1917

Events

January

• January 9 - WWI - Battle of Rafa: The last substantial Ottoman Army garrison on the Sinai Peninsula is captured by the Egyptian Expeditionary Force's Desert Column.
• January 10 – Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition: Seven survivors of the Ross Sea party are rescued after being stranded for several months.
• January 11 - Unknown saboteurs set off the Kingsland explosion at Kingsland, one of the events leading to United States involvement in WWI.
• January 16 - The Danish West Indies is sold to the United States for $25 million.
• January 22 - WWI: United States President Woodrow Wilson calls for "peace without victory" in Germany.
• January 25 - WWI: British armed merchantman is sunk by mines off Lough Swilly, with the loss of 354 of the 475 aboard.
• January 26 - The sea defences at the English village of Hallsands are breached, leading to all but one of the houses becoming uninhabitable.
• January 28 - The United States ends its search for Pancho Villa.
• January 30 - Pershing's troops in Mexico begin withdrawing back to the United States. They reach Columbus, New Mexico February 5.

  February

• February 1 - WWI: Atlantic U-boat Campaign: Germany announces its U-boats will resume unrestricted submarine warfare, rescinding the 'Sussex Pledge'.
• February 3 - WWI: The United States severs diplomatic relations with Germany.
• February 12 - Deportivo Toluca F.C. is founded as an Association football club in Mexico.
• February 13 - WWI:
• * Mata Hari is arrested in Paris for spying.
• * Raid on Nekhl: Units of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force completely reoccupy the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula.
• February 21 - British troopship is accidentally rammed and sunk off the Isle of Wight, killing 646, mainly members of the South African Native Labour Corps.
• February 24 - WWI: Walter Hines Page, United States ambassador to the United Kingdom, is shown the intercepted Zimmermann Telegram, in which Germany offers to give the American Southwest back to Mexico, if Mexico will take sides with Germany, in case the United States declares war on Germany.

  March

• March 1
• * WWI: The U.S. government releases the text of the Zimmermann Telegram to the public.
• * Ōmuta, Japan, is founded by Hiroushi Miruku.
• March 2 - The enactment of the Jones Act grants Puerto Ricans United States citizenship.
• March 4
• * Jeannette Rankin of Montana becomes the first woman member of the United States House of Representatives.
• March 7 - "Livery Stable Blues", recorded with "Dixie Jazz Band One Step" on February 26, by the Original Dixieland Jass Band in the United States, becomes the first jazz recording commercially released. On August 17 the band records "Tiger Rag".
• March 8
• * - The February Revolution begins in Russia: Women calling for bread in Petrograd start riots, which spontaneously spread throughout the city.
• * WWI: Norwegian tramp is torpedoed and sunk by SM U-62 in the Atlantic with the loss of 3 crew members.
• March 10 - The Province of Batangas is formally founded, as one of the Philippines' first encomiendas.
• March 11 - Mexican Revolution: Venustiano Carranza is elected president of Mexico; the United States gives de jure recognition of his government.
• March 12 - The Russian Duma declares a Provisional Government. It is dissolved 4 months later.
• March 14 - WWI: The Republic of China terminates diplomatic relations with Germany.
• March 15 - Emperor Nicholas II of Russia abdicates his throne and his son's claims. This is considered to be the end of the Russian Empire, after 196 years.
• March 16 - Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovich of Russia refuses the throne, and power passes to the newly formed Provisional Government, under Prince Georgy Lvov.
• March 25 - The Georgian Orthodox Church restores the autocephaly, abolished by Imperial Russia in 1811.
• March 26 - WWI: First Battle of Gaza - British Egyptian Expeditionary Force troops virtually encircle the Gaza garrison, but are then ordered to withdraw, leaving the city to the Ottoman defenders.
• March 30 - Hjalmar Hammarskjöld steps down as Prime Minister of Sweden; he is replaced by right-wing businessman and politician Carl Swartz.
• March 31 - The United States takes possession of the Danish West Indies, which become the US Virgin Islands, after paying $25 million to Denmark.

  April

• April - Imokawa Mukuzo Genkanban no Maki, the first anime, is released in Japan.
• April 2 - WWI: U.S. President Woodrow Wilson asks the United States Congress for a declaration of war on Germany.
• April 6 - WWI: The United States declares war on Germany.
• April 8 - In Petrograd, 40,000 ethnic Estonians demand national autonomy within Russia.
• April 9-May 16 - WWI: Battle of Arras - British Empire troops make a significant advance on the Western Front but are unable to achieve a breakthrough.
• April 9-12 - WWI: Canadian troops win the Battle of Vimy Ridge.
• April 10 - Eddystone explosion: an explosion at an ammunition plant near Chester, Pennsylvania, kills 139, mostly female workers.
• April 11 - WWI: Brazil severs diplomatic relations with Germany.
• April 12 - The Autonomous Governorate of Estonia is formed within Russia, from the Governorate of Estonia and the northern part of the Governorate of Livonia.
• April 16
• * - Vladimir Lenin arrives at the Finland Station in Petrograd after a German-sponsored voyage in a sealed train from his exile in Switzerland through Germany and Scandinavia.
• * WWI: The Nivelle Offensive commences.

• April 17
• * - Vladimir Lenin's April Theses are published. They become very influential in the following July Days and Bolshevik Revolution.
• * WWI: The Egyptian Expeditionary Force begins the Second Battle of Gaza. This unsuccessful frontal attack on strong Ottoman defences along with the first battle, results in 10,000 casualties, the dismissal of force commander General Archibald Murray, and the beginning of the Stalemate in Southern Palestine.
• * The Times and the Daily Mail print atrocity propaganda of the supposed existence of a German Corpse Factory processing dead soldiers' bodies.
• April 19 - WWI: Army transport fires the United States' first shots in anger in the war when her gun crew drives off a German U-boat in the English Channel seven miles southeast of Beachy Head.
• April 26 - WWI: The Agreement of Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne, between France, Italy and the United Kingdom, to settle interests in the Middle East, is signed.

  May

• May 3 - WWI: 1917 French Army mutinies begin.
• May 9 - WWI: The Nivelle Offensive is abandoned.
• May 13 - Nuncio Eugenio Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, is consecrated Archbishop by Pope Benedict XV.
• May 13-October 13 - 10-year-old Lúcia Santos and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto report experiencing a series of Marian apparitions near Fátima, Portugal, which become known as Our Lady of Fátima.
• May 15 - Robert Nivelle is replaced as Commander-in-Chief of the French Army, by Philippe Pétain.
• May 18 - WWI: The Selective Service Act passes the United States Congress, giving the President the power of conscription.
• May 21 - Over 300 acres are destroyed in the Great Atlanta fire of 1917 in the United States.
• May 22
• *The Commissioned Officer Corps of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey is established.
• *Ell Persons is lynched in Memphis, in connection with the rape and murder of 16-year-old Antoinette Rappal.
• May 23
• * A month of civil violence in Milan, Italy ends, after the Italian army forcibly takes over the city from anarchists and anti-war revolutionaries; 50 people are killed and 800 arrested.
• * WWI: During the Stalemate in Southern Palestine, the Raid on the Beersheba to Hafir el Auja railway by the British Desert Column takes place: large sections of the railway line linking Beersheba to the main Ottoman desert base are destroyed.
• May 26 - A tornado strikes Mattoon, Illinois, causing devastation and killing 101 people.
• May 27
• * WWI: 1917 French Army mutinies: Over 30,000 French troops refuse to go to the trenches at Missy-aux-Bois.
• * Pope Benedict XV promulgates the 1917 Code of Canon Law.

  June

• June 1 - 1917 French Army mutinies: A French infantry regiment seizes Missy-aux-Bois, and declares an anti-war military government. Other French army troops soon apprehend them.
• June 4 - The first Pulitzer Prizes are awarded: Laura E. Richards, Maud Howe Elliott and Florence Hall receive the first Pulitzer for a biography,. Jean Jules Jusserand receives the first Pulitzer for history, for his work With Americans of Past and Present Days. Herbert Bayard Swope receives the first Pulitzer for journalism, for his work for the New York World.
• June 5 - WWI: Conscription begins in the United States.
• June 7 - WWI: Battle of Messines opens with the British Army detonating 24 ammonal mines under the German lines, killing 10,000 in the deadliest deliberate non-nuclear man-made explosion in history.
• June 8 - Speculator Mine disaster: A fire at the Granite Mountain and Speculator ore mine, outside Butte, Montana, kills at least 168 workers.
• June 11 - King Constantine I of Greece abdicates for the first time, being succeeded by his son Alexander.
• June 13 - WWI: The first major German bombing raid on London by fixed-wing aircraft leaves 162 dead and 432 injured.
• June 15 - The United States enacts the Espionage Act.