On This Day: 17 June

Francis Drake proclaims English sovereignty over New Albion (California)		1579
Dutch explorer Willem Barentsz discovers the Arctic archipelago of Spitsbergen		1596
Mumtaz Mahal, wife of Mughal emperor Shah Jahan I, dies during childbirth. He will spend the next 17 years building her mausoleum, the Taj Mahal		1631
Portugal definitively secured independence from Spain in the Battle of Montes Claros – the last battle of the Portuguese Restoration War		1665
French explorers Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet reach the Mississippi River and become the first Europeans to make a detailed account of its course		1673
Louisburg, Cape Breton Island, surrendered by the French to the British		1745
Samuel Wallis, an English sea captain, sights Tahiti; he is considered the first European to do so		1767
Battle of Bunker Hill begins the American War of Independence. The colonists inflict heavy casualties on British forces, but lose the battle		1775
The French Third Estate (Commons) declares itself the National Assembly		1789
London's Opera House burns down		1789
Battle of Trebbia River (Wars of the French Revolution) starts		1799
Charles Mackintosh patents a new waterproof fabric		1823
The Wairau Affray – the first serious clash of arms between Maori and British settlers in the New Zealand Wars – takes place		1843
Three hundred lives are lost when the steamer Griffith is destroyed by fire on Lake Erie		1850
SS Great Eastern leaves the Needles, Isle of Wight, on her first transatlantic voyage		1860
Joseph Lister performs a mastectomy on his sister, in Glasgow Royal Infirmary, using carbolic acid – the first use of antiseptic		1867
Wilhelmshaven, Germany's first military port, is officially inaugurated		1869
The Rumelian Railway – one of the first major railways in the Ottoman Empire – opens		1873
The Statue of Liberty arrives in New York Harbor		1885
The Thames steamboat service starts		1905
Romanian aviation pioneer Aurel Vlaicu makes his first powered flight		1910
Portuguese troops enter action on the Western Front for the first time		1917
Gago Coutinho and Sacadura Cabral, of the Portuguese Naval Aviation, complete the first aerial crossing of the South Atlantic		1922
Seventeen lives are lost as the town of Murchison, New Zealand, is rocked by a 7.8 magnitude earthquake. At the time it was New Zealand's worst natural disaster		1929
Harry and Caresse Crosby publish the Black Sun Press edition of the Tales Told of Shem and Shaun sections of Finnegan's Wake		1929
Eugen Weidmann is the last person to be publicly guillotined in France		1939
The British Expeditionary Force is finally evacuated from France		1940
The Soviet Union occupies Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania		1940
Some 5,000 troops and refugees lose their lives when the British troopship Lancastria, anchored off St. Nazaire, is bombed by German aircraft. Churchill forbids publication of the news		1940
Iceland declares independence from Denmark and becomes a republic		1944
The first kidney transplant is carried out in Chicago		1950
The Soviet Union orders a division of troops into East Berlin to quell a rebellion against the Communist government		1953
The first purpose–built floating trade fair – the Sakura Maru, with 22,000 samples of Japanese goods on board – docks at Tilbury in Essex, where it will remain for four days before continuing on a tour of Europe		1964
China announces that it has successfully exploded its first thermonuclear weapon		1967
Edwin Land patents the Polaroid camera		1970
The bodies of Susan Blatchford, aged 11, and Gary Hanlon, 12, are found in a shallow grave in a wood at Waltham Abbey in Essex, ten weeks after their disappearance. In May 2000, convicted paedophile Ronald Jebson was jailed for life after finally confessing to the so–called 'Babes in the wood' murders		1970
Five members of the Republican Party's Campaign to Re–Elect the President (CREEP) are arrested in the Watergate Building in Washington DC		1972
The IRA takes responsibility for a 20–pound device that explodes in a corner of Westminster Hall (part of the Houses of Parliament)		1974
Defence Secretary Francis Pym announces the locations for the first US nuclear cruise missiles to be stored on British soil: RAF Greenham Common, Berkshire, and the disused RAF Molesworth in Cambridgeshire		1980
The Italian banker Roberto Calvi is found hanged under Blackfriars Bridge		1982
The Argentinian junta sacks President Leopoldo Galtieri		1982
Reggae poet Dennis Loban is sentenced to death for the murder of Peter Tosh		1988
South Africa repeals the Population Registration Act, which required racial classification of all South Africans at birth; this means the end of Apartheid		1991
8,000 scientists attend a conference on AIDS in Florence		1991
Presidents George Bush and Boris Yeltsin sign a "joint understanding" agreement on arms reduction; this would later be codified in START II		1992
Following a televised low–speed highway chase, O. J. Simpson is arrested for the murder of Nicole Simpson and Ronald Goldman		1994
President Clinton launches a $2 billion rescue bid to shore up the Japanese yen		1998
David Beckham agrees a £25m move to Real Madrid		2003
Nine people lose their lives in a mass shooting at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina		2015
At least 64 people lose their lives, and 204 others are injured, in a series of wildfires in central Portugal		2017

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On This Day: 17 June