ON THIS DAY
Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci is born in Florence, Italy. He explored South America and the Amazon River, believing he had discovered a new continent. In 1507, a German mapmaker first referred to the lands discovered in the New World as America.
Kissing in public – an act punishable by death – is banned in Naples, but the law seems to do little to prevent the spread of the plague, which claims many European lives.
Adam Smith’s influential economics book, The Wealth of Nations, is published.
Five of the Slachter’s Nek rebels are hanged at Van Aardtspos. Four of the nooses break and although the condemned men and public beg for mercy, the sentence is carried out using one rope. It is regarded as the beginning of Afrikaner struggle against British colonial rule.
1831 The French Foreign Legion is founded.
1839 The Prussian government limits the work week for children to 51 hours.
The US Supreme Court rules that the captive Africans who seized control of the ship Spanish schooner Amistad, had been taken into slavery illegally.
Congo cannibals kill thousands of Arabs during an uprising.
Mexican general Pancho Villa invades US, attacking a town in New Mexico, which leaves 18 dead.
1922 Martial law is declared in the Transvaal.
1934 Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin is born in Gzhatsk, Russia. On April 12, 1961, he became the first human in space, orbiting in a capsule 300km above the Earth’s surface. His space flight caused a worldwide sensation and marked the beginning of the space race.
The first night bombing raid on Tokyo inflicts damage comparable to that inflicted on Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the atomic bombs five months later.
1959 The Barbie doll makes its debut.
1953 A rusty 1.4kg shell, dating from 1901, explodes in a Johannesburg playgroun, injuring more than 30 children and a teacher. It was found on a koppie near the school by one of the pupils who brought it to school.
£100 000 worth of gold that went missing on the Cape Town Castle, is found near the ship’s engine room in Durban.
Japanese soldier Hiroo Onoda surrenders after fighting from the jungle and mountains in the Philippines, 29 years after the end of World War II.
Mozambican police arrest Robert McBride on charges of gunrunning.
Liquid water is discovered on a moon of Saturn. | THE HISTORIAN