June 30

• June 30, 827
  The allied fleets of Muslims lands in southwestern Sicily beginning the Muslim conquest of Sicily
• June 30, 1097
  The Crusaders defeat the Turks at Battle of Dorylaeum
• June 30, 1520
  Moctezuma II is murdered by the Aztec as Spanish conquistadors under Cortez fled the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan during the night and begin to plunder gold
• June 30, 1859
  French acrobat Charles Blondin crosses Niagara Falls on a tightrope as 5,000 spectators watch
• June 30, 1893
  Excelsior Diamond, the second largest rough diamond of gem quality ever found, is discovered at the Jagersfontein Mine in South Africa
• June 30, 1894
  Tower Bridge, a combined bascule and suspension bridge in London which crosses the River Thames, is opened
• June 30, 1908
  The Tunguska event near Tunguska River in central Siberia, Russia, later conjectured to be a meteorite strike, explodes 5-10 km above the forest and devastates thousands of square kilometers of Siberia
• June 30, 1923
  New Zealand claims Ross Dependency in Antarctica
• June 30, 1960
  Belgian Congo gains independence from Belgium as Republic of the Congo, triggering Congo Crisis, a conflict between nationalist faction under Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba and leader of country Mobutu Sese Seko
• June 30, 1963
  Cardinal Montini elected Pope Paul VI, 262nd head of Roman Catholic Church
• June 30, 1971
  Three cosmonauts die as Soyuz 11 depressurizes during reentry
• June 30, 1997
  Collapse of the currency of Thailand sparks the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis
• June 30, 2002
  Brazil national football team wins its fifth championship at the FIFA World Cup, held in South Korea and Japan

June 29

• June 29, 69
  Saint Peter, an early Christian leader and one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus Christ, is crucified upside down at his own request, since he saw himself unworthy to be crucified in the same way as Jesus Christ, according to Christian tradition
• June 29, 1236
  Ferdinand III of Castile conquers Cordoba, the old Umayyad capital in Spain
• June 29, 1440
  Italian League led by the Republic of Florence beat the Milanese in the Battle of Anghiari
• June 29, 1504
  Diego Mendez, one of Columbus's captains, returned to Jamaica with a small caravel and rescued the Columbus expedition, that stumbled across the Cayman Islands
• June 29, 1541
  The Spanish explorer Francisco Vásquez de Coronado reaches Kansas during the exploration of American southwest
• June 29, 1767
  The British Parliament approved the Townshend Revenue Acts, sponsored by statesman Charles Townshend, which imposed import duties on glass, lead, paint, paper and tea shipped to America
• June 29, 1858
  China cedes north bank of Amur River to Russia by Treaty of Aigun
• June 29, 1880
  The new king of Tahiti, pushed by the governor Henri Isidore Chessé, abdicate in favor of France
• June 29, 1881
  Muhammad Ahmad, a religious leader of the Samaniyya order, proclaims himself as the Mahdi or messianic redeemer of the Islamic faith in Sudan and leads a successful military campaign against the Turco-Egyptian government of the Sudan
• June 29, 1888
  Professor Frederick Treves performs the first appendectomy, the surgical removal of the vermiform appendix, in England
• June 29, 1913
  Second Balkan War begins, when Bulgaria, dissatisfied with its share of the spoils of the First Balkan War, attacks its former allies, Serbia and Greece
• June 29, 1916
  Boeing Model 1, the first Boeing aircraft, flies for first time
• June 29, 1921
  Adolf Hitler becomes Führer of the National Socialist German Workers' Party, commonly called Nazi Party, as hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic begins

June 28

• June 28, 1577
  Peter Paul Rubens, a Flemish painter, is born in Germany, in family of protestants exiled from Antwerp
• June 28, 1635
  The French colony of Guadeloupe is established in the Caribbean
• June 28, 1650
  Lord Cromwell set off for Scotland at the head of an army of 16,354 men
• June 28, 1675
  Frederick William, Elector of Brandenburg and Duke of Prussia, crushes the Swedes, who invaded and occupied parts of Brandenburg, at Fehrbellin
• June 28, 1745
  American New Englanders capture France's most imposing North American stronghold on Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia
• June 28, 1758
  British colonel James Wolfe issues the Wolfe's Manifesto for psychological intimidation of French forces
• June 28, 1776
  Colonists repulse a British sea attack on Charleston, South Carolina
• June 28, 1838
  Britain's Queen Victoria is crowned in Westminster Abbey
• June 28, 1914
  Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie are shot to death by Bosnian Serb nationalist Gavrilo Princip during an official visit to the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo, triggering World War I
• June 28, 1919
  The Treaty of Versailles, signed by Germany and the Allied Powers, blames Germany for World War I, establishes the Weimar Republic, redraws European borders, and creates a League of Nations
• June 28, 1935
  United States President Franklin Roosevelt orders the construction of a gold vault at Fort Knox, Kentucky
• June 28, 1941
  U.S. President Roosevelt signs Executive Order 8807, which creates the Office of Scientific Research and Development
• June 28, 1969
  Stonewall riots, a spontaneous demonstrations by members of the gay community against a police raid, marks start of the gay liberation movement
• June 28, 1978
  Seasat, the first Earth-orbiting satellite designed for remote sensing of the Earth's oceans, is launched by NASA

June 27

• June 27, 1580
  Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, the Duke of Alba, invade Portugal to put it under Spain's rule, ending the struggle for the throne of Portugal after the death of young King Sebastian I
• June 27, 1693
  The first woman's magazine "The Ladies' Mercury" published in London
• June 27, 1743
  King George of the English defeat the French at Dettingen, Bavaria during War of the Austrian Succession
• June 27, 1806
  Buenos Aires is captured by British
• June 27, 1839
  African slaves, kidnapped in Sierra Leone and sold into slavery in Cuba, revolt on the board of the Spanish coasting vessel La Amistad, transferring them from Cuba to Porta Prince as a load, then kill the captain, and order the crew back to Africa
• June 27, 1871
  The yen becomes the new form of currency in Japan during period of modernisation in Japan
• June 27, 1967
  The world's first automated teller machine is installed in Enfield, London
• June 27, 1977
  Djibouti gains independence from France, formerly the French Territory of the Afars and Issas

June 26

• June 26, 363
  Roman Emperor Julian receives a mortal wound in battle with the Sassanian Persians during battle of Samarra. Jovian succeeds
• June 26, 1541
  Francisco Pizarro, the Spanish Conqueror of Peru, is murdered by his former followers in Lima
• June 26, 1630
  Sweden enters the German wars, as King Gustavus Adolphus and 13,000 men, comprised of mostly Swedes, with some Scottish and Irish mercenaries, land on the island of Usedom off the Pomeranian coast after Imperial intervention in Poland
• June 26, 1721
  Dr. Zabdiel Boylston gives the first smallpox inoculation in Boston during the epidemic that has arrived by ship from Barbados
• June 26, 1794
  French defeat the Coalition Army at the Battle of Fleurus
• June 26, 1830
  Britainэs King George IV dies and is succeeded by his brother, King William IV
• June 26, 1894
  The American Railway Union with 125,000 workers, led by Eugene V. Debs, calls a general strike in sympathy with Pullman workers that blocked freight traffic in and out of Chicago
• June 26, 1909
  The Science Museum in London comes into existence as an independent entity
• June 26, 1924
  After eight years of occupation, United States troops leave the Dominican Republic
• June 26, 1936
  The Focke-Wulf Fw 61, the first practical helicopter, flies for the first time in Germany
• June 26, 1945
  United Nations Charter, the foundational treaty of the United Nations, is signed by 50 nations in San Francisco, California, United States
• June 26, 1948
  U.S. and British pilots begin delivering food and supplies by airplane to West Berlin after the city is isolated by a Soviet Union blockade
• June 26, 1963
  USA President John F. Kennedy speaks the famous words "Ich bin ein Berliner", which means I am a Berliner, on a visit to West Berlin
• June 26, 1974
  The Universal Product Code, a barcode symbology, is scanned for the first time, to sell a pack of chewing gum in Ohio
• June 26, 1976
  The CN Tower, the world's tallest free-standing land-based structure, opens in Toronto, Canada
• June 26, 1997
  Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, the first novel about a young wizard Harry Potter by British author J. K. Rowling, is released
• June 26, 2000
  A 'rough draft' of the genome, as part of the Human Genome Project, an international scientific research project with a primary goal of determining the sequence of chemical base pairs which make up DNA, is finished

June 25

• June 25, 253
  Saint Lucius I begins his reign as Catholic Pope
• June 25, 524
  Forces of Burgundian Kingdom beat the Frankish army at Battle of Vézeronce averting expansion of Merovingians
• June 25, 841
  Charles the Bald and Louis the German, two grandsons of Charlemagne, defeat third grandson Lothair I at Battle of Fontenoy during Carolingian Civil War
• June 25, 1530
  Augsburg Confession, the 28 articles of the Lutheran churches, are presented to the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V as an attempt to restore religious and political unity in the Holy Roman Empire
• June 25, 1630
  The fork is introduced to American dining by John Winthrop, Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony
• June 25, 1767
  The Jesuits are expelled from Spanish America, and their work is taken over by the Dominican Fathers
• June 25, 1850
  Lord Palmerston, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, claims that every British subject in the world should be protected by the British Empire and calls to to blockade Greece after a mob in Athens burned down the home of a British citizen
• June 25, 1876
  Alliance of native American forces led by Chiefs Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull defeat the United States Army troops of Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer in a bloody battle near southern Montana's Little Bighorn River
• June 25, 1947
  The Diary of a Young Girl, a book written by Jewish girl Anne Frank during the German occupation of the Netherlands in World War II, is published
• June 25, 1950
  Korean War, a war between North and South Korea, begins after Korean People's Army assisted by the Soviet Union cross the 38th parallel and invade South Korea
• June 25, 1975
  Mozambique gains independence after over four centuries of Portuguese rule
• June 25, 1991
  Slovenia and Croatia declare independence from Yugoslavia
• June 25, 2009
  Michael Jackson, an American singer-songwriter often referred to as the "King of Pop", dies of acute propofol and benzodiazepine intoxication after suffering from cardiac arrest

June 24

• June 24, 79
  Titus succeeds to the throne after death of his father, Roman emperor Vespasian
• June 24, 1128
  Afonso I of Portugal defeat the army of his mother Theresa and takes the leadership of the County of Portugal
• June 24, 1314
  Robert the Bruce, King of of Scotland, defeats superior English army at Bannockburn forcing English forces withdraw from Scotland, which becomes the key point in the First War of Scottish Independence
• June 24, 1340
  The English fleet defeat the French fleet at Sluys, off the Flemish coast
• June 24, 1497
  Italian explorer John Cabot, on a voyage for England, lands in North America on what is now Newfoundland and claims the new land for King Henry VII of England
• June 24, 1535
  The Münster Rebellion, an attempt of radical, millennialist, Anabaptists to establish a theocracy ends in bloodshed
• June 24, 1622
  The Dutch attempt to conquer Macau during Dutch–Portuguese War ends with fail after a three-day battle
• June 24, 1648
  Cossacks under Bohdan Khmelnytsky slaughter 2,000 Jews and 600 Polish Catholics in Ukraine
• June 24, 1664
  New Jersey, named after the Isle of Jersey, is founded
• June 24, 1692
  Kingston, Jamaica, is founded
• June 24, 1793
  First republican constitution in France is adopted
• June 24, 1812
  450,000 men of the Grande Armée of Napoleon crosses the Nieman River and begins invasion of Russia, resulting in catastrophic defeat for Franch
• June 24, 1821
  Simón Bolívar defeat the Royalist forces, led by Spanish Field Marshal Miguel de la Torre at Battle of Carabobo outside of Caracas
• June 24, 1859
  At the Battle of Solferino, also known as the Battle of the Three Sovereigns, the French army led by Napoleon III defeat the Austrian army under Franz Joseph I in northern Italy during Second Italian War of Independence
• June 24, 1932
  Bloodless revolution ends absolute monarchy in Thailand
• June 24, 1993
  Andrew Wiles, a British mathematician, wins worldwide fame after presenting his solution for Fermat's Last Theorem, a problem that has been unsolved for more than three centuries

June 23

• June 23, 207 BC
  Carthage is defeated by Roman armies led by the consuls Marcus Livius and Gaius Claudius Nero in the Battle of the Metaurus, while Carthaginian general Hasdrubal is killed, which becomes key battle in the Second Punic War
• June 23, 1606
  Treaty of Vienna ends anti-Habsburg uprising in Royal Hungary
• June 23, 1757
  Forces of the East India Company led by Robert Clive defeat Indians in Battle of Plassey marking the beginning of formal British rule in India after years of commercial activity
• June 23, 1758
  British and Hanoverian armies defeat the French at Krefeld in Germany
• June 23, 1775
  First regatta is hold on Thames, England
• June 23, 1845
  The congress of the Republic of Texas vote to accept annexation by the US after 10 years as an independent republic
• June 23, 1848
  A bloody insurrection of workers in Paris, later ruthlessly suppressed by General Cavaignac, erupts to protest inflation, unemployment and corruption
• June 23, 1865
  Confederate General Stand Watie, who was also a Cherokee chief, surrenders the last sizable Confederate army at Fort Towson, in the Oklahoma Territory
• June 23, 1894
  The International Olympic Committee is created by French Baron Pierre de Coubertin with Demetrios Vikelas as its first president
• June 23, 1938
  Marineland, the world's first oceanarium, opens in Florida, United States
• June 23, 1956
  Gamal Abdel Nasser is elected president of Egypt and new constitution of Egypt is accepted at referendum
• June 23, 1960
  Food and Drug Administration, a federal agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, approve Enovid, the first combined oral contraceptive pill, for contraceptive use
• June 23, 2010
  Marina Bay Sands, a casino-based vacation resort, is officially opened in Singapore and becomes the 2nd most expensive building in the world

June 22

• June 22, 168 BC
  Rome under general Lucius Aemilius Paullus defeats Philip V of Macedon at battle of Pydna and assures dominance in Greece
• June 22, 431
  First Council of Ephesus, the third ecumenical council of the early Christian Church, opens
• June 22, 1476
  The Swiss overcome Burgundy's Charles the Bold at the Battle of Morat during Burgundian Wars
• June 22, 1497
  Antitax insurrection in Cornwall is suppressed at Blackheath, London
• June 22, 1633
  Italian scientist Galileo Galilei is forced to recant that the Earth orbits the Sun and commuted to house arrest by the Roman Catholic Inquisition
• June 22, 1691
  Ahmed II succeeded Suleiman II in the Ottoman House of Osman
• June 22, 1740
  King Frederick II of Prussia ends torture and guarantees freedom of religion and the press
• June 22, 1783
  A poisonous cloud from Laki volcanic eruption in Iceland reaches Le Havre in France
• June 22, 1799
  In France a scientific congress adopts the length of the meter as one ten-millionth of the distance along the surface of the Earth from its equator to its pole, in a curved line of latitude passing through the center of Paris
• June 22, 1815
  Napoleon Bonaparte abdicates a second time, in favour of his son, Napoléon Francis Joseph Charles Bonaparte
• June 22, 1816
  An English statute establishes a single gold standard for money, with silver coins reduced to status of tokens of limited legal tender
• June 22, 1847
  The first doughnut with a hole in it is created in United States
• June 22, 1874
  Doctor Andrew Taylor Still of Macon, Missouri, founds osteopathy, a type of alternative medicine, that claims that the wellbeing of an individual depends on their bones, muscles, ligaments and connective tissue functioning smoothly together
• June 22, 1922
  The Irish Civil War begins between Irish republicans over the Anglo-Irish Treaty shortly after the establishment of the Irish Free State
• June 22, 1922
  Pius XI becomes Pope
• June 22, 1940
  After German blitz France formally surrenders at the signing ceremony, held in the same wagon-lit railroad car used by French Marshal Ferdinand Foch to accept the surrender of Germany in 1918
• June 22, 1941
  Over 4 million soldiers of the Axis powers invade the Soviet Union in Operation Barbarossa, the largest military operation in human history, opening the Eastern Front of World War II
• June 22, 1944
  Soviet forces, comprised of about 1.2 million men, 2715 tanks, and 5327 aircraft, launch Operation Bagration on German Army Group Centre to clear German forces from the Belorussian SSR and eastern Poland
• June 22, 1945
  Okinawa, Japan, is declared captured by the Allies with total US casualties about 80,000 and 120,000 Japanese
• June 22, 1978
  Charon, a satellite of the dwarf planet Pluto, is discovered by James Christy
• June 22, 1992
  Two skeletons excavated in Yekaterinburg are identified as Czar Nicholas II and Tsarina Alexandra

June 21

• June 21, 217 BC
  Roman army is ambushed and destroyed by Hannibal's army, numbering around 55,000 troops, at the Battle of Lake Trasimene, which becomes the largest ambush in military history
• June 21, 1377
  Edward III, King of England, dies
• June 21, 1547
  The great fire in Moscow destroys sections of Moscow which had been built almost entirely of wood including some building in the Kremlin
• June 21, 1607
  The Church of England Episcopal Church, the first Protestant Episcopal parish in America, is established at Jamestown
• June 21, 1661
  Sweden signs the Treaty of Cardis, in which Russia agrees to return to Sweden areas it had conquered in the Baltic lands
• June 21, 1675
  Sir Christopher Wren begins to rebuild St Paul's Cathedral in London, replacing the old building which has been destroyed by the Great fire
• June 21, 1749
  English transport ships land 2576 colonists on what is now Nova Scotia to establish a British military base, naming the town Halifax
• June 21, 1788
  New Hampshire ratifies the United States Constitution as the ninth state, and by the terms of Article VII it is in effect
• June 21, 1834
  Obed Hussey, an American inventor, patents mechanical reaping machine
• June 21, 1887
  Britain celebrates the golden jubilee of Queen Victoria
• June 21, 1893
  George Washington Gale Ferris, engineer, completes the construction of a 77-meter high revolving steel wheel with 38 passenger cars, each with 40 plush chairs, for the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, the first Ferris wheel
• June 21, 1897
  In Austria a giant Ferris wheel, designed by Walter Bassett of England, is opened in Vienna to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the accession of Emperor Franz Joseph to the Habsburg throne
• June 22, 1940
  After German blitz France formally surrenders at the signing ceremony, held in the same wagon-lit railroad car used by French Marshal Ferdinand Foch to accept the surrender of Germany in 1918
• June 21, 1948
  In a lab in Manchester, England, the Small Scale Experimental Machine computer, nicknamed "Baby" is created, the first to contain memory (128 bytes) which could store a program
• June 21, 1985
  It is confirmed by American, German, and Brazilian forensic pathologists that the body exhumed in Brazil on June 6 is, indeed, that of the German physician in Auschwitz concentration camp, Josef Mengele

June 20

• June 20, 451
  Combined Roman and Visigoth forces under Roman general Flavius Aetius stop Attila's army at the Catalaunian Plains in eastern France, the last great military campaign by Western Roman Empire
• June 20, 656
  Caliph Uthman ibn Affan is assassinated, thus Ali becomes caliph
• June 20, 840
  King of the Franks Louis the Pious dies triggering the Civil war in Frankish kingdom between his sons
• June 20, 1646
  In England, Parliament signs a peace treaty with Royalists
• June 20, 1675
  A band of Pokanoket retaliate for the execution of three of their people and attack several isolated homesteads in the small Plymouth colony settlement of Swansea, starting King Philip's War
• June 20, 1743
  The British warship Centurion under Commodore George Anson engaged and overcame the Spanish treasure galleon, Nuestra Senora de Covadonga, near the Philippines killing 58 Spaniards and capturing over 1 million Spanish silver dollars and 500 pounds of native silver
• June 20, 1756
  In India rebels defeat the British army at Calcutta and imprison between 64 and 146 British soldiers in a suffocating cell that gained notoriety as the Black Hole of Calcutta
• June 20, 1789
  Oath on the Tennis Court in Versailles, France, bonds members of the Third Estate to resist eviction until they have a new constitution
• June 20, 1791
  King Louis XVI is caught trying to escape French Revolution in the so-called Flight to Varennes
• June 20, 1793
  Eli Whitney, an American inventor, petitions patent for a cotton gin, a machine which cleans the tight-clinging seeds from short-staple cotton, which becomes one of the key inventions of the Industrial Revolution
• June 20, 1819
  The paddle-wheel steamship Savannah arrives in Liverpool, England, after a voyage of 27 days and 11 hours and becomes the first steamship to successfully cross the Atlantic
• June 20, 1837
  Queen Victoria ascends the British throne following the death of her uncle, King William IV, and beginning the Victorian era when the British Empire get the apex
• June 20, 1877
  Alexander Graham Bell installs the world's first commercial telephone service in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
• June 20, 1893
  A jury in New Bedford, Massachusetts, finds Lizzie Borden innocent of the ax murders of her father, wealthy Fall River, Massachusetts, businessman Andrew Borden and his wife, Abby Borden, however, is ostracized for the rest of her life
• June 20, 1948
  West German Finance Minister Ludwig Erhard eliminates most price controls and introduces a new currency, the "Deutsche mark"
• June 20, 1960
  Federation of Mali, with Senegal, becomes independent of France
• June 20, 1990
  The asteroid Eureka, the first Mars trojan, is discovered by David H. Levy
• June 20, 1991
  The Bundestag in Bonn decides that Berlin should become the German capital
• June 20, 2003
  The North East MRT Line, the world's first fully automated and driverless subway opens in Singapore

June 19

• June 19, 1821
  The Ottomans defeat the Greeks at the Battle of Dragasani
• June 19, 1862
  Congress prohibits slavery in all current and future United States territories
• June 19, 1867
  Mexican Emperor Maximilian is executed on the orders of Benito Juárez by a firing squad in Queretaro
• June 19, 1953
  Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who were convicted of conspiring to pass U.S. atomic secrets to the Soviets, are executed by electric chair at Sing Sing Prison in Ossining, New York
• June 19, 1961
  Kuwait regains complete independence from Britain
• June 19, 2014
  King Juan Carlos I of Spain abdicates in favor of his son, who ascends the Spanish throne as King Felipe VI

June 18

• June 18, 860
  Taking advantage from Byzantine-Arab Wars, Vikings from Rus' Khaganate on 200 vessels attack and lay siege of the city of Constantinople
• June 18, 1152
  Friedrich I Barbarossa is crowned Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire by Pope Adrian IV in Rome
• June 18, 1178
  In Canterbury, five men observe explosions on the Moon, likely the origin of lunar crater Giordano Bruno
• June 18, 1429
  French forces under Joan of Arc defeat the main British army at the battle of Patay
• June 18, 1643
  In England the battle of Chalgrove Field during the English Civil War ends with a minor Royalist victory
• June 18, 1685
  Monmouth Rebellion, an attempt to overthrow James II, begins in England
• June 18, 1757
  Austrian army beat Prussia at the Battle of Kolín, Bohemia
• June 18, 1812
  War of 1812 begins as United States declares war against Britain
• June 18, 1815
  Emperor of the French Napoleon, who escaped from exile in island of Elba, is defeated by British commander Wellington at the Battle of Waterloo, which brings a conclusion to the Napoleonic Wars and marks the beginning of a Pax Britannica
• June 18, 1935
  England and Germany sign a naval treaty, limiting the German surface fleet to 35 percent of British tonnage, and submarine fleet to 45 percent
• June 18, 1948
  Long Play, or 33 1⁄3 rpm microgroove vinyl record, is introduced by Columbia Records and becomes a new standard by the record industry
• June 18, 1979
  Jimmy Carter and Leonid Brezhnev sign the SALT II agreement in Vienna
• June 18, 1982
  Argentine military dictator Leopoldo Galtieri resigns, in the wake of his country's defeat in the Falklands War
• June 18, 1983
  Sally Ride becomes the first American woman in space
• June 18, 1989
  Solidarity, a Polish non–communist party-controlled trade union, wins landslide victory over the Communist Party in first free elections in Poland, beginning Revolutions in Central and Eastern Europe and collapse of the Soviet Bloc in Europe

June 17

• June 17, 362
  Roman emperor Julian decrees religious toleration in the empire and attempts to reestablish paganism
• June 17, 1397
  The Union of Kalmar, which grows out of the dynastic ties of the Scandinavian countries, unites Denmark, Sweden and Norway under one monarch
• June 17, 1579
  Sir Francis Drake sails into San Francisco Bay and proclaims English sovereignty over New Albion in modern-day California
• June 17, 1696
  John III Sobieski, King of Lithuania and Poland, dies
• June 17, 1767
  English navigator Samuel Wallis becomes the first European to visit Tahiti in existing records
• June 17, 1789
  The Third Estate of the Estates-General in France declare itself a national assembly, and undertake to frame a constitution
• June 17, 1797
  Mohammad Khan Qajar, cruel ruler of Persia, is killed, and his nephew Fath Ali Shah succeeded him
• June 17, 1848
  Austrian General Alfred Windisch-Grätz crushes a Czech uprising in Prague against Habsburg control
• June 17, 1930
  United States President Herbert Hoover signs the Hawley-Smoot Tariff bill, which increases some 900 American import duties, so contributing to the depth of the Depression
• June 17, 1942
  First World War II American expeditionary force lands in Africa
• June 17, 1944
  Republic of Iceland proclaimed at Thingvallir, Iceland
• June 17, 1950
  Julius Rosenberg is arrested in the US on suspicion of espionage, accused of heading a spy ring that passed top-secret information concerning the atomic bomb to the Soviet Union
• June 17, 1967
  China becomes world's fourth thermonuclear power
• June 17, 1972
  Five men are arrested for breaking and entering into the DNC headquarters at the Watergate complex, beginning the Watergate scandal

June 16

• June 16, 1487
  Henry VII beat John de la Pole at the Battle at Stoke, the last battle of the Wars of the Roses
• June 16, 1671
  Stenka Razin, Cossack rebel leader, is tortured and executed in Moscow
• June 16, 1755
  British capture Fort Beauséjour during French and Indian War and expel the Acadians, who move to destinations like Maine and Louisiana
• June 16, 1779
  Spain, in support of the US, declares war on England
• June 16, 1815
  Napoleon defeat the Prussians under Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher at the Battle of Ligny, Belgium
• June 16, 1824
  The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals is formed at Old Slaughter's Coffee House in London under the direction of Arthur Broome
• June 16, 1875
  In Paris, France, the first stone is laid for the Sacré-Cœur basilica in Montmartre, dedicated in honor of casualties during the Franco-Prussian War
• June 16, 1903
  Ford Motor Company, an American automaker, incorporates in Detroit
• June 16, 1940
  Marshal Philippe Pétain takes over the government, and immediately calls for a ceasefire after Paul Reynaud resigns as Prime Minister of France
• June 16, 1960
  Psycho, a psychological thriller-horror film directed by Alfred Hitchcock, considered one of the greatest films of all time, is released
• June 16, 1963
  Valentina Tereshkova from Soviet Union becomes the first woman in space
• June 16, 1976
  Student uprisings begin in Soweto, South Africa, in response to the introduction of Afrikaans as the medium of instruction in local schools
• June 16, 1977
  Leonid Brezhnev is named president of USSR
• June 16, 1989
  A crowd of 250,000 gathers at Heroes Square in Budapest for the historic reburial of Imre Nagy, the former Hungarian prime minister who had been executed in 1958
• June 16, 2009
  The first summit of BRICS economic bloc, an international association of emerging national economies created by Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, begins

June 15

• June 15, 1094
  El Cid aka Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, a Castilian nobleman and military leader, with a combined Christian and Moorish army conquest Valencia and becomes the ruler of Taifa of Valencia
• June 15, 1184
  King Magnus V of Norway is defeated by his rival, Sverre
• June 15, 1215
  King John of England affixes his royal seal to the Magna Carta, granting his barons more liberty and asserting the supremacy of the law over the king
• June 15, 1389
  Ottoman army under Murad I defeats Serbian army at the battle of Kosovo completing conquest of Serbia
• June 15, 1467
  Philip the Good Duke of Burgundy, dies at age 76
• June 15, 1658
  Aurangzeb, son of Mughal Emperor Shah-Jahan-e-Azam, deposes and imprisons his father, starting his reign lasted for 49 years and considered as an apex of Mughal Empire
• June 15, 1667
  Jean-Baptiste Denys, a French doctor, performs the first animal to human blood transfusion, transfusing nine ounces of blood from a lamb into 15-year-old boy
• June 15, 1703
  The Rákóczi Uprising against the Habsburg Monarchy becomes the first significant attempt to topple the rule of Habsburg Austria over Hungary
• June 15, 1733
  St. Croix island is purchased from the French by the Dutch West India and Guinea Company
• June 15, 1744
  The warship Centurion under British Commodore George Anson returns to England with a treasure
• June 15, 1775
  The Second Continental Congress vote unanimously to appoint George Washington head of the Continental Army
• June 15, 1785
  Two French balloonists, Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and Pierre Romain, die in world's first fatal aviation accident during flight across the English Channel
• June 15, 1844
  Charles Goodyear receives patent #3633 for the vulcanization of rubber, his process to strengthen rubber
• June 15, 1846
  The dispute between the United Staes and Great Britain over the Oregon country is settled by treaty, establishing the boundary at the 49th parallel
• June 15, 1878
  First attempt at motion pictures, using 12 cameras, each taking one picture, is done by Eadweard Muybridge to see if all four of a horse's hooves leave the ground at the same time
• June 15, 1888
  Wilhelm II becomes emperor of Germany
• June 15, 1896
  The Meiji Sanriku tsunami, triggered by magnitude 8.5 earthquake, strikes Japan and causes some 27,000 deaths and destroys 170 miles of coastline
• June 15, 1919
  Lieutenant Arthur Whitten Brown and Captain John Alcock complete the first trans-Atlantic non-stop flight, landing in Ireland
• June 15, 2000
  The June 15th North–South Joint Declaration is adopted between leaders of North and South Korea

June 14

• June 14, 1645
  Oliver Cromwell's army routes the King's army at Naseby, which markd the decisive turning point in the English Civil War
• June 14, 1649
  Jesuits set fire to Sainte-Marie among the Hurons in North America, abandoning the settlement created in 1639, due to Iroquois on the warpath against them
• June 14, 1667
  The Dutch fleet burn 3 ships and capture the English flagship near the River Medway during the Second Anglo-Dutch War
• June 14, 1755
  In England the first edition of Samuel Johnson's "A Dictionary of the English Language", which has 42,773 entries, is published
• June 14, 1777
  The Continental Congress in Philadelphia adopts the Stars and Stripes, created by Betsy Ross, as the national flag
• June 14, 1789
  Captain William Bligh of the HMS Bounty arrives in Timor in a small boat
• June 14, 1800
  French General Napoleon Bonaparte pushes the forces of Austria out of Italy in the Battle of Marengo
• June 14, 1822
  Charles Babbage, a young Cambridge mathematician, announces the invention of a machine capable of performing simple arithmetic calculations, which could perform up to 60 error-free calculation in 5 minutes, to the Astronomical Society
• June 14, 1834
  A process for making sandpaper is patented by Isaac Fischer, Springfield, Vermont
• June 14, 1846
  Americans in Northern California rebel against Mexican authorities in what is called the Bear Flag Revolt and proclaim the Republic of California
• June 14, 1866
  Prussia attacks Austria after disagreements over the administration of Schleswig-Holstein, starting Austro-Prussian War
• June 14, 1923
  Bulgarian Prime Minister Aleksandar Stamboliyski is brutally tortured and killed during a military coup
• June 14, 1935
  Chaco War between Bolivia and Paraguay ends with Paraguayan victory
• June 14, 1940
  Soviet Premier Josef Stalin sends an ultimatum to Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, making territorial demands
• June 14, 1943
  The Combined Bomber Offensive launches Operation Pointblank, a strategic bombing campaign against German industry and civilian morale
• June 14, 1982
  Argentina surrenders to Britain at Port Stanley, Falkland Islands, ending 74-day Falklands War over two British overseas territories in the South Atlantic
• June 14, 2008
  Expo 2008 is held in Zaragoza, Spain, with the topic of "Water and sustainable development"

June 13

• June 13, 323 BC
  Alexander the Great dies of fever after a feast in Babylon, which causes wars of the Diadochoi, his generals and friends, in the Empire
• June 13, 40
  Gnaeus Julius Agricola, a Roman general and governor of Britain, is born
• June 13, 1381
  During the Revolt of Peasants the rebels enter London and, joined by many local townsfolk, attack the gaols, destroy the Savoy Palace and the Temple Inns of Court
• June 13, 1886
  King Ludwig II, King of Bavaria, drowns in Lake Starnberg and is found floating dead with his doctor
• June 13, 1886
  A swift fire destroys Vancouver, Canada, in a time variously reported between twenty and forty-five minutes consuming about 1,000 wooden buildings, virtually the entire city
• June 13, 1956
  Real Madrid wins the first season of the European Cup, UEFA's premier club football tournament

June 12

• June 12, 1665
  England installs a municipal government in New York City, the former Dutch settlement of New Amsterdam
• June 12, 1701
  The Act of Settlement establishes the order of succession to the English throne and gives English crown to Sophia, Princess of Hanover
• June 12, 1776
  Virginia's colonial legislature becomes the first to adopt a Bill of Rights which grants every individual the right to the enjoyment of life and liberty and to acquire and possess property
• June 12, 1792
  George Vancouver discovers site of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
• June 12, 1849
  Gas mask is patented by Lewis Haslett
• June 12, 1898
  Emilio Aguinaldo, rebel leader and the first president, proclaims Philippine independence from Spain
• June 12, 1944
  Germany launches the first V-1 flying bombs against Britain: from 55 launch sites, seven are able to launch a total of ten flying bombs during the night, of which three reach England
• June 12, 1963
  African-American civil rights leader Medgar Evers, aged 37, is gunned down in the driveway of his home in Jackson, Mississippi, United States
• June 12, 1964
  South African justice Quartus de Wet sentences anti-apartheid politician Nelson Mandela and two of his co-accused to life imprisonment
• June 12, 1967
  Six-Day War between Israel and the neighboring states of Egypt, Jordan, and Syria ends with conquest of Sinai Peninsula and the West Bank of the Jordan River by Israel
• June 12, 1982
  Israel invades Lebanon after an attempt of Abu Nidal Organization to assassinate Shlomo Argov, Israel's ambassador to the United Kingdom
• June 12, 1987
  During a visit to Berlin, Germany, U.S. President Ronald Reagan challenges Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall
• June 12, 1991
  Boris Yeltsin is elected President of Russia, the largest and most populous of the fifteen Soviet republics
• June 12, 1997
  The Globe Theater, a theatre in London associated with William Shakespeare, is reopened by Queen Elizabeth II
• June 12, 1999
  NATO-led United Nations peacekeeping forces KFOR enter the province of Kosovo in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
• June 12, 2008
  A public vote in Ireland on the European Union's Lisbon treaty results in a "no" decision, by 53.4 percent to 46.6, while all members of the European Union must ratify the treaty for it to take effect
• June 12, 2009
  Official results of presidential election in Iran show Mahmoud Ahmadinejad defending his re-election with 62.6 percent of votes which lead to a series of sustained protests

June 11

• June 11, 1719
  Spanish attempt to restart the Jacobite rebellion fails after Scottish rebels, aided by Spanish troops, who are defeated at Glen Shiel surrender
• June 11, 1727
  George I dies on a journey to Hanover, George II becomes king of England
• June 11, 1742
  Austria cedes most of Silesia to Prussia by Treaty of Breslau, ending the First Silesian War
• June 11, 1770
  Captain James Cook, commander of the British ship Endeavour, discovers the Great Barrier Reef off Australia by running onto it
• June 11, 1795
  In Tripoli Pasha Yusuf Karamanli deposes his older brother Hamet in a bloodless coup in Ottoman Tripolitania
• June 11, 1798
  Napoleon captures Malta on his way to Egypt and expels the Knights Hospitaller of Malta from their base
• June 11, 1858
  Saint Isaac's Cathedral, the largest orthodox basilica, built by the French-born architect Auguste de Montferrand in Saint Petersburg, is opened
• June 11, 1898
  Guangxu Emperor of China began Hundred Days' Reform in effort to modernize China, but conservative forces soon squelch the attempt
• June 11, 1901
  Cook Islands are annexed and proclaimed part of New Zealand
• June 11, 1935
  Edwin Armstrong demonstrates FM broadcasting, broadcasting technology that uses the encoding of information in a carrier wave by varying the instantaneous frequency of the wave, for the first time
• June 11, 1963
  Thich Quảng Duc, Buddhist monk, immolates himself on a street in Saigon as a protest against the persecution of Buddhists by the South Vietnamese government
• June 11, 1975
  A democratic and republican Constitution of Greece is promulgated
• June 11, 2008
  Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope is launched
• June 11, 2009
  The World Health Organization declares the H1N1 influenza has reached the pandemic level, the first time it has called a global flu epidemic in 41 years