1264 Pope Urban IV died (b. ca. 1195).

1381 Jan Van Ruysbroeck (b. 1293 near Brussels), Flemish mystic, died.

1497 Hans Holbein (the Younger), portrait painter and engraver, was born (d. 1543) at Augsburg, Germany.

1552 Francis Xavier, a Jesuit missionary to Asia and one of the founding members of his order, died (b. 7 April 1506).

1570 Matthaeus Alber, the “Luther of Swabia,” reformer, friend of Philipp Melanchthon and reformer of Reutlingen, died (b. 1495, Reutlingen).

1670 Johann A. Freylinghausen, composer and poet, was born in Gandersheim, Brunswick (d. 12 February 1739).

1697 Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London, designed by Christopher Wren, was dedicated.

1703 Justus Falckner, first Lutheran pastor ordained in America, began serving his first parish in New York.

1773 John George Lochman, president of the General Synod in 1821, was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (d. 10 July 1826).

1831 Francis Nathan Peloubet, American Congregational clergyman and promoter of the Sunday school, was born in New York City (d. 1920).

1833 Conrad Sigmund Fritschel, professor at Wartburg Theological Seminary (Dubuque, Iowa) from 1858 to 1900, was born in Nuernberg, Germany (d. 26 April 1900).

1836 Moritz Braeuninger, missionary to the American Indians, was born in Crimmitschau, Saxony (d. 1860).

1859 Militant messianic abolitionist John Brown was hanged at Charles Town, (West) Virginia, for his attack on Harper’s Ferry (b. 9 May 1800).

1860 C. T. Studd, missionary to India and Africa, was born in England (d. 16 July 1931).

1873 The Reformed Episcopal Church was organized in New York City under the leadership of Bishop George David Cummins of Kentucky.

1879 Albert Bushnell, missionary to Africa for the American Board (Congregationalist), died in Sierra Leone, Africa (b. 1818).

1893 Charlotte Maria Tucker, missionary to India, died in Amritsar, India (b. 8 May 1821).

1908 The Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America was founded in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

1929 William Henry Parker (b. 4 March 1845), English Baptist hymn writer, died.

1980 Three American nuns and a lay churchwoman are killed by death squads in El Salvador.

1985 The International Bible Society occupied its new headquarters in Carter House in New York City.