1307 Battle of Barra Hill: Robert Bruce beats the Earl of Buchan

1436 The Aragonese invade Angevin-held Gaeta (Falls Feb 2, 1437)

1782 The French Army sails for home from Boston, after 2.5 years in America

1800 Royalist "Plot of the Rue Saint-Nicaise" to kill Napoleon with an "infernal machine" outside the opera fails, 1 k, c. 50 w

1806 Protestant mobs riot in NYC in an effort to disrupt Catholic Christmas Eve services

1814 Treaty of Ghent signed to end the War of 1812

1861 Skirmish at Wadesville, Mo

1864 Battle of Gordonsville, VA

1871 Premiere of Verdi's opera 'Aida', in Cairo.

1914 The first German air raid on Britain: An airplane drops a bomb on Dover, which falls in a rectory garden.

1937 The Netherlands recognizes the King of Italy as Emperor of Ethiopia

1941 Arcadia Conference, in Washington FDR, Churchill, and their military chiefs plan Allied strategy

1941 Dutch sub 'K-XVI' sinks the Japanese destroyer 'Sagiri'

1941 Italian blockade runner 'Orseolo' departs Kobe for Bordeaux, on her second run through the Allied blockade

1941 Japanese troops land on Jolo, in the southern Philippines

1941 Luzon: Japanese troops land at Lamon Bay

1941 Manila is heavily bombed by Japanese aircraft

1941 Sarawak: Japanese troops land at Kuching

1942 First powered flight of V-1 cruise missile, Peenemunde, Germany

1943 FDR appoints Dwight Eisenhower supreme commander of Allied forces in Europe

1943 Stilwell undertakes to relieve encircled Chinese New 38th Div in Burma

1944 SS 'Leopoldville' is torpedoed off France, c. 800 American soldiers from the 66th Inf Div die

1944 U.S. cruisers and destroyers bombard Iwo Jima

1963 Greeks & Turks riot in Cyprus

1966 USAF C-144 crashes near Binh Thai, Vietnam, 129 die

1985 Fidel Castro gives up smoking

1989 Operation Just Cause: Panama's Manual Noriega flees to Vatican embassy

1991 Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as head of Soviet Union