1492: First Spanish settlement in the New World, La Navidad, is founded by Christopher Columbus at the site of modern Môle-Saint-Nicolas in Haiti after the Santa María runs aground and is wrecked

1792: Trial of French King Louis XVI, court hears the king’s defense presented by Raymond Desèze

1825: Decembrist uprising in Russia against Tsar Nicholas I begins [O.S. 14 December]

1944: Battle of Bastogne: US General George S. Patton’s Third Army repulses German forces

2004: A 9.3 magnitude earthquake creates a tsunami that devastates Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, the Maldives, and other coastal regions of the Indian Ocean, killing about 230,000 people

Source: Onthisday.com