TODAY IN HISTORY

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT Aug. 27, 1883

The island volcano Krakatoa erupted with a series of cataclysmic explosions; the resulting tidal waves in Indonesia’s Sunda Strait claimed some 36,000 lives in Java and Sumatra.

ALSO ON THIS DATE 1776

The Battle of Long Island began during the Revolutionary War as British troops attacked American forces, who ended up being forced to retreat two days later.

1928

The Kellogg-Briand Pact was signed in Paris, outlawing war and providing for the peaceful settlement of disputes.

1979

British war hero Lord Louis Mountbatten and three other people, including his 14-year-old grandson Nicholas, were killed off the coast of Ireland in a boat explosion claimed by the Irish Republican Army.

1989

The first U.S. commercial satellite rocket was launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida — a Delta booster carrying a British communications satellite, the Marcopolo 1.