1. 432 - Saint Patrick, aged about 16, is captured by Irish pirates from his home in Great Britain and taken as a slave to Ireland (traditional date).

2. 455 - Roman senator Petronius Maximus is proclaimed emperor.

3. 461 - Saint Patrick dies.

4. 916 - Yelü Abaoji proclaims himself emperor, and the state is named Khitan.

5. 1269 - The Mongols promulgate the new script created by Phags - pa.

6. 1521 - Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan reaches the Philippines.

7. 1525 - Thomas Müntzer launches an uprising in Germany.

8. 1537 - French troops invade Flanders.

9. 1580 - Prince William I of Orange is welcomed in Amsterdam.

10. 1722 - William IV, Prince of Orange, is appointed mayor of Drente.

11. 1756 - St. Patrick's Day is first celebrated in NYC at the Crown & Thistle Tavern.

12. 1762 - The first St. Patrick's Day parade is held in NYC.

13. 1775 - The Transylvania Land Company, headed by Richard Henderson, buys most of Kentucky through a treaty signed with Cherokee chiefs at Sycamore Shoals on the Watauga River (later declared illegal).

14. 1776 - British forces evacuate Boston to Nova Scotia during the Revolutionary War.

15. 1778 - Britain declares war on France due to the French alliance with the US.

16. 1800 - The British warship HMS Queen Charlotte catches fire off the Tuscan Archipelago; 700 die.

17. 1804 - Friedrich Schiller's play Wilhelm Tell premieres.

18. 1824 - Britain and the Netherlands sign a trade agreement.

19. 1829 - The final performance by famous clown Joseph Grimaldi is held at a benefit performance at Sadler's Wells, London.

20. 1833 - The Phoenix Society forms (NY).

21. 1842 - The Treaty of 1842: The Wyandotte (Huron) Indian Nation cedes 114,000 acres of land in Ohio and Michigan to the US in exchange for 148,000 acres west of the Mississippi.

22. 1845 - Bristol man Henry Jones patents self - raising flour.

23. 1845 - The rubber band is patented by Stephen Perry of London.

24. 1854 - The first park land is purchased by a US city, Worcester, Massachusetts.

25. 1860 - The Japanese embassy arrives in San Francisco to sign a treaty of friendship, six years after the forcible ending of Japan's isolationist policy by US Navy Commodore Matthew C. Perry.

26. 1861 - Italy is unified into a single kingdom under Victor Emmanuel II following the campaigns led by Giuseppe Garibaldi.

27. 1863 - The Battle of Kelly's Ford, Virginia, takes place with 211 casualties.

28. 1868 - A postage stamp canceling machine patent is issued.

29. 1870 - The Massachusetts legislature authorizes the incorporation of Wellesley Female Seminary.

30. 1871 - The National Association of Professional Base - ball Players is organized.

31. 1876 - British high - jump champion Marshall Jones Brooks clears 1.83 m at Oxford, England, for an unofficial world record; thought to be the first leap over 6'.

32. 1876 - General Crook destroys Cheyennes and Oglala - Sioux Indian camps.

33. 1877 - Australia's English - born all - rounder Billy Midwinter completes Test cricket's first 5 - wicket haul, 5 - 78 in the first - ever Test match vs England in Melbourne.

34. 1883 - Marx is buried in Highgate Cemetery.

35. 1884 - John Joseph Montgomery makes the first glider flight at Otay, California.

36. 1886 - The Carrollton massacre (Mississippi) occurs, and 20 African - Americans are killed.

37. 1891 - The British steamer "Utopia" sinks off Gibraltar, killing 574.

38. 1893 - The Dominion Hockey Challenge Cup (Stanley Cup): The Montreal Hockey Club claims the inaugural trophy after finishing top of the final Amateur Hockey Association of Canada standings with a 7 - 1 - 0 record.

39. 1894 - The US and China sign a treaty preventing Chinese laborers from entering the US.

40. 1897 - British boxer Bob Fitzsimmons knocks out American champion "Gentleman" Jim Corbett in the 14th round to win the world heavyweight title in Carson City, Nevada.

41. 1898 - John Philip Holland achieves a successful test run for the first modern submarine off Staten Island, submerging for 1 hour 40 minutes.

42. 1899 - The Windsor luxury hotel in NYC catches fire, and 92 die.

43. 1900 - American modern dancer Isadora Duncan gives her first European performance in London, England.

44. 1900 - In South Africa, British troops relieve Mafeking, besieged by the Boers since October 13, 1899.

45. 1901 - At a show in Paris, 71 Vincent van Gogh's paintings cause a sensation, 11 years after his death.

46. 1901 - The Free - thinking - Democratic Union forms in the Netherlands.

47. 1905 - Albert Einstein finishes his scientific paper detailing his quantum theory of light, one of the foundations of modern physics.

48. 1905 - Eleanor Roosevelt (20) marries Franklin D. Roosevelt (23), later the 32nd US president, in New York, and is given away by her uncle, the 26th president Theodore Roosevelt.

49. 1939 - The Battle of Nanchang between the Kuomintang and the Japanese breaks out (Sino - Japanese War 1937 - 1945).

50. 1942 - The Bełżec concentration camp opens with the transport of 30,000 Lublin Polish Jews.