Events on March 30 31
Year 598
Balkan Campaign: The Avars lift the siege at the Byzantine stronghold of Tomis. Their leader Bayan I retreats north of the Danube River after the Avaro-Slavic hordes are decimated by the plague.
Year 1282
The people of Sicily rebel against the Angevin king Charles I, in what becomes known as the Sicilian Vespers.
Year 1296
Edward I sacks Berwick-upon-Tweed, during armed conflict between Scotland and England.
Year 1815
Joachim Murat issues the Rimini Proclamation which would later inspire Italian unification.
Year 1842
Ether anesthesia is used for the first time, in an operation by the American surgeon Dr. Crawford Long.
Year 1844
One of the most important battles of the Dominican War of Independence from Haiti takes place near the city of Santiago de los Caballeros.
Year 1855
Origins of the American Civil War: "Border Ruffians" from Missouri invade Kansas and force election of a pro-slavery legislature.
Year 1867
Alaska is purchased from Russia for $7.2 million, about 2-cent/acre ($4.19/km²), by United States Secretary of State William H. Seward.
Year 1885
The Battle for Kushka triggers the Panjdeh Incident which nearly gives rise to war between the British Empire and Russian Empire.
Year 1899
German Society of Chemistry issues an invitation to other national scientific organizations to appoint delegates to the International Committee on Atomic Weights.
Year 1912
Sultan Abd al-Hafid signs the Treaty of Fez, making Morocco a French protectorate.
Year 1918
Outburst of bloody March Events in Baku and other locations of Baku Governorate.
Year 1940
Second Sino-Japanese War: Japan declares Nanking capital of a new Chinese puppet government, nominally controlled by Wang Jingwei.
Year 1944
World War II: Allied bombers conduct their most severe bombing run on Sofia, Bulgaria.
Year 1944
Out of 795 Lancasters, Halifaxes and Mosquitos sent to attack Nuremberg, 95 bombers do not return, making it the largest RAF Bomber Command loss of the war.
Year 1945
World War II: Soviet forces invade Austria and capture Vienna; Polish and Soviet forces liberate Danzig.
Year 1965
Vietnam War: A car bomb explodes in front of the United States Embassy, Saigon, killing 22 and wounding 183 others.
Year 1972
Vietnam War: The Easter Offensive begins after North Vietnamese forces cross into the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) of South Vietnam.
Year 1979
Airey Neave, a British Member of Parliament, is killed by a car bomb as he exits the Palace of Westminster. The Irish National Liberation Army claims responsibility.
Year 1981
U.S. President Ronald Reagan is shot in the chest outside a Washington, D.C., hotel by John Hinckley, Jr.; three others are wounded in the same incident.
Year 1982
Space Shuttle program: STS-3 Mission is completed with the landing of Columbia at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico.