Browse Historical Events by Month: What Happened in August?

William Wallace, Scottish leader of the resistance against English rule, is captured by English forces near Glasgow.

The Battle of Bannockburn takes place, where Scottish forces led by Robert the Bruce defeat the English army, securing Scottish independence.

The Battle of Crécy occurs during the Hundred Years' War, where the English army, led by Edward III, defeats the French forces.

The St. Mary Magdalene's flood devastates the Netherlands, England, and Germany, causing significant loss of life and destruction.

The Battle of Nicopolis takes place, marking the final major crusade of the Middle Ages and resulting in a victory for the Ottoman Empire over an alliance of European forces.

The Battle of Bosworth Field. The last significant battle of the Wars of the Roses, the civil war between the houses of Lancaster and York that extended across England. The battle was won by an alliance of Lancastrians and disaffected Yorkists. Their leader Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond, became the first English monarch of the Tudor dynasty by his victory and subsequent marriage to a Yorkist princess. His opponent Richard III, the last king of the House of York, was killed during the battle. Historians consider Bosworth Field battle one of the defining moments of English history. More

Christopher Columbus sets sail from Palos de la Frontera, Spain, with three ships, Niña, Pinta and Santa Maria. Searching for a westerly route to the Far East. Instead, on October 12th, he lands in the Bahamas, thinking it was an outlying Japanese island. More

Explorer Christopher Columbus lands on South America at the Paria Peninsula in present-day Venezuela. He Thinking it was an island, he claims it for Spain and christened it "Isla Santa".

Spanish conquistador Hernándo Cortés succeeds in bringing about the fall of Tenochtitlan, the capital of the Aztec Empire after over two months of fighting. Cortes' conquests began with Cuba in 1511, Mexico’s Bay of Campeche in 1519, and then deeper into Mexico.

Ottoman Sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, defeats the Hungarian forces at the Battle of Mohács in 1526, establishing Ottoman control in the region for over 150 years. Sultan Suleiman I inherited the throne of the Ottoman Empire at the age of 26. He was the only son of Selim I, who conquered Mecca, Medina, Jerusalem and Alexandria. More

Thousands of Protestant Huguenots are massacred in France by Catholics, in what became known as the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre. More

Sir Humphrey Gilbert, a British navigator and explorer takes possession of the area around St. John’s harbor, Newfoundland in the name of the Queen. He was later lost at sea in a storm off the Azores on his return trip to England.

First enslaved Africans arrive in Virginia; Two English pirate ships, the Treasurer and White Lion. each carrying 20-30 African slaves land in the Jamestown colony within four days of each other. The slaves had been taken from a Portuguese slave ship, the San Juan Bautista, carrying 350 African slaves in route to Veracruz, Mexico.

Virginia’s first enslaved people spoke Bantu languages, and their homelands were the kingdoms of Ndongo and Kongo. They are the first recorded Africans to arrive in England's mainland American colonies. marking the beginning of what evolved into a legalized system of slavery that lasted two and a half centuries. More

George Washington becomes a Master Mason n his hometown of Fredericksburg, Virginia. He was twenty one years old. More

Most of the 55 members of the Continental Congress signed the parchment copy of the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia. More

General George Washington announces the Badge of Military Merit. The Badge was designed by Washington in the form of a purple heart, it was intended as a military order for soldiers who exhibited, "not only instances of unusual gallantry in battle, but also extraordinary fidelity and essential service in any way". It is believed that only three people received the Badge of Military Merit during the American Revolutionary War, In 1932, the United States War Department authorized the new Purple Heart Medal, officially considered the "successor decoration" to the Badge of Military Merit. More

Russians led by Grigorii Shelikhov established the first permanent Russian outpost in Alaska on Kodiak Island at Three Saints Bay. More

The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen is adopted in France, laying the groundwork for the French Revolution.

Benjamin Banneker, the son of a free Black American woman and a formerly enslaved African man from Guinea, writes a letter to Thomas Jefferson, then-Secretary of State. On the letter, Banneker criticizes Jefferson’s hypocritical stance on slavery in respectful but unambiguous terms, using Jefferson’s own words to make his case for the abolition of slavery. Jefferson brief response thanked him for the letter, expressed his ambivalence about slavery ("…no body [sic] wishes more sincerely than I do to see such proofs as you exhibit in your letter, that nature has given to our black brethren, talents equal to those of the other colours of men") and endorsed Banneker’s accomplishments. More

Louis XVI of France and his wife, Marie-Antoinette are imprisoned and the French monarchy is effectively overthrown, as the French Revolution (1787–99) continues. They were both executed by guillotine in 1793.