Today in history

45 BC — Julius Caesar defeats the Pompeiians at the battle of Munda in Spain. The Pompeiians, led by two sons of Pompey the Great, lose more than 30,000 men.

461 — Death according to the legend of St Patrick, patron saint of Ireland.

1776 — American revolutionaries under George Washington force British to evacuate Boston, Massachusetts.

1813 — Prussia’s Frederick William III declares war on France.

1871 — Site of Alice Springs in central Australia is selected by John Ross.

1912 — Lawrence Oates, English polar explorer with Robert Scott’s doomed expedition to the Antarctic, leaves the tent on his 32nd birthday saying, ‘‘I am just going outside, and may be some time.’’ He never returns.

1939 — British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain accuses Adolf Hitler of breaking his word after German troops crossed the Czech frontier.

1959 — A major uprising begins in Tibet against Chinese rule. The Dalai Lama flees the capital in disguise.

1969 — Golda Meir becomes prime minister of Israel.

1973 — Cambodian Air Force officer steals plane and bombs presidential palace in Phnom Penh, missing President Lon Nol but killing at least 20 people.

1992 — A car bomb explodes outside the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires, killing 29 people.

1998 — Catholics hold the first St Patrick’s Day in Belfast, a traditionally Protestant town.

1999 — Six International Olympic Committee members are expelled from the IOC in the Salt Lake City bribery scandal.

2003 — President George W Bush orders Saddam Hussein to leave Iraq with his sons by 4.15am on March 20 or face the might of the US military.

2004 — A car bomb shatters a five-storey hotel housing foreigners in central Baghdad, killing 27 people.

2008 — Prime Minister Kevin Rudd announces the wreck of HMAS Sydney has been found.

2015 — Masa Vukotic, a 17-year-old schoolgirl, is stabbed to death in a frenzied attack in a Melbourne park. Sean Christian Price, 31, later pleads guilty to her murder; Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ruling Likud Party wins the country’s election after a tight race that had put his lengthy rule in jeopardy.

2016 — China says an independent Hong Kong as ‘‘impossible’’, while pro-democracy movements gain traction in the territory. TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS Edmund Kean, British actor (1787-1833); Kate Greenaway, English illustrator (1846-1901); Billy Corgan, US rock singer of The Smashing Pumpkins (1967-) Justin Hawkins, British musician (1975-)