On this day: April 10

Events on April 10

• 1407 Deshin Shekpa, 5th Karmapa Lama visits the Ming dynasty capital at Nanjing and is awarded the title "Great Treasure Prince of Dharma". Wikipedia
• 1545 The settlement of Villa Imperial de Carlos V (now the city of Potosí) in Bolivia is founded after the discovery of huge silver deposits in the area. Wikipedia
• 1710 The Statute of Anne, the first law regulating copyright, comes into force in Great Britain. Wikipedia
• 1724 Bach led the first performance of his cantata Erfreut euch, ihr Herzen, his first cantata composed for Easter in Leipzig. Wikipedia
• 1724 Bach leads the first performance of his cantata Erfreut euch, ihr Herzen, BWV 66, his first cantata composed for Easter in Leipzig. Wikipedia
• 1796 War of the First Coalition: A surprise Austrian attack at the Battle of Voltri marks the beginning of the Italian Campaign, the decisive campaign under Napoleon Bonaparte that will end the war a year later. Wikipedia
• 1809 Napoleonic Wars: The War of the Fifth Coalition begins when forces of the Austrian Empire invade Bavaria. Wikipedia
• 1815 The Mount Tambora volcano begins a three-month-long eruption, lasting until July 15. The eruption ultimately kills 71,000 people and affects Earth's climate for the next two years. Wikipedia
• 1821 Patriarch Gregory V of Constantinople is hanged by the Ottoman government from the main gate of the Patriarchate and his body is thrown into the Bosphorus. Wikipedia
• 1865 American Civil War: A day after his surrender to Union forces, Confederate General Robert E. Lee addresses his troops for the last time. Wikipedia
• 1868 At Arogee in Abyssinia, British and Indian forces defeat an army of Emperor Tewodros II. While 700 Ethiopians are killed and many more injured, only two British/Indian troops die. Wikipedia
• 1872 The first Arbor Day is celebrated in Nebraska. Wikipedia
• 1887 On Easter Sunday, Pope Leo XIII authorizes the establishment of the Catholic University of America. Wikipedia
• 1912 RMS Titanic sets sail from Southampton, UK, on her maiden and only voyage. Wikipedia
• 1925 The Russian city of Tsaritsyn is renamed Stalingrad to honor the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, Soviet Communist Party General Secretary, who had guided the defense of Tsaritsyn during the Russian Civil War in 1920. Wikipedia
• 1941 World War II: The Axis powers establish the Independent State of Croatia. Wikipedia
• 1944 The Holocaust: Slovak Jewish prisoners Rudolf Vrba and Alfréd Wetzler escaped from Auschwitz, later publishing a report that became one of the earliest and most detailed descriptions of the camp's mass killings. Wikipedia
• 1963 One hundred twenty-nine American sailors die when the submarine USS Thresher sinks at sea. Wikipedia
• 1970 In the midst of business disagreements with his bandmates, Paul McCartney announced his departure from the Beatles. Wikipedia
• 1970 Paul McCartney announces that he is leaving The Beatles for personal and professional reasons. Wikipedia
• 1972 Vietnam War: For the first time since November 1967, American B-52 bombers reportedly begin bombing North Vietnam. Wikipedia
• 1972 Tombs containing bamboo slips, among them Sun Tzu's Art of War and Sun Bin's lost military treatise, are discovered by construction workers in Shandong. Wikipedia
• 1973 Invicta International Airlines Flight 435 crashes in a snowstorm on approach to Basel, Switzerland, killing 108 people. Wikipedia
• 1988 The Ojhri Camp explosion kills or injures more than 1,000 people in Rawalpindi and Islamabad, Pakistan. Wikipedia
• 1991 A rare tropical storm develops in the South Atlantic Ocean near Angola, the first to be documented by satellites. Wikipedia
• 2019 Scientists from the Event Horizon Telescope project released the first image of the black hole at the center of the galaxy M87. Wikipedia

Born on April 10

• 401 Theodosius II, Roman emperor (died 450) Wikipedia
• 1512 James V, king of Scotland (died 1542) Wikipedia
• 1583 Hugo Grotius, Dutch philosopher and jurist (died 1645) Wikipedia
• 1755 Samuel Hahnemann, German-French medical doctor and academic (died 1843) Wikipedia
• 1778 William Hazlitt, English essayist and critic (died 1830) Wikipedia
• 1829 William Booth, English minister, founded The Salvation Army (died 1912) Wikipedia
• 1847 Joseph Pulitzer, Hungarian-American journalist, publisher, and politician, founded Pulitzer, Inc. (died 1911) Wikipedia
• 1887 Bernardo Houssay, Argentinian physiologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1971) Wikipedia
• 1917 Robert Burns Woodward, American chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1979) Wikipedia
• 1927 Marshall Warren Nirenberg, American biochemist and geneticist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 2010) Wikipedia
• 1929 Max von Sydow, Swedish-French actor (died 2020) Wikipedia
• 1932 Omar Sharif, Egyptian actor and screenwriter (died 2015) Wikipedia
• 1937 Bella Akhmadulina, Soviet and Russian poet, short story writer, and translator (died 2010) Wikipedia
• 1952 Steven Seagal, American actor, producer, and martial artist Wikipedia
• 1972 Priit Kasesalu, Estonian computer programmer, co-created Skype Wikipedia
• 1973 Roberto Carlos, Brazilian footballer and manager Wikipedia
• 1984 Mandy Moore, American singer-songwriter and actress Wikipedia
• 1986 Vincent Kompany, Belgian footballer and manager Wikipedia
• 1986 Fernando Gago, Argentine footballer and manager Wikipedia
• 1988 Haley Joel Osment, American actor Wikipedia
• 1992 Daisy Ridley, English actress Wikipedia
• 1996 Andreas Christensen, Danish footballer Wikipedia

Died on April 10

• 1282 Ahmad Fanakati, chief minister under Kublai Khan Wikipedia
• 1585 Gregory XIII, pope of the Catholic Church (born 1502) Wikipedia
• 1599 Gabrielle d'Estrées, French mistress of Henry IV of France (born 1571) Wikipedia
• 1813 Joseph-Louis Lagrange, Italian mathematician and astronomer (born 1736) Wikipedia
• 1919 Emiliano Zapata, Mexican general (born 1879) Wikipedia
• 1931 Kahlil Gibran, Lebanese-American poet, painter, and philosopher (born 1883) Wikipedia
• 1954 Auguste Lumière, French director and producer (born 1862) Wikipedia
• 1955 Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, French priest, theologian, and philosopher (born 1881) Wikipedia
• 1966 Evelyn Waugh, English soldier, novelist, journalist and critic (born 1903) Wikipedia
• 1995 Morarji Desai, Indian politician, 4th Prime Minister of India (born 1896) Wikipedia
• 2010 Casualties in the 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash included: Wikipedia
• 2010 Dixie Carter, American actress and singer (born 1939) Wikipedia
• 2013 Robert Edwards, English physiologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1925) Wikipedia
• 2024 O. J. Simpson, American football player, actor, and broadcaster (born 1947) Wikipedia

Holidays and observances

• Christian feast day: Blessed Anthony Neyrot Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Fulbert of Chartres Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: James, Azadanus and Abdicius Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Magdalene of Canossa Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Mikael Agricola (Lutheran) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (Episcopal Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: William of Ockham (Anglicanism) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: William Law (Anglicanism) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: April 10 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Wikipedia
• Day of the Builder (Azerbaijan) Wikipedia
• Feast of the Third Day of the Writing of the Book of the Law (Thelema) Wikipedia
• Siblings Day (International observance) Wikipedia

The events, births, deaths and observances above are from the English Wikipedia article “April 10” and the articles it links to (authors and history), retrieved 2026-10-09 through the Wikimedia “On this day” feed. They are licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0; this selection is shared under the same licence. We picked the 26 events, 22 births and 14 deaths with the widest coverage across Wikipedia's language editions (counted from Wikidata) and sorted them by year; the wording is unchanged apart from removing references to pictures.