Today:
1799 – Napoleon Bonaparte launches a coup d’état, becoming the leader of France.
1848 – Robert Blum, a German revolutionary, is executed in Vienna as part of the suppression of the Revolutions of 1848.
1872 – The Great Boston Fire destroys about 65 acres of downtown Boston, Massachusetts.
1888 – Jack the Ripper’s last known victim, Mary Jane Kelly, is murdered in London.
1918 – Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany abdicates, marking the end of the German Empire and paving the way for the Weimar Republic.
1923 – Adolf Hitler’s Beer Hall Putsch fails in Munich, Germany.
1938 – Kristallnacht (the Night of Broken Glass) takes place in Nazi Germany, with coordinated attacks on Jewish communities.
1965 – A massive power failure in the northeastern United States and parts of Canada leaves 30 million people without electricity.
1989 – The Berlin Wall falls, leading to the reunification of East and West Germany.
2005 – The Venus Express mission by the European Space Agency is launched to study the planet Venus.