14 September 2024

81 – Domitian becomes Emperor of the Roman Empire upon the death of his brother Titus.

326 – Helena of Constantinople discovers the True Cross and the Holy Sepulchre (Jesus’s tomb) in Jerusalem.

629 – Emperor Heraclius enters Constantinople in triumph after his victory over the Persian Empire.

786 – “Night of the three Caliphs”: Harun al-Rashid becomes the Abbasid caliph upon the death of his brother al-Hadi. Birth of Harun’s son al-Ma’mun.

1180 – Battle of Ishibashiyama in Japan.

1607 – Flight of the Earls from Lough Swilly, Donegal, Ireland.

1682 – Bishop Gore School, one of the oldest schools in Wales, is founded.

1723 – Grand Master António Manoel de Vilhena lays down the first stone of Fort Manoel in Malta.

1741 – George Frideric Handel completes his oratorio Messiah

1752 – The British Empire adopts the Gregorian calendar, skipping eleven days (the previous day was September 2).

1763 – Seneca warriors defeat British forces at the Battle of Devil’s Hole during Pontiac’s War.

1791 – The Papal States lose Avignon to the revolutionary France.

1808 – Finnish War: Russians defeat the Swedes in the bloody Battle of Oravais.

1812 – Napoleonic Wars: The French Grande Armée enters Moscow. The Fire of Moscow begins as soon as Russian troops leave the city.

1814 – Battle of Baltimore: The poem Defence of Fort McHenry is written by Francis Scott Key. The poem is later used as the lyrics of The Star-Spangled Banner.

1829 – The Ottoman Empire signs the Treaty of Adrianople with Russia, thus ending the Russo-Turkish War.

1846 – Jang Bahadur and his brothers massacre about 40 members of the Nepalese palace court.

1862 – American Civil War: The Battle of South Mountain, part of the Maryland Campaign, is fought.

1901 – U.S. President William McKinley dies after an assassination attempt on September 6, and is succeeded by Vice President Theodore Roosevelt.

1914 – HMAS AE1, the Royal Australian Navy’s first submarine, was lost at sea with all hands near East New Britain, Papua New Guinea.

1917 – Russia is officially proclaimed a republic.

1928 – Macedonian actor Dimitar Geshoski is born in Prilep. During his career, he starred in over 100 theater, TV and film productions. He passed away in Skopje on Oct. 29, 1989.

1939 – World War II: The Estonian military boards the Polish submarine ORP Orzeł in Tallinn, sparking a diplomatic incident that the Soviet Union will later use to justify the annexation of Estonia.

1940 – Ip massacre: The Hungarian Army, supported by local Hungarians, kill 158 Romanian civilians in Ip, Sălaj, a village in Northern Transylvania, an act of ethnic cleansing.

1943 – World War II: The Wehrmacht starts a three-day retaliatory operation targeting several Greek villages in the region of Viannos, whose death toll would eventually exceed 500 persons.

1944 – World War II: Maastricht becomes the first Dutch city to be liberated by allied forces.

1954 – In a top-secret nuclear test, a Soviet Tu-4 bomber drops a 40 kiloton atomic weapon just north of Totskoye village.

1958 – The first two German post-war rockets, designed by the German engineer Ernst Mohr, reach the upper atmosphere.

1959 – The Soviet probe Luna 2 crashes onto the Moon, becoming the first human-made object to reach it.

1960 – The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) is founded.

1960 – Congo Crisis: With CIA help, Mobutu Sese Seko seizes power in a military coup, suspending parliament and the constitution.

1969 – The US Selective Service selects September 14 as the First Draft Lottery date.

1971 – Macedonian painter Tome Vladimirovski dies in Skopje. People, history, and landscapes inspired his paintings. He was born in Skopje on Aug. 26, 1904.

1975 – The first American saint, Elizabeth Ann Seton, is canonized by Pope Paul VI.

1979 – Afghan President Nur Muhammad Taraki is assassinated upon the order of Hafizullah Amin, who becomes the new president.

1982 – President-elect of Lebanon, Bachir Gemayel, is assassinated.

1984 – Joe Kittinger becomes the first person to fly a gas balloon alone across the Atlantic Ocean.

1985 – Penang Bridge, the longest bridge in Malaysia, connecting the island of Penang to the mainland, opens to traffic.

1992 – The Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina declares the breakaway Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia to be illegal.

1996 – Macedonian instrumentalist Pece Atanasovski dies in Prilep. The famous bagpipe player was born in the village of Dolneni in 1926.

1998 – Telecommunications companies MCI Communications and WorldCom complete their $37 billion merger to form MCI WorldCom.

1999 – Kiribati, Nauru, and Tonga join the United Nations.

2000 – Microsoft releases Windows ME.

2001 – Historic National Prayer Service held at Washington National Cathedral for victims of the September 11 attacks. A similar service is held in Canada on Parliament Hill, the largest vigil ever held in the nation’s capital.

2003 – In a referendum, Estonia approves joining the European Union.

2007 – Late-2000s financial crisis: The Northern Rock bank experiences the first bank run in the United Kingdom in 150 years.

2008 – All 88 people on board Aeroflot Flight 821 are killed when the plane crashes on approach to Perm Airport.