Anniversaries

TODAY: Births: Johann Michael Haydn, composer, 1737; Jack Hawkins (John Edward Hawkins), actor, 1910. Deaths: Dante (Durante) Alighieri, poet, 1321; Arthur Wellesley, first Duke of Wellington, soldier and statesman, 1852; Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, architect, 1852; Isadora Duncan, dancer, killed in a car crash 1927; Tomas Garrigue Masaryk, first president of Czechoslovakia, 1937; Princess Grace (Grace Kelly) of Monaco, after a car crash 1982. On this day: the Gregorian calendar was adopted in Britain, when 3 September became 14 September, 1752; Napoleon and his army entered Moscow, 1812; the first space machine landed on the moon, the Soviet Lunik II 1959. Today is the Feast Day of St Maternus of Cologne and St Notburga. Today is also the beginning of the Jewish New Year, AM 5757.

TOMORROW: Births: Trajan, Roman emperor, 53; Titus Oates, impostor and fabricator of the "Popish Plot", 1649; Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, detective-story writer, 1890; Jean Renoir, film director, 1894. Deaths: Sir Thomas Overbury, poet, poisoned in the Tower of London 1613; William Huskisson, statesman, run down by the locomotive Rocket, 1830; Isambard Kingdom Brunel, engineer, 1859; John Hanning Speke, explorer, shot by accident 1864; William Seward Burroughs, adding machine pioneer, 1898; Willy Messerschmitt, aircraft designer, 1978. On this day: tanks were first used in battle by the British army at the Somme, 1916; Russia was proclaimed a republic by Alexander Kerensky, 1917; in Germany, the Nuremberg laws were passed, outlawing Jews and making the Swastika the official flag of the country, 1935; Neville Chamberlain visited Hitler at Berchtesgaden over the Czech crisis, 1938; the first traffic wardens went on duty in London, 1960. Tomorrow is the Feast Day of St Achard or Aichardus, St Catherine of Genoa, St Mirin, St Nicetas the Goth and St Nicomedes.