On This Day - April 9-American Civil War ended
1865: On this day General Robert E. Lee, commander of the Army of Northern Virginia of the Confederate States of America, signed a treaty of surrender at Appomattox Court House, ending the American Civil War. The ordeal was made less painful for him by the considerate behaviour of General Ulysses S. Grant, commander of the Union armies.
1965: The Astrodome, an indoor stadium, opened in Houston, Texas, hosting its first baseball game.
1963: An act of Congress conferred honorary U.S. citizenship on Sir Winston Churchill.
1939: African American contralto Marian Anderson sang to an Easter Sunday crowd of 75,000 at the Lincoln Memorial after the Daughters of the American Revolution refused to allow her to sing at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C.
1682: René-Robert Cavelier, sieur de La Salle, claimed the Mississippi River basin for France, naming it Louisiana.
1388: The Battle of Näfels was a major victory for the Swiss Confederation in the first century of its struggle for self-determination against Habsburg overlordship. |
