August 20

636 The Battle of Yarmouk took place on August 20, 636, between the Rashidun Caliphate forces and the Byzantine Empire's army. The Rashidun forces led by Khalid ibn al-Walid were victorious and took control of Syria and Palestine. This battle was a crucial event in the early expansion of the Islamic Caliphate and marked the beginning of a series of successful conquests by the Muslims. 

Early 14th century illustration of the Battle of Yarmouk 

1083 The Principality of Hungary was established as a Christian kingdom upon the coronation of the first King Stephen I at Esztergom on Christmas Day 1000. Hungary enjoyed a lasting period of peace until his death in 1038 and he was canonized as St Stephen on August 20, 1083. Stephen I of Hungary's right hand, known as the Holy Right, is kept as a holy relic at the Basilica of King Saint Stephen in Budapest.

1153 Bernard of Clairvaux died at the age of sixty-three on August 20, 1153, after forty years spent in the cloister. He was buried at the Clairvaux Abbey, but after its dissolution in 1792 by the French revolutionary government, his remains were transferred to the Troyes Cathedral.

1598 A lasting legacy of the Spanish Armada is the Fair Isle sweater, with its distinctive bold symmetrical patterns. It was knitted by the island people of Fair Isle, which lies north of Scotland between mainland Shetland and Orkney. On August 20, 1588 the flagship of the Spanish Armada, El Gran Grifón, was shipwrecked in the cove of Stroms Heelor, forcing its 300 sailors to spend six weeks living with the islanders. The islanders learned the design from the Spaniards wrecked on their shores.

HRH Edward, Prince of Wales in a Fair Isle sweater

1619 The first 20 African slaves were brought to England's American territories by a Dutch ship. They landed off the coast of Virginia on August 20, 1619 and were then sold into slavery in Jamestown. The conditions on board ships carrying the slaves from Africa were disgraceful. They were fed twice a day at eight o'clock in the morning and four in the afternoon mainly with boiled rice and yams with beans boiled to the consistency of a pulp and sometimes a small quantity of beef or pork. 

1745 Methodist preacher Francis Asbury was born  at Hamstead Bridge, Staffordshire in England on August 20, 1745. Asbury arrived in British North America in 1771 and started touring the colonies and the Mississippi territory on horeseback. By covering thousands of miles each year as a circuit rider, Francis Asbury established Methodism as one of the leading American denominations. He saw the new denomination grow from under 500 members to over 200,000 by the time of his death in 1816.

1833 Benjamin Harrison the 23rd president of the USA was born on August 20, 1833 in North Bend, Ohio. He was the second of eight children born to John Scott Harrison and Elizabeth Ramsey (Irwin). Benjamin was the grandson of William Henry Harrison. He was the only president to be the grandson of a former president. The Republican candidate, Harrison was elected to the White House in 1888, beating Grover Cleveland, serving one full term.

1858 Charles Darwin originally conceived his scientific theory of evolution by means of natural selection after being puzzled by the geographical distribution of wildlife and fossils he collected on the during his five-year voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle. He first published his theory on August 20, 1858 in The Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society of London, alongside Alfred Russel Wallace's same theory. The next year Darwin expanded on his ideas in his book On the Origin of Species. 

Darwin's "B" notebook on Transmutation of Species

1882 Pyotr Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture" was an official commission for the opening of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior during the Moscow Exhibition of Industry and the Arts. It was first performed at the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour on August 20, 1882. Composed by Tchaikovsky to commemorate the Russian defense of Moscow against Napoleon’s armies, the Overture traces the sequence of the military campaign.

1897 British physician Sir Ronald Ross located the malaria parasite on August 20, 1897 when he was dissecting the stomach tissue of a mosquito that had been fed four days previously on a malarious patient. Ross went on to prove the role of female mosquitoes play in transmitting malaria to humans.  Ross' discovery earned him the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1902, the first Briton to win a Nobel. 

1910 The Great Fire of 1910 (also commonly referred to the Big Burn) started on August 20, 1910 in North East Washington, Northern Idaho and western Montana. The firestorm burned over two days and killed more than 80 people, including 78 firefighters, burning approximately 3 million acres. It is believed to be the largest, although not the deadliest, fire in US history.

Wallace, Idaho after the Great Fire of 1910

1912 Salvation Army founder William Booth was 83 years old when he died on August 20, 1912 at his home in Hadley Wood, London. He had been in poor health for several years. Booth's funeral service was held at London’s Olympia where 40,000 people attended, including Queen Mary, who sat almost unrecognised far to the rear of the great hall. He was buried in the main London burial ground for 19th century non-conformist ministers, the non-denominational Abney Park Cemetery in Stoke Newington.

1915 In 1909 the German chemist-physician Paul Ehrlich developed a chemical treatment for syphilis. Because some people died during the clinical testing of his compound, he was much criticized. In 1914, one of the most prominent accusers was convicted of criminal libel at a trial for which Ehrlich was called to testify. Though Ehrlich was thereby exonerated, the ordeal threw him into a depression from which he never fully recovered. He died on August 20, 1915, three days after suffering a heart attack.

1922 The first international athletics competition for women was held at the Pershing Stadium in Paris, France on August 20, 1922. It was called the "Women's Olympics." 77 participants from five nations competed in 11 events: running (60 metres, 100 yards, 300 metres, 1000 metres, 4 x 110 yards relay and hurdling 100 yards), high jump, long jump, standing long jump, javelin and shot put.

1959 In January 1959, Senegal and the French Sudan became one to form the Mali Federation. Their union did not last long and due to internal political difficulties, the Federation broke up on August 20, 1960 when Senegal and French Sudan (renamed the Republic of Mali) each broke apart into separate nations.

1962 The NS Savannah, the first nuclear-powered cargo-passenger ship, was christened in July 1959 as a showcase for Dwight D. Eisenhower's Atoms for Peace initiative. It took another two and a half years years to complete the reactor installation and initial trials before the ship was moved to Yorktown, Virginia, under temporary oil-fired power, where the reactor was started and tested. The completed NS Savannah was launched and made its maiden voyage on August 20, 1962.

1989  Public transport is of an extremely high standard in the Australian city of Adelaide and you can reach any point in the city within a period of 20 minutes by car. The final stage of the O-Bahn Busway in Adelaide was completed on August 20, 1989. At the time it was the world's longest and fastest guided busway with buses travelling a total of 12 km (7.5 mi) at maximum speeds of up to 100 km/h (62 mph).

1991 Vladimir Putin joined the KGB in 1975, training at the 401st KGB school in Okhta, Leningrad, before becoming a KGB Foreign Intelligence Officer. In June 1990, he started working in the International Affairs section of Leningrad State University and the following year, Putin was appointed head of the International Committee of the Saint Petersburg Mayor's office. Putin gave up his position in the KGB on August 20, 1991, during the putsch against Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev.

1991 After the Estonian military boarded the Polish submarine ORP Orzeł in Tallinn it sparked a diplomatic incident that the Soviet Union would use to justify Estonia's annexation in 1940. Fifty years later, the Estonian Supreme Council declared the Soviet occupation of Estonia to be illegal and Estonia declared formal independence, reconstituting the pre-1940 state, on the night of August 20, 1991. The next morning Soviet troops attempted to storm Tallinn TV Tower but were unsuccessful.