Events

• 46 BC – Julius Caesar fights Titus Labienus in the Battle of Ruspina.
• 871 – Battle of Reading: Æthelred of Wessex and his brother Alfred are defeated by a Danish invasion army.
• 1649 – English Civil War: The Rump Parliament votes to put Charles I on trial.
• 1717 – The Netherlands, Great Britain, and France sign the Triple Alliance in an attempt to maintain the Treaty of Utrecht; Britain having signed a preliminary alliance with France on November 28 (17 November 1716).
• 1762 – Great Britain declares war on Spain, which meant the entry of Spain into the Seven Years’ War.
• 1854 – The McDonald Islands are discovered by Captain William McDonald aboard the Samarang.
• 1878 – Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878): Sofia is liberated from Ottoman rule and designated the capital of Liberated Bulgaria.
• 1885 – Sino-French War: French troops under General Oscar de Négrier defeat a numerically superior Qing force at Núi Bop in northern Vietnam.
• 1918 – The Finnish Declaration of Independence is recognised by Russia, Sweden, Germany and France.
• 1944 – World War II: Operation Carpetbagger, involving the dropping of arms and supplies to resistance fighters in Europe, begins.
• 1948 – Burma gains its independence from the United Kingdom becoming an independent republic, named the Union of Burma, with Sao Shwe Thaik as its first President and U Nu its first Prime Minister.
  • Independence Day (Myanmar), celebrates the independence of Myanmar from the United Kingdom in 1948.
• 1951 – Korean War: Chinese and North Korean forces capture Seoul.
• 1976 – The Troubles: The Ulster Volunteer Force shoots dead six Irish Catholic civilians in County Armagh, Northern Ireland. The next day, gunmen would shoot dead ten Protestant civilians nearby in retaliation.
• 1989 – Second Gulf of Sidra incident: A pair of Libyan MiG-23 “Floggers” are shot down by a pair of US Navy F-14 Tomcats during an air-to-air confrontation.

People (Births)

• 1809 – Louis Braille, French educator, invented Braille (d. 1852).
  • World Braille Day today.
• 1832 – George Tryon, English admiral (d. 1893).
• 1848 – Katsura Tarō, Japanese general and politician, 6th Prime Minister of Japan (d. 1913).
• 1891 – Edward Brooker, English-Australian sergeant and politician, 31st Premier of Tasmania (d. 1948).
• 1973 – Frank Høj, Danish cyclist.
• 1974 – Danilo Hondo, German cyclist.
• 1975 – Shane Carwin, American mixed martial artist and wrestler.
• 1986 – Andrei Krauchanka, Belarusian decathlete.

People (Deaths)

• 1695 – François-Henri de Montmorency, duc de Luxembourg, French general (b. 1628).
• 1782 – Ange-Jacques Gabriel, French architect, designed École Militaire (b. 1698).
• 1863 – Roger Hanson, American general (b. 1827).
• 1883 – Antoine Chanzy, French general (b. 1823).
• 1912 – Clarence Dutton, American geologist and soldier (b. 1841).
• 1943 – Jerzy Iwanow-Szajnowicz, Greek-Polish swimmer and water polo player (b. 1911).
• 1943 – Marina Raskova, Russian pilot and navigator (b. 1912).
• 1985 – Brian Horrocks, Indian-English general (b. 1895).
• 2013 – Anwar Shamim, Pakistani general (b. 1931).
• 2019 – Harold Brown, 14th United States Secretary of Defence (b. 1927).