1969 Senator Edward Kennedy, returning from a party, drove off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, Massachusetts, causing the death of his companion, Mary Jo Kopechne. His conviction for leaving the scene of an accident was to dog his subsequent political career.
1969 US Senator Edward Kennedy’s car careered off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, Massachusetts, killing his passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne, a 28-year-old Washington secretary. Serious questions were asked about the 37-year-old senator’s conduct, not least his decision to leave the scene of the accident and not contact the police until several hours later.
1966 Corporal Patrick ‘Bob’ Gallagher (22) from Ballyhaunis, Co. Mayo, serving with the US Marines in Vietnam, saved the lives of three companions during a Viet Cong attack, for which he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honour.
1918 Nelson Mandela, anti-apartheid revolutionary and first democratically elected president of South Africa (1994–9), born in Mvezo, Cape Province.
1862 Lord John George Beresford, Church of Ireland archbishop of Armagh and primate of all Ireland since 1822, died.
1817 Jane Austen (41), English novelist, author notably of Pride and Prejudice (1813) and Emma (1815), died.
1811 William Makepeace Thackeray, English novelist whose Irish sketch book (1843) caused controversy on account of his graphic descriptions of pre-Famine poverty, born in Calcutta.
1610 Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, belligerent Italian painter best remembered for the uncompromising realism of his religious works, died in mysterious circumstances.
1972 James Jones (18), a member of the King’s Own Regiment from Kirby, Liverpool, was shot dead by an IRA sniper at a sentry post in West Belfast. He became the 100th British soldier to die on active service in Northern Ireland since 1969.
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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
1820 Sir William Howard Russell, one of the first modern war correspondents, whose coverage included the Crimean War and the American Civil War, born in Tallaght, Dublin.
1969 Death of Dwight D. ‘Ike’ Eisenhower (78), American army general, supreme commander of the Allied Expeditionary Forces in Europe during the Second World War and 34th (Republican) president of the United States (1953–61).
1979 The worst-ever accident in the US nuclear power industry began when a pressure valve in a reactor at the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania failed to close.
1957 Jack Butler Yeats (85), painter and younger brother of W.B. Yeats, died.
1972 Eight people, seven of them young girls, died when fire destroyed the offices of Noyek’s timber merchants in Parnell Street, Dublin.
1820 William Howard Russell, the first modern war correspondent, renowned for his reports on the mismanagement of the Crimean War for The Times (London), born at Lily Vale, Tallaght, Co. Dublin.
1760 Dublin-born Margaret (Peg) Woffington, renowned beauty and leading actress on the London stage for almost two decades, died.
1973 Irish naval service vessels apprehended the Claudia, a Cypriot coaster, off County Waterford. Six men, including Joe Cahill, were arrested for conspiracy to import arms.