20th May

The Battle of Crete, codenamed Operation Mercury, was a major Axis airborne and amphibious operation during World War II to capture the island of Crete. It began on the morning of 20 May 1941, with…

The Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence is a text published in 1819 with the now disputed claim that it was the first declaration of independence made in the Thirteen Colonies during the American…

Chiang Kai-shek was a Chinese military commander, revolutionary, and statesman who was the President of the Republic of China from 1948 to 1975 and the head of the Nationalist government from 1925 to…

The Law of 20 May 1802 was a decree passed by First Consul Napoleon of the French First Republic on 20 May 1802 that reinstated slavery. It decreed the reinstatement and continuation of slavery in…

Magdeburg is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. The city is on the Elbe river. The city was mentioned for the first time in a documentary record as "Magadoburg"…

The Popular Movement of the Revolution was the ruling political party in Zaire. For most of its existence, it was the only legally permitted party in the country. It was founded by Joseph-Désiré…

The Holocaust, known in Hebrew as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered around six million…

Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country in the Caribbean. It comprises the eponymous main island as well as 4,195 islands, islets, and cays. Situated at the convergence of the…

The discovery of cosmic microwave background radiation constitutes a major development in modern physical cosmology. In 1964, American physicist Arno Allan Penzias and radio-astronomer Robert Woodrow…

Operation Redwing was a United States series of 17 nuclear test detonations from May to July 1956. They were conducted at Bikini and Enewetak atolls by Joint Task Force 7 (JTF7). The entire operation…

The Battle of Ware Bottom Church was fought on May 20, 1864, between Union and Confederate forces during the American Civil War. The Union troops were led by Benjamin Butler, while the Confederates…

Human immunodeficiency viruses (HIVs) are two species of Lentivirus that infect humans. Over time, they cause acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in which progressive failure of…

Gero I, sometimes called the Great, was a prominent German noble from the Duchy of Saxony in the East Francia, who held several offices during the reign of king and later emperor…

Flavio Costantini was an Italian painter and illustrator. Costantini created portraits of writers and artists for newspapers, and illustrated several novels. His early works were…

Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de La Fayette, known in the United States as Lafayette, was a French military officer and politician who volunteered to join…

Thomas Boston was a Scottish Presbyterian church leader, theologian and philosopher. Boston was successively schoolmaster at Glencairn, and minister of Simprin in Berwickshire,…

Isabella Markham, was an English courtier, a Gentlewoman of the Privy Chamber of Queen Elizabeth I of England and a personal favourite of the queen. Isabella Markham was muse to…