May 30 in History

Every tree within fifteen kilometres of Jerusalem. Gone. The Romans needed timber for their siege engines, and Titus didn't hesitate—ancient olive groves, orchards that fed families for generations, all of it cut down to build a wall around the city. Not to get in. To make sure nobody got out. The Jewish defenders had just lost the Second Wall and retreated behind the First, still holding. But now they were trapped inside what would become their tomb. Starvation kills slower than swords, and Titus had time.

Jerome of Prague watched Jan Hus burn at the same council a year earlier, then recanted his own beliefs to save himself. Didn't work. He spent eleven months in Constance's dungeon rethinking that decision, finally withdrew his recantation, and went to the flames singing hymns in Czech. The council had been called to end the papal schism—three popes claiming legitimacy—but spent equal energy eliminating reformers who questioned church wealth and corruption. Sigismund promised Jerome safe conduct to get him there. The emperor who sponsored an antipope proved more interested in enforcing orthodoxy than keeping his word.

Moderate Utraquist forces destroyed the radical Taborite army at Lipany, killing their leader Prokop the Great and ending twenty years of Hussite religious warfare in Bohemia. The battle allowed the Catholic Church to negotiate the Compacts of Basel, granting Bohemian Hussites limited religious freedoms that made them the first successful Protestant movement in European history.

The rebellion lasted thirteen days. Prince Zhu Zhifan controlled China's northwest, claimed the throne his birthright, and commanded enough men to make Beijing nervous. Commander Qiu Yue didn't wait for reinforcements—he marched straight into Ningxia with troops half the size of the rebel army and won through speed alone. Zhifan was executed along with his entire family, standard Ming protocol for failed royal uprisings. The Zhengde Emperor rewarded Qiu Yue with titles and gold, then went back to his notorious habit of sneaking out of the palace in disguise. Some threats end quickly.

Bach showed up for his first day as cantor with a thirty-eight-minute cantata requiring four vocalists, a full orchestra, and two choirs. Die Elenden sollen essen—"The Meek Shall Eat"—premiered at St. Nicholas Church on May 30, 1723. He'd written it in just days. The Leipzig town council had wanted their third choice for the job to be, well, less ambitious. But Bach needed this position desperately—steady income, housing, school for his sons. Over the next twenty-seven years, he'd compose nearly three hundred more of these weekly masterpieces. Most never performed again in his lifetime.

The Austrians had fortified both banks of the Mincio River with artillery and thousands of troops. Napoleon ignored the bridges entirely. He sent engineers wading into the shallows at Borghetto to build a pontoon crossing in plain view of enemy guns, while his troops laid down covering fire from windows and rooftops. It worked in six hours. The entire Austrian defense of Lombardy collapsed by sunset. They abandoned Milan, Verona, and every city they'd held for decades, retreating to the Alps. All because nobody fortifies the spot that seems too obvious to attack.

Jackson let Dickinson shoot first. Strategy, not chivalry. Dickinson was the better marksman, and everyone knew it. The bullet cracked Jackson's ribs, lodged near his heart. Too close to remove. Ever. Jackson steadied himself, raised his pistol, killed Dickinson with one shot. The accusation about Rachel Jackson wasn't wrong—through no fault of hers, a paperwork error meant she'd technically been married to two men. But Jackson carried Dickinson's bullet in his chest for the next thirty-nine years, all the way to the White House. Some debts you pay forever.

The survivors could hear them screaming from inside the hull—372 people trapped as waves smashed the East Indiaman Arniston against the rocks at Waenhuiskrans. Only six men made it ashore. The ship was carrying soldiers and their families home from Ceylon after the Napoleonic Wars, so close to safety they could see the Cape shoreline. A navigation error in the storm. The wreck happened at a place locals called "the cave of the skulls." They'd been warning sailors about those rocks for generations.

John Francis raised his pistol at Queen Victoria's carriage on Constitution Hill. Didn't fire. Victoria and Albert saw him clearly, decided to drive the same route the next day—using themselves as bait. Francis showed up again, aimed, pulled the trigger. This time plainclothes police grabbed him before he could reload. The gun held no ball, just powder and wadding. He'd never intended to kill her. Francis wanted execution's fame, got transportation to Australia instead. Britain had just learned its Queen was braver than her would-be assassin.

The ship took 103 days from Calcutta, crossing waters most passengers had never seen until they couldn't see land at all. On May 30th, 1845, the Fatel Razack dropped anchor in Trinidad's Gulf of Paria with 225 Indians aboard—the first under a new British indenture system that would bring nearly half a million more over the next 72 years. They'd signed five-year contracts for plantation work the newly-freed African slaves had abandoned. Within three generations, Indians would make up 40% of Trinidad's population. The Atlantic slave trade had ended, but the Empire found another way.