On this day: Pope and Archbishop of Canterbury meet

1966: A Pope and an Archbishop of Canterbury met for the first time in 400 years. Picture: Getty

National day of Pakistan.

1695: Window Tax imposed in England.

1765: The Stamp Act, intended for taxing colonists in America, was passed in Parliament.

1775: US statesman Patrick Henry made plea for American freedom from Britain, declaring: “Give me liberty or give me death.”

1848: Free Church of Scotland settlement established at New Edinburgh, later Dunedin, New Zealand, under the Rev Thomas Burns, nephew of the poet.

1891: Goal nets, the invention of JA Brodie of Liverpool, used for the first time in an FA Cup Final.

1919: The Fascist Party was founded by Benito Mussolini in Milan.

1933: German Reichstag granted Adolf Hitler dictatorial powers until April, 1937.

1956: The foundation stone of Coventry Cathedral was laid by the Queen.

1956: Pakistan was proclaimed an Islamic republic within the Commonwealth.

1962: French government used fighter planes and tanks in attempt to end insurrection by European rightists in Algeria.

1962: World’s first nuclear– powered merchant ship, Savannah, launched in New Jersey.

1966: A Pope and an Archbishop of Canterbury met for the first time in 400 years.

1989: Police clashed with thousands of ethnic Albanian demonstrators in Yugoslavia.

1989: The Prince of Wales’s first winning racehorse, Devil’s Elbow, was disqualified by the Jockey Club for failing a dope test.

1990: Soviet government ordered western diplomats to leave and restricted entry of foreigners to Lithuania.

1992: A woman attacked Margaret Thatcher with a bunch of daffodils during an election walkabout in Cheshire.

1995: Manchester United footballer Eric Cantona was jailed for two weeks (reduced to 120 hours community service) for assaulting a fan at Crystal Palace.

1997: Five members of the Solar Temple sect committed suicide in Canada. In 1994, 53 members were found dead in Switzerland and Canada, and in 1995, 16 committed suicide in France.

2001: The Russian Mir space station was disposed of, breaking up in the atmosphere before falling into the southern Pacific Ocean near Fiji.

2007: In Melbourne, Australia, a fire in the Burnley Tunnel killed three people.

2010: British Gas employees voted for strike action over claims of “macho management”.

2010: It was revealed that the St James Centre in Edinburgh would close for up to four years to make way for an £850 million development.