Anniversaries

Anniversaries

Births: St John of the Cross, mystic, 1542; Farinelli (Carlo Broschi), castrato singer, 1705; Louis-Lazare Hoche, French Revolutionary soldier, 1768; Eleuthere Irenee du Pont de Nemours, gunpowder manufacturer, 1771; Sir John Ross, Arctic explorer, 1777; Henry Ward Beecher, clergyman, 1813; William Henry (W.H.) Smith, bookseller and politician, 1825; Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce, writer and satirist, 1842; Horatio Herbert, Earl Kitchener, soldier, 1850; Harry Plunket Greene, baritone, 1865; Oswald Veblen, mathematician, 1880; Jack Dempsey, heavyweight boxer, 1895; Brian Alexander Johnston, broadcaster and cricket commentator, 1912. Deaths: Ferdinand I (the Great), King of Castile and Leon, 1065; Lucrezia Borgia, Duchess of Ferrara, 1519; John Hampden, Parliamentary general, from wounds, 1643; William Smellie, printer, author and naturalist, 1795; Adam Lindsay Gordon, poet, committed suicide 1870; Marie-Francois Sadi Carnot, engineer and statesman, 1894; Stephen Grover Cleveland, 22nd and 24th US President, 1908; Walter Rathenau, statesman, assassinated 1922; Stuart Davis, abstract artist, 1964; Valentine Dyall, actor, 1985; Rex Ernest Warner, writer, 1986. On this day: Robert the Bruce and his army defeated the forces of Edward II at Bannockburn, 1314; the English fleet defeated the French at the Battle of Sluys, 1340; John Cabot reached the shores of North America, 1497; the Mother Grand Lodge of the Order of Freemasonry was inaugurated in London, 1717; Napoleon's armies invaded Russia, 1812; the French defeated the Austrians at the Battle of Solferino, 1859; the training of nurses began at St Thomas's Hospital, London, 1860; the Russian fleet in the Black Sea mutinied at Sebastopol, 1917; the blockade of Berlin by the Soviet Union began, 1948; in the United States, a 27-year-old soap opera, The Romance of Helen Trent, ended after 7,222 episodes, 1960; the Mersey Tunnel was opened, 1971. Today is the Feast Day of St Bartholomew of Farne, St John the Baptist, St Ralph or Raoul of Bourges and St Simplicius of Autun.