January 18th 1815, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA The Battle of New Orleans was the most important battle of the War of 1812, and a battle fought after a peace treaty between the United States of America and Great Britain was signed. On July 18th 1812 American president James Madison, had the American congress declare war on Great Britain, due to rising tensions between the two nations, mainly caused by Great Britain press-ganging American sailors on to English ships to fight against Napoleonic France. On August 14th 1814, British Maj-General Robert Ross landed close to Washington D.C. and marched on the city and proceeded to burn it down. About a month later Ross marched to Baltimore, but was defeated at the Battle of Baltimore by American General Samuel Smith. The fighting at Baltimore would inspire a poem by Francis Scott Key and eventually become the Star Spangled Banner, the American national anthem. The British then had plans to attack and capture the city of New Orleans. General Andrew Jackson who was in the area and had significant experience fighting the local Creek Indians, headed to New Orleans. When Jackson arrived he began recruiting from the locals to bolster his forces and assembled a rag-tag force of American soldiers, militiamen, French pirates and smugglers and Choctaw Indians. In late December 1814 the British arrived and set up a camp. During the night Jackson raided the camp, inflicting some losses on the British before withdrawing when morning came. In early January 1815 Jackson had fortifications constructed along a canal, which was named "Jackson's Line". At this point the Americans had around 5k men, while the British had around 8k led by Maj-General Edward Pakenham. On January 8th 1815 Pakenham began the attack on New Orleans under the cover of fog as he believed this prevent American cannons from firing at his men. But as the British got about halfway to Jackson's Line the fog lifted and American cannons began firing. The Americans were also much more accurate shots than the British dues to most of Jackson's men being hunters. During the battle Pakenham was killed, and discipline broke down among the British causing them to retreat. The battle lasted around 30 minutes, with the British losing 2k men and the Americans only losing 70. At this point word of a peace treaty had been signed almost a month ago reached America and ended the War of 1812. The Battle of New Orleans made Andrew Jackson a hero among the Americans.

Today begins the jewish "holiday" of hanukkah, so let's take a look at the real history behind it. After Alexander the Great's death in 323BC his empire was split amongst his generals. One of them was a man by the name of Seleucus I Nicator who founded the Seleucid Empire. In the year 170BC the Seleucid Empire had defeated Ptolemaic Egypt during the 6th Syrian War and gained full control of the Levant, including the province of Judea. In 168BC Seleucid Emperor Antiochus IV had plans to Hellenize the Levant and ordered a statue of the Greek God Zeus to be built outside of the jewish temple in Jerusalem. Because of this many jews gave up their religion and willingly converted to the Greek religion. In 167BC a jew by the name of Mattathias began what would become to known as the Maccabean Revolt when he refused to sacrifice a pig on the alter of a Greek temple then killed the man who volunteered to take his place and desecrated the alter and fled the city into the hill. One year later Mattathias's son Judas gathered like minded jews began a violent revolt, going into towns and massacring any Greek or jewish convert they could find and also began forcibly circumcising children, as well as destroying Greek temples. The Seleucid Governor was informed of the revolt and a Seleucid Army of around 30k was dispatched to crush the revolt. The jews fought a guerilla style war against the Seleucids, for many years and in 164BC the Seleucids withdrew to Syria due to Antiochus's death. The jews believed this was a sign they had won and built a new temple to commemorate. This event was completely forgotten by jews until around the 1890's when jewish rabbi's decided to turn the event into a holiday as a means of mocking the Christian Advent calendar and Christmas.

June 22nd 217B.C. Raphia(Rafah) Palestine. After Alexander the Great's death in 323B.C. his empire was spilt among his generals also known as the Diadochi. The two largest portions went to Seleucus I Nicator who founded the Seleucid Empire and Ptolemy I Soter who became Pharaoh of Egypt and started the Ptolemaic dynasty of pharaohs. For many years the Seleucid Empire and Ptolemaic Egypt fought over the region known as Cole-Syria(modern-day Syria, Lebanon, and Northern Palestine). In 219B.C. Seleucid Emperor Antiochus III invaded the region and captured a vast amount of territory, with the aid of the Governor of Tyre Theodotus, who switched sides from Egypt to the Seleucids. In 218B.C. Pharaoh Ptolemy IV began gathering an army to reclaim the region from the Seleucids. By mid-218B.C. he set out for the Levant. By mid 217B.C. both armies had met near the town of Raphia. The Ptolemaic Army had 75k men, 70k infantry, 5k cavalry, and 73 elephants. The Seleucids had 70k men, 64k infantry 6k cavalry and 102 elephants. The Seleucid elephants were Indian elephants which were much larger than the African elephants used by the Ptolemaic. These were also two of the largest armies assembled during the Hellenic Era. Both sides initially constructed fortified camps, and foraged the area for food where they fought small skirmishes against each other. During this time Theodotus came up with a daring plan and snuck into the Ptolemaic camp, located Ptolemy IV's royal tent, but when he entered the tent he did not find Ptolemy but his doctor who he ended up killing and managed to exit the camp unnoticed. On June 22nd Ptolemy assembled his army for battle and Antiochus assembled his army as well. Ptolemy placed himself on the Ptolemaic left flank and Antiochus commanded the Seleucid right flank. The battle started when both sides sent their elephants forward to attack, but as the elephants fought many of the African elephants were said to have become disturbed by the smell of the Indian elephants, which ended up causing many of the African elephants to run off the battlefield. Antiochus took advantage of this and ordered the entire Seleucid right flank to attack, which resulted in the collapse of the Ptolemaic left flank and Antiochus chased them off of the battlefield. Ptolemy escaped and took command of his center. The Ptolemaic right then advanced on the Seleucid left. Ptolemy then had his center advance on the Seleucid center. Ptolemy's center had significantly more men than the Seleucids, so after hard fighting both the Seleucid center and right had broke. Antiochus who was still chasing after the fleeing soldiers from the Ptolemaic left, had just been informed by a messenger that his center and right had collapsed. Antiochus and his men turned around to head back to the battle, but by that time it was too late. Antiochus withdrew to his camp. The Ptolemaic had lost 2k men, while the Seleucids had lost over 10k. The Battle of Raphia was considered to be one of the largest of the Hellenic Era. Despite Antiochus's loss at Raphia he would later go on to be one of the greatest Seleucid emperors expanding the empire's borders to it's largest extent and earing the title of Antiochus the Great.