ON THIS DAY
Stephanus Roos is shot on patrol in the Middelburg district. Some months later Commandant Senekal was killed in the same way. The town Roossenekal is named after them. They both fell in the war against the Mapoch tribe (1882-83).
French colonial forces dismiss Queen Ranavalona of the Kingdom of Madagascar.
To much jubilation, the 118-day Siege of Ladysmith is lifted.
After the French try to drive the Germans forces back in the Champagne region, they gain a few hundred metres at the cost of 50 000 casualties
The Rand mine workers’ revolt intensifies when three mineworkers are shot and killed outside the prison in Boksburg.
German president Paul von Hindenburg, on the advice of Chancellor Adolf Hitler, nullifies many of the key civil liberties of German citizens, paving the way for a one-party state.
DuPont scientist Wallace Carothers invents nylon.
The heavy cruiser USS Houston is sunk in the Battle of Sunda Strait with the loss of 693 crew, along with HMAS Perth, which lost 375 men.
An anti-government uprising in Taiwan, suppressed by Chiang Kaishek’s Republic of China government with 18 000-28 000 deaths, marks the beginning of the White Terror.
Scientists James Watson and Francis Crick announce to friends that they have unravelled the chemical structure of DNA; the formal announcement takes place on April 25. The first colour TVs go on sale. A British soldier dies in Derry after his vehicle was attacked with petrol bombs.
Sweden’s Prime Minister Olof Palme is assassinated in Stockholm. Allegations that SA was involved remain unproven.
US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents raid David Koresh’s Branch Davidian church in Waco, Texas. Four agents and six Davidians die, starting a 51-day standoff that ends in a fire that engulfed the Mount Carmel leading to the deaths of 76 Branch Davidians inside.
Hundreds of white-owned farms are seized in Zimbabwe in a campaign to reclaim what the invaders said had been stolen by colonial settlers.
Zimbabwe Reserve Bank governor Gideon Gono tells a panel of officials that many black farmers on former whiteowned farms are failing to produce food.
Pope Benedict XVI officially resigns, the first to do so since Pope Gregory XII, in 1415. | The Historian