• 1487 - Battle of Stoke Field, the last dying breath of the Wars of the Roses.
• 1586 - Mary Queen of Scots recognizes Philip II of Spain as her heir.
• 1745 - British troops take Cape Breton Island, which is now part of Nova Scotia, Canada.
• 1745 - Sir William Pepperell captures the French Fortress Louisbourg in Louisbourg, Nova Scotia during the War of the Austrian Succession.
• 1746 - War of Austrian Succession: Austria and Sardinia defeat a Franco-Spanish army at the Battle of Piacenza.
• 1755 - French and Indian War: French surrender Fort Beauséjour to the British, leading to the expulsion of the Acadians.
• 1774 - Formation of Harrodsburg, Kentucky.
• 1779 - Spain declares war on the Kingdom of Great Britain, and the siege of Gibraltar begins.
• 1815 - Battle of Ligny and Battle of Quatre Bras, two days before Waterloo.
• 1836 - Formation of the London Working Men's Association begins the Chartist Movement.
• 1846 - The Papal conclave of 1846 concludes. Pope Pius IX is elected pope, beginning the longest reign in the history of the papacy (not counting St. Peter).
• 1858 - Abraham Lincoln's House Divided speech in Springfield, Illinois.
• 1858 - Battle of Morar takes place during the Indian Mutiny.
• 1871 - University Tests Act allows students to enter the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge and Durham without religious tests, except for courses in theology.
• 1891 - John Abbott becomes Canada's third prime minister.
• 1897 - A treaty annexing the Republic of Hawaii to the United States is signed; the Republic wouldn't be dissolved until a year later.
• 1903 - Ford Motor Company incorporates.
• 1903 - Roald Amundsen commences first east-west navigation of the Northwest Passage by leaving Oslo, Norway.
• 1904 - Eugen Schauman assassinates Nikolai Bobrikov, Governor-General of Finland.
• 1904 - Irish author James Joyce begins a relationship with Nora Barnacle, and subsequently uses the date to set the actions for his novel Ulysses
• 1911 - A 772 gram stony meteorite struck earth near Kilbourn, Columbia County, Wisconsin damaging a barn.
• 1915 - Foundation of the British Women's Institute
• 1922 - General election in Irish Free State: large majority to pro-Treaty Sinn Féin.
• 1924 - Whampoa Military Academy is founded.
• 1925 - The most famous Young Pioneer camp of the USSR, Artek established.
• 1930 - Sovnarkom establishes decree time in the USSR.
• 1940 - World War II: Marshal Henri Philippe Pétain becomes Premier of Vichy France.
• 1940 - A Communist government is installed in Lithuania.
• 1948 - The storming of the cockpit of the Miss Macao passenger seaplane, operated by a subsidiary of the Cathay Pacific Airways, marks the first skyjacking of a commercial plane.
• 1955 - Pope Pius XII excommunicates Juan Perón.
• 1961 - Rudolf Nureyev defects at Le Bourget airport in Paris.
• 1963 - Soviet Space Program: Vostok 6 Mission, Cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova becomes the first woman in space.
• 1972 - Red Army Faction member Ulrike Meinhof is captured by police in Langenhagen.
• 1972 - Largest single-site hydro-electric power project in Canada starts at Churchill Falls, Labrador.
• 1976 - Soweto uprising: A non-violent march by 15,000 students in Soweto, South Africa turns into days of rioting when police open fire on the crowd and kill 566 children.
• 1977 - Oracle Corporation was incorporated in Redwood Shores, California as Software Development Laboratories (SDL) by Larry Ellison, Bob Miner and Ed Oates.
• 1989 - Historic reburial of Imre Nagy, the former Hungarian Prime Minister in Budapest.
• 1994 - A Chinese operated Tupolev TU-154 crashes 10 minutes after takeoff killing 160.
• 1997 - Dairat Labguer massacre in Algeria; some 50 people killed.
• 1999 - Maurice Greene sets a new 100m world record at 9.79 seconds. This is the largest drop in a 100m world record in the histojry of electronic timing from Donovan Bailey's 9.84.
• 2000 - Israel complies with UN Security Council Resolution 425 after 22 years of it issuance, which calls on Israel to completely withdraw from Lebanon. Israel withdrew from all of Lebanon, except the disputed Sheba Farms.

Births