Gazette: Anniversaries

TODAY

Births: Sir Richard Fanshawe, diplomat, translator and poet, baptised 1608; Giuseppe Puppo, violinist, 1749; Harriet Martineau, novelist and historian, 1802; Charles Kingsley, novelist, 1819; Henri Jean Augustin de Braekeleer, painter, 1840; Rikard Nordraak, composer and folksong collector, 1842; Sir Oliver Joseph Lodge, physicist, 1851; Pol Henry Plancon, bass singer, 1854; Robert Anthony Eden, first Earl of Avon, statesman, 1897; Brigid Antonia Brophy (Lady Levey), novelist, 1929; Anne Frank, diarist, 1929.

Deaths: Dr Thomas Arnold, Head of Rugby School, 1842; Montague Rhodes James, writer and editor, 1936; Sydney Howard, comedian, 1946; John Nicholson Ireland, composer, 1962; Sir Herbert Read, poet and critic, 1968; Edmund Wilson, novelist, playwright and poet, 1972; Dame Marie Rambert (Cyvia Rambam), ballet producer, director and teacher, 1982.

On this day: Magdalen College, Oxford, was founded, 1458; the Library of John Cotton was presented to the nation and now forms part of the British Library, 1700; the Act of Settlement was passed, 1701; the first electric telegraph was patented by Sir William Cooke and Sir Charles Wheatstone, 1837; the Rotherhithe-Stepney Tunnel beneath the Thames was opened, 1908; the Beatles were appointed MBE in the Birthday Honours, 1965; Boris Yeltsin was elected president of the Russian Republic, 1991.

Today is the Feast Day of St Eskill, St John of Sahagun, St Leo III, pope, St Odulphus, St Onuphrius and St Ternan.

TOMORROW

Births: Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, 1396; (Frances) Fanny Burney (Madame D'Arblay), novelist and diarist, 1752; Thomas Young, linguist and physicist, translator of the demotic inscriptions of the Rosetta Stone, 1773; Dr Thomas Arnold, Head of Rugby School, 1795; Sir Charles Algernon Parsons, inventor of the steam turbine, 1854; William Butler Yeats, poet, 1865; Elisabeth Schumann, operatic soprano, 1885; Dorothy Leigh Sayers, thriller writer and playwright, 1893.

Deaths: Alexander the Great, 323 BC; Simon Tissot, physician, 1797; Ludwig II, (Otto Friedrich Wilhelm II), King of Bavaria, committed suicide by drowning 1886; Sir Henry (O'Neal de Hane) Segrave, racing motorist, killed 1930; Charles Butterworth, actor, 1946; Gaston-Pierre-Etienne Flandin, French statesman, 1958; Martin Buber, philosopher, 1965; King Khalid of Saudi Arabia, 1982; Benjamin David (Benny) Goodman, clarinettist and bandleader, 1986.

On this day: the Parliamentarians under Fairfax and Cromwell defeated the Royalists under Charles I and Rupert at Naseby, near Northampton, 1645; Queen Victoria made her first railway journey (from Slough to Paddington in 23 minutes), 1842; in Paris, the ballet Petrushka, by Igor Stravinsky, was performed for the first time, 1911; 162 people were killed and 432 injured in a German daylight air-raid on London, 1917; the first V-1 flying- bombs fell on London, 1944; inflation in Britain reached 25 per cent, 1975; six shots from a blank cartridge pistol were fired at the Queen in the Mall by a 17-year-old youth, 1981; John Paul Getty II, millionaire, presented pounds 20,000,000 to the National Gallery to start an endowment fund, 1985; the Queen bestowed the title "Princess Royal" on Princess Anne, 1987.

Tomorrow is the Feast Day of St Antony of Padua, St Aquilina, St Felicula and St Triphyllius.

Tomorrow is the official birthday of the Queen.