Anniversaries

Births: James Scott, Duke of Monmouth, 1649; Theobald Bohm, flautist and composer, 1794; Giuditta Pasta (Negri), soprano, 1798; Isambard Kingdom Brunel, engineer, 1806; Charles-Pierre Baudelaire, poet, 1821; Eadweard Muybridge (Edward James Muggeridge), photographer and inventor, 1830; Sir Gerald Festus Kelly, artist, 1879; Hugh Todd Naylor Gaitskell, statesman, 1906; Sir Robert Murray Helpmann, dancer, 1909.

Deaths: Edward IV, King of England, 1483; Lorenzo de' Medici ('The Magnificent'), statesman, 1492; Francis Bacon, Viscount St Albans, statesman, 1626; William Law, theologian, 1761; Jacques Necker, financier and statesman, 1804; William Prout, physician and chemist, 1850; John Howard Payne, actor, playwright and consul, 1852; Dante Gabriel Rossetti, poet and painter, 1882; Edward Thomas, poet, killed in action 1917; Dietrich Bonhoeffer, theologian, 1945; Frank Lloyd Wright, architect, 1959; Sir Basil Henry Blackwell, bookseller and publisher, 1984.

On this day: Botany Bay, Australia, was discovered by Captain James Cook, 1770; the National Gallery, London, was opened, 1838; the world's first full-length colour film, The World, the Flesh and the Devil was shown at the Holborn Empire, London, 1914; Georgia voted to secede from the Soviet Union, 1991.

Today is Good Friday and the Feast Day of St Gaucherius, St Hugh of Rouen, St Mary Cleophas, St Uramar and St Waldetrudis or Waudru.