Anniversaries

Births: Alexander the Great, 356 BC; Sir Titus Salt MP, manufacturer and philanthropist, 1803; Charles Voss, pianist and composer, 1815; Sir James Dewar, chemist and physicist, inventor of the vacuum flask, 1842; Henry Arthur Jones, playwright, 1851; Sir George Robey (George Edward Wade), comedian, 1869; Upton Beall Sinclair, novelist, 1878; Ildebrando Pizzetti, composer, 1880; Charles Walter Stansby Williams, author and playwright, 1886; Kenneth More, actor, 1914.

Deaths: Robert Emmet, Irish nationalist, executed 1803; Jakob Ludwig Karl Grimm, philologist and folklorist, 1863; Sir Titus Salt MP, manufacturer and philanthropist, 1876; Theodor Fontane, poet and novelist, 1898; Annie Besant (Wood) "Ajax", theosophist, 1933; Sir Edward Denison Ross, Orientalist, 1940; Fiorello Henry La Guardia, mayor of New York, 1947; Nikolaos Skalkottas, composer, 1949; Jean Julius Christian Sibelius, composer, 1957; George Seferis (Giorgos Stylianou Seferiades), poet and diplomat, 1971; Jule Styne (Julius Kerwin Stein), songwriter and composer, 1994.

On this day: Aetius defeated the Huns under Attila at Chalons-sur-Marne, 451; Richard I defeated the French at Gisors, 1198; Salisbury Cathedral was consecrated, 1258; Ferdinand Magellan and a fleet of five ships set off from Seville on a circumnavigation of the world, 1519; the Treaty of Hampton Court was signed between Queen Elizabeth I and Louis I de Bourbon, 1562; the Treaty of Ryswick was signed by France, England, Spain and Holland, 1697; the Amateur Dramatic Company, consisting of Dickens, Forster, Jerrold, Leech and Lemon, appeared in Ben Jonson's Every Man in his Humour at Miss Kelly's Theatre, London, 1845; six Victoria Crosses were awarded for gallantry at the Battle of Alma, 1854; Delhi was recaptured from the Indian mutineers by the British, 1857; the liner Mauretania was launched, 1906; the Methodist Church of Great Britain and Ireland was established, 1932; the first London production of the musical Once Upon a Mattress was presented, 1960; the liner Queen Elizabeth II was launched, 1966.

Today is the Feast Day of St Candida of Carthage, Saints Fausta and Evilasius, Saints Theodore, Philippa and their Companions, St Vincent Madelgarus and the Martyrs of Korea. Today is also Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement).