16 FEBRUARY

BRITISH CRUSH OPPOSITION TO DUTCH COLONIAL RULE IN SURABAYA, KILLING HUNDREDS, INCLUDING MANY CIVILIANS. 10 November 1945 – British army launched a military assault on the Indonesian city of Surabaya where nationalist opposition groups refused to submit to Dutch colonial rule. Many hundreds, possibly thousands, were killed, including many civilians, as British and Indian soldiers,…

INDIAN SOLDIERS REFUSE ORDERS TO USE CARTRIDGES GREASED WITH PIG AND COW FAT [ 24 April 1857 ] On 24 April 1857, eighty five Indian soldiers of the Third Bengal Light Cavalry stationed at Meerut, a town 40 miles north east of Delhi, refused orders to use cartridges covered by paper greased with pig and…

LORD MANSFIELD – THROWING SLAVES OVERBOARD CANNOT BE MURDER. [ 22 May 1783 ] On this day in 1783, Lord Mansfied, the presiding judge at an appeal hearing, issued his verdict on the case of  132 men, women and children thrown overboard from a British owned slave ship, the Zong, on 29 November 1871.  It…

BRITISH ARMY URGES TOLERANT APPROACH TO LOYALIST PARAMILITARIES IN ITS RANKS. 12 June 1972 – British Military HQ in Northern Ireland urged the Ministry of Defence not to dismiss Ulster Defence Regiment soldiers with links to the paramilitary Ulster Defence Association, despite its many known terror links and its involvement in multiple bombings and shootings. …

THE TIMES ARGUES IRELAND’S POTATO FAMINE IS “A BLESSING” [ 22 September 1846 ] On this day in 1846, an editorial in The Times admonished those arguing for London to intervene to ameliorate the catastrophic potato famine in Ireland. Some might go hungry or starve, but this was a necessary evil, which would correct Irish indolence…

REPORT FROM JAMAICA – GIBBETED SLAVES SURVIVE FOUR TO EIGHT DAYS [ 18 June 1760 ] A letter, dated the 18 June 1760, from the British Caribbean territory of Jamaica and subsequently published in newspapers across England, Scotland and Ireland, described, with a grudging respect, the resilience of slaves who ‘are gibbeted alive in terrorem…