1702. The earl of Marlborough taken by a French party, but not being known, on producing a French pass, he was suffered to escape.
1714. Bernardin Romazzini, an Italian physician, died at Padua, aged 81. Although blind he discharged the duties of professor of medicine with great applause in the university.
1732. James Oglethorpe, with several colonists, embarked for Georgia, in America.
1757. Battle of Rossbach, a village in Prussian Saxony; a decisive victory obtained by Frederick the great over the French and Austrians under Soubise.
1764. Charles Churchill, the celebrated English poet, died at Boulogne.
1774. The militia of Virginia, assembled at fort Gower under lord Dunmore, the royal governor, declared their determination to support their countrymen, when called upon, and not the king, if he proceeded to execute the late obnoxious laws by force.
1780. Vasili Evdokimovitch Adaduror, a Russian mathematician, died. He instructed Catharine II in the Russian language.
1782. The America, a 74 gun ship, built at Portsmouth, N. H., by order of congress, was launched. This was the first line of battle ship ever built in America.
1798. Lewis Galvani, an Italian philosopher, died at Bologna; celebrated as the discoverer of that kind of electricity called, after him, Galvanism. (See [Feb. 5, 1799].)
1807. Maria Angelica Kauffman, an eminent French painter, and royal academician in London, died at Rome. She is styled by the Germans, "the painter of the soul;" and her mental acquirements and moral conduct were no less distinguished than her talents as an artist.