From Historynet: Today in History February 25

1570          Pope Pius V  issues the bull Regnans in Excelsis which excommunicates Queen Elizabeth  of England.

1601          Robert Devereux , the second Earl of Essex and former favorite of Elizabeth I , is beheaded in the Tower of London for high treason.

1642          Dutch settlers slaughter lower Hudson Valley Indians in New Netherland, North America, who sought refuge from Mohawk attackers.

1779          The British surrender the Illinois country to George Rogers Clark at Vincennes.

1781          American General Nathaniel Greene  crosses the Dan River on his way to attack Cornwallis.

1791          President George Washington  signs a bill creating the Bank of the United States.

1804          Thomas Jefferson  is nominated for president at the Democratic-Republican caucus.

1815          Napoleon  leaves his exile on the island of Elba, returning to France.

1831          The Polish army halts the Russian advance into their country at the Battle of Grochow.

1836          Samuel Colt  patents the first revolving cylinder multi-shot firearm.

1862          Confederate troops abandon Nashville, Tennessee, in the face of Grant's  advance. The ironclad Monitor is commissioned at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

1865          General Joseph E. Johnston  replaces 

John Bell Hood  as Commander of the Confederate Army of Tennessee.

1904          J.M. Synge's  play Riders to the Sea opens in Dublin.

1910          The 13th Dalai Lama  flees from the Chinese and takes refuge in India.

1913          The 16th Amendment to the constitution is adopted, setting the legal basis for the income tax.

1919          Oregon introduces the first state tax on gasoline at one cent per gallon, to be used for road construction.

1926          Poland demands a permanent seat on the League of Nations council.

1928          Bell Labs introduces a new device to end the fluttering of the television image.

1943          U.S. troops retake the Kasserine Pass in Tunisia, where they had been defeated five days before.

1944          U.S. forces destroy 135 Japanese planes in Marianas and Guam.

1952          French colonial forces evacuate Hoa Binh in Indochina.

1956          Stalin  is secretly disavowed by 

Khrushchev  at a party congress for promoting the "cult of the individual."

1976          The U.S. Supreme Court rules that states may ban the hiring of illegal aliens.