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HISTORY & TIMELINE
26 February

A journey through
26 February in history

From a king’s death on the battlefield at Benevento in 1266 to the first flight of the rocket family that carried Apollo, 26 February has seen escapes, experiments and the carving-up of a continent. This timeline follows the date across seven centuries.

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JUMP THROUGH TIME
II
THE MIDDLE AGES

Medieval History

Kingdoms, conflict, faith, power and the changing medieval world.

1266
The Battle of Benevento in a 14th-century manuscript of Giovanni Villani's chronicle.The Battle of Benevento in a 14th-century manuscript of Giovanni Villani’s chronicle.Image: Giovanni Villani · Public domain
world · Europe

Charles of Anjou defeats Manfred at Benevento

On 26 February 1266, near Benevento in southern Italy, the French prince Charles of Anjou, backed by the Pope, defeated King Manfred of Sicily, who was killed in the battle. The victory all but destroyed the power of the Hohenstaufen dynasty in Italy and began Angevin rule over the Kingdom of Sicily and Naples.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: Battle of Benevento ↗
IV
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

The 1800s

Industry, empire, invention, reform and a century of enormous transformation.

1815
Napoleon leaving Elba, painted by Joseph Beaume in 1836.Napoleon leaving Elba, painted by Joseph Beaume in 1836.Image: Joseph Beaume · Public domain
world · Europe

Napoleon escapes from Elba

Less than a year after his abdication, Napoleon slipped away from his exile on the Mediterranean island of Elba on 26 February 1815, sailing in the brig Inconstant with a small flotilla. He landed near Cannes on 1 March with about 1,500 men and marched north towards Paris. Troops sent to stop him went over to his side, King Louis XVIII fled, and Napoleon entered Paris on 20 March. His return, the ‘Hundred Days’, ended with his defeat at Waterloo in June and exile to St Helena.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: Hundred Days ↗
1885
The title page of Germany's ratification of the General Act, April 1885.The title page of Germany’s ratification of the General Act, April 1885.Image: Auswärtiges Amt der Reichsregierung des Deutschen Reiches · Public domain
politics · Africa

The Berlin Conference signs its General Act

The Berlin West Africa Conference, which had opened in November 1884, closed on 26 February 1885 with a General Act signed by fourteen countries, none of them African. It declared the Congo and Niger rivers open to free navigation, recognised the Congo basin under King Leopold II’s control, and set rules for claiming African land by ‘effective occupation’. It helped speed the European scramble to divide the continent.

Source: South African History Online: General Act of the Berlin Conference on West Africa, 26 February 1885 ↗
V
THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

The 1900s

War and peace, technological leaps, social change, politics, sport and popular culture.

1914
Olympic (left) and Britannic (right) together at the Harland and Wolff yard in Belfast, about 1915.Olympic (left) and Britannic (right) together at the Harland and Wolff yard in Belfast, about 1915.Image: Unknown authorUnknown author · Public domain
world · Europe

Titanic’s sister Britannic is launched

The liner Britannic, the third and largest of White Star Line’s Olympic-class ships, was launched at the Harland and Wolff yard in Belfast on 26 February 1914. Her design was changed after the loss of Titanic, with more lifeboats and extra watertight protection. She never carried paying passengers: requisitioned as a hospital ship in the First World War, she struck a mine in the Aegean in November 1916 and sank in under an hour, with the loss of 30 lives.

Source: Titanic Belfast: Britannic (II) fact file ↗
1917
The Original Dixieland Jazz Band on a promotional postcard of about 1918.The Original Dixieland Jazz Band on a promotional postcard of about 1918.Image: Unknown authorUnknown author · Public domain
culture · Americas

The first jazz record is made

On 26 February 1917 the Original Dixieland Jass Band, five white musicians from New Orleans then playing in New York, recorded ‘Livery Stable Blues’ and ‘Dixieland Jass Band One-Step’ for the Victor company. The record is generally counted as the first jazz recording, and it sold in huge numbers. It is an awkward first: the band’s leader Nick LaRocca later claimed to have invented jazz, a music created by Black musicians in New Orleans who had not yet been given the chance to record.

Source: Library of Congress, Now See Hear!: The first jazz recording, one hundred years later ↗
1929
The Teton Range in winter.The Teton Range in winter.Image: NPS · Public domain
world · Americas

Grand Teton becomes a national park

On 26 February 1929 President Calvin Coolidge signed the bill creating Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming. The first park covered 96,000 acres, taking in the jagged peaks of the Teton Range and six glacial lakes at their foot. Much of the valley of Jackson Hole below was quietly bought up by John D. Rockefeller Jr. to protect it. After years of dispute it was joined to the park in 1950, making an enlarged park of about 310,000 acres.

Source: National Park Service: Creation of Grand Teton National Park, a thumbnail history ↗
1935
The memorial near Weedon Bec, Northamptonshire, marking the field where the 1935 test took place.The memorial near Weedon Bec, Northamptonshire, marking the field where the 1935 test took place.Image: Cj1340 · CC BY-SA 3.0
science · Europe

The Daventry experiment shows radar can work

On the morning of 26 February 1935 a Handley Page Heyford bomber flew back and forth near the BBC’s powerful shortwave transmitter at Daventry. In a van parked in a field below, Arnold Wilkins and Robert Watson-Watt watched a spot on a screen rise as radio waves bounced back from the aircraft, several miles away. Watson-Watt is said to have remarked that Britain was an island once more. Money for research began to flow at once, and within a few years a chain of radar stations along the coast was ready to guide fighters in the Battle of Britain.

Source: Science Museum: Robert Watson-Watt and the triumph of radar ↗
1936
Rebel troops gathered at the Tokyo police headquarters in the snow, 26 February 1936.Rebel troops gathered at the Tokyo police headquarters in the snow, 26 February 1936.Image: Kōyō Ishikawa · Public domain
politics · Asia

Young officers attempt a coup in Tokyo

Before dawn on 26 February 1936, in heavy snow, radical young army officers led about 1,400 soldiers against the prime minister’s residence and other targets in Tokyo. They killed the finance minister Takahashi Korekiyo, the former prime minister Saitō Makoto and the army’s inspector general of military training, and occupied the centre of the capital. Emperor Hirohito demanded that the revolt be put down, and the troops surrendered after three days. Its leaders were executed, but the army emerged with greater power over the government, speeding Japan’s path to war.

Source: National Diet Library, Japan: The 2.26 Incident of 1936 ↗
1966
The Saturn IB rocket with its Apollo spacecraft on the pad at Launch Complex 34 during a countdown test, 6 February 1966.The Saturn IB rocket with its Apollo spacecraft on the pad at Launch Complex 34 during a countdown test, 6 February 1966.Image: NASA Johnson Space Center · Public domain
science · Americas

The first Saturn IB and Apollo spacecraft fly

At 11.12 in the morning on 26 February 1966 the first Saturn IB rocket lifted off from Cape Kennedy carrying an uncrewed Apollo command and service module. It was the first flight of Apollo spacecraft hardware and of the J-2 engine that would later power the upper stages of the Saturn V. On the 37-minute suborbital flight the service module’s engine fired and the command module’s heat shield was tested at high speed, before it splashed down in the South Atlantic. The Saturn IB later launched the first crewed Apollo flight, Apollo 7.

Source: NASA: 55 years ago, Apollo AS-201 test flight ↗
RESEARCH

Sources & Further Reading

Selected authoritative references supporting the events on this page.

WHY THESE MOMENTS?

Significance before volume

This page is not the longest possible list of events. It is a chronological journey through 26 February, where each entry is chosen for historical significance, human interest and reliability.

Facts are checked against authoritative museums, archives, universities and reference works. Where sources disagree, the page says so.

EXPLORED THE DEEPER STORY?

Return to the highlights of 26 February

Discover the lighter side of the date with famous birthdays, culture, firsts and lives remembered.

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