- 553 – The Second Council of Constantinople begins.[1]
- 1215 – Rebel barons renounce their allegiance to King John of England — part of a chain of events leading to the signing of the Magna Carta.
- 1260 – Kublai Khan becomes ruler of the Mongol Empire.[2]
- 1640 – King Charles I of England dissolves the Short Parliament.[3]
- 1654 – Cromwell’s Act of Grace, aimed at reconciliation with the Scots, proclaimed in Edinburgh.
- 1762 – Russia and Prussia sign the Treaty of St. Petersburg.
- 1789 – In France, the Estates-General convenes for the first time since 1614.
- 1809 – Mary Kies becomes the first woman awarded a U.S. patent, for a technique of weaving straw with silk and thread.
- 1821 – Emperor Napoleon dies in exile on the island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean.
- 1835 – The first railway in continental Europe opens between Brussels and Mechelen.
- 1862 – Cinco de Mayo: Troops led by Ignacio Zaragoza halt a French invasion in the Battle of Puebla in Mexico.
- 1864 – American Civil War: The Battle of the Wilderness begins in Spotsylvania County.
- 1865 – American Civil War: The Confederate government was declared dissolved at Washington, Georgia.
- 1866 – Memorial Day first celebrated in United States at Waterloo, New York.
- 1877 – American Indian Wars: Sitting Bull leads his band of Lakota into Canada to avoid harassment by the United States Army under Colonel Nelson Miles.
- 1891 – 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.
- 1904 – Pitching against the Philadelphia Athletics at the Huntington Avenue Grounds, Cy Young of the Boston Americans throws the first perfect game in the modern era of baseball.
- 1905 – The trial in the Stratton Brothers case begins in London, England; it marks the first time that fingerprint evidence is used to gain a conviction for murder.
- 1920 – Authorities arrest Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti for alleged robbery and murder.
- 1936 – Italian troops occupy Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
- 1940 – World War II: Norwegian Campaign: Norwegian squads in Hegra Fortress and Vinjesvingen capitulate to German forces after all other Norwegian forces in southern Norway had laid down their arms.
- 1941 – Emperor Haile Selassie returns to Addis Ababa; the country commemorates the date as Liberation Day or Patriots’ Victory Day.
- 1945 – World War II: The Prague uprising begins as an attempt by the Czech resistance to free the city from German occupation.
- 1945 – World War II: A Fu-Go balloon bomb launched by the Japanese Army kills six people near Bly, Oregon.
- 1945 – World War II: Battle of Castle Itter, the only battle in which American and German troops fought cooperatively.
- 1946 – The International Military Tribunal for the Far East begins in Tokyo with twenty-eight Japanese military and government officials accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
- 1955 – The General Treaty, by which France, Britain and the United States recognize the sovereignty of West Germany, comes into effect.
- 1961 – Alan Shepard becomes the first American to travel into outer space, on a sub-orbital flight.
- 1964 – The Council of Europe declares May 5 as Europe Day.
- 1972 – Alitalia Flight 112 crashes into Mount Longa near Palermo, Sicily, killing all 115 aboard, making it the deadliest single-aircraft disaster in Italy.
- 1973 – Secretariat wins the 1973 Kentucky Derby in 1:592⁄5, an as-yet unbeaten record.
- 1980 – Operation Nimrod: The British Special Air Service storms the Iranian embassy in London after a six-day siege.
- 1981 – Bobby Sands dies in the Long Kesh prison hospital after 66 days of hunger-striking, aged 27.
- 1985 – Ronald Reagan visits the military cemetery at Bitburg and the site of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, where he makes a speech.
- 1987 – Iran–Contra affair: Start of Congressional televised hearings in the United States of America
- 1991 – A riot breaks out in the Mt. Pleasant section of Washington, D.C. after police shoot a Salvadoran man.
- 1994 – The signing of the Bishkek Protocol between Armenia and Azerbaijan effectively freezes the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
- 1994 – American teenager Michael P. Fay is caned in Singapore for theft and vandalism.
- 2006 – The government of Sudan signs an accord with the Sudan Liberation Army.
- 2007 – Kenya Airways Flight 507 crashes after takeoff from Douala International Airport in Douala, Cameroon, killing all 114 aboard, making it the deadliest aircraft disaster in Cameroon.[4]
- 2010 – Mass protests in Greece erupt in response to austerity measures imposed by the government as a result of the Greek government-debt crisis.
-Source: wikipedia
