05 August History
- 1391 - Castilian sailors in Barcelona, Spain set fire to a Jewish ghetto, killing 100 people and setting off four days of violence against Jews.
- 1763 - Colonel Henry Bouquet decisively defeats the Indians at the Battle of Bushy Run in Pennsylvania during Pontiac's rebellion.
- 1762 - Russia, Prussia and Austria sign a treaty agreeing on the partition of Poland.
- 1815 - A peace treaty with Tripoli–which follows treaties with Algeria and Tunis–brings an end to the Barbary Wars.
- 1858 - The first transatlantic cable is completed.
- 1861 - Congress adopts the nation's first income tax to finance the Civil War.
- 1864 - The Union Navy captures Mobile Bay in Alabama.
- 1892 - Harriet Tubman receives a pension from Congress for her work as a nurse, spy and scout during the Civil War.
- 1914 - The British Expeditionary Force mobilizes for World War I.
- 1914 - The first electric traffic signal lights are installed in Cleveland, Ohio.
- 1915 - The Austro-German Army takes Warsaw, in present-day Poland, on the Eastern Front.
- 1916 - The British navy defeats the Ottomans at the naval battle off Port Said, Egypt.
- 1921 - Mustapha Kemal is appointed virtual ruler of the Ottoman Empire.
- 1941 - The German army completes taking 410,000 Russian prisoners in Uman and Smolensk pockets in the Soviet Union.
- 1951 - The United Nations Command suspends armistice talks with the North Koreans when armed troops are spotted in neutral areas.
- 1962 - Actress Marilyn Monroe dies under mysterious circumstances.
- 1974 - President Richard Nixon admits he ordered a cover-up for political as well as national security reasons.
05 August Birthdays
- 1850 - Guy de Maupassant, short story writer and author of "The Necklace."
- 1876 - Mary Ritter Beard, American historian and writer.
- 1906 - John Houston, film director of such movies as The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and The Maltese Falcon.
- 1908 - Miriam Rothschild, English scientist and writer.
- 1923 - Richard G. Kleindienst, one of the key officials who helped elect Richard Nixon to the presidency in 1969.
- 1930 - Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon.