Today in History, August 15th
On August 15, 1947, India won independence from Britain. Plus the Panama Canal's opening, Woodstock and the fall of Kabul.
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August 15 is best known for 1947, when India became independent and British rule on the subcontinent came to an end. The date also saw the Panama Canal open to traffic in 1914 and the Woodstock festival begin in 1969.
The big story: India wins independence (1947)
At the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947, the Indian Independence Act took effect, and roughly two centuries of British rule were over. The law created two new countries out of the old empire: India, with a Hindu majority, and Pakistan, with a Muslim one. Pakistan marks its independence on August 14; India celebrates on the 15th. Jawaharlal Nehru became the first prime minister of independent India, a post he held until 1964. Freedom came with a heavy price. The province of Punjab was cut in two, and in the first days of independence hundreds were killed there. The wider upheaval of partition cost hundreds of thousands of lives. Mahatma Gandhi, whose decades of nonviolent protest had helped force the British out, spent his final months trying to calm the bloodshed between Hindus and Muslims. He was assassinated in January 1948. Even so, he had praised the British withdrawal as the “noblest act of the British nation.”
More events on August 15
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1057 | Macbeth, king of Scots, was killed in battle near Lumphanan by Malcolm, the future Malcolm III. The real Macbeth had beaten Duncan in battle, not murdered him in bed as Shakespeare told it. |
| 1534 | Ignatius of Loyola and a handful of companions, including Francis Xavier, took vows of poverty, chastity and obedience at Montmartre in Paris. The group became the core of the Jesuits. |
| 1899 | Henry Ford quit his job as chief engineer at the Edison Illuminating Company in Detroit to build automobiles full time. |
| 1914 | The Panama Canal opened to traffic when the U.S. cargo and passenger ship Ancon made the passage between the Atlantic and Pacific. |
| 1945 | Emperor Hirohito told the Japanese people by radio that Japan had accepted the Allies’ surrender terms. The broadcast broke the long tradition of imperial silence. |
| 1969 | The Woodstock festival opened on Max Yasgur’s dairy farm in Bethel, New York. Crowds were so large that organizers gave up on tickets and let people in free. |
| 1977 | Ohio State University’s Big Ear radio telescope picked up the “Wow!” signal, a 72-second burst that has never been detected again or fully explained. |
| 1979 | Francis Ford Coppola’s Vietnam War film Apocalypse Now opened in U.S. theaters after a famously troubled production. |
| 1998 | A car bomb planted by the Real IRA exploded in Omagh, Northern Ireland, killing 29 people. |
| 2021 | Taliban forces entered Kabul and took power as the Afghan government collapsed and President Ashraf Ghani fled, two weeks before the U.S. withdrawal deadline. |
Born on August 15
- 1769: Napoleon Bonaparte, later emperor of the French, born in Ajaccio, Corsica.
- 1879: Ethel Barrymore, stage and film actress called the “first lady” of the American theater, born in Philadelphia.
- 1912: Julia Child, cook, author and host of The French Chef, born in Pasadena, California.
- 1938: Stephen Breyer, U.S. Supreme Court justice from 1994 to 2022, born in San Francisco.
Sources
- India and Pakistan win independence, History.com
- Jawaharlal Nehru, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- On This Day: August 15, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- This Day in History: August 15, History.com
- Macbeth, king of Scots, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- St. Ignatius of Loyola, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- The Woodstock festival opens in Bethel, New York, History.com
- The mysterious “Wow!” signal is detected, History.com
- Hirohito, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Julia Child, Encyclopaedia Britannica
