From Hitler ’s 1941 decision to invade Russia to the partition of India, from Spain funding the voyages of Christopher Columbus to Decca records rejecting The Beatles.
These seismic events all had a momentous effect on the years to come.
They’re among the 50 decisions which changed the world, according to experts who put the list together to mark the 50th issue of History Revealed magazine.
Here they are, in no particular order...
1941: Hitler invades Russia. Clash with Soviets sapped Nazis’ strength, enabling an Allied fightback.
1066: Harold Godwinson sends his troops north
King Harold beat an invading Viking army in the Battle of Stamford Bridge, 19 days before the Battle of Hastings.
1961: JFK pledges to put a man on the moon
The US President said they’d do it within a decade and they did – in 1969.
1947: India is split in two
The Partition of India and creation of Pakistan was the largest mass migration in human history, 15 million people displaced and one million killed.
1762: Catherine the Great refuses to flee Russia
Instead, after husband Peter III became Tsar, she mobilized troops, had him arrested and spent the next 34 years expanding the Russian Empire.
1532: Atahualpa accepts an invitation to dinner
The Inca Emperor and his 80,000 men felt no threat from Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro and his 180 troops. But at the feast he was captured and 7,000 of his men slaughtered.
1492: Spain funds the voyages of Christopher Columbus
Explorer became the first European to discover the Caribbean and Americas.
1589: Richard Hakluyt publishes a book that changes how the world is viewed
The huge Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation urged exploration of Africa and the New World.
1587: Elizabeth I has Mary, Queen of Scots executed
It enraged Catholic Europe and led to the Spanish Armada the following year.
1945: The US drops the atom bomb on Hiroshima, Japan
It killed 80,000 people instantly. Three days later, a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan surrendered, and the Second World War came to an end.
1962: Decca turns down Beatles
If the band had signed to Decca, they’d have had to record what they were ordered to and probably failed to become a musical phenomenon.
1945: Nation votes for Clement Attlee over Winston Churchill
Setting up the welfare state and NHS, Attlee’s government transformed and rebuilt a war-torn country.
1744: Dutch choose not to colonise Australia
British founded colony at Botany Bay 44 years later.
1439: Johannes Gutenberg reveals idea to clear his debts
Printing press revolutionised book production.
1963: Martin Luther King decides to “tell them about the dream”
At the March On Washington, MLK improvised the most famous oratory of the civil rights movement.
1200s: Invention of the metal-backed mirror
People gained awareness of themselves as individuals.
1643: Royalist Sir Ingram Hopton spares Oliver Cromwell’s life at Battle of Winceby, Lincs
Junior commander would become Lord Protector.
1803: France agrees to Louisiana Purchase
Buying New Orleans and the state for $15million doubled size of the US.
1994: Tim Berners-Lee makes the internet open
The British computer scientist created the World Wide Web and ensured open, free access for all.
AD 313: Roman Emperor Constantine converts to Christianity
It would become dominant religion of the Roman Empire.
1914: Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s driver takes wrong turn
Assassin Gavrilo Princip happened to be in the Sarajevo street and the heir to the Austro-Hungarian empire was killed... igniting the First World War.
1955: Rosa Parks refuses to give up bus seat to white passenger
Trial gave momentum to a nationwide campaign to end segregation on public facilities in the US.
AD 991: Anglo-Saxons pay the first “Danegeld” to the Vikings
Huge sums were paid to make the Danes go away but led to conquest in Britain in 1013 and 1016.
1879: Western Union hands a telephone monopoly to Alexander Graham Bell
They lost a court case to the inventor of the telephone, and exited the phone business.
1944: General Eisenhower delays D-Day by 24 hours
Decision to put his faith in his weather forecasters was rewarded.
31 BC: Cleopatra and Mark Antony make a disastrous decision to delay
Ruler of Egypt and Roman husband Mark Antony waited too long to fight rival Octavian at Actium, and lost. Rome used Egypt’s wealth to shape the Western world.
1453: Henry VI decides to marry Margaret Beaufort to Edmund Tudor
Four years later, 13-year-old Margaret gave birth to a son who would be crowned Henry VII.
9th Century: Gunpowder adopted as a deadly new weapon
Discovered by Chinese alchemists attempting to create a substance that offered immortality.
1947: UN agrees to create the state of Israel
In the 70 years since, peace has been a near-total absentee in the region.
1620: English pilgrims settle in North America
They laid down democratic principles that would underpin the republic a little over 150 years later.
1533: Henry VIII breaks from Rome
When the Pope refused to annul his marriage he created the Church of England and enacted the Dissolution of the Monasteries.
The monks and nuns could no longer look after the poor. That created more vagrancy, and can be seen as the roots of the Poor Law Acts, the workhouse system and the Welfare State.
1918: Education for the masses
Fisher Act raised school leaving age to 14 and made provision for tertiary education, school welfare and centres for pupils with special needs.
5th century: Vortigern invites Saxons to Britain
To deal with aggression from the Picts and Scots, the Briton king turned to Saxony. But they gained the upper hand and more than 500 years of Anglo-Saxon rule ensued.
1860/1: Southern states secede from the Union
Objecting to anti-slavery president Abraham Lincoln, they fought a four-year civil war against the North.
1578: Sebastian I of Portugal gets involved in a succession crisis in Morocco
It led to the Battle of the Three Kings (where all three died), letting Philip II of Spain seize the Portuguese throne.
1494: The Treaty of Tordesillas is signed
Pope Alexander VI divided the New World between Spain and Portugal, giving Portugal the coastline of Brazil – and subsequently its vast interior.
49BC: Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon
Marching on Rome with the 13th Legion started a civil war, which Caesar won, ending the Republic and creating the Roman Empire.
1978: James Callaghan doesn’t call General Election
Experts believe he’d have won, perhaps meaning we would never have had Thatcherism.
1899: Wright Brothers set sights on flight
They wrote to Smithsonian Institution for information on aeronautics. Their historic day, near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, came just four years later.
AD 664: King Oswiu sides with Rome
The Northumberland king opted for Roman christianity over the Irish Celtic version – central was the calculation of when Easter was.
1778: France joins American Revolutionary War
And swung conflict against Britain.
Prehistory: Neolithic people go from hunting to agriculture
The beginning of the modern world.
323 BC: Alexander the Great fails to name an heir
When he died at the age of 32, 40 years of war ensued between rivals.
1794: Toussaint L’Ouverture switches his allegiance from Spain to France
Leader in what would become Haiti, behind the only successful revolution of enslaved people in history.
1906: The suffragettes swap Manchester for London
Brought cause into the political heart of London and ensured their actions received much more exposure.
1485: Richard III charges at Bosworth Field
It led to his death – and the beginning of Tudor England.
1635: The Japanese issue the Sakoku Edicts
Designed to extinguish foreign influence. Isolationism kept Japan off the world stage for more than 200 years.
1833: British Parliament votes to end slavery
Move abolished slavery across the British Empire.
1859: Charles Darwin publishes Theory of Evolution
Provoked backlash from the religious community but was the moment science stood on its own two feet.
1940: Churchill refuses to negotiate with Germany
He said Hitler’s terms would reduce Britain to a “slave state” ruled by a puppet government.
- The latest issue of History Revealed is on sale at £4.99. www.historyrevealed.com
