Today in History

1619 – First known African slaves are sold in North America. About 20 Angolans, kidnapped by the Portuguese, arrive in the British colony of Virginia and are bought by colonists.

1866 – United States President Andrew Johnson formally declares the American Civil War over, even though fighting had stopped months earlier.

1904 – A cartoon is published in which a kiwi morphs into a moa as the All Blacks defeat Great Britain 9-3. It might have been the first use of a kiwi as a national symbol.

1911 – The first commercial telegram is sent around the world by the New York Times.

1940 – New Zealand shipping company freighter Turakina is intercepted and sunk off Taranaki, with the loss of 36 lives; Leon Trotsky, left, is fatally wounded by an assassin in Mexico.

1968 – About 200,000 Warsaw Pact troops and 5000 tanks invade Czechoslovakia to crush the ‘‘Prague Spring’’.

1987 – Treasure hunters salvaging objects from doomed luxury liner Titanic scoop up a fortune in jewels. 1995 – A collision between two trains in northern India kills 358 people.

2013 – A court in Pakistan indicts former president Perez Musharraf on murder charges stemming from the assassination of ex-prime minister Benazir Bhutto.

2016 – South African middle Caster Semenya retains her Olympic women’s 800m title in Rio de Janeiro.

Birthdays

Benjamin Harrison, US president (1833-1901); Raymond Poincare, French president (1860-1934); Jim Reeves, US singer (1923-64); Don King, US boxing promoter (1931-); Slobodan Milosevic, Serbian president (1941-2006); Robert Plant, UK singer (1948-); Led Zeppelin (1948-); Rajiv Gandhi, Indian prime minister (1944-91); Amy Adams, US actress (1974-).