On this day: Britain detonated its first atomic bomb

Britain detonates its first atomic bomb at the Monte Bello Islands off Australia on this day in 1952. Picture: Getty

1283: Dafydd AP Gruffydd, prince of Gwynedd in Wales, became the first person to be executed by being hanged, drawn and quartered.

1594: Battle of Glenlivet and the defeat of the Royal troops under the Earl of Argyll by Catholic lords under the Earl of Huntly.

1712: The Duke of Montrose issued a warrant for the arrest of Rob Roy McGregor.

1849: Author Edgar Allan Poe was found delirious in a gutter in Baltimore. It was the last time he was seen in public before his death.

1872: Bloomingdales department store opened in New York.

1888: The New Zealand Natives – a mainly Maori rugby team – became the first to perform the haka, and wear the all-black strip and silver fern motif, when they played their first match in a tour of the UK, defeating Surrey 4-1.

1906: SOS was established as an international distress signal at the Berlin Radio Conference replacing the call sign CQD.

1910: The first recorded mid-air collision of two aircraft occurred at an airshow in Milan, Italy. Both pilots survived but one, Captain Bertram Dickson of the British Army, was so badly injured, he never flew again.

1914: 2,400 people died in an earthquake in Turkey.

1918: German-Austrian note was sent to US via Switzerland for armistice in First World War.

1929: Britain restored diplomatic relations with USSR.

1929: The Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes changed its name to Yugoslavia.

1932: Iraq joined League of Nations as British mandate ended.

1935: Italian forces invaded Ethiopia.

1940: Former prime minister Neville Chamberlain resigned from the government because of poor health – he died two months later.

1941: The aerosol was patented by LD Goodhue and WN Sullivan.

1941: The Nazis blew up six synagogues in Paris.

1943: The British 8th Army landed at Termoli, east Italy.

1945: Elvis Presley gave his first public performance at the age of ten.

1952: Tea rationing ended in Britain.

1952: Britain detonated its first atomic bomb, at the Monte Bello Islands off the north-west coast of Australia.

1956: The Bolshoi Ballet appeared at Covent Garden, London, for the first time.

1957: Willy Brandt was elected mayor of West Berlin.

1959: The post code, required in the addressing of mail for mechanical sorting, was first used in Britain, in Norwich.

1972: US president Richard Nixon signed the SALT agreement (Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty) with the Soviet Union.

1990: East and West Germany were reunited as the Federal Republic of Germany.

1990: Former Labour MP Dick Douglas joined SNP.

1993: There was bloodshed in Moscow as demonstrators attacked government buildings. President Boris Yeltsin declared a state of emergency.

1995: Former American football star and film actor OJ Simpson was cleared at the end of a nine-month trial of the murders of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown, and her male friend, Ronald Goldman.

Birthdays

Births: 1637 George Gordon, Earl of Aberdeen; 1803 John Gorrie, physician, scientist, inventor, and humanitarian; 1900 Thomas Clayton Wolfe, novelist.

Deaths: 1226 St Francis of Assisi; 1637 Ben Jonson, poet and dramatist; 1690 Robert Barclay, Gordonstoun-born Quaker, writer and governor of East Jersey; 1967 Woody Guthrie, singer and composer; 1967 Malcolm Sargent, organist, composer and conductor; 2004 Janet Leigh, actress; 2005 Ronnie Barker, actor, comedian and writer.

Anniversaries

Christopher Bruce CBE, ballet dancer and choreographer, 70; Neve Campbell, actress, 42; Chubby Checker (born Ernest Evans), singer, “King of the Twist”, 74; Fred Couples, golfer, 56; Michael Garner, actor, 61; David Goode, sculptor, 49; Tommy Lee, rock drummer, 53; Gwen Stefani, pop singer, 46; Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Swedish footballer, 34; Clive Owen, actor, 51; Charlie Wernham, comedian and actor (Hollyoaks), 21; Greg Proops, actor and comedian, 56; Kathryn D Sullivan, Nasa astronaut, first woman to walk in space, 64; Stanisław Skrowaczewski, conductor and composer, 92.