1820 Edward Bransfield from Ballinacurra, Middleton, Co. Cork, commander of the English merchant vessel Williams, made the first sighting of the mainland of Antarctica—Trinity Peninsula, the northernmost point of the continent.
1968 Vietnam War—the Tet Offensive. After declaring a truce over the seven-day Tet (lunar New Year) holiday, c. 70,000 Viet Cong troops launched surprise attacks on US and South Vietnam forces throughout South Vietnam.
1948 Mahatma Ghandi (78), India’s prophet of non-violence, was assassinated in his own garden in New Delhi by the Hindu extremist Nathuran Vinayak Godse.
1864 The National Gallery of Ireland in Merrion Square, Dublin, financed by William Dargan from a testimonial of £5,000 he received in acknowledgement of his services to the Dublin Exhibition (1853), was formally opened.
1661 Oliver Cromwell, former lord protector of England, was formally executed, more than two years after his death.
1933 Adolph Hitler was appointed German chancellor by President von Hindenburg.
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Personal Histories
Personal Histories is an initiative by History Ireland,
which aims to capture the individual histories of Irish
people both in Ireland and around the world. It is hoped
to build an extensive database reflecting Irish lives,
giving them a chance to be heard, remembered and to
add their voice to the historical record.
Click Here to go to the Personal Histories page
1992 Five Catholics were killed when UFF gunmen attacked a betting shop on the Ormeau Road, Belfast. Seven others were wounded.
1921 Katherine O’Shea Parnell (76), widow of Charles Stewart Parnell (1846–91), died at Littlehampton, Sussex. (See ‘100 Years Ago’, p. 70.)
1820 William Drennan (66), United Irishman, physician, co-founder of the Royal Belfast Academical Institution (1810) and poet, author of ‘The Wake of William Orr’, died.
1992 Five Catholic men were shot dead by two UFF gunmen in an attack on Seán Graham’s bookmaker’s shop on the Ormeau Road, Belfast.
1921 Katherine O’Shea (76), wife of Charles Stewart Parnell (1846–91), died at 39 East Ham Road, Littlehampton, Sussex.
1918 The luxury liner SS Tuscania, en route from New Jersey to Liverpool with over 2,000 US servicemen, was torpedoed and sunk by a German Uboat 13km north of Rathlin Island. Around 210 servicemen and crew lost their lives.
1917 In the Roscommon North by-election, Count Plunkett, father of Joseph Plunkett (1887–1916), who was endorsed by Sinn Féin, defeated T.J. Devine (Irish Parliamentary Party) by 3,022 votes to 1,708.
2013 The McAleese report on the Magdalene laundries was published. It found ‘significant’ State collusion in the admission of thousands of ‘fallen women’ into the institutions, where they were abused and worked for nothing in conditions of slavery.