Today in History in 1587 Virginia Dare, granddaughter of Governor John White of the Colony of Roanoke, Virginia, becomes the first child of English parents to be born in the Americas. Exactly three years later, White returns from a supply trip to England to find that everyone from the colony had disappeared.

Our on this day in history archives contain over 200,000 events, birthdays and deaths from 6,000 years of history. Here is a roundup of a few of them:

August 18 is the 230th day of the year (231st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 135 days remaining until the end of the year.

EVENTS

1201 – The city of Riga in present-day Latvia is founded.

1487 - The Siege of Malaga comes to an end, with the taking of the city by Castilian and Aragonese forces.

1572 – Henry IV of France and Margaret of Valois marry.

1587 - Virginia Dare, granddaughter of Governor John White of the Colony of Roanoke, Virginia, becomes the first child of English parents to be born in the Americas. Exactly three years later, White returns from a supply trip to England to find that everyone from the colony had disappeared.

1612 - The trial of the Pendle witches, one of England's most well-known witch trials, begins at Lancaster Assizes.

1634 - Urbain Grandier, accused and convicted of sorcery, is burned alive in Loudon, France.

1783 - A huge fireball meteor is seen across Great Britain as it passes over the east coast.

1807 - Napoleon Bonaparte creates the Kingdom of Westphalia and installs his brother Jerome Bonaparte as its king.

1864 - American Civil War: Battle of Globe Tavern.

1868 - French astronomer Pierre Janssen discovers helium.

1870 - Franco-Prussian War: Battle of Gravelotte.

1877 – Mars' moon Phobos is discovered by Asaph Hall.

1891 – A major hurricane strikes Martinique, killing around 700 people.

From 1901

1917 – The city of Thessaloniki in present-day Greece is largely destroyed by fire.

1920 - The Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, guaranteeing women the right to vote.

1940 - World War II: Battle of Britain's "Hardest Day", on which both sides suffer their heaviest losses.

1945 - Sukarno becomes President of Indonesia, a day after declaring Indonesia independent from the Netherlands.

1946 - The Vergarolla explosion in Croatia kills 70 people.

1948 - The Australian cricket team completes a 4-0 Ashes series win over England during its undefeated "Invincibles" tour.

1950 - Julien Lahaut, chairman of the Belgian Communist Party, is murdered by far-right extremists.

1958 - Vladimir Nabokov's controversial novel Lolita is published in the United States.

1958 - Brojen Das from Bangladesh becomes the first Asian to swim across the English Channel.

1959 – The Mini automobile goes on sale.

1960 - The combined oral contraceptive pill becomes available in the United States.

1963 - James Meredith becomes the first African American to graduate from the University of Mississippi.

1965 - Vietnam War: Operation Starlite begins - US marines destroy a Viet Cong stronghold on the Van Tuong peninsula in the major American ground battle of the war.

1966 - Vietnam War: The Battle of Long Tan ensues after a patrol from the 6th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment clashes with a Viet Cong force in Phuoc Tuy province.

1971 - Vietnam War: Australia and New Zealand decide to withdraw their troops from Vietnam.

1976 - The Soviet Luna 24 probe lands on the Moon.

1976 - In the Korean Demilitarized Zone at Panmunjom, the axe murder incident results in the deaths of two US soldiers.

1977 – Steve Biko is arrested. His death a few weeks later, at the hands of the police, makes him a symbol of the brutality of South Africa's apartheid system.

1983 – Hurricane Alicia hits Texas, killing 22 people.

1988 – George H. W. Bush makes his campaign promise Read my lips, no new taxes during a speech in Louisiana.

1989 - Leading Presidential hopeful Luis Carlos Galan is murdered near Bogota, Colombia.

1991 – The August Coup against Mikhail Gorbachev begins.

1994 - A magnitude 5.9 earthquake kills 159 people in Algeria.

2005 – A massive power blackout hits the Indonesian island of Java, affecting around 100 million people.

2008 – Pervez Musharraf announces his resignation as President of Pakistan. Asif Ali Zardari succeeds him in September.

2017 - Two people are killed and several are injured in a stabbing attack in Turku, Finland.

2018 - The 2018 Asian Games, co-hosted by the cities of Jakarta and Palembang (in Indonesia), begin.

2018 - Former cricketer Imran Khan becomes Prime Minister of Pakistan.