Anniversaries

Births: St Matthias I Corvinus (Matyas Hunyadi), King of Hungary, 1443; Charles V (Charles I of Spain), Holy Roman Emperor, 1500; Don John of Austria, soldier, 1547; Charles Le Brun, historical painter, 1619; James Quin, actor, 1693; Samuel Wesley, organist and composer, 1766; Johann Baptist Cramer, pianist, conductor and composer, 1771; Wilhelm Karl Grimm, philologist and folklorist, 1786; Johann Christian Clausen Dahl, landscape painter, 1788; Winslow Homer, painter and illustrator, 1836; Arrigo (Enrico Giuseppe Giovanni) Boito, poet and composer, 1842; Grant Allen (James Grant Blairfindie Allen), writer and man of letters, 1848; George Augustus Moore, novelist, 1852; Eugene Arnold Dolmetsch, early music enthusiast, 1858; Sir Cyril Arthur Pearson, newspaper proprietor, 1866; Chester William Nimitz, admiral, 1885.

Deaths: Francis, Duc de Guise, French military commander, assassinated 1563; Marc-Antoine Charpentier, composer, 1704; Sir Edmund Andros, Governor of Virginia, 1714; Sir James Radcliffe Bt, third Earl of Derwentwater, statesman, 1716; Henry Cavendish, physicist, 1810; Robert Fulton, steamboat pioneer, 1815; Thomas Coutts, banker, 1822; Thomas Bowdler, editor and censor, 1825; Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky, mathematician, 1856; Ignaz Lachner, conductor and composer, 1895; Sir Edward Marshall Hall, lawyer, 1927; Ahmed Pasha, Egyptian prime minister, assassinated 1945; Pierre-Marie-Felix Janet, psychologist and neurologist, 1947; Grant Franklin Thomas Richards, publisher, 1948; Marcel Grandjany, composer, 1975; Bobby Moore, footballer, 1993; Jean Sablon, singer, actor and composer, 1994; Dinah Shore (Frances Rose Shore), singer, 1994.

On this day: Francis I of France was defeated at the Battle of Pavia, 1525; Pope Gregory XIII issued a Bull announcing the Gregorian Calendar, 1582; the Battle of the Alamo began, 1836; Louis-Philippe, King of France, abdicated, 1848; Avonmouth Dock, Bristol, was opened, 1877; the Simplon Tunnel, between Switzerland and Italy, was completed, 1905; the Flying Scotsman went into service, 1923; a world land-speed record of 253.96 mph was set up by Sir Malcolm Campbell, 1932; the first commercial nylon product - toothbrush bristles - was produced in the US, 1938; Juan Domingo Pern was elected president of Argentina, 1946; the government of Dr Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana was overthrown by a military coup, 1966; a group of army officers seized power in Sierra Leone, 1967.

Today is the Feast Day of Saints Montanus, Lucius, and their Companions and St Praetextatus or Prix.