1642: A Royalist force under Lord Wilmot successfully stormed Marlborough.

1848: US President Polk triggered the Gold Rush of '49 by confirming that gold had been discovered in California

1902: Guglielmo Marconi transmitted the first readable wireless radio signal across the Atlantic from his station at Glace Bay, Cape Breton to Poldhu in Cornwall

1944: The capabilities of Bomber Command's ever improving electronic navigation and bombing aids were demonstrated when 94 Lancasters of 5 Group conducted a devastating blind attack on Hamm, bombing through thick cloud. All of the Lancasters returned safely. During the night, a further 497 Bomber Command aircraft attacked Soest, successfully targeting the area of the railway yards. Two Halifax aircraft failed to return.

1945: Five US Navy Avenger torpedo bombers took off from Fort Lauderdale on a training flight. No trace of those aircraft, one sent to look for them, or their 27 crewmembers, was ever found. The area where they were lost became known as the Bermuda Triangle

1950: Commonwealth naval forces took the lead in the evacuation of US and South Korean troops from Chinnampo which involved operating in the very shallow waters of the Taedong River estuary at night . The cruiser HMS Ceylon, with three Canadian and two Australian destroyers (HMA Ships Bataan and Warramunga) escorted to safety transports carrying nearly 8,000 troops, with air cover provided by the carrier HMS Theseus.

1983: SAS soldiers involved in an undercover operation in Northern Ireland shot dead two IRA terrorists, Brian Campbell and Colm McGirr in Coalisland, County Tyrone. One was armed with an Armalite rifle and the other a shotgun. The soldiers challenged both men and when they did not respond, the patrol opened fire killing the two men. An injured third man escaped.