Anniversaries

Anniversaries

Births: John Arbuthnot, physician and author, 1667; David Cox, landscape painter, 1783; Sir James Brooke, Rajah of Sarawak, 1803; Alexander II, Tsar of Russia, 1818; Julius Hey, composer and teacher, 1832; Georges Boulanger, soldier and politician, 1837; Jules-Henri Poincare, mathematician and astronomer, 1854; William Randolph Hearst, newspaper proprietor, 1863; Rafael Sabatini, author, 1875; Sir Thomas Beecham, conductor, 1879; Wallingford Riegger, cellist and composer, 1885; Andrew John Young, poet, 1885; Sir Malcolm Sargent, conductor, 1895; Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington, jazz composer and bandleader, 1899; Richard Carlson, actor and director, 1912. Deaths: John Cleveland, poet, 1658; Ambrose Rookwood, Robert Lowick and Cranbourne, executed for the attempted assassination of William III 1696; George Farquhar, playwright, 1707; Charles Bell, anatomist, 1842; Konstantinos Petrou Kavafis (Constantine Cavafy), poet, 1933; Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, film director, 1980; Barbara Goolden, novelist, 1990. On this day: the Siege of Orleans was relieved, 1429; Elizabeth Canning was convicted of perjury and transported, 1754; Captain Cook landed at Kurnell, Botany Bay, Australia, 1770; the Corn Law Bill received Royal Assent, 1842; at Oxford University a statute was passed admitting women to examinations, 1884; the Dublin Post Office was burnt by Sinn Fein rebels, 1916; in Italy, the German army surrendered unconditionally to Field Marshal Alexander, 1945; the first London performance of the musical Oklahoma! was staged, 1947; the first London performance of the musical She Loves Me was staged, 1964; in Ethiopia a severe earthquake caused the death of 24 people, injuring 168, 1969; in the US, a Navy munitions train blew up in a marshalling yard at Roseville, California, setting off 100 more explosions, 1973. Today is the Feast Day of St Catherine of Siena, St Hugh of Cluny, St Joseph Cottolengo, St Robert of Molesmes and St Wilfrid the Younger.