Browse Historical Events by Month:
The first Olympic games, the founding of dynasties, and legendary battles. Explore historic milestones from March that influenced today's world. Dates for earlier events may be approximate.
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Nikita S. Khrushchev becomes Premier of the Soviet Union on March 27, 1958, He also remains First Secretary and therefore leader of the Communist party. The two posts had been combined and held by Stalin, highlighting his role as the new undisputed leader of the nation.
Tibetans begin their revolt in Lhasa on March 10, 1959 against the Chinese government which had invaded Tibet in1950. Chinese troops launched a counter-offensive against the Tibetans, capturing Lhasa and resulting in the deaths of some 2,000 Tibetan rebels.
The Chinese government dissolved the Tibetan government headed by the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama assumed control of the Tibetan government on The Chinese government officially dissolved the Lhasa-based Tibetan government, known as the Kashag, on March 28, 1959, following the Tibetan uprising and the 14th Dalai Lama's escape to India with some 80 supporters . Some 87,000 Tibetans and 2,000 Chinese government troops were killed, and some 100,000 Tibetans fled as refugees to India, Nepal, and Bhutan during the conflict.
The Sharpeville massacre in South Africa occurs on March 21, 1960, as police open fire on a crowd of approximately 5,000 demonstrating against apartheid, resulting in at least 91 people killed and 238 people wounded. Many people were shot in the back as they fled from the police. More
President John F. Kennedy establishes the Peace Corps by executive order on March 1, 1961, to promote world peace and friendship by creating closer ties between American volunteers and the people of the communities they serve.
The U.S. Congress recognized it through legislation later that year. The Peace Core Services was affected by the Covid Pandemic and in 2025 by the DOGE cost cuts.
The French - Algerian war or the the War of Algerian independence comes to an end with the signing of a peace agreement on March 18, 1962, to end the seven-year Algerian War and bringing an end to 130 years of colonial French rule in Algeria.
Between 500,000 and a million Algerians had been killed, out of an estimated population of just three million before the war. French losses were also high; between 150,000 and 200,000 French soldiers lost their lives, with the vast majority of them dying in hospitals. More
The Alcatraz Federal Prison in San Francisco Bay closes on March 21, 1963, after 29 years of operation.
The first batch of 137 prisoners had arrived at Alcatraz on August 11, 1934 from the United States Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas. During its 29 year history, Alcatraz held some of the most dangerous civilian prisoners, including Al Capone and Robert Stroud, the “Birdman of Alcatraz”. More
A 9.2-magnitude earthquake, struck South-central Alaska on March 27, 1964. It is the strongest earthquake in U.S. history and second-most powerful worldwide The quake lasted 4.5 minutes, causing 139 fatalities, devastating tsunamis and major structural damage.
The epicenter was in the northern Prince William Sound region, roughly 75 miles east of Anchorage. The rupture spanned 800 km (500 miles) of the Earth's crust, with the Pacific plate breaking free from the North America. The event caused massive vertical changes, some areas, like Kodiak and Hinchinbrook Island, were permanently raised by up to 30 feet, while other areas dropped up to 8 feet. Resulting tsunamis affected the coasts of Alaska, British Columbia, and Northern California. The city of Valdez experienced a massive underwater landslide, and in Anchorage, 4th Avenue dropped 3 meters. The disaster led to major improvements in scientific understanding, prompting the development of the NOAA Tsunami Warning Centers and the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program. More
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Civil rights marchers, including John Lewis and Martin Luther King Jr., are attacked by police on March 7, 1965, at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, in what becomes known as "Bloody Sunday." More
This file was provided to Wikimedia Commons by the National Archives and Records Administration as part of a cooperation project. The National Archives and Records Administration provides images depicting American and global history which are public domain or licensed under a free license.
The first American combat troops arrive in Vietnam on March 8, 1965as 3,500 Marines of the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade land in Da Nang to protect the U.S. airbase and to allow the Vietnamese troops guarding it from Viet Cong attacks to return to combat. More
Soviet cosmonaut Aleksei A. Leonov was the first man ever to walk in space, when he exited the spacecraft on a tether on March 18, 1965 and floated for approximately 12 minutes, 9 seconds outside the capsule. He was the pilot of the Voskhod 2 mission, part of the Soviet Union's attempt in competition with the US to reach the moon.
President Lyndon B. Johnson places the Alabama National Guard under federal control on March 20, 1965, to protect a civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery to the state capital; dispatching 2,500 U.S. Army troops and 1,900 Alabama National Guard troops, along with FBI agents and U.S. Marshals to provide protection for the marchers.
On March 7, demonstrators sought to march there to protest the death of Jimmie Lee Jackson, a black man shot by a state trooper. State and local police had attacked them with billy clubs and tear gas. Televised scenes of “Bloody Sunday” outraged many Americans. More
Martin Luther King Jr. leads thousands of civil rights demonstrators out of Selma, Alabama, on March 21, 1965, on his third, and this time, successful attempt, to complete the march to the state capital of Montgomery, aimed to secure voting rights.
The successful march was protected by federalized National Guardsmen, ordered by President Lyndon B. Johnson after two previous attempts were halted by injunctions and violence particularly on "Bloody Sunday" on March 7. The March grew to roughly 25,000 by the time they reached the Capitol in Montgomery on March 25. The publicity surrounding it contributed to the passage of the Voting Rights Act later that year on August 6, 1965.
Martin Luther King Jr. leads his first anti-war march, on March 25, 1967, in Chicago. Reinforcing the connection between war abroad and injustice at home: “The bombs in Vietnam explode at home... destroy the dream and possibility for a decent America”. More
Mauritius officially achieves independence from British rule, on March 12, 1968, becoming an independent state with a new constitution within the Commonwealth.
Independence came after 158 years of colonial rule when the British seized control of the Island from the French in 1810 during the Napoleonic wars. Mauritius went on to became a republic, with a president as head of state on March 12, 1992.
Vietnamese villagers including women and children are killed by U.S. soldiers in the village of My Lai by members of an army platoon commanded by Lt. William Calley. On September 5, 1969, he was charged with the premeditated murder in the death of 109 Vietnamese civilians at My Lai.
His court-martial began on November 1970 and he was convicted on March 1971 of the premeditated murder of twenty-two infants, children, women, and old men, and assault with intent to murder a child of about two years. He was sentenced to be dismissed from the Army and to be confined at hard labor for life. On August 1971, Lieutenant General Albert O. Connor, commanding general of Third U.S. Army, reduced Calley’s sentence to twenty years confinement. In April 1974, the Secretary of the Army, Howard H. Callaway, further reduced Calley’s sentence to ten years confinement, making Calley eligible for parole in 6 months. He was pardoned by President Richard Nixon in 1974 after serving about a third of his 10-year sentence and was released in November 1974 having served three years of house arrest for the murders. More
James Earl Ray pleads guilty to the first-degree murder of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on March 10, 1969, in a Memphis, Tennessee court, on advise from his attorney to avoid a potential death sentence by electric chair. He was sentenced to 99 years in prison. He quickly recanted his confession, spending the rest of his life claiming he was framed and seeking a new trial.
Lt. William Calley is convicted of murder on March 29, 1971, in the My Lai Massacre, during the Vietnam War on March 16, 1968 He was sentenced to be dismissed from the Army and to be confined at hard labor for life. On August 1971, Lieutenant General Albert O. Connor, commanding general of Third U.S. Army, reduced Calley’s sentence to twenty years confinement.
In April 1974, the Secretary of the Army, Howard H. Callaway, further reduced Calley’s sentence to ten years confinement, making Calley eligible for parole in 6 months. He was pardoned by President Richard Nixon in 1974 after serving about a third of his 10-year sentence and was released in November 1974 having served three years of house arrest for the murders. Calley More
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Pioneer 10 is launched on March 2, 1972, to study Jupiter. It was NASA's first mission to the outer planets. The mission was a spectacular success and the spacecraft notched a series of firsts unmatched by any other robotic spacecraft to date. More
The last U.S. combat troops departed South Vietnam on March 29, 1973, bringing the direct American military involvement in the Vietnam War to an end.
The Paris Peace accords had been signed on January 27, 1973 by the North and South Vietnamese Governments and by the U.S Nixon Administration. On the same day, Hanoi released the remaining 591 American prisoners of war (POWs). Over 58,000 Americans died in the Vietnam War.
On April 29, 1975, the North Vietnamese troops began to shell Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, as they get ready to capture the city, and the U.S. ordered the evacuation of all personnel, but the only way out was by helicopter. When the massive evacuation ended a day later, about 6,500 people had been airlifted including nearly 900 Americans. Hours later, on April 30, Saigon fell, and with it, came the end of the Vietnam War. More
All 346 occupants of a Turkish Airlines McDonnell Douglas DC 10 were killed after the plane suffered an explosive decompression when an improperly secured hold door detached passing 12000ft in the climb shortly after departing Paris Orly airport.
A similar DC10 explosive decompression in Canada two years earlier, had identified an identical fault in the door closure mechanism which had allowed it to indicate and appear secured. Non-mandated corrective actions promulgated after that investigation had not been completed on the aircraft at the time of the accident. More
