19th March

[chenrezig]

1649 The House of Commons passed an act abolishing the House of Lords, declaring it 'useless and dangerous to the people of England'.

1702 Anne Stuart, sister of Mary, succeeded to the throne of England, Scotland and Ireland on the death of William III of Orange.

1813 Dr. David Livingstone was born here at Blantyre, on the outskirts of Glasgow. He was a Scottish missionary and explorer and the first white man to see the Victoria Falls of the Zambezi.

1821 The birth of Sir Richard Francis Burton, English scholar and explorer who discovered the source of the Nile.

1921 Irish War of Independence: One of the biggest engagements of the war took place at Crossbarry in County Cork. About 100 Irish Republican Army (IRA) volunteers escaped an attempt by over 1,300 British forces to encircle them.

1938 The BBC televised its first rugby match, the Calcutta Cup game between England and Scotland at Twickenham. Scotland won 21-16.

1945 World War II: Adolf Hitler issued his 'Nero Decree' ordering all industries, military installations, shops, transportation facilities and communications facilities in Germany to be destroyed in order to prevent their use by Allied forces as they penetrated deep within Germany.

1958 Britain’s first planetarium opened at Madame Tussaud’s, London.

1965 The Tailor And Cutter Magazine ran an article asking The Rolling Stones to wear ties to save tie makers from financial disaster.

1969 British troops landed on the Caribbean island of Anguilla, after the island declared itself a republic. They were well received, and the island remained a UK dependency.

1969 The 1,263 ft. tall TV-mast at Emley Moor in Yorkshire collapsed due to a build up of ice.

1982 A group of Argentines landed at South Georgia (a dependency of the disputed Falklands Islands which Britain claimed in 1833) and planted their nation's flag. The provocation led to war between Britain and Argentina.

1986 Buckingham Palace announced the engagement of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson. Exactly six years later it was announced that they were to separate.

1988 Two British soldiers, in civilian clothes, blundered into an IRA funeral in Northern Ireland and were kicked and beaten to death.

2003 British troops were poised to invade Iraq as Saddam Hussein defied a final United States ultimatum to leave the country or face war.

2015 Top Gear presenters James May and Richard Hammond rejected an offer to present the season's last three shows without the suspended star, Jeremy Clarkson. On 25th March the BBC's director general confirmed that Jeremy Clarkson's contract would not be renewed, after an 'unprovoked physical attack' on a Top Gear producer Oisin Tymon

2015 Margaret Aspinall and Trevor Hicks, who campaigned for 20 years to secure fresh Hillsborough inquests, received their CBE medals from the Queen. Britain's worst sporting tragedy took place at the Hillsborough Stadium, in Sheffield on 15th April 1989. 96 people died as a result of the crush on the terraces at the Liverpool v Nottingham Forest football match.

[Rosalind]

go90 tha22222

[annie]

than999

[wendy]