February 18



Events

Up to 1900 
 1229 - Sixth Crusade: Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor signs a ten-year truce with al-Kamil, regaining Jerusalem, Nazareth and Bethlehem, with neither military engagement nor support from the Pope.
 1268 – The Livonian Brothers of the Sword are defeated by Dovmont of Pskov in the Battle of Rakvere.
 1332 - Amda Seyon I of Ethiopia begins his campaigns in the southern Muslim provinces.
 1478 – George Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Clarence is executed in the Tower of London after being convicted of treason against his older brother, King Edward IV of England.
 1637 - Eighty Years' War: Off Cornwall, a Spanish fleet intercepts a very important Anglo-Dutch merchant convoy of 44 vessels escorted by 6 warships, destroying or capturing 20 of them.
 1745 - Surakarta, Central Java, is founded.
 1766 - A mutiny by captive Malagasy begins at sea on the slave ship Meermin, leading to the ship's destruction on Cape Agulhas in present-day South Africa and recapture of the instigators.
 1791 - United States Congress passes a law making Vermont a state from March 4.
 1814 - Napoleonic Wars: Battle of Montereau.
 1861 – Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy assumes the title of King of Italy.
 1861 – In Montgomery, Alabama, Jefferson Davis is inaugurated as provisional President of the Confederate States of America.
 1865 - American Civil War: Union forces under General William Tecumseh Sherman set the South Carolina State House on fire during the burning of Columbia, South Carolina.
 1873 – Bulgarian revolutionary Vasil Levski is executed by hanging in Sofia by the Ottoman authorities.
 1885 - The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain, is published.
 1900 – Second Boer War: British forces suffer their worst single-day loss of life of the war on the first day of the Battle of Paardeberg.

1901  2000 
 1906 - Edouard de Laveleye forms the Belgian Olympic Committee.
 1910 – The future-World Governing body for the sport of Skiing is founded in Kristiania, present-day Oslo, in Norway.
 1911 - The first airmail flight takes place in what is then British India.
 1913 - Pedro Lascurain becomes President of Mexico for 45 minutes. This is the shortest time that a President has ever served in office.
 1930 – From photographs taken in January, Clyde Tombaugh discovers the dwarf planet Pluto.
 1932 – The Empire of Japan declares Manzhougou (Manchuria) independent of the Republic of China.
 1942 - World War II: The Imperial Japanese Army begins the systematic extermination of people in the Chinese community in Singapore that it sees as hostile to its regime.
 1943 – Members of the White Rose Resistance Movement are arrested by the Nazis.
 1946 - Sailors of the Royal Indian Navy mutiny in Bombay. This action later spreads throughout India.
 1947 - First Indochina War: The French gain complete control of Hanoi after forcing the Viet Minh to withdraw to the mountains.
 1952 – Greece and Turkey join NATO.
 1954 – The first Church of Scientology is established in Los Angeles, California.
 1957 – Kenyan rebel leader Dedan Kimathi is executed by the British colonial government.
 1960 – The Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley, California, begin.
 1963 – The eruption of the Agung volcano on Bali kills around 1,500 people.
 1965 – The Gambia becomes independent from the United Kingdom.
 1969 - Hawthorne Nevada Airlines Flight 708 crashes into Mount Whitney, California, killing all on board.
 1977 – The Space Shuttle Enterprise makes its first flight, on a Boeing 747.
 1978 – The first Ironman triathlon takes place on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. It is won by Gordon Haller.
 1979 – Snow falls in the Sahara desert of southern Algeria for the only time in recorded history.
 1983 – 13 people die in the Wah Mee massacre in Seattle. It is believed to be the worst robbery-motivated killing in US history.
 1985 - NBA player Larry Bird barely misses a quadruple-double in a game against the Utah Jazz.  He sits out the entire fourth quarter.
 1988 – Anthony Kennedy becomes a member of the Supreme Court of the United States.
 1991 - The IRA detonates bombs at London's Paddington and Victoria Stations.
 2000 - Stjepan Mesic becomes President of Croatia.

From 2001 
 2001 - Inter-ethnic violence begins in Sampit, Indonesia, between Dayaks and Madurese.
 2001 – Dale Earnhardt dies in a crash on the last lap of the last turn on the Daytona 500.
 2001 – FBI agent Robert Hanssen is arrested for spying for the Soviet Union.
 2003 – Nearly 200 people die in the Daegu subway fire in South Korea.
 2004 – Up to 295 people, including around 200 rescue workers, are killed in Iran, when a freight train carrying sulfur, petrol and fertiliser catches fire and explodes.
 2005 – A ban on Fox Hunting in the United Kingdom enters effect.
 2007 – Terrorist bombings occur on the Samjhauta Express in Panipat, Haryana, India, killing 68 people.
 2010 – A coup takes place in Niamey, Niger. President Mamadou Tandja is replaced by a ruling junta, the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy.
 2014 - At least 76 people are killed and hundreds are injured in clashes between riot police and demonstrators in Kyiv, Ukraine, during the Euromaidan protests.

Births

Up to 1800 
 1372 - Iban Hajar al-Asqalani, Egyptian jurist and scholar (d. 1448) 
 1374 – Saint Jadwiga of Poland, Queen of Poland (d. 1399)
 1404 – Leon Battista Alberti, Italian painter and philosopher (d. 1472)
 1486 - Chaitanya Mahaprabha, Indian saint (d. 1534)
 1516 – Queen Mary I of England (d. 1558)
 1530 - Uesugi Kenshin, Japanese daimyo (d. 1578)
 1543 - Charles III, Duke of Burgundy (d. 1608)
 1609 - Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon, English statesman and historian (d. 1674)
 1632 - Giovanni Battista Vitali, Italian composer and violinist (d. 1692)
 1635 - Johan Goransson Gyllenstierna, Swedish statesman (d. 1680)
 1642 - Marie Champnesle, French actress (d. 1698)
 1677 - Jacques Cassini, French astronomer (d. 1756)
 1732 – Johann Christian Kittel, German organist, composer and teacher (d. 1809)
 1745 – Alessandro Volta, Italian physicist (d. 1827)

1801  1900 
 1814 - Samuel Fenton Cary, American lawyer and politician (d. 1900)
 1817 – Lewis A. Armistead, American Confederate General (d. 1863)
 1818 – Pedro Figueredo, Cuban poet, musician and revolutionary (d. 1870)
 1832 - Octave Chanute, French-American civil engineer and aviation pioneer (d. 1910)
 1836 - Sri Ramakrishna, Indian Bengali Guru (d. 1886)
 1838 – Ernst Mach, Austrian physicist (d. 1916)
 1846 – Wilson Barrett, English playwright (d. 1904)
 1848 – Louis Comfort Tiffany, American glass artist (d. 1933)
 1849 – Alexander Kielland, Norwegian writer (d. 1906)
 1850 - George Henschel, German-British baritone, conductor and composer (d. 1934)
 1854 - Herbert Gladstone, British politician (d. 1930)
 1855 - Jean Jules Jusserand, French author and diplomat (d. 1932)
 1857 - Max Klinger, German sculptor and painter (d. 1920)
 1858 – Princess Louise Marie of Belgium (d. 1924)
 1860 – Anders Zorn, Swedish painter (d. 1920)
 1875 - Wilhelm Külz, German politician (d. 1948)
 1878 - Harriet Bosse, Swedish-Norwegian actress (d. 1961)
 1883 - Nikos Kazantzakis, Greek writer (d. 1957)
 1885 - Henri Laurens, French sculptor and illustrator (d. 1954)
 1890 - Edward Arnold, American actor (d. 1956)
 1890 - Adolphe Menjou, American actor (d. 1963)
 1892 – Wendell Wilkie, American politician (d. 1944)
 1896 - André Breton, French writer (d. 1966)
 1897 – Charles Kuentz, German-born French World War I veteran (d. 2005)
 1898 – Enzo Ferrari, Italian founder of Ferrari (d. 1988)
 1898 – Luis Muñoz Marin, 1st Governor of Puerto Rico (d. 1980)
 1899 - Arthur Bryant, British historian (d. 1985)

1901  1950 
 1901 - Reginald Sheffield, British actor (d. 1957)
 1902 - Walter Herbert, German-born conductor and impresario (d. 1975)
 1903 – Nikolai Podgorny, Soviet politician (d. 1983)
 1906 – Hans Asperger, Austrian physician, after whom Asperger syndrome is named (d. 1980)
 1912 - Heinz Kühn, German politician (d. 1992)
 1914 - Pee Wee King, American singer-songwriter (d. 2000)
 1915 - Phyllis Calvert, English actress (d. 2002)
 1916 - Jean Drapeau, 37th Mayor of Montreal (d. 1999)
 1919 - Amir Abbas Hoveyda, Prime Minister of Iran (d. 1979)
 1919 – Jack Palance, American actor (d. 2006)
 1920 – Bill Cullen, American game show host (d. 1990)
 1920 – Eddie Slovik, American soldier (d. 1945)
 1922 - Helen Gurley Brown, American publisher (d. 2012)
 1922 - Joe Tipton, American baseball player (d. 1994)
 1922 - Eric Gairy, 1st Prime Minister of Grenada (d. 1997)
 1925 - Marcel Barbeau, Canadian painter and sculptor (d. 2016)
 1925 - George Kennedy, American actor (d. 2016)
 1927 - Richard A. Snelling, two-time Governor of Vermont (d. 1991)
 1927 - John Warner, American politician (d. 2021)
 1929 - Len Deighton, English author
 1929 - Ertem Egilmez, Turkish movie director, producer and screenwriter (d. 1989)
 1931 – Toni Morrison, American writer, Nobel Prize winner
 1931 - Bob St. Clair, American football player (d. 2015)
 1932 – Milos Forman, Czech movie director
 1933 – Yoko Ono, Japanese singer and performance artist
 1933 – Bobby Robson, English footballer and manager (d. 2009)
 1933 - Mary Ure, Scottish actress (d. 1975)
 1934 - Paco Rabanne, Spanish fashion designer
 1936 - Ab McDonald, Canadian ice hockey player
 1938 – Sadanoyama Shinmatsu, Japanese sumo wrestler
 1938 – Istvan Szabo, Hungarian movie director
 1939 - Marek Janowski, Polish-born conductor
 1940 - Prue Leith, South African-English chef and author
 1943 - Graeme Garden, Scottish writer, actor and comedian
 1944 - Pat Bowlen, American owner of the Denver Broncos football team
 1945 - Judy Rankin, American golfer
 1946 – Michael Buerk, British newsreader
 1946 – Jean-Claude Dreyfus, French actor
 1947 – Princess Christina of the Netherlands
 1947 - Dennis DeYoung, American musician
 1947 - Carlos Lopes, Portuguese athlete
 1948 – Sinead Cusack, Irish actress
 1949 – Gary Ridgway, American serial killer
 1950 - Cristina Ferrare, American model, actress, author and host
 1950 - Cybill Shepherd, American actress
 1950 – John Hughes, American movie director (d. 2009)

1951  1975 
 1951 - Komal, last Queen of Nepal
 1951 - Isabel Preysler, Filipino-Spanish journalist
 1952 - Randy Crawford, American singer
 1954 – John Travolta, American actor
 1956 – Rüdiger Abramczik, German footballer and manager
 1956 - Bidzina Ivanishvili, Georgian politician and businessman
 1957 
 Marita Koch, German athlete
 Bruce Rauner, American politician, 42nd Governor of Illinois
 Christiane Torloni, Brazilian actress
 Vanna White, American actress/game show model (Wheel of Fortune)
 1958 - Lucie Visser, Dutch actress and model
 1958 - Gar Samuelson, American drummer (d. 1999)
 1959 – Hallgrimur Helgason, Icelandic artist and writer
 1960 - Greta Scacchi, Australian actress
 1960 - Tony Anselmo, American animator
 1961 - Hironobu Kageyama, Japanese singer
 1961 - Alison Owen, British movie producer
 1963 – Anders Frisk, Swedish football referee
 1964 – Matt Dillon, American actor
 1964 - Paul Hanley, British musician
 1965 – Dr. Dre, American record producer and rapper
 1967 – Roberto Baggio, Italian footballer
 1967 – Colin Jackson, Welsh athlete
 1968 - Molly Ringwald, American actress
 1969 - Alexander Mogilny, Russian ice hockey player
 1969 - Jason Sutter, American drummer
 1970 - Susan Egan, American actress
 1970 - Raine Maida, Canadian singer-songwriter
 1971 - Merritt Gant, American guitarist
 1971 - Constnatin Popa, Romanian-Israeli basketball player
 1971 - Thomas Bjorn, Danish golfer
 1972 - Fabian Picardo, 7th Chief Minister of Gibraltar
 1973 – Claude Makélélé, French footballer
 1973 - Shawn Estes, American baseball player
 1974 – Yevgeny Kafelnikov, Russian tennis player
 1975 – Keith Gillespie, Irish footballer
 1975 – Gary Neville, English footballer
 1975 - Thora Arnorsdottir, Icelandic television presenter and former Presidential candidate

From 1976 
 1977 – Chrissie Wellington, English tri-athlete
 1978 – Josip Simunic, Croatian footballer
 1980 - Nikolai Antropov, Kazakhstani ice hockey player
 1981 - Andrei Kirilenko, Russian basketball player
 1981 - Ivan Sproule, Irish footballer
 1982 - Courtney Act, Australian drag queen, singer and entertainer
 1982 - Kaspars Cipruss, Latvian basketball player
 1983 - Roberta Vinci, Italian tennis player
 1983 – Jermaine Jenas, English footballer
 1984 - Laurent Vidal, French triathlete (d. 2015)
 1985 – Anton Ferdinand, English footballer
 1985 - Jos van der Emden, Dutch cyclist
 1985 - Song Jae-rim, South Korean actor and model
 1985 – Lee Boyd Malvo, Jamaican-American spree killer
 1986 - Vika Jigulina, Romanian singer
 1986 - Marc Torrejon, Spanish footballer
 1988 - Changmin, South Korean singer-songwriter, dancer and actor
 1988 – Maiara Walsh, Brazilian-American actress
 1990 - Park Shin-hye, South Korean actress, dancer, model and singer
 1990 - Kang So-ra, South Korean actress
 1991 - Malese Jow, American actress and singer-songwriter
 1991 – Henry Surtees, English racing driver (d. 2009)
 1992 - Logan Miller, American actor
 1995 - Samantha Crawford, American tennis player

Deaths

Up to 1900 
 814 - Anglibert, Frankish monk and diplomat (b. 760)
 901 - Thabit ibn Qurra, Iraqi physician, astronomer and mathematician (b. 826)
 999 – Pope Gregory V (b. 972)
 1139 - Prince Yaropolk II of Kiev (b. 1082)
 1294 – Kublai Khan, Mongol ruler (b. 1215)
 1379 - Albert II of Mecklenburg (b. 1318)
 1405 – Tamerlane, Mongol ruler (b. 1336)
 1455 – Fra Angelico, Italian artist (b. 1395)
 1478 – George Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Clarence (b. 1449)
 1535 - Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, German magician, astrologer and theologian (b. 1486)
 1546 – Martin Luther, German religious reformer (b. 1483)
 1564 – Michelangelo, Italian artist and sculptor (b. 1475)
 1712 - Louis, duc de Bourgogne, heir to the French throne (b. 1682)
 1743 - Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici, last of the Medicis (b. 1667)
 1772 - Johann Hartwig Ernst, Count of Bernstorff, Danish statesman (b. 1712)
 1780 – Kristijonas Donelaitis, Lithuanian poet (b. 1714)
 1834 - William Wirt, United States Attorney General (b. 1772)
 1851 – Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi, German mathematician (b. 1804)
 1873 – Vasil Levski, Bulgarian revolutionary (b. 1837)
 1890 – Gyula Andrassy, Hungarian politician and statesman (b. 1823)
 1891 - Henry Hastings Sibley, American politician (b. 1811)
 1893 - Serranus Clinton Hastings, American politician (b. 1814)
 1895 - Archduke Albrecht, Duke of Teschen (b. 1817)
 1899 – Sophus Lie, Norwegian mathematician (b. 1842)
 1900 - Clinton L. Merriam, American politician (b. 1824)

1901  2000 
 1902 – Charles Lewis Tiffany, founder of Tiffany and Co. (b. 1812)
 1906 - John Batterson Stetson, American businessman (b. 1830)
 1910 - Lucy Stanton, American abolitionist (b. 1831)
 1911 - Billy Murdoch, Australian cricketer (b. 1854)
 1915 - Harry Ward Leonard, American engineer and inventor (b. 1861)
 1931 - Frank C. Emerson, Governor of Wyoming (b. 1882)
 1932 - Frederick Augustus III of Saxony (b. 1865)
 1933 - James J. Corbett, American boxer (b. 1866)
 1937 - Lamartine Griffin Hardman, American politician, Governor of Georgia (b. 1856)
 1937 - Grigory Ordzhonikidze, Soviet politician (b. 1886)
 1945 - Ivan Chernyakhovsky, Russian general (b. 1906)
 1949 - Nicolas Alcala-Zamora, Spanish politician (b. 1877)
 1956 - Gustave Charpentier, French composer (b. 1860)
 1957 – Dedan Kimathi, Kenyan rebel leader (b. 1920)
 1957 - Henry Norris Russell, American astronomer (b. 1877)
 1964 - Joseph-Armand Bombardier, Canadian inventor and industrialist (b. 1907)
 1966 - Robert Rossen, American screenwriter, movie director and producer (b. 1908)
 1967 – Dragisa Cvetkovic, Prime Minister of Yugoslavia (b. 1893)
 1967 – J. Robert Oppenheimer, American physicist (b. 1904)
 1969 - Dragisa Cvetkovic, 17th Prime Minister of Yugoslavia (b. 1893)
 1973 - Frank Costello, Italian-American mob boss (b. 1891)
 1977 - Andy Devine, American actor (b. 1905)
 1978 - Maggie McNamara, American actress (b. 1928)
 1981 – John Knudsen Northrop, American aircraft manufacturer (b. 1895)
 1982 - Ngaio Marsh, New Zealand author (b. 1895)
 1993 - Jacqueline Hill, British actress (b. 1929)
 1995 - Bob Stinson, American guitarist (b. 1959)

From 2001 
 2001 – Dale Earnhardt, American racing driver (b. 1951)
 2001 – Balthus, Polish-French painter (b. 1908)
 2003 – Isser Harel, Israeli Mossad leader (b. 1912)
 2004 – Jean Rouch, French movie maker and ethnologist (b. 1917)
 2008 – Alain Robbe-Grillet, French writer and movie maker (b. 1922)
 2009 – Kamila Skolimowska, Polish hammer thrower (b. 1982)
 2009 – At-Tayyib Salih, Sudanese writer (b. 1929)
 2010 – John Babcock, Canadian World War I veteran (b. 1900)
 2010 – Ariel Ramirez, Argentine composer (b. 1921)
 2012 – Roald Aas, Norwegian speed skater and cyclist (b. 1928)
 2012 – George Brizan, Grenadian politician (b. 1942)
 2013 – Jerry Buss, American businessman and owner of the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team (b. 1933)
 2013 – Elspet Gray, Scottish actress (b. 1928)
 2013 – Otfried Preussler, German writer (b. 1923)
 2014 – Nelson Frazier, Jr., American professional wrestler (b. 1971)
 2014 – Nikhil Baran Sengupta, Indian art director, producer, designer and actor (b. 1943)
 2014 – Malcolm Tierney, British actor (b. 1938)
 2014 – Al Greene, American baseball player (b. 1954)
 2014 – Kristof Goddaert, Belgian cyclist (b. 1986)
 2015 – Cass Ballenger, American politician (b. 1926)
 2015 – Claude Criquielion, Belgian cyclist (b. 1957)
 2015 – Mark Fischer, American lawyer (b. 1950)
 2015 – Jerome Kersey, American basketball player (b. 1962)
 2016 – Abdul Rashid Khan, Indian musician (b. 1907)
 2016 – Pantelis Pantelidis, Greek singer-songwriter (b. 1983)
 2016 – John Reinhardt, American diplomat (b. 1920)
 2017 – Omar Abdel-Rahman, Egyptian terrorist (b. 1938)
 2017 – Ivan Koloff, Canadian professional wrestler (b. 1942)
 2017 – Lawrence F. Snowden, American military officer (b. 1921)
 2017 – Pasquale Squitieri, Italian movie director and screenwriter (b. 1938)
 2017 – Clive Stubblefield, American drummer (b. 1942)
 2017 – Michael Ogio, Governor-General of Papua New Guinea (b. 1942)
 2017 – Norma McCorvey, American activist (b. 1947)
 2017 – Dan Vickerman, Australian rugby player (b. 1979)
 2017 – Richard Schickel, American writer, filmmaker and critic (b. 1933)
 2020 – Sreten Stefanović, Serbian Olympic gymnast (b. 1916)
 2020 – José Bonaparte, Argentine paleontologist (b. 1928)

Observances 
 Independence Day (the Gambia)
 International Asperger's Day

Days of the year