Today in history
1083 — Henry IV of Germany storms Rome, capturing St Peter’s.
1539 — Explorer Hernando De Soto claims Florida in the Americas for Spain.
1621 — Dutch West India Company receives charter for New Netherlands, now New York.
1657 — Death of William Harvey, English physician who discovered the nature of the circulation of blood and the function of the heart as a pump.
1769 — Captain James Cook, a year into his circumnavigation of the world, observes the transit of Venus across the face of the Sun from Tahiti, the main purpose of his voyage.
1818 — The last of the Maratha Wars between the British and the Maratha Confederacy in India ends, securing British supremacy in India.
1864 — More than 7000 Union troops are killed or wounded in less than an hour at Cold Harbour, near Richmond, Virginia, during the American Civil War.
1937 — Britain’s Duke of Windsor, formerly King Edward VIII, marries American divorcee Wallis Simpson in France.
1940 — Allied evacuation from Dunkirk, France, is completed in World War II.
1942 — The Battle of Midway, the turning point in the sea war in the Pacific, begins.
1959 — Singapore becomes selfgoverning.
1968 — Pop artist Andy Warhol is shot and critically wounded in his New York film studio, known as ‘‘The Factory’’, by feminist and actress Valerie Solanas.
1969 — Australian aircraft carrier HMAS Melbourne collides with the US destroyer Frank E Evans in the South China Sea, resulting in the deaths of 74 Americans.
1989 — Chinese troops storm Tiananmen Square, killing hundreds of pro-democracy demonstrators.
1992 — The world’s largest environmental summit, the Earth Summit, opens in Rio De Janeiro with 178 nations taking part.
1998 — A high-speed train derails in Eschede, Germany, killing 101 people.
2000 — Archaeologists scouring the Mediterranean seabed announce they have found the 2500-year-old ruins of the submerged Pharaonic cities Herakleion, Canopus and Menouthis, that until now were known only through Greek tragedies, travelogues and legends.
2001 — Mel Brooks’ musical comedy The Producers wins a record 12 Tony Awards. Today’s Birthdays: Jefferson Davis, first and only president of the US Confederacy (1808-1889); George V, King of England (1865-1936); Josephine Baker, US cabaret artist (1906-1975); Allen Ginsberg, US poet (1926-1997); Suzi Quatro, US singer (1950-); Rafael Nadal, Spanish tennis player (1986-).