Napoleon establishes the French Empire (1804), and Addis Ababa falls to rebel forces, ending the Derg regime (1991). Born on this day: Kylie Minogue, Ian Fleming and Patrick White. Died: Maya Angelou, Edward VIII and Anne Brontë.
30 events, 58 births and 64 deaths on this date.
Corsican-born general Napoleon Bonaparte, who had risen to fame during the Revolution, now took the title of emperor, replacing the republic with imperial rule. The move gave him a firmer grip on power and launched years of war across Europe.
Jacques-Louis David · Public domainThe French RevolutionHear the story in ChunksAfter a rapid offensive, the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front seized the capital, bringing down the military government of Mengistu Haile Mariam. The fall also brought the long Ethiopian Civil War to an end.
Nepal's newly elected Constituent Assembly voted to abolish the monarchy, bringing an end to the Shah dynasty's rule that had lasted about 240 years. The move followed a long civil war and marked the country's shift to a secular federal republic.
Naturalist John Muir founded the Sierra Club in San Francisco, creating an organisation dedicated to protecting the wild landscapes of the Sierra Nevada. It became one of the most influential conservation groups in the United States.
Jim McDougal, Susan McDougal and former Arkansas governor Jim Guy Tucker were convicted of fraud in a case tied to the Whitewater land deal. The two McDougals had been Clinton's business partners in the venture, which dogged his White House years.
Turing sent his paper On Computable Numbers to a journal, introducing an imaginary machine that could carry out any calculation. That idea, the Turing machine, became a foundation of theoretical computer science.
Elliott & Fry · Public domain
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Australian singer, songwriter and actress known as the Princess of Pop, with global hits such as Can't Get You Out of My Head. She first gained fame playing Charlene Mitchell in the soap opera Neighbours.
PhilipRomanoPhoto · CC BY 4.0
Ian Fleming was a British writer and journalist remembered for creating James Bond, the MI6 spy whose novels have sold over 100 million copies. He began writing Casino Royale in 1952, at the age of 44.
Erich Hartmann · Public domain
Patrick White was an Australian novelist and playwright whose sharp, satirical books challenged the realist tradition of his homeland. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1973, the only Australian to receive it.
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
Maya Angelou was an American memoirist and poet whose first autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, brought her international acclaim. She also recited her poem On the Pulse of Morning at Bill Clinton's first inauguration in 1993.
York College ISLGP · CC BY 2.0
Edward VIII reigned for less than a year before abdicating in 1936 to marry Wallis Simpson, a decision that caused a constitutional crisis. He afterwards lived as the Duke of Windsor and died in Paris in 1972.
Attributed to Angelo Laviosa / Formerly attributed to Vincenzo Laviosa · Public domain
Anne Brontë was the youngest novelist of the Brontë family, remembered for The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, a novel often counted among the first feminist works in English. She died in 1849, aged 29, most likely of tuberculosis, and her novels only regained their reputation long after.
Branwell Brontë · Public domain
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