- 1461 – Wars of the Roses in England: Lancastrian King Henry VI (pictured) was deposed by his Yorkist cousin, who then became King Edward IV.
- 1681 – King Charles II of England granted Quaker William Penn a charter for the Pennsylvania Colony.
- 1769 – French astronomer Charles Messier first noted the Orion Nebula, a bright nebula visible to the naked eye in the night sky situated south of Orion's Belt, later cataloguing it as Messier 42 in his List of Messier objects.
- 1849 – According to urban legend, President pro tempore of the U.S. Senate David Rice Atchison became the de jure U.S. President for one day after Zachary Taylor refused to be sworn into office on a Sunday when his predecessor James Polk's term expired.
- 1980 – Robert Mugabe of the Zimbabwe African National Union was elected to head the first government in Zimbabwe.