Today in History

1570   Pope Pius V issues the bull Regnans in Excelsis which excommunicates Queen Elizabeth of England.   
1601   Robert Devereux, the second Earl of Essex and former favorite of Elizabeth I, is beheaded in the Tower of London for high treason.  
1642   Dutch settlers slaughter lower Hudson Valley Indians in New Netherland, North America, who sought refuge from Mohawk attackers.  
1779   The British surrender the Illinois country to George Rogers Clark at Vincennes.  
1781   American General Nathaniel Greene crosses the Dan River on his way to attack Cornwallis.  
1791   President George Washington sign a bill creating the Bank of the United States.  
1804   Thomas Jefferson is nominated for president at the Democratic-Republican caucus.  
1815   Napoleon leaves his exile on the island of Elba, returning to France.  
1831   The Polish army halts the Russian advance into their country at the Battle of Grochow.  
1836   Samuel Colt patents the first revolving cylinder multi-shot firearm.  
1862   Confederate troops abandon Nashville, Tennessee, in the face of Grant's advance. The ironclad Monitor is commissioned at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
1865   General Joseph E. Johnston replaces John Bell Hood as Commander of the Confederate Army of Tennessee.  
1904   J.M. Synge's play Riders to the Sea opens in Dublin.  
1910   The Dalai Lama flees from the Chinese and takes refuge in India.  
1919   Oregon introduces the first state tax on gasoline at one cent per gallon, to be used for road construction.  
1913   The 16th Amendment to the constitution is adopted, setting the legal basis for the income tax.
1926   Poland demands a permanent seat on the League of Nations council.  
1928   Bell Labs introduces a new device to end the fluttering of the television image.
1943   U.S. troops retake the Kasserine Pass in Tunisia, where they had been defeated five days before.  
1944   U.S. forces destroy 135 Japanese planes in Marianas and Guam.  
1952   French colonial forces evacuate Hoa Binh in Indochina.  
1956   Stalin is secretly disavowed by Khrushchev at a party congress for promoting the "cult of the individual."  
1976   The U.S. Supreme Court rules that states may ban the hiring of illegal aliens.