1260: Qutuz, Mamluk Sultan of Egypt (1259-60), is assassinated by Baibars, a fellow Mamluk leader, who seizes power for himself 1648: Treaty of Westphalia ends the Thirty Years’ War in the Holy Roman Empire; Switzerland’s independence is recognized 1929: On “Black Thursday,” the Dow Jones Industrial Average drops 12.8%, marking the start of the stock […]
42 BC: Roman Republican civil wars: Second Battle of Philippi – Brutus’s army is decisively defeated by Mark Antony and Octavian. Brutus commits suicide. 1911: First aerial reconnaissance mission is flown by an Italian pilot over Turkish lines during the Italo-Turkish War 1942: During WWII, Britain launches major offensive at El Alamein, Egypt 1977: Paleontologist […]
1633: Battle of Liaoluo Bay: Dutch East India Company is defeated by Chinese Ming naval forces in the southern Fujian Sea 1721: Tsar Peter the Great titles himself “Emperor of All Russia” 1879: Thomas Edison perfects the carbonized cotton filament light bulb 1884: International Meridian Conference in Washington, D.C. adopts Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) worldwide […]
1805: Battle of Trafalgar: British Admiral Horatio Nelson defeats the combined French and Spanish fleet. Nelson is shot and killed during the battle. 1854: Florence Nightingale, with a staff of 38 nurses, is sent to the Crimean War 1944: US troops capture Aachen, the first large German city to fall in World War II 1948: UN […]
1097: The first Crusaders arrive in Antioch, Ancient Syria, during the First Crusade 1603: Chinese uprising in the Philippines fails after 23,000 people are killed 1803: US Senate ratifies the Louisiana Purchase 1917: US suffragette Alice Paul begins a seven-month jail sentence for peacefully picketing in support of the Women’s Suffrage (right to vote) Amendment […]
202 BC: Battle of Zama: Hannibal Barca and the Carthaginian army are defeated by Roman legions under Scipio Africanus, ending the Second Punic War 1781: British forces under General Charles Cornwallis sign terms of surrender to George Washington and Comte de Rochambeau at Yorktown at 2 p.m., effectively ending the American Revolutionary War 1926: Russian […]
1009: Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem is destroyed by the Fatimid caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, who hacks the church’s foundations down to the bedrock 1685: French King Louis XIV revokes the Edict of Nantes, canceling the rights of French Protestants 1867: US takes formal possession of Alaska from Russia, after paying $7.2 million […]
1854: French and British forces bombard Sevastopol for the first time during the Crimean War 1907: Guglielmo Marconi’s company begins the first commercial transatlantic wireless service between Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada and Clifden, Ireland 1943: Burma Railway, built by Allied POWs and Asian laborers, is completed for use by the Japanese army 1973: OPEC […]
1813: Battle of Leipzig, the largest battle in Europe prior to World War I, sees Napoleon’s forces defeated by Prussia, Austria, and Russia 1900: Great Britain and Germany sign the Anglo-German Treaty, agreeing to maintain the territorial integrity of China and support the “Open Door” policy called for by the US Secretary of State 1934: […]
1581: The first ballet “Ballet Comique de la Reine,” commissioned by Catherine de Medici, is staged in Paris 1582: Gregorian calendar is introduced in Spain, Portugal, and the Papal States after skipping 10 days from October 4 to sync the calendar to the solar year and compensate for the drift that has occurred due to […]
