Slaves, it is thought, were first brought to the English colony of Jamestown, Virginia, on this day. Subsequently Africans were transshipped to North America from the Caribbean in increasing numbers. Initially, however, the English colonists relied for their dependent labour primarily on indentured servants from the mother country. In the 1660s and '70s the laws of slave ownership were clarified (for example, Africans who converted to Christianity did no longer have to be manumitted), and the price of servants may have increased because of rising wage rates in prospering England; soon thereafter African slaves replaced English indentured labourers.
| 1977: | | Voyager 2 was launched to observe and transmit information about the outer planetary system. |
|
| 1975: | | | Viking 1 was launched on its mission to orbit Mars. |
|
| 1968: | | The Warsaw Pact nations (except Romania and Albania), led by the Soviet Union, invaded Czechoslovakia to put an end to the Prague Spring. |
|
| 1960: | | Senegal seceded from the Mali Federation, declaring its full independence. |
|
| 1940: | | Leon Trotsky was assassinated by a Stalinist agent in Mexico. |
|
| 1914: | | The German army captured Brussels during the initial German invasion of World War I. |
|
| 1889: | | Labour activists closed the entire Port of London in the London Dock Strike. |
|
| 1865: | | Austria and Prussia signed the Convention of Gastein, an agreement that temporarily postponed the final struggle between them for hegemony over Germany. |
|
| 1794: | | U.S. General “Mad” Anthony Wayne defeated the Northwest Indian Confederation in the Battle of Fallen Timbers. |
|
| 1741: | | Alaska was encountered by Danish explorer Vitus Bering, who was working for Russia. |
|