On May 10, 1534, French navigator Jacques Cartier becomes the first European explorer to encounter the eastern coast of Canada, as he enters the Gulf of St. Lawrence in the present-day province of Quebec. In the first of his three expeditions to Canada, he would circumnavigate the Gulf and explore the coasts of Newfoundland and […]

On May 10, 1775, Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold lead a successful attack on Fort Ticonderoga in upstate New York, while the Second Continental Congress assembles in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Congress faced the task of conducting a war already in progress. Fighting had begun with the Battle of Lexington and Concord on April 19, and […]

Jefferson Davis, president of the fallen Confederate government, is captured with his wife and entourage near Irwinville, Georgia, by a detachment of Union General James H. Wilson’s cavalry. On April 2, 1865, with the Confederate defeat at Petersburg, Virginia imminent, General Robert E. Lee informed President Davis that he could no longer protect Richmond and […]

The humiliating defeat of Louis Napoleon’s Second Empire of France is made complete on May 10, 1871, when the Treaty of Frankfurt is signed, ending the Franco-Prussian War and marking the decisive entry of a newly unified German state on the stage of European power politics, so long dominated by the great empires of England […]

Winston Churchill, First Lord of the Admiralty, is called to replace Neville Chamberlain as British prime minister following the latter’s resignation after losing a confidence vote in the House of Commons. In 1938, Prime Minister Chamberlain signed the Munich Agreement with Nazi leader Adolf Hitler, giving the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia over to German conquest […]

On May 10, 1980, United States Secretary of the Treasury G. William Miller announces the approval of nearly $1.5 billion dollars in federal loan guarantees for the nearly bankrupt Chrysler Corporation. At the time, it was the largest rescue package ever granted by the U.S. government to an American corporation. Founded as the Maxwell Motor […]

The government of the People’s Republic of China announces that it is releasing 211 people arrested during the massive protests held in Tiananmen Square in Beijing in June 1989. Most observers viewed the prisoner release as an attempt by the communist government of China to dispel much of the terrible publicity it received for its […]

Eight climbers die on Mount Everest during a storm on May 10, 1996. It was the worst loss of life ever on the mountain on a single day. Author Jon Krakauer, who himself attempted to climb the peak that year, wrote a best-selling book about the incident, Into Thin Air, which was published in 1997. […]