On this day

1099 – The First Crusade: The Siege of Jerusalem begins.

1329 - Robert I (the Bruce), king of Scotland died. He earned a place in Scottish history for his legendary victory over the English at Bannockburn in 1314.

1862 – The United States and the United Kingdom agree to suppress the slave trade.

1906 - Cunard Line's RMS Lusitania was launched at the John Brown Shipyard at Clydebank, Glasgow. At the time she was the world's fastest and largest liner.

1939 - King George VI and his wife, Queen Elizabeth, arrived at Niagara Falls, New York, from Canada, the first visit to the United States by a reigning British monarch.

1975 – Sony introduces the Betamax videocassette recorder for sale to the public.

1982 – Priscilla Presley opens Graceland to the public; the bathroom where Elvis Presley died five years earlier is kept off-limits.

1998 – James Byrd, Jr. of Texas is killed when white supremacists drag him behind a pickup truck along an asphalt pavement.

2000 – The United Nations defines the Blue Line as the border between Israel and Lebanon.

793 - Vikings raided the abbey at Lindisfarne in Northumbria. The event is commonly accepted as the beginning of the Scandinavian invasion of England.

1042 - Harthacnut, King of England and Denmark, died. He was succeeded in England by his adopted heir, Edward the Confessor, and in Denmark by Magnus, King of Norway.

1783 – The volcano Laki, in Iceland, begins an eight-month eruption which kills over 9,000 people and starts a seven-year famine.

1794 – Robespierre inaugurates the French Revolution's new state religion, the Cult of the Supreme Being, with large organized festivals all across France.

1949 – Celebrities Helen Keller, Dorothy Parker, Danny Kaye, Fredric March, John Garfield, Paul Muni and Edward G. Robinson are named in an FBI report as Communist Party members.

1949 – George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four is published.

1968 - Authorities announced the capture in London of James Earl Ray, the suspected assassin of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

1984 – Homosexuality is declared legal in the Australian state of New South Wales.

2004 – The first Venus Transit in modern history takes place, the previous one being in 1882.

2008 – The Akihabara massacre takes place in the Akihabara shopping quarter in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. Tomohiro Katō drives a two-ton truck into a crowd before leaving the truck and attacking people with a knife.

68 – Roman Emperor Nero commits suicide, after quoting Homer's Iliad, thus ending the Julio-Claudian Dynasty and starting the civil year known as the Year of the Four Emperors.

1534 - French navigator Jacques Cartier became the first European explorer to discover the St. Lawrence River in present-day Quebec, Canada.

1870 - Charles Dickens, English novelist died at his home - Gad's Hill Place, Kent. Dickens rocketed to fame with his 1836 serial publication of The Pickwick Papers. His other notable works are Oliver Twist, A Christmas Carol, David Copperfield, Bleak House, Hard Times, A Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations.

1873 - Alexandra Palace in London burned down, after being open for only 16 days. It was built as a public centre of recreation, education and entertainment and as North London's counterpart to the Crystal Palace in South London. With typical Victorian vigour, the palace was quickly rebuilt and it reopened on 1st May 1875.

1898 - An agreement was signed under which Hong Kong was leased to Britain, by China, for a period of 99 years.

1924 – In the second attempt to climb Mount Everest, George Mallory and Andrew "Sandy" Irvine disappear, possibly having first made it to the top.

1930 – Chicago Tribune reporter Jake Lingle is killed during rush hour at the Illinois Central train station by Leo Vincent Brothers, allegedly over a 100,000 USD gambling debt owed to Al Capone.

1933 - Baird demonstrated high definition television at his Long Acre studio in London, showing the difference between the previous 30-line picture and the new 120-line tubes.

1934 - Donald Duck made his debut, in The Wise Little Hen.

1958 - The Queen opened an extended airport at Gatwick, south of London, modernised at a cost of £7m.

1986 – The Rogers Commission releases its report on the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.

1999 – Kosovo War: the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and NATO sign a peace treaty.

1829 – The first Boat Race between the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge takes place, with Oxford winning.

1886 – Mount Tarawera in New Zealand erupts, killing 153 people and destroying the famous Pink and White Terraces.

1898 - U.S. Marines landed at Guantnamo Bay and for a month fought a land war in Cuba, ending Spanish colonial rule in the Western Hemisphere.

1940 - World War II: Italy officially declared war on Britain and France.

1942 - World War II: The Czech village of Lidice was destroyed and every man in it killed in reprisal for the assassination of Nazi leader Reinhard Heydrich. Women and children were deported.

1943 - The ball-point pen was patented in the U.S.A. by Laszlo Biro.

1944 – World War II: 642 men, women and children are killed in the Oradour-sur-Glane Massacre in France.

1944 – World War II: In Distomo, Boeotia Prefecture, Greece 218 men, women and children are massacred by German troops.

1965 - A de Havilland jet airliner made the first automatic landing, relying entirely on instruments, at Heathrow Airport.

1977 – James Earl Ray escapes from Brushy Mountain State Prison in Petros, Tennessee, but is recaptured on June 13.

1993 - The death of Manchester born comedian Les Dawson. He is remembered for his deadpan style, grumpy on stage personality, and jokes about his mother-in-law and wife.

1997 – Before fleeing his northern stronghold, Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot orders the killing of his defense chief Son Sen and 11 of Sen's family members.

1999 – Kosovo War: NATO suspends its air strikes after Slobodan Milošević agrees to withdraw Serbian forces from Kosovo.

2002 – The first direct electronic communication experiment between the nervous systems of two humans is carried out by Kevin Warwick in the United Kingdom.

2003 – The Spirit Rover is launched, beginning NASA's Mars Exploration Rover mission.

1184 BC – Trojan War: Troy is sacked and burned, according to calculations by Eratosthenes.

1488 - James III of Scotland was murdered by rebellious Scottish nobles and was succeeded by his 15 year old son, James IV.

1509 - Eighteen year old King Henry VIII married Catherine of Aragon, the first of his six wives.

1770 - Captain James Cook, commander of the British ship Endeavour, discovered the Great Barrier Reef, Australia.

1892 – The Limelight Department, one of the world's first film studios, is officially established in Melbourne, Australia.

1942 – World War II: The United States agrees to send Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet Union.

1955 – Eighty-three are killed and at least 100 are injured after an Austin-Healey and a Mercedes-Benz collide at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, the deadliest ever accident in motorsports.

1959 - The Hovercraft, invented by Christopher Cockerell was officially demonstrated for the first time, at Southampton.

1962 – Frank Morris, John Anglin and Clarence Anglin allegedly become the only prisoners to escape from the prison on Alcatraz Island.

1972 – The Eltham Well Hall rail crash, caused by an intoxicated train driver, kills six people and injures 126.

1982 - The movie "E.T. - The Extra-Terrestrial" opened.

2002 – Antonio Meucci is acknowledged as the first inventor of the telephone by the United States Congress.

1429 - In the Hundred Years' War, Joan of Arc led the French army in their capture of the city of Jargeau (France) against the English commander, William de la Pole, the 1st Duke of Suffolk.

1667 - The first successful human blood transfusion was performed, in France.

1667 - The Dutch fleet (under Admiral de Ruyter) burned Sheerness, sailed up the River Medway, raided Chatham dockyard, and then escaped with the royal barge, the Royal Charles.

1942 – Holocaust: Anne Frank receives a diary for her thirteenth birthday.

1964 – Anti-apartheid activist and ANC leader Nelson Mandela is sentenced to life in prison for sabotage in South Africa.

1991 - Boris Yeltsin became the first popularly elected leader in the 1000-year history of Russia.

1994 – Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman are murdered outside her home in Los Angeles, California. O.J. Simpson is later acquitted of the killings, but is held liable in wrongful death civil suit.

1997 - Queen Elizabeth II reopened the Globe Theatre in London. The new theatre was approximately 750 feet (230 m) from the site of Shakespeare's original theatre, built in 1599.

2004 - A 1.3 kg chondrite type meteorite strikes a house in Ellerslie, New Zealand causing serious damage but no injuries.

313 – The Edict of Milan, signed by Constantine the Great and co-emperor Valerius Licinius granting religious freedom throughout the Roman Empire, is posted in Nicomedia.

1665 - The Great Plague began to take hold, as the official death toll reached 112.

1842 - Queen Victoria travelled by train for the first time, from Slough (near Windsor Castle) to Paddington, accompanied by Prince Albert. A special coach had been built earlier, but the Queen had been reluctant to try this new form of travel. On her first journey, the engine driver was assisted by the great civil engineer, Isambard Kingdom Brunel.

1900 - China's Boxer Rebellion targeting foreigners, as well as Chinese Christians, erupted into full-scale violence.

1917 - The deadliest German air raid on London during World War I was carried out by Gotha G bombers and resulted in 162 deaths, including 46 children, with a further 432 people injured.

1934 – Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini meet in Venice, Italy; Mussolini later describes the German dictator as "a silly little monkey".

1944 - World War II: the first German V1 flying bomb, or 'doodlebug' landed in Britain - killing three people in a house in the coastal city of Southampton. Only four of the eleven bombs hit their targets.

1955 – Mir Mine, the first diamond mine in the USSR, is discovered.

1970 – "The Long and Winding Road" becomes the Beatles' last US Number 1 song.

1983 - After more than a decade in space, Pioneer 10, the world's first outer-planetary probe, left the solar system.

2005 – A jury in Santa Maria, California acquits pop singer Michael Jackson of molesting 13-year-old Gavin Arvizo at his Neverland Ranch.

2010 – A capsule of the Japanese spacecraft Hayabusa, containing particles of the asteroid 25143 Itokawa, returns to Earth.

(11-06-2012 11:43 )skully Wrote:  1972 – The Eltham Well Hall rail crash, caused by an intoxicated train driver, kills six people and injures 126.

The accident was caused by the train trying to take a sharp curve with a 20-mph speed limit at approximately 65 mph. The engine and first four coaches came off the track and skidded into a coal yard, the next five coaches left the track but stayed upright and the rear coach stayed on the rails. The train was found to be in perfect working order and the opinion was that whilst the driver had (in car terms) taken his foot off the accelerator he had inexplicably not applied the brakes. This was backed up by the guard who realised that they were travelling too fast as they approached the curve and tried to apply the emergency brake from the rear of the train but it was too late. Four of the deaths occurred immediately and two others died of their injuries in hospital two and five months later respectively.

The journey was an excursion special, carrying railway employees and their families back to London after spending the day in Margate. Among the passengers was 13 year old Phil Daniels, who went on to become an actor (he played Kevin Wicks in "Eastenders" and starred in the films "Scum" and "Quadrophenia"). Daniels and his family were uninjured.

The driver, 33 year old Robert Wilsdon, who was one of those killed, was found to be four times over the drink-driving limit and had been drinking not only immediately before setting off but almost certainly in the cab as well. A medical expert stated that during the time given, 5½ pints of bitter, a third of a bottle of sherry and a quarter bottle of spirits would "just about achieve" the levels found, providing that "the bulk of the spirits was drunk between 20:15 and 21:30". The inquiry hypothesized that the driver had taken spirits into the cab with him, having collected them during his unexplained absence before leaving Margate.

The inquiry Chairman, Colonel J.R.H Robertson, praised the work of the emergency services, noting that the first police officer arrive within five minutes of the derailment and the first appliance and ambulance within seven minutes. At the same time he stated "I wish to record my disgust at the conduct of those sightseers who, in their thoughtless determination to relish all the sad scenes of tragedy, crowded quickly to the site and sadly hampered the relief work".

In these Health & Safety obsessed days, it is astonishing to think how a driver could have got into that much of a state and driven a ten-coach train. One of the failings indentified was that drivers were allowed to book on duty by telephone rather than have to report to a supervisor at a depot or station, but those colleagues who had seen Wilsdon on that fateful evening all testified that he had appeared perfectly normal, and walked and spoke without any signs of being drunk. They also testified that he was a frequent drinker who could "hold his drink". Colonel Stephenson had discreetly sought evidence from the Licensed Victuallers Association as to whether somebody really could drink that much and appear "normal" or were the witnesses trying to cover up for themselves because they didn't say anything or report him at the time. The reply Stephenson got was an overwhelming "yes they can", leading him to rule that no blame should be attached to his colleagues and that the accident was solely down to the actions of the driver.

1648 – Margaret Jones is hanged in Boston for witchcraft in the first such execution for the Massachusetts colony.

1789 - English Captain William Bligh and 18 others, cast adrift from the H.M.S. Bounty, reached Timor after travelling nearly 4,000 miles in a small, open boat.

1789 – Whiskey distilled from maize is first produced by American clergyman the Rev Elijah Craig. It is named Bourbon because Rev Craig lived in Bourbon County, Kentucky.

1822 - Englishman Charles Babbage proposed an automatic, mechanical calculator (he called it a difference engine). He is considered a 'father of the computer' and is credited with inventing the first mechanical computer that eventually led to more complex designs.

1900 – Hawaii becomes a United States territory.

1907 – Norway gives women the right to vote.

1947 – Roswell UFO incident: a supposed UFO crash lands in Roswell, New Mexico.

1966 – The Vatican announces the abolition of the Index Librorum Prohibitorum (index of prohibited books), which was originally instituted in 1557.

1982 - Argentine forces surrendered at Port Stanley, ending the Falklands War. 255 Britons and 652 Argentines died in the conflict.

1994 – The 1994 Stanley Cup riot occurs after the New York Rangers win the Stanley Cup from Vancouver, causing an estimated CA$1.1 million, leading to 200 arrests and injuries. One person is left with permanent brain damage.

763 BC – Assyrians record a solar eclipse that is later used to fix the chronology of Mesopotamian history.

1215 - King John put his seal to Magna Carta at Runnymede, England, a peace treaty between John and his barons, guaranteeing that the king would respect feudal rights and privileges, uphold the freedom of the church, and maintain the nation's laws.

1752 - Benjamin Franklin flew the kite with a key tied to its string and proved that lightning contained electricity (traditional date, the exact date is unknown).

1846 – The Oregon Treaty establishes the 49th parallel as the border between the United States and Canada, from the Rocky Mountains to the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

1860 - British nurse Florence Nightingale, famous for tending British wounded during the Crimean War, opened a school for nurses at St Thomas's Hospital in London.

1864 – Arlington National Cemetery is established when 200 acres (0.81 km2) around Arlington Mansion (formerly owned by Confederate General Robert E. Lee) are officially set aside as a military cemetery by U.S. Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton.

1888 – Crown Prince Wilhelm becomes Kaiser Wilhelm II; he will be the last Emperor of the German Empire.

1910 - British explorer Captain Robert Scott began his ill-fated expedition to reach the South Pole.

1919 – John Alcock and Arthur Brown complete the first nonstop transatlantic flight when they reach Clifden, County Galway, Ireland.

1928 - The House of commons voted to fix the date of Easter. However, a clause in the Bill allowed the consideration of the opinions of all the major churches and the Act was never put in force.

1940 – World War II: Operation Ariel begins – Allied troops start to evacuate France, following Germany's takeover of Paris and most of the nation.

1985 – Rembrandt's painting Danaë is attacked by a man (later judged insane) who throws sulfuric acid on the canvas and cuts it twice with a knife.

1996 - An IRA bomb, the biggest ever to go off on the British mainland, devastated the centre of Manchester. Miraculously no-one was killed but 200 people were taken to hospital.

1998 - Britain introduced a £2 coin.

2002 – Near-Earth asteroid 2002 MN misses the Earth by 75,000 miles (121,000 km), about one-third of the distance between the Earth and the Moon.