July 3
1863:
Battle of Gettysburg ended.
Following three days of intense fighting—casualties numbered more than 40,000—the Battle of Gettysburg ended on this day in 1863 with a victory for the Union forces and was seen as a turning point in the American Civil War.
1976:
Israel launched a rescue of hostages held by airplane hijackers in Entebbe, Uganda.
1962:
Algeria gained its independence from France.
1856:
The U.S. House of Representatives voted to admit Kansas to statehood under the antislavery resolution known as the Topeka Constitution, despite the opposition of the Senate and President Franklin Pierce.
1608:
Samuel de Champlain founded the city of Quebec, the first permanent European base in Canada.
July 4
1776:
Declaration of Independence approved by Second Continental Congress.
The Declaration of Independence, adopted this day in 1776 by the Second Continental Congress, called for the American colonies to secede from Great Britain, a proclamation now commemorated as a U.S. national holiday.
1946:
The Republic of the Philippines was proclaimed an independent country with Manuel Roxas as its first president.
1884:
The Statue of Liberty was presented to the United States by the French in Paris.
1865:
Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland was published.
1845:
Essayist and philosopher Henry David Thoreau moved to his retreat at Walden Pond, where he eventually wrote a series of reflective essays titled Walden; or, Life in the Woods.
1826:
Two major figures of the American Revolution who became U.S. presidents, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, died—50 years to the day after the adoption of the Declaration of Independence.
1804:
American writer Nathaniel Hawthorne, whose greatest works, including the novel The Scarlet Letter (1850), are marked by profound psychological and moral insight, was born in Salem, Massachusetts.
1054:
The Crab Nebula, the brightest known remnant of a supernova, was first noticed by Chinese astronomers.
July 5
1950:
Israel's Law of Return passed.
During its early years, Israel had to absorb a major influx of immigrants, including several hundred thousand nearly destitute Holocaust survivors and a large influx of Sephardic Jews from Arab states, who had felt increasingly insecure in their home countries following the Arab defeat in the Arab-Israeli war of 1948. As a result, on this day the Knesset (parliament) passed the Law of Return, granting Jews the freedom to immigrate to Israel and immediate citizenship. This law, however, proved to be controversial in later years, when the question “Who is a Jew?” raised other issues in the Jewish state, including those of immigration of non-Jewish relatives.
1975:
Arthur Ashe defeated Jimmy Connors in four sets at the 89th Wimbledon tennis championship.
1971:
The 26th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was certified, granting suffrage to citizens age 18 years and older.
1865:
The U.S. Secret Service began operation under the Treasury Department to aid in the prevention of counterfeiting.
1859:
Captain N.C. Brooks discovered the Midway Islands in the central Pacific Ocean and claimed the territory for the United States.
July 6
1415:
Jan Hus burned at the stake.
Against the backdrop of the Western Schism and an intense rivalry between the German and the Czech masters at the University of Prague, Jan Hus, the dean of the philosophy faculty, embraced the philosophical writings of John Wycliffe. After taking control of the Bethlehem Chapel in Prague, which had become the centre of the growing national reform movement in Bohemia, Hus became increasingly absorbed in public preaching and eventually emerged as the popular leader of the religious reform movement in Czechoslovakia. Found to be a dangerous heretic by the Council of Constance, he was burned at the stake on this day.
1964:
Malawi (formerly Nyasaland) broke from British rule and became an independent country under the Commonwealth of Nations.
1957:
Tennis player Althea Gibson became the first black to win the Wimbledon singles championship with her defeat of Darlene Hard.
1928:
The first full-length sound motion picture, Lights of New York, premiered in New York City.
1885:
Louis Pasteur successfully tested an antirabies vaccine.
1777:
British General John Burgoyne captured Fort Ticonderoga from the Americans during the American Revolution.
July 7
1898:
Hawaiian Islands annexed by the United States.
The U.S. Congress annexed Hawaii through a joint resolution signed by President William McKinley on this day in 1898, paving the way for the islands to become a territory (1900) and later a U.S. state (1959).
1978: The Solomon Islands became an independent nation.
1946:
Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini became the first U.S. citizen to be canonized by the Roman Catholic Church.
1937:
Chinese and Japanese troops clashed near the Marco Polo Bridge（Lugouqiao Bridge） outside Beijing prior to World War II.
1906:
Satchel Paige, a professional baseball pitcher who earned legendary fame during his many years in the Negro leagues, is believed to have been born this day in Mobile, Alabama.
1807:
The first of the Treaties of Tilsit was signed between France and Russia after Napoleon's victories over the Russians and Prussians.
1770:
A Russian fleet destroyed an Ottoman fleet in the Battle of 莈şme on the Aegean Sea.
1438:
King Charles VII of France issued the Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges, restricting the rights of the pope and in many cases making his jurisdiction subject to the will of the king.
1307:
King Edward I of England died on his way to subdue the new Scottish king, Robert the Bruce.
July 8
1497:
Vasco da Gama's first voyage to India.
On this day in 1497, Vasco da Gama sailed from Lisbon with a fleet of four vessels, and he ultimately opened a sea route from western Europe to Asia by way of the Cape of Good Hope, ushering in a new era in world history.
1950:
Douglas MacArthur was appointed commander of United Nations forces in the Korean War.
1906:
Philip C. Johnson, an architect and critic known for his promotion of the International style and, later, for his role in defining postmodernist architecture, was born in Cleveland, Ohio.
1896:
William Jennings Bryan delivered his “Cross of Gold” speech at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
1889:
Journalist Charles Henry Dow published the first issue of The Wall Street Journal.
1889:
John L. Sullivan beat Jake Kilrain in 75 rounds to defend his title in the last heavyweight championship bout held under London Prize Ring rules.
1833:
The Treaty of Hünk鈘 İskelesi, a defensive alliance between the Ottoman Empire and Russia, was signed at the village of Hünk鈘 İskelesi, near Istanbul.
1815:
Louis XVIII returned to Paris following the Hundred Days.
July 9
1942:
Anne Frank forced into hiding.
Anne Frank and her family went into hiding in Amsterdam on this day in 1942 and lived in a secret annex—an experience documented in her diary, which became a classic of war literature—until their capture on August 4, 1944.
2002:
Fearing that there would not be enough eligible players to continue, Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig stopped the annual All-Star Game in the 11th inning with the score tied at 7–7.
1960:
Launched this day was the Thresher, the first of a class of U.S. nuclear-powered attack submarines, which sank in 1963 in the worst submarine accident in history.
1856:
Nikola Tesla—a Serbian American inventor and researcher who discovered the rotating magnetic field, the basis of most alternating-current machinery—was born this day or the next in Smiljan, Croatia.
1850:
Zachary Taylor, 12th president of the United States, died only 16 months after taking office.
1828:
American portrait painter Gilbert Stuart died in Boston.
1816:
The Congress of Tucumán declared Argentina's independence from Spain.
1762:
Catherine II overthrew Peter III and began her reign as empress of Russia.
1755:
General Edward Braddock's British army was thoroughly defeated in the Battle of the Monongahela during the French and Indian War.
1540:
The marriage of King Henry VIII of England and his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves, was annulled.
July 10
1962:
Telstar 1 launched.
Telstar 1, the first communications satellite to transmit live television signals and telephone conversations across the Atlantic Ocean, was launched this day in 1962, inaugurating a new age in electronic communications.
1985:
The Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior was sunk by two bomb explosions while berthed in Auckland Harbour, New Zealand.
1973:
The Bahamas gained independence from Britain within the Commonwealth.
1952:
The constitution of Eritrea, prepared by the United Nations in consultation with Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia, was adopted.
1925:
The Scopes Trial began in Dayton, Tennessee, with William Jennings Bryan arguing for the prosecution and Clarence Darrow for the defense.
1875:
Mary McLeod Bethune, an African American educator who was active in national black affairs and a special adviser to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, was born in Mayesville, South Carolina.
1609:
The Catholic League was formed by Maximilian I, duke of Bavaria, and the Catholic powers in Germany.
1584:
William I, first of the hereditary stadholders of the United Provinces of the Netherlands, was assassinated.
July 11
1804:
Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton duel.
Outraged over disparaging remarks that Alexander Hamilton had allegedly made at a dinner party, Aaron Burr challenged his longtime rival to a duel, and on this day he fatally shot Hamilton on the heights of Weehawken, New Jersey. In 1800, Burr, the Republican candidate for vice president, had compelled Hamilton to acknowledge his authorship of The Public Conduct and Character of John Adams, Esq., President of the United States, a personal attack Hamilton had circulated privately, thereby bringing his quarrel with Adams into the open. When Thomas Jefferson and Burr received the same number of electoral votes (through an anomaly that would result in adoption of the 12th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution), the choice between them for president was cast into the House of Representatives, and Hamilton persuaded his Federalist colleagues to support their old Republican enemy Jefferson (who then won the presidency) rather than Burr.
1955:
The U.S. Air Force Academy officially opened at temporary quarters at Lowry Air Force Base in Denver, Colorado.
1914:
George Herman (“Babe”) Ruth played in his first major league baseball game, for the Boston Red Sox.
1863:
Angered by unfair practices in Civil War conscription, New York City workers rioted and attacked draft headquarters.
1798:
The U.S. Marine Corps, originally established in 1775, was formally reestablished.
1690:
In the Battle of the Boyne, King William III of England defeated former king James II, who was attempting to take back the throne.
1302:
In the Battle of the Golden Spurs, an untrained Flemish infantry militia defeated a professional force of French and patrician Flemish cavalry, thus halting the growth of French control over Belgium.
1274:
Robert the Bruce, Scottish king who freed Scotland from English rule, was born.
July 12
1984:
Geraldine Ferraro designated running mate of Walter Mondale.
Democratic presidential candidate Walter F. Mondale put forward Geraldine Ferraro as his running mate on this day, making her the first woman ever nominated for vice president by a major political party in the United States. The onetime U.S. district attorney for Queens county in New York won a reputation as an effective and hardworking politician while representing that state's Ninth Congressional District in the House of Representatives. Her skillful negotiating as the chair of the 1984 Democratic platform committee helped convince Mondale to pick her for the ticket.
1975:
The island nation of S鉶 Tomé and Príncipe was granted independence from Portugal.
1920:
The independent republic of Lithuania, having successfully expelled invading Soviet troops, signed a peace treaty with Russia.
1862: The Congressional Medal of Honor, awarded for battlefield bravery, was created for the U.S. Army.
1543:
King Henry VIII of England wed his sixth and last wife, Catherine Parr.
1536:
Renaissance scholar and humanist Desiderius Erasmus died in Basel, Switzerland.
July 13
1793:
French revolutionary Jean-Paul Marat assassinated.
On this day, Jean-Paul Marat, a leader of the radical Montagnard faction during the French Revolution, was stabbed to death in his bath by Charlotte Corday, a young Girondin supporter from Normandy. The author of Plan de législation criminelle (“Plan for Criminal Legislation”), which was considered subversive and was suppressed by French authorities, Marat assimilated the ideas of such critics of the ancien régime as Montesquieu and Jean-Jacques Rousseau and corresponded with the American Revolutionary leader Benjamin Franklin. In 1789, at the start of the French Revolution, Marat went from being a supporter of the monarchy to publishing antiroyalist pamphlets.
1878:
The Treaty of Berlin was signed, replacing the Treaty of San Stefano that ended the Russo-Turkish War.
1861:
General George B. McClellan and Union troops defeated Confederate forces in northwestern Virginia. Once the area was under the Union's control, pro-Union settlers were able to form it into the separate state of West Virginia.
1832:
Henry Rowe Schoolcraft identified the source of the Mississippi River as Lake Itasca, in Minnesota.
1787:
The U.S. Congress passed the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, which laid the basis for the government of the Northwest Territory and for the admission of its constituent parts as states of the Union.
1713:
Spain and Britain signed one of the treaties of Utrecht, this one giving Gibraltar and Minorca to Britain.
July 14
1789: Bastille stormed by Paris mob.
On this morning a mob advanced on the Bastille (the state prison) in Paris, intent on asking the prison governor to release the arms and munitions stored there. Angered by the governor's evasiveness, the people stormed and captured the prison. This dramatic action came to symbolize the end of the ancien régime. Commemorating this event, one of the most pivotal in the history of France, Bastille Day has been celebrated annually on July 14 since 1880 as a French national holiday with parades, speeches, and fireworks.
1968:
Baseball great Hank Aaron hit his 500th career home run.
1921:
Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, in a still-controversial decision, were found guilty of the murder of two men.
1881:
American gunfighter Billy the Kid was shot and killed by Sheriff Pat Garrett.
1865:
British mountaineer Edward Whymper climbed the Matterhorn.
July 15
1965:
Close-up pictures of Mars provided by Mariner 4 .
Mariner 4, launched by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) on November 28, 1964, flew by Mars and returned pictures of its surface this day. The Mariner program consisted of interplanetary probes designed to fly by Mars, Venus, and Mercury. Mariners 2 (1962) and 5 (1967) passed Venus within 35,000 km and 4,000 km (22,000 miles and 2,500 miles), respectively, and made temperature and atmospheric density measurements. Mariners 4 (1965), 6 and 7 (1969), and 9 (1971–72) obtained photographs of the Martian surface and made significant analyses of the atmosphere.
1978:
American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan performed in England before 200,000 people.
1912:
Jim Thorpe won a gold medal for the decathlon at the Olympics in Stockholm.
1883:
Circus performer Charles Stratton, known to the world as Tom Thumb, died.
1606:
Dutch artist Rembrandt was born in Leiden, Netherlands.
July 16
1945:
First atomic bomb exploded near Alamogordo, New Mexico.
The United States tested the first atomic bomb this day in 1945 near Alamogordo, New Mexico, and the following month dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, hastening the end of World War II.
2001:
Jacques Rogge of Belgium was chosen to replace Juan António Samaranch as the president of the International Olympic Committee.
1918:
Former Russian tsar Nicholas II and his family were executed by Bolsheviks.
1862:
Ida Bell Wells-Barnett, an American journalist who led a crusade against lynching, was born in Holly Springs, Mississippi.
1790:
Washington, D.C., was established by Congress as the capital of the United States.
1054:
Humbert of Silva Candida, cardinal and papal legate, excommunicated Michael Cerularius, patriarch of Constantinople, who retaliated by excommunicating the cardinal, which led to the schism between the churches of Rome and Constantinople.
July 17
1936:
Beginning of the Spanish Civil War .
A well-planned uprising by Nationalist rebels against the Republican government of Spain began this day in 1936, sparking a bloody civil war that lasted until 1939, when the Nationalists and Francisco Franco assumed power.
1998:
The United Nations completed the statute establishing the International Criminal Court, which began sittings four years later.
1945:
Joseph Stalin, Winston Churchill, and Harry S. Truman met at the Potsdam Conference, the last Allied summit conference of World War II.
1944:
German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel was seriously injured when his car was forced off the road by British fighter-bombers.
1862:
Abraham Lincoln's wartime Congress passed the second Confiscation Act, a precursor to the Emancipation Proclamation.
1763:
John Jacob Astor, founder of a renowned family of Anglo-American capitalists, business leaders, and philanthropists, was born in Waldorf, Germany.
1683:
Turkish forces began the Siege of Vienna against the Habsburg Holy Roman emperor Leopold I.
1453:
French forces routed the English in the Battle of Castillon, the concluding battle of the Hundred Years' War.
July 18
1925:
Publication of Mein Kampf.
The first volume of Mein Kampf, the political manifesto written by Adolf Hitler that became the bible of Nazism in Germany's Third Reich, was published this day in 1925, and two years later the second volume appeared.
1944:
Allied forces captured the French town of Saint-L
July 19
1870:
Beginning of the Franco-German War.
The French emperor, Napoleon III, declared war on Prussia, on this day, beginning the Franco-German War, at least partly because his military advisers were convinced that the reorganization of the French army in 1866 had made it superior to its German counterparts. They also had great faith in two recently introduced technical innovations: the breech-loading chassepot rifle, with which the entire army was now equipped; and the newly invented mitrailleuse, an early machine gun.
1965:
American wild animal tamer Clyde Beatty died in Ventura, California.
1947:
Aung San, the Burmese nationalist leader and prime minister, was assassinated in Rangoon (Yang鬾, Myanmar).
1886:
Franz Liszt played the piano for the last time at a concert in Luxembourg.
1848:
The Seneca Falls Convention opened in New York, launching the woman suffrage movement in the United States.
1813:
The Sisters of Charity, the first American religious society, was founded by Mother Elizabeth Bayley Seton.
1333:
Scottish forces were defeated by the English under Edward III in the Battle of Halidon Hill.
July 20
1969:
First Moon landing.
On this day at 4:18 PM, North American Eastern Daylight Time (EDT), the Eagle lunar landing module, carrying Neil Armstrong and Edwin (“Buzz”) Aldrin, touched down on the Moon near the southwestern edge of the Sea of Tranquillity (Mare Tranquillitatis)—the ultimate triumph for the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) Apollo program. At 10:56 PM EDT, Armstrong stepped from the Eagle onto the Moon's dusty surface with the words, “That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” Armstrong and Aldrin left the module for more than two hours and deployed scientific instruments, collected surface samples, and took numerous photographs.
1976:
The Viking I lander touched down at Chryse Planitia on Mars.
1944:
German military leaders attempted to assassinate Adolf Hitler in the July Plot.
1917:
The Corfu Declaration was issued, calling for the establishment of a unified Yugoslav state following World War I.
1917:
Prince Georgy Yevgenyevich Lvov resigned his post as prime minister of Russia's Provisional Government following the July Days demonstrations.
1894:
The Pullman Strike, a widespread railroad strike in the United States, ended, shortly after President Grover Cleveland ordered federal troops to Chicago.
1877:
The Siege of Pleven began in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78.
1402:
The forces of the Ottoman sultan Bayezid I were defeated by those of the Central Asian ruler Timur in the Battle of Ankara, resulting in the collapse of Bayezid's empire.
July 21
1798:
Egyptians defeated in the Battle of the Pyramids.
Napoleon's Army of Egypt used a new military tactic, the massive divisional square, to defeat the Egyptian forces of Murād Bey this day in 1798 at the Battle of the Pyramids during Napoleon's Egyptian campaign.
1983:
The world's lowest recorded temperature, −128.6 °F (−89.2 °C), was measured at Vostok Station, Antarctica.
1967:
Albert John Luthuli, president of the African National Congress (1952–60) and the first African to be awarded a Nobel Prize for Peace (1960), died after being struck by a train.
1961:
Virgil I. (“Gus”) Grissom became the second American to enter space during Project Mercury.
1954:
The Geneva Accords effectively divided Vietnam at the 17th parallel.
1861:
The First Battle of Bull Run (called First Manassas by the South) was fought during the American Civil War.
1774:
The Treaty of Kü绋筴 Kaynarca was signed at the conclusion of the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–74.
1613:
Michael Romanov was crowned tsar of Russia, founding the Romanov dynasty.
July 22
1977:
Deng Xiaoping reinstated.
After falling from favour during the Cultural Revolution (1966–76), Deng Xiaoping returned to power on this day in 1977 after the Chinese Communist Party reinstated all his former high posts, including that of vice-premier.
1946:
A violent Jewish right-wing underground movement in Palestine, the Irgun Zvai Leumi, blew up a wing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, killing 91 soldiers and civilians.
1943:
Led by U.S. General George S. Patton, Allied forces took Palermo, on the northwest corner of Sicily, giving them a strategic foothold from which to invade mainland Italy during World War II.
1923:
Bob Dole—U.S. senator (1968–96), Republican congressional leader, and his party's candidate for the presidency in 1996—was born in Russell, Kansas.
1812:
The duke of Wellington defeated “40,000 Frenchmen in 40 minutes” at Salamanca, Spain, during the Peninsular War.
1456:
Hungarian forces led by János Hunyadi, including an untrained army of peasants, won one of the most remarkable victories in the history of Turkish wars, resisting Ottoman sultan Mehmed II's siege of Belgrade.