June 18 – Some important events on this day.
618 👉🏼 Coronation of the Chinese governor Li Yuan as Emperor Gaozu of Tang, the new Emperor of China, initiating three centuries of the Tang Dynasty’s rule over China
1155 👉🏼 Pope Adrian IV crowns Frederick I Barbarossa Roman-German Emperor
1583 👉🏼 Richard Martin of London takes out first life insurance policy, on William Gibbons; premium was £383
1682 👉🏼 William Penn founds Philadelphia, US.
He was an early Quaker and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, the English North American colony and the future Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. He was an early champion of democracy and religious freedom, notable for his good relations and successful treaties with the Lenape Indians. Under his direction, the city of Philadelphia was planned and developed.
1812 👉🏼 War of 1812 begins as US declares war against Britain.
1815 👉🏼 Battle of Waterloo: Napoleon and France defeated by British forces under Wellington and Prussian troops under Blucher.
Probably you may recognize ‘Waterloo’ as the catchy 1974 tune from the Swedish pop group ABBA, where they give you a basic rundown of one of the most significant battles in history: “My My, at Waterloo, Napoleon did surrender!”
Yes, he did. After more than a decade of dominating the European continent, the French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte had been defeated at Leipzig in 1813 and was later exiled to the island of Elba. This triumphant arrangement did not last long: Napoleon quickly escaped, starting what was known as the Hundred Days, where he assumed control of France once more. Hearing the news, his adversaries rushed together an army and went to confront him at the town of Waterloo in Belgium.
The coalition armies, controlled by the Duke of Wellington for the British and Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher for the Prussians, crushed Napoleon in the battle. When he returned to Paris, the country had turned against him, and so he abdicated for a second and final time, decisively ending the Napoleonic era. He was later exiled to the island of St. Helena in the Atlantic, where he died (having possibly been murdered) in 1821.
1892 👉🏼 Macadamia nuts 1st planted in Hawaii
1928 👉🏼 American aviator Amelia Earhart becomes the 1st woman to fly across the Atlantic Ocean landing at Burry Port, Wales
1940 👉🏼 Winston Churchill’s “this was their finest hour” speech urging perseverance during Battle of Britain delivered to British House of Commons
1940 👉🏼Hitler and Mussolini meet in Munich
1948 👉🏼 UN Commission on Human Rights adopts the International Declaration of Human Rights
1959 👉🏼 Governor of Louisiana Earl K. Long is committed to a state mental hospital; he responds by having the hospital’s director fired and replaced with a crony who proceeds to proclaim him perfectly sane