Anniversaries

Births: Arthur Phillip, admiral and first governor of New South Wales, 1738; James Barry, historical painter, 1741; Heinrich Wilhelm Matthaus Olbers, astronomer, 1758; Joseph Gillott, pen manufacturer, 1799; Sir George Williams, merchant and founder of the YMCA, 1821; Christian Friedrich Theodore Thomas, conductor, 1835; Henry John Heinz, food products magnate, 1844; Sir John Bernard Partridge, artist and cartoonist, 1861; Anna Eleanor Roosevelt, writer and lecturer, 1884; Francois Mauriac, author, 1885; Ethel Edith Mannin, novelist and travel writer, 1900; Richard Burton (Jenkins), actor, 1925.

Deaths: Huldrych Zwingli, religious reformer, killed in battle 1531; Sir Thomas Wyatt, poet and diplomat, 1542; Meriwether Lewis, explorer, 1809; Samuel Wesley, composer and organist, 1837; Friedrich Hegar, conductor and composer, 1841; James Prescott Joule, physicist, 1889; Josef Anton Bruckner, composer, 1896; Jean-Henri Fabre, entomologist, 1915; Steele Rudd (Arthur Hoey Davis), novelist, 1935; Maurice de Vlaminck, painter, 1958; Leonard 'Chico' Marx, comedian, 1961; Jean Cocteau, poet, novelist and playwright, 1963.

On this day: the Order of the Bath was constituted, 1399; the title 'Defender of the Faith' was conferred on Henry VIII by Pope Leo X, 1521; the Spanish fleet was engaged by the Dutch admiral Maarten Tromp, 1639; Peter the Great became Tsar of Russia, 1669; in India, following a great storm, 30,000 people died, 1737; during the Irish Rebellion, a Dutch fleet aiding the rebels was defeated off Camperdown (Kamperduin) by Admiral Adam Duncan, 1797; the Chicago Fire ended, having almost completely destroyed the city at a cost of dollars 196m, 1871; the Anglo-Boer War started, 1899; the Lusitania, on her maiden voyage, crossed the Atlantic in record time, 1907; the Little Theatre, Adelphi, Strand, opened, 1910; enormous inflation overtook German currency, with the mark dropping to an exchange rate of 10,000,000,000 to the pound, 1923; in China, fighting broke out between the Nationalists under Chiang Kai-shek and the Communists under Mao Tse-tung, 1945; the second Vatican Council was opened by Pope John XXIII, 1963; the Apollo 7 spacecraft, with a crew of three, was launched from Cape Kennedy, 1968.

Today is the Feast Day of St Agilbert, St Alexander Sauli, Saints Andronicus, Tarachus, and Probus, St Bruno the Great of Cologne, St Canice or Kenneth, St Gummarus or Gomaire, St Mary Soledad and St Nectarius of Constantinople.