Robert Howe (1732–86) was a Continental Army general from North
Carolina during the American Revolutionary War. He was one of only five
general officers, and the only major general, in the Continental Army
from that state. At the outset of the war, he was appointed a brigadier
general in the Continental Army, and eventually became commander of the
Southern Department. His early military career was contentious and
consumed by conflict with political and military leaders in Georgia and
South Carolina. These confrontations, including a 1778 duel with
Christopher Gadsden, and Howe's reputation as a womanizer eventually led
to his removal from command over the Southern Department. Prior to the
formal turnover of his command, Howe commanded the Continental Army and
Patriot militia forces in defeat in the First Battle of Savannah. He
later sat as a senior officer on the court-martial board that sentenced
British officer John André, a co-conspirator of Benedict Arnold, to
death. Howe himself was accused of attempting to defect to the British,
but the accusations were cast aside at the time as a British stratagem.
He died in December 1786 after being elected to the North Carolina House
of Commons.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Howe_(Continental_Army_officer)>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1860:
To counter the French Navy's La Gloire, the world's first
ironclad warship, the British Royal Navy launched the world's first
iron-hulled armoured battleship, HMS Warrior.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Warrior_(1860)>
1890:
The United States Army killed over 150 members of the Great
Sioux Nation at the Wounded Knee Massacre.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wounded_Knee_Massacre>
1911:
Sun Yat-sen was elected in Nanjing as the Provisional President
of the Republic of China.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Yat-sen>
1930:
Muhammad Iqbal introduced the two-nation theory outlining a
vision for the creation of an independent state for Muslim-majority
provinces in northwestern British India.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-nation_theory>
1992:
President of Brazil Fernando Collor de Mello resigned in an
attempt to stop his impeachment proceedings from continuing, but the
Senate of Brazil continued anyway, finding him guilty.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Collor_de_Mello>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
nobble:
1. (UK, Australia, slang) To injure or obstruct intently; batter.
2. (UK, slang) To gain influence by corrupt means or intimidation.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/nobble>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
 Saints are not made by accident. Still less is a Christian
martyrdom the effect of a man's will to become a Saint, as a man by
willing and contriving may become a ruler of men. Ambition fortifies the
will of man to become ruler over other men: it operates with deception,
cajolery, and violence, it is the action of impurity upon impurity. Not
so in Heaven. A martyr, a saint, is always made by the design of God,
for His love of men, to warn them and to lead them, to bring them back
to His ways. A martyrdom is never the design of man; for the true martyr
is he who has become the instrument of God, who has lost his will in the
will of God, not lost it but found it, for he has found freedom in
submission to God. The martyr no longer desires anything for himself,
not even the glory of martyrdom.
--T. S. Eliot
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/T._S._Eliot>