0330 – Constantinople, previously the town of Byzantium, was founded.
1573 – Henry of Anjou became the first elected king of Poland.
1647 – Peter Stuyvesant arrived in New Amsterdam to become governor.
1689 – French and English naval battle takes place at Bantry Bay.
1745 – French forces defeat an Anglo-Dutch-Hanoverian army at Fontenoy.
1792 – The Columbia River was discovered by Captain Robert Gray.
1812 – British prime Minster Spencer Perceval was shot by a bankrupt banker in the lobby of the House of Commons.
1860 – Giuseppe Garibaldi landed at Marsala, Sicily.
1889 – Major Joseph Washington Wham takes charge of $28,000 in gold and silver to pay troops at various points in the Arizona Territory. The money was stolen in a train robbery.
1944 – A major offensive was launched by the allied forces in central Italy.
1949 – Siam changed its name to Thailand.
1960 – Israeli soldiers captured Adolf Eichmann in Buenos Aires.
1967 – The siege of Khe Sanh ended.
1995 – The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty was extended indefinitely. The treaty limited the spread of nuclear material for military purposes.
1996 – An Atlanta-bound ValuJet DC-9 caught fire shortly after takeoff from Miami and crashed into the Florida Everglades. All 110 people on board were killed.
1998 – India conducted its first underground nuclear tests, three of them, in 24 years.
