On this day: DeLorean Motor Company goes into receivership

John de Loreans car firm went into receivership in 1982 with an estimated loss of Â£17.8m of taxpayers money. Picture: PA

1797: Pope Pius VI, by Treaty of Tolentino, ceded the Romagna, Bologna and Ferrara to France, as Napoleon Bonaparte advanced through Tyrol to Vienna.

1803: Act of Mediation was passed in Switzerland, under which Cantons regained independence.

1807: British fleet forced way through Dardanelles to support Russia in war against Turkey.

1843: In the middle of a performance of Norma at the Royal Opera House, Madrid, the leading lady rushed off stage to give birth to a daughter, who later became opera singer Adelina Patti. Her father was a tenor.

1901: The Mercedes car, a 35 horsepower model, was named after Mercedes Jellinck, the daughter of a director of the Daimler Company.

1906: In the United States, William S Kellogg formed the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company to make the cereal he invented as therapy for mental patients.

1910: Manchester United played their first match on their new ground – Old Trafford. They were beaten 4-3 by Liverpool.

1924: Shah Ahmad of Persia was deposed.

1927: Chinese Nationalists extracted from Britain a reduction of concessions at Hankow and Kiukiang.

1945: Iwo Jima was invaded by United States Marines. The island was conquered on 16 March with the loss of 4,590 lives.

1957: Emergency Ward 10, the first continuous television series, began on ITV – it was shown twice-weekly for ten years.

1959: Agreement was signed in London by Greece, Turkey and Britain for independence of Cyprus.

1976: Iceland broke off diplomatic relations with Britain after the two countries failed to agree on limits in the “Cod War” fishing dispute.

1982: John de Lorean’s sports car firm went into receivership with an estimated loss of at least £17.8 million of taxpayers’ money.

1985: EastEnders began on BBC television.

1989: Lebanon’s Muslim and Christian religious leaders flew to Kuwait for talks with Arab League committee on ending Lebanon’s 14-year-old civil war.

1989: Norway banned the killing of seal pups for a year after British-Swedish documentary on its sealing methods.

1991: Snow fell on the Algerian Sahara Desert for the first time for 30 years.

1991: Boris Yeltsin called for the resignation of Russian premier Mikhail Gorbachev, saying Gorbachev was sacrificing reform for increased personal power.

1992: Sara Keays, former mistress of Cecil (now Lord) Parkinson, won £105,000 libel damages against New Woman magazine.

1994: Four climbers died in a spate of accidents in the Highlands.

2002: Nasa’s Mars Odyssey space probe began to map the surface of Mars using its thermal emission imaging system.

2010: Golfer Tiger Woods made a televised statement in which he apologised after admitting he had cheated on his wife.

ANNIVERSARIES:

Births: 1473 Nicolaus Copernicus, Polish astronomer; 1717 David Garrick, actor and theatre manager; 1789 Sir William Fairbairn, Kelso-born engineer; 1893 Jimmy Durante, actor and comedian;1911 Merle Oberon, film actress; 1918 Nigel Ivan Forbes KBE, 22nd Lord Forbes, Premier Lord of Scotland; 1924 Lee Marvin, film actor; 1926 Michael Kennedy CBE, British music critic, writer and broadcaster; 1930 John Frankenheimer, film and television director; 1961 Justin Fashanu, footballer.

Deaths: 1849 Bernard Barton, poet; 1916 Ernst Mach, Austrian physicist (on the day after his 78th birthday); 1947 André Gide, author; 1972 John Grierson, documentary film maker; 1995 Sir Nicholas Fairbairn QC, MP; 1997 Deng Xiaoping, Chinese leader.