73 The Romans breach the final defenses at Masada
305 Roman Emperor Diocletian (284-305) retires to grow cabbages at Spoletum, while his partner Maximian (286-305) retires too, under protest
1006 Supernova in Lupus
1045 Giovanni Graziani elected Pope as Gregory VI (1045-1046; abdicated, d. 1048)
1654 Parliament imposes the Pale on Ireland: The Irish are forced west of the Shannon
1703 Battle at Pultusk: Swedes defeat the Russians & Saxons
1707 Parliament forms the United Kingdom of Great Britain
1759 British fleet captures Guadeloupe from the France
1815 Battle of Tolentino: the Austrians defeat Joachim Murat's invasion of nothern Italy from Naples -- Learn More
1857 Filibuster William Walker surrenders to USN, Nicaragua
1862 David Farragut captures New Orleans
1863 Battle of Chancellorsville beings (ends on the 4th)
1863 Confederate Congress urges the killing of black men captured in the military service of the United States
1863 Grant's Vicksburg Campaign: Battle of Port Gibson, Mississippi
1866 The Fenian armed schooner 'Friend' takes a British ship off Canada
1869 The Folies-Bergere opens in Paris, a beacon for soldiers in three Franco-German wars
1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago opens for 18 months -- Learn More
1898 Battle of Manila Bay: "You may fire when ready, Mr. Gridley" -- Learn More
1915 A German U-boat sinks the American tanker 'Gulflight', 3 killed
1917 German torpedo plane sinks the British steamer 'Gena'
1919 Eruption of Mount Kelud, Indonesia, c. 5,000 die
1919 U.S. anti-radical "May Day Raids"
1929 Berlin: May Day demonstrators shot by police, 19 killed & injured
1931 The Empire State Building opens
1936 Emperor Haile Selassie leaves Ethiopia as the Italians rout his army
1937 FDR signs the Second Neutrality Act
1941 German assault on Tobruk
1942 Japanese troops occupy Mandalay, Burma, and press on westwards.
1943 Wartime food rationing begins in US
1944 U.S. Navy bombards Ponape, in the Carolines.
1945 Australians land on Tarakan, Borneo.
1947 Vice Adm Roscoe Hillenkoeter becomes 1st CIA director
1948 Democratic People's Republic of [North] Korea established
1954 Puerto Rican radicals shoot up the House of Representatives, 4 injured
1960 Francis Gary Powers' U-2 spy plane is shot down over Sverdlovsk
1961 Fidel Castro announces there will be no more elections in Cuba
1961 First hijack of an American commercial airliner, to Cuba
1962 First French underground nuclear blast, in the Sahara
1992 Rioting in Los Angeles over the Rodney King verdict
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