Lancaster's chevauchée of 1346 was a large-scale mounted raid directed
by Henry, Earl of Lancaster, in south western France during the Hundred
Years' War. The main English army had defeated the larger French army at
the Battle of Crécy in August, and French defences in the south west
were left weak and disorganised. Lancaster took advantage by leading a
raid between 12 September and 31 October 1346 while sending other forces
into Quercy and the Bazadais. All three offensives were successful, with
Lancaster's chevauchée, of approximately 2,000 English and Gascon
soldiers, meeting no effective resistance from the French, penetrating
160 miles (260 kilometres) north and storming the rich city of Poitiers.
His force then razed and looted large areas of Saintonge, Aunis and
Poitou, capturing numerous towns, castles and smaller fortified places
as they went. The offensives completely disrupted the French defences
and shifted the focus of the fighting.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lancaster%27s_chevauch%C3%A9e_of_1346>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1848:
Switzerland became a federal state with the adoption of a new
constitution.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switzerland>
1942:
RMS Laconia was sunk by a U-boat off the coast of West Africa,
which then attempted to rescue the passengers as it was acting under the
old prize rules.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laconia_incident>
1962:
At Rice Stadium in Houston, U.S. president John F. Kennedy made
a speech later known by the line "We choose to go to the Moon" (video
featured).
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_choose_to_go_to_the_Moon>
2015:
An explosion involving illegally stored mining detonators in
Petlawad, in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, killed 104 people and
injured more than 150 others.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petlawad_explosion>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
connive:
1. (intransitive) Often followed by with: to secretly cooperate with
another person or persons in order to commit a crime or other
wrongdoing; to collude, to conspire.
2. (intransitive, botany, rare) Of parts of a plant: to be converging or
in close contact; to be connivent.
3. (intransitive, obsolete) Often followed by at: to pretend to be
ignorant of something in order to escape blame; to ignore or overlook a
fault deliberately.
4. (intransitive, obsolete) To open and close the eyes rapidly; to wink.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/connive>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
Clarity of thought is a shining point in a vast expanse of
unrelieved darkness. Genius is not so much a light as it is a constant
awareness of the surrounding gloom, and its typical cowardice is to
bathe in its own glow and avoid, as much as possible, looking out beyond
its boundary. No matter how much genuine strength it may contain, there
is also, inevitably, a considerable part that is only the pretense of
that strength.
--Stanisław Lem
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Stanis%C5%82aw_Lem>
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