April 13

April 13 is the 103rd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (104th in leap years). There are 262 days remaining. It is also the Ides of April.

Events

• 1055 - Victor II is consecrated pope
• 1111 - Henry V is crowned Holy Roman Emperor
• 1180 - Frederick Barbarossa issues the Gelnhausen Charter
• 1204 - The Fourth Crusade sacks Constantinople
• 1598 - King Henry IV of France issues the Edict of Nantes, allowing freedom of religion to the Huguenots
• 1829 - The British Parliament grants freedom of religion to Roman Catholics
• 1849 - Hungary becomes a republic
• 1861 - American Civil War: Fort Sumter surrenders
• 1873 - Colfax Massacre
• 1883 - Alferd Packer is convicted of murder
• 1902 - James C. Penney opens his first store in Kemmerer, Wyoming
• 1919 - Amritsar massacre: British and Gurkha troops massacre at least 379 unarmed demonstrators in Amritsar, India
• 1941 - Pact of neutrality between the USSR and Japan is signed
• 1943 - World War II: The discovery of a mass grave of Polish prisoners-of-war executed by Soviet forces in the Katyń Forest Massacre was announced in Germany, driving a wedge between the Western Allies, the Polish government-in-exile in London, and the Soviet Union.
• 1943 - The Jefferson Memorial is dedicated in Washington, DC, on the 200th anniversary of Thomas Jefferson's birth.
• 1945 - German troops massacre more than 1000 political and military prisoners in Gardelegen Germany. The atrocity is discovered two days later by American forces.
• 1970 - The oxygen tank aboard Apollo 13 explodes, putting the crew into deadly peril.
• 1975 - An attack by Phalangists on a Palestinian bus in Ain El Remmeneh, Lebanon marks the beginning of a 15 year civil war.
• 1983 - Harold Washington is elected as the first African-American mayor in Chicago's history
• 1984 - Pete Rose becomes the first player in National League history to collect 4,000 hits
• 1985 - Enver Hoxha is succeeded by Ramiz Alia as the leader of Albania
• 1986 - Jack Nicklaus wins his sixth Masters Tournament
• 1987 - Portugal and China sign an agreement in which the island of Macao would be returned to China in 1999
• 1990 - The Soviet Union admits to committing the Katyn Massacre
• 1993 - Baseball: Lee Smith passes Jeff Reardon for first on the all-time savess list with his 358th save in a 9-7 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers
• 1997 - Tiger Woods becomes the youngest golfer to win the Masters Tournament
• 1997 - Baseball: For the first time in 36 years, two doubleheader games are played between the same pairs of cities on the same day. The San Francisco Giants v New York Mets and New York Yankees v Oakland Athletics
• 2029 - The asteroid 2004 MN4 will pass within 65,000 km of the Earth
  

  Births

• 1519 - Catherine de Medici, Queen of France (d. 1589)
• 1570 - Guy Fawkes, Gunpowder Plot conspirator (d. 1606)
• 1593 - Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford, English statesman (d. 1641)
• 1618 - Roger de Rabutin, Comte de Bussy, French writer (d. 1693)
• 1713 - Frederick (Lord) North, British prime minister (d. 1792)
• 1729 - Thomas Percy, Bishop of Dromore and magazine editor (d. 1811)
• 1735 - Isaac Low, New York delegate to the Continental Congress (d. 1791)
• 1743 - Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (d. 1826)
• 1747 - Louis Philip II, Duke of Orléans (d. 1793)
• 1769 - Thomas Lawrence, English painter (d. 1830)
• 1771 - Richard Trevithick, mechanical engineer (d. 1833)
• 1780 - Alexander Mitchell, Irish engineer (d. 1868)
• 1787 - John Robertson, U.S. congressman (d. 1873)
• 1808 - Antonio Meucci, Italian inventor (d. 1896)
• 1825 - Thomas D'Arcy McGee, Canadian journalist and politician (d. 1868)
• 1828 - Joseph Barber Lightfoot, English theologian and Bishop of Durham (d. 1889)
• 1832 - Juan Montalvo, Ecuadoran author (d. 1889)
• 1850 - Arthur Matthew Weld Downing, British astronomer (d. 1917)
• 1852 - F.W. Woolworth, businessman, founder of Woolworth's (d. 1919)
• 1860 - James Ensor, painter (d. 1949)
• 1866 - Butch Cassidy, American outlaw (d. 1908)
• 1872 - Alexander Roda Roda, writer (d. 1945)
• 1873 - John W. Davis, American politician (d. 1955)
• 1875 - Ray Lyman Wilbur, U.S. Secretary of the Interior (d. 1949)
• 1880 - Charles Christie, film studio owner (d. 1955)
• 1881 - Ludwig Binswanger, psychiatrist (d. 1966)
• 1885 - Georg Lukács, philosopher and literary critic (d. 1971)
• 1887 - Gordon S. Fahrni, Canadian physician and President of the Canadian Medical Association (d. 1995)
• 1889 - Herbert Osborne Yardley, cryptographer (d. 1958)
• 1890 - Frank Murphy, American public servant (d. 1949)
• 1891 - Nella Larsen, African-American novelist (d. 1964)
• 1892 - Sir Robert Alexander Watson-Watt, inventor of Radar (d. 1973)
• 1892 - Arthur Travers 'Bomber' Harris, Royal Air Force commander in World War II (d. 1984)
• 1894 - Arthur Fadden, thirteenth Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1973)
• 1897 - Werner Voss, German World War I flying ace (d. 1917)
• 1900 - Pierre Molinier, painter and photographer (d. 1976)
• 1901 - Jacques Lacan, psychoanalyst and semanticist (d. 1981)
• 1902 - Philippe de Rothschild, race car driver and wine grower (d. 1988)
• 1904 - Sir David Robinson, British philanthropist and entrepreneur (d. 1987)
• 1906 - Samuel Beckett, Irish writer, winner of the Nobel Prize in literature (d. 1989)
• 1907 - Harold E. Stassen, frequent candidate for President of the United States (d. 2001)
• 1909 - Eudora Welty, American writer, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 1973 (d. 2001)
• 1909 - Stanislaw Marcin Ulam, Polish-American mathematician (d. 1984)
• 1911 - Ico Hitrec, Croatian football player (d.1946)
• 1919 - Howard Keel, actor, singer, and president of the Screen Actors Guild )d. 2004)
• 1919 - Roland Gaucher, French journalist
• 1920 - Roberto Calvi, banker (d. 1982)
• 1920 - Liam Cosgrave, fifth Taoiseach of the Ireland
• 1920 - John LaPorta, jazz musician
• 1920 - Claude Cheysson, French politician
• 1922 - John Braine, British novelist (d. 1986)
• 1923 - Don Adams, actor and comedian
• 1924 - Stanley Donen, director
• 1924 - Jack Chick, Christian evangelist
• 1926 - John Spencer-Churchill, 11th Duke of Marlborough
• 1928 - Alan Clark, British politician (d. 1999)
• 1931 - Dan Gurney, race car driver
• 1932 - Orlando Letelier, Chilean politician (d. 1976)
• 1933 - Ben Nighthorse Campbell. U.S. Senator
• 1935 - Lyle Waggoner, actor
• 1937 - Lanford Wilson, playwright
• 1937 - Edward Fox, British actor
• 1939 - Paul Sorvino, actor
• 1939 - Seamus Heaney, poet
• 1943 - Bill Conti, musician
• 1944 - Jack Casady, musician (Jefferson Airplane)
• 1944 - Susan Davis, American politician
• 1945 - Bob Kalsu, American football player (d. 1970)
• 1945 - Tony Dow, child actor
• 1946 - Al Green, singer and pastor
• 1948 - Sue Doughty, British politician
• 1949 - Frank Doran, Scottish Politician
• 1950 - Ron Perlman, actor
• 1950 - William Sadler. actor
• 1951 - Peabo Bryson, pop singer
• 1951 - Peter Davison, actor
• 1951 - Max Weinberg, drummer
• 1952 - David Drew, British politician
• 1952 - Ron Dittemore, NASA manager
• 1953 - Stephen Byers, British politician
• 1954 - Jimmy Destri, musician
• 1955 - Ole von Beust, mayor of Hamburg
• 1955 - Lupe Pintor, Mexican boxer
• 1956 - Alison Wheeler, British political activist
• 1956 - Peter 'Possum' Bourne, Australian race car driver (d. 2003)
• 1960 - Rudi Völler, German football coach
• 1962 - Hillel Slovak, guitarist (Red Hot Chili Peppers) (d. 1988)
• 1963 - Garry Kasparov, chess grandmaster
• 1964 - Caroline Rhea, actress
• 1970 - Rick Schroder, actor
• 1972 - Mariusz Czerkawski, hockey player
• 1972 - Aaron Lewis, singer
• 1974 - Sergei Gonchar, hockey player
• 1975 - Lou Bega, musician and artist
• 1976 - Jonathan Brandis, actor (d. 2003)
• 1976 - Patrik Elias, hockey player
• 1978 - Arron Asham, hockey player
• 1979 - Baron Davis, basketball player
• 1997 - Sloane Momsen, actress
  

  Deaths

• 799 - Paul the Deacon, monk and chronicler (b. ca 720)
• 814 - Krum, khan of Bulgaria
• 1093 - Vsevolod I of Kiev (b. 1093)
• 1279 - Boleslaus the Pious, Polish duke
• 1605 - Boris Godunov, Tsar of Russia
• 1638 - Henri, duc de Rohan, French Huguenot leader (b. 1579)
• 1695 - Jean de la Fontaine, French author (b. 1621)
• 1722 - Charles Leslie, theologian (b. 1650)
• 1794 - Nicolas Chamfort, French writer (b. 1741)
• 1793 - Pierre Gaspard Chaumette, French revolutionary (b. 1763)
• 1826 - Franz Danzi, German composer (b. 1763)
• 1853 - James Iredell, Jr, Governor of North Carolina 1b. 1788)
• 1853 - Leopold Gmelin, German chemist (b. 1788)
• 1855 - Henry De la Beche, English geologist (b. 1796)
• 1868 - Tewodros II, Emperor of Ethiopia (b. 1818)
• 1880 - Robert Fortune, Scottish botanist (b. 1813)
• 1882 - Bruno Bauer, German theologian (b. 1809)
• 1909 - Whitley Stokes, British lawyer (b. 1830)
• 1910 - William Quiller Orchardson, British painter (b. 1835)
• 1911 - George Washington Glick, Governor of Kansas (b. 1827)
• 1911 - John McLane, Governor of New Hampshire (b. 1852)
• 1912 - Ishikawa Takuboku, Japanese author (b. 1886)
• 1925 - Elwood Haynes, automobile pioneer
• 1938 - Grey Owl, proponent of nature conservation (b. 1888)
• 1941 - Annie Jump Cannon, American astronomer (b. 1863)
• 1945 - Ernst Cassirer, German philosopher (b. 1874)
• 1961 - Army Pfc. John A. Bennett (executed)
• 1962 - Culbert Olson, Governor of California (b. 1876)
• 1966 - Abdul Salam Arif, President of Iraq (b. 1921)
• 1975 - François (Ngarta) Tombalbaye, first president of Chad (b. 1918)
• 1975 - Larry Parks, American actor (b. 1914)
• 1978 - Jack Chambers, Canadian artist and film maker (b. 1931)
• 1981 - Asaka Yasuhiko, member of the Japanese imperial family (b. 1887)
• 1984 - Ralph Kirkpatrick, American musician (b. 1911)
• 1984 - Richard Hurndall. British actor (b. 1910)
• 1997 - Dorothy Frooks, American author, publisher, military figure, and actress (b. 1896)
• 1999 - Willi Stoph, East Germany politician
• 2000 - Giorgio Bassani, Italian writer (b. 1916)
• 2002 - Jon Gustafson, editor
• 2004 - Lou Berberet, baseball player (b. 1929)
• 2004 - Caron Keating, British television presenter (b. 1962)
• 2005 - Johnnie Johnson (b. 1924), Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member, piano player and blues musician
  

  Holidays and Observances

• First day of Thai New Year

• Easter - 2036

  External links

• BBC: On This Day

April 12 - April 14 - March 13 - May 13 -- listing of all days