June
4
Independence
Day
Tonga : June 4 1970
June
4 : International Day of Innocent Children
Victims of Aggression
On 19 August 1982, at its emergency special
session on the question of Palestine, the
General Assembly, “appalled at the great number
of innocent Palestinian and Lebanese children
victims of Israel’s acts of aggression”, decided
to commemorate 4 June of each year as the
International Day of Innocent Children Victims
of Aggression (resolution ES-7/8).
The
purpose of the day is to acknowledge the pain
suffered by children throughout the world
who are the victims of physical, mental and
emotional abuse. This day affirms the UN's
commitment to protect the rights of children.
Events
1039
– Henry III becomes Holy Roman Emperor.
1411 – King Charles VI granted a monopoly
for the ripening of Roquefort cheese to the
people of Roquefort-sur-Soulzon as they had
been doing for centuries.
1615 – Siege of Osaka: Forces under the shogun
Tokugawa Ieyasu take Osaka Castle in Japan.
1760 – Great Upheaval: New England planters
arrive to claim land in Nova Scotia, Canada
taken from the Acadians.
1783 – The Montgolfier brothers publicly demonstrate
their montgolfière (hot air balloon).
1792 – Captain George Vancouver claims Puget
Sound for the Kingdom of Great Britain.
1794 – British troops capture Port-au-Prince
in Haiti.
1802 – Grieving over the death of his wife,
Marie Clotilde of France, King Charles Emmanuel
IV of Sardinia abdicates his throne in favor
of his brother, Victor Emmanuel.
1812 – Following Louisiana's admittance as
a U.S. state, the Louisiana Territory is renamed
the Missouri Territory.
1825 – French American Revolutionary War General
Lafayette speaks at what would become Lafayette
Square, Buffalo, during his visit to the United
States.
1859 – Italian Independence wars: In the Battle
of Magenta, the French army, under Louis-Napoleon,
defeat the Austrian army.
1862 – American Civil War: Confederate troops
evacuate Fort Pillow on the Mississippi River,
leaving the way clear for Union troops to
take Memphis, Tennessee.
1876 – An express train called the Transcontinental
Express arrives in San Francisco, California,
via the First Transcontinental Railroad only
83 hours and 39 minutes after leaving New
York City.
1878 – Cyprus Convention: The Ottoman Empire
cedes Cyprus to the United Kingdom but retains
nominal title.
1896 – Henry Ford completes the Ford Quadricycle,
his first gasoline-powered automobile, and
gives it a successful test run.
1912 – Massachusetts becomes the first state
of the United States to set a minimum wage.
1913 – Emily Davison, a suffragette, runs
out in front of King George V's horse, Anmer,
at the Epsom Derby. She is trampled, never
regains consciousness and dies a few days
later.
1916 – World War I: Russia opens the Brusilov
Offensive with an artillery barrage of Austro-Hungarian
lines in Galicia.
1917 – The first Pulitzer Prizes are awarded:
Laura E. Richards, Maude H. Elliott, and Florence
Hall receive the first Pulitzer for biography
(for Julia Ward Howe). Jean Jules Jusserand
receives the first Pulitzer for history for
his work With Americans of Past and Present
Days. Herbert B. Swope receives the first
Pulitzer for journalism for his work for the
New York World.
1919 – Women's rights: The U.S. Congress approves
the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution,
which guarantees suffrage to women, and sends
it to the U.S. states for ratification.
1920 – Hungary loses 71% of its territory
and 63% of its population when the Treaty
of Trianon is signed in Paris.
1928 – President of the Republic of China
Zhang Zuolin is assassinated by Japanese agents.
1939 – Holocaust: The MS St. Louis, a ship
carrying 963 Jewish refugees, is denied permission
to land in Florida, United States, after already
being turned away from Cuba. Forced to return
to Europe, more than 200 of its passengers
later die in Nazi concentration camps.
1940 – World War II: The Dunkirk evacuation
ends – British forces complete evacuation
of 300,000 troops from Dunkirk in France.
To rally the morale of the country, Winston
Churchill delivers his famous "We shall
fight on the beaches" speech.
1942 – World War II: The Battle of Midway
begins. Japanese Admiral Chuichi Nagumo orders
a strike on Midway Island by much of the Imperial
Japanese navy.
1943 – A military coup in Argentina ousts
Ramón Castillo.
1944 – World War II: A hunter-killer group
of the United States Navy captures the German
submarine U-505 – the first time a U.S. Navy
vessel had captured an enemy vessel at sea
since the 19th century.
1944 – World War II: Rome falls to the Allies,
the first Axis capital to fall.
1957 – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered
his famous Power of Nonviolence speech at
the University of California, Berkeley.
1961 – In the Vienna summit, Soviet premier
Nikita Khrushchev sparks the Berlin Crisis
by threatening to sign a separate peace treaty
with East Germany and ending American, British
and French access to East Berlin.
1965 – Duane Earl Pope robbed the Farmers'
State Bank of Big Springs, Nebraska, killing
three people execution style and severely
wounding a fourth. The crime landed Pope on
the FBI Ten Most Wanted list.
1967 – Stockport Air Disaster: British Midland
flight G-ALHG crashes in Hopes Carr, Stockport,
killing 72 passengers and crew.
1970 – Tonga gains independence from the United
Kingdom.
1974 – During Ten Cent Beer Night, inebriated
Cleveland Indians fans start a riot, causing
the game to be forfeited to the Texas Rangers.
1975 – Governor of California Jerry Brown
signs the California Agricultural Labor Relations
Act into law, the first law in the U.S. giving
farmworkers collective bargaining rights.
1979 – Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings takes
power in Ghana after a military coup in which
General Fred Akuffo is overthrown.
1986 – Jonathan Pollard pleads guilty to espionage
for selling top secret United States military
intelligence to Israel.
1988 – Three cars on a train carrying hexogen
to Kazakhstan explode in Arzamas, Gorky Oblast,
USSR, killing 91 and injuring about 1,500.
1989 – Ali Khamenei is elected the new Supreme
Leader of Islamic republic of Iran by the
Assembly of Experts after the death of Ayatollah
Ruhollah Khomeini.
1989 – The Tiananmen Square protests are violently
ended in Beijing by the People's Liberation
Army.
1989 – Solidarity's victory in the first (somewhat)
free parliamentary elections in post-war Poland
sparks off a succession of peaceful anti-communist
revolutions in Eastern Europe, leads to the
creation of the so-called Contract Sejm and
begins the Autumn of Nations.
1989 – Ufa train disaster: A natural gas explosion
near Ufa, Russia, kills 575 as two trains
passing each other throw sparks near a leaky
pipeline.
1996 – The first flight of Ariane 5 explodes
after roughly 20 seconds. It was a Cluster
mission.
1998 – Terry Nichols is sentenced to life
in prison for his role in the Oklahoma City
bombing.
2001 – Gyanendra, the last King of Nepal,
ascends to the throne after the massacre in
the Royal Palace.
2004 – Marvin Heemeyer's (eventually suicidal)
protest rampage with an improvised bulletproofed
bulldozer destroys 13 Granby, Colorado buildings
including the town hall.
2010 – Falcon 9 Flight 1 was the maiden flight
of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, which launched
from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space
Launch Complex 40.
Holidays
and observances
Bhagat
Puran Singh's Birthday. (Sikhism)
Birthday of Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim (Finland)
Christian Feast Day:
Francis Caracciolo
Optatus
Petroc of Cornwall
Quirinus of Sescia
Saturnina
June 4 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Emancipation Day or Independence Day, commemorates
the abolition of serfdom in Tonga by King
George Tupou in 1862, and the independence
of Tonga from the British protectorate in
1970. (Tonga)
Flag Day (Estonia)
International Day of Innocent Children Victims
of Aggression (International)
National Unity Day (Hungary)
For details, contact Datacentre
|