ON THIS DAY

NOVEMBER 11

1100 Henry I of England marries Matilda of Scotland, the daughter of Malcolm III of Scotland, and a direct descendant of the Saxon king Edmund Ironside.

1838 Andries Pretorius arrives at the laagers on the banks of the Klein-Tugela in response to a plea for help against the Zulus.

1880 Australian bushranger Ned Kelly is hanged.

1885 World War II General George S Patton is born in San Gabriel, California.

In 1942 he led the Allied task force that landed at Casablanca in North Africa. Known for his flamboyant manner and his pearl-handled pistols he often wore as sidearms, he commanded the US 7th Army during the invasion of Sicily, then received worldwide attention and an official reprimand for slapping a hospitalised soldier suffering from battle fatigue. After D-Day, he led the US 3rd Army across France and into Germany. He died in Heidelberg, Germany, on December 21, 1945, of injuries from a car accident.

1895 British Bechuanaland is annexed to the Cape Colony.

1900 Ferrar Reginald Mostyn Cleaver, a barrister of English descent who identified himself completely with the cause of the ZAR and who fought in the commandos during the 2nd Anglo-Boer War, dies in a prison camp in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka).

1918 At 5am, in Marshal Foch’s railway car in the Forest of Compiegne, the Armistice between the Allied and Central Powers was signed, silencing the guns of World War I, effective at 11 am, the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month. In many countries, including South Africa, a moment of silence in memory of the millions of fallen soldiers is still observed.

1923 Adolf Hitler is arrested for high treason for his role in the Munich Beer Hall Putsch.

1943 The Nazis running the Theresienstadt death camp torture 47 000 Jews, forcing them to stand exposed for 8 hours in the bitterly cold November rain.

1965 The white-minority government of Rhodesia unilaterally declares independence. 1973 Egypt and Israel sign a cease-fire. 1975 Angola gains independence from Portugal.

1992 The Church of England votes to allow women to become priests.

2000 Some 155 skiers and snowboarders die when a cable car catches fire in an alpine tunnel in Kaprun, Austria.

2004 The PLO confirms the death of Yasser Arafat from unidentified causes.