US soldiers are wounded. They were on their way for leave outside Iraq. The dead are:
— 6 men serving in the 2nd Battalion, 5th Field Artillery Regiment, III Corps Artillery:

Spc. Steven D. Conover, 21, of Wilmington OH.

Sgt. Keelan L. Moss, 23, of Houston TX.

Sgt. Joel Pérez, 25, of Rio Grande, Puerto Rico.

Sgt. Ross A. Pennanen, 36, of Oklahoma.

Staff Sgt. Paul A. Velazquez, 29, of California.

Staff Sgt. Joe N. Wilson, 30, of Michigan.
— A man and a woman serving in the 16th Signal Battalion:

Pfc. Anthony D. Dagostino, 20, of Waterbury CT.

Pfc. Karina S. Lau, 20, of Livingston CA.
— 4 men serving in the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment:

Spc. Darius T. Jennings, 22, of Cordova SC, in its 2nd Squadron.

Sgt. Ernest G. Bucklew, 33, of Enon Valley PA, in its Support Squadron.

Staff Sgt. Daniel A. Bader, 28, of Colorado Springs CO, in its Air Defense Artillery Battery, 1st Squadron.

Spc. Brian H. Penisten, 28, Fort Wayne IN, Air Defense Artillery Battery, 1st Squadron.
— 2 men serving in Company F, 106th Aviation Battalion, Army National Guard:

1st Lt. Brian D. Slavenas, 30, of Genoa IL F Company, 106th Aviation Battalion, Army National Guard.

Chief Warrant Officer Bruce A. Smith, 41, of West Liberty IA, of its Detachment 1
— A woman serving in the 151st Adjutant General Postal Detachment 3:

Spc. Frances M. Vega, 20, of Fort Buchanan, Puerto Rico.

2003 A US soldier of the 1st Armored Division, by a roadside bomb in Baghdad.
2003 Two US civilians working for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, by a roadside bomb in Fallujah, Iraq.
2003 Some 70 persons by drowning and by being hit by rocks and tree logs in a 10-minute 21:30 flash flood in Bohorok, near Medan, Sumatra, Indonesia. The dead include 5 foreigners: a German, an Australian, two Chinese and a Singaporean. The flood, consequence of massive logging in the nearby Leuser National Park, destroyed cheap guesthouses for the tourists who come to visit the Orangutan Reserve in Bohorok.
2003 Sharifbhai, Zakir Allarakha, and Zakir Yusuf; all three of the same Muslim family, shot by Purushottam Jadhav, a former municipal councilor, in Virangam town, 70 km from Ahmedabad {now you know why it isn't named Ahmedagood}, India. A few youths of the Muslim minority community were playing cricket in the Chand Fadi neighborhood of Virangam, the ball entered a place of worship, and a riot ensued. Jadhav, who was passing by, abused the youths who beat him up, and followed him to his home from where he called the police and informed them that a mob was gathering outside his house and throwing stones. He and his friends then fire on the mob. Jadhav, along with 24 others, is arrested. Forty persons, including three teen-aged boys, are injured.
2002 Selden Rodman, born on 19 February 1909, poet, critic, promoter of Haitian and other folk art. author of more than 40 books including Mortal Triumph and Other Poems (1932), New Anthology of Modern Poetry (1938), 1947 Horace Pippin, a Negro Painter in America (1947) Mexican Journal (1958).
2001 Yasser Asira, by a missile fired from an Israeli helicopter, as the Hamas militant, from Tell, West Bank, was en route to a terrorist attack (according to the Israelis).

2001 Mona Fandey, her husband Mohamed Affandi Abdul Rahman, and their helper Juraimi Hussin, hanged.
    They go to the gallows in Malaysia after exhausting all appeals for the murder of Mazlan Idris in 1993. The three were sentenced to death in 1995 after a sensational trial which heard how they approached Mazlan with promises of building his career and fortune, then chopped his body into bits and went on a shopping spree with his money.
      The murder story was among the most bizarre in the country's history. A US-educated lawmaker in Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's United Malays National Organization (UMNO), Mazlan sought supernatural help to climb up the party ladder. Before his killing, he was made to lie on a floor, close his eyes and wait for money to "fall from the sky." He was then beheaded with an axe, skinned and chopped into 18 parts before being buried in a hole and covered over with cement.
      His grisly death led to calls for a ban on witchcraft, which remains a fairly common practice among superstitious Malays. The murder trial also became a media circus because Fandey performed various theatrics in court and wore jazzy outfits and smiled for press photographers. The voodoo woman — said to be a member of royalty, a pop singer and water ballet artiste before turning to witchcraft — testified she had also given talismans and charms to other UMNO politicians to make them more appealing to voters. The court heard she used Mazlan's money for plastic surgery and she also bought a Mercedes Benz. Her husband, in his defense, said Mazlan owed him two million ringgit ($526'000) for a "magic cane," talisman and a traditional hat said to have belonged to former Indonesian president Sukarno.

2001 Epifanio Irizarry Jusino, 86, in his native Ponce, Puerto Rico, impressionist painter.

2000 More die in al-Aqsa intifada
      Threatening an early morning truce agreement, a car bomb kills two Israelis in the afternoon as it exploded near an open-air market that was a favorite target of Islamic groups during previous waves of terrorism. A tremendous boom resounded through downtown Jerusalem as black plumes of smoke curled into the sky. On the narrow one-way street where the explosion took place lay the charred, mangled remains of the car. In an alleyway, sheets draped the two victims, one the daughter of a former cabinet member.
      After two relatively explosion-free years, Israelis hoped that terrorism belonged to the past. But in the last month, the peace effort has been sliding backward into violence.
      In the morning, Israelis and Palestinians agreed to put the brakes on their violent confrontation and steer their societies back toward the path of peace. After a bloody day yesterday, they establish a series of steps to end the conflict. Even after the afternoon's bombing, the two sides reiterate their commitments. Like the broken truce agreements behind them, though, this latest one was immediately tested by events. As agreed, for instance, the Israelis pulled back their tanks this morning from certain junctions between Israeli-controlled and Palestinian- ruled territories in the West Bank and Gaza. Palestinian youths still marched to the Beit El junction near Ramallah, however, and began throwing stones. At first, they lobbed the rocks into a void; there was no longer any Israeli target there. By day's end, though, the Israeli soldiers had returned, and the familiar confrontations resumed. Similarly, despite the cease-fire pact, Palestinian gunmen opened fire once more tonight on Gilo, the southeastern Jerusalem neighborhood, and Israeli troops returned machine-gun fire toward the shooting in the Palestinian town of Beit Jala.
      Even as the day began, a 17-year- old Palestinian was shot dead in a clash in the village of Hizme near Jerusalem. In a phone call, Prime Minister Ehud Barak of Israel extended condolences about the death to Yasir Arafat, the Palestinian leader, his office said. And an 18-year-old Palestinian was shot in the heart after an emotional funeral in Al Khader, near Bethlehem. The death toll from the monthlong conflict rose to 168.
      No one expected immediate results from the overnight decision, considering the patterns of conflict established over many weeks. But the Israeli and Palestinian leaders contributed to the skepticism when they hesitated to deliver simultaneous, joint appeals for calm. The appeals were scheduled for 14:00. Israeli Channel One and Channel Two went live from the Defense Ministry, where Mr. Barak was expected to speak. In her home in Gilo, with her shutters pulled low as an extra layer to guard against bullets, Tami Reuveni sat on her couch and waited. She waited while television reporters filled the time with banter and speculations. She got up, washed a few dishes and then returned to wait some more. At the sound of gunfire, her 10-year-old daughter shouted, "Mom, they're shooting at us again." But Mrs. Reuveni told her not to worry; the shooting sounded as if it was in Bethlehem. "That's it," Mrs. Reuveni said finally, clicking off the doily-covered set at 14:40. "They're not going to bother with making empty promises. There's no chance of peace, no chance for cease-fire even." The appeals were delayed when Mr. Arafat refused to appear before cameras, and Mr. Barak declined to go first. They tentatively decided that they would both go on the radio instead at 16:00.
      But before that, the car, a Mazda packed with 10 kg of explosives, blew up near the Mahane Yehuda Market. The Palestinian Islamic Jihad group claimed responsibility for the attack. "The Jerusalem Brigades, the military arm of the Islamic Jihad movement, affirms that this action came as part of our response to the crimes of the Israeli enemy against our defenseless Palestinian people," the group said in a statement faxed to news organizations. One of those killed was the 28-year- old daughter of Yitzhak Levy, leader of the National Religious Party, which represents the settlers and religious Zionists. Mr. Levy served as housing minister under Mr. Barak until his party quit the government last summer in protest against expected concessions to the Palestinians. He identified the body of his daughter, Ayelet Hashachar.
      The other person killed was Hanan Levy, 33, a lawyer. Yaakov Hasson, a shopkeeper who is also a medic, said he struggled to pull a woman's body, apparently Mrs. Hashachar's, from the flames. Mr. Hasson, whose trousers were stained with blood, said that he realized quickly that the woman was dead, her legs blown off by the blast. Mrs. Hashachar was in the process of moving from a settlement near Ramallah to Jerusalem. Several hundred people attended her funeral late tonight, including a Who's Who of the Israeli right wing, among them Benjamin Netanyahu, the former prime minister, and Ariel Sharon, the Likud Party leader. The rabbis' speeches repeatedly said that she was killed "because she was a Jew." Among the 10 wounded in the bombing were six members of a family from Gilo called Or. They had escaped from their tense neighborhood to their grandmother's home near the market, only to find themselves in the epicenter of a terror attack. "We ran away from Gilo, came to the heart of the city and were hit by an attack here," said Rinat. Or, a young girl who was lightly wounded. "I guess we're going back to Gilo."
      The police presence near the market had been high because of a terror alert. Police investigators suggested that the bombers were heading for the congested center of the market, but took side roads when they saw the officers. Their car got stuck behind a moving van on narrow Shomron Street. They apparently jumped out and fled on foot, detonating the car as they ran. "Somebody wanted to make a big disaster in the center of city," said Yehuda Wilk, the Israeli police commissioner. "They certainly didn't intend to let the bomb explode in a small narrow street." At first, as a crowd began gathering at the site, word traveled that it was the bombers who were killed. " When it became clear that the two killed were Israelis, fury passed through the rapidly growing crowd. A senior Palestinian official, Nabil Shaath, said he had called Mr. Barak's chief of staff, Gilad Sher, to express sorrow over the bombing.
      Mr. Barak suggested in a statement that he held the Palestinian government responsible for the attack since it recently released suspected terrorists from prison and "loosened the reins." But Shimon Peres, the former prime minister, brushed away this accusation as counter-productive. It was Mr. Peres who had traveled to Gaza on Wednesday night to reach the truce agreement with Mr. Arafat. "We don't know who carried out the attack, but we do know that we have to return to negotiations," Mr. Peres said. By late tonight, neither leader had gone on the air to issue a declaration of a cease-fire, as stipulated in their early morning agreement. Mr. Sher, however, said he believed that the Palestinians had made a concerted effort to quiet the streets today, which he did not believe that they had done after the truce agreement reached in Sharm el Sheik, Egypt, two weeks ago.
      The Palestinians released a statement calling on their people "to continue their popular expressions through peaceful means." But the Israelis criticized the statement for not making an explicit call for the violence to stop. The Israeli government released a text of what it said was the joint declaration that Mr. Barak and Mr. Arafat were to have read. It said, in part, "I hereby call all forces and parties to refrain from violence, incitement and the use of force in order to restore peace and calm." Islamic resistance groups, which have been talking with the Palestinian Authority about forming a unity government, denounced the cease- fire agreement this morning. The Hamas organization led a march of thousands in Gaza protesting against a truce and a return to peace talks. A Hamas statement said Palestinians should seek instead "to transform the land under the feet of the occupiers into flames and a volcano."

1984 Margie Velma Barfield, executed for murder.
In North Carolina, Margie Velma Barfield becomes the first woman to be executed in the modern era of the death penalty in the US. Capital punishment, banned in 1972, was reinstated by the Supreme Court in 1976. Women on death row in 1972 had had their death sentences commuted to life, and a woman had not been executed since 1962. The fifty-two-year-old private nurse and former Sunday school teacher was convicted of lacing her fiancée's food with rat poison, and later admitted to poisoning three others, including her mother. In prison, Barfield became known as "Death Row Granny," and considered herself a born-again Christian who had repented for her crimes. Despite opposition to her death sentence by several national and international groups, North Carolina carried out the execution

1975 Pier Paolo Pasolini, director cinematográfico, novelista y poeta, asesinado en Ostia (Italia).
1970 Besicovitch, mathematician

1963 Ngo Dinh Diem and Ngo Dinh Nhu, murdered during coup approved by US.
      South Vietnam's President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu are murdered during a coup by dissident generals of the South Vietnamese army. In the early afternoon hours of November 1, the dissidents seized key military installations and communications systems in Saigon, secured the surrender of Nhu's Special Forces, and demanded the resignation of Diem and Nhu. The president and his brother first believed the attack to be the opening of a countercoup engineered by Nhu and General To That Dinh, who controlled nearly all forces in and around Saigon, but Dinh had joined the insurgent generals. Diem was unable to summon any support, so he and Nhu escaped the palace through an underground passage to a Catholic church in the Chinese sector of the city. From there, Diem began negotiating with the generals by phone. He agreed to surrender and was promised safe conduct, but shortly after midnight he and his brother were brutally murdered in back of the armored personnel carrier sent to pick them up and bring them back to the palace.
      President Kennedy, who was aware that the generals were planning a coup and had sent word that the United States would not interfere, was nonetheless shocked at the murder of Diem and Nhu. Few in South Vietnam shared his surprise, though, as Diem had been very unpopular, particularly with the Buddhists. In fact, many in Saigon rejoiced at his death. The Soviet newspaper Izvestia expressed satisfaction at Diem's end while asserting that, "...new American puppets have come to power." US Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge called the insurgent generals to his office to congratulate them and cabled Kennedy that the prospects for a shorter war had greatly improved with the demise of Diem and Nhu.
      Following the overthrow of his government by South Vietnamese military forces the day before, President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother are captured and killed by a group of soldiers. The death of Diem caused celebration among many people in South Vietnam, but also lead to political chaos in the nation. The United States subsequently became more heavily involved in Vietnam as it tried to stabilize the South Vietnamese government and beat back the communist rebels that were becoming an increasingly powerful threat. While the United States publicly disclaimed any knowledge of or participation in the planning of the coup that overthrew Diem, it was later revealed that American officials met with the generals who organized the plot and gave them encouragement to go through with their plans. Quite simply, Diem was perceived as an impediment to the accomplishment of US goals in Southeast Asia. His increasingly dictatorial rule only succeeded in alienating most of the South Vietnamese people, and his brutal repression of protests led by Buddhist monks during the summer of 1963 convinced many American officials that the time had come for Diem to go. Three weeks later, an assassin shot President Kennedy. By then, the United States was more heavily involved in the South Vietnamese quagmire than ever. Its participation in the overthrow of the Diem regime signaled a growing impatience with South Vietnamese management of the war. From this point on, the United States moved step by step to become more directly and heavily involved in the fight against the communist rebels.

1961 James Grove Thurber, 61, humorist (The Male Animal)

1950 George Bernard Shaw. Shaw was born on 26 July 1856. In his work, Shaw supported socialism and decried the abuses of capitalism, the degradation of women, and the ill effects of poverty, violence, and war. His writing was filled with humor, wit and sparkle, as well as reformist messages. In 1925, Shaw won the Nobel Prize for literature. — MORE SHAW ONLINE:

Man and Superman

Pygmalion

You Never Can Tell

Misalliance

Mrs. Warren's Profession

Major Barbara, with an Essay as First Aid to Critics

The Perfect Wagnerite: A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring

An Unsocial Socialist

1949 Paul Michel Dupuy, French artist born on 22 March 1869
1931 Juan Zorrilla de San Martín, poeta uruguayo.
1927 Rodolphe Wytsman, Belgian artist born on 11 March 1860.
1920 Louise Imogen Guiney, author. GUINEY ONLINE: A Roadside Harp: A Book of Verses, A Roadside Harp: A Book of Verses.
1919 Edgar Stanton Maclay, editor of The Journal of William Maclay, United States Senator from Pennsylvania, 1789-1791
1917 First US soldiers killed in combat in WW I

1916 More casualties as French retake forts Douaumont and Vaux at Verdun.
      During the First World War Verdun was a fortified French garrison town on the River Meuse 200 km east of Paris. In December 1915, General Erich von Falkenhayn, Chief of Staff of the German Army, decided to attack Verdun. Although he admitted he would be unable to break through at these point on the Western Front, he argued that in defending Verdun, the Germans would "bleed the French army white".
      The German attack on Verdun started on 21 February 1916. A million troops, led by Crown Prince Wilhelm, faced only about 200'000 French defenders. The following day the French was forced to retreat to their second line of trenches. By 24 February the French had moved back to the third line and were only 8km from Verdun.
      On 24th February, General Henri-Philippe Pétain was appointed commander of the Verdun sector. He gave orders that no more withdrawals would take place. He arranged for every spare French soldier to this part of the Western Front. Of the 330 infantry regiments of the French Army, 259 eventually fought at Verdun.
      The German advance was brought to a halt at the end of February. On 6 March, the German Fifth Army launched a new attack at Verdun. The Germans advanced 3km before they were stopped in front of the area around Mort Homme Hill. The French held this strategic point until it was finally secured by the Germans on 29 May, and Fort Vaux fell on 7th June, after a long siege.
      Further attacks continued throughout the summer and early autumn. However, the scale of the German attacks were reduced by the need to transfer troops to defend their front-line at the Somme. The French now counter-attacked and General Charles Mangin became a national hero when the forts at Douaumont and Vaux were recaptured by 2 November 1916. Over the next six weeks the French infantry gained another 2 km at Verdun.
      Verdun, the longest battle of the First World War, ended on the 18th December. The French Army lost about 550'000 men at Verdun. It is estimated that the German Army suffered 434'000 casualties. About half of all casualties at Verdun were killed.

1914 Burkhardt, mathematician.
1909 William Powell Frith, Britist artist born on 19 January 1819. — MORE ON FRITH AT ART “4” NOVEMBER with links to images.
1899 Anna Swanwick, translator of Goethe's Egmont, Egmont, Faust.

The second Afghan War begins: Akbar Khan successfully revolts against Shah Shuja in Afghanistan
1841 Alexander Burnes, assassiné, les Anglais chassés de Kaboul.
Les Anglais étaient intervenus en Afghanistan pour renverser l’émir Dost Mohammed, dont ils craignaient qu’il fasse allégeance aux Russes. Après une marche difficile, l’«armée de l’Indus», forte de 16'500 combattants anglais et indiens, avait pris ses quartiers d’hiver à Kaboul: parties de polo, soirées mondaines,... Mais les liaisons entre officiers anglais et femmes indigènes alimentaient le ressentiment des Afghans. Une émeute éclate le 02 novembre 1841. L’officier Alexander Burnes, qui n’est pas le moins indifférent au charme afghan et a imprudemment choisi d’habiter en ville plutôt que dans le cantonnement militaire, est assassiné.
Craignant un soulèvement général, le commandant de l’expédition ordonne un repli immédiat sur Jalalabad, à une semaine de marche. Mais l’hiver s’est installé en force et les cols sont enneigés. Dès le premier jour, les pillards afghans dépouillent l’armée de ses bagages. Plus de couvertures ni de tentes. L’hiver ajoute ses morsures aux attaques des francs-tireurs. C’est très vite la débandade. Les soldats de la reine Victoria sont massacrés ou réduits en esclavage. Un seul homme, le chirurgien Brydon, arrive à Jalalabad. Atteinte dans son prestige par la plus grave défaite de son histoire coloniale, la Grande-Bretagne organisera sans tarder une expédition punitive. Celle-ci se contentera de détruire le fastueux Bazar couvert de Kaboul et d’imposer un vague traité d’allégeance aux Afghans, avant de se retirer. Jusqu’à la fin du XXe siècle, l'Afghanistan restera fidèle à sa vocation d’Etat-tampon entre les impérialismes russe et anglo-saxon.

1803 Charles Leclerc, of yellow fever at Cap Français, Saint-Domingue, French general, brother-in-law of Napoléon, who attempted to suppress the Haitian revolt led by the former slave Toussaint-Louverture, whom he captured by treachery after having made peace with him..
1781 El Padre Isla, escritor jesuita español.
1753 Candido Vitali (or Vitale), Italian artist born in 1680.
1739 Charles Jervas, Irish artist born in 1675.
1705 il cavaliere Daniel Seiter (or Soiter, Syder), Italian artist born in 1647, 1648, or 1649.
1661 Daniel Seghers (or Zeghers), le Jésuite d'Anvers, Flemish painter born on 05 December 1590. — MORE ON SEGHERS AT ART “4” NOVEMBER with links to images.
1624 Cornelis van der Voort (or Voorde, Voerst), Flemish artist born in 1576.
1600 Richard Hooker, author. HOOKER ONLINE: A Learned Discourse of Justification, Works, and how the Foundation of Faith is Overthrown
1570 More than 1000 people as a tidal wave in the North Sea destroys the sea walls from Holland to Jutland..

Births which occurred on a November 02:
1942 Shirley Gregory ("Shere Hite") St Joseph Missouri, sex therapist, author of The Hite Report, Women and Love, Sexual Honesty: By Women for Women, A Nationwide Study of Female Sexuality
1939 Richard Serra, escultor estadounidense.
1938 Patrick Buchanan, US conservative political columnist, minor party presidential candidate 1996, 2000
1932 Melvin Schwartz, who would win the 1988 Nobel Physics Prize, jointly with Lederman and Steinberger “for the neutrino beam method and the demonstration of the doublet structure of the leptons through the discovery of the muon neutrino”. — MORE
1932 Henri Namphy Cap Haitien Haiti, President of Haiti (1986- )
1929 Richard Taylor, Canadian, he would share the 1990 Nobel Physics Prize with Jerome I. Friedman (born 28 Mar 1930) and Henry W. Kendall (09 Dec 1926 – 15 Feb 1999) "for their pioneering investigations concerning deep inelastic scattering of electrons on protons and bound neutrons, which have been of essential importance for the development of the quark model in particle physics" . — MORE
1925 Modest Cuixart, pintor español.
1919 Jorge de Sena, poeta, dramaturgo y narrador portugués.
1911 Odysseus Alepoudhelis “Odysseus Elytis”, Greek who would win the 1979 Nobel Literature Prize “for his poetry, which, against the background of Greek tradition, depicts with sensuous strength and intellectual clear-sightedness modern man's struggle for freedom and creativeness.” — MORE
1871 Heegaard, mathematician.
1871 Santiago Argüello, poeta y abogado nicaragüense.
1865 Warren Gamaliel Harding , near Corsica, Ohio (on the 70th birthday of US President Polk). He would become the 29th President of the US (R, 1921-23) (First US president to speak on radio)
1847 George Sorel French Socialist thinker, writer (violent revolutions)
1837 Emile Antoine Bayard, French artist who died in 1891.
1826 Smith, mathematician.

1815 George Boole, mathematician.
At sixteen, the self-taught Boole began teaching to support his family. In his free time, he studied mathematics extensively, and at age twenty-four, he began submitting mathematical papers to prominent journals. His work in the symbolic representation of logic (Boolean algebra) would prove critical to the developments of digital computer circuits, computer programming, telephone switching, and other modern technologies. Despite his lack of formal education, Boole was appointed professor of mathematics at Queen's College in County Cork, Ireland, and later became a fellow of the Royal Society.

1808 Jules-Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly
1804 Rafael Valentín Valdivieso Zañartu, arzobispo chileno.
1795 James Knox Polk, in Mecklenburg County, NC, 11th President of the US (D) (1845-1849) (Speaker of the House of Representatives, US Congress)
1755 Marie-Antoinette, à Vienne (Autriche), fille de l'Impératrice Marie-Thérèse et de l'Empereur d'Autriche François Ier. Elle épouse en 1770 le futur Louis XVI. Frivole, dépensière, elle est très vite impopulaire et devient le symbole de tous les abus de l'Ancien Régime. Elle sera condamnée à mort par le Tribunal Révolutionnaire en octobre 1793. — Queen of France, who never said: "Qu'ils mangent de la brioche.", but lost her head anyhow.
1734 Daniel Boone (frontiersman, explorer; captured and adopted by Shawnee Indians as Big Turtle; captured by British) (US Hall of Fame-1915)

1721 (22 October Julian) The Russian Empire
Peter is acclaimed Father of the Fatherland, Peter the Great, and emperor of all the Russia’s, by the Russian Senate, in gratitude for victory in the Great Northern War, in which in 1700, Peter attacked Sweden, with Poland and Denmark as allies. The war lasted until 1721 when the Treaty of Nystad gave Russia the prized Swedish provinces on the eastern shores of the Baltic Sea. Sweden became a second-rate military power, and Poland was reduced to a pawn of its more powerful neighbors, Russia and Prussia.

1699 Jean-Baptiste Siméon Chardin, French painter specialized in still life. He died on 06 December 1779. — MORE ON CHARDIN AT ART “4” NOVEMBER with links to images.
1649 Jean-Baptiste Corneille, French painter and engraver who died on 12 April 1695. — link to an image.
1470 King Edward V of England (1483); deposed, murdered? by Richard III

1439 Naissance de l'impôt permanent en France.
      Au Moyen Âge, le roi se contentait du revenu de ses domaines. Lorsqu'il devait partir en guerre et ne pouvait se suffire des armées de ses vassaux, il recrutait des mercenaires. Pour les payer, le roi devait convoquer les Etats généraux et il leur demandait le droit de lever une aide exceptionnelle pour la "taille des lances" chaque fois qu'il en avait besoin.
      Les Etats généraux représentaient l'ensemble des sujets, avec des délégués des trois ordres de la société médiévale: clergé, noblesse et tiers état (le tiers état était formé de tous les sujets dépourvus de privilèges; ses délégués appartenaient à la bourgeoisie des villes).
      Après les victoires de Jeanne d'Arc, le roi Charles VII est disposé à bouter les Anglais hors du royaume et à en finir avec la guerre de Cent Ans. Mais il a besoin pour cela de beaucoup d'argent. Les délégués des Etats généraux se lassent de se réunir tous les ans pour renouveler l'autorisation de lever l'impôt.
      A Orléans, le 2 novembre 1439, ils accordent au roi la permission de renouveler la "taille" d'année en année. Le roi publie alors une ordonnance pour prélever annuellement la taille dans le pays. Cette mesure va donner à Charles VII le moyen d'entretenir une armée régulière.
La taille
      Le montant global de la taille est fixé par le Conseil du roi et réparti entre les provinces et les paroisses. Les instances de ces circonscriptions la répartissent ensuite entre les familles.. Tous les non-combattants sont normalement astreints à la taille en échange d'une exemption du service militaire. Le clergé en est quant à lui dispensé car il lui est interdit de verser le sang pour des motifs religieux.
      Les combattants professionnels, c'est-à-dire les nobles, en sont aussi dispensés... Trois siècles plus tard, quand les nobles auront renoncé pour la plupart au service des armes, cette dispense de l'impôt apparaîtra à beaucoup injustifiée.
      A la fin de l'Ancien Régime, la taille devient le symbole de l'injustice fiscale (on plaindra alors les paysans "taillables et corvéables à merci").
      Dans les pays d'élection (les plus anciennes provinces du royaume), la taille est répartie de façon très arbitraire entre les familles d'après les signes apparents de richesse.
      Dans les pays d'état (les provinces les plus récentes qui ont conservé leurs Etats provinciaux: Bretagne, Béarn, Dauphiné, Provence, Languedoc), la taille est répartie de façon plus équitable d'après la richesse réelle. Les nobles eux-mêmes paient la taille pour les terres roturières qui ne relèvent pas de leur fief

Holidays Israel : Balfour Declaration Day (1917) / Mexico/Portugal : Dia de Muertos/Day of the Dead / North & South Dakota : Admission Day (1889) / Venezuela : Memorial Day

Religious Observances Ang, RC : All Souls' Day-All Faithful Departed / Christian : St Marcian / Conmemoración de los Fieles Difuntos; Santos: Jorge y Justo.

Thoughts for the day : “Fortune truly helps those who are of good judgment.”
“Good judgment truly helps those who have inherited a fortune.”
“Fortunately truth helps those who are judged good.”

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updated Wednesday 05-Nov-2003 0:38 UT

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