ON THIS DAY

1689 General Piccolomini of Austria burns down Skopje to prevent the spread of a devastating outbreak of cholera. He died of the bug himself soon after.

1795 Colonel Robert Gordon, explorer of the interior of South Africa, commits suicide because of his inability to prevent the British occupation of the Cape.

1829 Nqetho, Qwabe chief, forces the Reverend JW Shepstone to abandon the Morley mission station. Nqetho was murdered in December of that year on orders from Dingane.

Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday & Clanton involved in gunfight at OK Corral, in Tombstone, Arizona.

1916 US nurse Margaret Sanger arrested for obscenity (advocating birth control). 1918 Cecil Chubb gives prehistoric monument Stonehenge to the British nation.

1918 Germany’s supreme commander General Eric Ludendorff resigns, protesting against the terms to which the German government had agreed in negotiating an armistice.

1950 Mother Teresa founds Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta, India.

1951 Winston Churchill re-elected British prime minister at the age of 86.

1954 Chevrolet unveils the V-8 engine. 1976 Transkei gains independence, not recognised outside of South Africa.

1988 Donald Trump bills Mike Tyson $2 000 000 for four months’ advisory service.

2002 Moscow Theatre Siege ends: approximately 50 Chechen rebels and 150 hostages die when Russian Spetsnaz storm a theatre building in Moscow, which had been occupied by the rebels during a musical performance three days before.

| The Historian