Now & Then
◆ 20 MARCH
1602: The Dutch East India Company was founded by the Netherlands government.
1616: Sir Walter Raleigh was released from the Tower of London to seek gold in Guiana.
1780: The firm of James Watt & Co was founded to manufacture the world’s first duplicating machines. 1806: The foundation stone of Dartmoor Prison, Devon, was laid. Originally built to house French prisoners of war, it was used as a convict prison from 1850.
1815: Napoleon returned from banishment on Elba to regain power in France. It was his “Last 100 Days” and ended in his defeat at Waterloo.
1849: Second Sikh War between Sikhs and Britain began in India. 1851: Marble Arch was unveiled at its present site in London after being moved from near Buckingham Palace.
1916: Allies agreed on partition of Turkey.
1917: Hospital ship Asturias was torpedoed by a German U-boat. 1933: The Nazis opened a concentration camp at Dachau, near Munich.
1935: The British Council was established.
1944: A major eruption of Vesuvius began.
1945: Mandalay was recaptured from the Japanese by the British. 1952: South Africa Supreme Court invalidated race legislation of DF Malan.
1956: Tunisia became an independent sovereign state, under president Habib Bourguiba, having been a French protectorate since 1881.
1957: Britain accepted Nato offer to mediate in Cyprus but Greece rejected.
1966: World Cup football trophy was stolen from Central Hall, Westminster.
1972: Nineteen climbers on Japan’s Mount Fuji were killed in an avalanche.
1974: An attempt was made to kidnap Princess Anne in the Mall in London.
1980: The pirate radio station Radio Caroline ceased broadcasting after 16 years, when its home, the ship Mi Amigo sank. 1990: Namibia gained independence from South Africa. 1991: The knighthood conferred on Guinness trial defendant Jack Lyons was cancelled and annulled. 1992: Royal press secretary apologised to the Queen for an off-the-record comment that “the knives are out for Fergie”.
1993: A three-year-old boy died and 56 people were injured when an IRA bomb trap blasted shoppers in Warrington.
1993: President Boris Yeltsin declared emergency rule in Russia. 1996: The government admitted for the first time that there was a possible link between BSE or mad cow disease and the deaths of ten people.
2003: In the early hours of the morning, military operations began in Iraq.
2006: Cyclone Larry made landfall in eastern Australia, destroying most of the country’s banana crop. 2010: British Airways cabin crew began a three-day walkout over pay and working conditions. 2010: Pope Benedict XVI apologised to victims of child sex abuse by Catholic priests in Ireland in a pastoral letter to Irish Catholics.
◆ BIRTHDAYS
Freema Agyeman, British actress, 45; Baroness Ashton of Upholland, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy 2009-2014, 68; Yvette Cooper, Labour MP, 55; Holly Hunter, American actress, 66; Kathy Ireland, American actress, 61; Spike Lee, actor, film director and producer, 67; David Malouf, Australian novelist, 90; Jane March, actress, 51; Greg Searle MBE, British Olympic oarsman, 52; David Thewlis, actor, 61.
◆ ANNIVERSARIES
Births: 43BC Ovid, poet; 1724 Duncan Macintyre (Donnachadh Ban), Gaelic poet; 1828 Henrik Ibsen, playwright; 1873 Sergei Rachmaninov, composer; 1911 Ginger Rogers, actress and dancer; 1917 Dame Vera Lynn DBE, singer. Deaths: AD687 St Cuthbert, Bishop of Lindisfarne; 1727 Sir Isaac Newton, scientist and mathematician; 1964 Brendan Behan, Irish playwright; 2010 Harry Carpenter OBE, sports commentator2019 Baroness Warnock DBE, British philosopher and writer; 2020 Kenny Rogers, country singer.