From Historynet: Today in History February 18

1478          George, the Duke of Clarence , who had opposed his brother Edward IV , is murdered in the Tower of London.

1688          Quakers in Germantown, Pa. adopt the first formal antislavery resolution in America.

1813          Czar Alexander  enters Warsaw at the head of his Army.

1861          Victor Emmanuel II  becomes the first King of Italy.

1861          Jefferson F. Davis  is inaugurated as the Confederacy's provisional president at a ceremony held in Montgomery, Ala.

1865          Union troops force the Confederates to abandon Fort Anderson, N.C.

1878          The bitter and bloody Lincoln County War begins with the murder of Billy the Kid's  mentor, Englishman rancher John Tunstall .

1885          The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by 

Mark Twain , is published in New York.

1907          600,000 tons of grain are sent to Russia to relieve the famine there.

1920          Vuillemin and Chalus  complete their first flight over the Sahara Desert.

1932          Manchurian independence is formally declared.

1935          Rome reports sending troops to Italian Somalia.

1939          The Golden Gate Exposition opens in San Francisco.

1943          German General Erwin Rommel  takes three towns in Tunisia, North Africa.

1944          The U.S. Army and Marines invade Eniwetok Atoll in the Pacific.

1945          U.S. Marines storm ashore at Iwo Jima.

1954          East and West Berlin drop thousands of propaganda leaflets on each other after the end of a month long truce.

1962          Robert F. Kennedy  says that U.S. troops will stay in Vietnam until Communism is defeated.

1964          The United States cuts military aid to five nations in reprisal for having trade relations with Cuba.

1967          The National Art Gallery in Washington agrees to buy a Da Vinci for a record $5 million.

1968          Three U.S. pilots that were held by the Vietnamese arrive in Washington.

1972          The California Supreme Court voids the death penalty.

1974          Randolph Hearst  is to give $2 million in free food for the poor in order to open talks for his daughter Patty.

1982          Mexico devalues the peso by 30 percent to fight an economic slide.