On This Day - What happened 4 April

On 4 April, led by Michel Ney, they confronted Napoleon. Napoleon asserted the army would follow him, and Ney replied the army would follow its generals. While the ordinary soldiers and regimental officers wanted to fight on, without any senior officers or marshals any prospective invasion of Paris would have been impossible.

On April 4, 1818, a plan was passed by Congress at the suggestion of U.S. Naval Captain Samuel C. Reid in which the flag was changed to have 20 stars, with a new star to be added when each new state was admitted, but the number of stripes would be reduced to 13 so as to honor the original colonies.

The remaining eight slave states rejected pleas to join the Confederacy following a two-to-one no-vote in Virginia's First Secessionist Convention on April 4, 1861.

On 4 April 1862, Mendeleev got engaged to Feozva Nikitichna Leshcheva in Saint Petersburg, Russia.

On 4 April, South African General Jan Smuts was sent to Hungary. He carried the proposition that the Hungarian communist government under Kun abide by the conditions previously presented to Károlyi in the Vix note. Smuts' mission also represented official recognition of the Kun communist government by the Allied council.

Soviets entered Pomerania. The offensive lasted from 24 February to 4 April 1945.

Talks for a new military alliance which could also include North America resulted in the signature of the North Atlantic Treaty on 4 April 1949 by the member states of the Western Union plus the United States, Canada, Portugal, Italy, Norway, Denmark and Iceland.

On April 4, 1959, Genovese was convicted in New York of conspiracy to violate federal narcotics laws. Sent to prison for 15 years, Genovese tried to run his crime family from prison until his death in 1969. Meanwhile, Gambino now became the most powerful man in the Cosa Nostra.

The Eisenhower administration had created a plan to overthrow Fidel Castro's regime in Cuba. Led by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), with help from the U.S. military, the plan was for an invasion of Cuba by a counter-revolutionary insurgency composed of U.S.-trained, anti-Castro Cuban exiles led by CIA paramilitary officers. The intention was to invade Cuba and instigate an uprising among the Cuban people, hoping to remove Castro from power. Kennedy approved the final invasion plan on April 4, 1961.

On 4 April 1961, President Kennedy then approved the Bay of Pigs plan (also known as Operation Zapata), because it had a sufficiently long airfield, it was farther away from large groups of civilians than the Trinidad plan, and it was less "noisy" militarily, which would make denial of direct US involvement more plausible. The invasion landing area was changed to beaches bordering the Bahía de Cochinos (Bay of Pigs) in Las Villas Province.

During an April 4, 1967, appearance at the New York City Riverside Church—exactly one year before his death—King delivered a speech titled "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence." He spoke strongly against the U.S.'s role in the war, arguing that the U.S. was in Vietnam "to occupy it as an American colony" and calling the U.S. government "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today".

The plan to set up a shantytown in Washington, D.C., was carried out soon after the April 4 assassination. Criticism of King's plan was subdued in the wake of his death, and the SCLC received an unprecedented wave of donations for the purpose of carrying it out. The campaign officially began in Memphis, on May 2, at the hotel where King was murdered.

After a period of well being, the edema returned on 4 April and Vera insisted that medical equipment should be installed in the apartment.

Gates and Allen officially established Microsoft on April 4, 1975, with Gates as the CEO. The original name of "Micro-Soft" (short for microcomputer software) was suggested by Allen.

The nuclear-powered submarine Conqueror set sail from France on 4 April, whilst the two aircraft carriers Invincible and Hermes, in the company of escort vessels, left Portsmouth only a day later.

The Chilean government also allowed the United Kingdom to requisition the refueling vessel RFA Tidepool, which Chile had recently purchased and which had arrived at Arica in Chile on 4 April. The ship left port soon afterwards, bound for Ascention Island through the Panama Canal and stopping at Curacao en route.

On 4 April 2000, Cameron was selected as PPC for Witney in Oxfordshire.

The merger of Vodafone's US wireless assets with Bell Atlantic Corp to form Verizon was completed on 4 April 2000, just a few months prior to Bell Atlantic's merger with GTE to form Verizon Communications, Inc.

A Chinese health specialist admitted at a press conference of not informing the public early enough about the outbreak. The PRC Health Minister also claimed that the disease has been under control in most parts of mainland China. He also released the names of seven drugs which he claimed to be effective in curing SARS.

On April 5, the Singapore government announced that school closures would be extended. Junior colleges were to reopen on April 9, secondary schools would reopen on April 14 and primary schools and pre-schools would reopen on April 16.

On April 4, 2007, the NYSE Group completed its merger with Euronext, the European combined stock market, thus forming NYSE Euronext, the first transatlantic stock exchange.

The policies of French President Nicolas Sarkozy resulted in a major reform of France's military position, culminating with the return to full membership on 4 April 2009, which also included France rejoining the NATO Military Command Structure, while maintaining an independent nuclear deterrent.

On April 4, 2011, Obama announced his reelection campaign for 2012 in a video titled "It Begins with Us" that he posted on his website and filed election papers with the Federal Election Commission.

The following night on Raw, The Rock and Cena agreed to a match at WrestleMania XXVIII the next year. They then worked together to fend off an attack by The Corre, which at the time consisted of Wade Barrett, Heath Slater, Justin Gabriel, and Ezekiel Jackson.

Speaking on 4 April 2013, the US Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel, informed the press that Pyongyang "formally informed" the Pentagon that it "ratified" the potential use of a nuclear weapon against South Korea, Japan and the United States of America, including Guam and Hawaii.

On 4 April 2013, she received an honorary BAFTA for her patronage of the film industry and was called "the most memorable Bond girl yet" at the award ceremony.

Hart was charged on April 14, 2013, on suspicion of drunk driving after his black Mercedes nearly collided with a tanker truck on a Southern California freeway. Hart failed a field sobriety test and was booked for misdemeanor "Driving under the influence".

David Malpass was elected President of the World Bank on April 4, 2019.

On April 4, 2019, the divorce was finalized (Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Tuttle).

On 4 April 2019, half a billion records of Facebook users were found exposed on Amazon cloud servers, containing information about users’ friends, likes, groups, and checked-in locations, as well as “names, passwords and email addresses.

As of 4 April, there were 119,827 confirmed cases, 14,681 deaths, and 19,758 recoveries in Italy, with the majority of those cases occurring in the Lombardy region. A CNN report indicated that the combination of Italy's large elderly population and the inability to test all who have the virus to date may be contributing to the high fatality rate.

Frederick II, King of Denmark and Norway, passed away at the age of 53.

The English fleet defeated Barbary pirates at Postage Farina.

John Hoppner was an English portrait painter who was born in London in 1758.