Anniversaries

Births: John Campbell, military historian, 1708; John Fothergill, physician, 1712; Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, composer, 1714; Franco Faccio, conductor and composer, 1840; Ruggiero Leoncavallo, composer, 1858; Kenneth Grahame, author, 1859; Frederic William Goudy, printer and typographer, 1865; Otto Hahn, physicist and chemist, 1879; Leonard Alfred George Strong, novelist, poet and playwright, 1896.

Deaths: Francesco Sforza, soldier, 1466; William III, king, 1702; Abraham Darby, ironfounder, 1717; Francis Egerton, third Duke of Bridgewater, canal pioneer, 1803; Louis- Hector Berlioz, composer, 1869; Count Ferdinand Adolf August Heinrich von Zeppelin, soldier and inventor, 1917; William Howard Taft, 27th US president, 1930; Sir Thomas Beecham Bt, conductor, 1961; Richard Austen Butler, Baron Butler of Saffron Walden, statesman, 1982; Alan Tindal Lennox- Boyd, first Viscount Boyd, statesman, accidentally killed, 1983; Sir William Turner Walton, composer, 1983; Ralph Mcallister Ingersoll, publisher, author and journalist, 1985.

On this day: Queen Anne acceded to the British throne, 1702; the British Army captured Aboukir, 1801; the Confederate ironclad Virginia sank the USS Cumberland during the Battle of Hampton Roads, 1862; work began on the Amsterdam- North Sea Canal, 1865; the 'February' Revolution (Old Style date) began in Russia at Petrograd, 1917; President Woodrow Wilson ordered the arming of US merchant ships, 1917; in Russia, Leon Trotsky resigned the post of foreign minister, 1918; French troops occupied the Ruhr after Germany failed to pay reparations, 1921; Mahatma Gandhi started a civil disobedience campaign in India, 1930; a coal strike began in Britain, 1944; the musical show Gay Rosalinda was first produced in London, 1945; the USSR claimed to be the possessor of the atomic bomb, 1950; the first London production of the musical show Kiss Me, Kate was presented, 1945; the US landed 3,500 marines in South Vietnam, 1965; in Dublin, the Nelson Column was destroyed by an IRA bomb, 1966. Today is the Feast Day of St Duthac, St Felix of Dunwich, St Humphrey or Hunfrid, St John of God, St Julian of Toledo, Saints Philemon and Apollonius, St Pontius of Carthage, St Senan of Scattery, St Stephen of Obazine and St Veremund.