955 – Battle of Lechfeld: Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor defeats the Magyars, ending 50 years of Magyar invasion of the West.
991 – Battle of Maldon: The English, led by Byrhtnoth, Ealdorman of Essex, are defeated by a band of inland-raiding Vikings near Maldon, Essex.
1270 – Yekuno Amlak takes the imperial throne of Ethiopia, restoring the Solomonic dynasty to power after a 100-year Zagwe interregnum.
1316 – The Second Battle of Athenry takes place near Athenry during the Bruce campaign in Ireland.
1512 – The naval Battle of Saint-Mathieu, during the War of the League of Cambrai, sees the simultaneous destruction of the Breton ship La Cordelière and the English ship The Regent.
1519 – Ferdinand Magellan’s five ships set sail from Seville to circumnavigate the globe. The Basque second-in-command Juan Sebastián Elcano will complete the expedition after Magellan’s death in the Philippines.
1557 – Battle of St. Quentin: Spanish victory over the French in the Italian War of 1551–59.
1628 – The Swedish warship Vasa sinks in the Stockholm harbour after only about 20 minutes of her maiden voyage.
1675 – The foundation stone of the Royal Greenwich Observatory in London, England is laid.
1680 – The Pueblo Revolt begins in New Mexico.
1755 – Under the orders of Charles Lawrence, the British Army begins to forcibly deport the Acadians from Nova Scotia to the Thirteen Colonies.
1776 – American Revolutionary War: Word of the United States Declaration of Independence reaches London.
1792 – French Revolution: Storming of the Tuileries Palace: Louis XVI of France is arrested and taken into custody as his Swiss Guards are massacred by the Parisian mob.
1809 – Quito, now the capital of Ecuador, declares independence from Spain. This rebellion will be crushed on August 2, 1810.
1861 – American Civil War: Battle of Wilson’s Creek: The war enters Missouri when a band of raw Confederate troops defeat Union forces in the southwestern part of the state.
1864 – After Uruguay’s governing Blanco Party refuses Brazil’s demands, José Antônio Saraiva announces that the Brazilian military will begin reprisals, beginning the Uruguayan War.
1904 – Russo-Japanese War: The Battle of the Yellow Sea between the Russian and Japanese battleship fleets takes place.
1905 – Russo-Japanese War: Peace negotiations begin in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
1913 – Second Balkan War: Delegates from Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro, and Greece sign the Treaty of Bucharest, ending the war.
1920 – World War I: Ottoman sultan Mehmed VI’s representatives sign the Treaty of Sèvres that divides up the Ottoman Empire between the Allies.
1932 – A 5.1 kilograms (11 lb) chondrite-type meteorite breaks into at least seven pieces and lands near the town of Archie in Cass County, Missouri.
1944 – World War II: The Battle of Guam comes to an effective end.
1944 – World War II: The Battle of Narva ends with a combined German–Estonian force successfully defending Narva, Estonia, from invading Soviet troops.
1949 – U.S. President Harry S. Truman signs the National Security Act Amendment, streamlining the defense agencies of the United States government, and replacing the Department of War with the United States Department of Defense.
1953 – First Indochina War: The French Union withdraws its forces from Operation Camargue against the Viet Minh in central Vietnam.
1954 – At Massena, New York, the groundbreaking ceremony for the Saint Lawrence Seaway is held.
1961 – First use in Vietnam War of the Agent Orange by the U.S. Army.
1988 – Japanese American internment: U.S. President Ronald Reagan signs the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, providing $20,000 payments to Japanese Americans who were either interned in or relocated by the United States during World War II.
1990 – The Magellan space probe reaches Venus.
1990 – More than 127 Muslims are killed in North East Sri Lanka by paramilitary troops.
1995 – Oklahoma City bombing: Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols are indicted for the bombing. Michael Fortier pleads guilty in a plea-bargain for his testimony.
1998 – HRH Prince Al-Muhtadee Billah is proclaimed the crown prince of Brunei with a Royal Proclamation.
2003 – Yuri Malenchenko becomes the first person to marry in outer space.
2009 – Twenty people are killed in Handlová, Trenčín Region, in the deadliest mining disaster in Slovakia’s history.
2012 – The Marikana massacre begins near Rustenburg, South Africa, resulting in the deaths of 47 people.
2014 – Thirty-nine people are killed in a plane crash at Tehran’s Mehrabad Airport.