Anniversaries

Births: Casimir IV, King of Poland, 1427; Sir Philip Sidney, poet, soldier and courtier, 1554; John Bunyan, writer, baptised 1628; Jonathan Swift, author, 1667; Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens), author, 1835; Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, statesman, 1874.

Deaths: St Gregory of Tours (Georgius Florentius), bishop and historian, 539; Edmund Ironside, King of the English, 1016; James Sheridan Knowles, playwright, 1862; Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde, playwright, 1900; Sir Terence Mervyn Rattigan, playwright, 1977; Zeppo (Herbert) Marx, comedian and agent, 1979; Joyce Irene Grenfell, entertainer, 1979; Richard Llewellyn (Richard Dafydd Vivian Llewellyn Lloyd), author, 1983; Cary Grant (Alexander Archibald Leach), actor, 1986.

On this day: Mexico declared war on France, 1838; photographs were first transmitted by radio from Britain to the United States, 1924; Commander Richard Byrd, USN, flew over the South Pole, 1929; the Crystal Palace at Sydenham, near London, was destroyed by fire, 1936; the Trades Description Act came into force, 1968; because of a union dispute, the Times ceased publication for nearly a full year, 1978.

Today is the Feast Day of St Andrew the Apostle, St Cuthbert Mayne and St Sapor.