On This Day: 19 May

Piers Gaveston, favourite of Edward II, is taken prisoner in Scarborough Castle (where he had settled the previous year) by a group of nobles led by Thomas of Lancaster and Guy de Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick; he would be brutally executed by them one month later		1312
Catherine of Aragon (aged 13) is married by proxy to Arthur, Prince of Wales (who is 12)		1499
French explorer Jacques Cartier sets sail on his second voyage to North America with three ships, 110 men, and Chief Donnacona's two sons (whom Cartier had kidnapped during his first voyage)		1535
Anne Boleyn is executed, after being found guilty of adultery, treason and incest		1536
Queen Elizabeth I orders the arrest of Mary, Queen of Scots		1568
Spanish Armada sets sail from Lisbon		1588
Decisive defeat in the Battle of Rocroi, by French forces under the duc d'Enghien, marks the symbolic end of Spain as a dominant land power		1643
The Rump Parliament declares England a Commonwealth		1649
English forces begin an invasion of Jamaica, which would result in its capture from Spain		1655
French physicist, mathematician, astronomer and musician Jean–Pierre Christin proposes the reversal of the Celsius scale (from water boiling at 0 degrees and ice melting at 100 degrees, to vice versa)		1743
Napoleon institutes the Legion d'Honneur		1802
Captain Sir John Franklin and his ill–fated Arctic expedition depart from Greenhithe, Kent (on the Thames estuary)		1845
Mexico ratifies the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, ending the Mexican–American War and ceding California, Nevada, Utah and parts of four other modern–day states to the USA for US$15 million		1848
Oscar Wilde released from Reading Gaol		1897
The 169 islands of the Kingdom of Tonga (the Friendly Islands) become a British protectorate (Times)		1900
Simplon Tunnel officially opened, linking Italy and Switzerland through the Alps		1906
Parks Canada, the world's first national park service, is established as the Dominion Parks Branch under the Department of the Interior		1911
Mustafa Kemal Atatürk lands at Samsun on the Anatolian Black Sea coast, initiating what would become known as the Turkish War of Independence		1919
In a coup d'état engineered by the allegedly Fascist organisation Zveno, and the Bulgarian Army, Kimon Georgiev is installed as Prime Minister of Bulgaria		1934
Egypt closes the Suez Canal to Israeli ships and commerce		1950
The city of South Amboy, New Jersey, is devastated when a barge containing munitions destined for Pakistan explodes in its harbour		1950
11 Bengalis die when police open fire on protesters demanding state recognition of Bengali language in the Bengali Language Movement, at Silchar Railway Station in Assam		1961
Soviet spacecraft Venera 1 passes Venus, becoming the first man–made object to fly by another planet (it had lost contact with Earth a month earlier and did not send back any data)		1961
Marilyn Monroe's rendition of Happy Birthday proves to be the highlight of a birthday salute to President John F. Kennedy at Madison Square Garden		1962
The New York Post Sunday Magazine publishes Martin Luther King Jr.'s 'Letter from Birmingham Jail' (a.k.a. The Negro Is Your Brother), defending the strategy of non–violent resistance to racism		1963
Tui Malila, a Madagascar radiated tortoise, dies. Presented to the Tongan royal family by Captain Cook in 1773 or 1777, it was therefore at least 188 years old – the world's oldest tortoise		1965
The Soviet Union launches Mars 2, which would become the first man–made object to reach the surface of Mars (although the landing system failed and the lander was lost)		1971
Royal Navy frigates sail inside Iceland's 50–mile fishing limit		1973
Gaullist Valery Giscard d'Estaing is elected President of France, narrowly defeating the Communist–backed Socialist candidate, Francois Mitterand (who would eventually succeed him seven years later)		1974
Sophia Loren is jailed for one month for non–payment of £2,500 tax in 1970		1982
South African aircraft launch raids on bases in Zambia, Zimbabwe and Botswana, purportedly used by the anti–apartheid African National Congress (ANC)		1986
US President Ronald Reagan signs the Firearm Owners Protection Act – prohibiting the sale to civilians of automatic firearms manufactured after this date		1986
Croatia votes for independence		1991
17 days after the election of a Labour government, Health Secretary Frank Dobson announces that the sponsorship of sports events by tobacco firms is to be outlawed		1997
The Foreign office confirms that King Faud of Saudi Arabia has pardoned British nurses Lucille McLaughlin, 32 (from Dundee) and Deborah Parry, 39 (Alton, Hants) of the murder of their Australian colleague Yvonne Gilford in 1996		1998
Security at the House of Commons comes under scrutiny after Fathers 4 Justice protesters attack prime minister Tony Blair with a bag of purple flour		2004
A mystery buyer, believed to be Roman Abramovich, pays £478,000 for the 1896–1909 FA Cup – a record for an item of football memorabilia. (Made in 1896 to replace the one stolen from a Birmingham shop window, it was presented to Lord Kinnaird in 1909 to mark his 20–year–plus presidency of the FA after the Association realised it didn't have a copyright on it.) At the same auction, Alan Ball's World Cup winner's medal is sold for £164,000		2004
EgyptAir Flight 804 crashes into the Mediterranean while traveling from Paris to Cairo, killing all 66 people on board		2016
An estimated global television audience of 1.9 billion watches the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle at St. George's Chapel, Windsor		2018

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On This Day: 19 May