Anniversaries

Births: Thomas Weelkes, composer, baptised 1576; Thomas Babington Macaulay, Baron Macaulay, historian and essayist, 1800; Ernesto Camillo Sivori, violinist and composer, 1815; Johann Strauss the Younger, composer, 1825; Georges (Alexandre-Cesar Leopold) Bizet, composer, 1838; Pablo Ruiz Picasso, painter, 1881; John Berryman, poet, 1914; Don Banks, composer, 1923.

Deaths: Stephen, King of England, 1154; Geoffrey Chaucer, poet, 1400; Evangelista Torricelli, scientist and inventor of the barometer, 1647; Eduard Hildebrandt, painter, 1868; Sir Charles Halle (Carl Halle), conductor and pianist, 1895; King Alexander of Greece, 1920; Susan Lawrence, politician, 1947; Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, 18th Baron Dunsany, author, 1957; Vincent Leonard Price, actor and writer, 1993.

On this day: led by King Henry V, the English army defeated the French at the Battle of Agincourt, 1415; the Charge of the Light Brigade took place at Balaclava, 1854; the Fiji Islands were annexed by Great Britain, 1874; the Transvaal was annexed by Great Britain, 1900; Terence McSwiney, Sinn Fein Lord Mayor of Cork, died after 73 days' hunger strike in Brixton Prison, London, 1920; the magazine Private Eye was first published, 1961; Taiwan was expelled, and the People's Republic of China was admitted to the United Nations, 1971; US Marines and Rangers invaded Grenada, 1983.

Today is the Feast Day of Saints Chrysanthus and Daria, Saints Crispin and Crispinian, The Forty Martyrs of England and Wales, Saints Fronto and George, St Gaudentius of Brescia and St Richard Gwyn.