January 16

• 1922 Michael Collins, as chairman of the Provisional Government of Southern Ireland, formally accepted the transfer of power from the British authorities at Dublin Castle.
• 1822 Thomas Clarke Luby, revolutionary, author, journalist and founding member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (1858), born in Dublin, the son of a Church of Ireland clergyman.
• 1991 Operation Desert Storm, a military operation by a US-led coalition of two dozen nations to expel occupying Iraqi forces from Kuwait, began.
• 1920 Prohibition came into force in the USA following ratification of the 18th amendment to the constitution.
• 1969 A Czech student, Jan Palach (20), burned himself to death in Wenceslas Square, Prague, in protest against the continuing presence of Soviet and Warsaw Pact troops in Czechoslovakia.
• 1922 Michael Collins, as chairman of the Provisional Government of Southern Ireland, formally accepted the transfer of power from the British at Dublin Castle.
• 1816 Frances Browne, known as ‘the blind poetess of Donegal’, whose fairy-tale Granny’s wonderful chair and its tales of fairy times (1856) won international acclaim, born in Stranorlar, Co. Donegal.
• 1913 The Home Rule bill was carried in the House of Commons (367–257) but was defeated in the House of Lords (326–69) a fortnight later.
• 1809 The Battle of Corunna took place, in which the British, led by Sir John Moore, won a rearguard action against the French. The death of Moore in the Peninsular War was to inspire the classic poem On the Burial of Sir John Moore (1817) by Kildare-born Revd Charles Wolfe (1791–1823).