| January 27, 1847 Several hundred citizens of Marshall, Michigan, helped former slaves escape to Canada rather than be returned to their “owner” by bounty hunters. Adam Crosswhite and his family, escaped Kentucky slaves, were tracked to the abolitionist town of Marshall by Francis Troutman and others. Both black and white residents detained the bounty hunters and threatened them with tar and feathers. While Troutman was being charged with assault and fined $100, the Crosswhites fled to Canada.  Back in Kentucky, the slaveowner stirred up intense excitement about “abolitionist mobs” in Michigan. Since 1832, Michigan had had an active antislavery society. Quakers in Cass County, Laura Haviland in Adrian and former slave Sojourner Truth in Battle Creek were only a few of the many Michiganians who worked on the Underground Railroad—an informal network that assisted escaping slaves. Southern concern over the Underground Railroad led Congress to pass a more stringent Fugitive Slave Law in 1850. In 1854 opposition to the extension of slavery prompted Michigan citizens to meet in nearby Jackson to organize the Republican Party.  Laura Haviland with some artifacts of slavery Sojourner Truth – this should be a link to Ohio History Connection’s entry on Sojourner Truth. That page is no longer available. I don’t see a date or a reason, just that it’s gone. So, here is a link to the National Women’s History Museum’s entry on Sojourner Truth! -A |
| January 27, 1945 The Red Army of the Soviet Union liberated the German Nazis’ largest concentration camps: the Auschwitz main camp, the Birkenau death camp and the Monowitz labor camp in southwestern Poland.  Soviet troops liberated the Nazi concentration camps Auschwitz and Birkenau in Poland. |
January 27, 1951 The first atomic test was conducted at the Nevada Proving Ground as an Air Force plane dropped a one-kiloton bomb on Frenchman Flats. The Proving Ground was created by President Harry Truman on January 11, 1951.  The final nuclear test, Divider, was conducted on September 23, 1992. There were 99 above ground tests and over 800 below ground tests there. read more |
| January 27, 1969 In Detroit, African-American auto workers, known as the Eldon Avenue Axle Plant Revolutionary Union Movement, led a wildcat strike against racist practices and poor working conditions at the Chrysler plant.Since the 1967 Detroit riots, black workers had organized groups in several Detroit auto plants critical of both the auto companies and the United Auto Workers union leadership. These groups combined Black-Power nationalism and workplace militancy, and temporarily shut down more than a dozen inner-city plants. The most well-known of these groups was the Dodge Revolutionary Union Movement, or DRUM. They criticized both the seniority system and grievance procedures as racist. Veterans of this movement went on to lead many of the same local unions.  Detroit: I Do Mind Dying A Study in Urban Revolution (pdf) |
| January 27, 1973 The United States and North Vietnam signed “An Agreement Ending the War and Restoring Peace in Vietnam” in Paris and all U.S. troops were to leave Vietnam within 90 days. The United States, South Vietnam, Viet Cong, and North Vietnam formally sign but because South Vietnam was unwilling to recognize the Viet Cong’s Provisional Revolutionary Government, all references to it were confined to the document signed by North Vietnam and the United States. The same day, the United States announced an end to the military draft.The Vietnam War resulted in between three and four million Vietnamese deaths with a countless number of Vietnamese casualties. It cost the United States 58,000 lives and 350,000 casualties. The financial cost to the United States came to something over $150 billion dollars.  Henry A. Kissinger and Le Duc Thos initial the agreement. |
| January 27, 1973 The Pentagon announced a “zero draft,” putting the Selective Service System on standby after five years of continuous operation. 1,728,344 men had been drafted in the previous eight years (principally for the war in Vietnam), 25% of all the armed forces. |
January 27, 1988  CISPIS demo May, 1981 Wash DC The Center for Constitutional Rights revealed the FBI had spied on numerous organizations critical of Reagan administration policies in Central America. The principal target was the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES). 100 other groups were also investigated, including the Roman Catholic Maryknoll Sisters, the United Auto Workers, the United Steel Workers, and the National Education Association. FBI Director William Sessions said the investigations were an outgrowth of the belief that CISPES was aiding a “terrorist organization.” CISPES today How domestic surveillance multiplied under the label or preventing terrorist attacks |
| January 27, 1996 France performed its final nuclear weapons test. France exploded the last in a series of six underground nuclear devices in the South Pacific. The tests, ordered by President Jacques Chirac, ended a moratorium imposed by the former president, François Mitterand, but Chirac said France would accept the terms of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. |
https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryjanuary.htm#january27
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