Anniversaries

Births: Peter Mark Roget, lexicographer, 1779; Captain Matthew Webb, Channel swimmer, 1848; Alan Alexander Milne, writer, 1882; Arthur Mitchell Ransome, critic and writer of children's books, 1884; Oliver Norvell Hardy, comedian, 1892; Cary Grant (Archibald Alexander Leach), actor, 1904.

Deaths: Joseph Rudyard Kipling, writer, 1936; Henry George Liddell, dean of Christ Church, Oxford, and Greek lexicographer, 1898; Sydney Greenstreet, actor, 1954; Hugh Todd Naylor Gaitskell, statesman, 1963; Sir Cecil Walter Hardy Beaton, designer and photographer, 1980; John Frederick, Baron Wolfenden, social reformer, 1985.

On this day: Henry VII of Lancaster and Elizabeth of York were married, 1486; Lima, capital of Peru, was founded by Pizarro, 1535; Captain Cook discovered the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii), 1778; the German Reich or Empire was proclaimed in the Hall of Mirrors, Versailles, 1871; the Peace Conference opened at Versailles, 1919.

Today is the Feast Day of St Peter's Chair, Rome, St Desle or Deicolus, St Prisca or Priscilla and St Volusian.