• 1481 - Battle of Westbrook - Holland defeats troops of Utrecht.
• 1620 - Elizabeth Báthory's crimes are uncovered.
• 1620 - Pilgrim Fathers land at what becomes New Plymouth in Massachusetts.
• 1776 - American Revolutionary War: The British are defeated in the Battle of Trenton.
• 1790 - Louis XVI of France gives his public assent to Civil Constitution of the Clergy during the French Revolution.
• 1792 - The final trial of Louis XVI of France begins in Paris.
• 1793 - Battle of Geisberg: French defeat Austrians.
• 1793 - The wedding of Prince Friedrich Ludwig of Prussia and Frederica of Mecklenburg-Strelitz takes place.
• 1805 - Austria and France sign the Treaty of Pressburg.
• 1806 - Battles of Pultusk and Golymin: Russian forces hold French forces under Napoleon.
• 1811 - A theater fire in Richmond, Virginia kills the Governor of Virginia George William Smith and the president of the First National Bank of Virginia Abraham B. Venable.
• 1825 - Several Imperial Russia army officers lead circa 3000 soldiers on the Senate Square in the failed Decembrist uprising.
• 1848 - The Phi Delta Theta fraternity is founded at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.
• 1860 - The first ever inter-club football match takes place between Hallam F.C. and Sheffield F.C. at the Sandygate Road ground in Sheffield, England.
• 1861 - American Civil War: The Trent Affair: Confederate diplomatic envoys James M. Mason and John Slidell are freed by the United States government, thus heading off a possible war between the United States and Britain.
• 1862 - American Civil War: The Battle of Chickasaw Bayou begins.
• 1862 - Four nuns serving as volunteer nurses on board USS Red Rover are the first female nurses on a U.S. Navy hospital ship.
• 1862 - The largest mass-hanging in U.S. history took place in Mankato, Minnesota, killing 39.
• 1870 - The 12.8-km long Fréjus Rail Tunnel through the Alps is completed.
• 1871 - Gilbert and Sullivan collaborate for the first time, on their lost opera, Thespis. It does modestly well, but the two wouldn't collaborate again for four years.
• 1883 - The Harbour Grace Affray between Irish Catholics and Protestant Orangemen causes five deaths in Newfoundland.
• 1898 - Marie and Pierre Curie announce the isolation of radium.
• 1916 - Joseph Joffre is made Marshal of France.
• 1919 - Babe Ruth of the Boston Red Sox is sold to the New York Yankees by owner Harry Frazee.
• 1925 - The Communist Party of India is founded.
• 1925 - Turkey adopts the Gregorian Calendar.
• 1933 - The Nissan Motor Company is organized in Tokyo, Japan.
• 1933 - FM radio is patented.
• 1943 - World War II: The German warship Scharnhorst sinks off the coast of North Cape in Norway after being attacked by the Royal Navy late the previous evening.
• 1944 - World War II: U.S. troops repulse German forces at Bastogne.
• 1945 - CFP franc and CFA franc are created.
• 1948 - Cardinal Mindszenty is arrested in Hungary and accused of treason and conspiracy.
• 1966 - The first Kwanzaa is celebrated by Maulana Karenga, the chair of Black Studies at California State University, Long Beach.
• 1973 - Comet Kohoutek reaches perihelion but isn't as spectacular a display as expected.
• 1973 - Soyuz 13 lands on earth after a week in orbit.
• 1974 - Salyut 4 is launched.
• 1975 - The Tupolev Tu-144 goes into service in Soviet Union.
• 1976 - The Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist-Leninist) is founded.
• 1979 - Soviet Special forces take over presidential palace in Kabul, Afghanistan.
• 1979 - Opening night of the Concerts for the People of Kampuchea at the Hammersmith Odeon; a benefit concert for the citizens of Cambodia who were victims of dictator Pol Pot.
• 1980 - Aeroflot puts the Ilyushin Il-86 into service.
• 1982 - Time Magazine's Man of the Year is for the first time a non-human, the personal computer.
• 1986 - The first long-running American television soap opera, Search for Tomorrow, airs its final episode after thirty-five years on the air.
• 1988 - The Nanjing Anti-African protests in Nanjing, the People's Republic of China begin.
• 1991 - The Supreme Soviet meets and formally dissolves the USSR.
• 1996 - Start of the largest strike in South Korean history.
• 1996 - The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification goes into force.
• 1996 - Six-year-old beauty queen JonBenét Ramsey is found beaten and strangled in the basement of her family's home in Boulder, Colorado.
• 1997 - The Soufriere Hills volcano on the island of Montserrat explodes, creating a small tsunami offshore.
• 1998 - Iraq announces its intention to fire upon U.S. and British warplanes that patrol the northern and southern no-fly zones.
• 1998 - Severe gales over Ireland, northern England, and southern Scotland cause widespread disruption and widespread power outages in Northern Ireland and southern Scotland.
• 1999 - Severe weather in France kills over 100 people and causes extensive damage to property, trees and the French national power grid (see Lothar).
• 2003 - A strong magnitude 6.6 earthquake devastates southeast Iranian city of Bam, killing tens of thousands and destroying the citadel of Arg-é Bam.
• 2004 - An earthquake measuring 9.3 on the Richter magnitude scale creates a tsunami causing devastation in Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, the Maldives and many other areas around the rim of the Indian Ocean, killing more than 300,000.
• 2005 - Boxing Day shooting on a busy shopping street in Toronto.
• 2006 - The 2006 Hengchun earthquake with 7.1 magnitude hit Taiwan.

Births