Historical Events on Saturday, 17th January

17/01/2026

Indonesia Air Transport ATR 42 crashed near Mount Bulusaraung in South Sulawesi, after losing contact en route to Makassar.

On 17 January 2026, an ATR 42 operated by Indonesia Air Transport crashed while flying from Adisutjipto Airport to Sultan Hasanuddin International Airport in Indonesia. Air traffic control reportedly lost contact with the flight in the South Sulawesi area, and the aircraft was ultimately found to have crashed in the Bulusaraung mountain area. All ten people on board were killed. Burning wreckage was found in a remote area.

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17/01/2023

An avalanche strikes Nyingchi, Tibet, killing 28 people.

An avalanche struck a road in Nyingchi at around 7:50 PM China Standard Time on 17 January 2023. Twenty-eight people were killed and 53 others were rescued, five of whom were seriously injured.

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17/01/2017

The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 is announced to be suspended.

The disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 on 8 March 2014 led to a multinational search effort in Southeast Asia and the southern Indian Ocean that became the most expensive search in aviation history.

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17/01/2016

President Barack Obama announces the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, an agreement intended to limit Iran's nuclear program.

Barack Hussein Obama II is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president. Obama previously served as a U.S. senator representing Illinois from 2005 to 2008 and as an Illinois state senator from 1997 to 2004.

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17/01/2013

Former cyclist Lance Armstrong confesses to his doping in an airing of Oprah's Next Chapter.

Lance Edward Armstrong is an American former professional road racing cyclist. He achieved international fame for winning the Tour de France a record seven consecutive times from 1999 to 2005, but was stripped of his titles in 2012 after an investigation into doping allegations found that Armstrong used performance-enhancing drugs over his career. Armstrong is banned from all sanctioned bicycling events.

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Shahzad Luqman is murdered by members of Golden Dawn in Petralona, Athens, leading the creation of new measures to combat race-based attacks in Greece.

Shehzad Luqman was a 27-year-old man of Pakistani origin who was murdered by members of Golden Dawn in the early hours of 17 January 2013 in Petralona, Athens.

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17/01/2010

Rioting begins between Muslim and Christian groups in Jos, Nigeria, results in at least 200 deaths.

Clashes took place in 2010 between Muslim and Christian ethnic groups in central Nigeria in and near the city of Jos. The first spate of violence of 2010 started on 17 January in Jos and spread to surrounding communities. Houses, churches, mosques and vehicles were set ablaze, during at least four days of fighting. At least 326 people, and possibly more than a thousand, were killed.

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17/01/2008

British Airways Flight 38 crashes short of the runway at Heathrow Airport, injuring 47.

British Airways Flight 38 was a scheduled international passenger flight from Beijing Capital International Airport in Beijing, China, to Heathrow Airport in London, United Kingdom, an 8,100-kilometre trip. On 17 January 2008, the Boeing 777-200ER aircraft crash-landed short of runway 27L at Heathrow. Of the 152 people on board, 47 were injured, 1 of them seriously. The aircraft sustained heavy damage and was written off as a result, becoming the first hull loss of a Boeing 777.

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17/01/2007

The Doomsday Clock is set to five minutes to midnight in response to North Korea's nuclear testing.

The Doomsday Clock is a symbol that represents the estimated likelihood of a human-made global catastrophe, in the opinion of the nonprofit organization Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

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17/01/2002

Mount Nyiragongo erupts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, displacing an estimated 400,000 people.

Mount Nyiragongo is an active stratovolcano with an elevation of 3,470 m (11,385 ft) in the Virunga Mountains associated with the Albertine Rift. It is located inside Virunga National Park, in the North Kivu province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, about 12 km (7.5 mi) north of the town of Goma and Lake Kivu and just 9.8 km (6.1mi) west of the border with Rwanda. The main crater is about two kilometres (1 mi) wide and usually contains a lava lake. The crater presently has two distinct cooled lava benches within the crater walls – one at about 3,175 m (10,417 ft) and a lower one at about 2,975 m (9,760 ft).

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17/01/1998

Clinton–Lewinsky scandal: Matt Drudge breaks the story of the Bill Clinton–Monica Lewinsky affair on his Drudge Report website.

A sex scandal involving Bill Clinton, the 42nd president of the United States, and Monica Lewinsky, a White House intern, erupted in 1998. Their sexual relationship began in 1995—when Clinton was 49 years old and Lewinsky was 22 years old—and lasted 18 months, ending in 1997. Clinton ended televised remarks on January 26, 1998, with the later infamous statement: "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky." Further investigation led to charges of perjury and to the impeachment of Clinton in 1998 by the U.S. House of Representatives. He was subsequently acquitted on both impeachment charges, of perjury and obstruction of justice in a 21-day U.S. Senate trial.

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17/01/1997

Cape Canaveral Air Force Station: A Delta II carrying the GPS IIR-1 satellite explodes 13 seconds after launch, dropping 250 tons of burning rocket remains around the launch pad.

Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS) is an installation of the United States Space Force's Space Launch Delta 45, located on Cape Canaveral in Brevard County, Florida.

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17/01/1996

The Czech Republic applies for membership in the European Union.

The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The Czech Republic has a hilly landscape that covers an area of 78,871 square kilometers (30,452 sq mi) with a mostly temperate continental and oceanic climate. The capital and largest city is Prague; other major cities and urban areas include Brno, Ostrava, Plzeň and Liberec.

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17/01/1995

The 6.9 Mw  Great Hanshin earthquake shakes the southern Hyōgo Prefecture with a maximum Shindo of 7, leaving 5,502–6,434 people dead, and 251,301–310,000 displaced.

The Kobe earthquake, also known as the Great Hanshin Earthquake , occurred on January 17, 1995, at 05:46:53 JST in the southern part of Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan, including the region of Hanshin. It measured 6.9 on the moment magnitude scale and had a maximum intensity of 7 on the JMA Seismic Intensity Scale. The tremors lasted for approximately 20 seconds. The focus of the earthquake was located 17 km beneath its epicenter, on the northern end of Awaji Island, 20 km away from the center of the city of Kobe.

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17/01/1994

The 6.7 Mw  Northridge earthquake shakes the Greater Los Angeles Area with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent), leaving 57 people dead and more than 8,700 injured.

The 1994 Northridge earthquake affected Greater Los Angeles, California, United States, on January 17, 1994, at 04:30:55 PST. The epicenter of the moment magnitude 6.7 blind thrust earthquake was beneath the San Fernando Valley. The shock lasted approximately 8 seconds and achieved a peak ground acceleration of over 1.7 g. It is the largest recorded earthquake in the area's history, slightly surpassing the Mw 6.6 1971 San Fernando earthquake. Shaking was felt as far away as San Diego, California; Turlock, California; Las Vegas, Nevada; Richfield, Utah; Phoenix, Arizona; and Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico. Sixty people died and more than 9,000 were injured. In addition, property damage was estimated to be $13–50 billion, making it among the costliest natural disasters in U.S. history.

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17/01/1992

During a visit to South Korea, Japanese Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa apologizes for forcing Korean women into sexual slavery during World War II.

The prime minister of Japan is the head of government of Japan. The prime minister chairs the Cabinet of Japan and has the ability to select and dismiss its ministers of state. The prime minister also serves as the commander-in-chief of the Japan Self Defence Forces.

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17/01/1991

Gulf War: Operation Desert Storm begins early in the morning as aircraft strike positions across Iraq, it is also the first major combat sortie for the F-117. LCDR Scott Speicher's F/A-18C Hornet from VFA-81 is shot down by a Mig-25 and is the first American casualty of the War. Iraq fires eight Scud missiles into Israel in an unsuccessful bid to provoke Israeli retaliation.

The Gulf War was an armed conflict between Iraq and a 42-country coalition led by the United States. The coalition's efforts were in two phases: Operation Desert Shield, which marked the military buildup from August 1990 to January 1991; and Operation Desert Storm, from the bombing campaign against Iraq on 17 January until the American-led liberation of Kuwait on 28 February.

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Crown Prince Harald of Norway becomes King Harald V, following the death of his father, King Olav V.

Harald V is King of Norway, reigning since 1991.

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17/01/1989

Patrick Purdy opens fire at an elementary school in Stockton, California, killing five and wounding 31 others.

The Stockton schoolyard shooting occurred at Cleveland Elementary School in Stockton, California, on January 17, 1989. The perpetrator, 24-year-old Patrick Purdy, shot and killed five children and wounded thirty-one others—all but one of them children—before committing suicide approximately three minutes after first opening fire.

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17/01/1981

President of the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos lifts martial law eight years and five months after declaring it.

President of the Philippines is the title of the head of state, head of government and chief executive of the Philippines. The president leads the executive branch of the Philippine government and is the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.

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17/01/1977

Capital punishment in the United States resumes after a ten-year hiatus, as convicted murderer Gary Gilmore is executed by firing squad in Utah.

In the United States, capital punishment is a legal penalty in 27 states, throughout the country at the federal level, and in American Samoa. It is also a legal penalty for some military offenses. Capital punishment has been abolished in the other 23 states and in the federal capital, Washington, D.C. It is constitutionally permitted only for murder, with permissibility for use for crimes against the state not having been legally decided. Although it is a legal penalty in 27 states, only 21 of them have authority to execute death sentences, with the other 6 subject to moratoriums.

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17/01/1969

Black Panther Party members Bunchy Carter and John Huggins are killed during a meeting in Campbell Hall on the campus of UCLA.

The Black Panther Party was an American Marxist–Leninist and black power political and militant organization founded by college students Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton in October 1966 in Oakland, California and active in that area until 1982. Between 1968 and 1971, it was also a nationwide organization with chapters in many major American cities, including San Francisco, New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Philadelphia. Members were active in many prisons and had international chapters in the United Kingdom and Algeria. The party first drew attention for openly carrying firearms in Oakland while monitoring police activity. Its earliest goal was to challenge the excessive force and misconduct of the Oakland Police Department that affected the African American community during the civil rights movement. It advocated for decent housing, community control of education and police, exemption from military service, and free breakfast for children. Party members were involved in many fatal firefights with police.

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17/01/1966

Palomares incident: A B-52 bomber collides with a KC-135 Stratotanker over Spain, killing seven airmen, and dropping three 70-kiloton nuclear bombs near the town of Palomares and another one into the sea.

The Palomares accident occurred on 17 January 1966, when a United States Air Force B-52G bomber collided with a KC-135 tanker during mid-air refueling at 31,000 feet (9,450 m) over the Mediterranean Sea, near the Spanish village of Palomares in Almería province. The collision destroyed the tanker, killing all four crew members, and caused the bomber to break apart, resulting in the deaths of three of its seven crew members. The B-52G was participating in Operation Chrome Dome, a Cold War airborne alert mission involving continuous flights of nuclear-armed bombers.

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17/01/1961

U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivers a televised farewell address to the nation three days before leaving office, in which he warns against the accumulation of power by the "military–industrial complex" as well as the dangers of massive spending, especially deficit spending.

Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th president of the United States, serving from 1953 to 1961. A General of the Army, Eisenhower was the supreme commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force. His successful leadership in Operation Torch (1942–1943) and Operation Overlord was pivotal to the Allied victory in World War II.

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Former Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba is murdered together with former Minister of Youth and Sports of the Republic of the Congo Maurice Mpolo and former Senator from Kasai Province Joseph Okito in circumstances suggesting the support and complicity of the governments of Belgium and the United States.

The Republic of the Congo or First Congolese Republic, formerly the Belgian Congo and now called the Democratic Republic of the Congo, was a state in Central Africa that gained independence in 1960 and continued until a 1965 coup d'état by General Joseph Mobutu.

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17/01/1950

The Great Brink's Robbery: Eleven thieves steal more than $2 million from an armored car company's offices in Boston.

The Great Brink's Robbery was an armed robbery of the Brink's building in the North End of Boston, Massachusetts, on January 17, 1950. The $2.775 million theft consisted of $1,218,211.29 in cash and $1,557,183.83 in checks, money orders, and other securities. It was at the time the largest robbery in the history of the United States and has been called "the crime of the century," and "the perfect crime ". The robbery remained unsolved for nearly six years, until estranged group member Joseph O'Keefe testified only days before the statute of limitations would have expired.

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United Nations Security Council Resolution 79 relating to arms control is adopted.

United Nations Security Council Resolution 79, adopted on January 17, 1950, having received and the text of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 300 concerning the regulation and general reduction of conventional armaments and armed forces, the Council decided to transmit the resolution to the Commission for Conventional Armaments for further study in accordance with the Commission’s plan of work.

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17/01/1948

The Renville Agreement between the Netherlands and Indonesia is ratified.

The Renville Agreement was a United Nations Security Council-brokered political accord between the Netherlands, which was seeking to re-establish its colony in Southeast Asia, and Indonesian Republicans seeking Indonesian independence during the Indonesian National Revolution. Ratified on 17 January 1948, the agreement was an unsuccessful attempt to resolve the disputes that arose following the 1946 Linggadjati Agreement. It recognised a cease-fire along the Status Quo Line or so-called "Van Mook Line", an artificial line that connected the most advanced Dutch positions.

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17/01/1946

The UN Security Council holds its first session.

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations and has primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. Its powers, outlined in the UN Charter, include establishing peacekeeping operations, authorizing military action, and imposing international sanctions. Under Chapter VII of the Charter, the Council may identify threats to international peace, determine breaches of that peace, and authorize responses up to and including the use of force. It is the only UN body with the authority to issue resolutions binding on all member states. The Council also recommends the admission of new member states to the United Nations General Assembly and approves changes to the Charter.

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17/01/1945

World War II: The Vistula–Oder Offensive forces German troops out of Warsaw.

The Vistula–Oder offensive was a Red Army operation on the Eastern Front in the European theatre of World War II in January 1945. The army made a major advance into German-held territory, capturing Kraków, Warsaw, and Poznań. The Red Army had built up their strength around a number of key bridgeheads, with two fronts commanded by Marshal Georgy Zhukov and Marshal Ivan Konev. Against them, the German Army Group A, led by Colonel-General Josef Harpe, was outnumbered five to one. Within days, German commandants evacuated the concentration camps, sending the prisoners on their death marches to the west, where ethnic Germans also started fleeing. In a little over two weeks, the Red Army had advanced 480 kilometres (300 mi) from the Vistula to the Oder, only 69 kilometres (43 mi) from Berlin, which was undefended. However, Zhukov called a halt, owing to continued German resistance on his northern flank (Pomerania), and the advance on Berlin had to be delayed until April.

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The SS-Totenkopfverbände begin the evacuation of the Auschwitz concentration camp as the Red Army closes in.

SS-Totenkopfverbände was a major branch of the Nazi Party's paramilitary Schutzstaffel (SS) organisation. It was responsible for administering the concentration camps and extermination camps of Nazi Germany, among similar duties. It was both the successor and expanded organisation to the SS-Wachverbände formed in 1933. While the Totenkopf was the universal cap badge of the SS, the SS-TV also wore this insignia on the right collar tab to distinguish itself from other SS formations.

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Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg is taken into Soviet custody while in Hungary; he is never publicly seen again.

Raoul Wallenberg was a Swedish architect, businessman, diplomat, and humanitarian. He saved thousands of Jews in German-occupied Hungary during the Holocaust from German Nazis and Hungarian fascists during the later stages of World War II. While serving as Sweden's special envoy in Budapest between July and December 1944, Wallenberg issued protective passports and sheltered Jews in buildings which he declared as Swedish territory.

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17/01/1944

World War II: Allied forces launch the first of four assaults on Monte Cassino with the intention of breaking through the Winter Line and seizing Rome, an effort that would ultimately take four months and cost 105,000 Allied casualties.

The Allies, or Allied powers, formally referred to as the United Nations from 1942, were an international military coalition formed during World War II (1939–1945) to oppose the Axis powers. Its principal members were the "Big Four"—the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, the United States, and China.

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17/01/1943

World War II: Greek submarine Papanikolis captures the 200-ton sailing vessel Agios Stefanos and mans her with part of her crew.

World War II, or the Second World War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Axis powers. Nearly all of the world's countries participated. Tanks and aircraft played major roles, the latter enabling the strategic bombing of cities and delivery of the only nuclear weapons used in war. World War II was the deadliest conflict in history, causing the death of 60 to 75 million people. Millions died as a result of massacres, starvation, disease, and genocides including the Holocaust. After the Allied victory, Germany, Austria, Japan, and Korea were occupied, and German and Japanese leaders were tried for war crimes.

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17/01/1941

Franco-Thai War: Vichy French forces inflict a decisive defeat over the Royal Thai Navy.

The Franco-Thai War was fought between Thailand and Vichy France over certain areas of French Indochina.

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17/01/1920

Alcohol Prohibition begins in the United States as the Volstead Act goes into effect.

The Prohibition era was the period from 1920 to 1933 when the United States prohibited the production, importation, transportation, and sale of alcoholic beverages. The alcohol industry was curtailed by a succession of state legislatures, and Prohibition was formally introduced nationwide under the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified on January 16, 1919. Prohibition ended with the ratification of the Twenty-first Amendment, which repealed the Eighteenth Amendment on December 5, 1933.

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17/01/1918

Finnish Civil War: The first serious battles take place between the Red Guards and the White Guard.

The Finnish Civil War was a civil war in 1918 fought for the leadership and control of recently independent Finland between White Finland and the Finnish Socialist Workers' Republic. The clashes took place in the context of the national, political, and social turmoil caused by World War I in Europe. The belligerents were the paramilitary Red Guards, led by a section of the Social Democratic Party with backup of the Russian bolsheviks, and the paramilitary White Guards of the senate. General C. G. E. Mannerheim led the White Guards with major assistance by both the Finnish Jäger Battalion trained in Germany and the German Imperial Army, along the German goal to control Fennoscandia and Petrograd of Russia. The Reds, composed of industrial and agrarian working class people, controlled the cities and industrial centres of southern Finland. The Whites, composed of land owners and the middle and upper class, controlled the rural central and northern Finland.

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17/01/1917

The United States pays Denmark $25 million for the Virgin Islands.

The United States Virgin Islands, officially the Virgin Islands of the United States, are a Caribbean insular territory of the United States. The islands are geographically part of the Virgin Islands archipelago and are located in the Leeward Islands of the Lesser Antilles. The islands have a tropical climate.

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17/01/1915

Russia defeats Ottoman Turkey in the Battle of Sarikamish during the Caucasus Campaign of World War I.

Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country in Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the largest country in the world, spanning eleven time zones and sharing land borders with fourteen countries. With a population of over 140 million, Russia is the most populous country in Europe and the ninth-most populous in the world. It is a highly urbanised country, with sixteen of its urban areas having more than 1 million inhabitants. Moscow, the most populous metropolitan area in Europe, is the capital and largest city of Russia, while Saint Petersburg is its second-largest city and a major cultural centre.

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17/01/1912

British polar explorer Captain Robert Falcon Scott reaches the South Pole, one month after Roald Amundsen.

Captain Robert Falcon Scott was a British Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the Discovery expedition of 1901–04 and the Terra Nova expedition of 1910–13.

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17/01/1904

Anton Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard receives its premiere performance at the Moscow Art Theatre.

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was a Russian playwright and short story writer. Widely considered one of the greatest writers of all time, his career as a playwright produced four classics, and his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics. Along with Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg, Chekhov is often referred to as one of the three seminal figures in the birth of early modernism in the theatre. Chekhov was a physician by profession. "Medicine is my lawful wife," he once said, "and literature is my mistress."

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17/01/1903

El Yunque National Forest in Puerto Rico becomes part of the United States National Forest System as the Luquillo Forest Reserve.

El Yunque National Forest, formerly known as the Caribbean National Forest, is a forest located in northeastern Puerto Rico. While there are both temperate and tropical rainforests in other states and territories, it is the only tropical rainforest in the United States National Forest System and the United States Forest Service. El Yunque National Forest is located on the slopes of the Sierra de Luquillo mountains, encompassing more than 28,000 acres of land, making it the largest block of public land in Puerto Rico.

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17/01/1899

The United States takes possession of Wake Island in the Pacific Ocean.

Wake Island, also known as Wake Atoll, is a coral atoll in the Micronesia subregion of the Pacific Ocean. The atoll is composed of three islets – Wake, Wilkes, and Peale Islands – surrounding a lagoon encircled by a coral reef. The nearest inhabited island is Utirik Atoll in the Marshall Islands, located 592 miles to the southeast.

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17/01/1893

Lorrin A. Thurston, along with the Citizens' Committee of Public Safety, led the Overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii and the government of Queen Liliʻuokalani.

Lorrin Andrews Thurston was a Hawaiian citizen lawyer, politician, and businessman. Thurston played a prominent role in the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii to replace Queen Liliʻuokalani with the Republic of Hawaii, with discreet US support for which Congress much later apologized. He published the Pacific Commercial Advertiser, and owned other enterprises. From 1906 to 1916, he and his network lobbied with national politicians to create a national park to preserve the Hawaiian volcanoes.

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17/01/1885

A British force defeats a large Dervish army at the Battle of Abu Klea in the Sudan.

A dervish, darvesh, or darwīsh is a Muslim who seeks salvation through ascetic practices and meditations. It can refer to an individual or to a member of a Sufi order (tariqah). Their focus is on the universal values of love and service, deserting the illusions of ego (nafs) to reach God. This is usually done by performing a lifestyle which decreases bodily function to a minimum in order to attain what would be called "esoteric knowledge" in Western terminology. In most Sufi orders, a dervish is known to practice dhikr through physical exertions or religious practices to attain the ecstatic trance to reach God. Their most popular practice is Sama, which is associated with the 13th-century mystic Rumi.

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17/01/1873

A group of Modoc warriors defeats the United States Army in the First Battle of the Stronghold, part of the Modoc War.

The Modoc are an Indigenous American people who historically lived in the area which is now northeastern California and central Southern Oregon. Currently, they include two federally recognized tribes, the Klamath Tribes in Oregon and the Modoc Tribe of Oklahoma, now known as the Modoc Nation.

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17/01/1852

The United Kingdom signs the Sand River Convention with the South African Republic.

The Sand River Convention of 17 January 1852 was a convention whereby the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland formally recognised the independence of the Boers north of the Vaal River.

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17/01/1811

Mexican War of Independence: In the Battle of Calderón Bridge, a heavily outnumbered Spanish force of 6,000 troops defeats nearly 100,000 Mexican revolutionaries.

The Mexican War of Independence was an armed conflict and political process resulting in Mexico's independence from the Spanish Empire. It was not a single, coherent event, but local and regional struggles that occurred within the same period, and can be considered a revolutionary civil war. It culminated with the drafting of the Declaration of Independence of the Mexican Empire in Mexico City on September 28, 1821, following the collapse of royal government and the military triumph of forces for independence.

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17/01/1799

Maltese patriot Dun Mikiel Xerri, along with a number of other patriots, is executed.

Malta, officially the Republic of Malta, is an island country in Southern Europe located in the Mediterranean Sea, between Sicily and North Africa. It consists of an archipelago 80 km (50 mi) south of Italy, 284 km (176 mi) east of Tunisia, and 333 km (207 mi) north of Libya. The two official languages are Maltese and English but Maltese is recognised as the national language. The country's capital is Valletta, which is the smallest capital city in the European Union (EU) by both area and population.

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17/01/1781

American Revolutionary War: Battle of Cowpens: Continental troops under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan defeat British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton at the battle in South Carolina.

The American Revolutionary War, also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which American Patriot forces organized as the Continental Army and commanded by George Washington defeated the British Army. The conflict was fought in North America, the Caribbean, and the Atlantic Ocean. The war's outcome seemed uncertain for most of the war, but Washington and the Continental Army's decisive victory in the Siege of Yorktown in 1781 led King George III and the Kingdom of Great Britain to negotiate an end to the war. In 1783, in the Treaty of Paris, the British monarchy acknowledged the independence of the Thirteen Colonies, leading to the establishment of the United States as an independent and sovereign nation.

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17/01/1773

Captain James Cook leads the first expedition to sail south of the Antarctic Circle.

Captain James Cook was a British Royal Navy officer, explorer, and cartographer who led three voyages of exploration to the Pacific and Southern Oceans between 1768 and 1779. He completed the first recorded circumnavigation of the main islands of New Zealand, and led the first recorded visit by Europeans to the east coast of Australia and the Hawaiian Islands.

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17/01/1649

The Second Ormonde Peace creates an alliance between the Irish Royalists and Confederates during the War of the Three Kingdoms. The coalition was then decisively defeated during the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland.

The Second Ormonde Peace was a peace treaty and alliance signed on 17 January 1649 between the Marquess of Ormonde, the leader of the Irish Royalists, and the Irish Confederates. It united a coalition of former Protestants and Catholics enemies from Ireland, Scotland and England – the three Kingdoms ruled by Charles I who was then held a prisoner by the Puritan Rump Parliament. His execution on 30 January drew together the signatories in allegiance to his young son Charles II.

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17/01/1648

England's Long Parliament passes the "Vote of No Addresses", breaking off negotiations with King Charles I and thereby setting the scene for the second phase of the English Civil War.

The Long Parliament was an English Parliament which nominally lasted from 1640 until 1660, making it the longest-lasting Parliament in English and British history. It followed the fiasco of the Short Parliament, which had convened for only three weeks during the spring of 1640 after an 11-year parliamentary absence. In September 1640, King Charles I issued writs summoning a parliament to convene on 3 November 1640. He intended it to pass financial bills, a step made necessary by the costs of the Bishops' Wars against Scotland. The Long Parliament received its name from the fact that, by an act of Parliament, the Parliament Act 1640, it stipulated it could be dissolved only with agreement of the members; and those members did not agree to its dissolution until 16 March 1660, after the English Civil War and near the close of the Interregnum.

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17/01/1608

Emperor Susenyos I of Ethiopia surprises an Oromo army at Ebenat; his army reportedly kills 12,000 Oromo at the cost of 400 of his men.

Susenyos I, also known as Susenyos the Catholic, was Emperor of Ethiopia from 1607 to 1632, and a member of the Solomonic dynasty. His throne names were Seltan Sagad and Malak Sagad III.

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17/01/1595

During the French Wars of Religion, Henry IV of France declares war on Spain.

The French Wars of Religion were a series of civil wars between French Catholics and Protestants from 1562 to 1598. Between two and four million people died from violence, famine or disease directly caused by the conflict, and it severely damaged the power of the French monarchy. One of its most notorious episodes was the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre in 1572. The fighting ended with a compromise in 1598, when Henry of Navarre, who converted to Catholicism in 1593, was proclaimed King Henry IV of France and issued the Edict of Nantes, which granted substantial rights and freedoms to the Huguenots. However, Catholics continued to disapprove of Protestants and of Henry, and his assassination in 1610 triggered a fresh round of Huguenot rebellions in the 1620s.

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17/01/1562

France grants religious toleration to the Huguenots in the Edict of Saint-Germain.

The Huguenots are a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed (Calvinist) tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Besançon Hugues, was in common use by the mid-16th century. Huguenot was frequently used in reference to those of the Reformed Church of France from the time of the Protestant Reformation. By contrast, the Protestant populations of eastern France, in Alsace, Moselle, and Montbéliard, were mainly Lutherans.

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17/01/1524

Giovanni da Verrazzano sets sail westward from Madeira to find a sea route to the Pacific Ocean.

Giovanni da Verrazzano was an Italian explorer from the Republic of Florence, best known for his expedition to North America. He led most of his later missions, including the one to America, in the service of King Francis I of France.

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17/01/1377

Pope Gregory XI reaches Rome, after deciding to move the Papacy back to Rome from Avignon.

Pope Gregory XI was head of the Catholic Church from 30 December 1370 to his death, in March 1378. He was the seventh and last Avignon pope and the most recent French pope. In 1377, Gregory XI returned the papal court to Rome, ending nearly 70 years of papal residency in Avignon, in modern-day France. His death was swiftly followed by the Western Schism involving two Avignon-based antipopes.

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17/01/1362

Saint Marcellus' flood kills at least 25,000 people on the shores of the North Sea.

Saint Marcellus's flood or Grote Mandrenke was an intense extratropical cyclone, coinciding with a new moon, which swept across the British Isles, the Netherlands, northern Germany, and Denmark around 16 January 1362, causing at least 25,000 deaths. The storm tide is also called the "Second St. Marcellus flood" because it peaked on 16 January, the feast day of St. Marcellus. A previous "First St. Marcellus flood" had drowned 36,000 people along the coasts of West Friesland and Groningen on 16 January 1219.

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01/01/1970

Octavian divorces his wife Scribonia and marries Livia Drusilla, ending the fragile peace between the Second Triumvirate and Sextus Pompey.

Augustus, also known as Octavian, was the founder of the Roman Empire and the first Roman emperor from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. The reign of Augustus initiated an imperial cult and an era of imperial peace in which the Roman world was largely free of armed conflict. The principate, a style of government where the emperor showed nominal deference to the Senate, was established during his reign and lasted until the Crisis of the Third Century.

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