Events Pre-1600 461 – Roman Emperor Majorian is beheaded near the river Iria in north-west Italy following his arrest and deposition by the magister militum Ricimer. 626 – The Avar and Slav armies leave the siege of Constantinople. 768 – Pope Stephen III is elected to office, and quickly seeks Frankish protection against the Lombard threat, since the Byzantine Empire is no longer able to help. 936 – Coronation of King Otto I of Germany. 1461 – The Ming dynasty Chinese military general Cao Qin stages a coup against the Tianshun Emperor. 1479 – Battle of Guinegate: French troops of King Louis XI were defeated by the Burgundians led by Archduke Maximilian of Habsburg. 1601–1900 1679 – The brigantine Le Griffon, commissioned by René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, is towed to the south-eastern end of the Niagara River, to become the first ship to sail the upper Great Lakes of North America. 1714 – The Battle of Gangut: The first important victory of the Russian Navy. 1743 – The Treaty of Åbo ended the 1741–1743 Russo-Swedish War. 1782 – George Washington orders the creation of the Badge of Military Merit to honor soldiers wounded in battle. It is later renamed to the more poetic Purple Heart. 1786 – The first federal Indian Reservation is created by the United States. 1789 – The United States Department of War is established. 1791 – American troops destroy the Miami town of Kenapacomaqua near the site of present-day Logansport, Indiana in the Northwest Indian War. 1794 – U.S. President George Washington invokes the Militia Acts of 1792 to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania. 1819 – Simón Bolívar triumphs over Spain in the Battle of Boyacá. 1858 – The first Australian rules football match is played between Melbourne Grammar and Scotch College. 1890 – Anna Månsdotter, found guilty of the 1889 Yngsjö murder, became the last woman to be executed in Sweden. 1901–present 1909 – Alice Huyler Ramsey and three friends become the first women to complete a transcontinental auto trip, taking 59 days to travel from New York, New York to San Francisco, California. 1927 – The Peace Bridge opens between Fort Erie, Ontario and Buffalo, New York. 1930 – The last confirmed lynching of black people in the Northern United States occurs in Marion, Indiana; two men, Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith, are killed. 1933 – The Kingdom of Iraq