Under Thursday, July 13, the book of history records, among other things:
1558: A Flemish army in Spanish service under the governor Count Egmont beats the French at Gravelingen (Gravelines).
1793: The French revolutionary Jean-Paul Marat, head of the Jacobin Club, is stabbed to death by the Breton Catholic Charlotte de Corday d’Armont during a bath. She had vowed to kill Marat because he said that 200,000 people had to be eliminated to consolidate the republic.
1878: After four weeks of negotiations between the major European powers and the Ottoman Empire mediated by the German Chancellor Bismarck, the Berlin Congress ends with the reorganization of territorial relations in the Balkans. Romania, Serbia and Montenegro are recognized as sovereign states. Austria-Hungary receives the mandate to occupy Bosnia and Herzegovina.
1908: At the fourth Olympic Games in London, women are allowed to compete in tennis for the first time.
1943: With the failure of Hitler’s offensive operation “Zitadelle” against the Soviet salient at Kursk, the German offensive power was finally broken. Within a few days, the Wehrmacht suffered even higher losses than in the Battle of Stalingrad.
1943: Alexander Schmorell and Kurt Huber, members of the student resistance group “White Rose”, are executed in Germany.
1948: The film “The Lord from the Other Star”, in which Heinz Rühmann plays a leading role for the first time since the end of the war, has its world premiere in Berlin.
1978: After the Albanian leadership repeatedly criticized Beijing’s course, the People’s Republic of China stopped providing military and economic aid to Albania.
2003: The provisional governing council set up by the US occupying power in Iraq meets in Baghdad for its inaugural meeting.
2008: In Paris, 43 countries found a Union for the Mediterranean (Union pour la Méditerranée). France and Egypt take over the presidency, while delegations from Europe, North Africa and the Middle East lay the foundation for better cooperation in the region.
birthdays: Ferdinand III, Roman-German Emperor (1608-1657); Theophil von Hansen, Dan. master builder (1813-1891); Alberto Ascari, Italian racing driver (1918-1955); Erich Lessing, Austria Photographer (1923-2018); Michael Verhoeven, German film director and producer (1938); Violeta Dinescu, German-Roman. female composer (1953).
days of death: Karl Erb, German tenor (1877-1958); Willy Fritsch, German actor (1901-1973); Compay Segundo, kuban. singer and guitarist (1907-2003); Thorvald Stoltenberg, Norwegian politician, UNHCR chief 1990 (1931-2018).
name days: Heinrich, Kunigunde, Margaretha, Mildred, Milda, Silas, Arno, Eugen, Sarah, Jakob, Berthold.