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1649 King Charles I, who had reigned since 1625, was executed in Whitehall.
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1661 Oliver Cromwell was ritually executed, more than two years after his death.
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1790 the first lifeboat was tested by Henry Greathead of South Shields.
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1933 Hitler was sworn in as German chancellor.
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1948 Mahatma Gandhi, Indian leader, was assassinated in Delhi.
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1965 Sir Winston Churchill’s state funeral took place in London.
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1968 the Vietcong launched the Tet Offensive against South Vietnam.
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1972 British troops killed 13 people during a civil rights march in Londonderry on what is now known as Bloody Sunday.
31 JANUARY (#ulink_8eb601fd-7958-5b69-9910-e3baec2a0b54)
1606 Guy Fawkes and his fellow Gunpowder Plot conspirators were executed.
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1788 Charles Edward Stuart (Bonnie Prince Charlie), leader of the Jacobite rebellion, died in Rome aged 68.
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1858 the Great Eastern steamship, the largest vessel in the world, built by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, was launched.
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1929 Leon Trotsky was expelled from the Soviet Union.
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1983 the wearing of front seatbelts in cars was made compulsory in Britain.
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1990 the first McDonald’s restaurant in Russia opened in Pushkin Square, Moscow.
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2010 Avatar became the first film to gross more than $2 billion worldwide.
1 FEBRUARY (#ulink_5c516022-3b1e-5015-a17f-5e1467d38641)
1851 Mary Shelley, who at 21 wrote Frankenstein, died aged 54.
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1874 Hugo von Hofmannsthal, poet, dramatist and librettist (Der Rosenkavalier), was born in Vienna.
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1884 publication of the first fascicle of the Oxford English Dictionary.
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1896 the world premiere of Puccini’s opera La Bohème took place in Turin, with Arturo Toscanini conducting.
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1910 the first British labour exchange opened.
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1915 Stanley Matthews, footballer, was born in Stoke-on-Trent.
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1924 Britain formally recognised the Soviet Union.
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1974 Ronald Biggs, one of the Great Train Robbers, was arrested by Brazilian police in Rio de Janeiro.
2 FEBRUARY (#ulink_aa47052e-ef16-5966-ac30-72cdc3e19208)
1650 Nell Gwyn, comic actress and mistress of King Charles II, was born.
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1709 Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk, inspiration for Robinson Crusoe, was rescued after being marooned for four years on an island off Chile.
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1901 the state funeral of Queen Victoria took place at Windsor.
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1972 the British embassy in Dublin was burnt down by demonstrators protesting the killings on Bloody Sunday two days previously in Londonderry.
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1977 the Pompidou Centre opened in Paris.
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1979 Sid Vicious (Simon John Ritchie), bass guitarist of the Sex Pistols, died in New York aged 21.
3 FEBRUARY (#ulink_13d86f5b-7f32-5f54-8c85-0fa255ea9c77)
1761 Richard (Beau) Nash, dandy who developed Bath into the most fashionable spa town in England, died.
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1877 The Celebrated Chop Waltz, better known as Chopsticks, music for the piano by 16-year-old Euphemia Allen, was registered at the British Museum.
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1919 President Woodrow Wilson attended the first meeting of the League of Nations in Paris.
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1924 Woodrow Wilson, 28th American president 1913–21, died aged 67.
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1960 Harold Macmillan made his Wind of Change speech to the South African parliament.
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1969 Yassir Arafat was appointed chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation.
4 FEBRUARY (#ulink_418a8177-dd67-5a9d-add1-984342a2c3b0)
1911 Rolls-Royce commissioned its famous figurehead, The Spirit of Ecstasy, from the sculptor Charles Sykes.
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1927 Malcolm Campbell set the land-speed record at 174.88mph in his 12-cylinder Napier-Campbell Blue Bird on Pendine Sands, Carmarthen Bay.
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1945 the Yalta conference opened, at which Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin discussed strategy for the final months of the war.
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1962 The Sunday Times issued the first colour supplement in Britain.
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1968 the world’s largest hovercraft (165 tons and costing £1.75 million) was launched at Cowes, Isle of Wight.
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1971 the British carmaker Rolls-Royce declared itself bankrupt.
5 FEBRUARY (#ulink_b58d0369-f495-5251-8e19-2788dc639c87)
1811 the Prince of Wales, later King George IV, was declared Prince Regent.
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1887 Verdi’s Otello received its world premiere at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan.
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1920 the RAF College at Cranwell, Lincolnshire, opened.
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1982 Laker Airways collapsed with debts of £270 million.
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1983 the Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie was imprisoned in France.
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1987 Liberace, pianist known for his flamboyant costumes, died.
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1999 South African president Nelson Mandela made his last State of the Nation speech to parliament before retiring.
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2008 tornados killed 57 people in the southern United States.
6 FEBRUARY (#ulink_71da6fb3-75de-5bb7-8c05-ee0d629568ee)
1685 King James II acceded to the throne.
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