*1753* George Washington, the adjutant of Virginia, delivers an ultimatum to the French forces at Fort Le Boeuf, south of Lake Erie, reiterating Britain's claim to the entire Ohio River valley.
*1770* The British soldiers responsible for the "Boston Massacre" are acquitted on murder charges.
*1862* The Union loses its first ship to a torpedo, USS Cairo , in the Yazoo River.
*1863* Orders are given in Richmond, Virginia, that no more supplies from the Union should be received by Federal prisoners.
*1901* Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi receives the first transatlantic radio transmission in St. John's Newfoundland.
*1927* Communists forces seize Canton, China.
*1930* The Spanish Civil War begins as rebels take a border town.
*1930* The last Allied troops withdraw from the Saar region in Germany.
*1931* Under pressure from the Communists in Canton, Chiang Kai-shek resigns as president of the Nanking Government but remains the head of the Nationalist government that holds nominal rule over most of China.
*1943* The German Army launches Operation Winter Tempest, the relief of the Sixth Army trapped in Stalingrad.
*1943* The exiled Czech government signs a treaty with the Soviet Union for postwar cooperation.
*1956* The United Nations calls for immediate Soviet withdrawal from Hungary.
*1964* Kenya becomes a republic.
*1964* Three Buddhist leaders begin a hunger strike to protest the government in Saigon.
*1967* The United States ends the airlift of 6,500 men in Vietnam.
*1979* South Korean Army Major General Chun Doo-hwan, acting without authorization from President Choi Kyu-ha, orders the arrest of Army Chief of Staff General Jeong Seung-hwa, alleging that the chief of staff was involved in the assassination of ex-President Park Chung Hee.
*1985* Arrow Air Flight 1285 crashes after takeoff at Gander, Newfoundland; among the 256 dead are 236 members of the US Army's 101st Airborne Division.
*1991* The Russian Federation becomes independent from the USSR.
*1995* Willie Brown beats incumbent mayor Frank Jordon to become the first African-American mayor of San Francisco.
*2000* The US Supreme Court announces its decision in Bush v. Gore, effectively ending legal changes to the results of that year's Presidential election.