On 18 November 1655, during the Swedish invasion known in Poland as the Deluge, the Pauline monastery of Jasna Góra in Częstochowa refused to let a Swedish force in. Prior Augustyn Kordecki's small garrison held out for forty days until the Swedes withdrew on the night of 26 to 27 December, and the defense became a symbol of Polish resistance.
The Siege of Jasna Góra, 1655: the monastery that would not fall
18 November to 27 December 1655 · 370 years ago
In the summer of 1655 King Charles X Gustav of Sweden invaded the Commonwealth, already exhausted by war in the east. Much of the nobility and army capitulated, King John II Casimir took refuge in Silesia, and by October the Swedes held both Warsaw and Kraków.
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18 November 1803 · 222 years ago
Rebels led by Jean-Jacques Dessalines and François Capois attacked French troops under General Rochambeau at Vertières, near Cap-Français, in the last major battle of the Haitian Revolution. The French were beaten and capitulated, and Haiti declared independence soon after.
Read the full story of Battle of Vertières, 1803: the last battle of the Haitian Revolution ›
