On this day in history - 17th January

On 17th January 1746, The Jacobites won the Battle of Falkirk Muir

During the Second Jacobite Rising, the Battle of Falkirk was the last noteworthy Jacobite success. After turning back from the London campaign for winter, the Jacobite Army returned to Scotland and besieged Major General Blakeney in Stirling Castle. Lieutenant General Henry Hawley led his troops from Edinburgh to relieve Blakeney. On 17 January 1746 he engaged the Jacobites on Falkirk Moor, but his cannons were not able to be effectively drawn to the battle field.

He relied on cavalry to rout the Jacobite troops, but his dragoons' charge failed under a severe volley from the Highlanders and they retreated, in turn causing the royal troops to flee the field.

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Births

1845 Douglas, Allison
1896 Montagu-Douglas-Scott, Lord William
1896 Douglas, Francis Archibald Kelhead (11th Marquis of Queensbury)
1743/44 Douglas, Hannah
1719/20 Douglas, John
1836 Douglas, Mary
1907 Douglas, Elisabeth Rosie
1865 Douglas, Edward Herbert
1846 Douglas, Simeon Fuller
1741/42 Douglas, Col. William
1861 Montagu-Douglas-Scott, Walter Henry (Earl of Dalkeith)
1952 Douglas, (John) Stewart Sholto (22nd Earl of Morton)
1854 Douglas, Archibald Bruce
1721/22 Douglas, William
1980 Douglas, James Owen

 

Deaths

1794 Douglas, Samuel
1822 Douglas, Abel
1804 Douglas, Colonel Archibald (of Douglas Support)

 

Events

1362 – Saint Marcellus' flood kills at least 25,000 people on the shores of the North Sea.
1595 – During the French Wars of Religion, Henry IV of France declares war on Spain.
1608 – Emperor Susenyos I of Ethiopia surprises an Oromo army at Ebenat; his army reportedly kills 12,000 Oromo at the cost of 400 of his men.
1648 – England's Long Parliament passes the "Vote of No Addresses", breaking off negotiations with King Charles I and thereby setting the scene for the second phase of the English Civil War.
1773 – Captain James Cook leads the first expedition to sail south of the Antarctic Circle.
1781 – American Revolutionary War: Battle of Cowpens: Continental troops under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan defeat British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton at the battle in South Carolina.
1811 – Mexican War of Independence: In the Battle of Calderón Bridge, a heavily outnumbered Spanish force of 6,000 troops defeats nearly 100,000 Mexican revolutionaries.
1912 – British polar explorer Captain Robert Falcon Scott reaches the South Pole, one month after Roald Amundsen.
1915 – Russia defeats Ottoman Turkey in the Battle of Sarikamish during the Caucasus Campaign of World War I.
1918 – Finnish Civil War: The first serious battles take place between the Red Guards and the White Guard.
1944 – World War II: Allied forces launch the first of four assaults on Monte Cassino with the intention of breaking through the Winter Line and seizing Rome, an effort that would ultimately take four months and cost 105,000 Allied casualties.
1945 – World War II: The Vistula–Oder Offensive forces German troops out of Warsaw.
1946 – The UN Security Council holds its first session.
1961 – Former Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba is murdered in circumstances suggesting the support and complicity of the governments of Belgium and the United States.
1991 – Gulf War: Operation Desert Storm begins early in the morning as aircraft strike positions across Iraq, it is also the first major combat sortie for the F-117. LCDR Scott Speicher's F/A-18C Hornet from VFA-81 is shot down by a Mig-25 and is the first American casualty of the War. Iraq fires eight Scud missiles into Israel in an unsuccessful bid to provoke Israeli retaliation.
2002 – Mount Nyiragongo erupts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, displacing an estimated 400,000 peopl

Events on this day