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History Quiz Page - Modern History

History questions about the events and people of the last 200 hundred years.


25 Questions - Modern History

  1. Which incident in 1962 nearly led to a nuclear confrontation between the U.S. and Russia?
  2. Who became became President of the United States upon the assassination of Abraham Lincoln?
  3. What name was given to a series of 20th-century confrontations between the United Kingdom and Iceland?
  4. In which month of 1945 did Hitler marry Eva Braun?
  5. Which officer led the Charge of the Light Brigade against Russian forces during the Battle of Balaclava?




  6. Which explorer is buried in South Georgia, who died there in 1921 on route to his third Antarctic expedition?
  7. Following the death of Vladimir Lenin in 1924, who became the new leader of the Soviet Union?
  8. From which country did Vietnam claim independence in 1945?
  9. The Titanic was built at the Harland and Wolff Shipyard in which city?
  10. The World Health Organization declared which disease eradicated in 1980?
  11. What term was used to describe the social and economic campaign led by the Chinese Communist Party from 1958 to 1962?
  12. What was the name of the first ship designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel? It was the longest steamship in the world.
  13. In which year did the American Civil War effectively end when General Lee surrendered to General Grant at the Battle of Appomattox Court House?
  14. Which Italian general, nicknamed the George Washington of Italy, contributed to Italian unification and the creation of the Kingdom of Italy?
  15. Who became British Prime Minister in 1937?
  16. Who developed what is now known as Marxism together with Karl Marx?
  17. On April 15, 2013, two homemade bombs detonated near the finish line of a marathon in which American city?
  18. Which Vietnamese politician and revolutionary served as Prime Minister of Vietnam from 1945 to 1955?
  19. Which hilltop in South Africa was the site of a battle in the Boer War from 23 to 24 January 1900?
  20. Which city was named after the wife of King William IV?
  21. Which battle took place on 2 September 1898, at Kerreri, in the Sudan?
  22. Which ship was abandoned in the Arctic waterway Tariyunnuaq in 1854 while searching for Sir John Franklin and his lost expedition?
  23. What name was given to the scandal in British history that helped topple the Conservative government in the early 1960s?
  24. On which island did Napolean spend the last days of his life?
  25. Which drinks brand, which sold the world's first soft drink in 1783, was the official sponsor of the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, London in 1851?

Answers - Modern History

  1. Cuban Missile Crises
  2. Andrew Johnson
  3. The Cod Wars
  4. April
  5. Lord Cardigan
  6. Ernest Shackleton
  7. Joseph Stalin
  8. France
  9. Belfast
  10. Smallpox
  11. The Great Leap Forward
  12. The SS Great Western
  13. 1865
  14. Garibaldi (Giuseppe Garibaldi)
  15. Neville Chamberlain
  16. Friedrich Engels
  17. Boston
  18. Ho Chi Minh
  19. Spion Kop
  20. Adelaide, Australia
  21. Battle of Omdurman
  22. HMS Resolute (its oak timbers were used to make The Resolute desk, used by several presidents in the White House as the Oval Office desk, including the most recent presidents)
  23. Profumo affair
  24. St. Helena
  25. Schweppes