On this day
1765: English wig-makers petitioned George III for financial relief as the male fashion of wearing wigs came to an end.
1810: French emperor Napoleon married Marie Louise of Austria, having rejected Josephine because of her inability to fill the royal nursery.
1847: Inventor Thomas Edison was born in Ohio.
1852: The first flushing lavatory for women opened in Bedford Street, London.
1858: The ‘Miracle of Lourdes’ took place when St Bernadette (peasant girl Bernadette Soubirous) had her first vision of the Virgin Mary.
1929: The 109 acres of the Vatican in Rome was made an independent sovereign state under the Lateran Treaty.
1940: John Buchan, Scottish novelist who became Lord Tweedsmuir, died. He is best remembered for his creation Richard Hannay and the novel The Thirty-Nine Steps.
1975: Margaret Thatcher became the first woman leader of a British political party, the Conservatives, at the age of 49.
1990: South Africa’s black nationalist leader Nelson Mandela was freed from prison after 27 years.
2010: The fashion world mourned the loss of a “modern-day genius” following the death of Alexander McQueen. ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR: A Belfast couple tied the knot in the first same-sex marriage to take place in Northern Ireland.