September 23

Events
Up to 1900
1338 Hundred Years' War: The Battle of Arnemuiden is fought, as the first naval battle.
1409 Battle of Kherlen: Second significant victory by the Mongols over Ming Dynasty China since 1368.
1459 Battle of Blore Heath: First major battle of the English Wars of the Roses.
1568 Spanish naval forces rout and English fleet under command of John Hawkins, at the Battle of San Juan de Ulua near Veracruz.
1641 The Merchant Royal, carrying treasure worth over a billion US Dollars, is lost at sea off Land's End, Cornwall.
1805 Napoleonic Wars: After the Austrians march into Bavaria, France declares war on Prussia.
1806 The Lewis and Clark expedition ends with the return to St. Louis, Missouri.
1821 Tripolitsa, Greece, falls and 30,000 Turks are massacred during the Greek War of Independence.
1845 Knickerbockers Baseball Club is founded in New York City. It is the first baseball team to play under modern rules.
1846 The planet Neptune is officially discovered.
1868 Grito de Lares, "Lares Revolt", occurs in Puerto Rico against Spanish rule.
1875 Billy the Kid is arrested for the first time, for stealing clothes from a laundryman.
1889 Nintendo Koppai, later the Nintendo Company, is founded in Japan by Fusajiro Yamauchi.
1901 2000
1905 Norway and Sweden sign the "Karlstad Treaty", peacefully ending their union.
1908 The University of Alberta is founded.
1909 The Phantom of the Opera, a novel by Gaston Leroux, is published as a series in the Le Gaulois newspaper.
1910 French-Peruvian pilot Geo Chavez becomes the first person to fly a plane across the Alps.
1913 Roland Garros becomes the first person to fly a plane across the Mediterranean Sea, doing so from San Raphael, France to Bizerte, Tunisia.
1932 The Kingdom of Hejaz and Nejd is renamed Saudi Arabia.
1938 Mobilisation of the Czech army in response to the Munich Crisis.
1939 Psychologist and key figure in Psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud dies at the age of 83.
1941 Holocaust: The first gas chamber experiments take place at Auschwitz.
1943 The Nazi puppet state of the Italian Social Republic is founded.
1959 Iowa farmer and corn breeder Roswell Garst hosts Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev.
1965 Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 ends.
1972 Ferdinand Marcos announces the implementation of martial law over TV and radio in the Philippines.
1973 Chilean poet Pablo Neruda dies, 12 days after the coup that brought Augusto Pinochet to power in Chile.
1973 Juan Peron retakes power in Argentina, but dies just over 9 months later.
1980 Bob Marley plays in his last live performance, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
1983 Saint Kitts and Nevis joins the UN.
1983 Gerrie Coetzee becomes the first African heavyweight boxing World champion.
1983 Gulf Air Flight 771 is bombed, killing all 117 people on board.
1989 Azerbaijan declares its sovereignty from the Soviet Union.
1993 The 2000 Summer Olympics are awarded to Sydney, Australia.
1999 NASA announces it has lost contact with the Mars Climate Orbiter.
From 2001
2002 The first public version of the web browser Mozilla Firefox (Phoenix 0.1) is released.
2004 Hurricane Jeanne reportedly kills 1,070 people in Haiti.
2008 The Kauhajoki Shooting occurs in Finland, as 10 people are shot dead. The gunman, Matti Saari, later turns the gun on himself.
2009 Major dust storms affect Eastern Australia, as people in Sydney wake up to find their city shrouded in red dust.
2017 New Zealand general election: The centre-right New Zealand National Party under Prime Minister Bill English becomes the largest party for the 4th term in-a-row. The New Zealand Labour Party under Jacinda Ardern performs a lot better than in the previous election.
2017 Iran announces a weapon-test, only a few days after a speech by US President Donald Trump in which he strongly criticised the country.
2019 British travel company Thomas Cook collapses.
2019 Russia joins the Paris Climate Agreement.
2019 Climate change activist Greta Thunberg speaks at a United Nations Climate summit.
Births
Up to 1800
480 BC Euripides, Greek playwright (d. 406 BC)
63 BC Augustus Caesar, Roman Emperor (d. 14)
1158 Geoffrey II, Duke of Brittany (d. 1186)
1161 Emperor Takamura of Japan (d. 1181)
1215 Kublai Khan, Mongol ruler (d. 1294)
1392 Filippo Maria Visconti, Italian regent (d. 1447)
1434 Yolande of Valois (d. 1478)
1495 Bagrat III of Imereti, King of Imereti in Georgia (d. 1565)
1598 Eleonore Gonzaga, wife of Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1655)
1642 Giovanni Maria Bononcini, Italian violinist and composer (d. 1678)
1647 Joseph Dudley, American statesman (d. 1720)
1713 King Ferdinand VI of Spain (d. 1759)
1740 Empress Go-Sakuramachi of Japan (d. 1813)
1759 Clothilde of France (d. 1802)
1771 Emperor Kokaku of Japan (d. 1840)
1778 Mariano Moreno, Argentine lawyer, journalist and politician (d. 1811)
1781 Princess Juliane of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld (d. 1860)
1783 Peter von Cornelius, German painter (d. 1867)
1791 Johann Franz Encke, German astronomer (d. 1865)
1801 1900
1819 Hippolyte Fizeau, French physicist (d. 1896)
1823 John Colton, English-Australian politician, Premier of South Australia (d. 1902)
1834 Aleksey Suvorin, Russian publisher, dramatist and theatre critic (d. 1912)
1838 Victoria Woodhull, American Women's rights activist (d. 1927)
1850 Alfred Boucher, French sculptor (d. 1934)
1852 William Stewart Halsted, American surgeon (d. 1922)
1853 Princess Marie Elisabeth of Saxe-Meiningen (d. 1923)
1853 Konstantin Stoilov, Prime Minister of Bulgaria (d. 1901)
1861 Robert Bosch, German industrialist, engineer and inventor (d. 1942)
1863 Mary Church Terrell, American author and activist (d. 1954)
1864 Draga Masin, Queen Consort of Serbia (d. 1903)
1865 Emma Orczy, British novelist (d. 1947)
1865 Suzanne Valadon, French painter (d. 1938).
1876 Moshe Zvi Segal, Israeli scholar (d. 1968)
1880 John Boyd Orr, 1st Baron Boyd-Orr, Scottish physician (d. 1971)
1883 Grigory Zinoviev, Soviet politician (d. 1936)
1884 Eugene Talmadge, American politician, Governor of Georgia (d. 1946)
1889 Walter Lippmann, American journalist (d. 1974)
1890 Friedrich Paulus, German general (d. 1957)
1892 Georgi Damyanov, Bulgarian politician (d. 1958)
1893 Aleksei Losev, Russian philosopher and philologist (d. 1988)
1895 Miron Merzhanov, Soviet architect (d. 1975)
1897 Walter Pidgeon, Canadian actor (d. 1984)
1899 Tom C. Clark, 59th Attorney General of the United States (d. 1977)
1900 Bill Stone, British World War I veteran (d. 2009)
1901 1950
1901 Jaroslav Seifert, Czech writer (d. 1986)
1902 Ion Gheorghe Maurer, Romanian jurist and Communist politician (d. 2000)
1902 Su Buqing, Chinese mathematician and academic (d. 2003)
1905 Tiny Bradshaw, American bandleader and musician (d. 1958)
1906 Charles Ritchie, Canadian diplomat (d. 1995)
1907 Albert Ammons, American pianist (d. 1949)
1907 Duarte Nuno, Duke of Braganza, Portuguese royal (d. 1976)
1907 Jarmila Novotna, Czech soprano and actress (d. 1994)
1908 Ramdhari Singh Dinkar, Indian Hindi poet (d. 1974)
1911 Frank Moss, American politician (d. 2003)
1912 Ghulam Mustafa Khan, Pakistani critic and linguist (d. 2005)
1913 Tokutaro Ukon, Japanese footballer (d. 1944)
1913 Carl-Henning Pedersen, Danish painter (d. 2007)
1914 Omar Ali Saifuddin III, Sultan of Brunei (d. 1986)
1915 Sergio Bertoni, Italian footballer (d. 1995)
1915 Clifford Shull, American physicist (d. 2001)
1916 Aldo Moro, Italian politician (d. 1978)
1917 Asima Chatterjee, Indian organic chemist (d. 2006)
1917 Santo, Mexican masked professional wrestler and actor (d. 1984)
1917 Imre Nemeth, Hungarian hammer thrower (d. 1989)
1918 Salvatore Pappalardo, Italian cardinal (d. 2006)
1920 Alexander Arutunian, Armenian composer (d. 2012)
1920 Mickey Rooney, American actor (d. 2014)
1920 Ovadia Yosef, Israeli rabbi (d. 2013)
1922 Louise Latham, American actress (d. 2018)
1923 Basil Feldman, Baron Feldman, British politician and businessman (d. 2019)
1923 Mohamed Hassanein Heikal, Egyptian journalist (d. 2016)
1923 Margaret Pellegrini, American actress (d. 2013)
1924 Pedro Joaquin Chamorro Cardenal, Nicaraguan editor and journalist (d. 1978)
1924 Jean Piat, French actor (d. 2018)
1925 Angelo Acerbi, Italian Roman Catholic archbishop
1925 George J. Laurer, American inventor
1926 John Coltrane, American jazz musician (d. 1967)
1926 Andre Cassagnes, French toymaker (d. 2013)
1927 Mighty Joe Young, American blues guitarist, singer and songwriter (d. 1999)
1928 Hollie Pihl, American judge (d. 2018)
1930 Ray Charles, American musician (d. 2004)
1930 Colin Blakely, British actor (d. 1987)
1930 Albert Manent, Spanish writer (d. 2014)
1934 Franc Rode, Slovenian cardinal
1934 Ahmad Shah Khan, Crown Prince of Afghanistan
1934 Per-Olov Enquist, Swedish author
1936 Valentin Paniagua, former President of Peru (d. 2006)
1937 Martin Litchfield West, British philologist (d. 2015)
1938 Romy Schneider, German-born actress (d. 1982)
1939 Roy Buchanan, American guitarist (d. 1988)
1939 Henry Blofeld, English cricket journalist
1940 Tim Rose, American-born English musician (d. 2002)
1940 Michel Temer, President and 25th Vice president of Brazil
1940 Mohammad-Reza Shajarian, Iranian musician and songwriter
1941 Norma Winstone, English singer and lyricist
1941 Luis Durnwalder, Italian politician
1942 Sila Maria Calderon, 7th Governor of Puerto Rico
1943 Julio Iglesias, Spanish singer
1943 Tanuja, Indian actress
1943 Lino Oviedo, Paraguayan general and politician (d. 2013)
1945 Igor Ivanov, Russian politician
1945 Ron Bushy, American drummer (Iron Butterfly)
1946 Bernard Maris, French economist, writer and journalist (d. 2015)
1947 Jerzy Popieluszko, Polish priest (d. 1984)
1947 Mary Kay Place, American actress and singer
1949 Bruce Springsteen, American singer-songwriter and musician
1949 Floella Benjamin, British actress, author, television presenter and politician
1950 Dietmar Lorenz, German judoka
1951 1975
1952 Mark Bego, American author
1953 Nicholas Witchell, English journalist
1954 Cherie Blair, English lawyer, wife of Tony Blair
1956 Paolo Rossi, Italian footballer
1956 Andoni Goikoetxea, Basque-Spanish footballer
1957 Emilia Contessa, Indonesian actress and singer
1957 Rosalind Chow, American actress
1957 Fergus Ewing, Scottish footballer
1958 Larry Mize, golfer
1959 Fernando Romay, Spanish basketball player
1959 Jason Alexander, American actor, director and producer
1959 Elizabeth Pena, American actress (d. 2014)
1961 William McCool, American astronaut (d. 2003)
1962 Deborah Orr, Scottish journalist
1963 Alex Proyas, Australian director and producer
1964 Clayton Blackmore, Welsh footballer
1964 Larry Krystkowiak, American basketball player
1965 Aleqa Hammond, former Prime Minister of Greenland
1967 Masashi Nakayama, Japanese footballer
1968 Yvette Fielding, British actress and producer
1968 Adam Price, Welsh politician
1968 Erik Weihenmayer, American athlete, adventurer and author
1970 Lucia Ciffarelli, American singer-songwriter and pianist
1970 Ani DiFranco, American singer
1971 Sean Spicer, former White House Press Secretary
1972 Karl Pilkington, English radio personality
1973 Jermaine Dupri, American hip hop musician
1973 Toshihiro Hattori, Japanese footballer
1973 Artim Sakiri, Macedonian footballer
1974 Matt Hardy, American professional wrestler
1975 Chris Hawkins, English journalist
From 1976
1976 Homaro Cantu, American chef and inventor (d. 2015)
1977 Rachael Yamagata, American singer
1977 Suzanne Tamim, Lebanese singer (d. 2008)
1979 Ricky Davis, American basketball player
1979 Fabio Simplicio, Brazilian footballer
1981 Natalie Horler, German singer (Cascada)
1981 Helen Richardson-Walsh, English field hockey player
1983 Leinier Dominguez, Cuban chess player
1984 Anneliese van der Pol, Dutch-American actress
1984 Kate French, American actress
1985 Hossein Kaebi, Iranian footballer
1986 Maki Goto, Japanese singer-songwriter and actress
1986 Martin Cranie, English footballer
1986 Gina-Lisa Lohfink, German model and television personality
1987 Skylar Astin, American actor and singer
1987 Yu Kobayashi, Japanese footballer
1988 Juan Martin del Potro, Argentine tennis player
1988 Shannon Chan-Kent, Canadian actress and singer
1989 Brandon Jennings, American basketball player
1991 Lee Alexander, Scottish footballer
1991 Key, South Korean singer and actor
1991 Melanie Oudin, American tennis player
1992 Finn Russell, Scottish rugby union player
1994 Yerry Mina, Colombian footballer
1996 Lee Hi, South Korean singer
Deaths
Up to 1900
76 Pope Linus
1241 Snorri Sturluson, Icelandic historian and poet (b. 1179)
1386 Dan I of Wallachia (b. 1354)
1390 John I, Duke of Lorraine (b. 1346)
1535 Catherine of Saxe-Lauenberg (b. 1513)
1657 Joachim Jung, German philosopher and mathematician (b. 1587)
1738 Herman Boerhaeve, Dutch humanist and physician (b. 1668)
1773 Johan Ernst Gunnerus, Norwegian bishop and naturalist (b. 1718)
1789 John Rogers, American Congressman (b. 1723)
1816 Alessandro Verri, Italian writer (b. 1741)
1830 Elizabeth Monroe, First Lady of the United States (b. 1768)
1835 Vincenzo Bellini, Italian composer (b. 1801)
1836 Maria Malibran, French mezzo soprano (b. 1808)
1844 Alexander von Benckendorff, Russian general and statesman (b. 1783)
1850 Jose Artigas, Uruguayan national hero (b. 1764)
1870 Prosper Merimee, French writer (b. 1803)
1877 Urbain Le Verrier, French mathematician (b. 1811)
1882 Friedrich Wohler, German chemist (b. 1800)
1889 Wilkie Collins, English author and playwright (b. 1824)
1896 Ivar Aasen, Norwegian poet and linguist (b. 1813)
1901 2000
1917 Werner Voss, German World War I pilot (b. 1897)
1929 Richard Adolf Zsigmondy, Austrian chemist (b. 1865)
1939 Sigmund Freud, Austrian psychologist (b. 1856)
1943 Salvo D'Acquisto, Italian military officer (b. 1920)
1943 Ernst Trygger, Swedish politician (b. 1857)
1944 Jakob Schaffner, Swiss author (b. 1875)
1950 Sam Barry, American basketball player and coach (b. 1892)
1968 Padre Pio, Italian priest (b. 1887)
1970 Bourvil, French actor (b. 1917)
1971 Billy Gilbert, American actor (b. 1894)
1971 James Waddell Alexander II, American mathematician (b. 1888)
1973 Pablo Neruda, Chilean poet (b. 1904)
1973 A. S. Neill, Scottish educator (b. 1883)
1974 Cliff Arquette, American actor (b. 1905)
1987 Bob Fosse, American choreographer (b. 1927)
1988 Tibor Sekelj, Yugoslavian explorer (b. 1912)
1992 James Van Fleet, American general (b. 1892)
1994 Jerry Barber, American golfer (b. 1916)
1994 Robert Bloch, American writer (b. 1917)
1994 Madeleine Renaud, French actress (b. 1900)
1998 Ray Bowden, English footballer (b. 1909)
1999 Ivan Goff, Australian-American screenwriter and producer (b. 1910)
From 2001
2003 Shawn Lane, American musician (b. 1963)
2006 Malcolm Arnold, British composer (b. 1921)
2006 Etta Baker, American blues guitarist and singer (b. 1913)
2006 Tim Rooney, American actor (b. 1947)
2009 Ertugrul Osman, head of the Ottoman dynasty (b. 1912)
2012 Corrie Sanders, South African boxer (b. 1966)
2012 Pavel Grachev, Russian general (b. 1948)
2013 Vlatko Markovic, Croatian footballer (b. 1937)
2014 Al Suomi, American ice hockey player (b. 1913)
2014 Gilles Latulippe, Canadian comedian, actor and theatre manager (b. 1937)
2014 Henryk Glucklich, Polish speedway rider (b. 1945)
2015 Mike Gibson, Australian sports journalist and broadcaster (b. 1940)
2015 Dragan Holcer, Croatian footballer (b. 1945)
2015 Denis Sonet, French priest (b. 1926)
2017 Charles Bradley, American singer (b. 1948)
2017 Elizabeth D. Phillips, American educator and academic administrator (b. 1945)
2017 Samuel H. Young, American politician (b. 1922)
2018 Charles K. Kao, Chinese-born electrical engineer (b. 1933)
2018 Gary Kurtz, American film producer (b. 1940)
2019 Al Alvarez, English poet and writer (b. 1929)
2019 Madhav Apte, Indian cricketer (b. 1932)
2019 Elaine Feinstein, English poet and novelist (b. 1930)
2019 Robert Hunter, American songwriter, poet and guitarist (b. 1941)
2019 Curt Wittlin, Swiss philologist (b. 1941)
Observances
Feast of Saint Pio
Celebrate Bisexuality Day
National holiday of Saudi Arabia
September Equinox in some years (Autumn in the Northern Hemisphere, and Spring in the Southern Hemisphere)
Days of the year