Highlights of this day in history: Bruno Richard Hauptmann convicted in the Lindbergh baby kidnap-murder; The World War II bombing of Dresden begins; Konstantin Chernenko becomes Soviet leader; Peter Gabriel born; Waylon Jennings dies. (Feb. 13)
- 1258 Baghdad falls to the Mongols as the Abbasid Caliphate is destroyed
- 1349 Jews are expelled from Burgsordf, Switzerland
- 1566 St Augustine, Florida, founded
- 1601 First East India Company voyage departs from London, lead by John Lancaster
- 1689 British Parliament adopts the Bill of Rights which establishes the rights of parliament and places limits on the crown
- 1942 Hitler's Operation Sealion, the invasion of England, is cancelled
- 1945 Allied planes begin bombing Dresden, Germany; a firestorm results and over 22,000 die
- 1945 USSR captures Budapest, after a 49-day battle with Germany; 159,000 die
- 1130 Gregorio de' Papareschi elected as Pope Innocent II...
Birthdays
- 1950 Peter Gabriel, Surrey England, rock vocalist (Genesis, In Your Eyes)
- 1951 David Naughton, actor (My Sister Sam, Separate Vacations), born in Hartford, Connecticut
- 1961 Henry Rollins, US vocalist/poet (Big Ugly Mouth, Talking From the Box)
- 1971 Mats Sundin, Bromma SWE, NHL center (Team Sweden, Toronto Maple Leafs)
- 1977 Randy Moss, American football player
- 1979 Mena Suvari, American actress
Deaths
- 1980 David Janssen, [Meyer], actor (Fugitive, Harry O), dies at 49
- 1996 Martin Balsam, actor (Archie's Place), dies at 76
- 2002 Waylon Jennings, American musician (b. 1937)
- 2014 Ralph Waite, White Plains NY, American actor, director and political candidate (John Walton Snr. in The Waltons)
- 2016 Antonin Scalia, American 105th Supreme Court Justice (1986-2016), dies at 79
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Source: OnThisDay.com
-- Henry Frederick, Headline Surfer