On June 1:
193 Roman Emperor Didius Julianus was assassinated.
987 Hugh Capet was elected King of France.
1204 King Philip Augustus of France conquered Rouen.
1215 Beijing ruler Emperor Xuanzong of Jin, was captured by the Mongols under Genghis Khan, ending the Battle of Beijing.
1252 Alfonso X was elected King of Castile and León.
1495 Friar John Cor recorded the first known batch of scotch whisky.
1533 Anne Boleyn was crowned Queen of England.
1660 Mary Dyer was hanged for defying a law banning Quakers from the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
1679 The Scottish Covenanters defeated John Graham of Claverhouse at the Battle of Drumclog.
1779 Benedict Arnold, a general in the Continental Army was court-martialed for malfeasance.
1792 Kentucky was admitted as the 15th state of the United States.
![]() |
![]() |
1794 The battle of the Glorious First of June was fought, the first naval engagement between Britain and France during the French Revolutionary Wars.
1796 Tennessee was admitted as the 16th state of the United States.
![]() |
![]() |
1812 War of 1812: U.S. President James Madison asked the Congress to declare war on the United Kingdom.
1813 James Lawrence, the mortally-wounded commander of the USS Chesapeake, gave his final order: “Don’t give up the ship!”
1815 Napoleon swore fidelity to the Constitution of France.
1831 James Clark Ross discovered the North Magnetic Pole.
1843 Henry Faulds, Scottish fingerprinting pioneer, was born (d. 1930).
1855 American adventurer William Walker conquered Nicaragua.
1857 Charles Baudelaire‘s Fleurs du mal was published.
1862 American Civil War, Peninsula Campaign: Battle of Seven Pines (or the Battle of Fair Oaks) ended inconclusively, with both sides claiming victory.
1868 Treaty of Bosque Redondo was signed allowing the Navajos to return to their lands in Arizona and New Mexico.
1869 Thomas Edison received a patent for his electric voting machine.
1878 – John Masefield, English novelist and poet was born (d. 1967).
1879 Napoleon Eugene, the last dynastic Bonaparte, was killed in the Anglo-Zulu War.
![]() |
1886 – The railroads of the Southern United States converted 11,000 miles of track from a five foot rail gauge to standard gauge.
1890 The United States Census Bureau began using Herman Hollerith‘s tabulating machine to count census returns.
1907 Frank Whittle, English inventor of the jet engine was born (d. 1996).
![]() |
1910 Robert Falcon Scott‘s South Pole expedition left England.
1918 World War I: Battle for Belleau Wood – Allied Forces under John J. Pershing and James Harbord engaged Imperial German Forces under Wilhelm, German Crown Prince.
1920 Adolfo de la Huerta became president of Mexico.
1921 Nelson Riddle, American bandleader and arranger, was born (d. 1985).
1921 Tulsa Race Riot.
1922 The Royal Ulster Constabulary was founded.
1926 Andy Griffith, American actor was born.
![]() |
1926 – Marilyn Monroe, American actress, was born (d. 1962).
1928 Bob Monkhouse, English comedian, was born (d. 2003).
1929 The 1st Conference of the Communist Parties of Latin America was held in Buenos Aires.
1930 Edward Woodward, English actor, was born (d. 2009).
1934 Pat Boone, American singer, was born.
1935 The first driving tests were introduced in the United Kingdom.
1937 Morgan Freeman, American actor, was born.
![]() |
1937 Colleen McCullough, Australian novelist, was born.
![]() |
1939 Maiden flight of the Focke-Wulf Fw 190 Würger (D-OPZE) fighter aeroplane.
1940 The Leninist Communist Youth League of the Karelo-Finnish SSR holds its first congress.
1940 The Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit Corporation went out of business, giving the City of New York full control of the subway system in the city.
1941 World War II: Battle of Crete ended as Crete capitulated to Germany.
1941 – The Farhud, a pogrom of Iraqi Jews in Baghdad.
1942 World War II: the Warsaw paper Liberty Brigade published the first news of the concentration camps.
1943 British Overseas Airways Corporation Flight 777 wasshot down over the Bay of Biscay by German Junkers Ju 88s, killing actor Leslie Howard and leading to speculation the downing was an attempt to kill British Prime Minister Winston Churchill.
1946 Ion Antonescu, “Conducator” (leader) of Romania during World War 2, was executed.
1947 – Ronnie Wood, English guitarist (Rolling Stones), was born.
1950 Wayne Nelson, American musician (Little River Band), was born.
1956 First international flight (to Montreal YUL) from the Atlanta Municipal Airport
1958 Charles de Gaulle cme out of retirement to lead France by decree for six months.
![]() |
1960 New Zealand’s first official television transmission began at 7.30pm.
1960 Simon Gallup, English bassist (The Cure), was born.
1963 Kenya gained internal self-rule (Madaraka Day).
![]() |
|
1974 Flixborough disaster: an explosion at a chemical plant killed 28 people.
1974 –The Heimlich maneuver for rescuing choking victims was published in the journal Emergency Medicine.
1978 The first international applications under the Patent Cooperation Treaty were filed.
1979 – The first black-led government of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in 90 years took power.
![]() |
![]() |
1980 Cable News Network (CNN) begins broadcasting.
1988 The 4th Congress of the Communist Youth of Greece started.
1990 George H. W. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev signed a treaty to end chemical weapon production.
1993 Dobrinja mortar attack: 13 were killed and 133 wounded when Serb mortar shells are fired at a soccer game in Dobrinja, west of Sarajevo.
1999 American Airlines Flight 1420 slid and crashed while landing at Little Rock National Airport, killing 11 people.
2000 The Patent Law Treaty was signed.
2001 Nepalese royal massacre : Crown Prince Dipendra of Nepal shot and killed several members of his family including his father and mother, King Birendra and Queen Aiswarya.
2001 – Dolphinarium massacre: a Hamas suicide bomber killed 21 at a disco in Tel Aviv.
2003 Filling began of the reservoir behind the Three Gorges Dam.
2005 The Dutch referendum on the European Constitution resulted in its rejection.
2009 Air France Flight 447 crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Brazil. All 228 passengers and crew were killed.
2009 – General Motors filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy. It is the fourth largest United States bankruptcy in history.
Sourced from NZ History Online & Wikipedia