Today in History: June 9

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411 BC – The Athenian coup succeeds, forming a short-lived oligarchy. AD 53 – The Roman emperor Nero marries Claudia Octavia. AD 68 – Nero commits suicide, after quoting Homer's Iliad, thus ending the Julio-Claudian dynasty and starting the civil war known as the Year of the Four Emperors. 721 – Odo of Aquitaine defeats the Moors in the Battle of Toulouse. 747 – Abbasid Revolution: Abu Muslim Khorasani begins an open revolt against Umayyad rule, which is carried out under the sign of the Black Standard. 1311 – Duccio's Maestà, a seminal artwork of the early Italian Renaissance, is unveiled and installed in Siena Cathedral in Siena, Italy. 1523 – The Parisian Faculty of Theology fines Simon de Colines for publishing the Biblical commentary Commentarii initiatorii in quatuor Evangelia by Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples. 1534 – Jacques Cartier is the first European to describe and map the Saint Lawrence River. 1667 – Second Anglo-Dutch War: The Raid on the Medway by the Dutch fleet begins. It lasts for five days and results in the worst ever defeat of the Royal Navy. 1732 – James Oglethorpe is granted a royal charter for the colony of the future U.S. state of Georgia. 1762 – British forces begin the Siege of Havana and capture the city during the Seven Years' War. 1772 – The British schooner Gaspee is burned in Narragansett Bay, Rhode Island. 1798 – Irish Rebellion of 1798: Battles of Arklow and Saintfield. 1815 – End of the Congress of Vienna: The new European political situation is set. 1815 – Luxembourg declares independence from the French Empire. 1856 – Five hundred Mormons leave Iowa City, Iowa for the Mormon Trail. 1862 – American Civil War: Stonewall Jackson concludes his successful Shenandoah Valley Campaign with a victory in the Battle of Port Republic; his tactics during the campaign are now studied by militaries around the world. 1863 – American Civil War: Battle of Brandy Station, Virginia. 1885 – Treaty of Tientsin is signed to end the Sino-French War, with China eventually giving up Tonkin and Annam – most of present-day Vietnam – to France. 1900 – Indian nationalist Birsa Munda dies in a British prison of cholera 1915 – William Jennings Bryan resigns as Woodrow Wilson's Secretary of State over a disagreement regarding the United States' handling of the sinking of the RMS Lusitania. 1923 – Bulgaria's military takes over the government in a coup. 1928 – Charles Kingsford Smith completes the first trans-Pacific flight in a Fokker Trimotor monoplane, the Southern Cross. 1930 – A Chicago Tribune reporter, Jake Lingle, is killed during rush hour at the Illinois Central train station by Leo Vincent Brothers, allegedly over a $100,000 gambling debt owed to Al Capone. 1934 – Donald Duck makes his debut in The Wise Little Hen. 1944 – World War II: Ninety-nine civilians are hanged from lampposts and balconies by German troops in Tulle, France, in reprisal for maquisards attacks. 1944 – World War II: The Soviet Union invades East Karelia and the previously Finnish part of Karelia, occupied by Finland since 1941. 1948 – Foundation of the International Council on Archives under the auspices of the UNESCO. 1953 – The Flint–Worcester tornado outbreak sequence kills 94 people in Massachusetts. 1954 – McCarthyism: Joseph Welch, special counsel for the United States Army, lashes out at Senator Joseph McCarthy during hearings on whether Communism has infiltrated the Army giving McCarthy the famous rebuke, "You've done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?" 1957 – First ascent of Broad Peak by Fritz Wintersteller, Marcus Schmuck, Kurt Diemberger, and Hermann Buhl. 1959 – The USS George Washington is launched. It is the first nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine. 1965 – The civilian Prime Minister of South Vietnam, Phan Huy Quát, resigns after being unable to work with a junta led by Nguyễn Cao Kỳ. 1965 – Vietnam War: The Viet Cong commences combat with the Army of the Republic of Vietnam in the Battle of Đồng Xoài, one of the largest battles in the war. 1967 – Six-Day War: Israel captures the Golan Heights from Syria. 1968 – U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson declares a national day of mourning following the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy. 1972 – Severe rainfall causes a dam in the Black Hills of South Dakota to burst, creating a flood that kills 238 people and causes $160 million in damage. 1973 – In horse racing, Secretariat wins the U.S. Triple Crown. 1978 – The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints opens its priesthood to "all worthy men", ending a 148-year-old policy of excluding black men. 1979 – The Ghost Train fire at Luna Park Sydney, Australia, kills seven. 1999 – Kosovo War: The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and NATO sign a peace treaty. 2008 – Two bombs explode at a train station near Algiers, Algeria, killing at least 13 people. 2009 – An explosion kills 17 people and injures at least 46 at a hotel in Peshawar, Pakistan. 2010 – At least 40 people are killed and more than 70 wounded in a suicide bombing at a wedding party in Arghandab, Kandahar.