October 1, 331 BC: Alexander the Great defeats Darius III of Persia  in the Battle of Gaugamela 

October 2, 1187: Saladin captures Jerusalem from Crusaders

October 3, 52 BC: Vercingetorix, leader of the Gauls, surrenders to the Romans under Julius Caesar , ending the siege and battle of Alesia 

October 4, 1072: Sancho II, king of Castile, brother of Alfonso VI, is murdered at about 35.

October 5, 1916: Adolf Hitler is wounded in the left thigh by an exploding shell during the Battle of the Somme 

October 6, 1948: Paleoanthropologist Mary Leakey finds the first partial fossil skull of Proconsul africanus, an ancestor of apes and humans on Rusinga Island, Kenya 

October 7, 1559: Far side of Moon seen for the 1st time, courtesy of USSR's Luna 3 space probe 

October 8, 1862: Otto von Bismarck becomes Chancellor of the German Empire

October 9, 768: Charlemagne and his brother Carloman I are crowned Kings of The Franks 

October 10, 1903: The Women's Social and Political Union was formed by Emmeline Pankhurst  to fight for women's rights in Britain. 

October 11, 1977: American inventor Gordon Gould  issued his first US patent for a optically pumped laser amplifier, 20 years after first claiming to have invented the laser 

October 12, 1900: The first modern submarine is commissioned by the U.S. Navy as the USS Holland, named for its designer John Philip Holland

October 13, 1943: Italy declares war on former Axis partner Germany 

October 14, 1322: Robert the Bruce of Scotland defeats King Edward II of England at Byland, forcing Edward to accept Scotland's independence 

October 15, 533: Byzantine general Belisarius makes his formal entry into Carthage, having conquered it from the Vandals.