1571 — Hans Misel is martyred for his faith after refusing to recant his Anabaptist beliefs. According to Martyr’s Mirror, when the executioner brought him to the place where he was to be executed, he said to him, that if he would recant, he still had authority to let him go. But he refused, and would there seal his faith with his blood, and so far as he was concerned, he said, he might proceed. Thus he was beheaded and then burnt, and as they could not burn him quickly enough, they cut him into pieces and burned the pieces. When the executioner had struck off his head, so that the same lay on the ground, his body still remained erect, with the hands uplifted, as though he were praying, till the executioner pushed him over with his foot. It was also said that his head and hair could not be burned, but that it was found entire and undisfigured in the ashes, and was thus buried.
(Being an Anabaptist, that is of particular interest to me. Thanks to Google Alerts and Voice of the Martyrs for the info.)
In other news…
1545 — The first session of the Counter-Reformation Council of Trent opens. Responding to the spread of Protestantism and the drastic need for moral and administrative reforms within the Roman Catholic church, it met on and off for 18 years.
1949 — The Knesset votes to move the capital of Israel to Jerusalem.
1972 — Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt begin the third and final moonwalk of Apollo 17. This was the last manned mission to the moon.
1981 — General Wojciech Jaruzelski declares martial law in Poland to prevent dismantling of the communist system by Solidarity.
2006 — The Baiji (aka Chinese River Dolphin) is announced as extinct.