ON THIS DAY

• 65 BC: Horace, Roman poet, was born in Venusian Apulia.

• 1542: Mary, Queen of Scots, was born at Linlithgow Palace.

• 1733: A Dorset man reported seeing a polished silver disc in the sky – the first known sighting of an Unidentified Flying Object, or UFO.

• 1864: TheCliftonSuspension Bridge over the River Avon at Bristol, designed by Brunel, was opened.

• 1941: Britain and the United States declared war on Japan.

• 1980: John Lennon was shot dead in New York by Mark David Chapman.

• 1991: Leaders of the three republics Russia, Belorussia and Ukraine – formed a “commonwealth of independent states” and pronounced the Soviet Union dead.