565 - St Columba reported seeing a monster in Loch Ness. It was the first reported sighting of the monster.
1138 - The English defeated the Scottish at Cowton Moor. Banners of various saints were carried into battle, which led to its being called the Battle of the Standard.
1485 - England's King Richard III was killed in the Battle of Bosworth Field, ending the War of the Roses.
1642 - The English Civil War began, between the supporters of Charles I (Cavaliers) and of Parliament (Roundheads), when the king raised his standard at Nottingham.
1770 - Captain James Cook, having landed at Australia, claimed it for the British crown.
1305 - Scottish patriot William Wallace was hanged, beheaded, and quartered in London, and his body parts were later displayed in different cities. His barbaric murder came as a result of his efforts to free Scotland from the occupying English forces.
1617 - The first one-way streets were introduced in London.
1775 - King George III proclaimed the American colonies in a state of open rebellion.
1940 - The German Luftwaffe began night bombing London.
1680 - Colonel Blood, an Irish adventurer who stole the Crown Jewels from the Tower of London in 1671, died. He had been captured after the theft, but insisted on seeing King Charles II, who pardoned him.
1759 - William Wilberforce, English philanthropist, was born. He campaigned for many important causes, most notably the abolition of slavery in Britain and its colonies.
1814 - British forces captured Washington DC and set the White House on fire.
1875 - Matthew Webb (Captain Webb) started his attempt from Dover, England to become the first person to swim the English Channel. He reached Calais, France at 10.40 am the following morning having been in the water for 22 hours.
1947 - The first Edinburgh Festival was held.
1975 - The first ever nude performance in a British opera took place at Glyndebourne.
1981 - American Mark Chapman was given a 20 year life sentence for shooting John Lennon - in New York.
1998 - Britain, the United States and the Netherlands agreed to put two Libyans on trial for planting the bomb which blew up a Pan Am airliner over the town of Lockerbie, Scotland, killing all those on board and several on the ground.
1718 - Hundreds of French colonists arrived in Louisiana, with some of them settling in present-day New Orleans.
1917 - The Order of the British Empire (OBE), and the Companion of Honour (CH), were awarded for the first time.
1919 - The world's first international daily air service began between London and Paris.
1928 - The opening of the famous Kop End at Liverpool Football Club's ground at Anfield. It was most likely named after the Battle of Spion Kop during the Boer War, the word 'Kopje' meaning 'small hill'.
1940 - The RAF made the first air raid on Berlin.
1944 - World War II - The Allies liberated Paris.
2009 - South Korea's first rocket blasted off into space.
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Happy Birthday Sean Connery, 80 years young today
Like your knowledge of Anfield Skully.The Kop was indeed named after the battle of Spion Kop in South Africa.
It's a combination of several websites and an on this day in history book. I only know a fraction of what I post.
I've got a History Channel calender on my desk and today's entry is 'the death of Friedrich Nietzsche in 1900'
55BC - Julius Caesar crossed the English Channel for his invasion of Britain.
1907 - Houdini escapes from chains underwater at the Aquatic Park in 57 seconds.
1910 - Mother Teresa was born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu in Skopje, Macedonia.
1929 - The first roller coaster is built in the U.S.
1936 - Over 7000 people queued to see the first high definition television pictures on sets at the Olympia Radio Show, west London. The pictures were transmitted by the BBC from Alexandra Palace.
1959 - British car manufacturers Austin and Morris launched a small family car - the Mini.
1981 - Voyager 2 takes photo's of Saturn's moon Titan.
1994 - A man was given the world's first battery-operated heart in a pioneering operation in Britain.
1784 - The first balloon ascent was made in Britain, by James Tytler at Edinburgh.
1859 - Edwin L. Drake drilled the first successful U.S. oil well.
1883 - The island volcano Krakatoa erupted (with the force of 1300 megatons) and the resulting tidal waves claimed 36,000 lives on the Indonesian islands of Java and Sumatra.
1900 - Britain's first long distance bus service began between London and Leeds. The journey took 2 days
1950 - The BBC transmitted the first ever live television pictures across the Channel.
1958 - The USSR launches Sputnik 3 with two dogs aboard.
1962 - The United States launched the Mariner 2 space probe, which flew past Venus the following December.
1975 - Haile Selassie, the last emperor of Ethiopia's 3,000-year-old monarchy, died in Addis Ababa. He had been overthrown a year earlier.
2008 - Barack Obama becomes the first African-American to be nominated by a major political party for President of the United States.
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