11 March History
- 537 - The Goths lay siege to Rome.
- 1649 - The peace of Rueil is signed between the Frondeurs (rebels) and the French government.
- 1665 - A new legal code is approved for the Dutch and English towns, guaranteeing religious observances unhindered.
- 1702 - The Daily Courant, the first regular English newspaper is published.
- 1810 - The Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte is married by proxy to Archduchess Marie Louise.
- 1811 - Ned Ludd leads a group of workers in a wild protest against mechanization.
- 1824 - The U.S. War Department creates the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Seneca Indian Ely Parker becomes the first Indian to lead the Bureau.
- 1845 - Seven hundred Maoris led by their chief, Hone-Heke, burn the small town of Kororareka in protest at the settlement of Maoriland by Europeans, in breach with the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi.
- 1861 - A Confederate Convention is held in Montgomery, Ala., where the new constitution is adopted.
- 1863 - Union troops under General Ulysess S. Grant give up their preparations to take Vicksburg after failing to pass Fort Pemberton, north of Vicksburg.
- 1865 - Union General William Sherman and his forces occupy Fayetteville, N.C.
- 1888 - A disastrous blizzard hits the northeastern United States. Some 400 people die, mainly from exposure.
- 1900 - British Prime Minister Lord Salisbury rejects the peace overtures offered from Boer leader Paul Kruger.
- 1905 - The Parisian subway is officially inaugurated.
- 1907 - President Teddy Roosevelt induces California to revoke its anti-Japanese legislation.
- 1930 - President Howard Taft becomes the first U.S. president to be buried in the National Cemetery in Arlington, Va.
- 1935 - The German Air Force becomes an official organ of the Reich.
- 1941 - President Franklin D. Roosevelt authorizes the Lend-Lease Act which authorizes the act of giving war supplies to the Allies.
- 1942 - General Douglas MacArthur leaves Bataan for Australia.
- 1965 - The American navy begins inspecting Vietnamese junks in hopes of ending arms smuggling to the South.
- 1966 - Three men are convicted of the murder of Malcolm X.
- 1969 - Levi-Strauss starts to sell bell-bottomed jeans.
- 1973 - An FBI agent is shot at Wounded Knee in South Dakota.
- 1985 - Mikhail Gorbachev is named the new Soviet leader.
- 1990 - Lithuania declares its independence from the Soviet Union.
11 March Birthdays
- 1731 - Robert Treat Paine, Declaration of Independence signer
- 1860 - Thomas Hastings, architect of the New York Public Library.
- 1885 - Sir Michael Campbell, the first motorist to exceed 300 mph.
- 1899 - Frederick IX, King of Denmark
- 1908 - Lawrence Welk, orchestra leader.
- 1926 - Ralph David Abernathy, civil rights leader, associate of Dr. King.
- 1952 - Douglas Adams, British writer, (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy).