August 4
is the 216th day of the year in the
Gregorian Calendar (217th in
leap years), with 149 days remaining.
*
70 - The
destruction of the Second Temple in
Jerusalem by the
Romans.
*
1265 -
Second Barons' War:
Battle of Evesham - The army of
Prince Edward (
future Edward I of England) defeated the forces of rebellious barons led by
Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester; killing
de Montfort and many of his allies. (This is sometimes considered the end of the age of
chivalry in
England.)
*
1578 -
Battle of Al Kasr al Kebir -
Moroccans defeat
Portuguese. King
Sebastian of Portugal is defeated and killed in
North Africa, leaving his elderly uncle,
Cardinal Henry, as his heir. This initiates a succession crisis in
Portugal.
*
1693 - Date traditionally ascribed to
Dom Perignon's invention of
Champagne.
*
1704 -
War of the Spanish Succession:
Gibraltar captured by
English and
Dutch fleet, commanded by
Admiral Sir George Rooke and allied with
Archduke Charles.
*
1735 -
Freedom of the press:
New York Weekly Journal writer John Peter Zenger is acquitted of seditious
libel against the royal governor of
New York, on the basis that what he published was true.
*
1753 -
George Washington, then a young
Virginia planter, becomes a
Master Mason, the highest basic rank in the fraternity of
Freemasonry.
*
1782 -
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is married to
Constanze Weber.
*
1789 - In
France members of the
National Constituent Assembly take an oath to end
feudalism and abandon their
privileges.
*
1790 - A newly passed
tariff act creates the
Revenue Cutter Service (the forerunner of the
United States Coast Guard).
*
1821 -
Atkinson & Alexander publish the
Saturday Evening Post for the first time as a weekly
newspaper.
*
1824 - Battle of
Kos fought between
Turks and
Greeks.
*
1854 - The
Hinomaru is established as the official flag to be flown from
Japanese ships.
*
1873 -
Indian Wars: While protecting a
railroad survey party in
Montana, the
United States 7th Cavalry, under
Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer, clash for the first time with the
Sioux (near the
Tongue River; only one man on each side is killed).
*
1892 - The family of
Lizzie Borden is found murdered in their
Fall River, Massachusetts home.
*
1902 -
Greenwich foot tunnel under the River
Thames opens.
*
1906 -
Central Railway Station, Sydney opens.
*
1914 -
World War I:
Germany invaded
Belgium; in response, the
United Kingdom declares war on
Germany. The
United States proclaims
neutrality.
*
1944 -
Holocaust: A tip from a
Dutch informer leads the
Gestapo to a sealed-off area in an
Amsterdam warehouse where they find
Jewish
diarist Anne Frank and her family.
*
1947 - The
Supreme Court of Japan is established.
*
1954 -
Government of Pakistan approves the
National Anthem, written by Hafeez Jullundhry and composed by Ahmed G. Chagla.
*
1964 -
American civil rights movement:
Civil rights workers
Michael Schwerner,
Andrew Goodman and
James Chaney are found dead in
Mississippi after disappearing on
June 21.
*1964 -
Vietnam War:
United States destroyers
USS Maddox and
USS C. Turner Joy are allegedly attacked in the
Gulf of Tonkin. Air support from the carrier
USS Ticonderoga sinks two, possibly three
North Vietnamese gunboats. Years later, the claim of
NVA attack was revealed to be false.
*
1969 -
Vietnam War: At the apartment of
French intermediary
Jean Sainteny in
Paris,
US representative
Henry Kissinger and
North Vietnamese representative
Xuan Thuy begin secret peace negotiations. The negotiations will eventually fail.
*
1975 - The
Japanese Red Army takes more than 50 hostages at the
AIA building housing several embassies in
Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia. The hostages included the
U.S. consul and the
Swedish charge d'affaires. The gunmen win the release of five imprisoned comrades and fly with them to
Libya.
*
1977 -
US President Jimmy Carter signs legislation creating the
United States Department of Energy.
*
1983 -
Thomas Sankara becomes
president of
Upper Volta.
*1983 -
New York Yankee outfielder Dave Winfield accidentally kills a
gull during warmups in the outfield prior to a
baseball game in
Toronto at
Exhibition Stadium and is charged by local police for his "act of cruelty to animals". His
manager Billy Martin quipped, "It's the first time he's hit the
cutoff man."
*
1984 - The
African
republic Upper Volta changes its name to
Burkina Faso.
*
1985 - In a day of milestones,
Tom Seaver of the
Chicago White Sox becomes the 17th pitcher to win
300th career games and
Rod Carew of the
California Angels becomes the 16th player ever to collect
3000 career hits. Seaver pitches the
White Sox to a 4â€"1 six-hit victory on
Phil Rizzuto Day at
Yankee Stadium as 54,032
New Yorkers cheer him on, while Carew bloops a single to left off
Frank Viola in the 3rd inning of the
Angels 6â€"5 win over the
Twins. It marks the only day in which two men reach these two milestones on the same day.
*
1987 - The
Federal Communications Commission rescinds the
Fairness Doctrine which had required
radio and
television stations to "fairly" present controversial issues.
*
1991 - The
Greek cruise ship
Oceanos sinks off the
Wild Coast of
South Africa.
*
1993 - A
federal judge sentences
LAPD officers
Stacey Koon and
Laurence Powell to 30 months in prison for violating
motorist Rodney King's
civil rights.
*
1995 -
Operation Storm begins in
Croatia.
*
1997 - 185,000
Teamsters union
United Parcel Service drivers walk off the job.
*
2005 -
Prime Minister Paul Martin announces that
Michaëlle Jean will be
Canada's 27th â€" and first
black â€"
Governor General.
*
2006 -
Dame Silvia Cartwright will step down as the
Governor-General of New Zealand and will be replaced by
The Honourable Anand Satyanand, who will be sworn in on
23 August.
*
1222 -
Richard de Clare, 6th Earl of Hertford, English soldier (d.
1262)
*
1290 - Duke
Leopold I of Austria (d.
1326)
*
1521 -
Pope Urban VII (d.
1590)
*
1604 -
François Hédelin, abbé d'Aubignac, French writer (d.
1676)
*
1701 -
Thomas Blackwell, Scottish classical scholar (d.
1757)
*
1719 -
Johann Gottlob Lehmann, German minerologist and geologist (d.
1767)
*
1721 -
Granville Leveson-Gower, 1st Marquess of Stafford, English politician (d.
1803)
*
1755 -
Nicolas-Jacques Conté, French painter, inventor of the modern pencil (d.
1805)
*
1792 -
Percy Bysshe Shelley, English poet (d.
1822)
*
1805 -
William Rowan Hamilton, Irish mathematician (d.
1865)
*
1834 -
John Venn, English mathematician (d.
1923)
*
1848 -
Vladimir Sukhomlinov, Russian general (d.
1926)
*
1859 -
Knut Hamsun, Norwegian writer,
Nobel Prize Laureate (d.
1952)
*
1867 -
Jake Beckley, Baseball player (d.
1918)
*
1870 - Sir
Harry Lauder, Scottish entertainer (d.
1950)
*
1884 -
Henri Cornet, French cyclist (d.
1941)
*
1890 -
Dolf Luque, baseball player (d.
1957)
*
1899 -
Ezra Taft Benson, 13th
president of
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (d.
1994)
*
1900 -
Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, (Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother),
Queen consort of
George VI of the United Kingdom (d.
2002)
*
1901 -
Louis Armstrong, American musician (d.
1971)
*
1902 -
Wild Bill Hallahan, baseball player (d.
1981)
*
1904 -
Witold Gombrowicz, Polish novelist and dramatist (d.
1969)
*
1906 -
Eugen Schuhmacher, German zoologist (d.
1973)
*
1908 -
Kurt Eichhorn, German conductor (d.
1994)
*
1909 -
Glenn Cunningham, runner (d.
1988)
*
1910 -
William Schuman, American composer (d.
1992)
*
1912 -
Aleksandr Danilovich Aleksandrov, Russian mathematician, physicist, philosopher, and mountaineer (d.
1999)
*
1912 -
Raoul Wallenberg, Swedish diplomat
*
1913 -
Robert Hayden, American poet (d.
1980)
*
1921 -
Maurice Richard, Canadian hockey player (d.
2000)
*
1923 -
Reg Grundy, Australian media and television mogul
*
1927 -
Jess Thomas, American tenor (d.
1993)
*
1929 -
Kishore Kumar, Indian singer and actor (d.
1987)
*
1936 -
Assia Djebar, Algerian writer and filmmaker
*
1937 -
David Bedford, English musician
*
1940 -
Timi Yuro, American singer (d.
2004)
*1940 -
Abdurrahman Wahid, 4th
President of Indonesia*
1942 -
David Lange, 32nd
Prime Minister of New Zealand (d.
2005)
*
1943 -
Bjørn Wirkola, Norwegian ski jumper
*
1944 -
Richard Belzer, American actor and comedian
*
1946 -
Maureen Starkey, one-time wife of Beatle,
Ringo Starr (d.
1994)
*
1947 -
Klaus Schulze, German composer
*
1948 -
Johnny Grubb, US baseball player
*
1952 -
Moya Brennan, Irish singer
*
1952 -
Gábor Demszky, Hungarian politician
*
1955 -
Alberto Gonzales, American politician, 80th
United States Attorney General*1955 -
Billy Bob Thornton, American actor and writer
*
1957 -
John Wark, Scottish footballer
*
1958 -
Mary Decker, American athlete
*
1959 -
Robbin Crosby, American musician (
Ratt) (d.
2002)
*
1960 -
Dean Malenko, American professional wrestler
* 1960 -
JosĂ© Luis RodrĂguez Zapatero, 5th
Prime Minister of Spain*
1961 -
Barack Obama, American politician,
United States Senator from Illinois*
1962 -
Roger Clemens, American baseball player
*
1967 -
Mike Marsh, American athlete
*
1968 -
Marcus Schenkenberg, Swedish model
*
1968 -
Daniel Dae Kim, American actor
*
1969 -
Troy O'Leary, American baseball player
*
1970 -
Michael DeLuise, American actor
*
1971 -
Jeff Gordon, American race car driver
*
1972 -
Stefan Brogren, Canadian actor
*
1974 -
Cristian González, Argentine footballer
*
1975 -
Daniella van Graas, Dutch model and actress
*
1977 -
LuĂs Boa Morte, Portuguese footballer
*
1978 -
Kurt Busch, American race car driver
*
1985 -
Ha Seung-Jin, Korean basketball player
*1985 -
Luis Antonio Valencia, Ecuadorean footballer
*1985 -
Mark Milligan, Australian footballer
*
1992 -
Dylan and Cole Sprouse, Italian-born American child actors
*
1060 - King
Henry I of France (b.
1008)
*
1265 - Killed in the
Battle of Evesham:
**
Hugh le Despencer, 1st Baron le Despencer (b.
1223)
**
Henry de Montfort (b.
1238)
**
Peter de Montfort**
Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester (b.
1208)
*
1306 - King
Wenceslaus III of Bohemia (b.
1289)
*
1338 -
Thomas of Brotherton, 1st Earl of Norfolk, son of
Edward I of England (b.
1300)
*
1526 -
Juan Sebastián Elcano, Spanish explorer (b.
1476)
*
1578 - King
Sebastian of Portugal (b.
1554)
* 1578 -
Thomas Stucley, English adventurer
*
1598 -
William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, English statesman (b.
1520)
*
1612 -
Hugh Broughton, English scholar (b.
1549)
*
1639 -
Juan Ruiz de AlarcĂłn, Mexican dramatist
*
1727 -
Victor-Maurice, comte de Broglie, French general (b.
1647)
*
1741 -
Andrew Hamilton, American lawyer
*
1784 -
Giovanni Battista Martini, Italian musician (b.
1706)
*
1792 -
John Burgoyne, British general (b.
1723)
*
1795 -
Timothy Ruggles, American-born Tory politician (b.
1711)
*
1873 -
Viktor Hartmann, Russian painter (b.
1834)
*
1875 -
Hans Christian Andersen, Danish writer (b.
1805)
*
1900 -
Isaac Levitan, Russian painter (b.
1860)
*
1938 -
Pearl White, American actress (b.
1889)
*
1957 -
Washington LuĂs Pereira de Sousa, President of Brazil (b.
1869)
*
1967 -
Peter Smith, English cricketer (b.
1908)
*
1976 -
Roy Herbert Thomson, Lord Thomson of Fleet, Canadian publisher (b.
1894)
*
1981 -
Melvyn Douglas, American actor (b.
1901)
*
1997 -
Jeanne Calment, world's oldest human (b.
1875)
*
1998 -
Yuri Artyukhin, cosmonaut (b.
1930)
*
1999 -
Victor Mature, American actor (b.
1915)
*
2000 -
Leslie Glass, American adult film actress (b.
1963)
*
2001 -
Lorenzo Music, American actor, writer, and producer (b.
1937)
*
2003 -
Frederick Chapman Robbins, American pediatrician and virologist,
Nobel Prize Laureate (b.
1916)
*
Roman Catholicism - the feasts of at least 3 saints:
**St.
Saint John Vianney, the patron saint of priests
**St.
Dominic**St.
Luanus/
Lugid*
Burkina Faso -
Anniversary of the Revolution.
*
Cook Islands -
Constitution Day (celebrations begin on the last
Friday in
July and last up to 2 weeks.)
*
El Salvador -
Transfiguration Bank Holiday*
Ancient Egypt -
Jubilation of the Heart of Re.
*
BBC: On This Day*
The New York Times: On This Day*
On This Day in Canada*
Epic Idiot: On This DayAugust 3 -
August 5 -
July 4 -
September 4 --
listing of all days
