ON THIS DAY FEBRUARY 23

1455 The Gutenberg Bible, the first Western book printed with movable type, is published.

1804 George Rex, allegedly the son of King George III and Hannah Lightfoot, auctions his house in Cape Town and settles at Melkhoutkraal, Knysna.

1836 The 13-day Siege of the Alamo begins in San Antonio, Texas.

1854 The official independence of the Orange Free State is declared.

1874 Inspired by the athleticism of the ancient Greeks, Welsh major

Walter Winfield patents a game called

sphairistike (Greek for ‘the art of playing ball’) to help fill the need for gentle outdoor activities for the middle-classes, and is credited as being the inventor of lawn tennis.

1886 The Times of London publishes the world’s first classified advertisement.

1900 At the Battle of the Tugela Heights, a British attempt to take Hart’s Hill fails.

1903 Cuba leases Guantanamo Bay to the US in perpetuity.

1905 The Rotary Club, the world’s first service club, is formed in Chicago.

1916 Believing panic-stricken soldiers, French artillery turn their sights on the village of Samogneux and wipe out the entire French 72nd division, as well as men from other units. In all, 16 224 died from “friendly fire”.

1942 Japanese submarines shell the coast of California, in the US.

1944 The USSR begins deporting

Chechen and Ingush peoples from the North Caucasus to Central Asia.

1945 US Marines summit Mount Suribachi, in Japan, and plant the American flag, signalling the conquest of Iwo Jima.

1954 The first mass inoculation against polio takes place.

1991 US President George HW Bush gives Iraq 24 hours to withdraw from Kuwait.

1997 Scientists in Scotland say they have cloned a sheep, named “Dolly”.

2008 A US Air Force B-2 Spirit bomber crashes on Guam, destroying the B2’s perfect safety record and making it the most expensive air crash in history. (The plane cost $1.2 billion.)