Joan of Arc was burned at the stake on this day in the year 1431

The hero of Orleans and just a girl of 19, Joan of Arc helped turn the Hundred Years' War around for the French after years of failure against the English. Because they had been defeated by a peasant girl, the English figured that she either had to be a heretic or a witch. When she was captured and taken into English custody, a sham trial was held that found her guilty of wearing men's clothing and she was sentenced to death by fire.

Her final request to her captors was said to have been: "Please hold the cross up high that I may see it through the flames."

In the immediate aftermath of her execution, many amongst the English felt that they had just burned a saint. The authorities who presided over the trial and execution made sure there was nothing but ash left of her body (lest her remains could be used as relics). They ten tossed the ashes into a river where they floated into oblivion.

20 years later, Joan of Arc was famously re-tried and found innocent of the charges. The man who who originally tried and condemned her was excommunicated. In 1920, she was declared a saint of the Catholic Church and is to this day considered the patron saint of France.

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