Today in History

44BC - Julius Caesar is killed by senate conspirators.

1493 - Christopher Columbus returns to Spain after his first voyage to the New World.

1877 - First cricket test between Australia and England starts in Melbourne. Australia win by 45 runs.

1883 - Irish-American terrorists attempt to blow up the London offices of The Times.

1892 - The first escalator patented, by Jesse Reno, of New York.

1913 - Woodrow Wilson holds the first press conference by a US president.

1917 - Tsar Nicholas II of Russia abdicates and a provisional government is installed.

1919 - Hundreds of soldiers from the New Zealand Expeditionary Force riot at Sling Camp on Salisbury Plain, in England, enraged by repeated delays in sailings of troopships due to take them home.

1939 - Germany invades Czechoslovakia.

1944 - New Zealand forces capture Castle Hill in the battle for Cassino.

1964 - American actress Elizabeth Taylor and British actor Richard Burton wed for the first time.

1972 - The Godfather is released in US cinemas.

1991 - Four Los Angeles police are charged with beating motorist Rodney King.

1998 - Childcare guru Benjamin Spock dies, aged 94.

2019 - A self-proclaimed “white nationalist” opens fire on worshippers at two mosques in Christchurch. Fifty-one people are fatally injured and 40 wounded.

Birthdays

Andrew Jackson, US president (1767-1854); Lord Melbourne, UK politician (1779-1848); Ruth Bader Ginsburg, US Supreme Court judge (1933-2020); Mike Love, US singer, Beach Boys (1941-); Ry Cooder, US musician (1947-); Apirana Taylor, Māori poet/musician (1955-) Malcolm, NZ actress (1965-); Eva Longoria, US actress (1975-); Paul Pogba, French footballer (1993-).