Wikipedia:Main Page history/2020 July 1

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The Battle of Malvern Hill was fought on July 1, 1862, between the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, led by Robert E. Lee, and the Union Army of the Potomac under George B. McClellan. It was the final battle of the Seven Days Battles during the American Civil War, taking place on the 130-foot (40 m) elevation of Malvern Hill, near the Confederate capital of Richmond. Including inactive reserves, more than 50,000 soldiers from each side took part, using more than 200 pieces of artillery. The Union's V Corps, commanded by Fitz John Porter, took up positions on the hill on June 30. The battle occurred in stages: over the course of four hours a series of blunders in planning and communication caused Lee's forces to launch three failed frontal infantry assaults across hundreds of yards of open ground, unsupported by Confederate artillery, charging toward strongly entrenched Union infantry and artillery. These errors provided Union forces with an opportunity to inflict heavy casualties. (Full article...)

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Patrick Stewart

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... that Craig Hall, the first African American in New York City Ballet to dance the title role in Apollo, went on to teach the role to Taylor Stanley, another dancer of color?
... that St Luke's burial ground, on the south side of London's Cale Street, once had a 9-foot-high (2.7 m) wall and railings to protect against grave robbers?
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In the news

COVID-19 pandemic

Great Hall of the People

China passes a controversial Hong Kong national security law at the National People's Congress (building pictured), bypassing the Legislative Council of Hong Kong.
An attack on the Pakistan Stock Exchange in Karachi leaves eight people dead and seven others injured.
Lazarus Chakwera is elected President of Malawi in fresh elections ordered by the Constitutional Court after irregularities were uncovered during voting in 2019.

On this day

July 1: Canada Day (1867); Republic Day in Ghana (1960); Independence Day in Rwanda (1962)

Kwame Nkrumah

1770 – Lexell's Comet approached Earth at a distance of 0.015 AU (2.2 million km; 1.4 million mi), closer to the Earth than any other comet in recorded history.
1916 – First World War: The first day of the Battle of Albert, the opening phase of the Battle of the Somme, became the bloodiest day in the British Army's history, with 57,470 casualties, including 19,240 deaths.
1960 – Ghana became a republic, with Kwame Nkrumah (pictured) as its first president.
2002 – Bashkirian Airlines Flight 2937 and DHL Flight 611 collided in mid-air over Überlingen, Germany, killing all 71 people aboard both aircraft.

Rhoda Delaval (b. 1725)
Liv Tyler (b. 1977)
Pauli Murray (d. 1985)

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Today's featured picture

Florence Van Leer Earle Coates (July 1, 1850 – April 6, 1927) was an American poet. She became well known, both at home and abroad, for her works of poetry, nearly three hundred of which were published in literary magazines such as the Atlantic Monthly, Scribner's Magazine, The Literary Digest, Lippincott's, The Century Magazine, and Harper's Magazine. She was encouraged by Matthew Arnold with whom she maintained a correspondence until his death in 1888. Many of her nature poems were inspired by the flora and fauna of the Adirondacks, where the Coates family spent their summer months at "Camp Elsinore" beside Upper St. Regis Lake; here they entertained many friends such as Otis Skinner, Violet Oakley, Henry Mills Alden, and Agnes Repplier.

Photograph credit: unknown; restored by Adam Cuerden

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