On This Day

raveydavey · Posted: Wed Nov 04, 2009 7:01 pm Post subject:

November 4th:

1605: Guy Fawkes was arrested when around 30 barrels of gunpowder camouflaged with coals and faggots were discovered in the cellar under Parliament. Robert Catesby’s small band of Catholic zealots who planned to blow up James I and Parliament were only arrested after Fawkes revealed their names when tortured on the rack. (Yes, I thought it was tomorrow as well....)

1650 William III, King of England, Scotland and Ireland was born ..... in Holland. On the day after his 38th birthday he landed at Torbay with an army of English and Dutch troops, and when Parliament declared the throne empty, he was proclaimed king.

1852 For the first time in its history, journalists were allowed into the House of Commons to report debates.

1859 Joseph Rowntree, British chocolate manufacturer and philanthropist, died.

1890 The Prince of Wales travelled by the underground electric railway from King William Street to the Oval to mark the opening of what is now the City Branch of the Northern Line. It was the first electrified underground railway system.

1900 Britain's first driving lessons were given, in London.

1922 English explorers Lord Carnarvon and Howard Carter discovered the Tomb of King Tutankhamen, in the Valley of the Kings near Luxor, Egypt. It had been undisturbed since 1337 BC.

1929 Violinist Yehudi Menuhin made his London debut, aged 12.

1942 The Battle of El Alamein ended with victory for the allies, after 12 days of conflict with Rommel's 'Africa Corps'.

1946: UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) was established.

1951: In Korea, enemy attacks were in danger of over-running a position held by the King's Own Scottish Borderers. Private Speakman, from the Black Watch but serving with the KOSB, on his own initiative led forward a group of six men with a large supply of grenades, and led a series of charges to break up the attack. Although wounded in the leg, he continued to counter-attack until his company had safely withdrawn to a fresh position. He received the Victoria Cross.

1952 Queen Elizabeth II opened her first Parliament.

1956: Soviet troops overrun Hungary. Soviet troops pour into the city in a massive dawn offensive in repsonse to a national uprising led by Prime Minister Imre Nagy.

1974 Judith Ward was convicted of an army coach bombing on the M62 motorway in which 12 people died. She received a life term for each of those who died. Her conviction was quashed in 1992 when her lawyers argued that the trial jury should have been told of her history of mental illness.

1980: Reagan beats Carter in landslide. Former Hollywood actor and Republican Ronald Reagan wins the US presidential elections by a huge majority.

1987 Millionaire Peter de Savary bought Land’s End in Cornwall.

1992: Clinton beats Bush to the White House. Bill Clinton is elected US President.

1994 400 years of shipbuilding came to an end at the Swan Hunter Shipyard, Tyneside, with the launch of the Royal Naval Frigate ' Richmond'. The yard stood empty for a few years, before it was bought by Jaap Kroese, a Dutch millionaire.

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raveydavey · Posted: Thu Nov 05, 2009 6:56 pm Post subject:

November 5th:

1605 Guy Fawkes (born here, in York) was arrested when around 30 barrels of gunpowder, camouflaged with coal, were discovered in the cellar under Parliament. Robert Catesby’s small band of Catholic zealots who planned to blow up James I and Parliament were only arrested after Fawkes revealed their names when tortured on the rack. The 'Gunpowder Plot' is commemorated each year in Britain on 5th November , 'Guy Fawkes' Night'. The setting off of fireworks is still preceded by children asking for ‘a penny for the Guy’, a grotesque effigy of Guy Fawkes which is burnt on a bonfire this night. (See, I told you it was today....bloody internet!)

1854: The third major engagement of the Crimean War, the Battle of Inkerman, was fought. The Russians planned a major coordinated assault by four large columns of troops from Sevastopol against British positions on Mount Inkerman. The British position, held by 2nd Division, was relatively weak, with deep gullies and ravines making reinforcement difficult, and the defenders outnumbered by over 5:1. The attack was launched in the early hours of the morning, amid rain and mist. However, Russian coordination failed, and the battle developed into a series of vicious close quarter actions fought in and around the gullies on the hillside. Bosquet's French troops arrived to lend invaluable support, as did additional British forces, and the Russians were eventually driven back, having lost 10,700 men killed or wounded. The British lost some 2,300, and the French about 900. No less than sixteen Victoria Crosses (VC) were awarded.

1909 Woolworths opened its first British store, in Liverpool. Almost 100 years later, (at the end of the first week in January 2009) the last remaining stores closed, for the final time.

1912 The appointment of a British Board of Film Censors. They decided on only two classifications - 'Universal' and 'Not Suitable for Children'.

1913 Vivien Leigh, British actress who won an Oscar for 'Gone With the Wind' was born.

1935 Lester Piggott, champion jockey, was born. Aged 18, he rode his first Derby winner.

1914 World War I: Britain and France declared war on Turkey.

1927 Britain’s first automatic traffic lights were installed at Princess Square road junction in Wolverhampton, in the West Midlands.

1932 Gillespie Road London Underground station, which also served Arsenal Football Club’s Highbury ground, had its name changed to Arsenal after representations by the club.

1940: The German "pocket battleship" Admiral Scheer attacked convoy HX-84 in the mid-Atlantic. The convoy comprised 37 ships, escorted by the armed merchant cruiser Jervis Bay, commanded by Captain Fegen. Although unarmoured and massively outgunned - seven elderly 6" guns against Scheer's 11" main battery - Fegen attacked the German ship head on, ordering the convoy to scatter. Jervis Bay never once brought Admiral Scheer within the range of her own guns, but fought on with her decks ablaze. 190 of her crew of 255 were killed, including Fegen. The delay allowed most of the convoy to get clear, the German raider only being able to sink five ships before nightfall. The Canadian armed freighter Beaverford put up a dogged fight for over four hours before being lost. Captain Fegen was awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross.

1950: 77 Squadron Royal Australian Air Force commenced operations in Korea, flying close-support missions for Australian infantry.

1952: Landslide victory for Eisenhower. General Dwight D Eisenhower sweeps to victory in the American presidential elections with the largest number of popular votes ever recorded for a presidential candidate.

1956: British and French paratroopers were dropped in airborne assaults at Port Fuad and Port Said in Egypt during the Suez Crisis.

1967 At least 40 people were killed and 80 hurt after a train derailed near Hither Green, south-east London.

1971 Princess Anne was voted ‘Sportswoman of the Year’ by the British Sportswriters' Association.

1979 The trial began in Dublin, of the two men accused of the murder of Lord Mountbatten.

1991 Millionaire publishing tycoon Robert Maxwell was found dead at sea, several hours after mysteriously disappearing from his yacht off the Canary Islands.

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raveydavey · Posted: Fri Nov 06, 2009 4:41 pm Post subject:

November 6th:

1282: As part of the preparations for Edward I's second campaign in Wales, a flotilla of small ships had been sent to Anglesey, held by the English, to construct a pontoon bridge across the Menai Strait. The plan was for the Anglesey force to launch an attack in the Welsh rear coordinated with Edward's advance from the east with the main force. Luke de Tany, the Anglesey commander, proved too impatient and launched his attack prematurely when the King had only reached Denbigh. De Tany's force was easily defeated by the Welsh, he fell in action, and the pontoon bridge was wrecked.

1429 Henry VI was crowned King of England, seven years after acceding to the throne at the age of eight months. Two years later, in Paris, he was also crowned King of France.

1638 Birth of James Gregory, Scottish mathematician and astronomer who described the first practical reflecting telescope and contributed towards the discovery of calculus.

1892 Birth of Sir John Alcock, English aviator who flew the first non-stop flight across the Atlantic in 1919 with Sir Arthur Whitten-Brown.

1924 Tory leader Stanley Baldwin was elected Prime Minister. He appointed Winston Churchill, former Liberal, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

1935 The RAF's first monoplane fighter, the 'Hawker Hurricane' made its maiden flight.

1938 Singer P.J. Proby , popular in the 60s, was born. He was banned from performing when his trousers regularly and 'accidentally' split on stage.

1942 The Church of England relaxed its rule that women must wear hats in church.

1956: British and French troops conducted an amphibious landing at Port Said during the Suez Crisis, under cover of naval gunfire and air support. 3 Commando Brigade made the first extensive use of helicopters in such an assault, 45 Commando being flown in by Fleet Air Arm Whirlwinds and Sycamores. A cease-fire followed at midnight.

1968 2300 jobs were lost when British Eagle airlines stopped flying.

1970 Three times Grand National hero Red Rum, the greatest ever steeplechaser, won his first ever race, a novice event at Doncaster, at odds of 100/7.

1975 UK punk rock group, the Sex Pistols, gave their first public performance at London's St Martin's College of Art. College authorities cut the concert short after a mere 10 minutes.

1986 Forty five people died after a Chinook helicopter carrying oil rig workers plunged into the North Sea off the coast of Scotland.

1988: A virus which crippled 6,000 US Defence Department computers was spread by a 23-year-old graduate whose father headed the country’s computer security agency.

1996: 'Comeback Kid' wins second term. Democratic President Bill Clinton crushes Bob Dole but Republicans retain control of both Houses.

1999: Australia rejects republic. Australians reject a proposal to break ties with the British monarchy and become a republic.

2003 Michael Howard took over as leader of the Conservative party after Iain Duncan Smith was ousted in a no-confidence vote.

2004 Fred Dibnah, aged 66, steeplejack and TV personality lost his three-year fight against cancer only weeks after filming his final television series. He had been awarded the MBE in 2003. Was that really 5 years ago? By 'eck, as Fred himself might have said...

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raveydavey · Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2009 3:06 pm Post subject:

November 7th:

1594: English and French royalist troops under Sir John Norris, supported by a naval squadron under Sir Martin Frobisher, stormed the Spanish fort at Roscanvel in Brittany and massacred the defenders. Frobisher, however, was wounded in the assault and subsequently died of his injuries. The fort had been established by the Spanish in March of that year, and occupied a commanding position over the strategic anchorage of Brest Roads. It thus posed a significant threat to English security by offering a potential staging post for Spanish expeditions to invade England, Wales or Ireland, as had been attempted by the Armada in 1588 and was to be repeated several more times during the Anglo-Spanish war. The fort's location is remembered by the modern name of Pointe des Espagnols.

1665 The first edition of the London Gazette, the world's longest running journal. It carried news of military appointments and engagements.

1783 The last public hanging in Britain took place when John Austin, a forger, was executed at Tyburn, near Marble Arch in London.

1872: The Marie Celeste, the ill-fated brigantine, sailed from New York to be found mysteriously abandoned some time later.

1918: Birth of (William Franklin) Billy Graham, US evangelist who campaigned for Christ using all the techniques of modern communication to address huge audiences in the US and worldwide. He made several appearance at Elland Road over the years.

1935 The Royal National Institute for the Blind distributed its first Talking Books of players and records to blind and partially sighted people.

1942 The birth of Jean Shrimpton, leading English model whose face and figure, enhanced with a miniskirt, set the fashion for the 60s.

1953 Lucinda Green, frequent winner of the Badminton horse trials, was born.

1956 An official ceasefire during the Suez Crisis following the British and French invasion of Egypt after President Nasser had announced the nationalisation of the Suez Canal.

1956: Eisenhower re-elected with record vote. Eisenhower is returned to the White House with the biggest share of votes for 100 years.

1967 British heavyweight champion Henry Cooper beat challenger Billy Walker to become the only boxer to win three Lonsdale Belts outright.

1974 Lord Lucan mysteriously disappeared following the murder of his children's nanny and a serious assault on his wife.

1989: Protests force out East German rulers. East German leader Egon Krenz prepares to choose a new government after mass resignations of Communist ministers.

1990 Mary Robinson became the first woman President of the Irish Republic.

1996 A team of British, American and Australian scientists reported evidence that life on Earth originated some 350 million years earlier than previously believed.

1997 Despite him being instrumental in their overnight phenomenal international success, British group 'The Spice Girls' sacked their creator and manager Simon Fuller.

1998 Families of World War 1 soldiers executed for cowardice or desertion laid a wreath at the Cenotaph in Whitehall in the first ceremony of its kind to pay tribute to the 306 servicemen who died.

2001 Prime Minister Tony Blair insisted that his global activity for the war on terrorism did not mean that domestic issues such as crime, health and education were neglected.

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raveydavey · Posted: Sun Nov 08, 2009 1:36 pm Post subject:

November 8th:

November 8th is 'The Feast of the Four Crowned Ones', still marked by some English freemasons. It commemorates four masons martyred by Emperor Diocletian for refusing to sculpt a pagan god.

1656 Birth of Edmond Halley, English astronomer and mathematician best known for the comet named after him and for his work predicting its orbit. He also produced the first meteorological chart.

1674 John Milton, blind English poet of Paradise Lost, died.

1793: The Louvre was opened to the public by the revolutionary government, although only part of the great collection could be viewed.

1802 The birth of Sir Benjamin Hall, commissioner of works at the time of Big Ben’s installation in the tower at the Houses of Parliament. The famous 13 ton bell is named after him.

1847 Bram Stoker, Irish author remembered for the classic, 'Dracula', was born. Whitby in Yorkshire has associations with the Dracula novel.

1866: Birth of Herbert Austin, later Baron Austin, English motor car manufacturer who first went to Australia where he managed several engineering works. He returned to England and produced his first car in 1895. He joined the Wolsey Company and then opened his own works in 1905.

1920 Rupert Bear made his first appearance in the Daily Express.

1942: As Rommel's Axis forces were driven out of Egypt following their defeat at El Alamein, Operation Torch saw Allied forces numbering over 100,000 land in North Africa, at Oran, Algiers and Casablanca. Vichy French forces put up fierce resistance, particularly at Casablanca, although Algiers surrendered that evening. At Oran, the sloops HMS Walney and HMS Hartland ran the gauntlet of shore batteries in an attempt to land an assault party in the harbour. Hartland was sunk and every man on Walney's bridge was killed, save only Captain Peters, her Canadian commanding officer, who was blinded in one eye but pressed on the attack, despite his ship being ablaze. Walney reached her target jetty, but sank alongside. Peters and a few survivors made it to shore, but he tragically died five days later when the aircraft evacuating him back to the UK crashed. He was awarded the Victoria Cross (VC).

1957 A report into a fire at Windscale nuclear power plant in Cumbria blamed the accident on human error, poor management and faulty instruments. The fire caused an unspecified amount of radioactive iodine vapour - iodine 131 - to escape into the atmosphere.

1958 Melody Maker published the first British album charts.

1965 The bill abolishing the death penalty became law.

1967 Britain's first commercial radio station, Radio Leicester, was given a licence to broadcast.

1974 Covent Garden ceased to be the location of London’s famous flower and vegetable market as it moved across the Thames, leaving the old warehouses and Floral Hall.

1974: Police hunt Lord Lucan after murder. Detectives are searching for British aristocrat Lord Lucan following the death of his children's nanny last night.

1987 An IRA bomb exploded shortly before a Remembrance Day service at the Cenotaph in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland, killing 11 people.

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cardboardbox?Youwerelucky · Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 9:16 am Post subject:

Do you just cut and paste from last year Laughing

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Wedding Venues Leeds Carp Fishing

raveydavey · Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 5:48 pm Post subject:

30 Mill · Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 5:53 pm Post subject:

Dont be soft - stick with it

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raveydavey · Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 6:44 pm Post subject:

November 9th:

1841 Birth of King Edward VII, eldest son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert.

1847 In Edinburgh, Dr James Young Simpson delivered Wilhelmina Carstairs while chloroform was administered to her mother, the first child to be born with the aid of anaesthetics.

1857: During the Indian Mutiny, the British and loyal Indian garrison defended the Residency at Lucknow for five months. In November, a relief force under Sir Colin Campbell marched on the city. On 9 November, Mr Thomas Kavanagh, a Civil Servant in the Residency garrison, volunteered to break out and guide the relief column through the city. Disguising himself as an Indian, he managed to smuggle himself across the city, eventually reaching Campbell's positions. Drawing on the intelligence he delivered, Campbell launched a successful assault on 16 November, and succeeded in evacuating the Residency survivors by 23 November. Kavanagh received the Victoria Cross (VC) for his heroism, one of only five civilians ever to be so decorated.

1859 Flogging in the British army was abolished.

1888 At 3:30 a.m. in London's Whitechapel, 25-year-old Mary Kelly became Jack the Ripper's last known victim.

1907 The Cullinan Diamond, the largest diamond yet found, was presented by the Transvaal to King Edward VII.

1908 Britain's first woman mayor, Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, was elected at Aldeburgh. She died on 17th December, 1917 and was buried in Aldeburgh churchyard, Suffolk.

1914: Off the Cocos Islands, the Royal Australian Navy's light cruiser HMAS Sydney finally caught the elusive German light cruiser Emden, which had carried out a remarkable raiding mission against merchant shipping in the Indian Ocean, despite being hunted by the entire Japanese fleet and the British and French Far East squadrons. Sydney was more modern and more heavily armed, and trapped Emden whilst she was landing a raiding party to destroy the wireless and telegraph station on Direction Island. A bloody two-hour engagement left Emden wrecked on North Keeling Island.

1922: The SS (Schutzstaffel or ‘Protection Squad’) was formed in Germany.

1940 Neville Chamberlain, British statesman, died.

1953 Dylan Thomas, Welsh poet, died in New York, aged 39. His heavy drinking and wild living contributed to his early demise. He had a long affinity with Laugharne, (Carmarthenshire) spending the last four years of his life in the Boathouse.

1960: Narrow victory for John F Kennedy. Senator John F Kennedy has won the election to become the youngest elected president of the United States.

1961 Brian Epstein went to a lunchtime session at The Cavern in Liverpool to see for himself why his record shop was receiving so many requests for records by a group that had apparently made none. He later became their manager.

1970: France mourns death of de Gaulle. One of the greatest figures in the history of France, General Charles de Gaulle, dies at his home of a heart attack.

1979 Four men were found guilty of killing paperboy Carl Bridgewater. Eighteen years later their convictions were quashed.

1989: Following demands for political reform from its citizens, the East German government decided to lift the ‘iron curtain’ and allow free travel through the Berlin Wall. Soon after the announcement, many thousands of jubilant East Berliners swarmed through the crossing points into West Berlin. The following day bulldozers moved in and began demolishing the 28-year-old barrier.

1992 Sir Ranulph Fiennes and Dr Michael Stroud set out on their unassisted crossing of the Antarctic. For 97 days they fought pain, starvation and snow blindness until they were eventually airlifted out after completing the first and the longest, unsupported journey in Polar history. They walked more than 1,350 miles across some of the most hostile terrain in the world, averaging more than 14 miles a day at temperatures as low as -45°C.

1999 Pop singer Gary Glitter appeared at Bristol Crown Court charged with seducing and sexually humiliating a 14-year-old girl. The charges related back to 1980.

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raveydavey · Posted: Tue Nov 10, 2009 5:32 pm Post subject:

November 10th:

1337: English forces under Edward III's Admiral of the North, Sir Walter Mauny, sacked Cadzand on the Scheldt at the start of the Hundred Years War. Edward's efforts to raise money and men for operations on the continent had fared poorly, not least given the need to maintain an army fighting the Scots. To maintain the pressure on the French, Mauny was dispatched across the Channel with a couple of thousand troops that could be spared. Although his main mission was to convey Edward's chief diplomat - the Bishop of Lincoln, Henry Burghersh - to bolster support amongst allies in the Low Countries, Mauny took the opportunity to raid French-held territory in Flanders. The sack of Cadzand provoked the local troops to offer battle, and Mauny - himself from Hainault in Flanders by birth - inflicted a bloody defeat on them. Although the raid proved of great psychological value in panicking the French government, the longer term penalty was bitterness towards the English in that part of Flanders.

1483: Birth of Martin Luther, religious reformer who attacked church abuses and began the Reformation.

1683: Birth of George II, King of England from 1727 to 1760 who leaned heavily on his prime minister, Sir Robert Walpole. He had a passion for opera and was Handel’s patron.

1697 William Hogarth, painter, best known for his series, 'The Rake's Progress', was born.

1854: At Sevastopol, a Russian shell fell in a British trench, its fuse still burning. Rifleman Wheatley attempted to extinguish the fuse with his rifle butt. When this failed, he picked up the bomb and threw it out of the trench, where it immediately exploded. He received the Victoria Cross (VC).

1871 Henry Morton Stanley, sent out to Africa by his newspaper to find Scottish missionary David Livingstone, finally made contact with him at Ujiji on Lake Tanganyika with the immortal words, ‘Dr Livingstone, I presume?'

1913 Battersea elected the first coloured mayor in London, John Archer, born in Liverpool of Jamaican parents. The honour of Britain's first black mayor goes to Allen Glaser Minns (Dr. Allan Glaisyer Minns?) who was elected Mayor of Thetford, Norfolk in 1904.

1925 Richard Burton, legendary Welsh actor, was born.

1938: ‘Kristallnacht’ in Germany, when in the early hours Nazis burned 267 synagogues and destroyed thousands of Jewish homes and businesses, smashing shop windows, which gave the night its name.

1942 Buoyant after the desert victory at El Alamein, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill said: 'This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.'

1944: A Gurkha reconnaissance patrol at Monte San Bartolo in Italy ran into overwhelming opposition. The scout, Rifleman Thaman Gurung, sacrificed himself to allow his platoon to withdraw. His gallantry not only saved several lives, but also allowed the patrol to escape with valuable intelligence which contributed to the successful capture of the position a few days later. Gurung received a posthumous Victoria Cross.

1958 British speed enthusiast Donald Campbell broke the water speed record of 248mph on Coniston Water. He died in 1967 (also on Coniston Water) and is buried in the new parish churchyard at Coniston.

1960 Bookshops all over England sold out of Penguin's first run of the controversial novel Lady Chatterley's Lover. All 200,000 copies were sold on the first day of publication.

1968 England and Yorkshire fast bowler Fred Trueman announced his retirement, possibly with the words "There is only so much of a beating the Lancastrians and Australians can take" Very Happy

1980 Outspoken left wing MP Michael Foot defeated (then Leeds East MP) Denis Healey in a shock result to become the new leader of the Labour party.

1986 The legendary jockey, Sir Gordon Richards, died aged 82.

1997 Louise Woodward, British child-minder, was freed from jail in the United States after her conviction for murdering a baby was reduced to manslaughter. Her sentence was cut to 279 days, the exact length of time she had already spent in jail.

2002 Viewers of the UK music channel VH1 voted 'I Will Always Love You' as the most romantic song ever.

_________________
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30 Mill · Posted: Tue Nov 10, 2009 10:46 pm Post subject:

raveydavey · Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2009 6:47 pm Post subject:

November 11th: Feast Day of St Menas (or Mannas), who was believed by the Greeks to have the power to locate lost objects, especially sheep - making him popular in Wales I would imagine?

1887 Work started on building the Scumchester Ship Canal.

1918 At the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, the Great War ended; a war that had lasted for 4 years and 97 days. Germany, bereft of manpower, supplies and food, signed an armistice agreement with the Allies. The war left 9 million soldiers dead and more than 21 million wounded, with Germany, Russia, Austria Hungary, France, and Great Britain each losing nearly a million or more lives. Peace was not finally secured until the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. Britain had lost some 888,000 men killed, India 72,000, Canada 65,000, Australia 62,000, New Zealand 18,000 and South Africa 9,300. Smaller parts of the Empire and Dominions had also made huge sacrifices: of the 6,500 men who served during the war with the Royal Newfoundland Regiment, 1,250 men were killed, the 1st Battalion having suffered perhaps the worst casualties of any unit on the first day of the Somme, when 91% of its men were wounded or killed in just 40 minutes. In addition, some 6 million civilians died from disease, starvation, or exposure.

1919 Britain introduced a two minute silence at 11:00 a.m. to remember those who died in World War I.

1920: The body of the unknown soldier was buried under the Arc de Triomphe, while the body of an unknown British soldier returned from France was interred in Westminster Abbey. This ceremony was recorded using a microphone by Lionel Guest and H O Merriman, the first electrical recording made.

1921 The first British Legion Poppy Day.

1940: 21 Fleet Air Arm Swordfish biplanes from HMS Illustrious conducted an audacious night attack on the Italian battle fleet in Taranto harbour with torpedoes and bombs. Three Italian battleships received serious damage, sinking at their moorings. Despite formidable anti-aircraft defences, only two Swordfish were lost.

1940: Willys launched the Jeep (called so from the initials ‘GP’, for general purpose car).

1942: The Royal Indian Navy minesweeper Bengal, armed with a single small 12 pounder (5.4kg) gun, and the Dutch tanker Ondina, armed with a single 4" gun, won a remarkable victory over two heavily armed Japanese raiders, each carrying six 6" guns, torpedoes and aircraft. The raiders attacked the Allied ships in the Indian Ocean, but Bengal charged at them, setting one of the raiders on fire - she subsequently sank. Ondina was heavily shelled and hit by two torpedoes, but drove the other raider off. Although Ondina's crew then abandoned her, they later re-embarked, put out the fires and brought her into Fremantle.

1946 Stevenage was officially designed as Britain’s first New Town, one of ten which were planned to relieve London’s post-war housing problems.

1952: The first video recorder was demonstrated at Bing Crosby Enterprises in Beverly Hills, California by inventors John Mullin and Wayne Johnson.

1953 The BBC television programme Panorama was first broadcast.

1954 Thousands of elderly people took part in a rally in London calling for an increase in their pensions.

1965 The Rhodesian Government, led by Prime Minister Ian Smith, illegally severed its links with the British Crown.

1975: Australian Prime Minister Gough Whitlam was dismissed by the Governor-General Sir John Kerr because, unable to get his budget plans through Parliament he refused to call a general election.

1987 Irises, a painting by Vincent Van Gogh was sold for £27m at Sotheby's, a world record at that time for a work of art.

1987: An amateur pilot, dubbed the Black Baron for his illegal night-time flights over Paris when he buzzed the Champs-Elysées, was grounded by a French court after a massive manhunt. He was fined £5,000 and banned from flying for three years.

1992 The Church of England General Synod voted to allow women to be ordained to the priesthood.

1997 Britain's Labour Party admitted to accepting a £1m donation from Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone, but claimed it would be repaid and that it had nothing to do with the Government's decision to exempt motor racing from the ban on tobacco-related sports sponsorship.

1998 In the first joint engagement of its kind, the Queen and the Irish president, Mary McAleese, unveiled a peace tower in memory of the Irish dead of the First World War.

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raveydavey · Posted: Thu Nov 12, 2009 6:25 pm Post subject:

November 12th:

1642: Following the Royalist victory at Edgehill on 23 October, the Parliamentarian army had retreated to London. King Charles I pursued, but faced a formidable challenge in trying to take Parliament's power-base in London. Prince Rupert led a dawn assault on a pair of Parliamentarian regiments holding Brentford, commanded by Lord Brooke and Denzill Holles respectively. Dense fog aided the attackers, and Holles' regiment was particularly roughly handled, with many of its men drowned in the Thames trying to escape. Along the river, the Royalist Colonel Blagge pulled off another coup by setting up some artillery at Sion House, which caught a Parliamentarian supply convoy of barges by surprise, sinking several of them.

1660 English author John Bunyan was arrested for preaching without a licence. He refused to give up preaching and remained in jail for 12 years.

1684: Birth of Edward Vernon (‘Old Grog’), English admiral.

1847 The first public demonstration of the use of chloroform as an anaesthetic was given by James Simpson, at the University of Edinburgh.

1911 Birth of Reverend Chad Varah, founder of the Samaritans, the voluntary group who counsel those in distress. Originally established at St Stephen’s Church, London, it provides a service day and night, every day of the year. (Reverend Chad Varah died on 8th November 2007, aged 95.)

1912 The remains of English explorer Robert Scott and his companions were found in Antarctica.

1919 The first flight from England to Australia started at Hounslow, with Ross and Smith in a Vickers Vimy. They landed safely on 13th December 1919.

1923: Hitler was arrested after his failed Beer Hall putsch in Munich on the 8th.

1933 The first photograph of the ‘Loch Ness monster’ was taken by Mr Hugh Gray. He managed to take five pictures altogether but after processing, four of them were blank and the fifth was not confirmed as being Nessie. I took a photo of Nessie in 2003 - I'll have to see if I can find it....

1942: Pharmaceutical giant Bayer patented polyurethane.

1944: Lancaster bombers from 617 and 9 Squadrons conducted a precision bombing attack on the German battleship Tirpitz in Tromso Fjiord. Flying from RAF Lossiemouth, the Lancasters dropped 12,000lb (5,443kg) Tallboy bombs from 14,000 feet (4.2km), scoring at least two direct hits. These finally achieved the long-sought destruction of Tirpitz - she blew up and capsized. There is continuing debate to this day between 9 and 617 Squadrons as to which was responsible for the hits.

1954: New York's Ellis Island closes. New York's main immigration point, Ellis Island, shuts its doors after 62 years.

1974 A salmon was caught in the Thames, the first since around 1840. It was an 8lb 4 1/2oz female and she was discovered entangled in the protective nets around West Thurrock power station It was regarded by Thames Water authority as a vindication of the £100m they had spent on effluent control.

1982: Solidarity leader Walesa released. The Polish government frees the leader of the outlawed Solidarity movement, Lech Walesa, after 11 months of internment.

1984 It was announced, by Chancellor Nigel Lawson, that the pound note (in circulation for more than 150 years) would be phased out and replaced with the pound coin.

1997 The so-called 'Great Train Robber', Ronnie Biggs, was celebrating after Brazil's Supreme Court rejected a British request to extradite him, for the second time. The court in Rio de Janeiro ruled that because Biggs' crime was committed more than 20 years ago he could not be extradited under Brazilian law.

2001 Greece held 12 plane-spotting British 'spies' to carry out further inquiries. All were arrested for allegedly taking photographs at an air show at a military base.

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Boycott Sheffield

30 Mill · Posted: Thu Nov 12, 2009 7:47 pm Post subject:

raveydavey · Posted: Fri Nov 13, 2009 3:58 pm Post subject:

November 13th:

1093 Malcolm III of Scotland, son of King Duncan, died at Alnwick, Northumberland, during his fifth attempt to invade England.

1312 Birth of Edward III, King of England from 1327. He invaded Scotland and was soundly beaten at Bannockburn.

1687 Nell Gwyn, actress and one of Charles II's 13 mistresses, died aged 37.

1850 Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish author of Treasure Island, Kidnapped and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, was born.

1887 'Bloody Sunday' in London when violence erupted in Trafalgar Square at a Socialist rally attended by Irish agitators.

1907: The first helicopter rose 6 feet above ground in a field in Normandy powered by two motor-driven propellers above the pilot.

1916 The Battle of the Somme (World War 1) ended. By the end of the battle, the British Army had suffered 420,000 casualties including nearly 60,000 on the first day alone. The French lost 200,000 men and the Germans nearly 500,000. The battle epitomised the futility of trench warfare and the indiscriminate slaughter of so many men.

1916: Nineteen year-old Private Cunningham of the East Yorkshire Regiment was a member of bomb section (armed with large quantities of grenades) during a trench attack. Every other member of his section was killed or wounded, but Cunningham patiently collected all their grenades, and continued the attack alone, successfully clearing the trench of defenders. He received the Victoria Cross (VC).

1936 King Edward VIII told Prime Minister Baldwin that he intended to marry twice divorced Mrs, Simpson.

1940: Walt Disney’s Fantasia opened in New York.

1941: HMS Ark Royal, so often claimed by Goebbels to have been sunk, was finally hit by torpedoes from U-81 off Gibraltar. Efforts to save her proved fruitless, and she eventually sank on 14 November. On hearing the news the people of Leeds immediately set about raising funds to build a replacement.

1947 Chancellor of the Exchequer, Hugh Dalton, resigned after admitting he had disclosed tax proposals to a reporter several minutes before presenting his Budget speech.

1965: Warrant Officer Wheatley won the first of four Australian Victoria Crosses during the Vietnam War. A member of the Australian Army Training Team supporting the ARVN, he insisted on staying behind to defend a wounded comrade when their position at Tra Bong was overwhelmed. He was killed conducting a lone defence against heavy odds.

1969 Britain's first live quintuplets this century were born at Queen Charlotte's maternity hospital in London.

1978: A Sea Harrier made its first successful deck landing on HMS Hermes.

1979 The Times newspaper was published for the first time in nearly a year. The paper's disappearance from news stands followed a dispute between management and unions over manning levels and the introduction of new technology.

1987 With a view to encouraging 'safe sex', or AIDS prevention, the BBC screened its first condom 'commercial' (without a brand name).

1995 18 year Leah Betts was on a life-support machine after taking a single ecstasy tablet at her 18th birthday party. She died three days later without ever regaining consciousness.

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raveydavey · Posted: Sat Nov 14, 2009 1:34 pm Post subject:

November 14th:

1582 English playwright William Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway.

1770: Scottish explorer James Bruce discovered the source of the Blue Nile in north-east Ethiopia, which was then considered the main stream of the Nile.

1896 The speed limit for horseless carriages in Britain was raised from 4 mph (2 mph in towns) to 14 mph. It was marked by the first London to Brighton Car Run, which only became a regular and official event from 1927, when it was sponsored by the Daily Sketch.

1889: New York World star female reporter Nellie Bly set sail from New York to beat Phileas Fogg’s 80 days to go around the world as described in Jules Verne’s classic. She filed stories during her travels and ran a competition for readers to guess what her time would be, attracting nearly one million entries. She actually did it in 72 days, 6 hours, 11 minutes and 14 seconds having travelled by sea, on sampans, on horseback, by rail and road.

1911 George V and Queen Mary landed at Gibraltar, the first time a reigning British monarch had visited a British Commonwealth country.

1922 BBC radio was first broadcast from Alexandra Palace. The first programme was broadcast at 6 pm from 2LO London (later the BBC). A news bulletin, repeated again at 9 pm, and a weather report were the entire programme.

1940 In one raid, 449 German Luftwaffe bombers dropped 503 tons of bombs and 881 incendiaries onto the City of Coventry, killing over 500 civilians and destroying the medieval cathedral. A new cathedral was built, adjacent to the old, and the bombed cathedral was left as a memorial.

1941 The British aircraft carrier Ark Royal sank off Gibraltar after being hit by a torpedo from German U-boat, the U-81.

1948 Birth of Prince Charles (Charles Philip Arthur George), Prince of Wales and an enthusiastic and concerned environmentalist.

1952 Britain’s first music chart was published, in the New Musical Express, with Al Martino’s ‘Here in my Heart’ at No. 1 and Vera Lynn in at 7, 8 and 10.

1969 The BBC began colour television programmes.

1973 Bobby Moore made his 108th and final appearance for England.

1973 Princess Anne married Captain Mark Phillips at Westminster Abbey.

1977 Firefighters claimed widespread support for their first national strike, over a 30% pay demand. More than 10,000 troops were called in to cover emergencies.

1983 The first Cruise missiles arrived at Greenham Common, a US airbase.

2000: Fuel protesters rally for tax cut. Convoys of lorries and tractors have converged on London and Edinburgh to mark the 60-day deadline for government action to cut fuel tax.

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raveydavey · Posted: Sun Nov 15, 2009 3:03 pm Post subject:

November 15th: The Feast Day of Albert the Great, patron saint of medical technicians. Albert was a pioneer of books for students of natural sciences.

1577 English explorer and navigator Sir Francis Drake began his voyage to sail around the world.

1708 William Pitt the Elder, 1st Earl of Chatham and British Prime Minister, was born.

1897: Birth of Aneurin Bevan, British Labour politician, son of a miner, who was the architect of the National Health Service.

1899 The SS St. Paul became the first ship to receive radio messages, transmitted from the Needles wireless station off the Isle of Wight.

1918: Victory Day in Britain following the end of the First World War.

1899 Winston Churchill was captured by the Boers while covering the war as a reporter for the Morning Post. He escaped a few weeks later.

1922 Children's Hour was first broadcast on the radio. It established a tradition of drama and story-telling and built up a devoted audience of over three million at its peak.

1923: Rampant inflation in Germany reached a peak this day when the mark (4.2 to $1 in 1914) had risen to 4,200,000,000 to $1.

1940: Germans bomb Coventry to destruction. The German Luftwaffe bombs Coventry overnight in a massive raid leaving much of the city devastated.

1942: Church bells -silent since June 1940, reserved for use as an invasion alarm - were rung in the UK as a celebration of victory at El Alamein.

1956: Love Me Tender, Elvis Presley’s first film, was premiered in New York. It recouped its production costs after three days.

1968 The liner Queen Elizabeth completed her final passenger voyage when she landed at Southampton. She was sold to a US group who planned to moor her in Florida as a tourist attraction. She was replaced by the new liner the QE2.

1969 ATV (Midland) screened the first colour television commercial in Britain. It was for Birds Eye Peas and cost just £23 for the off peak 30 second slot.

1977 The birth of Peter Phillips, son of Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips.

1985 Britain and the Republic of Ireland signed a deal giving Dublin a role in Northern Ireland for the first time in more than 60 years. Unionists accused Mrs. Thatcher of treachery.

1991 In the wake of increased sectarian violence in Northern Ireland, Britain called up 1,400 reserve troops for full-time active duty.

1994 The launch of Britain's first Internet newspaper, The Electronic Telegraph.

1998 Britain and America called back their fighter planes after Iraq agreed to allow UN weapons inspectors back into the country.

2002 Moors murderer Myra Hindley, the woman who came to personify evil , died in prison, aged 60.

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raveydavey · Posted: Mon Nov 16, 2009 7:21 pm Post subject:

November 16th:

42 BC: Birth of Tiberius Claudius Nero, second emperor of Rome, succeeding Augustus in AD 14, who improved and strengthened the principate, but was depicted as cruel and perverted by historians.

1724 Jack Sheppard, Stepney born highwayman, was hanged at Tyburn in front of 200,000 spectators.

1811 John Bright, son of a Quaker cotton spinner, was born in Rochdale, Lancashire. He achieved fame as an English statesman, as MP for Durham and Scumchester and as a great reformer and orator.

1824: Australian explorer Hamilton Hume discovered the Murray River, the longest in Australia, 1,609 miles (2,589 km).

1848 Frédéric Chopin gave his last public performance at London’s Guildhall. He played on, despite illness and an uninterested audience who spent most of the evening in the refreshment areas.

1869: The formal opening of the Suez Canal took place. It had taken ten years to make the 100-mile canal devised by Ferdinand de Lesseps. He celebrated his 64th birthday three days later. In 1974, the Suez Canal was reopened following its closure in the 1967 Suez conflict.

1896 Birth of Oswald Mosley, English politician who was successively a Conservative and Labour Member of Parliament before forming the British Union of Fascists. Provocative marches through the Jewish East End of London prior to the Second World War led to major confrontations. He was interned during the war and later lived in exile in France.

1915: Private Caffrey of the York & Lancaster Regiment left the safety of his trench, accompanied by a corporal from the Royal Army Medical Corps, to rescue a wounded man lying in No Man's Land. Spotted by the Germans, their first attempt was driven back by an artillery bombardment. At the second attempt, they reached the wounded man, and bandaged his wounds. But as they were lifting him, the RAMC corporal fell with a serious head wound. On his own, Caffrey bandaged him in turn and got him back to the British lines. He then braved enemy fire a third time to successfully rescue, at last, the original wounded colleague. Caffrey received the Victoria Cross.

1928 In London, obscenity charges were brought against Radclyffe Hall for her crusading lesbian novel The Well of Loneliness.

1938 Willie Hall of Tottenham Hotspurs scored five goals for England against Ireland with his three goals in 3 minutes, setting a record for the fastest ever in an international match.

1942 Willie Carson, English jockey, was born.

1960 The TV personality with a reputation for outspokenness, Gilbert Harding, died as he left the BBC's Broadcasting House in London.

1961 Frank Bruno, British boxer, was born.

1976 Seven men who took part in an £8m bank robbery raid at the Bank of America in Mayfair, London, received jail terms totalling nearly 100 years. Only £1/2m was recovered. The judge said the sentence ensured that the thieves would not enjoy the fruits of their haul.

1983 More than 20 English football supporters were arrested in Luxembourg after a night of violence.

1995 The Queen Mother, aged 95, had her right hip replaced in an operation in London.

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raveydavey · Posted: Tue Nov 17, 2009 7:22 pm Post subject:

November 17th: The Feast Day of Hilda, patron saint of business and professional women.

1558 Mary I, England's first queen (also known as 'Bloody Mary'), died at St James's Palace London. She was succeeded by Elizabeth I.

1603 The trial of Sir Walter Raleigh began. Falsely accused of treason, he had been offered a large sum of money by Lord Cobham, a critic of England’s King James I, to make peace with the Spanish and put Arabella Stuart, James’s cousin, on the throne. Raleigh claimed he turned down the offer, but Lord Cobham told his accusers that Raleigh was involved in the plot.

1800: The US Congress met for the first time and John Adams became the first President to move into the Executive Mansion (later renamed the White House).

1849: As part of the Royal Navy's campaign to suppress the slave trade, Castor and Dee sent a landing party in boats up the river at Porto de Angoche in Mozambique to destroy a slave ship and slaving centre.

1869 England’s James Moore won the first cycle road race, an 83 miles race from Paris to Rouen.

1880 The first three women to graduate in Britain received their Bachelor of Arts degrees at London University.

1882 The Royal Astronomer witnessed an unidentified flying object from the Greenwich Observatory. He described it as a circular object, glowing bright green.

1887 The birth of Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, English soldier who was a painstaking planner, which contributed to his most successful battle in North Africa when he broke through Rommel’s lines during the Second World War. ‘Monty’ was also a superb communicator, which assured his popularity with his men.

1917: Royal Navy and German light forces clashed off Heligoland. Ordinary Seaman Carless of HMS Caledon was awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross for continuing to man his gun and tend to the wounded despite being himself mortally wounded.

1922 Britain elected its first Communist Member of Parliament, J T Walton-Newbold standing for Motherwell, Scotland. He eventually joined the Labour Party.

1941: British Commandos led by Lieutenant Colonel Keyes attacked a house at Beda Littoria in Libya, believed to be the headquarters of General Rommel, commander of the Afrika Korps. The Commandos had been landed by submarine three days before, and had approached the location through difficult terrain. Keyes went forward with two men, and successfully overcame a sentry. Bursting into the building, they killed the occupants of the first room they entered, but Keyes was then shot dead as he attacked the next room. It later emerged that Rommel was in Rome at the time. Although the raid was failure, Keyes was awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross.

1945 H J Wilson of the RAF set a new world air speed record 606 mph in Gloster Meteor IV.

1955 Anglesey became the first authority in Britain to introduce fluoride into the water supply.

1959 Two Scottish airports, Prestwick and Renfrew, became the first to offer duty free goods in Britain. London Heathrow followed soon after.

1964 Britain said that it was banning all arms exports to South Africa.

1970 Stephanie Rahn became the Sun newspaper's first 'Page Three Girl'. Cool

1986: French car chief shot dead. The head of the Renault car company, Georges Besse, is assassinated outside his home in Paris.

2003: Washington sniper convicted. An ex-soldier who served in the Gulf War is found guilty of at least one of the Washington sniper killings in October 2002.

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raveydavey · Posted: Wed Nov 18, 2009 6:52 pm Post subject:

November 18th:

9: Birth of Vespasian (Titus Flavius Vespasianus), Roman emperor who consolidated the empire, directed the pacification of Wales and northern Britain and established extensive sales and excise taxes, including one on public urinals.

1477 Caxton’s book, the Dictes or Sayengis of the Philosophres, was published. It was the first printed book in England bearing a date.

1626: St Peter’s in Rome was consecrated.

1836 Sir W.S. Gilbert, who collaborated with Sir Arthur Sullivan to produce light operas, was born.

1852 The state funeral of the Duke of Wellington took place at St Paul’s Cathedral. It was one of the biggest ever held in London.

1906 Birth of Sir Alec Issigonis, born in Turkey of a Bavarian mother and a Greek father. He came to Britain in 1922 and made his way slowly in the motor industry, designing the Morris Minor in 1948, the first British car to sell more than a million. In 1959 he had his greatest triumph when he unveiled the Mini Minor which ten years later became the first British car to sell over two million.

1910 More than 100 were arrested by police when suffragettes tried to storm the House of Commons at Westminster, London.

1916 General Douglas Haig called off the first Battle of the Somme in Europe after five months of futile battle, which included the first use of tanks. The Allied advance of just 125 square miles claimed 420,000 British and 195,000 French casualties. German losses were over 650,000.

1928: The first Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, was screened in the US. It was the first experimental sound cartoon and, although not strictly the first Mickey cartoon, it was the first with his amended name.

1942: Australian troops captured Popondetta in New Guinea, just north of the Owen Stanley mountains, to provide an important base to liberate the rest of the island.

1963: Bell Telephone introduced push button telephones.

1967 A ban on the movement of farm animals across the whole of England and Wales came into effect at midnight, in a bid to curb the spread of foot and mouth disease.

1978: In Guyana, a US sect led by the ‘Reverend’ Jim Lloyd murdered three visiting newsmen and a US congressman who had come to investigate the movement. Lloyd then ordered his 900 men, women and children to commit mass suicide by drinking a soft drink laced with cyanide. It was probably the largest mass suicide in modern times.

1983 The world's first all-girl sextuplets were born, to Mrs. Janet Walton at Liverpool Maternity Hospital. They were named Hannah, Lucy, Ruth, Sarah, Kate and Jenny.

1987 The worst fire in the history of the London Underground killed 30 people. The blaze began in the machinery below a wooden escalator in King’s Cross Underground station and soon filled the tunnels with dense, choking smoke and intense heat.

1991 Church envoy Terry Waite was freed by the Islamic extremists who kidnapped him in Beirut in 1987.

2000: Hollywood meets Wales in 'wedding of year'. The film world celebrates the celebrity wedding of the year as film star Michael Douglas marries Welsh actress Catherine Zeta Jones.

2003 The US President, George W. Bush, made a state visit to Britain amid the tightest security London had ever seen.

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