What Happened This Day In History. APRIL 18

April 18

310        St. Eusebius of Vercelli begins his reign as Catholic Pope.

1521        Martin Luther confronts the emperor Charles V, refusing to retract the views which led                         to his excommunication.

1676 Sudbury, Massachusetts is attacked by Indians.

1775 American revolutionaries Paul Revere and William Dawes ride though the towns of 

                        Massachusetts warning that “the British are coming.”

1791 National Guardsmen prevent Louis XVI and his family from leaving Paris.

1818 A regiment of Indians and blacks is defeated at the Battle of Suwannee, in Florida, 

                        ending the First Seminole War.

1834 William Lamb becomes prime minister of England.

1838 The Wilkes’ expedition to the South Pole sets sail.

1847 U.S. forces defeat Mexicans at Cerro Gordo in one of the bloodiest battle of the war.

1853 The first train in Asia begins running from Bombay to Tanna.

1861 Colonel Robert E. Lee turns down an offer to command the Union armies.

1895 The First Sino-Japanese War ends.

1906 A massive earthquake hits San Francisco, measuring 8.25 on the Richter scale.

1923 Yankee Stadium opens with Babe Ruth hitting a three-run homer as the Yankees beat 

                        the Red Sox 4-1.

1937 Leon Trotsky calls for the overthrow of Soviet leader Josef Stalin.

1942 James H. Doolittle bombs Tokyo and other Japanese cities.

1943 Traveling in a bomber, Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, the mastermind of the  

                        attack on Pearl Harbor, is shot down by American P-38 fighters.

1946 The League of Nations dissolves.

1949 The Republic of Ireland withdraws from British Commonwealth.

1950 The first transatlantic jet passenger trip is completed.

1954 Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser seizes power in Egypt.

1978 The U.S. Senate approves the transfer of the Panama Canal to Panama.

1980 Zimbabwe’s (Rhodesia) formal independence from Britain is proclaimed.

1983 A suicide bomber kills U.S. Marines at the U.S. Embassy in Lebanon.

Born on April 18

1480 Lucretia Borgia, daughter of Pope Alexander VI and a patron of the arts.

1817 George Henry Lewes, philosophical writer.

1857 Clarence S. Darrow, lawyer.

1864 Richard Harding Davis, journalist.

1918 Clifton Keith Hillegass, founder of the study guides known as Cliff’s Notes.

1940 Ed Garvey, labor leader.