Events

• 671 – Emperor Tenji of Japan introduces a water clock (clepsydra) called Rokoku. The instrument, which measures time and indicates hours, is placed in the capital of Ōtsu.
• 1190 – Third Crusade: Frederick I Barbarossa drowns in the river Saleph while leading an army to Jerusalem.
• 1329 – The Battle of Pelekanon results in a Byzantine defeat by the Ottoman Empire.
• 1523 – Copenhagen is surrounded by the army of Frederick I of Denmark, as the city will not recognise him as the successor of Christian II of Denmark.
• 1539 – Council of Trent: Pope Paul III sends out letters to his bishops, delaying the Council due to war and the difficulty bishops had traveling to Venice.
• 1596 – Willem Barents and Jacob van Heemskerk discover Bear Island.
• 1619 – Thirty Years’ War: Battle of Záblatí, a turning point in the Bohemian Revolt.
• 1624 – Signing of the Treaty of Compiègne between France and the Netherlands.
• 1719 – Jacobite risings: Battle of Glen Shiel.
• 1793 – French Revolution: Following the arrests of Girondin leaders, the Jacobins gain control of the Committee of Public Safety installing the revolutionary dictatorship.
• 1805 – First Barbary War: Yusuf Karamanli signs a treaty ending the hostilities between Tripolitania and the United States.
• 1829 – The first Boat Race between the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge takes place on the Thames in London.
• 1854 – The United States Naval Academy graduates its first class of students.
• 1861 – American Civil War: Battle of Big Bethel: Confederate troops under John B. Magruder defeat a much larger Union force led by General Ebenezer W. Pierce in Virginia.
• 1864 – American Civil War: Battle of Brice’s Crossroads: Confederate troops under Nathan Bedford Forrest defeat a much larger Union force led by General Samuel D. Sturgis in Mississippi.
• 1871 – Sinmiyangyo: Captain McLane Tilton leads 109 US Marines in a naval attack on Han River forts on Kanghwa Island, Korea.
• 1878 – League of Prizren is established, to oppose the decisions of the Congress of Berlin and the Treaty of San Stefano, as a consequence of which the Albanian lands in the Balkans were being partitioned and given to the neighbour states of Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, and Greece.
• 1898 – Spanish-American War: In the Battle of Guantánamo Bay, US Marines begin the American invasion of Spanish-held Cuba.
• 1916 – The Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire was declared by Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca.
• 1918 – The Austro-Hungarian battleship SMS Szent István sinks off the Croatian coast after being torpedoed by an Italian MAS motorboat; the event is recorded by camera from a nearby vessel.
• 1935 – Dr. Robert Smith takes his last drink, and Alcoholics Anonymous is founded in Akron, Ohio, United States, by him and Bill Wilson.
• 1935 – Chaco War ends: A truce is called between Bolivia and Paraguay who had been fighting since 1932.
• 1940 – World War II: The Kingdom of Italy declares war on France and the United Kingdom.
• 1940 – World War II: US President Franklin D. Roosevelt denounces Italy’s actions in his “Stab in the Back” speech at the graduation ceremonies of the University of Virginia.
• 1940 – World War II: Military resistance to the German occupation of Norway ends.
• 1942 – World War II: The Lidice massacre is perpetrated as a reprisal for the assassination of Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich.
• 1944 – World War II: Six hundred forty-two men, women and children massacred at Oradour-sur-Glane, France.
• 1944 – World War II: In Distomo, Boeotia, Greece, 218 men, women and children are massacred by German troops.
• 1945 – Australian Imperial Forces land in Brunei Bay to liberate Brunei.
• 1967 – The Six-Day War ends: Israel and Syria agree to a cease-fire.
• 1982 – Lebanon War: The Syrian Arab Army defeats the Israeli Defence Forces in the Battle of Sultan Yacoub.
• 1994 – China conducts a nuclear test for DF-31 warhead at Area C (Beishan), Lop Nur, its prominence being due to the Cox Report.
• 1996 – Peace talks begin in Northern Ireland without the participation of Sinn Féin.
• 1997 – Before fleeing his northern stronghold, Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot orders the killing of his defence chief Son Sen and 11 of Sen’s family members.
• 1999 – Kosovo War: NATO suspends its airstrikes after Slobodan Milošević agrees to withdraw Serbian forces from Kosovo.
• 2009 – James Wenneker von Brunn, who was 88-years-old, opened fire inside the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and fatally shot Museum Special Police Officer Stephen Tyrone Johns. Other security guards returned fire, wounding von Brunn, who was apprehended.
• Army Day (Jordan).
• Navy Day (Italy).

People (Births)

• 1884 – Leone Sextus Tollemache, English captain (d. 1917).
• 1909 – Lang Hancock, Australian soldier and businessman (d. 1992).
• 1921 – Jean Robic, French cyclist (d. 1980).
• 1923 – Robert Maxwell, Czech-English captain, publisher, and politician (d. 1991).
• 1929 – James McDivitt, American general, pilot, and astronaut.
• 1929 – Ian Sinclair, Australian farmer and politician, 42nd Australian Minister for Defence.
• 1947 – Robert Wright, English air marshal.
• 1951 – Burglinde Pollak, German pentathlete.
• 1981 – Andrey Yepishin, Russian sprinter.
• 1983 – Jade Bailey, Barbadian athlete.
• 1984 – Johanna Kedzierski, German sprinter.
• 1984 – Dirk Van Tichelt, Belgian martial artist.

People (Deaths)

• 323 BC – Alexander the Great, Macedonian king (b. 356 BC).
• 903 – Cheng Rui, Chinese warlord.
• 932 – Dong Zhang, Chinese general.
• 1791 – Toussaint-Guillaume Picquet de la Motte, French admiral (b. 1720).
• 1831 – Hans Karl von Diebitsch, German-Russian field marshal (b. 1785).
• 1849 – Thomas Robert Bugeaud, French general and politician (b. 1784).
• 1996 – George Hees, Canadian soldier, football player, and politician (b. 1910).
• 1998 – Hammond Innes, English soldier and author (b. 1914).
• 2000 – Hafez al-Assad, Syrian general and politician, 18th President of Syria (b. 1930).
• 2003 – Donald Regan, American colonel and politician, 11th White House Chief of Staff (b. 1918).