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HISTORY & TIMELINE
13 February

A journey through
13 February in history

The thirteenth day of February has seen soldiers turn on their hosts in a Highland glen, the last Bourbon king of Naples give up his fortress and a jury deliver its verdict in the trial of the century. This timeline follows 13 February from the seventeenth century to the twenty-first.

Begin the Timeline ↓ ← Back to Explore This Day
JUMP THROUGH TIME
III
A CHANGING WORLD

Early Modern Era

Exploration, political change, scientific development and expanding global connections.

1689
The Bill of Rights ratified by King William and Queen Mary before their coronation, an engraving after Samuel Wale, 1783.The Bill of Rights ratified by King William and Queen Mary before their coronation, an engraving after Samuel Wale, 1783.Image: Samuel Wale · Public domain
politics · Europe

Parliament offers the English crown to William and Mary

In November 1688 William of Orange, the Dutch stadtholder, landed in England with an army at the invitation of leading Protestants who feared the Catholic rule of his father-in-law, James II. James’s support melted away and he fled to France. A Convention Parliament declared that James had abandoned the throne, and on 13 February 1689, in the Banqueting House in Whitehall, it offered the crown jointly to William and his wife Mary, James’s elder daughter, after reading out a Declaration of Rights that listed the liberties the Stuarts had broken. The Declaration became the Bill of Rights later that year, and the ‘Glorious Revolution’ confirmed that the monarch would rule with, and not over, Parliament.

Source: UK Parliament: the Convention and Bill of Rights ↗
1692
The memorial to the Glencoe massacre in the village of Glencoe.The memorial to the Glencoe massacre in the village of Glencoe.Image: Kim Traynor · CC BY-SA 3.0
world · Europe

Government soldiers massacre the MacDonalds of Glencoe

The Highland clans had been ordered to swear allegiance to William III by 1 January 1692. Alasdair MacIain, chief of the MacDonalds of Glencoe, was a few days late. Soldiers of the Earl of Argyll’s regiment were billeted on the MacDonalds as guests for almost two weeks, and in the early morning of 13 February they turned on their hosts, killing MacIain and 37 others; more died of cold as they fled into the snow. A Scottish inquiry later called it ‘murder under trust’.

Source: National Trust for Scotland: the Glencoe massacre ↗
IV
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

The 1800s

Industry, empire, invention, reform and a century of enormous transformation.

1861
General Manfredo Fanti with Piedmontese troops at Mola di Gaeta, a drawing by Raffaele Pontremoli, about 1880.General Manfredo Fanti with Piedmontese troops at Mola di Gaeta, a drawing by Raffaele Pontremoli, about 1880.Image: Raffaele Pontremoli · Public domain
world · Europe

Gaeta surrenders and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies comes to an end

After Garibaldi’s Thousand conquered Sicily and Naples in 1860, the young King Francis II of the Two Sicilies retreated with his last loyal troops to the fortress of Gaeta on the coast north of Naples. Besieged by the Piedmontese army of General Cialdini, bombarded and struck by typhus, the garrison held out for three months, encouraged by the king’s wife, Maria Sophia. On 13 February 1861 Francis surrendered and went into exile in Rome, and a month later the Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: Francis II, king of the Two Sicilies ↗
V
THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

The 1900s

War and peace, technological leaps, social change, politics, sport and popular culture.

1935
The Hunterdon County Courthouse in Flemington, New Jersey, where the trial was held.The Hunterdon County Courthouse in Flemington, New Jersey, where the trial was held.Image: Zeete · CC BY-SA 4.0
world · Americas

A jury convicts Bruno Hauptmann in the Lindbergh kidnapping trial

In March 1932 the baby son of the aviator Charles Lindbergh was taken from the family’s home in New Jersey, and weeks later his body was found nearby. In 1934 police traced ransom money to Bruno Richard Hauptmann, a German-born carpenter in the Bronx. His trial in the small town of Flemington drew reporters from around the world and was called the trial of the century. On 13 February 1935, after eleven hours of deliberation, the jury found him guilty of murder. He protested his innocence to the end and was executed in 1936.

Source: Federal Bureau of Investigation: the Lindbergh kidnapping ↗
1945
The wrecked Chain Bridge over the Danube and the ruined Royal Palace on Castle Hill, Budapest, 1945.The wrecked Chain Bridge over the Danube and the ruined Royal Palace on Castle Hill, Budapest, 1945.Image: FOTO:Fortepan — ID 16247: Adományozó/Donor: Kurutz Márton. archive copy at the Wayback Machine · CC BY-SA 3.0
world · Europe

The siege of Budapest ends in ruins

By late 1944 the Red Army had fought its way into Hungary, Germany’s last ally. Hitler ordered Budapest to be held at all costs, and at the end of December Soviet and Romanian forces encircled the city with tens of thousands of German and Hungarian troops and hundreds of thousands of civilians inside. Pest, on the east bank, fell in January. The defenders held out in Buda and on its Castle Hill for weeks more, and on 13 February 1945 the last resistance ended. The siege had lasted more than a hundred days and cost tens of thousands of civilian lives, and much of the historic city lay in ruins.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: Budapest, the modern city ↗
1960
The start of the Tanezrouft road south of Reggane in the Algerian Sahara, the area of the first French tests, photographed in 1990.The start of the Tanezrouft road south of Reggane in the Algerian Sahara, the area of the first French tests, photographed in 1990.Image: Albert Backer · CC BY-SA 3.0
science · Africa

France tests its first atomic bomb in the Sahara

After the Second World War, France was determined to have its own nuclear weapons rather than rely on the United States, and under President Charles de Gaulle it built a test site near the oasis of Reggane in the Sahara, in what was then French Algeria. On 13 February 1960 a bomb code-named Gerboise Bleue (Blue Jerboa) was exploded on top of a tower in the desert. With a yield of about 70 kilotons, several times that of the Hiroshima bomb, it made France the fourth nuclear power after the United States, the Soviet Union and Britain. France carried out 17 tests in Algeria before moving them to French Polynesia, and the fallout and the waste left in the desert are still a cause of grievance in Algeria.

Source: CTBTO Preparatory Commission: 13 February 1960, the first French nuclear test ↗
VI
2000 TO TODAY

Modern Day

The events of recent decades that have already become part of the historical record.

2008
The text of the Apology to Australia's Indigenous Peoples, displayed at Parliament House, Canberra.The text of the Apology to Australia’s Indigenous Peoples, displayed at Parliament House, Canberra.Image: Bill H. Gong · CC BY-SA 4.0
world · Oceania

Australia’s prime minister says sorry to the Stolen Generations

For much of the twentieth century, Australian governments and churches removed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, aiming to absorb them into white society. The children taken became known as the Stolen Generations. On 13 February 2008, as the first business of the new parliament, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd moved a formal apology for the laws and policies that had inflicted ‘profound grief, suffering and loss’, and above all for the removal of children from their families. Thousands gathered in Canberra and millions watched across the country, and many people wept as he finished.

Source: National Museum of Australia: national apology ↗
2012
A Vega rocket on its launch pad at Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, before a later launch in June 2015.A Vega rocket on its launch pad at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, before a later launch in June 2015.Image: ESA_events · CC BY-SA 2.0
science · Americas

Europe’s Vega rocket makes its first flight

Europe’s Ariane rockets were built to carry large satellites. To launch smaller scientific and Earth-watching satellites more cheaply, the European Space Agency and Italy, the main contributor, developed a light rocket named Vega. On 13 February 2012 the first Vega lifted off from Europe’s Spaceport at Kourou in French Guiana and placed nine satellites in orbit, among them LARES, an Italian sphere of tungsten alloy covered with laser reflectors, used to test a prediction of Einstein’s theory of relativity. The flawless first flight qualified the rocket for regular service.

Source: European Space Agency: ESA’s new Vega launcher scores success on maiden flight ↗
RESEARCH

Sources & Further Reading

Selected authoritative references supporting the events on this page.

WHY THESE MOMENTS?

Significance before volume

This page is not the longest possible list of events. It is a chronological journey through 13 February, where each entry is chosen for historical significance, human interest and reliability.

Facts are checked against authoritative museums, archives, universities and reference works. Where sources disagree, the page says so.

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