Category: It happened today…

  1803  The US purchases 831321 square miles of land from France for $15 million. This becomes known as the “Louisiana Purchase”. 1860  South Carolina secedes from the Union. 1924  Adolf Hitler is paroled...

  1848  Birth of English novelist Emily Bronte. 1902  Birth of British actor Sir Ralph Richardson. 1905  First motorised ambulance service set up in London. 1906  Birth of Soviet president Leonid Brezhnev. 1991  Mikhail...

  1737  Death of violin maker Antonio Stradivari. 1779  Birth of English clown and creator of the classic clown make up, Joseph Grimaldi. 1825  Tsar Nicholas I succeeds to the Russian throne. 1913  Birth...

  1778  Birth of Sir Humphrey Davy, English chemist and inventor of theminers safety lamp. 1830  Death of the South American revolutionary Simon Bolivar. 1967  Australian prime minister Harold Holt disappears while swimming. His...

  1653  Oliver Cromwell made Lord Protector of England. 1773  Boston Tea Party takes place as a protest against a tea tax. 1775  Birth of English novelist Jane Austen. 1889  Birth of English playwright...

  1832  Birth  of Alexandre Gustave Eiffel, French engineer who built the Eiffel Tower in Paris. 1840  Napoleon’s body is interred at Les Invalides in Paris. 1918  Portuguese president Sidonio Paes is assassinated. 1943...

  1799  Death of George Washington. 1861  Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria, dies of typhoid. 1906  The first German submarine, the U1, enters service 1926  The British author Agatha Christie was found in...

  1784  Death of Dr Samuel Johnson, English poet and lexicographer. 1862  Union Army defeated by Confederate General Robert E Lee at Fredericksburg. 1904  The first electric train enters service on London’s Metropolitan Railway....

  1863  Birth of Edvard Munch, Norwegian painter. 1901  Marconi sends radio signal across Atlantic Ocean. Signal sent from Cornwall in England to St John’s in Newfoundland. 1913  The Mona Lisa which had been...

  1783  William Pitt is made British prime minister and chancellor of the exchequer at the age of 24. 1817  Death of Rear-Admiral William Bligh, previously captain of HMS Bounty when the crew mutinied....

  1793  Madame Du Barry, mistress to King Louis XV of France is sent to the guillotine. 1896  Birth of Ira Gershwin, American songwriter. 1926  Death of French painter Claude Monet. 1988  Death of...

  1791  Death of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart at the age of 35. 1839  Birth of General George Armstrong Custer. 1870  Death of Alexandre Dumas, author of The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers. 1945  Six...

  1154  Nicholas Breakspeare becomes the first English pope, taking the name Adrian IV. 1791  The Observer Sunday newspaper is published in Britain for the first time. 1872  The Marie Celeste is found adrift in the Atlantic...

  1552  Death of the Jesuit missionary Francis Xavier. 1828  Andrew Jackson wins US presidential election. 1926  British novelist Agatha Christie disappears from her Surrey home. 1967  Dr Christiaan Barnard performs the world’s first...

  1547  Death of the conquistador Hernan Cortes. 1814  Death of the Marquis de Sade. 1859  The American abolitionist John Brown is hanged for treason. 1901  King Camp Gillette markets the first safety razor....

  1135  Death of King Henry I of England. 1918  Denmark passes an act giving independence to Iceland. 1939  World premiere of Gone with the Wind is held in New York. 1973  Death of David Ben...

  1835  Birth of American author Mark Twain. 1874  Birth of British prime minister Sir Winston Churchill. 1900  Death of Irish playwright Oscar Wilde. 1936  The Crystal Palace in London, originally constructed to house...

  1780  Death of Maria Theresa, widow of the Holy Roman Emperor Francis I. 1924  Death of Italian composer Giacomo Puccini. 1943  Tehran conference between Joseph Stalin, Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill opens. 1974...

  1757  Birth of English poet William Blake. 1859  Death of the American writer Washington Irving. 1919  Nancy Astor becomes the first female MP in Great Britain. 1945  Death of Dwight Davis, founder of...

  1701  Birth of Anders Celsius, inventor of the celsius temperature scale. 1893  For the first time in history, women are able to vote in  national election. The poll took place in New Zealand....