March 16 – Some Important Events on this day
597 BC 👉🏼 Babylonians capture Jerusalem, replace Jehoiachin with Zedekiah as king
1527 👉🏼 Battle of Khanua: Mughal Emperor Babur defeats Rajput forces led by Rana Sanga consolidating Mughal power
1660 👉🏼 English Long Parliament disbands
1792 👉🏼 King gustav III of Sweden is shot by Count Jacob Johan Anckarström at a masked ball at the Opera.
By this year, King Gustav III of Sweden had amassed an enormous amount of personal power, displacing the old constitutional monarchy and forming an absolutist system based on the principles of the Enlightenment.
Among many liberal reforms he had made (while also cracking down on dissent) was to curtail the powers of the Swedish nobility. Ever since he had essentially seized power in a coup against the Swedish parliament in 1772, the nobles had decided to oppose him, eventually conspiring to murder him.
Thus, the assassination took place during a masquerade ball at the Swedish Royal Opera. A Swedish count by the name of Jacob Johan Anckarström shot the King in the back as he entered the ball wearing his costume. Gustav did not die immediately however, but thirteen days later when he died of septicemia on 29 March 1792.
1818 👉🏼 Second Battle of Cancha Rayada – Spanish forces defeat Chileans under José de San Martín, Argentine general and a key leader of South America’s successful struggle for independence from the Spanish Empire that led to independence in Argentina, Chile and Peru. 🇦🇷 🇨🇱 🇵🇪
1834 👉🏼 Charles Darwin, aboard HMS Beagle, anchors in the recently British-acquired Falklands Islands for the first time.
1867 👉🏼 First publication of an article by Joseph Lister outlining the discovery of antiseptic surgery, in “The Lancet”
1869 👉🏼 Hiram R. Revels makes 1st official speech by an African American in the Senate. He was the first person of color to serve in the United States Senate, and in the whole U.S. Congress. 🇺🇸
1900 👉🏼 Sir Arthur Evans rediscovers the bronze age city of Knossos in Crete, home of the legendary Minotaur
1924 👉🏼 The free port of Fiume is formally annexed by Mussolini’s fascist regime.
1935 👉🏼 Adolf Hitler orders German re-armament in violation of The Treaty of Versailles
1968 👉🏼 General Motors produces its 100 millionth automobile, the Oldsmobile Toronado 🚘
1978 👉🏼 Red Brigade kidnaps former premier Aldo Moro in Italy, 5 killed. Aldo Moro was one of Italy’s longest-serving post-war Prime Ministers, holding power for a combined total of more than six years.