Events Pre-1600 224 – The Battle of Hormozdgan is fought. Ardashir I defeats and kills Artabanus V, effectively ending the Parthian Empire. 357 – Emperor Constantius II enters Rome for the first time to celebrate his victory over Magnus Magnentius. 1192 – Assassination of Conrad of Montferrat (Conrad I), King of Jerusalem, in Tyre, two days after his title to the throne is confirmed by election. The killing is carried out by Hashshashin. 1253 – Nichiren, a Japanese Buddhist monk, propounds Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō for the first time and declares it to be the essence of Buddhism, in effect founding Nichiren Buddhism. 1294 – Temür, grandson of Kublai, is elected Khagan of the Mongols with the reigning title Oljeitu. 1503 – The Battle of Cerignola is fought. It is noted as one of the first European battles in history won by small arms fire using gunpowder.
1601–1900 1611 – Establishment of the Pontifical and Royal University of Santo Tomas, the Catholic University of the Philippines and the largest Catholic university in the world. 1625 – A combined Spanish and Portuguese fleet of 52 ships commences the recapture of Bahia from the Dutch during the Dutch–Portuguese War. 1738 – Pope Clement XII issues the first papal condemnation of Freemasonry and formally prohibits Catholics from becoming Freemasons. 1758 – The Marathas defeat the Afghans in the Battle of Attock and capture the city. 1788 – Maryland becomes the seventh state to ratify the United States Constitution. 1789 – The Mutiny on the Bounty occurs, with the ship's captain, Lieutenant William Bligh and 18 sailors, set adrift, and the rebel crew setting sail for Tahiti. Eventually the majority of rebels sail for Pitcairn Island. 1792 – France invades the Austrian Netherlands (present day Belgium and Luxembourg), beginning the French Revolutionary Wars. 1794 – Sardinians, headed by Giovanni Maria Angioy, start a revolution against the Savoy domination, expelling Viceroy Balbiano and his officials from Cagliari, the capital and largest city of the island. 1796 – The Armistice of Cherasco is signed by Napoleon Bonaparte and Vittorio Amedeo III, King of Sardinia, expanding French territory along the Mediterranean coast. 1858 – The Bawani Imli massacre, where 52 Indian freedom fighters are hanged to death on a tamarind tree by British colonial forces. 1859 – The sailing clipper ship Pomona is wrecked on the coast of Ireland with the loss of 424 of the 448 passengers and crew aboard. 1869 – Chinese and Irish laborers for the Central Pacific Railroad working on the first transcontinental railroad lay ten miles of track in one day, a feat which has never been matched. 1881 – Billy the Kid escapes from the Lincoln County jail in Mesilla, New Mexico. 1887 – A week after being arrested by the Prussian Secret Police, French police inspector Guillaume Schnaebelé is released on order of Wilhelm I, German Emperor, defusing a possible war.
1901–present 1910 – Frenchman Louis Paulhan wins the 1910 London to Manchester air race, the first long-distance aeroplane race in the United Kingdom. 1920 – The Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic is founded. 1923 – Wembley Stadium is opened, named initially as the Empire Stadium. 1930 – The Independence Producers host the first night game in the history of Organized Baseball in Independence, Kansas. 1937 – South African medical researcher Max Theiler develops the yellow fever vaccine at the Rockefeller Foundation in New York City. 1941 – The Ustaše massacre nearly 200 Serbs in the village of Gudovac, the first massacre of their genocidal campaign against Serbs of the Independent State of Croatia. 1944 – World War II: Nine German E-boats attack US and UK units during Exercise Tiger, the rehearsal for the Normandy landings, killing 946. 1945 – Benito Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci are shot dead by Walter Audisio, a member of the Italian resistance movement. 1945 – The Holocaust: Nazi Germany carries out its final use of gas chambers to execute 33 Upper Austrian socialist and communist leaders in Mauthausen concentration camp. 1947 – Thor Heyerdahl and five crew mates set out from Peru on the Kon-Tiki to demonstrate that Peruvian natives could have settled Polynesia. 1948 – Igor Stravinsky conducts the premiere of his American ballet, Orpheus at the New York City Center. 1949 – The Hukbalahap are accused of assassinating former First Lady of the Philippines Aurora Quezon, while she is en route to dedicate a hospital in memory of her late husband; her daughter and ten others are also killed. 1952 – Dwight D. Eisenhower resigns as Supreme Allied Commander of NATO in order to campaign in the 1952 United States presidential election. 1952 – The Treaty of San Francisco comes into effect, restoring Japanese sovereignty and ending its state of war with most of the Allies of World War II. 1952 – The Sino-Japanese Peace Treaty (Treaty of Taipei) is signed in Taipei, Taiwan between Japan and the Republic of China to officially end the Second Sino-Japanese War. 1965 – United States occupation of the Dominican Republic: American troops land in the Dominican Republic to "forestall establishment of a Communist dictatorship" and to evacuate US Army troops. 1967 – Vietnam War: Boxer Muhammad Ali refuses his induction into the United States Army and is subsequently stripped of his championship and license. 1969 – Charles de Gaulle resigns as President of France. 1970 – Vietnam War: US President Richard Nixon formally authorizes American combat troops to take part in the Cambodian campaign. 1973 – The Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd, recorded in Abbey Road Studios goes to number one on the US Billboard chart, beginning a record-breaking 741-week chart run. 1975 – General Cao Văn Viên, chief of the South Vietnamese military, departs for the US as the North Vietnamese Army closes in on victory. 1977 – The Red Army Faction trial ends, with Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin and Jan-Carl Raspe found guilty of four counts of murder and more than 30 counts of attempted murder. 1978 – The President of Afghanistan, Mohammad Daoud Khan, is overthrown and assassinated in a coup led by pro-communist rebels. 1983 – The West German news magazine Stern begins publishing excerpts from the purported diaries of Adolf Hitler, later revealed to be forgeries. 1986 – High levels of radiation resulting from the Chernobyl disaster are detected at Forsmark Nuclear Power Plant in Sweden, leading Soviet authorities to publicly announce the accident. 1988 – Near Maui, Hawaii, flight attendant Clarabelle "C.B." Lansing is blown out of Aloha Airlines Flight 243, a Boeing 737, and falls to her death when part of the plane's fuselage rips open in mid-flight. 1991 – Space Shuttle Discovery launches on STS-39, the first unclassified shuttle mission for the United States Department of Defense. 1994 – Former Central Intelligence Agency counterintelligence officer and analyst Aldrich Ames pleads guilty to giving US secrets to the Soviet Union and later Russia. 1996 – Whitewater controversy: President Bill Clinton gives a 4 hour videotaped testimony for the defense. 1996 – Port Arthur massacre, Tasmania: A gunman, Martin Bryant, opens fire at the Broad Arrow Cafe in Port Arthur, Tasmania, killing 35 people and wounding 23 others. 2004 – CBS News releases evidence of the Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse. The photographs show rape and abuse from the American troops over Iraqi detainees.
Births
Pre-1600 AD 32 – Otho, Roman emperor (died 69 AD) 1402 – Nezahualcoyotl, Acolhuan philosopher, warrior, poet and ruler (died 1472) 1442 – Edward IV, king of England (died 1483) 1545 – Yi Sun-sin, Korean commander (died 1598) 1573 – Charles de Valois, Duke of Angoulême, son of Charles IX (died 1650)
1601–1900 1604 – Joris Jansen Rapelje, Dutch settler in colonial North America (died 1662) 1623 – Wilhelmus Beekman, Dutch politician (died 1707) 1630 – Charles Cotton, English poet and author (died 1687) 1676 – Frederick I, prince consort and king of Sweden (died 1751) 1715 – Franz Sparry, Austrian composer and educator (died 1767) 1758 – James Monroe, American soldier, lawyer, and politician, 5th President of the United States (died 1831) 1761 – Marie Harel, French cheesemaker (died 1844) 1765 – Sylvestre François Lacroix, French mathematician and academic (died 1834) 1819 – Ezra Abbot, American scholar and academic (died 1884) 1827 – William Hall, Canadian soldier, Victoria Cross recipient (died 1904) 1838 – Tobias Asser, Dutch lawyer and scholar, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1913) 1848 – Ludvig Schytte, Danish pianist, composer, and educator (died 1909) 1854 – Hertha Marks Ayrton, Polish-British engineer, mathematician, and physicist. (died 1923) 1855 – José Malhoa, Portuguese painter (died 1933) 1863 – Josiah Thomas, English-Australian miner and politician, 7th Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs (died 1933) 1863 – Nikolai von Meck, Russian engineer (died 1929) 1865 – Charles W. Woodworth, American entomologist and academic (died 1940) 1868 – Lucy Booth, English composer (died 1953) 1868 – Georgy Voronoy, Ukrainian-Russian mathematician and academic (died 1908) 1874 – Karl Kraus, Austrian journalist and author (died 1936) 1874 – Sidney Toler, American actor and director (died 1947) 1876 – Nicola Romeo, Italian engineer and businessman (died 1938) 1878 – Lionel Barrymore, American actor and director (died 1954) 1886 – Erich Salomon, German-born news photographer (died 1944) 1886 – Art Shaw, American hurdler (died 1955) 1888 – Walter Tull, English footballer and soldier (died 1918) 1889 – António de Oliveira Salazar, Portuguese economist and politician, 100th Prime Minister of Portugal (died 1970) 1896 – Na Hye-sok, South Korean journalist, poet, and painter (died 1948) 1896 – Tristan Tzara, Romanian-French poet and critic (died 1963) 1897 – Ye Jianying, Chinese general and politician, Head of State of the People's Republic of China (died 1986) 1900 – Alice Berry, Australian activist (died 1978) 1900 – Heinrich Müller, German SS officer, Gestapo chief, and key individual in the Holocaust (died 1945) 1900 – Jan Oort, Dutch astronomer and academic (died 1992)
1901–present 1901 – H. B. Stallard, English runner and surgeon (died 1973) 1902 – Johan Borgen, Norwegian author and critic (died 1979) 1906 – Kurt Gödel, Czech-American mathematician, philosopher, and academic (died 1978) 1906 – Paul Sacher, Swiss conductor and philanthropist (died 1999) 1908 – Ethel Catherwood, American-Canadian high jumper and javelin thrower (died 1987) 1908 – Jack Fingleton, Australian cricketer, journalist, and sportscaster (died 1981) 1908 – Oskar Schindler, Czech-German businessman (died 1974) 1909 – Arthur Võõbus, Estonian-American theologist and orientalist (died 1988) 1910 – Sam Merwin, Jr., American author (died 1996) 1911 – Lee Falk, American director, producer, and playwright (died 1999) 1912 – Odette Hallowes, French soldier and spy (died 1995) 1912 – Kaneto Shindō, Japanese director, producer, and screenwriter (died 2012) 1913 – Rose Murphy, American singer (died 1989) 1914 – Michel Mohrt, French author, historian (died 2011) 1916 – Ferruccio Lamborghini, Italian businessman, created Lamborghini (died 1993) 1917 – Robert Cornthwaite, American actor (died 2006) 1921 – Rowland Evans, American soldier, journalist, and author (died 2001) 1921 – Simin Daneshvar, Iranian author and academic (died 2012) 1922 – Barbara Lüdemann, German politician (died 1992) 1923 – Carolyn Cassady, American author (died 2013) 1923 – William Guarnere, American sergeant (died 2014) 1924 – Dick Ayers, American author and illustrator (died 2014) 1924 – Blossom Dearie, American singer and pianist (died 2009) 1924 – Kenneth Kaunda, Zambian educator and politician, first president of Zambia (died 2021) 1925 – T. John Lesinski, American judge and politician, 51st Lieutenant Governor of Michigan (died 1996)