November 1900 - November 17, 1900 (Saturday)

November 17, 1900 (Saturday)

• Tests were completed at the Indian Head Proving Ground in Maryland of the most advanced American weapon up to that time. The twelve-inch naval gun was designed to fire shells that "would pierce any armor ever made". Forty of the guns were scheduled to be placed on new battleships and armored cruisers.
• General Kitchener announced plans to "depopulate the towns in the Transvaal". In accordance with the order, the burning of farms was discontinued, and civilians were relocated to what became described by British M.P. John Ellis as "concentration camps", a term coined from "reconcentrado" camps that Spain had set up in Cuba. By October 1901, the camps housed 111,619 white and 43,780 black citizens, and had a death rate of 34 percent.