On this day: May 2

Events on May 2

• 1194 King Richard I of England gave the city of Portsmouth its first royal charter. Wikipedia
• 1559 Presbyterian clergyman John Knox returned from exile to lead the Scottish Reformation. Wikipedia
• 1611 The King James Version of the Bible is published for the first time in London, England, by printer Robert Barker. Wikipedia
• 1670 A royal charter granted the Hudson's Bay Company a monopoly in the fur trade in Rupert's Land (present-day Canada). Wikipedia
• 1808 Outbreak of the Peninsular War: The people of Madrid rise up in rebellion against French occupation. Francisco de Goya later memorializes this event in his painting The Second of May 1808. Wikipedia
• 1863 American Civil War: Stonewall Jackson is wounded by friendly fire while returning to camp after reconnoitering during the Battle of Chancellorsville. He succumbs to pneumonia eight days later. Wikipedia
• 1876 The April Uprising breaks out in Ottoman Bulgaria. Wikipedia
• 1878 A dust explosion at the world's largest flour mill in Minneapolis resulted in 18 deaths. Wikipedia
• 1889 The Treaty of Wuchale was signed, ending the Italo-Ethiopian War, but differences in translation later led to another war. Wikipedia
• 1941 World War II: Following the coup d'état against Iraq Crown Prince 'Abd al-Ilah earlier that year, the United Kingdom launches the Anglo-Iraqi War to restore him to power. Wikipedia
• 1945 World War II: General Helmuth Weidling, the German commander of Berlin, surrendered to Soviet forces led by Marshal Georgy Zhukov, ending the Battle of Berlin. Wikipedia
• 1964 Vietnam War: An explosion attributed to Viet Cong commandos caused the escort carrier USNS Card to sink in the port of Saigon. Wikipedia
• 1982 Falklands War: HMS Conqueror sank the Argentine cruiser General Belgrano, the only ship ever to have been deliberately sunk by a nuclear submarine in battle. Wikipedia
• 1986 Henri Toivonen was killed in an accident while leading the Tour de Corse rally, resulting in FISA banning the popular Group B rally cars for the following season. Wikipedia
• 1986 Chernobyl disaster: The City of Chernobyl is evacuated six days after the disaster. Wikipedia
• 1995 Croatian War of Independence: Serb forces began rocket attacks on the Croatian capital Zagreb, killing 7 people and injuring around 200 others. Wikipedia
• 1998 The European Central Bank is founded in Brussels in order to define and execute the European Union's monetary policy. Wikipedia
• 1999 Mireya Moscoso became the first woman to be elected President of Panama. Wikipedia
• 2000 President Bill Clinton announces that accurate GPS access would no longer be restricted to the United States military. Wikipedia
• 2003 Cyclone Manou formed in the Indian Ocean; over the next two weeks it struck Madagascar and left more than 100,000 people homeless. Wikipedia
• 2008 The Chaitén volcano in Chile began to erupt for the first time since around 1640. Wikipedia
• 2008 Cyclone Nargis makes landfall in Burma killing over 138,000 people and leaving millions of people homeless. Wikipedia
• 2011 The Conservative Party of Canada won enough seats in the federal election to establish their first majority government. Wikipedia
• 2011 Osama bin Laden was killed by U.S. Navy SEAL Team Six in his private residential compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Wikipedia
• 2014 Russo-Ukrainian War: Forty-eight people were killed during a confrontation between pro-Russian protesters and pro-Ukrainian unity protesters in the southern Ukrainian port city of Odesa. Wikipedia
• 2014 Two mudslides in Badakhshan Province, Afghanistan, killed at least 350 people. Wikipedia

Born on May 2

• 1360 Yongle Emperor of China (died 1424) Wikipedia
• 1601 Athanasius Kircher, German priest and scholar (died 1680) Wikipedia
• 1660 Alessandro Scarlatti, Italian composer (died 1725) Wikipedia
• 1729 Catherine the Great of Russia (died 1796) Wikipedia
• 1772 Novalis, German author and poet (died 1801) Wikipedia
• 1859 Jerome K. Jerome, English author and playwright (died 1927) Wikipedia
• 1860 Theodor Herzl, Austro-Hungarian Zionist philosopher, journalist and author (died 1904) Wikipedia
• 1886 Gottfried Benn, German author and poet (died 1956) Wikipedia
• 1892 Manfred von Richthofen, German captain and pilot (died 1918) Wikipedia
• 1903 Benjamin Spock, American pediatrician, activist, and author (died 1998) Wikipedia
• 1921 Satyajit Ray, Indian director, producer, and screenwriter (died 1992) Wikipedia
• 1929 Édouard Balladur, Turkish-French economist and politician, 162nd Prime Minister of France (died 2026) Wikipedia
• 1942 Jacques Rogge, Belgian businessman (died 2021) Wikipedia
• 1946 David Suchet, English actor Wikipedia
• 1952 Christine Baranski, American actress and singer Wikipedia
• 1955 Donatella Versace, Italian fashion designer Wikipedia
• 1972 Dwayne Johnson, American actor and wrestler Wikipedia
• 1975 David Beckham, English footballer, coach, and model Wikipedia
• 1983 Tina Maze, Slovenian skier Wikipedia
• 1985 Lily Allen, English singer-songwriter and actress Wikipedia
• 1996 Julian Brandt, German footballer Wikipedia
• 2015 Princess Charlotte of Wales, British royal, and third in line to the British throne Wikipedia

Died on May 2

• 373 Athanasius of Alexandria, Egyptian bishop and saint (born 298) Wikipedia
• 1519 Leonardo da Vinci, Italian painter, sculptor, and architect (born 1452) Wikipedia
• 1857 Alfred de Musset, French dramatist, poet, and novelist (born 1810) Wikipedia
• 1864 Giacomo Meyerbeer, German composer and educator (born 1791) Wikipedia
• 1925 Johann Palisa, Austrian astronomer (born 1848) Wikipedia
• 1945 Martin Bormann, German politician (born 1900) Wikipedia
• 1957 Joseph McCarthy, American captain, lawyer, judge, and politician (born 1908) Wikipedia
• 1969 Franz von Papen, German general and politician, Chancellor of Germany (born 1879) Wikipedia
• 1972 J. Edgar Hoover, American 1st director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (born 1895) Wikipedia
• 1979 Giulio Natta, Italian chemist and engineer, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1903) Wikipedia
• 1997 Paulo Freire, Brazilian philosopher and academic (born 1921) Wikipedia
• 1997 John Eccles, Australian neurophysiologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1903) Wikipedia
• 2011 Osama bin Laden, Saudi Arabian terrorist, founder of Al-Qaeda (born 1957) Wikipedia
• 2015 Maya Plisetskaya, Russian-Lithuanian ballerina, choreographer, actress, and director (born 1925) Wikipedia

Holidays and observances

• Christian feast day: Ahudemmeh (Syriac Orthodox Church). Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Athanasius of Alexandria (Western Christianity) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Bolesław Strzelecki (Catholic Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Boris I of Bulgaria (Bulgarian Orthodox Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Germanus of Normandy Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Joseph Luu Van Nguyen (Catholic Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Wiborada (Catholic Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: William Tirry (Catholic Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: May 2 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Wikipedia
• The last day of the Festival of Ridván (Baháʼí Faith) (this date is non-Gregorian and may change according to the March equinox, see List of observances set by the Baháʼí calendar) Wikipedia
• Anniversary of the Dos de Mayo Uprising (Community of Madrid, Spain) Wikipedia
• Birth Anniversary of Third Druk Gyalpo (Bhutan) Wikipedia
• Flag Day (Poland) Wikipedia
• Indonesia National Education Day Wikipedia
• Teachers' Day (Iran) (this date is non-Gregorian and may change according to the March Equinox, see List of observances set by the Solar Hijri calendar) Wikipedia
• International Harry Potter Day Wikipedia
• World Tuna Day

Sources

• Wikipedia — “May 2” — events, births, deaths and observances (text under CC BY-SA 4.0) (checked 2026-10-15)
• Wikipedia — “Selected anniversaries/May 2” — the anniversaries editors chose for the date and the article each one is about (checked 2026-10-15)
• Wikidata — in how many language editions each entry's own article exists, used to fill the lists (CC0) (checked 2026-10-15)
• vacanza/holidays (open-source holiday rules, MIT licence) — holiday rules used to build the lists (checked 2026-10-15)

The events, births, deaths and observances above are from the English Wikipedia article “May 2” and the articles it links to (authors and history), retrieved 2026-10-15 through the Wikimedia “On this day” feed. They are licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0; this selection is shared under the same licence. Every anniversary that Wikipedia's editors selected for May 2 stays on the list; the remaining places, up to 26 events, 22 births and 14 deaths, go to the entries whose own article — about the event itself, or else the person or thing it is about — appears in the most language editions (counted from Wikidata); an article about a person or thing, which covers far more than one day, counts half. An entry with no article of its own counts, also at half, by the least covered article it links, and one that links only places counts for nothing. Each list runs by year, and the wording is unchanged apart from removing references to pictures, audio and video.