What Happened on August 19th in History
30 historical events on this date
First flight of the B-25 Mitchell medium bomber.
The North American B-25 Mitchell is an American medium bomber that was introduced in 1941 and named in honor of Brigadier General William "Billy" Mitchell, a pioneer of U.S. military aviation. Used...
Germany and Romania sign the Tiraspol Agreement, rendering the region of Transnistria under control of the latter.
Nazi Germany, officially the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it...
World War II: Operation Jubilee (The Dieppe Raid): The 2nd Canadian Infantry Division leads an amphibious assault by allied forces on Dieppe, France and fails.
World War II, or the Second World War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Axis powers. Nearly all of the world's countries participated. Tanks and aircraft played major...
World War II: Liberation of Paris: Paris, France rises against German occupation with the help of Allied troops.
The Liberation of Paris was a battle that took place during World War II from 19 August 1944 until the German garrison surrendered the French capital on 25 August 1944. Paris had been occupied by...
August Revolution: Viet Minh led by Ho Chi Minh take power in Hanoi, Vietnam.
The August Revolution, also known as the August General Uprising, was a revolution led by the Việt Minh against the Japanese occupation of Vietnam and the Empire of Vietnam from 13 to 28 August...
Cold War: The CIA and MI6 help to overthrow the government of Mohammad Mosaddegh in Iran and reinstate the Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.
The Cold War was a period of international geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist...
In the Northeast United States, severe flooding caused by Hurricane Diane, claims 200 lives.
The Northeastern United States form one of the four census regions defined by the United States Census Bureau. Located on the Atlantic coast of North America, the region borders Canada to its north,...
Cold War: In Moscow, Russia, Soviet Union, downed American U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers is sentenced to ten years imprisonment by the Soviet Union for espionage.
The Lockheed U-2, nicknamed the "Dragon Lady", is an American single-engine, high–altitude reconnaissance aircraft operated by the United States Air Force (USAF) and the Central Intelligence Agency...
Sputnik program: Korabl-Sputnik 2: The Soviet Union launches the satellite with the dogs Belka and Strelka, 40 mice, two rats and a variety of plants.
Sputnik is a name for multiple spacecrafts launched under the Soviet space program. "Sputnik 1", "Sputnik 2" and "Sputnik 3" were the official Soviet names of those objects, and the remaining...
Syncom 3, the first geostationary communication satellite, is launched. Two months later, it would enable live coverage of the 1964 Summer Olympics.
Syncom started as a 1961 NASA program for active geosynchronous communication satellites, all of which were developed and manufactured by the Space and Communications division of Hughes Aircraft...
Japanese prime minister Eisaku Satō becomes the first post-World War II sitting prime minister to visit Okinawa Prefecture.
The prime minister of Japan is the head of government of Japan. The prime minister chairs the Cabinet of Japan and has the ability to select and dismiss its ministers of state. The prime minister...
In Iran, the Cinema Rex fire causes more than 300 deaths.
The Cinema Rex fire happened on August 19th 1978 when the Cinema Rex in Abadan, Iran, was set ablaze, killing between 377 and 470 people. The event started when four individuals, who were militants...
Saudia Flight 163, a Lockheed L-1011 TriStar burns after making an emergency landing at Riyadh International Airport in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, killing 301 people.
Saudia Flight 163 was a scheduled Saudia passenger flight departing from Quaid-e-Azam Airport in Karachi, Pakistan, bound for Kandara Airport in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, via then-Riyadh International...
Otłoczyn railway accident: In Poland's worst post-war railway accident, 67 people lose their lives and a further 62 are injured.
The Otłoczyn railway accident was a train crash which occurred on 19 August 1980, near the village of Otłoczyn. At 4:30 a.m., a freight train collided with a passenger train which ran from Toruń...
Gulf of Sidra Incident: United States F-14A Tomcat fighters intercept and shoot down two Libyan Sukhoi Su-22 fighter jets over the Gulf of Sidra.
In the first Gulf of Sidra incident, 19 August 1981, two Libyan Sukhoi Su-22M3 Fitter-G fired upon two U.S. Grumman F-14A Tomcats and were subsequently shot down off the Libyan coast. Libya had...
Hungerford massacre: In the United Kingdom, Michael Ryan kills sixteen people with a semi-automatic rifle and then commits suicide.
The Hungerford massacre was a spree shooting in Wiltshire and Berkshire, England, which occurred on 19 August 1987 when 27-year-old Michael Ryan shot and killed sixteen people, including his mother...
Polish president Wojciech Jaruzelski nominates Solidarity activist Tadeusz Mazowiecki to be the first non-communist prime minister in 42 years.
Wojciech Witold Jaruzelski was a Polish military general, politician and de facto leader of the Polish People's Republic from 1981 until 1989, and a military dictator from 13 December 1981 until 22...
Several hundred East Germans cross the frontier between Hungary and Austria during the Pan-European Picnic, part of the events that began the process of the Fall of the Berlin Wall.
East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from its formation on 7 October 1949 until its reunification with West Germany on 3 October 1990. Until...
Dissolution of the Soviet Union: The August Coup begins when Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev is placed under house arrest while on holiday in the town of Foros, Ukraine.
The Soviet Union was formally dissolved and ceased to exist as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the...
Crown Heights riot in New York City begins.
The Crown Heights riot was a race riot that took place from August 19 to August 21, 1991, in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, New York City. Black residents attacked Orthodox Jewish residents,...
In Belgrade, Yugoslavia, tens of thousands of Serbians rally to demand the resignation of Federal Republic of Yugoslavia President Slobodan Milošević.
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers and at the crossroads of the Pannonian Plain and the Balkan Peninsula. According to...
Khankala Mi-26 crash: A Russian Mil Mi-26 helicopter carrying troops is hit by a Chechen missile outside Grozny, killing 118 soldiers.
On 19 August 2002, a group of Chechen fighters armed with a man-portable air-defense system brought down a Russian Mil Mi-26 helicopter in a minefield, which resulted in the death of 127 Russian...
A truck-bomb attack on United Nations headquarters in Iraq kills the agency's top envoy Sérgio Vieira de Mello and 21 other employees.
The Canal Hotel bombing was a suicide truck bombing in Baghdad, Iraq, during the afternoon of 19 August 2003. It killed 23 people, including the United Nations' Special Representative in Iraq Sérgio...
Shmuel HaNavi bus bombing: A suicide attack on a bus in Jerusalem, planned by Hamas, kills 23 Israelis, seven of them children.
On August 19, 2003, Palestinian militant Raed Abdel Hamid Misk, sent by the Hamas cell in Hebron, dressed as a Haredi Jew, boarded a crowded bus with Orthodox Jewish children returning from the...
Google Inc. has its initial public offering on Nasdaq.
Google LLC is an American multinational technology corporation focused on information technology, online advertising, search engine technology, email, cloud computing, software, quantum computing,...
The first-ever joint military exercise between Russia and China, called Peace Mission 2005 begins.
Peace Mission 2005 was the first ever joint military exercise between China and Russia. The exercise started on August 19, 2005, and consisted of combined land, sea, and air elements simulating an...
A series of bombings in Baghdad, Iraq, kills 101 and injures 565 others.
The August 2009 Baghdad bombings were three coordinated car bomb attacks and a number of mortar strikes in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, on 19 August 2009. The explosives were detonated simultaneously...
Operation Iraqi Freedom ends, with the last of the United States brigade combat teams crossing the border to Kuwait.
The Iraq War, also referred to as the Second Gulf War, was a protracted armed conflict in Iraq from 2003 to 2011. It began with the invasion by a United States–led coalition, which resulted in the...
The Dhamara Ghat train accident kills at least 37 people in the Indian state of Bihar.
The Dhamara Ghat train accident occurred on 19 August 2013 when the Saharsa Patna Rajya Rani Express train struck a large group of people at the Dhamara Ghat railway station in the Indian state of...
Tens of thousands of farmed non-native Atlantic salmon are accidentally released into the wild in Washington waters in the 2017 Cypress Island Atlantic salmon pen break.
The Atlantic salmon is a species of ray-finned fish in the family Salmonidae. It is the third largest of the Salmonidae, behind Siberian taimen and Pacific Chinook salmon, growing up to 1 m (3.3 ft)...