The American flag was flown in battle for the first time on this day
in 1777, during a Revolutionary War skirmish at Cooch’s Bridge, Delaware. Patriot General William Maxwell ordered the stars and
stripes banner raised as a detachment of his infantry and cavalry
met an advance guard of British and Hessian troops.
The rebels were defeated and forced to retreat to General George Washington’s main force near Brandywine Creek in Pennsylvania.
On August 30, 2003, the actor Charles Bronson, best known
for his tough-guy roles in such films as The Dirty Dozen
(1967) and the Death Wish franchise (1974), died at the age
of 81 in Los Angeles.
Bronson was born Charles Buchinsky on November 3, 1921,
in Ehrenfeld, Pennsylvania, to Lithuanian immigrants. The
11th of 15 children, he worked in the Pennsylvania coal
mines as a teen and later served in the Army during World
War II. After the war, he worked a series of odd jobs and
took acting lessons. He had an uncredited part in the 1951
film You’re in the Navy Now, starring Gary Cooper, and a
small part (credited as Charles Buchinsky) in 1952’s Pat
and Mike, with Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn. In
the mid-1950s, he changed his name to Bronson because
he believed it wasn’t smart for an actor have a Russian-
sounding last name at a time when there was a strong anti-Communist sentiment in America. (history.com)
On August 24, 1814, during the War of 1812 between the United
States and England, British troops entered Washington, D.C.
and burned the White House in retaliation for the American
attack on the city of York in Ontario, Canada, in June 1813.
When the British arrived at the White House, they found that
President James Madison and his first lady Dolley had already
fled to safety in Maryland. Soldiers reportedly sat down to eat
a meal made of leftover food from the White House scullery
using White House dishes and silver before ransacking the
presidential mansion and setting it ablaze.
The fire ruined the white house and the grounds. (Library of Congress)
Though he had landed on the beaches of Normandy and been
wounded in battle fighting with the U.S. Army, Staff Sergeant
Marcario GarcÃa was not yet a U.S. citizen when President
Harry S. Truman awarded him the Medal of Honor on August
23, 1945. GarcÃa became the first Mexican national to receive
the American military’s highest honor.
Marcario GarcÃa (January 20, 1920 – December 24, 1972)
(Fox News) – Dozens of German warships that sank during World
War II have resurfaced in the Danube River near Prahovo, Serbia.
The vessels – exposed due to the river’s low water levels – were
among hundreds of Nazi Germany’s Black Sea fleet that retreated
from Soviet forces in 1944.
