THIS DAY

1695: Henry Purcell, English composer, died of tuberculosis, aged 36. It is said that a friend asked him if he had made his peace with God, and he replied: “We’ve never quarrelled.”

1783: Man’s first freeflight was made by Jean de Rozier and the Marquis d‘Arlandes in the Montgolfier brothers’ hot air balloon. They flew above Paris and, after 25 minutes, landed a few miles south.

1787: Sir Samuel Cunard, shipowner, was born in Nova Scotia. He came to Britain in 1838 and established what became the Cunard Line.

1918: The German battle fleet surrendered to the Allies at Scapa Flow in the Orkneys.

1934: Cole Porter’s Anything Goes opened in New York and made a star of Ethel Merman.

1936: The first television gardening programme was broadcast by the BBC – In Your Garden with Mr Middleton.

1974: IRA bombs in two Birmingham public houses killed 19 people.