Anniversaries

TODAY

Births: Aurangzeb, the last Mogul emperor of India, 1618; Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, microscope pioneer, 1632; Jacques Laffitte, banker and politician, 1767; Sir Moses Haim Montefiore, philanthropist, 1784; Sarah Josepha Hale (Buell), editor, and poet for children, 1788; David Roberts, painter, 1796; Ernst Friedrich Eduard Richter, composer, 1808; Ferdinand von Hiller, composer and author, 1811; Eugene- Samuel-Auguste Fromentin, painter and writer, 1820; George Frederick Samuel Robinson, first Marquess of Ripon, statesman, 1827; Sigismund Christian Hubert Goetze, painter, 1866; Dame Agnes Sybil Thorndike, actress, 1882; Merian C. Cooper, author, film producer and director, 1893; Jack Warner (Jack Waters), actor, 1894; Moss Hart, playwright and director, 1904; Jackie Coogan (Jack Leslie Coogan), actor, 1914; Tito Gobbi, baritone, 1915.

Deaths: Lady Jane Seymour, Queen of England and wife of Henry VIII, 1537; Tycho Brahe, astronomer and mathematician, 1601; Sir William Rollo, Royalist soldier, executed 1645; Pierre Gassendi (Gassend), scientist and philosopher, 1655; Gabriel Metsu, painter, 1667; Pietro Alessandro Gaspare Scarlatti, composer, 1725; Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf, composer, 1799; Joseph Lancaster, educationist, 1838; Francis Turner Palgrave, editor and anthologist, 1897; Pierre-Cecile Puvis de Chavannes, mural painter, 1898; Alexandre-Charles Lecocq, composer, 1918; Sigismund Christian Hubert Goetze, painter, 1939; Vidkun Quisling, Norwegian wartime traitor, executed 1945; Franz Lehar, composer, 1948; Christian Dior, fashion designer, 1957; George Edward Moore, philosopher, 1958; Carl Sprague Ruggles, composer, engraver and painter, 1971; Edward Burra, painter, 1976.

On this day: the cathedral of Notre Dame, Chartres, France, was consecrated, 1260; murderers were no longer allowed to plead Benefit of Clergy, 1513; the Thirty Years War ended after the Treaty of Westphalia was signed, 1648; the transcontinental telegraph line was completed in the US, 1861; Strauss's operetta Der Zigeunerbaron was first produced in Vienna, 1885; the Italians defeated the Austrians at Vittorio Veneto, and Austria-Hungary surrendered to the Allies, 1918; the United Nations Charter came into force, 1945; Soviet troops intervened in Hungary, 1956; the United States started to blockade Cuba, 1962; Northern Rhodesia, renamed Zambia, became independent, 1964; Israeli artillery destroyed a petrol refinery at Port Suez, 1967; 300 people died and 150,000 were made homeless when floods swept through Tunisia, 1969.

Today is United Nations Day and the Feast Day of St Antony Claret, St Aretas, St Elesbaan, St Evergislus, St Felix of Thibiuca, St Maglorius or Maelor, St Martin or Mark, St Martin of Vertou, The Martyrs of Najran, St Proclus of Constantinople and St Senoch.

TOMORROW

Births: Thomas Weelkes, composer, baptised 1576; Dr James Beattie, poet and philosopher, 1735; Thomas Babington Macaulay, Lord Macaulay, historian and essayist, 1800; Richard Parkes Bonington, painter, 1801; Ernesto Camillo Sivori, violinist and composer, 1815; Johann Strauss the Younger, composer, 1825; Sir Joseph Archer Crowe, consular official and art critic, 1828; Georges Alexandre-Cesar-Leopold Bizet, composer, 1838; Pablo Ruiz Picasso, painter, 1881; Richard Evelyn Byrd, admiral, aviator and polar explorer, 1888; Abel Gance, film director and producer, 1889; Levi Eshkol, Israeli statesman, 1895; Don Banks, composer, 1923.

Deaths: Stephen, King of England, 1154; Geoffrey Chaucer, poet, 1400; Giorgione (Giorgio da Castelfranco), painter, 1510; Evangelista Torricelli, scientist and inventor of the barometer, 1647; George II, King of England, 1760; Eduard Hildebrandt, painter, 1868; Sir Charles Halle (Carl Halle), conductor and pianist, 1895; Frank Norris, novelist, 1902; Frederick William Serafino Austin Lewis Mary Rolfe ('Baron Corvo'), author, 1913; Sir Ernest Albert Waterlow, painter, 1919; King Alexander of Greece, 1920; Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, 18th Baron Dunsany, author, 1957.

On this day: the English army, led by King Henry V, defeated the French at the Battle of Agincourt, 1415; Bradshaw's Railway Guide was first published, 1839; the Charge of the Light Brigade took place at Balaclava, 1854; the Fiji Islands were annexed by Great Britain, 1874; Strauss's operetta Wiener Blut was first produced in Vienna, 1899; Great Britain annexed the Transvaal, 1900; 343 people died when the Canadian Pacific steamer Princess Sophia was wrecked off Alaska, 1918; Terence McSwiney, Sinn Fein Lord Mayor of Cork, died after 73 days' hunger strike in Brixton Prison, London 1920; the first London production of the musical show Follow the Girls was presented, 1945; 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.

Tomorrow 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.