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From today's featured article

General Earl Van Dorn and other ships at the Battle of Plum Point Bend

CSS General Earl Van Dorn was a cottonclad warship used by the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. Purchased for Confederate service in New Orleans in early 1862 to serve with the River Defense Fleet, she was converted into a cottonclad warship by installing an iron-covered framework of timbers on her bow that served as a ram, and protecting her machinery with timber bulkheads packed with cotton. A sidewheel steamer, she was 182 feet (55 m) long and was armed with a single 32-pounder cannon on the bow. Initially assigned to defend the Mississippi River, she arrived at Memphis, Tennessee, in April 1862. On May 10, she fought with the River Defense Fleet against the Union navy in the Battle of Plum Point Bend (pictured), where she rammed and sank USS Mound City. After withdrawing up the Yazoo River to Liverpool Landing, Mississippi, General Earl Van Dorn, along with two other warships, was burnt to prevent her capture by approaching Union vessels. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Pillars at Horvat Sumaqa

... that the function of more than thirty grooved stone pillars at Horvat Sumaqa (pictured) remains unknown?
... that an early Elton John song has been described as "only marginally less horrifying" than its title?
... that two rowhouses survive amid skyscrapers in Midtown Manhattan?
... that several mining communities in Idaho during the late 19th century were majority-Chinese?
... that environmental destruction can be a means of genocide?
... that two painted slabs of the Berlin Wall are displayed as public art in Battery Park City?
... that Camila Cabello's album Romance features songs inspired by her relationship with Shawn Mendes?
... that a viral video was mistakenly linked to a missing-person case?
... that former academic William Riches declared his home an independent nation in 2017, in protest against Brexit?

In the news

Valentino in 2007

Italian fashion designer Valentino (pictured), founder of his eponymous fashion house, dies at the age of 93.
Wildfires in Chile leave more than 20 people dead.
In association football, the Africa Cup of Nations concludes with Senegal defeating Morocco in the final.
A diplomatic crisis over Greenland leads to European troop deployments and tariff threats from the United States.

On this day

January 25: Feast day of Saint Gregory of Nazianzus (Eastern Christianity), and of Dwynwen in Wales; Tatiana Day in Russia

Anne Boleyn

1533 – Anne Boleyn (depicted), already pregnant with the future Elizabeth I, secretly married Henry VIII of England in the second of his six marriages.
1971 – Idi Amin seized power from Ugandan president Milton Obote in a coup d'état, beginning eight years of military rule.
1995 – A team of Norwegian and American scientists launched a Black Brant XII sounding rocket, which was mistaken by Russian forces for a Trident missile.
2006 – Three independent observing campaigns announced the discovery of OGLE-2005-BLG-390Lb, a super-Earth 21,500 ± 3,300 light-years away from Earth near the center of the Milky Way.
2011 – Arab Spring: The Egyptian revolution began with protests on the "Day of Anger", eventually leading to the removal of President Hosni Mubarak after nearly 30 years of rule.

John Fisher, 1st Baron Fisher (b. 1841)
John Doubleday (d. 1856)
Adele Astaire (d. 1981)
Rio Waida (b. 2000)

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Today's featured picture

Hermann Schwarz (25 January 1843 – 30 November 1921) was a German mathematician, known for his work in complex analysis. Between 1867 and 1869, he worked at the University of Halle, then at the Swiss Federal Polytechnic in Zurich. From 1875, Schwarz worked at Göttingen University, dealing with the subjects of complex analysis, differential geometry, and the calculus of variations. In 1892, he became a member of the Berlin Academy of Science and a professor at the University of Berlin, where his students included Lipót Fejér, Paul Koebe and Ernst Zermelo. Schwarz's name is attached to many ideas in mathematics. This photograph of Schwarz, taken around 1890, is in the collection of the ETH Library.

Photograph credit: Louis Zipfel; restored by Adam Cuerden

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