464 Procopius Anthemius is proclaimed Roman Emperor in the West (464-472)
1204 Fourth Crusaders capture Constantinople, amid great slaughter
1229 Peace treaty between Castille and Toulouse
1365 2nd Treaty of Guerande: the House of Blois cedes Brittany to John IV de Montfort
1394 Turkish Sultan Bayazid takes Thessaloniki
1495 Italian League formed to fight Charles VIII of France
1637 Shimabara Revolt begins in Japan
1706 The new United Kingdom of Great Britain adopts the "Union" flag
1782 Battle of Providen: Indecisive Anglo-French naval clash off India
1796 Battle of Montenotte: Bonaparte's French defeat the Austrians
1809 Battle of Oporto: The English defeat the French
1861 Confederates shell Fort Sumter, initiating the Civil War
1862 Great Locomotive Chase: James Andrews steals a train at Kenesaw, GA
1864 Battle of Blair's Landing, La
1864 Fort Pillow Massacre: N. B. Forrest's men slaughter black troops
1877 British annex the Transvaal Republic
1911 First US naval aviator: Lt Theodore Ellyson
1916 Battle of Hacienda Santa Cruz de la Villegas: Maj. Charles Young, senior black officer in the U.S. Army, leads a squadron of the 10th Cavalry ("Buffalo Soldiers") to rescue the white 13th Cav, besieged by the Mexicans
1924 Off Balboa, Panama, 19-year old hooker Madeline Blair is found aboard the USS 'Arizona' (BB-39), having been plying her trade there since the ship left New York a month earlier -- Learn More
1928 Attempted assassination of King Victor Emanuel III by a bomb at a fair in Milan; 15 die, 40 injured
1931 Spanish voters elect an anti-monarchist parliament
1935 Germany prohibits publishing of "non-Aryan" writers
1940 Italy annexes Albania
1942 Bataan: Japanese massacre c. 400 Filipino officers
1942 Cebu: Fil-Am forces initiate guerrilla operations.
1943 Allies capture Soussa, Tunisia
1943 German occupiers seize the Catholic University at Nijmegen, the Netherlands
1943 New Guinea: Japanese aircraft raid Port Moresby
1944 British airlift a West African Chindit brigade into central Burma.
1945 Okinawa: 150 kamikaze attack the Allied fleet, sinking one destroyer.
1945 Senior U.S. commanders visit the Ohrduf Concentration Camp; Ike & Bradley are stunned, Patton vomits
1945 FDR dies, Harry Truman become President of the U.S.
1945 Russia captures Vienna, Austria
1945 The last wartime performance of the Berlin Philharmonic, opening appropriately with Brunhilde's aria and ending with the finale from "Die Gõtterdammerung".
1961 Douglas MacArthur declines offer to become baseball commissioner
1961 The first manned orbital mission: Yuri Alexeyevich Gagarin, in Vostok 1
1966 First B-52 raids on North Vietnam
1993 Bosnia: USS 'Theodore Roosevelt' (CVN-71) & NATO a/c initiate no-fly zone
