10/15/1964
Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev steps down. He had held the positions of party leader and prime minister since the late 1950s.

10/16/1944
His Majesty’s Canadian Ship Annan and HMCS Loch Achanalt are patrolling as part of Escort Group 6 in the Atlantic when they pick up a radar contact from a surfaced U-boat. The two frigates open fire and several crew on Annan are wounded by return fire. Annan sinks U-1006 with depth charges. Forty-six German submariners are rescued.

10/16/1970
Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau invokes the War Measures Act in response to a deepening crisis in Quebec.

10/17/1952
In Korea, Canadian forces become involved in fierce combat on Hill 355. Suffering an extremely heavy bombardment, Canadian soldiers manage to hold on to the hill. It would be the scene of much fighting during the war.

10/17/1970
Quebec cabinet minister Pierre Laporte is murdered by members of the FLQ.

10/18/1940
The destroyer HMCS Skeena rescues six from the torpedoed SS Bruse.

10/18/1967
A Soviet space probe gets a look beneath the clouds of Venus.

10/19/1987
Panicked stockholders sell off millions of shares causing world stock markets to collapse.

10/20/1967
Oakland, Calif., is the site of the biggest anti-Vietnam war demonstration to date.

10/21/1910
The cruiser HMCS Niobe arrives in Halifax.

10/21-24/1944
In Italy, a Canadian infantry brigade is ordered to establish a bridgehead across the swollen Savio River in order to divert German attention from a larger American and British attack on dryer ground near Bologna. The Canadians face thick mud, torrential rain, and high water making it difficult to get heavy weapons across. In the bridgehead’s vulnerable early hours, Private Ernest Alvia Smokey Smith earns the Victoria Cross by repulsing a stubborn and vicious German counter-attack with a PIAT (Projector, Infantry Anti-Tank) gun and a Tommy gun.