On This Day: 5 May

Rebel barons renounce their allegiance to King John of England – part of a chain of events leading to the signing of the Magna Carta		1215
Kublai Khan becomes ruler of the Mongol Empire		1260
The Mamelukes under Sultan Qalawun capture the Crusaders' last stronghold at Acre		1291
Christopher Columbus lands on the island of Jamaica, and claims it for Spain		1494
King Charles I dissolves the Short Parliament		1640
King Charles I surrenders to a Scottish army at Newark		1646
Cromwell's Act of Grace, aimed at reconciliation with the Scots, is proclaimed in Edinburgh		1654
Captain John Dutton of the British East India Company occupies St. Helena		1659
Earl Ferrers is the first person to be hanged at Tyburn – for the murder of his valet		1760
Russia and Prussia sign the Treaty of St. Petersburg		1762
The French Estates–General assembles for the first time since 1614, at Versailles		1789
Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of the French 1804–14 and 1814–15, dies in exile on St. Helena		1821
The first railway in continental Europe opens, between Brussels and Mechelen		1835
Giuseppe Garibaldi sets sail from Genoa, leading the expedition of the Thousand to conquer the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies and giving birth to the Kingdom of Italy		1860
Confederates win the Battle of Williamsburg		1862
Battle of the Wilderness began		1864
The USA's first train robbery takes place at North Bend, Ohio		1865
Louis Pasteur carries out a successful public inoculation against anthrax on an ox, several cows, and 25 sheep		1881
Excavation of the Corinth Canal, Greece, begins		1882
The Music Hall in New York City (later known as Carnegie Hall) has its grand opening and first public performance, with Tchaikovsky as the guest conductor		1891
Stocks fall sharply in New York as the "panic of 1893" begins		1893
Cy Young, pitching for the Boston Americans against the Philadelphia Athletics at the Huntington Avenue Grounds, throws the first perfect game in the modern era of baseball		1904
The trial of the Stratton Brothers – the first in which fingerprint evidence would be used to gain a conviction for murder – begins in London		1905
Pravda is published fir the first time, in St. Petersburg		1912
Bartolomeo Vinzetti and Nicola Sacco arrested in New York for possessing anarchist literature		1920
John T. Scopes is arrested in Dayton, Tennessee, for teaching evolution in violation of the Butler Act		1925
To the Lighthouse, by Virginia Woolf, is published for the first time		1927
Amy Johnson begins her solo flight to Australia		1930
Mahatma Gandhi arrested by British authorities in India after his campaign of disobedience		1930
Italian forces capture Addis Ababa, ending the Ethiopian war		1936
Norwegian refugees form a government–in–exile in London, as troops in Norway capitulate to German forces		1940
Emperor Haile Selassie returns to Addis Ababa – on the date subsequently celebrated as Liberation Day or Patriots' Victory Day		1941
British forces invade Madagascar		1942
The International Military Tribunal for the Far East begins in Tokyo, with 28 Japanese military and government officials accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity		1946
Council of Europe set up in London		1949
The General Treaty, by which the post–war occupation officially ends and France, Britain and the United States recognize the sovereignty of West Germany, comes into effect		1955
The World Bank warns that the greatest threat to world peace is poverty		1955
Bert Trautmann breaks his neck in the FA Cup final, playing in goal for Manchester City in a 3–1 victory over Birmingham City		1956
Commander Alan B. Shepherd becomes the first US astronaut		1961
Britain's first satellite launched from Vandenburg air base, California		1963
The Council of Europe declares 5 May as Europe Day		1964
Students, led by Daniel Cohn–Bendit, clash with riot police in Paris		1968
All 115 on board lose their lives when Alitalia Flight 112 crashes into Mount Longa near Palermo, Sicily		1972
Secretariat wins the Kentucky Derby in a record time (still unbeaten in 2019) of 1 minute 59.4 seconds		1973
SAS troops storm the Iranian Embassy in London, freeing 19 hostages (Operation Nimrod)		1980
Bobby Sands, 27, MP for Fermanagh and South Tyrone, dies in the Maze prison after a 66–day hunger strike		1981
Televised Congressional hearings into the Iran–Contra affair begin in Washington, DC		1987
Japanese TV broadcasts the first live pictures from the summit of Everest		1988
The signing of the Bishkek Protocol between Armenia and Azerbaijan effectively freezes the Nagorno–Karabakh conflict		1994
NATO begins low–level bombing in Kosovo, showing the confidence it has in the damage it has inflicted on Serbian air defences and communications		1999
Labour wins a third consecutive election for the first time, but with a majority reduced by almost 100		2005
Mass protests erupt in Greece in response to austerity measures imposed by the government as a result of the government–debt crisis		2010

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On This Day: 5 May