The Battle of Barrosa (5 March 1811) was an unsuccessful French attack on a larger Anglo-Portuguese-Spanish force attempting to lift the siege of Cádiz in Spain during the Peninsular War. Cádiz had been invested by the French in early 1810, but in March of the following year a reduction in the besieging army gave its garrison of Anglo-Spanish troops an opportunity to lift the siege. A large Allied strike-force was shipped south from Cádiz to Tarifa, and moved to engage the siege lines from the rear. The French, under the command of Marshal Victor, were aware of the Allied movement and redeployed to prepare a trap. Victor placed one division on the road to Cádiz, blocking the Allied line of march, while his two remaining divisions fell on the single Anglo-Portuguese rearguard division under the command of Sir Thomas Graham. Following a fierce battle on two fronts, the British succeeded in routing the attacking French forces. A lack of support from the larger Spanish contingent prevented an absolute victory, and the French were able to regroup and reoccupy their siege lines. Graham's tactical victory proved to have little strategic effect on the continuing war, to the extent that Victor was able to claim the battle as a French victory since the siege remained in force until finally being lifted on 24 August 1812. (more...)

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_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1616:

Nicolaus Copernicus's De revolutionibus orbium coelestium, describing his heliocentric theory of the solar system, was banned by the Roman Catholic Church. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_revolutionibus_orbium_coelestium

1770:

British soldiers fired into a crowd in Boston, Massachusetts, killing five civilians. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Massacre

1824:

The First Anglo-Burmese War, the longest and most expensive war in British Indian history, began. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Anglo-Burmese_War

1936:

The prototype of the Supermarine Spitfire, a British single-seat fighter that was later used by the Royal Air Force and many other Allied countries during the Second World War, flew for the first time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supermarine_Spitfire

1975:

Computer hackers in Silicon Valley held the first meeting of the Homebrew Computer Club, whose members would go on have great influence on the development of the personal computer. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homebrew_Computer_Club

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

Tinker to Evers to Chance (n): (US, idiomatic) A task accomplished quickly by well-executed teamwork; those involved in the teamwork http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Tinker_to_Evers_to_Chance

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

This is a haunted world. It hath no breeze

But is the echo of some voice beloved: Its pines have human tones; its billows wear

The color and the sparkle of dear eyes. Its flowers are sweet with touch of tender hands

That once clasped ours. All things are beautiful Because of something lovelier than themselves,

Which breathes within them, and will never die. — Haunted, — but not with any spectral gloom;

Earth is suffused, inhabited by heaven. --Lucy Larcom http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Lucy_Larcom