1952: Ascension of Elizabeth II. Elizabeth II, who celebrated her Golden Jubilee in 2002, ascended the throne of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland this day in 1952, following the death of her father, King George VI. 1919: A German constitutional assembly met to form the Weimar Republic. 1862: Union naval commodore Andrew Foote, leading a flotilla of ironclads, captured Fort Henry, Tennessee, a strategic Confederate position during the American Civil War. 1840: Maori tribes of New Zealand signed the Treaty of Waitangi with Great Britain, a historic agreement purported to protect Maori rights that was the immediate basis of the British annexation of New Zealand. 46: Julius Caesar's forces delivered the final blow against supporters of Pompey the Great at the Battle of Thapsus Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica.