Today in History

1789 – Fletcher Christian and 25 other crew seize command of the HMS Bounty near Tonga, and set Captain William Bligh and 18 others adrift in a small, open boat.

1888 – The first British rugby team to tour New Zealand plays its first match, against Otago in Dunedin, winning 8-3.

1945 – Italian dictator Benito Mussolini and his mistress, Clara Petacci, are shot by partisans who captured them as they attempted to flee to Switzerland.

1967– Heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali refuses to be inducted into the US Army, and is stripped of his title.

1969 – Charles de Gaulle resigns as president of France after his plans for constitutional reform are defeated in a national referendum.

1977 – Andreas Baader and other members of the German-based Red Army Faction terror group are jailed for life.

1986 – Soviet officials admit an

accident at the Chernobyl

nuclear reactor in Ukraine, left, two days after the event.

1995 – Fourteen people standing on a viewing platform at Cave Creek, in Paparoa National Park on the West Coast, die as it collapses and falls about 30 metres into the creek-bed below.

1996 – 35 people are killed in a shooting spree by a gunman in Port Arthur, Tasmania.

2004 – A merino wether nicknamed Shrek, who had evaded muster in Central Otago for six years, is shorn on television. His fleece weighs 27kg, enough wool to make about 20 men’s suits.

Birthdays:

Edward IV, king of England (1442-1483); Oskar Schindler, Austrian businessman (1908-74); Ferruccio Lamborghini, Italian car designer (1916-93); Harper Lee, US novelist (1926-2016); Jimmy Barnes, Australian singer (1956-); Ian Rankin, UK novelist (1960-); John Daly, US golfer (1966-); Penelope Cruz, Spanish actor (1974-).