The Battles of Chattanooga begins as General Ulysses S. Grant orders two divisions to attack a smaller Confederate force and seize Orchard Knob, a small knoll southeast of Chattanooga.
Sadr City bombings in Baghdad
In one of the deadliest sectarian attacks in Iraq, Sunni insurgents bomb Sadr City, a heavily Shia neighborhood of Baghdad, killing over 200 Iraqi civilians. Al-Qaeda in Iraq, a primary suspect for the mortar attacks and car bombs, staged during the Shi'a remembrance of Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr, killed in 1999.
Declaration signer Edward Rutledge born
Edward Rutledge, the youngest signer of the Declaration of Independence and future Governor of South Carolina, is born in Charleston.
14th President Franklin Pierce is born in Hillsborough, New Hampshire. Born into a political family, Pierce's father was a Revolutionary War veteran and two-term Governor of New Hampshire. Pierce served in the House of Representatives and the Senate before being elected president in 1852.
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