April 13 is the 103rd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (104th in leap years). There are 262 days remaining. It is also the Ides of April.

Events

• 1055 - Victor II is consecrated pope
• 1111 - Henry V is crowned Holy Roman Emperor
• 1180 - Frederick Barbarossa issues the Gelnhausen Charter
• 1204 - The Fourth Crusade sacks Constantinople
• 1598 - King Henry IV of France issues the Edict of Nantes, allowing freedom of religion to the Huguenots
• 1829 - The British Parliament grants freedom of religion to Roman Catholics
• 1849 - Hungary becomes a republic
• 1861 - American Civil War: Fort Sumter surrenders
• 1873 - Colfax Massacre
• 1883 - Alferd Packer is convicted of murder
• 1902 - James C. Penney opens his first store in Kemmerer, Wyoming
• 1919 - Amritsar massacre: British and Gurkha troops massacre at least 379 unarmed demonstrators in Amritsar, India
• 1941 - Pact of neutrality between the USSR and Japan is signed
• 1943 - World War II: The discovery of a mass grave of Polish prisoners-of-war executed by Soviet forces in the Katyń Forest Massacre was announced in Germany, driving a wedge between the Western Allies, the Polish government-in-exile in London, and the Soviet Union.
• 1943 - The Jefferson Memorial is dedicated in Washington, DC, on the 200th anniversary of Thomas Jefferson's birth.
• 1945 - German troops massacre more than 1000 political and military prisoners in Gardelegen Germany. The atrocity is discovered two days later by American forces.
• 1970 - The oxygen tank aboard Apollo 13 explodes, putting the crew into deadly peril.
• 1975 - An attack by Phalangists on a Palestinian bus in Ain El Remmeneh, Lebanon marks the beginning of a 15 year civil war.
• 1983 - Harold Washington is elected as the first African-American mayor in Chicago's history
• 1984 - Pete Rose becomes the first player in National League history to collect 4,000 hits
• 1985 - Enver Hoxha is succeeded by Ramiz Alia as the leader of Albania
• 1986 - Jack Nicklaus wins his sixth Masters Tournament
• 1987 - Portugal and China sign an agreement in which the island of Macao would be returned to China in 1999
• 1990 - The Soviet Union admits to committing the Katyn Massacre
• 1993 - Baseball: Lee Smith passes Jeff Reardon for first on the all-time saves list with his 358th save in a 9-7 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers
• 1997 - Tiger Woods becomes the youngest golfer to win the Masters Tournament
• 1997 - Baseball: For the first time in 36 years, two doubleheader games are played between the same pairs of cities on the same day. The San Francisco Giants v New York Mets and New York Yankees v Oakland Athletics
• 2029 - The asteroid 2004 MN4 will pass within 65,000 km of the Earth

Births

• 1519 - Catherine de Medici, Queen of France (d. 1589)
• 1570 - Guy Fawkes, Gunpowder Plot conspirator (d. 1606)
• 1593 - Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford, English statesman (d. 1641)
• 1618 - Roger de Rabutin, Comte de Bussy, French writer (d. 1693)
• 1713 - Frederick (Lord) North, British prime minister (d. 1792)
• 1729 - Thomas Percy, Bishop of Dromore and magazine editor (d. 1811)
• 1735 - Isaac Low, New York delegate to the Continental Congress (d. 1791)
• 1743 - Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (d. 1826)
• 1747 - Louis Philip II, Duke of Orléans (d. 1793)
• 1769 - Thomas Lawrence, English painter (d. 1830)
• 1771 - Richard Trevithick, mechanical engineer (d. 1833)
• 1780 - Alexander Mitchell, Irish engineer (d. 1868)
• 1787 - John Robertson, U.S. congressman (d. 1873)
• 1808 - Antonio Meucci, Italian inventor (d. 1896)
• 1825 - Thomas D'Arcy McGee, Canadian journalist and politician (d. 1868)
• 1828 - Joseph Barber Lightfoot, English theologian and Bishop of Durham (d. 1889)
• 1832 - Juan Montalvo, Ecuadoran author (d. 1889)
• 1850 - Arthur Matthew Weld Downing, British astronomer (d. 1917)
• 1852 - F.W. Woolworth, businessman, founder of Woolworth's (d. 1919)
• 1860 - James Ensor, painter (d. 1949)
• 1866 - Butch Cassidy, American outlaw (d. 1908)
• 1872 - Alexander Roda Roda, writer (d. 1945)
• 1873 - John W. Davis, American politician (d. 1955)
• 1875 - Ray Lyman Wilbur, U.S. Secretary of the Interior (d. 1949)
• 1880 - Charles Christie, film studio owner (d. 1955)
• 1881 - Ludwig Binswanger, psychiatrist (d. 1966)
• 1885 - Georg Lukács, philosopher and literary critic (d. 1971)
• 1887 - Gordon S. Fahrni, Canadian physician and President of the Canadian Medical Association (d. 1995)
• 1889 - Herbert Osborne Yardley, cryptographer (d. 1958)
• 1890 - Frank Murphy, American public servant (d. 1949)
• 1891 - Nella Larsen, African-American novelist (d. 1964)
• 1892 - Sir Robert Alexander Watson-Watt, inventor of Radar (d. 1973)
• 1892 - Arthur Travers 'Bomber' Harris, Royal Air Force commander in World War II (d. 1984)
• 1894 - Arthur Fadden, thirteenth Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1973)
• 1897 - Werner Voss, German World War I flying ace (d. 1917)
• 1900 - Pierre Molinier, painter and photographer (d. 1976)
• 1901 - Jacques Lacan, psychoanalyst and semanticist (d. 1981)
• 1902 - Philippe de Rothschild, race car driver and wine grower (d. 1988)
• 1904 - Sir David Robinson, British philanthropist and entrepreneur (d. 1987)
• 1906 - Samuel Beckett, Irish writer, winner of the Nobel Prize in literature (d. 1989)
• 1907 - Harold E. Stassen, frequent candidate for President of the United States (d. 2001)
• 1909 - Eudora Welty, American writer, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 1973 (d. 2001)
• 1909 - Stanislaw Marcin Ulam, Polish-American mathematician (d. 1984)
• 1911 - Ico Hitrec, Croatian football player (d.1946)
• 1919 - Howard Keel, actor, singer, and president of the Screen Actors Guild )d. 2004)
• 1919 - Roland Gaucher, French journalist
• 1920 - Roberto Calvi, banker (d. 1982)
• 1920 - Liam Cosgrave, fifth Taoiseach of the Ireland
• 1920 - John LaPorta, jazz musician
• 1920 - Claude Cheysson, French politician
• 1922 - John Braine, British novelist (d. 1986)
• 1923 - Don Adams, actor and comedian
• 1924 - Stanley Donen, director
• 1924 - Jack Chick, Christian evangelist
• 1926 - John Spencer-Churchill, 11th Duke of Marlborough
• 1928 - Alan Clark, British politician (d. 1999)
• 1931 - Dan Gurney, race car driver
• 1932 - Orlando Letelier, Chilean politician (d. 1976)
• 1933 - Ben Nighthorse Campbell. U.S. Senator
• 1935 - Lyle Waggoner , actor
• 1937 - Lanford Wilson, playwright
• 1937 - Edward Fox, British actor
• 1939 - Paul Sorvino, actor
• 1939 - Seamus Heaney, poet
• 1943 - Bill Conti, musician
• 1944 - Jack Casady, musician (Jefferson Airplane)
• 1944 - Susan Davis, American politician
• 1945 - Bob Kalsu, American football player (d. 1970)
• 1945 - Tony Dow, child actor
• 1946 - Al Green, singer and pastor
• 1948 - Sue Doughty, British politician
• 1949 - Frank Doran, Scottish Politician
• 1950 - Ron Perlman, actor
• 1950 - William Sadler. actor
• 1951 - Peabo Bryson, pop singer
• 1951 - Peter Davison, actor
• 1951 - Max Weinberg, drummer
• 1952 - David Drew, British politician
• 1952 - Ron Dittemore, NASA manager
• 1953 - Stephen Byers, British politician
• 1954 - Jimmy Destri, musician
• 1955 - Ole von Beust, mayor of Hamburg
• 1955 - Lupe Pintor, Mexican boxer
• 1956 - Alison Wheeler, British political activist
• 1956 - Peter 'Possum' Bourne, Australian race car driver (d. 2003)
• 1960 - Rudi Völler, German football coach
• 1962 - Hillel Slovak, guitarist (Red Hot Chili Peppers) (d. 1988)
• 1963 - Garry Kasparov, chess grandmaster
• 1964 - Caroline Rhea, actress
• 1970 - Rick Schroder, actor
• 1972 - Mariusz Czerkawski, hockey player
• 1972 - Aaron Lewis, singer
• 1974 - Sergei Gonchar, hockey player
• 1975 - Lou Bega, musician and artist
• 1976 - Jonathan Brandis, actor (d. 2003)
• 1976 - Patrik Elias, hockey player
• 1978 - Arron Asham, hockey player
• 1979 - Baron Davis, basketball player
• 1997 - Sloane Momsen, actress

Deaths

• 799 - Paul the Deacon, monk and chronicler (b. ca 720)
• 814 - Krum, khan of Bulgaria
• 1093 - Vsevolod I of Kiev (b. 1093)
• 1279 - Boleslaus the Pious, Polish duke
• 1605 - Boris Godunov, Tsar of Russia
• 1638 - Henri, duc de Rohan, French Huguenot leader (b. 1579)
• 1695 - Jean de la Fontaine, French author (b. 1621)
• 1722 - Charles Leslie, theologian (b. 1650)
• 1794 - Nicolas Chamfort, French writer (b. 1741)
• 1793 - Pierre Gaspard Chaumette, French revolutionary (b. 1763)
• 1826 - Franz Danzi, German composer (b. 1763)
• 1853 - James Iredell, Jr., Governor of North Carolina 1b. 1788)
• 1853 - Leopold Gmelin, German chemist (b. 1788)
• 1855 - Henry De la Beche, English geologist (b. 1796)
• 1868 - Tewodros II, Emperor of Ethiopia (b. 1818)
• 1880 - Robert Fortune, Scottish botanist (b. 1813)
• 1882 - Bruno Bauer, German theologian (b. 1809)
• 1909 - Whitley Stokes, British lawyer (b. 1830)
• 1910 - William Quiller Orchardson, British painter (b. 1835)
• 1911 - George Washington Glick, Governor of Kansas (b. 1827)
• 1911 - John McLane, Governor of New Hampshire (b. 1852)
• 1912 - Ishikawa Takuboku, Japanese author (b. 1886)
• 1925 - Elwood Haynes, automobile pioneer
• 1938 - Grey Owl, proponent of nature conservation (b. 1888)
• 1941 - Annie Jump Cannon, American astronomer (b. 1863)
• 1945 - Ernst Cassirer, German philosopher (b. 1874)
• 1961 - Army Pfc. John A. Bennett (executed)
• 1962 - Culbert Olson, Governor of California (b. 1876)
• 1966 - Abdul Salam Arif, President of Iraq (b. 1921)
• 1975 - François (Ngarta) Tombalbaye, first president of Chad (b. 1918)
• 1975 - Larry Parks, American actor (b. 1914)
• 1978 - Jack Chambers, Canadian artist and film maker (b. 1931)
• 1981 - Asaka Yasuhiko, member of the Japanese imperial family (b. 1887)
• 1984 - Ralph Kirkpatrick, American musician (b. 1911)
• 1984 - Richard Hurndall. British actor (b. 1910)
• 1997 - Dorothy Frooks, American author, publisher, military figure, and actress (b. 1896)
• 1999 - Willi Stoph, East Germany politician
• 2000 - Giorgio Bassani, Italian writer (b. 1916)
• 2002 - Jon Gustafson , editor
• 2004 - Lou Berberet, baseball player (b. 1929)
• 2004 - Caron Keating, British television presenter (b. 1962)
• 2005 - Johnnie Johnson (b. 1924), Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member, piano player and blues musician

Holidays and Observances

• First day of Thai New Year

• Easter - 2036

External links

• BBC: On This Day

April 12 - April 14 - March 13 - May 13 -- listing of all days