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My Lai incident, in the Vietnam War, a massacre of Vietnamese civilians by U.S. soldiers. On Mar. 16, 1968, a unit of the U.S. army Americal division, led by Lt. William L. Calley, invaded the South Vietnamese hamlet of My Lai (more correctly, Son My), an alleged Viet Cong stronghold. In the course of combat operations, unarmed civilians, including women and children, were shot to death (the final army estimate for the number killed was 347). The incident remained unknown to the American public until the autumn of 1969, when a series of letters by a former soldier to government officials forced the army to take action. Several soldiers and veterans were charged with murder, and a number of officers were accused of dereliction of duty for covering up the incident. Special investigations by the U.S. army and the House of Representatives concluded that a massacre had in fact taken place. Of the many soldiers originally charged, only five were court-martialed, and one, Lt. Calley, convicted. On Mar. 29, 1971, he was found guilty of the premeditated murder of at least twenty-two Vietnamese civilians and sentenced to life imprisonment. His sentence was later reduced to 10 years, and in Sept., 1974, a federal district court overturned the conviction and Calley was released. The My Lai incident aroused widespread controversy and contributed to growing disillusionment in the United States with the Vietnam War. The U.S. army formally released a report on its investigation of the incident in Nov., 1974. In 1998 three U.S. soldiers saved Vietnamese civilians during the massacre were honored with the Soldier's Medal.

See R. Hammer, The Court-Martial of Lt. Calley (1971); S. M. Hersh, Mylai 4 (1970) and Cover-up (1972).

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Domrémy-la-Pucelle

Domrémy-la-Pucelle, village, Vosges dept., E France, in Lorraine, on the Meuse River. Joan of Arc was born (1412?) in the village. The house in which she was born is now a museum.

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Courcelle, Daniel Rémy, sieur de

Courcelle, Daniel Rémy, sieur de, d.1698, governor of New France (1665-72). He arrived with the intendant Jean Talon, and together they inaugurated a period of peace and prosperity. Courcelle led (1666) an unsuccessful winter raid on the Mohawk, but a campaign in Sept., 1666, under the marquis de Tracy and Courcelle induced the Iroquois to conclude a peace that was kept for a number of years. In 1671 he led to Lake Ontario an expedition that chose the site for a fort later established as Fort Frontenac. While governor, Courcelle instituted militia service for all males and supported the expeditions of Robert de La Salle and Louis Jolliet. Ill health led him to request his recall to France in 1672, and the comte de Frontenac took his place as governor. Courcelle was later appointed governor of Toulon, where he died.

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Gourmont, Rémy de

(born April 4, 1858, Bazoches-en-Houlmes, France—died Sept. 27, 1915, Paris) French novelist, poet, playwright, and philosopher. He worked 10 years at the national library; his dismissal resulted from an allegedly unpatriotic article in the Mercure de France, a journal he had cofounded. A painful skin disease later kept him a semirecluse. One of the most intelligent critics from the Symbolist movement, he had a major role in disseminating its aesthetic doctrines. His 50 published volumes are mainly collections of essays.

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Encyclopedia Britannica, 2008. Encyclopedia Britannica Online.