| 1471 | In England, the Yorkists defeat the Landcastians at the battle of Tewkesbury. |
| 1626 | Indians sell Manhattan Island for $24 in cloth and buttons to Dutch Explorer Peter Minuit. |
| 1715 | A French manufacturer debuts the first folding umbrella. |
| 1776 | Rhode Island declares independence from England. |
| 1795 | Thousands of rioters enter jails in Lyons, France, and massacre 99 Jacobin prisoners. |
| 1814 | Napoleon Bonaparte disembarks at Portoferraio on the island of Elba in the Mediterranean. |
| 1863 | The Battle of Chancellorsville ends when Union Army retreats. |
| 1864 | Union General Ulysses S. Grant’s forces cross the Rapidan River and meet Robert E. Lee’s Confederate army. |
| 1886 | A labor demonstration for an eight-hour workday at Haymarket Square in Chicago turned into a riot when a bomb exploded. |
| 1927 | A balloon soars over 40,000 feet for the first time. |
| 1927 | The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was founded. |
| 1930 | Mahatma Gandhi is arrested by the British. |
| 1942 | The Battle of the Coral Sea commences. |
| 1942 | The United States begins food rationing. |
| 1961 | A group of Freedom Riders left Washington, D.C., for New Orleans to challenge racial segregation on interstate buses and in bus terminals. |
| 1970 | Ohio National Guardsmen open fire on student protesters at Kent State University, killing four and wounding nine others. |
| 1980 | Yugoslav President Josip Broz Tito died at age 87. |
| 1994 | Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO leader Yasser Arafat signed an accord on Palestinian autonomy that granted self-rule in the Gaza Strip and Jericho. |
| 1998 | Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski was given four life sentences plus 30 years by a federal judge in Sacramento, Calif., under a plea agreement that spared him the death penalty. |
| 2000 | Londoners elected their mayor for the first time. |
| 2006 | A federal judge sentenced Zacarias Moussaoui to life in prison for his role in the 9/11 terrorist attacks. |
| 2007 | Paris Hilton was sentenced to jail for violating probation in an alcohol-related reckless driving case. (The hotel heiress served 23 days behind bars.) |
Today in History facts are from various sites including, but not limited too: the History Channel, The New York Times, WHG Historynet.com, and HistoryOrb.com.














