December 7:

• 1724 – Tumult of Thorn (Toruń): Polish authorities executed the Mayor of Toruń, Royal Prussia and nine other Lutheran citizens following tensions between Protestants and Catholics.

• 1815 – Michel Ney, Marshal of France, was executed by a firing squad near Paris' Jardin du Luxembourg for supporting Napoleon Bonaparte.

• 1941 – World War II: The Imperial Japanese Navy made its attack on Pearl Harbor, Oahu, Hawaii (pictured).

• 1949 – Chinese Civil War: The government of the Republic of China relocated from Mainland China to Taipei on the island of Taiwan.

• 1988 – An earthquake with a moment magnitude of 7.2 struck the Spitak region of Armenia, then part of the Soviet Union, killing at least 50,000 people.

• 1995 – The Galileo spacecraft arrived at Jupiter, a little more than six years after it was launched by Space Shuttle Atlantis during Mission STS-34.