Today in history
1547 – Great Britain passes a vagabond law.
1793 – A young Napoleon Bonaparte takes Toulon, France, from the British and Spanish in his first major military victory.
1795 – Austria signs armistice with France.
1842 – The United States recognises independence of Hawaii.
1843 – Charles Dickens’ classic Yuletide tale, A Christmas Carol , is first published in England.
1879 – All New Zealand men are awarded the right to vote, regardless of whether they own or rent land.
1907 – A coal mine explosion in Jacobs Creek, Pennsylvania, kills 239 workers.
1915 – British troops begin withdrawal from Suvla and Anzac troops from Gallipoli during Turkish campaign in World War I.
1941 – German dictator Adolf Hitler dismisses his chief of staff and takes personal command of the German army after military setbacks.
1966 – UN General Assembly endorses a draft treaty banning the use of weapons of mass destruction in space.
1972 – Apollo 17 spacecraft splashes down on target in Pacific Ocean, ending US Apollo program of landing men on Moon.
1984 – Prime Ministers Margaret Thatcher of Britain and Zhao Ziyang of China sign a joint declaration spelling out the terms for Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty on July 1, 1997.
1985 – Muslim gunmen kidnap 10 Christians in Beirut, Lebanon, stepping up the campaign of terror.
1998 – As US forces bomb Iraq, the US House of Representatives impeaches President Bill Clinton for obstructing justice and lying under oath about his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
1999 – Survivors wander through streets covered with rocks and mud as the death toll from massive mudslides and flooding in Venezuela surpasses 5000.
2004 – Car bombs rock Iraq’s two holiest Shiite cities, killing at least 62 people and wounding more than 120, while in downtown Baghdad dozens of gunmen carry out a brazen ambush, pulling out three election officials and executing them on the pavement in the middle of morning traffic.
2006 – A Libyan court convicts five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor and condemns them to death for infecting 400 children with HIV. Nearly seven months later, they are allowed to return to Bulgaria.
Today’s Birthdays: Su Tung-p’o, Chinese poet (1036-1101); Jean Genet, French writer (1910-1986); Edith Piaf, French singer (1915-1963); Robert Urich, US actor (1946-2002); Jake Gyllenhaal, US actor (1980– ); Lady Sovereign, British rapper (1985– ).