Events

• 585 BC – Lucius Tarquinius Priscus, king of Rome, celebrates a triumph for his victories over the Sabines, and the surrender of Collatia.
• 533 – Belisarius of the Byzantine Empire defeats Gelimer and the Vandals at the Battle of Ad Decimum, near Carthage, North Africa.
• 1437 – Battle of Tangier: a Portuguese expeditionary force initiates a failed attempt to seize the Moroccan citadel of Tangier.
• 1609 – Henry Hudson reaches the river that would later be named after him – the Hudson River.
• 1645 – Wars of the Three Kingdoms: Scottish Royalists are defeated by Covenanters at the Battle of Philiphaugh.
• 1743 – Great Britain, Austria and the Kingdom of Sardinia sign the Treaty of Worms.
• 1759 – Battle of the Plains of Abraham: the British defeat the French near Quebec City in the Seven Years’ War, known in the United States as the French and Indian War.
• 1782 – American Revolutionary War: Franco-Spanish troops launch the unsuccessful “grand assault” during the Great Siege of Gibraltar.
• 1788 – The Philadelphia Convention sets the date for the first presidential election in the United States, and New York City becomes the country’s temporary capital.
• 1791 – King Louis XVI of France accepts the new constitution.
• 1808 – Finnish War: In the Battle of Jutas, Swedish forces under Lieutenant General Georg Carl von Döbeln beat the Russians, making von Döbeln a Swedish war hero.
• 1812 – War of 1812: A supply wagon sent to relieve Fort Harrison is ambushed in the Attack at the Narrows.
• 1814 – In a turning point in the War of 1812, the British fail to capture Baltimore.
  • During the battle, Francis Scott Key composes his poem “Defence of Fort McHenry”, which is later set to music and becomes the United States’ national anthem.
• 1843 – The Greek Army rebels (OS date: 03 September) against the autocratic rule of king Otto of Greece, demanding the granting of a constitution.
• 1847 – Mexican-American War: Six teenage military cadets known as Niños Héroes die defending Chapultepec Castle in the Battle of Chapultepec.
  • American troops under General Winfield Scott capture Mexico City in the Mexican-American War.
• 1862 – American Civil War: Union soldiers find a copy of Robert E. Lee’s battle plans in a field outside Frederick, Maryland. It is the prelude to the Battle of Antietam.
• 1882 – Anglo-Egyptian War: The Battle of Tel el-Kebir is fought.
• 1900 – Filipino insurgents defeat a small American column in the Battle of Pulang Lupa, during the Philippine-American War.
• 1906 – The Santos-Dumont 14-bis makes a short hop, the first flight of a fixed-wing aircraft in Europe.
• 1914 – World War I: The Battle of Aisne begins between Germany and France.
• 1922 – The final act of the Greco-Turkish War, the Great Fire of Smyrna, commences.
• 1923 – Following a military coup in Spain, Miguel Primo de Rivera takes over, setting up a dictatorship.
• 1942 – World War II: Second day of the Battle of Edson’s Ridge in the Guadalcanal Campaign.
  • US Marines successfully defeated attacks by the Japanese with heavy losses for the Japanese forces.
• 1944 – World War II: Start of the Battle of Meligalas between the Greek Resistance forces of the Greek People’s Liberation Army (ELAS) and the collaborationist security battalions.
• 1948 – Deputy Prime Minister of India Vallabhbhai Patel orders the Army to move into Hyderabad to integrate it with the Indian Union.
• 1964 – South Vietnamese Generals Lâm Văn Phát and Dương Văn Đức fail in a coup attempt against General Nguyễn Khánh.
• 1968 – Cold War: Albania leaves the Warsaw Pact.
• 1971 – State police and National Guardsmen storm New York’s Attica Prison to quell a prison revolt, which claimed 43 lives.
• 1971 – Chairman Mao Zedong’s second in command and successor Marshal Lin Biao flees China after the failure of an alleged coup.
  • His plane crashes in Mongolia, killing all aboard.
• 1993 – Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin shakes hands with Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) chairman Yasser Arafat at the White House after signing the Oslo Accords granting limited Palestinian autonomy.
• 1997 – A German Air Force Tupolev Tu-154 and a United States Air Force Lockheed C-141 Starlifter collide in mid-air near Namibia, killing 33.
• Día de los Niños Héroes (Mexico).

People (Births)

• 1604 – Sir William Brereton, 1st Baronet, English commander and politician (d. 1661).
• 1813 – John Sedgwick, American general and educator (d. 1864).
• 1842 – John H. Bankhead, American soldier and politician (d. 1920).
• 1860 – John J. Pershing, American general and lawyer (d. 1948).
• 1865 – William Birdwood, Indian-English field marshal (d. 1951).
• 1883 – Petros Voulgaris, Greek admiral and politician, 136th Prime Minister of Greece (d. 1957).
• 1912 – Maurice K. Goddard, American colonel and politician (d. 1995).
• 1917 – Robert Ward, American soldier, composer, and educator (d. 2013).
• 1926 – J. Frank Raley Jr., American soldier and politician (d. 2012).
• 1928 – Tzannis Tzannetakis, Greek soldier and politician, 175th Prime Minister of Greece (d. 2010).
• 1946 – Henri Kuprashvili, Georgian swimmer.
• 1948 – Sitiveni Rabuka, Fijian general and politician, 3rd Prime Minister of Fiji.
• 1955 – Colin Moynihan, 4th Baron Moynihan, English rower and politician, Minister for Sport and the Olympics.
• 1967 – Michael Johnson, American former sprinter and journalist.
• 1973 – Christine Arron, French runner.
• 1981 – Koldo Fernández, Spanish cyclist.

People (Deaths)

• 1759 – James Wolfe, English general (b. 1727).
• 1800 – Claude Martin, French-English general and explorer (b. 1735).
• 1806 – Charles James Fox, English soldier and politician, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (b. 1749).
• 1847 – Nicolas Oudinot, French general (b. 1767).
• 1881 – Ambrose Burnside, American general and politician, 30th Governor of Rhode Island (b. 1824).
• 1912 – Nogi Maresuke, Japanese general (b. 1849).
• 1915 – Andrew L. Harris, American general and politician, 44th Governor of Ohio (b. 1835).
• 1946 – Amon Göth, Austrian captain (b. 1908).
• 1967 – Robert George, English air marshal and politician, 24th Governor of South Australia (b. 1896).
• 1971 – Lin Biao, Chinese general and politician, 2nd Vice Premier of the People’s Republic of China (b. 1907).
• 1991 – Robert Irving, English soldier and conductor (b. 1913).
• 2002 – George Stanley, Canadian soldier, historian, and author, designed the Flag of Canada (b. 1907).
• 2014 – Benjamin Adekunle, Nigerian general (b. 1936).