Today in History, November 11th
On November 11, 1918, the armistice ending World War I's fighting took effect at 11 a.m. Plus Washington statehood and the Unknown Soldier.
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November 11 is best known for the 1918 armistice that ended the fighting of World War I, which is why the date became Armistice Day and later Veterans Day in the United States. It is also the date Washington became the 42nd state in 1889 and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was dedicated at Arlington in 1921.
The big story: The Guns Fall Silent on the Western Front (1918)
Before dawn on November 11, 1918, German delegates met the Allies in a railroad car parked in the forest near Compiègne, France. Around 5 a.m. they signed an armistice. The fighting was set to stop at 11 a.m., the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, which gave the moment its tidy, haunting name. By then the war had killed about 9 million soldiers and left around 21 million wounded, with millions of civilians dead as well. An armistice is a ceasefire, not a peace deal, and the formal end came with the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. Its harsh terms for Germany helped set up the next war. In the United States, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the first Armistice Day in 1919. Congress made it a legal holiday in 1938 and, in 1954, renamed it Veterans Day to honor those who served in all American wars.
More events on November 11
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1620 | Anchored off Cape Cod, 41 Mayflower passengers signed the Mayflower Compact, a pact to form their own civil government, before going ashore (Old Style date; November 21 on the modern calendar). |
| 1831 | Nat Turner, who led a revolt of enslaved people in Southampton County, Virginia, that August, was hanged in Jerusalem, Virginia. |
| 1889 | President Benjamin Harrison admitted Washington as the 42nd state. |
| 1921 | The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was dedicated at Arlington National Cemetery, with President Warren G. Harding giving the main address. |
| 1965 | Prime Minister Ian Smith declared Southern Rhodesia independent from Britain without British consent. Britain answered with sanctions, and the country later became Zimbabwe. |
| 1975 | Angola became independent from Portugal. |
| 2000 | A fire on a funicular train in a tunnel above Kaprun, Austria, killed at least 155 people, most of them skiers. |
| 2004 | Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat died at a military hospital near Paris. |
Born on November 11
- 1744: Abigail Adams, letter writer, adviser to John Adams and First Lady (Old Style date; November 22 on the modern calendar).
- 1821: Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Russian novelist who wrote Crime and Punishment.
- 1885: George S. Patton, U.S. Army general in World War II.
- 1922: Kurt Vonnegut, novelist who wrote Slaughterhouse-Five.
Keep reading
Sources
- World War I Ends, History.com
- History of Veterans Day, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
- The Armistice of 1918, Armistice Museum (Compiègne)
- Mayflower Compact, Britannica
- Nat Turner Executed in Virginia, History.com
- Washington Becomes the 42nd State, HistoryLink
- The Centennial of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, U.S. Army
- Southern Rhodesia’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI), The National Archives (UK)
- Angola Celebrates 50 Years of Independence, United Nations
- Kaprun Gletscherbahn Fire, Europe for Visitors
- Yasser Arafat dies, News24
- Abigail Adams, Britannica
- Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Britannica
- George S. Patton, Britannica
- About Kurt Vonnegut, Kurt Vonnegut official site
wow! I wonder why they were so admanent (to go to court no less) to prevent a recount on elections? sounds like rotten fish to me. truth is not afraid of the light only lies are. did they say why the soldier refused to do those operations? was it on moral grounds? all this stuff is really intersting,
A recount would have cost Bush the election.(If the recount was in Gore’s favor.) If Florida had been overturned, Bush would not have had enough electoral college votes to win. This was a huge deal because Gore won the popular vote. I wrote an article about this the other day, if you want to check it out.
https://hankeringforhistory.com/2012/11/07/when-a-president-wins-the-electoral-college-but-not-the-popular-vote/