The Scotsman Sessions
The Scotsman Sessions are short video performances, recorded by artists all around the country & introduced by our critics. To explore the first 400 in the series, visit
MAY 22
1455: In the War of the Roses, the Lancastrians defeated the Yorkists at the Battle of St Albans.
1897: London’s Blackwall Tunnel under the Thames was officially opened by the Prince of Wales. 1906: Wilbur Wright patented his aeroplane.
1915: 227 died in a train disaster at Quintinshill, near Gretna Green, Dumfriesshire. A troop train, carrying the Seventh Royal Scots from Leith to Liverpool, hit a stationary local train and the night express from Euston then ploughed into the wreckage. Two signalmen were jailed.
1918: German planes raided Paris. 1921: Paavo Nurmi, athletics legend, broke the world 10,000 metre record by 18 seconds.
1923: Stanley Baldwin began the first of his three terms as Conservative prime minister. 1939: Germany’s Adolf Hitler and Italy’s Benito Mussolini signed “Pact of Steel,” a ten-year political and military alliance.
1944: Battle of Anzio started. 1970: The English cricket tour of South Africa was cancelled as a protest at apartheid policy.
1972: Ceylon became the Republic of Sri Lanka within the Commonwealth.
1975: White-ruled African nation of Rhodesia was expelled from Olympic competition because of its racial policies.
1979: After 11 years as prime minister, Pierre Trudeau lost the Canadian general election to Joe Clark’s Progressive Conservative Party.
1981: Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe jailed for life for attacks on women, including 13 murders and seven assaults.
1989: India test-fired successfully its first medium-range surfaceto-surface missile to cross the threshold of ballistic missile capability.
1991: UK restored diplomatic ties with Albania after 40 years.
1991: Importation to Britain of American pit bull terriers and Japanese tosas was banned in clampdown on aggressive dogs. 1995: An SFA tribunal ordered Celtic owner Fergus Mccann to pay Kilmarnock £200,000 for taking Tommy Burns and Billy Stark from Rugby Park to be his club’s management team.
1998: A federal judge ruled that
United States Secret Service agents can be compelled to testify before a grand jury concerning the Monica Lewinsky scandal, involving President Bill Clinton. 2003: Annika Sörenstam became the first woman to play the PGA Tour in 58 years.
2004:The US town of Hallam, Nebraska, was wiped out by a powerful tornado that broke a width record at an astounding 2.5 miles wide. One resident was killed. 2008: A nine-day outbreak of more than 200 tornadoes struck 19 US states and one Canadian province.
2014: Thailand’s army seized power in a bloodless military coup in the country, dissolving the government and suspending the constitution. A nationwide curfew from 10pm to 5am was imposed. 2017: Twenty-two people were killed at the hands of a suicide bomber during a terrorist attack at the Manchester Arena as they were leaving at the end of a concert by American singer Ariane Grande. The self-styled Islamic State claimed responsibility for the atrocity
◆ BIRTHDAYS
Richard Benjamin, American actor and director, 86; Walter Menzies Campbell, Baron Campbell of Pittenweem CBE, QC, MP, leader, Liberal Democratic Party 20067, and former athlete, 83; Naomi Campbell, model, 54; Ann Cusack, American actress, 63; Novak Djokovic, Serbian tennis champion, 37; Alison Eastwood, actress and designer, 52; Morrissey, rock singer, 65; Bernie Taupin, British songwriter, 74; Denise Welch, actress and TV presenter, 66.
ANNIVERSARIES
Births: 1859 Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Edinburgh-born novelist and creator of Sherlock Holmes; 1907 Lord Olivier, actor; 1924 Charles Aznavour, singer; 1930 Kenny Ball, British jazz trumpeter; 1946 George Best, footballer. Deaths: AD312 Constantine the Great, Roman emperor; 1885 Victor Hugo, poet and novelist; 1925 Sir John French, commander of British Expeditionary Force in France and Belgium; 1972 Cecil Day Lewis, Poet Laureate 1967-1972; 1972 Dame Margaret Rutherford, actress; 1990 Max Wall, actor and comedian; 1993 Denis Peploe, Scottish artist.