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August 23 in History

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Historical Events on August 23

30 BC

After the successful invasion of Egypt, Octavian executes Marcus Antonius Antyllus, eldest son of Mark Antony, and Caesarion, the last king of the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt and only child of Julius Caesar and Cleopatra.
20 BC

Ludi Volcanalici are held within the temple precinct of Vulcan, and used by Augustus to mark the treaty with Parthia and the return of the legionary standards that had been lost at the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BC.
AD 79

Mount Vesuvius begins stirring, on the feast day of Vulcan, the Roman god of fire.
406

Gothic king Radagaisus is executed after he is defeated by Roman general Stilicho and 12,000 "barbarians" are incorporated into the Roman army or sold as slaves.
476

Odoacer, chieftain of the Germanic tribes (Herulic - Scirian foederati), is proclaimed rex Italiae ("King of Italy") by his troops.
634

Abu Bakr dies at Medina and is succeeded by Umar I who becomes the second caliph of the Rashidun Caliphate.
1244

Siege of Jerusalem: The city's citadel, the Tower of David, surrenders to Khwarezmian Empire.
1268

Battle of Tagliacozzo: The army of Charles of Anjou defeats the Ghibellines supporters of Conradin of Hohenstaufen marking the fall of the Hohenstaufen family from the Imperial and Sicilian thrones, and leading to the new chapter of Angevin domination in Southern Italy.
1305

Sir William Wallace is executed for high treason at Smithfield, London.
1328

Battle of Cassel: French troops stop an uprising of Flemish farmers.
1382

Siege of Moscow: The Golden Horde led by Tokhtamysh lays siege to the capital of the Grand Duchy of Moscow.
1514

The Battle of Chaldiran ends with a decisive victory for the Sultan Selim I, Ottoman Empire, over the Shah Ismail I, founder of the Safavid dynasty.
1521

Christian II of Denmark is deposed as king of Sweden and Gustav Vasa is elected regent.
1541

French explorer Jacques Cartier lands near Quebec City in his third voyage to Canada.
1572

French Wars of Religion: Mob violence against thousands of Huguenots in Paris results in the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre.
1595

Long Turkish War: Wallachian prince Michael the Brave confronts the Ottoman army in the Battle of Călugăreni and achieves a tactical victory.
1600

Battle of Gifu Castle: The eastern forces of Tokugawa Ieyasu defeat the western Japanese clans loyal to Toyotomi Hideyori, leading to the destruction of Gifu Castle and serving as a prelude to the Battle of Sekigahara.
1614

Fettmilch Uprising: Jews are expelled from Frankfurt, Holy Roman Empire, following the plundering of the Judengasse.
1628

George Villiers, the first Duke of Buckingham, is assassinated by John Felton.
1650

Colonel George Monck of the English Army forms Monck's Regiment of Foot, which will later become the Coldstream Guards.
1655

Battle of Sobota: The Swedish Empire led by Charles X Gustav defeats the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.
1703

Edirne event: Sultan Mustafa II of the Ottoman Empire is dethroned.
1775

American Revolutionary War: King George III delivers his Proclamation of Rebellion to the Court of St James's stating that the American colonies have proceeded to a state of open and avowed rebellion.
1784

Western North Carolina (now eastern Tennessee) declares itself an independent state under the name of Franklin; it is not accepted into the United States, and only lasts for four years.
1799

Napoleon I of France leaves Egypt for France en route to seizing power.
1813

At the Battle of Großbeeren, the Prussians under Von Bülow repulse the French army.
1831

Nat Turner's slave rebellion is suppressed.
1839

The United Kingdom captures Hong Kong as a base as it prepares for war with Qing China. The ensuing three-year conflict will later be known as the First Opium War.
1864

The Union Navy captures Fort Morgan, Alabama, thus breaking Confederate dominance of all ports on the Gulf of Mexico except Galveston, Texas.
1866

Austro-Prussian War ends with the Treaty of Prague.
1873

Albert Bridge in Chelsea, London opens.
1898

The Southern Cross Expedition, the first British venture of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, departs from London.
1904

The automobile tire chain is patented.
1914

World War I: Battle of Mons: The British Army begins withdrawal.
1921

British airship R-38 experiences structural failure over Hull in England and crashes in the Humber estuary. Of her 49 British and American training crew, only four survive.
1923

Captain Lowell Smith and Lieutenant John P. Richter performed the first mid-air refueling on De Havilland DH-4B, setting an endurance flight record of 37 hours.
1927

Italian anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti are executed after a lengthy, controversial trial.
1929

Hebron Massacre during the 1929 Palestine riots: Arab attack on the Jewish community in Hebron in the British Mandate of Palestine, continuing until the next day, resulted in the death of 65-68 Jews and the remaining Jews being forced to leave the city.
1939

World War II: Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union sign a non-aggression treaty, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. In a secret addition to the pact, the Baltic states, Finland, Romania, and Poland are divided between the two nations.
1942

World War II: Beginning of the Battle of Stalingrad.
1943

World War II: Kharkiv is liberated after the Battle of Kursk.
1944

World War II: Marseille is liberated by the Allies.
1944

World War II: King Michael of Romania dismisses the pro-Nazi government of Marshal Antonescu, who is arrested. Romania switches sides from the Axis to the Allies.
1944

Freckleton Air Disaster: A United States Army Air Forces B-24 Liberator bomber crashes into a school in Freckleton, England, killing 61 people.
1945

Soviet-Japanese War: The USSR State Defense Committee issues Decree no. 9898cc "About Receiving, Accommodation, and Labor Utilization of the Japanese Army Prisoners of War".
1946

Ordinance No. 46 of the British Military Government constitutes the German Länder (states) of Hanover and Schleswig-Holstein.
1948

World Council of Churches is formed by 147 churches from 44 countries.
1954

First flight of the Lockheed C-130 multi-role aircraft.
1958

Chinese Civil War: The Second Taiwan Strait Crisis begins with the People's Liberation Army's bombardment of Quemoy.
1966

Lunar Orbiter 1 takes the first photograph of Earth from orbit around the Moon.
1970

Organized by Mexican American labor union leader César Chávez, the Salad Bowl strike, the largest farm worker strike in U.S. history, begins.
1973

A bank robbery gone wrong in Stockholm, Sweden, turns into a hostage crisis; over the next five days the hostages begin to sympathise with their captors, leading to the term "Stockholm syndrome".
1985

Hans Tiedge, top counter-spy of West Germany, defects to East Germany.
1987

The American male basketball team lost the gold medal to Brazilian team at the Pan American Games in Indianapolis, 120-115.
1989

Singing Revolution: Two million people from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania stand on the Vilnius-Tallinn road, holding hands.
1990

Saddam Hussein appears on Iraqi state television with a number of Western "guests" (actually hostages) to try to prevent the Gulf War.
1990

Armenia declares its independence from the Soviet Union.
1990

West and East Germany announce that they will reunite on October 3.
1991

The World Wide Web is opened to the public.
1994

Eugene Bullard, the only black pilot in World War I, is posthumously commissioned as Second Lieutenant in the United States Air Force.
2000

Gulf Air Flight 072 crashes into the Persian Gulf near Manama, Bahrain, killing 143.
2006

Natascha Kampusch, who had been abducted at the age of ten, escapes from her captor Wolfgang Přiklopil, after eight years of captivity.
2007

The skeletal remains of Russia's last royal family members Alexei Nikolaevich, Tsarevich of Russia, and his sister Grand Duchess Anastasia are discovered near Yekaterinburg, Russia.
2011

A magnitude 5.8 (class: moderate) earthquake occurs in Virginia. Damage occurs to monuments and structures in Washington D.C. and the resulted damage is estimated at $200 million-$300 million USD.
2011

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi is overthrown after the National Transitional Council forces take control of Bab al-Azizia compound during the Libyan Civil War.
2012

A hot-air balloon crashes near the Slovenian capital of Ljubljana, killing six people and injuring 28 others.
2013

A riot at the Palmasola prison complex in Santa Cruz, Bolivia kills 31 people.

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