Today:
1485: The Battle of Bosworth Field ends the Wars of the Roses. Richard III, the last English king to die in battle, is killed, and Henry Tudor becomes King Henry VII, establishing the Tudor dynasty.
1642: The English Civil War begins when King Charles I raises his royal standard in Nottingham, declaring war on Parliament.
1770: British explorer James Cook claims the eastern coast of Australia for Great Britain, naming it New South Wales.
1791: The Haitian Revolution, the largest and most successful slave rebellion in the Western Hemisphere, begins in Saint-Domingue, leading to Haiti’s independence.
1851: The schooner America wins a sailing race around the Isle of Wight, England, for a trophy that is later renamed the America’s Cup in its honor.
1911: The Mona Lisa is stolen from the Louvre Museum in Paris by an Italian museum employee, Vincenzo Peruggia. The painting was recovered two years later.
1922: Michael Collins, a leader of the Irish independence movement, is assassinated in an ambush during the Irish Civil War.
1962: French President Charles de Gaulle survives an assassination attempt by the Organisation de l’armée secrète (OAS), a far-right militant group.
1968: Pope Paul VI arrives in Bogotá, Colombia, marking the first time a pope has visited South America.
1989: Nolan Ryan of the Texas Rangers becomes the first pitcher in Major League Baseball history to record 5,000 strikeouts.