April 9th is Jenkins Ear Day

On April 9, 1731, Spanish guardacosta boarded and plundered the British ship Rebecca off Jamaica and, among other outrages, cut off the ear of English master mariner Robert Jenkins. Little notice was taken until seven years later, when Jenkins exhibited the detached ear and described the atrocity to a committee of the House of Commons. In consequence, Britain declared war on Spain in October 1739, a war that lasted until 1743 and is still known as the “War of Jenkins’s Ear.” Nothing else is known of him.