1805: Lewis and Clark began descending the rapids of the Columbia River at Celilo Falls

1854: John Rae arrived in England to claim the £10,000 Admiralty prize for discovery of the fate of Sir John Franklin's expedition. The Hudson's Bay Company explorer, fur trader and surgeon made four expeditions to the Arctic before meeting an Inuit man who told him of a group of white men who died of starvation four years earlier, and sold him some marked silverware and a medal which confirmed they were remains of the Franklin expedition.

Rae was not be awarded the prize until July 1856, since his report quotes Inuit statements that the last survivors had resorted to cannibalism, and many Britons, including Lady Franklin, insisted that sailors of the Royal Navy would never do such a thing; therefore Rae was not to be believed

1914: In France, Private May of the Cameronians braved heavy enemy fire to attempt to reach a wounded man lying in the open. Before he could reach him, the man was hit again and killed. May enjoyed better luck later in the day, when he successfully rescued a wounded officer. He received the Victoria Cross.

1916: During a trench raid in northern Greece, Private Lewis of the Welch Regiment suffered three wounds but refused to withdraw. He took on three enemy in a close-quarter fight and took all of them prisoner, then, with his last strength, rescued a wounded man before collapsing. Lewis received the Victoria Cross.

1918: In Belgium, Lieutenant McGregor, serving with the Machine-Gun Corps, was reduced to desperate measures to withdraw his heavy weapons to safety after covering a British retreat. Having sent all but one of his men to safety, he loaded the guns aboard a horse-drawn limber driven by the one man kept back. McGregor himself lay on the back of the limber with the guns, as the driver galloped the carriage at full speed through the enemy fire. They survived the ordeal, and McGregor's team was soon back in action with great effect. While directing their fire, he was killed. He was awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross.

1919: On the North-West Frontier, a convoy came under attack from tribesmen. Captain Andrews, a medical officer stationed nearby, rushed to the scene to set up a First Aid post as the fighting continued around him. Although he managed to get his patients under shelter, he was fully exposed whilst tending their wounds. He commandeered a lorry as a makeshift ambulance but was killed while loading the wounded aboard. Andrews was awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross.

1940: The only significant daylight Luftwaffe activity was a couple of fighter sweeps. Night attacks continued, but also on a much reduced scale.

1946: The Corfu Incident - the destroyer HMS Saumarez struck a mine whilst passing down the channel between Corfu and the Albanian coast. 36 crewmen were killed.

She was taken in tow by her consort HMS Volage, but she in turn struck a mine, losing eight crewmen. Volage nevertheless continued to tow Saumarez to safety, passing the towline over her bow and steaming astern. The International Court of Justice ruled that the mines had been laid after the end of the war, and awarded the UK £1 million in compensation. It has never been paid.

Corporal J. Sewell, 10th Australian Bomb Disposal Platoon, British Commonwealth Occupation Force, was awarded the George Medal for his rescue of Japanese survivors after an explosion in a boat carrying high explosives.

1951: The first of seven nuclear detonations as part of Operation Buster-Jangle, took place

1955: West Germany joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization

1960: US President John F. Kennedy ordered the surface blockade of Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis