Scott Allsop's Blog, page 49

24th December 1818: ‘Stille Nacht’, known in English as Silent Night, performed for the first time

‘Silent Night’ is based on a six-stanza poem written by Joseph Mohr, a young priest who arrived at the Nikolauskirche in the small Austrian town of Oberndorf bei Salzburg the previous ...

23rd December 1688: James II of England flees to exile in France during the Glorious Revolution

Facing the inevitability of conflict amidst diminishing support following the invasion by William of Orange, James II made the decision to flee to France where he found refuge under the protection of his cousin, Louis ...

22nd December 1882: The first use of electric lights on a Christmas tree

80 red, white, and blue walnut-sized glass light bulbs were hand-wired and placed around a large Christmas tree in the home of Edward H. Johnson's New York home on Fifth ...

21st December 1825: The Fredonian Rebellion begins when American settlers in Mexican Texas declare their independence

Haden Edwards, believing that the Mexican government had unjustly annulled his an empresario contract to establish a colony in East Texas, led a group of settlers to declare the independent Republic of ...

20th December 1860: South Carolina becomes the first state to secede from the United States of America

Other states soon followed South Carolina’s lead, setting the stage for the American Civil ...

19th December 1918: Ripley’s ‘Believe it or Not!’ published for the first time in the New York Globe

It has since been adapted into numerous formats and is still printed in more than 40 ...

18th December 1916: End of the Battle of Verdun during the First World War

German forces under the command of Crown Prince Wilhelm had begun the Battle of Verdun with the objective of "bleeding France white" by forcing the French army into a protracted, resource-draining defence of the historic fortress of ...

17th December 1969: Project Blue Book, the United States Air Force’s systematic study of UFOs, officially terminated

Project Blue Book began in 1952 to systematically assess and analyse reports of UFOs, and accumulated data from 12,618 ...

16th December 1944: The Battle of the Bulge begins on the Western Front of the Second World War

The Ardennes Counteroffensive marked a desperate attempt by the Nazis to turn the tide of the war in their favour and was conceived by Hitler ...

15th December 1791: United States Bill of Rights becomes law after ratification by the Virginia General Assembly

The significance of the Bill of Rights lies not only in its immediate impact on the legal framework of the United States but also in its enduring ...