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HISTORY & TIMELINE
26 May

A journey through
26 May in history

The story of 26 May runs from an English king stabbed at a feast in Pucklechurch in 946 to Narendra Modi taking the oath as India’s prime minister in 2014. In between come a Chickasaw victory over a French army, a treaty signed in an Afghan camp, the last coronation of a Russian tsar, the first Dow Jones average, the last Model T, a novel about a Transylvanian count and a Cold War pact to limit missile defences.

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JUMP THROUGH TIME
II
THE MIDDLE AGES

Medieval History

Kingdoms, conflict, faith, power and the changing medieval world.

946
King Edmund I as shown in a later medieval depictionKing Edmund I as shown in a later medieval depictionImage: Unknown author · Public domain
politics · Europe

King Edmund I is stabbed at a feast

Edmund, a grandson of Alfred the Great, became king of the English at eighteen and won back the lands of the north-east Midlands from Viking control. On 26 May 946, while celebrating the feast of St Augustine at Pucklechurch near Bristol, he was stabbed to death in a brawl with an exiled outlaw who had entered his hall. He was about twenty-five, and his brother Eadred took the throne.

Source: The Royal Family: Edmund I (r. 939-946) ↗
III
A CHANGING WORLD

Early Modern Era

Exploration, political change, scientific development and expanding global connections.

1736
Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, governor of French Louisiana, who led the attackJean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, governor of French Louisiana, who led the attackImage: Unidentified painter · Public domain
world · Americas

The Chickasaw turn back a French army at Ackia

France’s governor of Louisiana, Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, marched north with French soldiers and Choctaw allies to crush the Chickasaw, who traded with the British. On 26 May 1736 his troops attacked Chickasaw villages near present-day Tupelo, Mississippi, but were caught in heavy crossfire from hidden defenders. After about three hours Bienville broke off the assault and retreated, leaving the Chickasaw victorious.

Source: Mississippi Encyclopedia: Ackia, Battle of ↗
IV
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

The 1800s

Industry, empire, invention, reform and a century of enormous transformation.

1879
Emir Mohammad Yaqub Khan with British officers in May 1879, photographed by John BurkeEmir Mohammad Yaqub Khan with British officers in May 1879, photographed by John BurkeImage: John Burke (1843 - 1900) · Public domain
politics · Asia

Afghanistan signs the Treaty of Gandamak

During the Second Anglo-Afghan War, British forces from India occupied much of eastern Afghanistan. On 26 May 1879, at Gandamak between Kabul and the Khyber Pass, the new emir Yaqub Khan signed a treaty recognising him as ruler, but handing Britain control of Afghanistan’s foreign relations and key frontier districts, and agreeing to a British mission in Kabul. The peace was short: that September the mission was attacked and fighting resumed.

Source: Britannica: Treaty of Gandamak ↗
1896
Charles Dow, journalist and co-founder of Dow Jones & CompanyCharles Dow, journalist and co-founder of Dow Jones & CompanyImage: Unknown author · Public domain
world · Americas

Charles Dow publishes his industrial average

The journalist Charles Dow, co-founder of Dow Jones & Company, wanted a simple way to show how American industry was faring on the stock market. On 26 May 1896 he published the first Dow Jones Industrial Average, worked out with pencil and paper by adding the prices of twelve companies, among them makers of sugar, leather and steel, and dividing by twelve. Expanded to thirty companies, it remains one of the world’s best-known market measures.

Source: Library of Congress, This Month in Business History: Dow Jones Industrial Average first published ↗
1896
The coronation of Nicholas II and Alexandra in Moscow, painted by Laurits TuxenThe coronation of Nicholas II and Alexandra in Moscow, painted by Laurits TuxenImage: Laurits Tuxen · Public domain
politics · Europe

Russia crowns its last tsar

Nicholas II had come to the throne on his father’s death in 1894, but Russian tradition required a coronation in Moscow. On 26 May 1896 (14 May in Russia’s old calendar) he and his wife Alexandra were crowned in the Dormition Cathedral in the Kremlin, amid days of lavish ceremony. It was the last coronation of the Russian Empire: Nicholas was forced to abdicate in 1917 and was killed with his family the following year.

Source: State Hermitage Museum: The Coronation of Emperor Nicholas II and Alexandra Feodorovna, 14/26 May 1896 ↗
1897
The cover of the first edition of Bram Stoker's Dracula, 1897The cover of the first edition of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, 1897Image: British Library Board · Public domain
culture · Europe

Bram Stoker’s Dracula goes on sale

Bram Stoker was a Dublin-born civil servant turned theatre manager, who ran London’s Lyceum Theatre for the celebrated actor Henry Irving and wrote fiction in his spare hours. For about seven years he gathered material on vampire folklore and the geography of eastern Europe, building a tale about a centuries-old count who leaves his castle in Transylvania for England. Dracula was published in London in May 1897, on the 26th according to Britannica. Told entirely through diaries, letters and newspaper cuttings, it follows Jonathan Harker, Mina Murray, Professor Van Helsing and their friends as they hunt the count down. Reviews were mixed and Stoker made little money from it, but the book went on to shape the vampire story in fiction, theatre and film for more than a century.

Source: Britannica: Dracula (novel) ↗
V
THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

The 1900s

War and peace, technological leaps, social change, politics, sport and popular culture.

1908
William Knox D'Arcy, the financier whose Persian oil concession led to the strike at Masjed SoleymanWilliam Knox D’Arcy, the financier whose Persian oil concession led to the strike at Masjed SoleymanImage: Unknown author · Public domain
world · Middle East

Oil gushes from the ground at Masjed Soleyman

In 1901 the British-Australian financier William Knox D’Arcy won a sixty-year concession from the Shah of Persia to search for oil across much of the country. His engineer, George Reynolds, spent years drilling in harsh and remote country without success, and by 1908 the money was running out. The backers told Reynolds to prepare to stop work, but he kept drilling at a site in the south-west known as Masjed Soleyman. In the early hours of 26 May 1908 the drill struck oil, and a gusher shot high above the rig. It was the first major commercial oil find in the Middle East. The Anglo-Persian Oil Company was formed the following year to exploit it, and later grew into BP. The discovery transformed Iran’s economy and politics, and marked the start of the region’s central place in the world’s oil supply.

Source: Encyclopaedia Iranica: D’Arcy, William Knox ↗
1918
Noe Zhordania, who headed the government of the Democratic Republic of GeorgiaNoe Zhordania, who headed the government of the Democratic Republic of GeorgiaImage: Unknown author · Public domain
politics · Europe

Georgia declares its independence in Tbilisi

Georgia, in the southern Caucasus between the Black and Caspian Seas, had been absorbed into the Russian Empire in the early 1800s. When that empire collapsed in the revolutions of 1917, the peoples of the Caucasus first tried a short-lived joint federation. As it broke apart under the pressure of war with the Ottoman Empire, Georgian leaders decided to go their own way. On 26 May 1918 the Georgian National Council in Tbilisi adopted the Act of Independence, creating the Democratic Republic of Georgia. Led by Social Democrats under Noe Zhordania, it held multi-party elections and in 1921 adopted a constitution, before the Red Army invaded and the country was absorbed into Soviet rule. Georgia restored its independence in 1991, and 26 May is now its national Independence Day.

Source: National Archives of Georgia: The First Democratic Republic of Georgia ↗
1923
A poster for the first 24-hour endurance race at Le Mans, held on 26 and 27 May 1923A poster for the first 24-hour endurance race at Le Mans, held on 26 and 27 May 1923Image: Automobile Club de l'Ouest · Public domain
sport · Europe

The first 24 Hours of Le Mans gets under way

The Automobile Club de l’Ouest, based in the French city of Le Mans, wanted a race that would test not just speed but the reliability of everyday touring cars, with their lights, mudguards and hoods, over a full day and night. The result was a new ‘Grand Prix of Endurance’, run on a course of public roads of a little more than 17 kilometres around the city, starting on 26 May 1923. Thirty-three cars took the start and battled through rain and wind on rough roads. After twenty-four hours the winners were André Lagache and René Léonard in a Chenard & Walcker, who covered around 2,200 kilometres, with a sister car in second place. Held in June in most years since, the race became the world’s most famous endurance contest.

Source: 24 Hours of Le Mans (ACO): The Chenard & Walcker, 1923 ↗
1927
An early Ford Model T, photographed around 1910An early Ford Model T, photographed around 1910Image: Harry Shipler · Public domain
world · Americas

The fifteen-millionth Model T rolls off the line

When Henry Ford launched the Model T in 1908, he set out to build a car simple, tough and cheap enough for ordinary families. The moving assembly line his company introduced a few years later cut the time needed to build each car dramatically, and the price fell year after year. The ‘Tin Lizzie’ put much of America on wheels and changed how factories everywhere were organised. By the mid-1920s, though, rivals were offering more comfort and style, and sales were falling. On 26 May 1927 Henry Ford and his son Edsel drove the fifteen-millionth Model T off the line at the Highland Park plant in Michigan, the ceremonial last of its kind. The factories then closed for months while they were retooled for its successor, the Model A.

Source: The Henry Ford: Henry Ford and Edsel Ford in the fifteen-millionth Ford Model T, 26 May 1927 ↗
1940
British troops lining up on the beach at Dunkirk to wait for evacuation, late May 1940British troops lining up on the beach at Dunkirk to wait for evacuation, late May 1940Image: Unknown author · Public domain
world · Europe

The evacuation from Dunkirk begins

In May 1940 the German army swept through the Low Countries and into France, and its armoured columns raced to the English Channel, cutting off the British Expeditionary Force together with French and Belgian troops in a shrinking pocket around the port of Dunkirk. With surrender or destruction looming, the British government ordered an evacuation by sea, codenamed Operation Dynamo, which began on the evening of 26 May. The operation was run by Vice-Admiral Bertram Ramsay from tunnels deep in the cliffs at Dover. Warships and hundreds of civilian vessels, from ferries to fishing boats and pleasure craft, crossed under air attack to lift men from the harbour and the beaches. Planners hoped to save perhaps 45,000; by 4 June more than 338,000 British and Allied troops had been brought home, though most of their equipment was left behind.

Source: Imperial War Museums: What you need to know about the Dunkirk evacuations ↗
1966
Forbes Burnham, who led British Guiana into independence as Guyana's first prime ministerForbes Burnham, who led British Guiana into independence as Guyana’s first prime ministerImage: Fotograaf Onbekend / Anefo · CC0
politics · Americas

British Guiana becomes the independent nation of Guyana

British Guiana, on the north-eastern shoulder of South America, had been a British colony since the early 1800s, its sugar estates worked first by enslaved Africans and later by indentured labourers brought mostly from India. After the Second World War a strong independence movement grew up, led at first by Cheddi Jagan and Forbes Burnham, but bitter political divisions and British and American suspicion of Jagan’s left-wing politics slowed the road to self-rule. In 1964 a coalition led by Burnham took office, and Britain’s Parliament passed the Guyana Independence Act in May 1966. The Act came into force on 26 May, when the Union Jack was lowered and the new Golden Arrowhead flag raised in Georgetown. The colony took the name Guyana, an Amerindian word often translated as ‘land of many waters’, and the first National Assembly of the new country met the same day.

Source: Britannica: Guyana, Independence ↗
1972
The Grand Kremlin Palace in MoscowThe Grand Kremlin Palace in MoscowImage: Ed Yourdon from New York City, USA · CC BY-SA 2.0
politics · Global

Nixon and Brezhnev sign the first great arms control deal

By the late 1960s the United States and the Soviet Union each had enough nuclear missiles to destroy the other many times over, and both were beginning to build defences designed to shoot incoming warheads down. Strategists feared that such shields would only spur a new and costly race to build more missiles to overwhelm them. In 1969 the two sides opened the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks to try to halt the spiral. On 26 May 1972, during the first visit by an American president to Moscow, Richard Nixon and the Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, together with an interim agreement freezing numbers of offensive missiles. Each side was allowed only a small number of missile-defence sites. It was the high point of the thaw known as détente, and the treaty lasted thirty years until the United States withdrew in 2002.

Source: US Department of State, Office of the Historian: Strategic Arms Limitations Talks/Treaty (SALT) I and II ↗
1983
A satellite view of the Oga Peninsula and the Hachirōgata lagoon in Akita Prefecture, on the coast struck by the tsunamiA satellite view of the Oga Peninsula and the Hachirōgata lagoon in Akita Prefecture, on the coast struck by the tsunamiImage: User っ, from SRTM elevation data · Public domain
world · Asia

An earthquake and tsunami strike Japan’s western coast

Just before midday on 26 May 1983, a powerful earthquake, rated magnitude 7.8 by NOAA, struck beneath the Sea of Japan about 80 kilometres off Akita Prefecture in northern Honshu. It set off a tsunami that reached the coast within minutes, with waves up to around 14 metres high in places. About 100 people died in Japan, many on the Oga Peninsula, and the waves also reached the coasts of Korea and the Soviet Far East.

Source: NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information: Significant earthquake, Japan, 26 May 1983 ↗
VI
2000 TO TODAY

Modern Day

The events of recent decades that have already become part of the historical record.

2014
Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi, where the swearing-in took placeRashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi, where the swearing-in took placeImage: Tamjeed Ahmed · CC BY-SA 4.0
politics · Asia

Narendra Modi is sworn in as India’s prime minister

In the general election of spring 2014, the Bharatiya Janata Party led by Narendra Modi, the long-serving chief minister of Gujarat, won an outright majority in the Lok Sabha, the first single party to do so in thirty years. On the evening of 26 May, President Pranab Mukherjee administered the oath of office in the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi, before thousands of guests including leaders of neighbouring countries.

Source: Prime Minister of India: Shri Modi takes oath as the Prime Minister ↗
RESEARCH

Sources & Further Reading

Selected authoritative references supporting the events on this page.

The Royal Family: Edmund I (r. 939-946)↗Britannica: Edmund I↗Mississippi Encyclopedia: Ackia, Battle of↗National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway: Battle of Ackia commemoration↗Britannica: Treaty of Gandamak↗Encyclopaedia Iranica: Gandomak, Treaty of↗Library of Congress, This Month in Business History: Dow Jones Industrial Average first published↗S&P Dow Jones Indices: The Dow and the S&P 500, where it all began↗State Hermitage Museum: The Coronation of Emperor Nicholas II and Alexandra Feodorovna, 14/26 May 1896↗Moscow Kremlin Museums: Coronation of Nicholas II↗Britannica: Dracula (novel)↗Trinity College Dublin, Trinity Writers: Bram Stoker↗Encyclopaedia Iranica: D’Arcy, William Knox↗BP: First oil↗National Archives of Georgia: The First Democratic Republic of Georgia↗Legislative Herald of Georgia: Act of Restoration of State Independence of Georgia↗24 Hours of Le Mans (ACO): The Chenard & Walcker, 1923↗Britannica: 24 Hours of Le Mans↗The Henry Ford: Henry Ford and Edsel Ford in the fifteen-millionth Ford Model T, 26 May 1927↗Ford Motor Company: The Model T↗Imperial War Museums: What you need to know about the Dunkirk evacuations↗Britannica: Dunkirk evacuation↗Britannica: Guyana, Independence↗Parliament of Guyana: The Guyana Independence Order 1966↗US Department of State, Office of the Historian: Strategic Arms Limitations Talks/Treaty (SALT) I and II↗Britannica: Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty↗NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information: Significant earthquake, Japan, 26 May 1983↗US Geological Survey: Earthquake event page, 83 km WNW of Noshiro, Japan, 1983↗Prime Minister of India: Shri Modi takes oath as the Prime Minister↗President of India: President appoints Narendra Modi as Prime Minister, oath-taking ceremony on May 26↗
WHY THESE MOMENTS?

Significance before volume

This page is not the longest possible list of events. It is a chronological journey through 26 May, where each entry is chosen for historical significance, human interest and reliability.

Facts are checked against authoritative museums, archives, universities and reference works. Where sources disagree, the page says so.

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