Today in history
Today is Tuesday, October 8, the 281st day of 2019. There are 84 days left in the year. Highlights in history on this date:
1769 — Captain Cook, accompanied by Daniel Solander, Joseph Banks and a number of crew from the Endeavour, go ashore at Turanganui River, where one of the crew fatally shoots one of the local Maori. It is the first of many violent encounters between Cook’s men and east coast North Island Maori.
1806 — British forces laying siege to the French port Boulogne fire Congreve rockets, the first British use of rocketpropelled missiles.
1843 — AngloChinese commercial treaties confirm
the Treaty of Nanking.
1858 — The ‘‘Arrow Incident’’, in which a ship flying a British flag is boarded by Chinese, provokes the second AngloChinese War.
1868 — The first traffic bridge over the Clutha River
at Balclutha opens.
1871 — The Great Chicago Fire starts, supposedly when a cow kicks over a lantern in a barn. Most of the city is razed.
1879 — John Hall takes office as New Zealand premier. Succeeding Sir George Grey, he serves until April 1882.
1883 — Dunedin’s Grand Hotel (now part of the
Southern Cross Hotel) in the Exchange opens.
1887 — Sir Harry Albert Atkinson takes office for a fourth term as New Zealand’s premier, serving until January 1891.
1890 — The Government Printing Office in
Wellington is destroyed by fire. 1912 — Montenegro declares war on Turkey,
beginning the First Balkan War.
1915 — A German offensive during the Battle of Loos is repulsed, with 3000 casualties, but it did manage to disrupt British attack preparations during one of the fiercest battles of World War 1, resulting in no gains for either side and almost 430,000 casualties.
1918 — United States sergeant Alvin C. York almost singlehandedly kills 20 German soldiers and captures 132 in the Argonne Forest in France during WW1.
1922 — The New Zealand soldiers memorial at
Longueville, France, is unveiled.
1933 — Koroki Mahuta Te Wherowhero is crowned
the fifth Maori king.
1934 — Bruno Hauptmann is indicted on a murder charge over the death of the infant son of US aviation pioneer Charles Lindbergh.
1941 — Stanley Graham, a West Coast farmer, kills three police officers at Kowhitirangi. A fourth officer is fatally wounded and dies later. An agricultural instructor is shot also and dies from his wounds 17 months later. Graham escapes into the bush.
1952 — Three trains crash in northwest London,
killing 112 people and injuring more than 200.
1967 — In accordance with a recent referendum favouring later closing of liquor outlets, the final
six o’clock swill takes place.
1982 — The Polish Parliament dissolves Solidarity, formally ending Eastern Europe’s first experiment in tradeunion democracy.
1985 — Hijackers of the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro kill American passenger Leon Klinghoffer, dumping his body and wheelchair overboard. 1997 — Scientists report the Pathfinder probe’s exploration of Mars has yielded evidence that the planet was once hospitable to life.
2005 — More than 73,000 people are killed and about three million made homeless when an earthquake hits Pakistani Kashmir and neighbouring NorthWest Frontier Province. Another 1300 die in Indian Kashmir. 2010 — Dunedin track cyclist Alison Shanks breaks New Zealand’s gold medal drought at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi, winning the 3000m individual pursuit.