October 19



Events

Up to 1900 
 202 BC – The Battle of Zama results in the defeat of Carthage and Hannibal.
 AD 439 – The Vandals, led by King Gaiseric, take Carthage in North Africa.
 1216 - King John of England dies. His nine-year-old son takes to the throne, becoming King Henry III of England.
 1303 - Siegen, in Westphalia (in present-day Germany) is given city rights.
 1386 - First lecture at the University of Heidelberg.
 1453 – The French recapture of Bordeaux brings the Hundred Years' War to a close, with the English retaining only Calais on French soil.
 1466 – The Thirteen Years' War ended with the Second Treaty of Toruń. Gdansk Pomerania and Prussia as a whole was incorporated into Poland; the Teutonic Knights were allowed to rule its eastern part as Polish vassals.
 1781 – Major General Lord Charles Cornwallis surrenders to George Washington and Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau at Yorktown, Virginia, ending the American Revolutionary War.
 1789 - John Jay is sworn in as the first Chief Justice of the United States.
 1805 - Battle of Ulm in the Napoleonic Wars.
 1812 – Napoleon I of France retreats from Moscow.
 1813 – The Battle of Leipzig concludes, giving Napoleon Bonaparte one of his worst defeats.
 1845 - Opera Tannhäuser by Richar Wagner is first performed.
 1864 – Battle of Cedar Creek – Union Army under Philip Sheridan destroys Confederate Army under Jubal Early.
 1864 – Confederate raiders launch an attack on Saint Albans, Vermont from Canada.
 1866 - Austria hands over Veneto to France, which immediately gives it to Italy. Mantua also becomes part of Italy.
 1873 – Yale, Princeton, Columbia, and Rutgers universities draft the first code of American football rules.

1901  2000 
 1912 – Italy takes possession of Tripoli, Libya from the Ottoman Empire.
 1914 – The First Battle of Ypres begins.
 1917 – Love Field in Dallas, Texas is opened.
 1921 - Portugal's Prime Minister Antonio Joaquim Granjo is killed in a coup.
 1933 – Germany withdraws from the League of Nations.
 1935 – Fascist Italy invades Ethiopia.
 1943 – Streptomycin, the first antibiotic remedy for tuberculosis, is isolated by researchers at Rutgers University.
 1944 – United States forces land in the Philippines.
 1950 – The People's Republic of China joins the Korean War.
 1954 – First successful climb of Cho Oyu in the Himalayas.
 1956 - The Soviet Union and Japan sign a joint declaration, officially ending the state of war between them.
 1973 – President Richard Nixon rejects an Appeals Court demand to turn over the Watergate tapes.
 1973 - Heavy rain causes floods in south-eastern Spain, killing around 200 people.
 1974 – Niue becomes a self-governing territory of New Zealand.
 1982 – John De Lorean is arrested for trafficking in cocaine.
 1983 – Maurice Bishop, Prime Minister of Grenada, is overthrown and executed in a military coup d'état led by Bernard Coard.
 1985 – The first Blockbuster Video store opens in Dallas, Texas.
 1986 – Samora Machel, President of Mozambique and a prominent leader of FRELIMO, and 33 others died when their Tupolev 134 plane crashed into the Lebombo Mountains.
 1987 – In retaliation for Iranian attacks on ships in the Persian Gulf, the U.S. Navy disables three of Iran's offshore oil platforms.
 1987 – (Black Monday) Dow Jones Industrial Average falls by 22%.
 1989 – Guildford Four convictions are quashed by the Court of Appeal – they had spent 15 years in prison through a miscarriage of justice.
 1991 - An earthquake in northern India, of magnitude 7, kills 2,000 people.
 1992 - German politicians Petra Kelly and Gert Bastian are found dead. It is believed that Bastian killed Kelly on October 1, before killing himself.
 1994 – New Zealand's Goodnight Kiwi says good night for the last time.

From 2001 
 2001 – SIEV-X sinks en route to Christmas Island
 2003 – Mother Teresa is beatified by Pope John Paul II.
 2004 – Myanmar prime minister Khin Nyunt is ousted and placed under house arrest by the Thai government on charges of corruption.
 2005 – The trial of Saddam Hussein, on charges of Crimes against Humanity, begins.
 2005 – Hurricane Wilma becomes the most intense Atlantic hurricane on record.
 2007 - A bomb explosion occurs at a market in Makati, Philippines, killing 11 people.
 2008 - In the US, former Republican United States Secretary of State Colin Powell announces that he intends to vote for Democrat candidate Barack Obama over John McCain in the November 4 Presidential election.
 2012 - A bomb attack in Beirut, Lebanon, kills at least 11 people, including the Lebanese army chief. The attack is believed to be linked to the conflict in Syria.
 2015 - The Liberal Party of Canada wins an overall majority in Canada's general election, ending over nine years of Stephen Harper's Conservative government. Justin Trudeau is the designated Prime Minister of Canada.
 2017 - A stick-shaped object called 'Oumuamua is discovered as it passes through the Solar System.
 2018 - A train runs over a crowd celebrating a Hindu festival in Amritsar, India, killing at least 60 people.
 2018 - Unmanned European-Japanese spacecraft BepiColombo is launched on a seven-year journey to the planet Mercury.
 2018 - Saudi Arabia admits that the missing journalist Jamal Khashoggi died in its consulate in Istanbul, Turkey.
 2019 - A dam collapses at a gold mine on the Seiba river in the Krasnoyarsk region of Siberia, Russia, killing 15 people.
 2019 - The House of Commons of the United Kingdom holds a Saturday sitting for the first time since 1982 because of the issue of Brexit.

Births

Up to 1900 
 1276 - Prince Hisaaki, Japanese shogun (d. 1328)
 1433 – Marsilio Ficino, Italian philosopher (d. 1499)
 1562 – Archbishop George Abbot, Archbishop of Canterbury (d. 1633)
 1582 - Dmitry Ivanovich, Tsarevich of Russia (d. 1591)
 1605 – Thomas Browne, English writer (d. 1682)
 1610 - James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormonde, English statesman and soldier (d. 1688)
 1658 – Adolf Friedrich II of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (d. 1704)
 1688 - William Cheselden, English surgeon and anatomist (d. 1752)
 1718 - Victor-François, 2nd duc de Broglie, Marshal of France (d. 1804)
 1720 - John Woolman, American Quaker preacher and anti-Slavery activist (d. 1772)
 1748 - Martha Jefferson, wife of Thomas Jefferson (d. 1782)
 1774 - José de Fabrega, Panamanian military (d. 1844)
 1784 – John McLoughlin, Hudson's Bay company trader (d. 1857)
 1784 - James Henry Leigh Hunt, English Romantic critic, essayist and poet (d. 1859)
 1789 - Theophilos Kairis, Greek priest and revolutionary (d. 1853)
 1795 - Pedro Blanco Soto, Bolivian general and politician (d. 1829)
 1810 - Cassius Clay, American abolitionist (d. 1903)
 1814 - Theodoros Vryzakis, Greek painter (d. 1918)
 1827 - Charles Cordier, French sculptor (d. 1902)
 1851 – Empress Myeongseong of Korea (d. 1895)
 1856 - Edmund Beecher Wilson, American biologist (d. 1939)
 1858 – George Albert Boulenger, Belgian naturalist (d. 1937)
 1862 – Auguste Lumière, one of the inventors of cinema (d. 1954)
 1868 - Bertha Knight Landes, American politician (d. 1943)
 1871 - Luigi Albertini, Italian politician and publicist (d. 1941)
 1872 - Jacques E. Brandenberger, Swiss chemist (d. 1954)
 1873 – Jaap Eden, Dutch skater and cyclist (d. 1925)
 1876 - Mordecai Brown, American baseball player, coach and manager (d. 1945)
 1876 - Mihkel Pung, Estonian politician (d. 1941)
 1882 – Umberto Boccioni, Italian painter and sculptor (d. 1916)
 1884 - Eugen Habermann, Estonian architect (d. 1944)
 1885 – Charles Merrill, American investment banker (d. 1956)
 1895 – Lewis Mumford, American historian (d. 1990)
 1897 - Salimuzzaman Siddiqui, Pakistani scientist and scholar (d. 1994)
 1899 – Miguel Angel Asturias, Guatemalan writer (d. 1974)
 1900 – Erna Berger, German soprano (d. 1990)

1901  1950 
 1907 – Roger Wolfe Kahn, band leader (d. 1962)
 1908 – Geirr Tveitt, Norwegian composer (d. 1981)
 1909 - Stein Grieg Halvorsen, Norwegian theatre actor (d. 2013)
 1910 – Jean Genet, French writer (d. 1986)
 1910 – Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, Indian physicist (d. 1995)
 1913 – Vinícius de Moraes, Brazilian poet and songwriter (d. 1980)
 1913 - Haxhi Lleshi, Albanian military and politician (d. 1998)
 1914 - Juanita Moore, American actress (d. 2014)
 1915 - Farid al-Atrash, Syrian composer, musician and actor (d. 1974)
 1916 – Emil Gilels, Ukrainian pianist (d. 1994)
 1916 – Jean Dausset, French immunologist (d. 2009)
 1917 - Walter Munk, Austrian-born American oceanographer (d. 2019)
 1918 - Robert Schwarz Strauss, American politician and diplomat (d. 2014)
 1920 - Pandurana Shastri, Indian philosopher (d. 2003)
 1921 - George Nader, American actor (d. 2002)
 1921 – Gunnar Nordahl, Swedish footballer (d. 1995)
 1924 - Lubomir Strougal, former Prime Minister of Czechoslovakia
 1925 - Czeslaw Kiszczak, former Prime Minister of Poland (d. 2015)
 1925 - Bernard Hepton, English actor (d. 2018)
 1925 – Emilio Eduardo Massera, Argentine naval officer and member of the Military Junta (d. 2010)
 1926 - Arne Bendiksen, Norwegian singer and songwriter (d. 2009)
 1926 - Marjorie Tallchief, American ballerina
 1927 - Pierre Alechinsky, Belgian artist
 1931 - Manolo Escobar, Spanish singer and actor (d. 2013)
 1931 – John le Carré, English novelist
 1932 – Robert Reed, actor (d. 1992)
 1934 - William Frates, American military veteran and radiologist (d. 2019)
 1934 – Yakubu Gowon, former President of Nigeria
 1935 - Don Ward, Canadian-American ice hockey player (d. 2014)
 1935 - Agne Simonsson, Swedish footballer
 1936 - Sylvia Browne, American author (d. 2013)
 1937 – Peter Max, American pop artist
 1938 - Eugenio Montejo, Venezuelan poet (d. 2008)
 1940 – Michael Gambon, Irish-British actor
 1940 - Rosny Smarth, 8th Prime Minister of Haiti
 1941 - Pepetela, Angolan writer, politician and activist
 1941 - Simon Ward, English actor (d. 2012)
 1942 – Andrew Vachss, writer and attorney
 1943 - Takis Ikonomopoulos, Greek footballer
 1944 - Pepetela, Angolan writer, politician and activist
 1944 – Peter Tosh, Jamaican musician (d. 1987)
 1945 – Divine, actor (d. 1988)
 1945 – John Lithgow, American actor
 1945 - Angus Deaton, Scottish-American economist
 1945 - Gloria Jones, American singer and songwriter
 1945 – Patricia Ireland, American attorney and feminist
 1946 - Bob Holland, Australian cricketer (d. 2017)
 1946 – Philip Pullman, English writer
 1946 - Jürgen Croy, East German footballer
 1947 - Giorgio Cavazzano, comics artist and illustrator

1951  1975 
 1951 - Demetrios Christodoulou, Greek physicist
 1952 - Peter Bone, English politician
 1953 - Sylvie Bermann, French diplomat
 1953 - Lionel Hollins, American basketball player and coach
 1954 – Sam Allardyce, English football manager
 1954 - Joe Bryant, American basketball player
 1954 - Ken Stott, Scottish actor
 1955 - LaSalle Ishii, Japanese television personality, actor and director
 1956 - Carlo Urbani, Italian physician (d. 1993)
 1956 - Didier Theys, Belgian racing driver
 1956 - Sunny Deol, Indian actor and director
 1957 - Karl Wallinger, Welsh singer-songwriter, musician and producer
 1958 - Lou Briel, Puerto Rican singer-songwriter, pianist, producer and actor
 1958 - Michael Steele, American journalist and politician
 1959 - Nir Barkat, Israeli politician
 1959 - Martin Kusch, German philosopher
 1960 - Jennifer Holliday, American actress and singer
 1962 – Evander Holyfield, American boxing champion
 1962 - Tracy Chevalier, American author
 1963 – Prince Laurent of Belgium
 1964 - Jorge Luis González, Cuban-born American boxer
 1965 – Ty Pennington, American TV carpenter
 1966 – Jon Favreau, American actor, writer, director
 1966 – Sinitta, American-British singer
 1967 - Amy Carter, daughter of Jimmy Carter
 1969 – DJ Sammy, Spanish DJ
 1969 – Erwin Sánchez, Bolivian footballer
 1969 – Trey Parker, American cartoonist, comedian, writer, actor
 1969 - Dieter Thomas, German ski jumper
 1969 - Caroline Catz, English actress
 1970 - Nouria Mérah-Benida, Algerian runner
 1971 - David Wagner, German-American footballer and coach
 1972 – Pras, musician
 1973 - Joaquin Gage, Canadian ice hockey player
 1973 - Hicham Arazi, Moroccan tennis player

From 1976 
 1976 – Paul Hartley, Scottish footballer
 1976 – Desmond Harrington, American actor
 1976 – Michael Young, American baseball player
 1977 – Habib Beye, Senegalese footballer
 1977 - Jason Reitman, American writer and director
 1978 - Ruslan Chagaev, Uzbekistani boxer
 1979 - Brian Robertson, American trombonist (Suburban Legends)
 1979 - Lei Jia, Chinese singer
 1981 – Heikki Kovalainen, Finnish racing driver
 1982 – Louis Oosthuizen, South African golfer
 1982 - Gillian Jacobs, American actress
 1982 - Gonzalo Pineda, Mexican footballer
 1983 - Vladimir Gabulov, Russian footballer
 1983 - Cara Santa Maria, American journalist
 1983 - Rebecca Ferguson, Swedish singer
 1983 - Adrie Visser, Dutch cyclist
 1984 - Saki Fujita, Japanese voice actress
 1985 - Kevin O'Connor, Irish footballer
 1988 - Dot Rotten, English rapper and musician
 1989 – Miroslav Stoch, Slovakian footballer
 1990 - Janet Leon, Swedish singer-songwriter and dancer
 1990 - Ciara Renée, American actress and singer
 1991 - Cotton Dixon, American singer and pianist
 1992 - Kim Ji-won, South Korean actress
 1993 – Abby Sunderland, American sailor
 2004 – Abilass Jeyarajah, Sri Lankan tsunami survivor

Deaths

Up to 1900 
 727 - Frithuswith, English saint (b. 650)
 1187 – Pope Urban III
 1216 – King John of England (b. 1167)
 1587 – Francesco I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (b. 1541)
 1619 - Fujiwara Seika, Japanese philosopher and educator (b. 1561)
 1682 – Thomas Browne, English writer (b. 1605)
 1723 - Godfrey Kneller, German-born painter (b. 1646)
 1745 – Jonathan Swift, Irish writer (b. 1667)
 1790 - Lyman Hall, American signer of the Declaration of Independence (b. 1724)
 1813 – Jozef Poniatowski, Polish prince and Marshal of France (b. 1763)
 1815 - Paolo Mascagni, Italian physician (b. 1755)
 1842 - Aleksey Koltsov, Russian poet (b. 1808)
 1851 - Marie Thérèse of France (b. 1778)
 1856 - William Sprague, American politician (b. 1799)
 1860 - Ang Duong, Cambodian King (b. 1796)
 1889 – King Louis of Portugal (b. 1838)
 1890 – Richard Francis Burton, British explorer (b. 1821)
 1893 - Lucy Stone, American activist (b. 1818)
 1897 - George Pullman, American engineer and businessman (b. 1831)

1901  2000 
 1901 - Carl Frederik Tietgen, Danish financier and industrialist (b. 1829)
 1905 - Virgil Earp, American Western figure (b. 1843)
 1911 - Eugene Burton Ely, American aviator (b. 1886)
 1912 - Julius Maggi, Swiss businessman (b. 1846)
 1918 – Harold Lockwood, American actor (b. 1887)
 1921 - Antonio Joaquim Granjo, Prime Minister of Portugal
 1936 – Lu Xun, Chinese writer (b. 1881)
 1937 – Ernest Rutherford, New Zealand physicist (b. 1871)
 1940 - Umberto Caligaris, Italian footballer (b. 1901)
 1940 - Emilio Comici, Italian climber and cave explorer (b. 1901)
 1943 – Camille Claudel, French sculptor (b. 1864)
 1945 – Plutarco Elias Calles, President of Mexico (b. 1877)
 1950 – Edna St. Vincent Millay, American poet (b. 1892)
 1955 - Carlos Davila, Chilean politician, diplomat and journalist (b. 1887)
 1956 - Isham Jones, American bandleader, saxophonist, bassist and songwriter (b. 1894)
 1964 - Sergey Biryuzov, Marshal of the Soviet Union (b. 1904)
 1969 - Lacey Hearn, American sprinter (b. 1881)
 1970 – Lázaro Cárdenas, President of Mexico (b. 1895)
 1978 - Gig Young, American actor (b. 1913)
 1983 – Maurice Bishop, Prime Minister of Grenada (b. 1944)
 1984 – Jerzy Popieluszko, Polish priest, supported the Solidarity movement (b. 1947)
 1986 – Samora Machel, President of Mozambique (b. 1933)
 1987 – Jacqueline du Pré, British cellist (b. 1945)
 1994 - Martha Raye, American actress (b. 1916)
 1995 – Don Cherry, American jazz trumpeter (b. 1936)
 1997 - Glen Buxton, American guitarist (b. 1947)
 1999 - Nathalie Sarraute, French novelist (b. 1900)

From 2001 
 2002 - Nikolay Rukavishnikov, Russian physicist and cosmonaut (b. 1932)
 2003 – Alija Izetbegovic, President of Bosnia and Herzegovina (b. 1925)
 2003 – Road Warrior Hawk, American professional wrestler (b. 1957)
 2005 - Ryan Dallas Cook, American trombonist (Suburban Legends) (b. 1982)
 2008 - Gianni Raimondi, Italian tenor (b. 1923)
 2009 – Joseph Wiseman, Canadian actor (b. 1918)
 2009 - Howard Unruh, American murderer (b. 1921)
 2010 – Tom Bosley, American actor (b. 1927)
 2012 - Fiorenzo Magni, Italian cyclist (b. 1920)
 2014 - Lynda Bellingham, Canadian-English actress (b. 1948)
 2014 - Etienne Mourrut, French politician (b. 1939)
 2014 - John Holt, Jamaican singer (b. 1947)
 2014 - Gloria Casarez, American civil rights activist (b. 1971)
 2014 - Stephen Paulus, American composer (b. 1949)
 2014 - Raphael Ravenscroft, British saxophonist (b. 1954)
 2015 - Ali Treki, Libyan diplomat (b. 1938)
 2016 - Yvette Chauviré, French ballerina (b. 1917)
 2017 - Umberto Lenzi, Italian film director (b. 1931)
 2018 - Takanobu Hozumi, Japanese actor (b. 1931)
 2018 - Osamu Shimomura, Japanese biochemist, Nobel Prize for Chemistry winner (b. 1928)
 2018 - Diana Sowle, American actress (b. 1930)
 2019 - Erhard Eppler, German politician (b. 1926)
 2019 - Salvador Giner, Spanish sociologist (b. 1934)
 2019 - Ishmael Levenston, Saban politician (b. 1940)
 2019 - Joseph Lombardo, American mafioso (b. 1929)
 2019 - Alexander Volkov, Russian tennis player (b. 1967)

Observances 
 Constitution Day (Niue)
 Mother Teresa Day (Albania)

Days of the year