Today in History for Aug. 23, 2017

Alexander Travis historical marker in Evergreen, Ala.

Aug. 23, 1305 – Sir William Wallace was executed for high treason at Smithfield in London.

Aug. 23, 1541 – French explorer Jacques Cartier landed near Quebec City in his third voyage to Canada.

Aug. 23, 1741 – French explorer Jean-François de Galaup, comte de Lapérouse was born near Albi, France.

Aug. 23, 1775 – During the American Revolutionary War, King George III delivered his Proclamation of Rebellion to the Court of St. James's stating that the American colonies have proceeded to a state of open and avowed rebellion.

Aug. 23, 1784 - Four counties in western North Carolina declared their independence as the state of Franklin. The area, known as the Cumberland River Valley, would eventually become part of Tennessee. The petition for acceptance did not pass in the U.S. Congress. Franklin defied Congress until it rejoined North Carolina in 1788 when Cherokee, Chickamauga and Chickasaw began attacking settlements.

Aug. 23, 1790 – Early Conecuh County pioneer and minister Alexander Travis was born in Edgefield District, S.C.

Aug. 23, 1831 – Nat Turner's slave rebellion was suppressed.

Aug. 23, 1849 – Poet and editor William Ernest Henley was born in Gloucester, England.

Aug. 23, 1861 – During the Civil War, a skirmish was fought at Medoe, Mo.

Aug. 23, 1861 – During the Civil War, a skirmish was fought near Fort Craig in the New Mexico Territory.

Aug. 23, 1861 – During the Civil War, an engagement was fought between the U.S. steamers, Yankee and Release, with the batteries at the mouth of the Potomac Creek in Virginia.

Aug. 23, 1861 – During the Civil War, a skirmish was fought at Springfield, W.Va.

Aug. 23, 1861 – During the Civil War, Allan Pinkerton, head of the new secret service agency of the Federal government, placed Confederate spy Rose O'Neal Greenhow under house arrest in Washington, D.C. Greenhow was a wealthy widow living in Washington at the outbreak of the war, was well connected in the capital and was especially close with Massachusetts Senator Henry Wilson. The Maryland native was openly committed to the Southern cause, and she soon formed a substantial spy network.

Aug. 23, 1862 – During the Civil War, a skirmish occurred near Trinity, Ala.

Aug. 23, 1862 – During the Civil War, skirmishes were fought with Indians on Little River, Calif.; at Big Hill, Ky.; at Greenville, Miss.; at Four Mile, Hickory Grove and Wayman’s Mill (Fort Spring Creek) in Missouri; near Fort Donelson, Tenn.; at Beverly Ford and Fant’s Ford in Virginia; at Sulphur (or Warrenton) Springs, Smithfield (or Smithfield Springs) and Rappahannock Station in Virginia; at Moorefield, W.Va.; and at Bayou Sara, La. A naval action also took place at Bayou Sara, La.

Aug. 23, 1862 – During the Civil war, a Union train was captured between Harpers Ferry, W.Va. and Winchester, Va.

Aug. 23, 1863 - Alabama author Amelie Rives was born in Richmond, Va.

Aug. 23, 1863 – During the Civil War, skirmishes were fought at Fayetteville, Ark. and at Bennett’s’ Bayou, Mo.

Aug. 23, 1863 – During the Civil war, Union batteries ceased their first bombardment of Fort Sumter, leaving it a mass of rubble but still unconquered by the Northern besiegers.

Aug. 23, 1864 – Confederate 4th Cpl. Lewis Lavon Peacock, who is buried at Flat Rock in Conecuh County, was granted a 45-day furlough on this day after being admitted earlier to the General Hospital at Howard’s Grove in Richmond, Va. for sickness after the Bermuda Hundred campaign.

Aug. 23, 1864 – The Battle of Mobile Bay ended with the Confederate surrender of Fort Morgan. Alabama had seized the fort from federal control in January 1861 and then turned it over to Confederate forces, which, until August 1864, used it to keep the U.S. Navy out of Mobile Bay, while letting blockade runners in. The surrender of Fort Morgan left Wilmington, N.C. as the last port open for Confederate blockade runners.

Aug. 23, 1864 – During the Civil War, skirmishes were fought at Blue Springs, Tenn.; at Gerald Mountain, Ark.; at Webster, Mo; at Abbeville, Miss.; on the Dinwiddie Road, near Ream’s Station, Va.; and at Kearneysville, W.Va.

Aug. 23, 1864 – During the Civil War, a six-day Federal operation began in the Clinton, Olive Branch and Comite River vicinity of Louisiana; and a five-day Federal operation between Cassville, Mo. to Fayetteville, Ark. began. A three-day Federal operation began from Ozark, Mo. to Dubuque Crossing and Sugar Loaf Prairie in Missouri.

Aug. 23, 1865 - The trial of Henry Wirz began. He had been charged with conspiracy to injure the health and lives of Union soldiers and murder. The trial lasted two months, and he was executed on Nov. 10.

Aug. 23, 1868 – Writer and poet Edgar Lee Masters was born in Garnett, Kansas. He is best known for his 1915 book, “Spoon River Anthology.”

Aug. 23, 1877 – Texas Ranger John Armstrong arrested John Wesley Hardin, who lived for about 18 months in Pollard, Ala., in a Florida rail car near Pensacola, and returned the outlaw to Texas to stand trial for the murder of Deputy Sheriff Charles Webb three years earlier in a small town near Austin, Texas. Webb’s murder was one in a long series of killings committed by the famous outlaw-the 39th by Hardin’s own count. Tried in Austin, a jury found Hardin guilty of killing Sheriff Webb and sentenced him to life in the Texas state prison at Huntsville, but he served only 15 years before the governor pardoned him.

Aug. 23, 1884 – Humorist Will Cuppy was born in Auburn, Indiana.

Aug. 23, 1886 – Mrs. Sarah B. Page Faulk, aged about 72 years, died at the residence of John W. Rumbly, near Monroeville on this Monday night. Born on Sept. 14, 1814 in Jefferson County, Ga., she was buried in the Baptist Cemetery in Monroeville, Ala. (Some sources say that she died on Aug. 22.)

Aug. 23, 1888 - Alabama author Philip Henry Gosse died in Marychurch, Devon, England.

Aug. 23, 1896 – In Lovecraftian fiction, Viennese occult scholar Dr. Stanislaus Hinterstoisser was born. The doctor, who first appeared in 1978’s “The Necronomicon: The Book of Dead Names” by George Hay, is most famous for his discovery of Lovecraft’s father’s ties to the freemasons.

Aug. 23, 1898 – The Southern Cross Expedition, the first British venture of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, departed from London.

Aug. 23, 1901 - Evergreen received her first bale of new cotton of the season on this day. It was grown by John S. Johnston of the Callihan beat, and was sold to Chas. B. Savage, a leading merchant and cotton buyer, for 7.61 cents per pound. The bale weighed 577 pounds. Johnston had brought to the market the first bale of cotton of the season for the past three years, and Savage had purchased each bale at a good price.

Aug. 23, 1902 - Dr. W.J. Mason of Monroe County spent this Saturday in Evergreen.

Aug. 23, 1906 – The Monroe Journal reported that Prof. L.K. Benson, the new principal of Monroeville’s school, had arrived and was “at work in its behalf.”

Aug. 23, 1906 – The Monroe Journal reported that Miss Jennie Faulk left a few days before for St. Louis to purchase her fall stock of hats, millinery and ladies goods.

Aug. 23, 1906 – The Monroe Journal reported that Messrs. Barnett & Jackson had unloaded three solid carloads of furniture and stoves within the previous few days, the first carloads that had been actually shipped into the town. These came over the Monroeville branch of the Manistee & Repton railway.

Aug. 23, 1906 – The Monroe Journal reported, in news from the Perdue Hill community, that Dr. G.H. Harper and W.M. Florey were up from Manistee that week.

Aug. 23, 1906 – The Monroe Journal reported, in news from the Buena Vista community, that M.V. Middleton was having his store repaired and had put in a “nice lot of furniture.” J.J. Finklea had also “put a pretty new face on his nicely furnished store.”

Aug. 23, 1906 – The Monroe Journal reported, in news from the Pineville community, that Julius Farish’s little boy was playing in the yard at home, a few days before, and was badly bitten by an angry dog. His cheek was mangled and his eyelid bitten, but he was reportedly recovering. They shot the dog.

Aug. 23, 1906 – The Monroe Journal reported that a new store had opened up in Beatrice by Messrs. Fox and Wasden.

Aug. 23, 1911 – The Woodmen of the World baseball team beat the Knights of Pythias, 21-9, in “one of the greatest games of ball ever played in Evergreen.”

Aug. 23, 1914 - Alabama State Highway Engineer William Simpson Keller (Helen Keller’s half-brother) led a group through Evergreen, Ala. while scouting a route for a new trunk road between Montgomery and Mobile. They came to Evergreen from Georgiana and were received by a large crowd that included a band from Brewton. They were treated to a large barbecue dinner at the Country Club and greeted guests from Evergreen, Greenville, Georgiana, Garland, Owassa, Castleberry, Brewton, Pollard, Burnt Corn and Pensacola. Speeches were delivered by Rep. E.C. Page, attorneys Jas. A. Stallworth and E.E. Newton, the Hon. J.F. Jones and the Rev. A. Arnold Ross. Keller’s party departed Conecuh County early the next morning.

Aug. 23, 1914 – During World War I’s Battle of Mons, the British Army began its withdrawal.

Aug. 23, 1914 - In their first confrontation on European soil since the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, four divisions of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), commanded by Sir John French, struggled with the German 1st Army over the 60-foot-wide Mons Canal in Belgium, near the French frontier.

Aug. 23, 1917 – The Monroe Journal reported that four individual electric lighting plants were in operation in Monroeville at that time and a fifth was soon to be installed. The owners of these plants were delighted with their convenience and the comfort afforded by the numerous fans operated.

Aug. 23, 1917 – The Monroe Journal reported that John L. Kearley had accepted a position with the Peoples Bank of Roy and moved with his family to that place the early part of the week.

Aug. 23, 1917 – The Monroe Journal reported that Dr. W.B. Simmons of Piedmont, S.C., accompanied by Mrs. Simmons and their little son, was in Monroeville for a few days visit to his mother and other relatives.

Aug. 23, 1917 - The Monroe Journal noted, as an evidence of Monroeville’s growing commercial importance, that the town was to have that season a resident cotton buyer in the person of R.D. Hendrix, whose advertisement was found elsewhere in that day’s paper. Hendrix had opened an office in the Fore building and planned to keep in close telegraphic touch with the leading markets and be prepared to pay spot cash for cotton.

Aug. 23, 1917 – The Monroe Journal reported, under the headline “MONROE'S QUOTA SECURED,” that the local Board had concluded its examination of registrants under the first call and had certified to the district board the names of 211 persons who had not been exempted or discharged from military service.

Aug. 23, 1917 - J.H. Moore of Perdue Hill was in Monroeville on this Thursday circulating among his numerous friends. Moore had two sons in the service of their country, W. Locklin, being in the officers training camp at Ft. Oglethorpe, and John Hope Jr. at the naval training station, Norfolk.

Aug. 23, 1922 – National Baseball Hall of Fame third baseman George Kell was born in Swifton, Ark. During his career, he played for the Philadelphia Athletics, the Detroit Tigers, the Boston Red Sox, the Chicago White Sox and the Baltimore Orioles. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1983.

Aug. 23, 1934 – Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Sonny Jurgensen was born in Wilmington, N.C. He went on to play for Duke, the Philadelphia Eagles and the Washington Redskins. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1983.

Aug. 23, 1939 - Alabama author Lewis Nordan was born in Forest, Miss.

Aug. 23, 1939 – During World War II, Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression treaty, the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In a secret addition to the pact, the Baltic states, Finland, Romania and Poland were divided between the two nations.

Aug. 23, 1941 - After a lingering illness, W.H. Sellers passed away at his home in Monroeville on this Saturday afternoon about five p.m. Sellers was born in Montgomery County on Sept. 14, 1855, and when in his teens came with his family to Monroe County and settled near Franklin. For more than 25 years, he was engaged in the mercantile business at Franklin and in 1922 he moved to Monroeville and continued in business until a short time before his death. Burial was in the Methodist cemetery.

Aug. 23, 1944 – During World War II, King Michael of Romania dismissed the pro-Nazi government of Marshal Antonescu, who was arrested. Romania switched sides from the Axis to the Allies.

Aug. 23, 1945 – Pro Football Hall of Fame offensive tackle Rayfield Wright was born in Griffin, Ga. He went on to play for Fort Valley State and the Dallas Cowboys. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2006.

Aug. 23, 1957 – Evergreen High School’s football team was scheduled to hold its first preseason practice of the 1957 season on this Friday morning at 5 a.m. under head coach Wendell Hart and assistant coach Jeff Moorer. Standout players expected to be returning that season included Jimmy Bell, George Bolton, Robbie Boykin, Cleveland Brown, Howard Claybrook, Robert Daniels, Robert Ellington, Bobby English, Billy Grace, Jerry Mitchell, Jimmy Moorer, Paul Pace, Wayne Peacock, Ceylon Strong, Byron Warren, Dale Wiggins and Zeke Zukowski.

Aug. 23-24, 1957 – The grand opening for the new Standard Service Station at 231 South Alabama Ave. in Monroeville was set for this Friday and Saturday. Paul Winters, manager, said there would be free gifts for all customers on opening days with Fire-King Mixing Bowls to be given away with each purchase of five or more gallons of Crown gasoline. The new, modern station planned to serve the people of the Monroeville area with Standard Oil products.

Aug. 23, 1959 – The Conecuh County Amateur Baseball League’s All-Star Game was scheduled to be played in Evergreen.

Aug. 23, 1962 – The Evergreen Courant reported that Ronald Lee Shumack of Repton would be among the 557 degree earning candidates at Auburn University on Aug. 24. Shumack was a candidate for the Bachelor of Science in Agricultural Education degree.

Aug. 23, 1962 – The Evergreen Courant reported that optimism, hard work and enthusiasm were the key words in the Evergreen High Aggie camp that week as 38 candidates for the 1962 edition of the Green and White went through opening drills. Coach John Law Robinson wasted no time getting his charges down to cases as preparation for the opener with Atmore in Evergreen on Thursday night, Sept. 13, moved at a fast tempo. Mon., Aug. 20, and Tues., Aug. 21, the Aggies went through conditioning drills in sweat togs, but on Wed., Aug. 22, they had on the pads for the first “knocking” session. Robinson also welcomed on Mon., Aug. 20, his new assistant, Line Coach Fred Allmon. Robinson singled out two non-lettermen as the most improved men on the squad over spring drills. Tackle Stan Coker, up from the “B” team, and Halfback Bob Ivey, also a “B” grad, had shown up well. Other players on the team included Leon Adams, Johnny Bell, Scott Cook, Van Davis, Paul Deason, Alvin Dees, Marshall Dees, Jimmy Ellis, Joe Glass, DeWayne Grace, Benny Hammonds, Bobby Hammonds, Kenny Harper, Tommy Hartley, Bob Ivey, Donnie “Big” Jones, Ronnie Jones, Bill Kendall, Sid Lambert, Billy Lynch, Bobby Lynch, Mike Miniger Rodney Mitchell, Arlie Phillips, Charles Pierce, Winston Pugh, Jimmy Raines, Robert Rigsby, Joe Sasser, William Sessions, Ronnie Shaver, Calvin Smith, Johnny Snowden, Bob Tanner, Brent Thornley, James Ward and Jimmy Warren. Mike Moorer was on the team, but was lost for the season due to a surgery.

Aug. 23, 1964 – Huntsville, Ala. native Don Mincher of the Minnesota Twins became one of only 21 players to hit a home run completely over the right field roof and out of Tiger Stadium in Detroit during the 64-year history of its final configuration.

Aug. 23, 1966 – Lunar Orbiter 1 took the first photograph of the Earth from space.

Aug. 23, 1966 - The American cargo ship Baton Rouge Victory struck a mine laid by the Viet Cong in the Long Tao River, 22 miles south of Saigon.

Aug. 23, 1968 - Communist forces launched rocket and mortar attacks on numerous cities, provincial capitals and military installations. The heaviest shelling was on the U.S. airfield at Da Nang, the cities of Hue and Quang Tri. North Vietnamese forces numbering between 1200 and 1500 troops attacked the U.S. Special Forces camp at Duc Lap, 130 miles northeast of Saigon near the Cambodian border.

Aug. 23, 1976 – Actor, director and screenwriter Scott Caan was born in Los Angeles, Calif.

Aug. 23, 1976 – NBA power forward Pat Garrity was born in Las Vegas, Nevada. He went on to play for Notre Dame, the Phoenix Suns and the Orlando Magic.

Aug. 23, 1982 - Gaylord Perry of the Seattle Mariners was tossed out of a game for throwing an illegal spitball.

Aug. 23, 1989 - Pete Rose, the manager of the Cincinnati Reds, agreed to a lifetime ban from baseball after being accused of gambling on baseball.

Aug. 23, 1990 – Carlisle Hall, near Marion, Ala., was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Aug. 23, 1990 – Saddam Hussein appeared on Iraqi state television with a number of Western "guests" (actually hostages) to try to prevent the Gulf War. He told the group that they were being held "to prevent the scourge of war."

Aug. 23, 1996 – Osama bin Laden issued message entitled 'A declaration of war against the Americans occupying the land of the two holy places.'

Aug. 23, 2002 – National Baseball Hall of Fame pitcher Hoyt Wilhelm passed away at the age of 80 in Sarasota, Fla. During his career, he played for the New York Giants, the St. Louis Cardinals, the Cleveland Indians, the Baltimore Orioles, the Chicago White Sox, the California Angels, the Atlanta Braves, the Chicago Cubs and the Los Angeles Dodgers. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1985.

Aug. 23, 2005 - A movie version of Alabama author Ambrose Bierce's story "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" was released.

Aug. 23, 2007 – The skeletal remains of Russia's last royal family members Alexei Nikolaevich, Tsarevich of Russia, and his sister Grand Duchess Anastasia are discovered near Yekaterinburg, Russia.

Aug. 23, 2012 – Pro Football Hall of Fame half back Steve Van Buren died at the age of 91 in Lancaster, Pa. During his career, he played for LSU and the Philadelphia Eagles. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1965.

Aug. 23, 2013 – “Devil’s Pass,” a fictionalized movie about the Dyatlov Pass Incident, was released in theaters.

Aug. 23, 2014 - Evergreen, Ala. recorded a high of 100 this afternoon. This was the first triple digit high temperature in Evergreen since Aug. 31, 2011.

Aug. 23, 2014 – Monroe Academy’s football team defeated Lancaster Christian, 41-6, in Smyrna, Tenn.

  

Aug. 23, 2016 – Phil Creswell won the mayor’s election in Camden, and Leslie Dusty McDanal won the mayor’s election in Pine Hill. Incumbent Pine Apple mayor Christopher Carter Stone also won reelection.