Events

• 845 – The first duke of Brittany, Nominoe, defeats the Frankish king Charles the Bald at the Battle of Ballon near Redon.
• 1307 – Pope Clement V issues the papal bull Pastoralis Praeeminentiae which instructed all Christian monarchs in Europe to arrest all Templars and seize their assets.
• 1574 – Spanish navigator Juan Fernández discovers islands now known as the Juan Fernández Islands off Chile.
• 1635 – Dutch colonial forces on Taiwan launch a pacification campaign against native villages, resulting in Dutch control of the middle and south of the island.
• 1718 – Royal Navy Lieutenant Robert Maynard attacks and boards the vessels of the British pirate Edward Teach (best known as “Blackbeard”) off the coast of North Carolina.
  • The casualties on both sides include Maynard’s first officer Mister Hyde and Teach himself.
• 1837 – Canadian journalist and politician William Lyon Mackenzie calls for a rebellion against the United Kingdom in his essay “To the People of Upper Canada”, published in his newspaper The Constitution.
• 1940 – World War II: Following the initial Italian invasion, Greek troops counterattack into Italian-occupied Albania and capture Korytsa.
• 1942 – World War II: Battle of Stalingrad: General Friedrich Paulus sends Adolf Hitler a telegram saying that the German 6th Army is surrounded.
• 1943 – World War II: Cairo Conference: US President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Chinese Premier Chiang Kai-shek meet in Cairo, Egypt, to discuss ways to defeat Japan.
• 1943 – Lebanon gains independence from France.
  • Independence Day.
• 1948 – Chinese Civil War: Elements of the Chinese Communist Second Field Army under Liu Bocheng trap the Nationalist 12th Army, beginning the Shuangduiji Campaign, the largest engagement of the Huaihai Campaign.
• 1955 – The Soviet Union launches RDS-37, a 1.6 megaton two stage hydrogen bomb designed by Andrei Sakharov. The bomb was dropped over Semipalatinsk.
• 1963 – US President John F. Kennedy is assassinated and Texas Governor John Connally is seriously wounded by Lee Harvey Oswald (former US Marine), who also kills Dallas Police officer J.D. Tippit after fleeing the scene.
  • US Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn in as the 36th President of the United States afterwards.
• 1967 – UN Security Council Resolution 242 is adopted, establishing a set of the principles aimed at guiding negotiations for an Arab–Israeli peace settlement.
• 1974 – The United Nations General Assembly grants the Palestine Liberation Organisation observer status.
• 1975 – Juan Carlos is declared King of Spain following the death of General Francisco Franco.
• 1988 – In Palmdale, California, the first prototype B-2 Spirit stealth bomber is revealed.
• 2003 – Baghdad DHL attempted shootdown incident: Shortly after takeoff, a DHL Express cargo plane is struck on the left wing by a surface-to-air missile and forced to land.
• 2004 – The Orange Revolution begins in Ukraine, resulting from the presidential elections.
• 2012 – Ceasefire begins between Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Israel after eight days of violence and 150 deaths.

People (Births)

• 1428 – Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick, English commander and kingmaker (d. 1471).
• 1698 – Pierre de Rigaud, Marquis de Vaudreuil-Cavagnial, Canadian-American soldier and politician, 10th Governor of Louisiana (d. 1778).
• 1876 – Emil Beyer, American gymnast and triathlete (d. 1934).
• 1881 – Enver Pasha, Ottoman general and politician (d. 1922).
• 1890 – Charles de Gaulle, French general and politician, 18th President of France (d. 1970).
• 1902 – Philippe Leclerc de Hauteclocque, French general (d. 1947).
• 1909 – Mikhail Mil, Russian engineer, founded the Mil Moscow Helicopter Plant (d. 1970).
• 1914 – Peter Townsend, Burmese-English captain and pilot (d. 1995).
• 1922 – Wiyogo Atmodarminto, Indonesian general and politician, 10th Governor of Jakarta (d. 2012).
• 1922 – Eugene Stoner, American engineer and weapons designer, designed the AR-15 rifle (d. 1997).
• 1933 – Merv Lincoln, Australian Olympic athlete (d. 2016).
• 1939 – Mulayam Singh Yadav, Indian politician, 24th Indian Minister of Defence.
• 1942 – Guion Bluford, American colonel, pilot, and astronaut.
• 1975 – Joshua Wheeler, US Army sergeant (d. 2015).
• 1987 – Martti Aljand, Estonian swimmer.

People (Deaths)

• 1697 – Libéral Bruant, French architect and academic, designed Les Invalides (b. 1635).
• 1774 – Robert Clive, English general and politician, Lord Lieutenant of Shropshire (b. 1725).
• 1875 – Henry Wilson, American colonel, journalist, and politician, 18th Vice President of the United States (b. 1812).
• 1896 – George Washington Gale Ferris Jr., American engineer, invented the Ferris wheel (b. 1859).
• 1913 – Tokugawa Yoshinobu, Japanese shōgun (b. 1837).
• 1941 – Werner Mölders, German colonel and pilot (b. 1915).
• 1948 – Fakhri Pasha, Turkish general and politician (b. 1868).
• 1963 – John F. Kennedy, American lieutenant and politician, 35th President of the United States (b. 1917).
• 2000 – Emil Zátopek, Czech runner (b. 1922).
• 2012 – Pearl Laska Chamberlain, American pilot (b. 1909).
• 2015 – Kim Young-sam, South Korean soldier and politician, 7th President of South Korea (b. 1929).