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On this day: December 13

December 13 is the 347th day of the year (348th in leap years), with 18 days left until the end of the year.

 

December 13 in one line

Headline entries for December 13, from Wikipedia: in 1294, Saint Celestine V resigned the papacy after only five months to return to his previous life as an ascetic hermit; born 1989: Taylor Swift, American singer-songwriter; died 1784: Samuel Johnson, English poet and lexicographer (born 1709). In 2026 it is a Sunday, in 2027 a Monday.

Events on December 13

  • 1294 Saint Celestine V resigned the papacy after only five months to return to his previous life as an ascetic hermit. Wikipedia
  • 1545 The Council of Trent begins as the embodiment of the Counter-Reformation. Wikipedia
  • 1577 Francis Drake set sail from Plymouth, England, on his round-the-world voyage. Wikipedia
  • 1642 Abel Tasman is the first recorded European to sight New Zealand. Wikipedia
  • 1643 First English Civil War: Roundhead forces under Sir William Waller led a successful surprise attack in Hampshire on a winter garrison of Cavalier infantry and cavalry. Wikipedia
  • 1769 Dartmouth College was established by royal charter in present-day Hanover, New Hampshire. Wikipedia
  • 1809 Napoleonic Wars: While transporting supplies to Guadeloupe, French commodore François Wikipedia
  • 1862 American Civil War: Union forces under Ambrose Burnside suffered severe casualties against entrenched Confederate defenders at the Battle of Fredericksburg in Virginia. Wikipedia
  • 1864 American Civil War: Sherman's March to the Sea: The Second Battle of Fort McAllister ends with the fort being seized by Union forces under General William B. Hazen, threatening the city of Savannah with investment. Wikipedia
  • 1928 An American in Paris, a jazz-influenced orchestral piece by George Gershwin, premiered at Carnegie Hall in New York. Wikipedia
  • 1937 Second Sino-Japanese War: Japanese forces, capturing the Chinese city of Nanjing, began committing numerous atrocities over the next several weeks, including looting, rape and the execution of prisoners of war and civilians. Wikipedia
  • 1939 The Battle of the River Plate is fought off the coast of Uruguay; the first naval battle of World War II. The Kriegsmarine's Deutschland-class cruiser (pocket battleship) Admiral Graf Spee engages with three Royal Navy cruisers: HMS Ajax, HMNZS Achilles and HMS Exeter. Wikipedia
  • 1949 The Knesset votes to move the capital of Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Wikipedia
  • 1957 A 6.5 magnitude earthquake struck the Iranian Hamadan province, killing at least 1,130 people. Wikipedia
  • 1960 With Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia, out of the country, four conspirators staged a coup attempt to install Crown Prince Asfaw Wossen on the throne. Wikipedia
  • 1967 Constantine II of Greece attempts an unsuccessful counter-coup against the Regime of the Colonels. Wikipedia
  • 1972 Apollo program: Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt begin the third and final extra-vehicular activity (EVA) or "Moonwalk" of Apollo 17. To date they are the last humans to set foot on the Moon. Wikipedia
  • 1974 Malta becomes a republic within the Commonwealth of Nations. Wikipedia
  • 1981 Polish prime minister Wojciech Jaruzelski declared martial law. Wikipedia
  • 1989 The Troubles: The Provisional Irish Republican Army engaged in a fierce firefight with the King's Own Scottish Borderers at a vehicle checkpoint complex in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. Wikipedia
  • 1991 Croatian War of Independence: The Croatian Army retreated after the failure of Operation Whirlwind, destroying their tanks to avoid their capture. Wikipedia
  • 2003 Iraq War: Operation Red Dawn: Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein is captured near his home town of Tikrit. Wikipedia
  • 2007 The Treaty of Lisbon is signed by the EU member states to amend both the Treaty of Rome and the Maastricht Treaty which together form the constitutional basis of the EU. The Treaty of Lisbon is effective from 1 December 2009. Wikipedia
  • 2011 A man threw grenades and fired a rifle at crowds in Liège, Belgium, causing 6 deaths and injuring more than 120 others, before killing himself. Wikipedia
  • 2013 Beyoncé released her fifth studio album without any prior announcement or promotion; it sold 2.3 million copies before the end of the year. Wikipedia
  • 2019 Jo Swinson steps down as Leader of the Liberal Democrats after losing her seat in the 2019 general election making her tenure the shortest in the party's history. Wikipedia

Born on December 13

  • 1521 Pope Sixtus V (died 1590) Wikipedia
  • 1533 Eric XIV of Sweden (died 1577) Wikipedia
  • 1553 Henry IV of France (died 1610) Wikipedia
  • 1797 Heinrich Heine, German journalist, poet, and critic (died 1856) Wikipedia
  • 1816 Werner von Siemens, German engineer and businessman, founded Siemens (died 1892) Wikipedia
  • 1818 Mary Todd Lincoln, 16th First Lady of the United States (died 1882) Wikipedia
  • 1887 George Pólya, Hungarian-American mathematician and academic (died 1985) Wikipedia
  • 1902 Talcott Parsons, American sociologist and academic (died 1979) Wikipedia
  • 1911 Trygve Haavelmo, Norwegian economist and mathematician, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1999) Wikipedia
  • 1920 George P. Shultz, American economist and politician, 60th United States Secretary of State (died 2021) Wikipedia
  • 1923 Philip Warren Anderson, American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 2020) Wikipedia
  • 1925 Dick Van Dyke, American actor, singer, and dancer Wikipedia
  • 1929 Christopher Plummer, Canadian actor and producer (died 2021) Wikipedia
  • 1936 Prince Karim al-Husayn Shāh, Aga Khan IV, Swiss humanitarian and religious leader (died 2025) Wikipedia
  • 1953 Ben Bernanke, American economist Wikipedia
  • 1957 Steve Buscemi, American actor and director Wikipedia
  • 1964 Krišjānis Kariņš, American-Latvian politician, 23rd Prime Minister of Latvia Wikipedia
  • 1967 Jamie Foxx, American actor, singer, songwriter, producer, and comedian Wikipedia
  • 1981 Amy Lee, American singer, songwriter and pianist Wikipedia
  • 1984 Santi Cazorla, Spanish footballer Wikipedia
  • 1989 Taylor Swift, American singer-songwriter Wikipedia
  • 1995 Emma Corrin, English actor Wikipedia

Died on December 13

  • 1124 Pope Callixtus II (born 1065) Wikipedia
  • 1204 Maimonides, Spanish rabbi and philosopher (born 1135) Wikipedia
  • 1250 Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor (born 1194) Wikipedia
  • 1466 Donatello, Italian painter and sculptor (born 1386) Wikipedia
  • 1521 Manuel I of Portugal (born 1469) Wikipedia
  • 1565 Conrad Gessner, Swiss botanist and physician (born 1516) Wikipedia
  • 1754 Mahmud I, Ottoman sultan (born 1696) Wikipedia
  • 1784 Samuel Johnson, English poet and lexicographer (born 1709) Wikipedia
  • 1863 Christian Friedrich Hebbel, German poet and playwright (born 1813) Wikipedia
  • 1930 Fritz Pregl, Slovenian-Austrian chemist and physician, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1869) Wikipedia
  • 1931 Gustave Le Bon, French psychologist, sociologist, and anthropologist (born 1840) Wikipedia
  • 1935 Victor Grignard, French chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1871) Wikipedia
  • 1944 Wassily Kandinsky, Russian-French painter and theorist (born 1866) Wikipedia
  • 1947 Nicholas Roerich, Russian archaeologist, painter, and philosopher (born 1874) Wikipedia

Holidays and observances

Sources

The events, births, deaths and observances above are from the English Wikipedia article “December 13” and the articles it links to (authors and history), retrieved 2026-10-15 through the Wikimedia “On this day” feed. They are licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0; this selection is shared under the same licence. Every anniversary that Wikipedia's editors selected for December 13 stays on the list; the remaining places, up to 26 events, 22 births and 14 deaths, go to the entries whose own article — about the event itself, or else the person or thing it is about — appears in the most language editions (counted from Wikidata); an article about a person or thing, which covers far more than one day, counts half. An entry with no article of its own counts, also at half, by the least covered article it links, and one that links only places counts for nothing. Each list runs by year, and the wording is unchanged apart from removing references to pictures, audio and video.

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