NOW & THEN
1191: Richard I, the Lionheart, married Berengaria, reputed to be extremely ugly. Although Queen, she never set foot on English soil.
1686: League of Augsburg was formed by Holy Roman Empire, Spain, Sweden, Saxony, the Palatinate and Brandenburg against France’s King Louis XIV.
1745: En route from France to Scotland, Bonnie Prince Charlie looked on anxiously from his ship, Doutelle, as his other ship, Elisabeth, engaged in a fivehour battle with HMS Lion. Badly damaged and with a number of crewmen killed, both vessels finally withdrew.
1755: French troops defeated the British at the Battle of Duquesne (Pittsburgh).
1776: The American Declaration of Idependence was read on the parade ground at Lower Manhattan to thousands of George Washington’s troops who had moved up from Boston to help defend New York against the British.
1807: Napoleon I of France and Alexander I of Russia signed the treaties of Tilsit to end the War of the Fourth Coalition
1867: Queen’s Park Football Club was formed, the first senior club in Scotland.
1872: The first doughnut cutter was patented in America by John Blondel. A sea captain, he is said to have invented the hole so he could slip the doughnut over the handle of the ship’s wheel and eat while steering.
1877: Wimbledon staged its first lawn tennis championship at its original site in Worple Road, London.
1882: The Royal Navy bombarded Alexandria, Egypt.
1893: Chicago surgeon Daniel Williams performed the first open heart surgery – without anaesthetic.
1900: The commonwealth of Australia was established in the British parliament.
1910: A stone tablet describing the fall of Jerusalem was discovered by archaeologists in Egypt.
1916: The first cargo submarine to cross the Atlantic arrived in the USA from Germany.
1917: HMS Vanguard blew up in Scapa Flow with the loss of more than 800men.
1922: Johnny Weissmuller became the first man to swim 100 metres in less than a minute.
1938: Gas masks were first issued to the civilian population of Britain in anticipation of the Second World War.
1955: Rock Around the Clock by Bill Haley and the Comets topped the Billboard chart.
1977: Tom Watson won the Open Championship at Turnberry, following the classic “Duel in the Sun” with Jack Nicklaus.
1984: York Minster was struck by lightning and the roof destroyed.
1990: Four were killed and hundreds injured when celebrations of Germany’s victory over Argentina in the World Cup final turned violent.
1992: The space shuttle Columbus 13 landed.
1997: Mike Tyson was banned from boxing for biting off part of Evander Holyfield’s ear.
2007: The BBC was fined £50,000 for faking the winner of a phone-in competition on a Blue Peter programme. Marc Almond, singer, 62; Steve Coppell, former football player and manager, 63; Richard Demarco CBE, Portobello-born artist and gallery director, 88; Tom Hanks, actor, director and writer, 62; David Hockney, artist, 81; Courtney Love, singer and actress, 54; Richard Wilson OBE, Greenock-born actor director, 82; John Frieda, hairdresser, 67; Kelly Mcgillis, US actress, 61; Dean Koontz, US author, 73; Richard Roundtree, US actor (Shaft), 76; Paolo Di Canio, football manager and former player, 50; Brian Dennehy, US actor, 80 Births: 1819 Elias Howe, inventor of first practical sewing machine; 1888 Simon Marks, 1st Baron Marks of Broughton, founder of Marks & Spencer; 1901 Barbara Cartland, novelist; 1916 Sir Edward Heath, prime minister 1970-74; 1946 Mitch Mitchell, English drummer (Jimi Hendrix Experience). Deaths: 1441 Jan van Eyck, Flemish painter; 1746 Philip V, king of Spain; 1797 Edmund Burke, statesman, writer; 1932 King Camp Gillette, safety razor inventor; 1988 Barbara Woodhouse, animal trainer; 2002 Rod Steiger, US actor; 2016 Jackie Mcinally, Scottish footballer.