1981: U.S. President Ronald Reagan is shot in the chest outside a Washington, D.C., hotel by John Hinckley, Jr.; three others are wounded in the same incident.
1949: A riot breaks out in Austurvöllur square in Reykjavík, when Iceland joins NATO.
1945: World War II: Soviet forces invade Austria and capture Vienna; Polish and Soviet forces liberate Danzig.
1944: Out of 795 Lancasters, Halifaxes and Mosquitos sent to attack Nuremberg, 95 bombers do not return, making it the largest RAF Bomber Command loss of the war.
1944: World War II: Allied bombers conduct their most severe bombing run on Sofia, Bulgaria.
1939: The Heinkel He 100 fighter sets a world airspeed record of 463 mph (745 km/h).
1918: Outburst of bloody March Events in Baku and other locations of Baku Governorate.
1912: Sultan Abd al-Hafid signs the Treaty of Fez, making Morocco a French protectorate.
1899: German Society of Chemistry issues an invitation to other national scientific organizations to appoint delegates to the International Committee on Atomic Weights.
1296: Edward I sacks Berwick-upon-Tweed, during armed conflict between Scotland and England.
1282: The people of Sicily rebel against the Angevin king Charles I, in what becomes known as the Sicilian Vespers.
598: Balkan Campaign: The Avars lift the siege at the Byzantine stronghold of Tomis. Their leader Bayan I retreats north of the Danube River after the Avaro-Slavic hordes are decimated by the plague.