June 2nd in History

455 - Sack of Rome: Vandals enter Rome, and plunder the city for two weeks

1676 - Franco-Dutch War: France ensured the supremacy of its naval fleet for the remainder of the war with its victory in the Battle of Palermo.

1692 - Bridget Bishop is the first person to go to trial in the Salem witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts. Found guilty, she is hanged on June 10th.

1793 - French Revolution: François Hanriot, leader of the Parisian National Guard, arrests 22 Girondists selected by Jean-Paul Marat, setting the stage for the Reign of Terror.

1805 - Napoleonic Wars: A Franco-Spanish fleet recaptures Diamond Rock, an uninhabited island at the entrance to the bay leading to Fort-de-France, from the British.

1876 - Hristo Botev, a national revolutionary of Bulgaria, is killed in Stara Planina

1886 - US President Grover Cleveland marries Frances Folsom in the White House, becoming the only President to wed in the executive mansion.

1924 - US President Calvin Coolidge signs the Indian Citizenship Act into law, granting citizenship to all Native Americans born within the territorial limits of the United States.

1946 - Birth of the Italian Republic: In a referendum, Italians vote to turn Italy from a monarchy into a Republic. After the referendum, King Umberto II of Italy is exiled.

1953 - In Westminster Abbey the coronation of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Her Other Realms and Territories & Head of the Commonwealth, the first major international event to be televised.

1955 - The USSR and Yugoslavia sign the Belgrade declaration and thus normalize relations between both countries, discontinued since 1948.

1967 - Luis Monge is executed in Colorado's gas chamber, in the last pre-Furman execution in the United States.

1979 - Pope John Paul II starts his first official visit to his native Poland, becoming the first Pope to visit a Communist country.

2003 - Europe launches its first voyage to another planet, Mars. The European Space Agency's Mars Express probe launches from the Baikonur space centre in Kazakhstan.

2012 - The former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in the killing of demonstrators during the 2011 Egyptian revolution.

Famous Birthdays

926 - Emperor Murakami of Japan

1535 - Pope Leo XI

1731 - Martha Washington, wife of George Washington, 1st First Lady of the United States

1835 - St. Pope Pius X

1907 - Dorothy West, writer

1926 - Milo O'Shea, actor

1932 - Sammy Turner, singer

1940 - His Majesty Constantine II of Greece

1941 - Charlie Watts, drummer, producer, and composer

1955 - Dana Carvey, actor

1972 - Wayne Brady, comedian and actor

1976 - Her Majesty Queen 'Masenate Mohato Seeiso of Lesotho

1980 - Fabrizio Moretti, musician

1990 - Brittany Curran, actress