July 21

• July 21, 365
  An earthquake with epicenter in Crete levels the Egyptian Port of Alexandria as well as the Roman outpost of Leptis Magna in Libya, while thousands people dies
• July 21, 1403
  Henry IV defeats the rebel forces of English nobleman Henry Percy in the Battle of Shrewsbury during Glyndŵr Rising
• July 21, 1669
  John Locke's Constitution of English colony Carolina is approved
• July 21, 1711
  Russia and Turkey sign the Treaty of Pruth, which ends the year-long Russo-Turkish War and stipulates the return of Azov to the Ottomans and destruction of Taganrog and several Russian fortresses
• July 21, 1718
  The Turkish threat to Europe is eliminated with the signing of the Treaty of Passarowitz between Austria, Venice and the Ottoman Empire, starting Tulip period of the Ottoman Empire, a relatively peaceful period, during which the Ottoman Empire orients towards Europe
• July 21, 1773
  Pope Clement XIV promulgates Dominus ac Redemptor, a papal brief by which the Society of Jesus is suppressed
• July 21, 1798
  Napoleon Bonaparte defeats Murad Bey and his Mameluke warriors on the outskirts of Cairo at the Battle of the Pyramids ending 700 years of Mamluk rule in Egypt
• July 21, 1822
  Agustín de Iturbide, a Mexican army general and politician, is crowned Agustín I and becomes the first Emperor of Mexico
• July 21, 1831
  The Belgian Revolution in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands leads to the creation of Belgium as independent country with Leopold I, who takes the oath as King of the Belgians
• July 21, 1832
  Treaty of Constantinople grants Greek independence
• July 21, 1861
  In the first major battle of the Civil War, known as First Battle of Bull Run, Confederate forces repel an attempt by the Union Army to turn their flank in Virginia
• July 21, 1873
  At Adair, Iowa, more than seven years after the Liberty holdup, the James-Younger gang makes their first train robbery
• July 21, 1917
  Alexander Kerensky, a moderate socialist party member, becomes Russian Prime Minister
• July 21, 1925
  John Scopes, a Tennessee high school teacher, is indicted for teaching the theory of evolution to students of his science classes in violation of a Tennessee state law, and fined US$100
• July 21, 1954
  At Geneva, Switzerland, France agrees to independence of North and South Vietnam ending the First Indochina War
• July 21, 1969
  American astronaut Neil Armstrong steps off the lunar landing module Eagle during the spaceflight Apollo 11, becoming the first human to walk on the surface of the moon
• July 21, 1973
  USSR launches Mars 4 for fly-by of the red planet

July 16

• July 16, 276
  Marcus Annius Florianus, emperor of Rome, is murdered
• July 16, 1099
  Crusaders herded the Jews of Jerusalem into a synagogue and set it afire during massacre
• July 16, 1212
  Spanish Christians under Alfonso VIII of Castile and Sancho VII of Navarre succeed in defeating the Moors at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, which becomes an turning point in the Reconquista and marks the end of Muslim power in Spain
• July 16, 1548
  La Paz, the seat of government of Bolivia, is founded by Spanish conquistadors
• July 16, 1647
  Masaniello, an Italian fisherman, is murdered in Naples after leading a doomed revolt against Habsburg rule
• July 16, 1769
  Father Junípero Serra, a Spanish Franciscan friar, founds Mission San Diego de Alcalá, the first mission in California
• July 16, 1774
  Russia and the Ottoman Empire sign the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca, ending their six-year war and bringing Russia for the first time to the Mediterranean as the acknowledged protector of Orthodox Christians
• July 16, 1801
  Pope Pius VII and First consul Napoleon sign Concordat of 1801, which solidifies the Roman Catholic Church as the majority church of France, but maintains religious freedom
• July 16, 1809
  The city of La Paz, modern Bolivia, proclaims independence, which becomes the earliest step of the Spanish American wars of independence
• July 16, 1867
  Joseph Monier, a French gardener, patents reinforced concrete, initially developed to strengthen flowerpots
• July 16, 1918
  Russian tzar Nicholas II, his tsarina and their five children are executed by Bolsheviks by the order of Vladimir Lenin to prevent the rescue of the Imperial Family by approaching White forces during the Russian Civil War
• July 16, 1927
  Augusto Cesar Sandino, a Nicaraguan revolutionary, begins 5.5-year war against United States occupation of Nicaragua
• July 16, 1941
  A large pocket of 16th, 19th, and 20th Armies of Soviet Union are encircled in Smolensk by the two German Panzer Groups
• July 16, 1945
  The United States successfully tests the first plutonium atomic bomb, at the Alamogordo airbase in New Mexico
• July 16, 1979
  Iraqi President Hasan al-Bakr resigns and Vice President Saddam Hussein replaces him
• July 16, 1980
  1980 Summer Olympics, boycotted by 65 countries because of the Soviet war in Afghanistan, is opened

June 9

• June 9, 53 BC
  Parthians crush Roman army at battle of Carrhae, killing general Marcus Licinius Crassus
• June 9, 68
  Nero, Roman Emperor, commits suicide, ending the Julio-Claudian Dynasty
• June 9, 922
  French chose Robert I as King of France
• June 9, 1064
  Ferdinand I, the Count of Castile, conquers the city of Coimbra, modern-day Portugal
• June 9, 1456
  Pope Callixtus III excommunicates the apparition of Halley's Comet, believing it to be an ill omen for the Christian defenders of Belgrade from the besieging armies of the Ottoman Empire
• June 9, 1660
  Louis XIV marries Maria Teresa, the daughter of Philip IV of Spain, as part of the Treaty of the Pyrenees
• June 9, 1732
  Royal charter for Georgia is granted to British general James Oglethorpe by George II, for whom the colony is named
• June 9, 1940
  King Haakon VI of Norway flees to London, England after Norway falls to German forces
• June 9, 1955
  "Rock Around the Clock by Bill Haley and His Comets" becomes the first Rock & Roll song to top the U.S. record charts, bringing rock and roll to the American mainstream
• June 9, 2008
  Afghan and British forces uncover a stash of 237 tonnes of hashish in Kandahar province of Afghanistan, believed to be the world's biggest seizure of drugs by weight

June 2

• June 2, 455
  Rome is sacked by King of the Vandals Genseric, who carries a number of Roman citizens to be slaves and loots amounts of treasure from the city, but does not burn the buildings of the city
• June 2, 1537
  Pope Paul III bans the enslavement of Indians in the New World by the bulls Sublimus Dei
• June 2, 1780
  In England, the Earl of Derby originates first horse racing event on sweepstakes basis, the Epsom Derby
• June 2, 1864
  The Russian–Circassian War, begun in 1763, ends leaving about a million Circassians of the northwest Caucasus dead
• June 2, 1875
  Alexander Graham Bell makes his first complex sound transmission
• June 2, 1899
  The government of the Philippines declares war on the United States officially starting Philippine-American War
• June 2, 1936
  General Anastasio Somoza takes over as dictator of Nicaragua after the president of Nicaragua Juan Bautista Sacasa resigns
• June 2, 1946
  Italian plebiscite chooses republic over monarchy
• June 2, 1953
  Elizabeth II of Britain is crowned at Westminster Abbey

May 12

• May 12, 1191
  Richard I of England marries Berengaria of Navarre in Limassol, Cyprus
• May 12, 1215
  English barons serve ultimatum on king John
• May 12, 1264
  Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester, beats and captures English king Henry III at the Battle at Lewes during the Baron's War
• May 12, 1328
  Louis IV, Holy Roman Emperor selects Pietro Rainalducci as antipope Nicolaas V
• May 12, 1588
  King Henry III of France flees Paris after Catholic League under duke Henry of Guise enter the city
• May 12, 1689
  England's King William III joins the League of Augsburg and the Netherlands to counter the war of aggression launched by Louis XIV against the Palatinate states in Germany
• May 12, 1777
  First ice cream advertisement appears in New York
• May 12, 1780
  Charleston, South Carolina falls to the British after a long fight and siege
• May 12, 1789
  In England William Wilberforce lays out his case for the abolition of slavery to the House of Commons
• May 12, 1809
  Napoleon's troops capture Vienna, Austria
• May 12, 1881
  Treaty of Bardo, signed between representatives of the French Republic and Tunisian bey Muhammed as-Sadiq, establishes Tunis as a French protectorate and gives France responsibility for the defense and foreign policy decisions of Tunisia
• May 12, 1885
  In the Battle of Batoche, Saskatchewan, Metis rebels ran out of ammunition and resort to firing pebbles from their guns, until they are forced to retreat
• May 12, 1940
  Germany forces move to Meuse River and launch a blitz conquest of France
• May 12, 1951
  First hydrogen bomb test on a very small scale occurs during Operation Greenhouse on Enewetak Atoll

May 3

• May 3, 1382
  Battle of Beverhoutsveld occurs between County of Flanders and Ghent rebels near Brugge
• May 3, 1481
  Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II dies at age 60; Bayezid II succeeds
• May 3, 1493
  Pope Alexander VI issues bull Inter caetera, which grants to the Crowns of Castile and Aragon lands one hundred leagues west of the Cape Verde Islands
• May 3, 1512
  Pope Julius II opens 5th Council of Lateranen (18th ecumenical council) in Rome
• May 3, 1515
  Portugese fleet occupies Ormus in Persian Gulf
• May 3, 1791
  Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth adopt Constitution of May 3, Europe's first and the world's second modern codified national constitution, designed to redress long-standing political defects and traditional system of Golden Liberty
• May 3, 1845
  Fire kills 1,600 in popular theater in Guangzhou, China
• May 3, 1861
  United States President Lincoln asks for 42,000 Army Volunteers and another 18,000 seamen
• May 3, 1906
  British-controlled Egypt takes Sinai peninsula from the Ottoman Porte transfering administration of Sinai to the Egyptian government
• May 3, 1947
  Japan adopts a new constitution and forms a constitutional democracy
• May 3, 1952
  The first airplane lands at the geographic North Pole
• May 3, 1973
  Chicago's Willis Tower tops out, becoming with the hight of 443 metres the world's tallest building
• May 3, 2008
  Tropical cyclone Nargis with 120 kmh winds and 4 meter waves, the Myanmar's deadliest natural disaster, passes through western Myanmar killing over 140,000 people and leaving 2-3 million residents homeless

April 28

• April 28, 357
  Roman Emperor Constantius II visits Rome for the first time and only time in his life
• April 28, 1202
  King Philip II of France throws out King of England John, which resulted in the collapse of most of the Angevin Empire and contributed to the subsequent growth in power of the Capetian dynasty during the 13th century
• April 28, 1253
  Nichiren, a Buddhist monk, establishes a new sect of Buddhism, Nichiren Buddhism
• March 30, 1282
  Inhabitants in Palermo massacres French occupation forces in Sicily after a Frenchman harassed a woman, beginning the War of the Sicilian Vespers
• April 28, 1376
  Good Parliament, the longest Parliament up until that time, begin to work
• April 28, 1503
  Spain defeats France at the Battle of Cerignola, which considered to be the first battle in history won by gunpowder small arms (arquebus) and mark end of period of knighthood in Europe
• April 28, 1628
  King Kristian IV of Denmark signs a three year alliance with Sweden. Both powers agree to come to the defense of Stralsund if attacked
• April 28, 1738
  Pope Clement XII issues the Eminenti Apostolatus Specula prohibiting Catholics from becoming Freemasons, the first papal decree against the Freemasons
• April 28, 1760
  French forces besieging Quebec defeat the British in the Battle of Sainte-Foy
• April 28, 1789
  Fletcher Christian, master's mate on board HMS Bounty, leads a mutiny on the ship as the crew of the British ship set Captain William Bligh and 18 sailors adrift in a launch in the South Pacific
• April 28, 1818
  President Monroe proclaims naval disarmament on Great Lakes and Lake Champlain
• April 28, 1819
  In India a British hunting party discovers the painted caves at Ajanta
• April 28, 1914
  American engineer Willis Carrier patents air conditioner
• April 28, 1925
  Netherlands and Great Britain return to gold standard
• April 28, 1935
  Moscow Metro, the first underground railway system in the Soviet Union, opens
• April 28, 1945
  Benito Mussolini is executed near Lake Como by Italian partisans while attempt to escape north
• April 28, 1967
  Expo 67, the most attendees World Fair, opens in Montreal, Quebec, Canada
• April 28, 1969
  Charles de Gaulle resigns as President of France after losing a referendum in which he proposed more decentralization
• April 28, 1992
  The two remaining countries of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia - the Republic of Serbia and the Republic of Montenegro - form a new state, named the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
• April 28, 2004
  30 St Mary Axe, commercial skyscraper, also known as The Gherkin, opens in London and becomes one of the most recognised examples of contemporary architecture

April 27

• April 27, 1296
  England's King Edward I defeats the Scots at the Battle of Dunbar and deposes King John Balliol triggering Wars of Scottish Independence
• April 27, 1429
  Joan of Arc and a small army set out for Orleans, besieged by the English since October 1428
• April 27, 1521
  Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan is hit by a poisoned arrow while fighting with natives in the Philippine islands, and dies
• April 27, 1522
  Charles V and Pope Adrianus VI beat France at Battle of Bicocca
• April 27, 1565
  Miguel Lopez de Legazpi establishes the city of Cebu, the first Spanish settlement in the Philippines, starting a period of Spanish colonization of East Indies, that would last over three hundred years
• April 27, 1650
  James Graham, a Scottish nobleman and soldier, is defeated during Wars of the Three Kingdoms
• April 27, 1682
  A rebellion by Streltsy, the units of Russian guardsmen, triggered by the death of Feodor III of Russia, makes Peter the Great second tsar after Ivan V being proclaimed as the first tsar with Sophia acting as a regent for them both
• April 27, 1865
  The steamer Sultana catches fire and burns after one of its boilers exploded on the Mississippi River near Memphis, Tennessee, killing more than 1,800 paroled Union prisoners on their way home
• April 27, 1870
  Heinrich Schliemann, a German archeologist, starts an archaeological excavator of Troy, an ancient city situated on the summit of the mound of Hissarlik in northwest Anatolia
• April 27, 1909
  Sultan Abdul Hamid II of Turkey is overthrown and is succeeded by his brother Mehmed V
• April 27, 1950
  South Africa passes Group Areas Act segregating races
• April 27, 1961
  Sierra Leone declares independence from United Kingdom
• April 27, 1963
  Cuban premier Fidel Castro arrives in Moscow for the first time
• April 27, 1978
  Afghanistan President Daoud Khan is killed and Nur Mohammed Taraki succeeds him during Saur Revolution, marking beginning of long Afghan Civil War
• April 27, 1989
  Major demonstration for democratic reforms occurs in Beijing's Tiananmen square, China
• April 27, 2005
  Facing international pressure after demonstrations in Lebanon, Syria withdraws the last of its 14,000 troop military garrison in Lebanon, ending its 29 year military domination of that country

April 22

• April 22, 1073
  Gregory VII, Hildebrand of Sovana, becomes Pope after death of Pope Alexander II
• April 22, 1370
  The first stone of the Bastille is laid by order of King Charles V in order to defend Paris from England forces during Hundred Year War
• April 22, 1453
  The Ottomans haul 76 warships out of the water and drag them on wood rails to bypass the Greek blockade of the Constantinople harbor
• April 22, 1509
  Henry VIII ascends to English throne after death of his father Henry VII to become the second monarch of the Tudor dynasty
• April 22, 1529
  Treaty of Zaragoza defines the antimeridian of Tordesillas attributing the Moluccas to Portugal and Philippines to Spain
• April 22, 1676
  Netherlands and Spain forces are defeated by France in the Battle of Augusta, a Dutch skilled admiral Michiel de Ruyter is fatally wounded
• April 22, 1724
  Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher, is born in Konigsberg, modern-day Kaliningrad
• April 22, 1745
  Treaty of Fussen is signed between the Electorate of Bavaria and Habsburg Austria, restoring the status quo of Germany
• April 22, 1826
  Ibrahim Pasha, son of Muhammad Ali of Egypt, takes Missolonghi in West Greece after a long siege
• April 22, 1876
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, a Russian composer, completes his "Swan Lake" ballet
• April 22, 1898
  The United States Navy begin blockading Cuban ports under orders from President McKinley, formally declaring war between the United States and Spain
• April 22, 1915
  Second Battle of Ypres, marked by the first mass use of poison gas, begins between German Empire and Allies
• April 22, 1930
  United States, Britain and Japan sign London Naval Treaty to reduce naval forces, which is strongly opposed by the Japanese military and inflames growing anti-foreign sentiment and militarism
• April 22, 1943
  British Royal Air Force shoots down 14 German transport planes over Mediterranean Sea
• April 22, 1970
  First Earth Day held internationally to conserve natural resources
• April 22, 1977
  Simon Peres, a Polish-born Israeli statesman, becomes premier of Israel
• April 22, 1978
  The One Love Peace Concert is held at National Heroes Stadium in Kingston, Jamaica, where Bob Marley unites two opposing political leaders at this concert, bringing peace to the civil war-ridden streets of the city
• April 22, 2010
  The Deepwater Horizon oil rig off the Louisiana coast sinks into the Gulf of Mexico two days after an explosion tore through it, leaving the largest oil spill in United States history with 492,000 tonnes of oil

April 18

• April 18, 1506
  The cornerstone of new St. Peter's Basilica is laid by order of Pope Julius II after demolition of the ancient basilica
• April 18, 1521
  Martin Luther confronts the emperor Charles V in the Diet of Worms and refuses to retract his views which led to his excommunication
• April 18, 1663
  Osman declares war on Austria beginning Austro-Turkish War
• April 18, 1688
  Jacobite army begins siege of Derry in Ireland
• April 18, 1888
  The Imperial British East Africa Company, the administrator of British East Africa, is incorporated in London, England
• April 18, 1906
  At 5:13 a.m., an earthquake estimated 8.0 on the Richter scale strikes San Francisco, caused by a slip of the San Andreas Fault over a segment about 275 kilometers long, killing estimated 3,000 people from the quake and fires and destroying over 80% of the city
• April 18, 1924
  First crossword puzzle book is published in USA by Simon and Schuster
• April 18, 1949
  Republic of Ireland withdraws from British Commonwealth
• April 18, 1951
  France, West Germany and Benelux form European Steel and Coal Community by Treaty of Paris, making one more step to the founding of the European Union
• April 18, 1974
  Red Brigade, a paramilitary organization, kidnaps Italian Attorney General Mario Sossi
• April 18, 1980
  Zimbabwe, formerly Southern Rhodesia, declares independence from United Kingdom and Robert Mugabe becomes Prime Minister

April 8

• April 8, 217
  Roman emperor Caracalla is murdered by army officer after stopping to urinate during a travel to temple near Carrhae; Macrinus becomes the 24th Emperor of the Roman Empire
• April 8, 451
  Attila's Huns plunder city of Metz and continue moving south along the Moselle River
• April 8, 1195
  Alexios III Angelos drives out brother Isaac II Angelos as Byzantine emperor
• April 8, 1341
  Francesco Petrarch, Italian scholar and poet, is crowned poet laureate on the Capitol in Rome
• April 8, 1364
  King Jean II the Good of France dies in prison at the Savoy Palace, London and is given lavish funeral, thus his son Charles V begins his rule of France
• April 8, 1492
  Lorenzo de' Medici, ruler of Florence, dies
• April 8, 1820
  The Venus de Milo is discovered on the Aegean island of Melos by a peasant Yorgos Kentrotas
• April 8, 1898
  British General Horatio Kitchener with Anglo-Egyptian forces defeats 15,000 Sudanese Abdallahi ibn Muhammad, the leader of the dervishes in Sudan, at the Battle of Atbara, the turning point in the conquest of Sudan by a British and Egyptian coalition
• April 8, 1902
  Dmitry Sipyagin, Russian minister of interior and headed Secret Service, is assassinated in the Mariinsky Palace by Socialist-Revolutionary Stepan Balmashov
• April 8, 1904
  Great Britain and France sign Cordial Entente concerning colonial matter, marking the start of the alliance against Germany that fought the First World War
• April 8, 1911
  Heike Kamerlingh Onnes, a Dutch physicist, finds that at 4.2 K the resistance in a solid mercury wire immersed in liquid helium suddenly vanish, thus discovers superconductivity
• April 8, 1912
  Frederick Gowland Hopkins, an English biochemist, after series of animal feeding experiments, suggests the existence in normal diets of tiny quantities of substances that are essential for animal growth and survival, later called vitamins
• April 8, 1913
  Opening of China's first parliament takes place in Beijing
• April 8, 1946
  The assembly of the League of Nations meets for last time, voting that "from this day the League of Nations shall cease to exist"
• April 8, 1962
  Evian Accords, comprise a treaty signed by France and the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic, which sought Algeria's independence from France, is accepted by referendum in France
• April 8, 1973
  Pablo Picasso, a Spanish painter, sculptor, dies
• April 8, 1994
  Kurt Cobain, lead singer of Nirvana, is found dead in Seattle, Washington, where he committed a suicide by gunshot

March 26

• March 26, 1027
  John XIX crowns Conrad II the Holy Roman emperor
• March 26, 1668
  England takes control of Bombay, modern Mumbai, India
• March 26, 1790
  US Congress passes Naturalization Act is passed and requires two-year residency only for "free white persons" to grant the national citizenship
• March 26, 1859
  Urbain Le Verrier, a French mathematician, publishes a thorough study of Mercury's motion and proposes existence of a small planet Vulcan in an orbit between Mercury and the Sun
• March 26, 1913
  Bulgaria captures Adrianople, ending the first Balkan War
• March 26, 1971
  Bangladesh Liberation War between East Pakistan and Islamic Republic of Pakistan, which leads to independence of Bangladesh from Pakistan, begins with military operation of Pakistan Army aimed to curb the Bengali nationalist movement
• March 26, 1971
  East-Pakistan is proclaimed independent state of Bangladesh as the Pakistan Army launched military operations against the people of East Pakistan
• March 26, 1975
  The biological weapons convention enters into force
• March 26, 1995
  The Schengen Agreement easing cross-border travel goes into effect in several European countries
• March 26, 2000
  Vladimir Putin, the Prime Minister of Russia and former officer in the KGB, is elected President, gradually leading Russia into authoritarian regime

March 14

• March 14, 1558
  Ferdinand I is appointed Holy Roman emperor
• March 14, 1629
  About 1,000 puritans in Massachusetts Bay Company under the leadership of John Winthrop receive a royal charter from King Charles I to trade and colonize between the Charles and Merrimack rivers
• March 14, 1647
  The Treaty of Ulm is reached between the French and the Bavarians during the Thirty Years' War by which Maximilian I of Bavaria abandoned his alliance with the Holy Roman emperor Ferdinand III
• March 14, 1653
  Johan van Galen beats English fleet in the battle of Leghorn at Livorno
• March 14, 1841
  David Livingstone, a Scottish explorer in Africa, arrives as medical missionary in Capetown, South Africa
• March 14, 1864
  Samuel and Florence Baker arrive at Lake Luta N'Zige and named it Lake Albert, also find that the Nile enters the lake at a 130-foot waterfall that they named Murchison Falls
• March 14, 1879
  Physicist Albert Einstein, mathematician best known for his theories on relativity, is born in Ulm, Germany
• March 14, 1883
  Karl Marx, a German political philosopher, dies in London
• March 14, 1900
  United States Congress passes the Gold Standard Act, fixing gold value of dollar at 25.8 grains at 0.900 fine as standard unit of money of the United States
• March 14, 1939
  Slovakia declares their independence from the Czech government in Prague and becomes a client state of Nazi Germany
• March 14, 1942
  American physician John Bumstead and Orvan Hess become the first in the world to successfully treat a patient using penicillin
• March 14, 1991
  Emir of Kuwait Jaber Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah returns to Kuwait City, after the Iraqis leave
• March 14, 1995
  Astronaut Norman Thagard becomes the first American to ride into space aboard a Russian launch vehicle, lifting off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan
• March 14, 2004
  Vladimir Putin easily wins a second term in Russian presidential election

March 12

• March 12, 1054
  Pope Leo IX escapes captivity at Benevento and returns to Rome
• March 12, 1088
  Odo of Lagery elected as Pope Urban II, replacing Victor III
• March 12, 1365
  The University of Vienna is founded by Duke Rudolph IV
• March 12, 1609
  The Virginia Company establishes a settlement in the Islands of Bermuda making Bermuda an English colony
• March 12, 1664
  England's King Charles II grants land in the New World, later known as New Jersey, to his brother James, the Duke of York
• March 12, 1689
  Former English King James II lands in Ireland starting the Williamite War between Jacobites (supporters of Catholic King James II) and Williamites (supporters of Protestant Prince William of Orange)
• March 12, 1755
  First steam engine in America installed, to pump water from a mine
• March 12, 1845
  Francis Rynd, an Irish physician, describes in the Dublin Medical Press the hollow needle, his invention used in hypodermic syringes
• March 12, 1867
  Last French troops leave Mexico after Mexican Republican victory in French intervention
• March 12, 1917
  Russian State Duma deputies sets up Provisional Committee, a special government body competing for power with the Petrograd Soviet, set up by workers
• March 12, 1918
  Moscow becomes capital of revolutionary Russia
• March 12, 1925
  Sun Yat-sen, the Premier of the Kuomintang of China, dies, creating a power vacuum in the party and triggering contest between Chiang Kai-shek, a member of the right wing of the KMT, and Sun Yat-sen's close comrade-in-arms Wang Jingwei
• March 12, 1930
  Mahatma Gandhi, the preeminent leader of Indian nationalism, with large numbers of Indians begins the Salt March to the sea coast, the campaign against the British salt monopoly in colonial India, which becomes an important episode of the Indian independence movement
• March 12, 1938
  German troops, greeted by cheering German-Austrians with Nazi salutes, march into Austria and annex the country, which is called by Nazi propaganda the Anschluss
• March 12, 1939
  Pope Pius XII is crowned in Vatican ceremonies
• March 12, 1947
  Truman Doctrine, a United States policy to stop Soviet expansion during the Cold War, is proclaimed by United States President Harry S. Truman during his speech addressed to the U.S. Congress
• March 12, 1957
  German Democratic Republic accepts 22 Russian divisions
• March 12, 1968
  Mauritius gains independence from Britain
• March 12, 1968
  After poor performance in the New Hampshire Democratic primary, Lyndon Johnson announces he will not seek reelection
• March 12, 1993
  North Korea says that it plans to withdraw from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and refuses to allow inspectors access to nuclear sites
• March 12, 1999
  Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic join NATO

March 7

• March 7, 161
  Marcus Aurelius became emperor on the death of Antoninus Pius
• March 7, 1274
  Thomas Aquinas, Italian theologian, religious writer, influenced official policy of Catholic Church, dies at age 48
• March 7, 1530
  The Pope Clement VII refuses the appeal of Henry VIII of England on permission to divorce Catherine of Aragon
• March 7, 1695
  In Britain John Trevor, the speaker of the House of Commons office, is found guilty of accepting a bribe of 1000 guineas from the City of London to aid the passage of a bill through the house, and is expelled from the House of Commons
• March 7, 1799
  Napoleon Bonaparte captures the Turkish citadel at Jaffa, Palestine and orders the massacre of thousands of imprisoned Muslim soldiers claiming that he could not feed them
• March 7, 1850
  In a three-hour speech to the United Sates Senate, Daniel Webster, an American senator from Massachusetts, endorses the Compromise of 1850 as a means to defuse a four-year confrontation between the slave states of the South and the free states of the North
• March 7, 1917
  First jazz record "Dixie Jazz Band One Step", recorded by Nick LaRocca Original Dixieland Jazz Band, is released by RCA Victor in Camden, New Jersey
• March 7, 1926
  First transatlantic telephone call occurs between London and New York
• March 7, 1935
  Germany regains possession of the Saarland after plebiscite in Saar indicates a desire of 90.3 percent to join Germany
• March 7, 1936
  Germany inform foreign ministers of the re-occupation of the Rhineland in violation of the Treaty of Versailles, and outline a peace plan including 25-year non-aggression pacts for all countries bordering on Germany
• March 7, 1951
  Haj Ali Razmara becomes the third Iranian prime minister to be assassinated
• March 7, 1991
  Iraq continues to explode oil fields in Kuwait during its repeal
• March 7, 2009
  NASA launches from Cape Canaveral in Florida the unmanned Kepler telescope to orbit the Sun to search for Earth-like planets with the potential to host life

March 6

• March 6, 1475
  Michelangelo Buonarroti, painter, sculptor and architect, is born
• March 6, 1521
  Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan complete crossing the Pacific Ocean in 99 days, renames the South Sea as the Pacific Ocean, and lands at the island of Guam
• March 6, 1665
  Philosophical Transactions of Royal Society, a scientific journal published by the Royal Society of London, starts publishing
• March 6, 1714
  Peace of Rastatt is signed by French emperor and Charles VI of Habsburg to put an end to state of war between them from the War of the Spanish Succession
• March 6, 1728
  Spain and England sign Treaty of El Pardo, effectively ending end to the Anglo-Spanish War
• March 6, 1820
  The Missouri Compromise is signed by President James Monroe, providing for the admission of Missouri into the Union as a slave state, but prohibited slavery in the rest of the northern Louisiana Purchase territory
• March 6, 1836
  Battle of the Alamo ends with defeat for Texan separatists and murder of all the Alamo defenders after fighting for 13 days during the Texas Revolution in Mexico
• March 6, 1899
  German pharmaceutical company Friedrich Bayer registers Aspirin, brand name for acetylsalicylic acid, with the Imperial Patent Office in Berlin
• March 6, 1944
  United States Air Force begins daylight bombing of Berlin
• March 6, 1957
  Ghana, formerly Gold Coast, declares independence from United Kingdom, with Kwame Nkrumah as Prime Minister
• March 6, 1986
  USSR's Vega 1 flies by Halley's Comet at 8,889 km

February 25

• February 25, 1570
  Pope Pius V issues the bull Regnans in Excelsis which excommunicates Queen Elizabeth I and absolves her subjects from allegiance
• February 25, 1791
  President George Washington signs a bill creating the First Bank of the United States
• February 25, 1831
  The Polish revolutionaries halt the Russian advance into their country at the Battle of Olszynka Grochowska
• February 25, 1836
  Samuel Colt, an American inventor and industrialist, patents the first revolving barrel multi-shot firearm, which allows the shooter to fire 5 or 6 times before reloading
• February 25, 1856
  Congress of Paris between representatives of the great powers in Europe to make peace after Crimean War begins
• February 25, 1863
  US President Abraham Lincoln signs the National Currency Act into law, creating national banking system, comptroller of currency, allowing qualified banks to issue government-sponsored paper money in the banks' names
• February 25, 1910
  Dalai Lama flees Tibet from Chinese troops to British-Indies
• February 25, 1921
  Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic is proclaimed after invasion and occupation by Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic
• February 25, 1923
  Bread in Berlin, Germany rises to 2,000 marks due to hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic
• February 25, 1932
  Immigrant Adolf Hitler gets German citizenship
• February 25, 1939
  First Anderson bomb shelter in Britain erected in an Islington garden, named after Sir John Anderson with special responsibility for preparing air-raid precautions
• February 25, 1947
  The Allied Control Council of Germany issues Law No. 46, disbanding Prussia
• February 25, 1948
  The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia under Klement Gottwald, with Soviet backing, seize power in Czechoslovakia after coup d'aet, ending the last remaining democracy in Eastern Europe
• February 25, 1956
  Soviet party leader Nikita Khrushchev denounces Josef Stalin's purges and the personality cult at 20th Soviet Party Conference, ushering in a less repressive era in the Soviet Union
• February 25, 1964
  Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr., later accepted name Muhammad Ali, one of the greatest heavyweights in the sport's history, wins the world heavyweight championship for the first time
• February 25, 1980
  Military coup under DГ©si Bouterse and Roy Horb in Suriname ousts Prime Minister Henck Arron, replacing the government with a National Military Council and starting military dictatorship in Suriname
• February 25, 1992
  Khojaly Massacre, massacre of 613 Azerbaijani civilians by the Armenian, occurs in Khojaly
• February 25, 2006
  Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni wins his second re-election, sparking riots in Kampala by opposition supporters

February 24

• February 24, 303
  First official Roman edict for the Great Persecution of Christians and Manicheans is issued by Emperor Diocletian
• February 24, 1272
  Jacob, an Italian-Jewish trader, departed in haste from Zaitun, China
• February 24, 1525
  The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V captures the French king Francis I at the battle of Pavia in Italy during Italian War of 1521–26, making Spain dominant power in Italy
• February 24, 1538
  King Ferdinand of Austria and King John Zipolya of Hungary sign Treaty of Nagyrad dividing the medieval Kingdom of Hungary
• February 24, 1582
  Pope Gregory XIII issues a papal bull, or edict, outlining his calendar reforms, because the old Julian Calendar has an error rate of one day in every 128 years
• February 24, 1744
  French attempt to restart the Jacobite rebellion fails due to one of the worst storms of the century
• February 24, 1821
  Mexico rebels proclaim the Plan de Iguala, their declaration of independence from Spain, and take over the mission lands in California
• February 24, 1836
  Winslow Homer, American painter, is born
• February 24, 1839
  Steam shovel is patented by William Otis, Philadelphia
• February 24, 1881
  De Lesseps' Company begins work on Panama Canal
• February 24, 1895
  Cuban War for Independence, which results in Cuban independence from Spain, begins
• February 24, 1918
  Estonia declares independence from Russia
• February 24, 1924
  Mahatma Gandhi is released from jail having served only two of six years imprisonment for sedition
• February 24, 1949
  WAC Corporal, the first sounding rocket developed in the United States, used a German V-2 rocket acting as first stage, becomes the first rocket to outer space, White Sands, New Mexico
• February 24, 1986
  Voyager 2, an American space probe, performs first Uranus fly-by and makes the first close up images of the planet Uranus
• February 24, 1991
  United States and allies begin a ground war assault on Iraqi troops in Kuwait
• February 24, 2004
  A 6.5 Richter scale earthquake in Northern Morocco hits in the Rif mountains near the city of Al Hoceima, killing 400. Ait Kamara is destroyed; 517 are killed
• February 24, 2006
  A state of emergency is declared in the Philippines, after an alleged coup against President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is foiled

February 23

• February 23, 155
  Polycarp, Christian bishop of Smyrna, is arrested and burned at stake
• February 23, 1100
  Emperor Huizong, a calligrapher, painter and promoter of Taoism, begins to rule over China
• February 23, 1516
  The Hapsburg Charles I is proclaimed king of Aragon and Castile after the death of his grandfather Ferdinand II
• February 23, 1530
  Spain's King Carlos I is crowned Holy Roman Emperor Charles V by Pope Clement VII in the last coronation of a German king by a Pope
• February 23, 1574
  The 5th War of Religion, against the Huguenots, breaks out in France
• February 23, 1615
  The Estates-General in Paris are dissolved, having been in session since October 1614
• February 23, 1660
  Charles XI becomes king of Sweden after death of his father Charles X Gustav of a stroke
• February 23, 1685
  George Frideric Handel, composer and musician, is born in Halle, Germany
• February 23, 1689
  Protestant Dutch prince William III ascends to the throne over England, Scotland, and Ireland after King James II, Catholics protector, escape during England's Glorious Revolution
• February 23, 1820
  Cato Street Conspiracy, an attempt to murder all the British cabinet ministers and Prime Minister Lord Liverpool, is uncovered
• February 23, 1847
  American major general Zachary Taylor defeats Mexican General Antonio Loіpez de Santa Anna and Mexican army at the battle of Buena Vista, Mexico
• February 23, 1848
  Revolution of 1848 begins in France resulting in King Louis-Philippe's abdication, the establishment of the Second French Republic and spread of revolutionary movements throughout Europe
• February 23, 1854
  Great Britain and Orange Free state sign Convention of Bloemfontein, by which the independence of the Orange Free State is recognized
• February 23, 1893
  Rudolf Diesel, a German mechanical engineer, is granted a patent for the invention of the diesel engine, an internal combustion engine that uses the heat of compression to initiate ignition
• February 23, 1987
  Supernova 1987A, the first naked-eye supernova since 1604, first seen in Large Magellanic Cloud
• February 23, 1998
  Osama bin Laden publishes a fatwa, declaring jihad against all Jews and Crusaders, which declared the killing of North Americans and their allies
• February 23, 2002
  Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia kidnaps Oxygen Green Party presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, who is traveling in Colombian territory
• February 23, 2008
  Microsoft announces it will cease making HD DVD players for the Xbox 360