13 August History
- 1630 - Emperor Ferdinand II dismisses Albert Eusebius van Wallenstein, his most capable general.
- 1680 - War starts when the Spanish are expelled from Santa Fe, New Mexico, by Indians under Chief Pope.
- 1704 - The Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene of Austria defeat the French Army at the Battle of Blenheim.
- 1787 - The Ottoman Empire declares war on Russia.
- 1862 - Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest defeats a Union army under Thomas Crittenden at Murfreesboro, Tennessee.
- 1881 - The first African-American nursing school opens at Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia.
- 1889 - The first coin-operated telephone is patented by William Gray.
- 1892 - The first issue of the Afro American newspaper is published in Baltimore, Maryland.
- 1898 - Manila, the capital of the Philippines, falls to the U.S. Army.
- 1910 - British nurse Florence Nightingale, famous for her care of British soldiers during the Crimean War, dies.
- 1932 - Adolf Hitler refuses to serve as Franz Von Papen's vice chancellor.
- 1948 - During the Berlin Airlift, the weather over Berlin becomes so stormy that American planes have their most difficult day landing supplies. They deem it 'Black Friday.'
- 1963 - A 17 year-old Buddhist monk burns himself to death in Saigon, South Vietnam.
- 1989 - The wreckage of a plane that carried U.S. congressman Mickey Leland and others on a humanitarian mission is found on a mountain side in Ethiopia; there are no survivors.
13 August Birthdays
- 1655 - Johann Christoph Denner, inventor of the clarinet.
- 1818 - Lucy Stone, woman's rights activist, founder of Woman's Journal.
- 1860 - Phoebe Anne Moses, later known as Annie Oakley, a sharpshooter and entertainer.
- 1899 - Alfred Hitchcock, director of over 50 films including Rebecca, Rear Window, Psycho and North by Northwest.
- 1902 - Felix Wankel, inventory of the rotary engine which bears his name.
- 1912 - Ben Hogan, American golfer.
- 1916 - Daniel Schorr, radio and television correspondent.
- 1926 - Fidel Castro, Cuban revolutionary leader and president.