30 The Crucifixion [the first Friday following the first day of Passover on a Thursday]

1002 Battle of "Hocktide": Saxon women defeat Danish raiders

1097 Norman-Italian Crusaders under Bohemund & Tancred reach Constantinople

1241 Battle of Liegnitz/Wahlstadt: Mongol armies defeat the Poles & Germans

1260 Battle of Montaperti: The Sienese Ghibellines defeat the Florentine Guelfs'

1388 Battle of Naefels: The Swiss defeat the Hapsburgs

1454 Peace of Lodi: ends Milanese-Venetian war

1534 Turkish corsair Khair Ed-Din -- "Barbarossa", captures Sperlonga, Italy

1621 Expiration of the Twelve Years' Truce between Spain and the Netherlands

1770 Capt James Cook discovers Botany Bay, Australia

1783 Tippu Sultan expels the English from Bednore, India

1848 Battle of Sorio: The Austrians defeat Venetian Insurgents

1848 Battle of the Ponte di Goito: Piedmontese defeat the Austrians

1864 Battle of Pleasant Hill, La

1865 Appomattox: Robert E Lee & the Army of Northern Virginia pack it in.

1865 Union troops capture Ft Blakely, Alabama

1898 Lt Andrew S. Rowan leaves for Cuba with "a message for Garcia."

1913 Ebbet's Field opens in Brooklyn

1914 Tampico Incident: US sailors arrested in Mexico

1917 After a massive mine explosion, Canadian troops storm Vimy Ridge, initiating the Battle of Arras

1918 Latvia proclaims independence from Russia

1940 Germany invades Denmark, which promptly surrenders

1940 Germany invades Norway

1942 Bataan: c. 75,000 U.S. & Filipino troops surrender to the Japanese

1942 The Japanese First Air Fleet raids waters around Ceylon, sinking 12 merchant ships & HM CV 'Hermes'

1942 Manila Bay: U.S. troops hold out on Corregidor and Ft. Drum

1942 RAdm William F. Halsey, sails from Pearl Harbor in 'Enterprise' (CV-6)

1943 Japanese DD 'Isonami' sunk southeast of Celebes by USS 'Tautog" (SS-199)

1944 Japanese encircle Imphal, in northeastern India

1944 Japan offers to mediate peace between Germany and Russia.

1945 Philippines: U.S. forces land on Jolo in the Sulu Sea

1945 RAF sinks Pocket Battleship 'Admiral Scheer' in port

1959 NASA names seven astronauts for Project Mercury

1963 Congress declares Winston S. Churchill an honorary U.S. citizen

1981 USS 'George Washington' (SSBN-598) rams Japanese freighter 'Nisso Maru'

1991 Georgia votes to secede from the USSR

2003 Brooklynite CPL Edward Chin, USMC, plants the US and Free Iraq flags on the statue of Sadam Hussein in Firdos Square, Baghdad, which is then pulled down