On the 25th June 1876, the Battle of Little Bighorn began when American Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer led federal troops against the combined forces of the Lakota Sioux, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho Plains Indians.

Napoleon’s Grande Armée began its failed invasion of Russia when it crossed the Neman River in what Russians refer to as the Patriotic War of 1812.

The Battle of Bannockburn began on the 23rd June 1314, leading to one of the most important Scottish victories of the First War of Scottish Independence that was fought intermittently from 1296 until 1328.

MV Empire Windrush arrived at Tilbury Docks in London carrying 492 West Indian immigrants.

On the 21st June 1919, Admiral Ludwig von Reuter ordered the scuttling of the German High Seas naval fleet in Scapa Flow, a large natural harbor in the Orkney Islands in Scotland.

British prisoners of war were imprisoned in the ‘Black Hole of Calcutta’ after the Bengali army captured Fort William from the East India Company.

On the 19th June 1978, the Garfield comic strip was first published.

Germany and Russia signed the secret Reinsurance Treaty that ensured they would each remain neutral if the other went to war with a third European power.

On the 17th June 1885, the Statue of Liberty arrived in New York Harbour on board the French steam ship Isère.

Born Giovanni Maria Mastai-Ferretti, Pius IX’s election by the Papal conclave of 1846 came at a time of significant political unrest across Europe.

On the 15th June 1215, Magna Carta – one of the most famous documents in the world – was approved by King John when he added his seal to it in a field at Runnymede…

The Battle of Naseby, a decisive engagement of the English Civil War, was fought between the Royalist army of King Charles I and the Parliamentarian New Model Army.

On the 13th June 1944 the first German attack on Britain using the V-1 flying bomb, otherwise known as the ‘doodlebug’, took place.

US President Ronald Reagan made a speech in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin in which he called on the USSR’s leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, to ‘Tear down this wall!’