May 10

• May 10, 238
  Gordianus III succeeds as Roman emperor as Maximinus Thrax is murdered together with his son and his chief ministers by Praetorian Guard whilst attempting to put down a Senatorial revolt
• May 10, 1267
  Vienna's church orders all Jews to wear a distinctive garb called Pileum cornutum or Jewish Hat
• May 10, 1497
  Italian navigator Amerigo Vespucci leaves for first voyage to New World
• May 10, 1534
  French navigator Jacques Cartier reaches Newfoundland
• May 10, 1559
  Scottish Protestants under John Knox, considered the founder of the Presbyterian denomination in Scotland, upraise against Queen Mary sacking religious houses
• May 10, 1624
  Jacob Willekens and Piet Pieterszoon Hein briefly conquer Salvador, modern-day Brazil
• May 10, 1655
  Jamaica is captured by English
• May 10, 1676
  Bacon's Rebellion, an armed rebellion by Virginia settlers led by young Nathaniel Bacon against the rule of Governor William Berkeley, begins
• 1752, Summer
  Benjamin Franklin, an American polymath, statesman, and diplomat, invents and installs the first lightning rod atop the Pennsylvania State House making storms less dangerous
• May 10, 1773
  To keep the troubled East India Company afloat, Parliament passed the Tea Act, taxing all tea in the American colonies
• May 10, 1774
  Louis XV, King of France, dies of smallpox and is succeeded by his grandson Louis XVI
• May 10, 1775
  The Second Continental Congress convenes in Pennsylvania
• May 10, 1775
  83 Green Mountain Boys, members of a militia organization, led by Ethan Allen capture the British-held fortress at Ticonderoga, N.Y., on the western shore of Lake Champlain and take the entire garrison captive without firing a shot
• May 10, 1789
  Joaquim José da Silva Xavier also known as Tiradentes, rebel for Independence, is arrested in Brazil
• May 10, 1796
  Napoleon Bonaparte win a brilliant victory against the Austrians at Lodi bridge in Italy
• 1816
  American Colonization Society is established by Robert Finley to support the settling of enslaved blacks in Africa
• May 10, 1820
  American Colonization Society begins to send African Americans volunteers to the Pepper Coast to establish a colony for freed African Americans, later known as Liberia
• May 10, 1837
  Panic of 1837 begins, as United States banks in New York refuse to pay out gold and silver in exchange for deposit notes triggering economic depression
• May 10, 1857
  Indian Rebellion begins since revolt of sepoys of India against the British Army, which eventually force the British Empire to assume control of India from the East India Company
• May 10, 1865
  Confederate States of America President Jefferson Davis is captured by USA Cavalry in Irwinsville, Georgia
• May 10, 1869
  The final spike of the first transcontinental railroad acoss the United States is driven when the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific railways meet at Promontory Summit, in Utah Territory
• May 10, 1871
  Franco-Prussian War ends with Treaty of Frankfurt between France and Germany, by which German Empire is recognized and France loses Alsace-Lorraine
• May 10, 1940
  Winston Churchill becomes Prime Minister of the United Kingdom after resignation of previous prime minister Chamberlain and proposal of King George VI
• May 10, 1994
  Nelson Mandela, an anti-apartheid activist and politician, is inaugurated as the first black President of South Africa, marking end of apartheid in South Africa