ON THIS DAY MAY 12

1765 Lady Emma Hamilton, who became Admiral Lord Nelson’s famous mistress, is baptised. Hers was a genuine rags-to-richesto-rags story – thanks to the British nation ignoring their hero’s last wish.

1789 MP William Wilberforce makes his first major speech on abolition in the UK House of Commons, calling the slave trade morally reprehensible and an issue of natural justice.

1820 British nurse and public health activist Florence Nightingale is born, in Florence, Italy. She improved hospital sanitary conditions and greatly reduced the death rate for wounded soldiers. She received worldwide acclaim for her unselfish devotion to nursing and contributed to the development of modern nursing procedures, and emphasised the dignity of nursing as a profession. She was critical of British camps for prisoners in South Africa during the Anglo-Boer War.

1875 Cape Governor Sir Henry Barkly lays the cornerstone of parliament in Cape Town. 1900 Lord Roberts enters Kroonstad and Orange Free State President MT Steyn proclaims Heilbron his new capital.

1926 Roald Amundsen’s airship, Norge, is the first vessel to fly over the North Pole.

1935 William Wilson co-founds Alcoholics Anonymous in Ohio, US.

1941 Konrad Zuse presents the Z3, the world’s first working programmable, fully automatic computer, in Berlin.

1942 The tanker SS Virginia is torpedoed by a German submarine in the Mississippi River.

1949 The USSR lifts its blockade of Berlin. 1988 A bus going to Mount Frere, Transkei, overturns near Cathcart, killing 31 people.

1991 Inkatha supporters rampage through an informal settlement on the West Rand, killing 22. |