April 9 Birthday
On April 9, 1865, General Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia. The surrender took place in the home of Wilmer McLean. McLean had moved to Appomattox from Manassas, where the first battle of the war had been fought on his property. He moved to escape the war, and it ended in his parlor. Grant offered generous terms — Confederate officers could keep their sidearms, soldiers could keep their horses, and no one would be prosecuted for treason. Lee accepted. The surrender did not end the war — other Confederate armies continued fighting for weeks — but it ended the major campaign. The war had lasted four years and killed 750,000 people. Five days later, Lincoln was dead. The Bataan Death March began on April 9, 1942, when approximately 75,000 American and Filipino prisoners of war were forced to march from Bataan to Camp O'Donnell, a distance of sixty-five miles. The march took six days in tropical heat with no food or water. prisoners who fell behind were bayoneted, shot, or beheaded. Between 5,000 and 18,000 Filipinos and 500 to 650 Americans died on the march. The Japanese commander, General Masaharu Homma, was convicted of war crimes and executed in 1946. The Bataan Death March became a symbol of Japanese brutality and was used to recruit American soldiers for the Pacific war. On April 9, 1959, NASA introduced the Mercury Seven — the first American astronauts. They were military test pilots: Scott Carpenter, Gordon Cooper, John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Wally Schirra, Alan Shepard, and Deke Slayton. They were selected from 508 candidates. Each was under forty, held a bachelor's degree, and was shorter than five-foot-eleven (the Mercury capsule was cramped). They became instant celebrities. Life magazine bought exclusive rights to their personal stories for $500,000, which they split equally. Six of the seven flew in space; Slayton was grounded by a heart condition but later flew on the Apollo-Soyuz mission in 1975. Grissom died in the Apollo 1 fire in 1967. Paul Robeson, born this day in 1898, was a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Rutgers, an All-American football player, a Columbia Law School graduate, and a concert singer who sold out Carnegie Hall. He was blacklisted during the Cold War for his leftist views and his passport was revoked. He could not travel abroad for eight years. When asked why he did not move to the Soviet Union, he said, "Because my father was a slave, and my people died to build this country.". People born on April 9 fall under the zodiac sign of Aries. The birthstone is Diamond and the birth flower is Daisy. Historical events on April 9 include 1865: Robert E. Lee surrenders to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, 1942: Bataan Death March begins, 75,000 American and Filipino POWs forced to march, 1959: NASA introduces the Mercury 7 astronauts to the public. Famous people born on April 9 include Paul Robeson (1898), Hugh Hefner (1926), Dennis Quaid (1954).