Anniversaries

TODAY

Births: Joseph Marie Vien, painter, 1716; Robert Walter Weir, portrait painter, 1803; Ivan Aleksandrovich Goncharov, novelist and travel writer, 1812; David Popper, cellist and composer, 1846; Cyrus Hermann Kotzschmar Curtis, publisher and editor, 1850; Edward Wyllis Scripps, publisher and journalist, 1854; Edouard Daladier, statesman, 1884; Richard Allen Boone, actor, 1916; Sammy Cahn (Samuel Cohen), lyricist, 1914.

Deaths: Sir Thomas Picton, soldier, at Waterloo, 1815; William Combe, adventurer and poet, creator of 'Dr Syntax', 1823; William Cobbett, writer and politician, 1835; Eaton Hodgkinson, engineer, 1861; George Grote, historian, 1871; Samuel Butler, author, 1902; Roald Amundsen, explorer, lost in the Arctic, 1928; Arthur Edwin Kennelly, engineer and physicist, 1939; Douglas Robert Jardine, cricketer, 1958; Ethel Barrymore (Blythe), actress, 1959.

On this day: the English were defeated by the French under Joan of Arc at the Battle of Patay, 1429; the politician John Wilkes returned from France after four years, and was imprisoned for a year, 1768; war broke out between Britain and the United States, 1812; the Duke of Wellington, allied with von Blucher, defeated the French under Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo, 1815; Waterloo Bridge over the Thames in London opened, 1817; Adolf Hitler's book Mein Kampf was published, 1925; the first London performance of the musical show Cage Me a Peacock was staged, 1948; Egypt was proclaimed a republic, and General Neguib became president, 1953; a US air force plane crashed near Tokyo, with the loss of 129 lives, 1953; the Sunday Citizen newspaper was published for the last time, 1967; a Trident-1 of British European Airways crashed after take-off at London, killing all 118 people aboard 1972; a watercolour by Joseph William Turner was sold at auction for pounds 340,000, 1976.

Today is the Feast Day of St Amandus of Bordeaux, St Elizabeth of Schonau, Saints Gregory, Demetrius and Calogerus and Saints Mark and Marcellian.

TOMORROW

Births: James VI, King of Scotland / James I, King of England, 1566; Thomas Fuller, preacher and scholar, 1608; Blaise Pascal, mathematician and philosopher, 1623; Jean-Marie Collot d'Herbois, French revolutionary, 1749; Raffaello Sanzio Morghen, engraver, 1758; John Gibson, sculptor, 1790; Richard Monckton Milnes, first Baron Houghton, poet, 1809; Ferdinand David, violinist and composer, 1810; Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Baptist minister, 1834; Sir Frank (Francis) Job Short, engraver and painter, 1857; Sir George Alexander (George Samson), actor-manager, 1858; Douglas, first Earl Haig, soldier, 1861; Sir Max Pemberton, author and editor, 1863; Charles Coburn, actor, 1877; Bessie Wallis Warfield, Duchess of Windsor, 1896; Guy Lombardo, bandleader, 1902; Walter Reginald Hammond, cricketer, 1903.

Deaths: Piers Gaveston, Earl of Cornwall, court favourite, beheaded 1312; Nicholas Lmery, physician and chemist, 1715; John Brown, scholar and theologian, 1787; Sir Joseph Banks, naturalist and explorer, 1820; Maximilian, Archduke of Austria and Emperor of Mexico, executed 1867; Adrian Ludwig Richter, painter, 1884; Sir James Matthew Barrie, author and playwright, 1937; Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, US spies for the Soviet Union, executed 1953; Jean Arthur (Gladys Georgianna Greene), actress, 1991; Sir William Gerald Golding, novelist and Nobel prizewinner, 1993.

On this day: King Louis XI of France created a (private) Royal Mail service, 1464; Curwen's Act, limiting the power of a British Government to manipulate seats in Parliament, was passed, 1809; Greek rebels were defeated at Dragashan by the Turkish army, 1821; an Act was passed founding the Metropolitan Police, 1829; the Earl of Rosse announced his discovery of spiral nebulae, 1850; the first Zeppelin dirigible airship, the Deutschland was launched, 1910; all German titles and names were renounced by the British Royal Family, who adopted the name Windsor, 1917; King George V conferred peerages on members of the Teck and Battenberg families, 1917; a census was taken in Great Britain, 1921; the Battle of the Philippine Sea began, 1944; Kuwait became independent, 1961.

Tomorrow is the Feast Day of St Bruno-Boniface, St Deodatus or Die, Saints Gervase and Protase, St Juliana Falconieri, St Odo of Cambrai and St Romuald.