Events

• 365 – The Alemanni cross the Rhine and invade Gaul. Emperor Valentinian I moves to Paris to command the army and defend the Gallic cities.
• 1009 – Berber forces led by Sulayman ibn al-Hakam defeat the Umayyad caliph Muhammad II of Córdoba in the battle of Alcolea.
• 1141 – Empress Matilda’s reign as ‘Lady of the English’ ends with Stephen of Blois regaining the title of ‘King of England’.
• 1214 – The port city of Sinope surrenders to the Seljuq Turks.
• 1520 – The Strait of Magellan, the passage immediately south of mainland South America connecting the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans, is first discovered and navigated by European explorer Ferdinand Magellan during the first recorded circumnavigation voyage.
• 1555 – French Huguenots establish the France Antarctique colony in present-day Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
• 1612 – During the Time of Troubles, Polish troops are expelled from Moscow’s Kitay-gorod by Russian troops under the command of Dmitry Pozharsky (22 October O.S.).
• 1688 – William III of Orange sets out a second time from Hellevoetsluis in the Netherlands to seize the crowns of England, Scotland and Ireland from King James II of England during the Glorious Revolution.
• 1765 – The British Parliament enacts the Stamp Act on the Thirteen Colonies in order to help pay for British military operations in North America.
• 1790 – Edmund Burke publishes Reflections on the Revolution in France, in which he predicts that the French Revolution will end in a disaster.
• 1805 – Napoleon Bonaparte invades Austria during the War of the Third Coalition (refer to Napoleonic Wars).
• 1814 – Congress of Vienna opens to re-draw the European political map after the defeat of France in the Napoleonic Wars.
• 1861 – American Civil War: US. President Abraham Lincoln appoints George B. McClellan as the commander of the Union Army, replacing General Winfield Scott.
• 1893 – The Battle of Bembezi took place and was the most decisive battle won by the British in the First Matabele War of 1893.
• 1911 – World’s first combat aerial bombing mission takes place in Libya during the Italo-Turkish War.
  • Second Lieutenant Giulio Gavotti of Italy drops several small bombs.
• 1914 – World War I: The first British Royal Navy defeat of the war with Germany, the Battle of Coronel, is fought off of the western coast of Chile, in the Pacific, with the loss of HMS Good Hope and HMS Monmouth.
• 1914 – World War I: The Australian Imperial Force (AIF) departed by ship in a single convoy from Albany, Western Australia bound for Egypt.
• 1916 – In Russia, Pavel Milyukov delivers in the State Duma the famous “stupidity or treason” speech, precipitating the downfall of the government of Boris Stürmer.
• 1918 – World War I: With a brave action carried out into the waters of the Austro-Hungarian port of Pula, two officers of the Italian Regia Marina sink with a manned torpedo the enemy battleship SMS Viribus Unitis.
• 1918 – Western Ukraine separates from Austria-Hungary.
• 1922 – Abolition of the Ottoman sultanate: The last sultan of the Ottoman Empire, Mehmed VI, abdicates.
• 1942 – World War II: Matanikau Offensive begins during the Guadalcanal Campaign and ends three days later with an American victory.
• 1943 – World War II: The 3rd Marine Division, US Marines, landing on Bougainville in the Solomon Islands, secures a beachhead, leading that night to a naval clash at the Battle of Empress Augusta Bay.
• 1944 – World War II: Units of the British Army land at Walcheren.
• 1949 – All 55 people on board Eastern Air Lines Flight 537 are killed when the Douglas DC-4 operating the flight collides in mid-air with a Bolivian Air Force Lockheed P-38 Lightning aircraft over Alexandria, Virginia.
• 1951 – Operation Buster–Jangle: 6,500 United States Army soldiers are exposed to ‘Desert Rock’ atomic explosions for training purposes in Nevada.
  • Participation is not voluntary.
• 1952 – Nuclear weapons testing: The United States successfully detonates Ivy Mike, the first thermonuclear device, at the Eniwetok atoll.
  • The explosion had a yield of ten megatons TNT equivalent.
• 1954 – The Front de Libération Nationale fires the first shots of the Algerian War of Independence.
• 1955 – Vietnam War: The establishment of a Military Assistance Advisory Group in South Vietnam marks the beginning of American involvement in the conflict.
• 1956 – Hungarian Revolution: Imre Nagy announces Hungary’s neutrality and withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact.
  • Soviet troops begin to re-enter Hungary, contrary to assurances by the Soviet government.
  • János Kádár and Ferenc Münnich secretly defect to the Soviets.
• 1963 – The 1963 South Vietnamese coup begins (refer to Vietnam War).
• 1979 – In Bolivia, Colonel Alberto Natusch executes a bloody coup d’état against the constitutional government of Wálter Guevara.
• 1981 – Antigua and Barbuda gains independence from the United Kingdom.
• 1993 – The Maastricht Treaty takes effect, formally establishing the European Union.
• 2001 – Turkey, Australia, and Canada agree to commit troops to the invasion of Afghanistan.
• Anniversary of the Revolution (Algeria).
• Independence Day, celebrates the independence of Antigua and Barbuda from the United Kingdom in 1981.
• Self-Defence Forces Commemoration Day (Japan).

People (Births)

• 1611 – François-Marie, comte de Broglie, Italian-French commander (d. 1656).
• 1720 – Toussaint-Guillaume Picquet de la Motte, French admiral (d. 1791).
• 1839 – Ahmed Muhtar Pasha, Ottoman general and politician, 227th Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire (d. 1919).
• 1881 – Perikles Ioannidis, Greek admiral (d. 1965).
• 1940 – Barry Sadler, American sergeant, author, actor, and singer-songwriter (d. 1989).
• 1944 – Oscar Temaru, French-Polynesian soldier and politician, President of French Polynesia.
• 1962 – Sharron Davies, English swimmer.
• 1986 – Ksenija Balta, Estonian high jumper, sprinter, and heptathlete.

People (Deaths)

• 1319 – Uguccione della Faggiuola, Italian condottieri (b. c. 1250).
• 1814 – Alexander Samoylov, Russian general and politician, Russian Minister of Justice (b. 1744).
• 2007 – Paul Tibbets, American general (b. 1915).
• 2014 – Jackie Fairweather, Australian runner and coach (b. 1967).
• 2015 – Houston McTear, American sprinter (b. 1957).