1648 Parliament broke off negotiations with King Charles I, in response to the news that Charles was entering into an engagement with the Scots, thereby setting the scene for the second phase of the English Civil War.

1746 ‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’ and his Highlanders won the battle of Falkirk. It was to be their last victory in the 'forty-five' Jacobite uprising, as three months later they were defeated at Culloden.

1773 Captain Cook's ship and his crew, aboard 'Resolution', became the first Europeans to sail below the Antarctic Circle. Cook also surveyed, mapped and took possession for Britain of South Georgia. He almost encountered the mainland of Antarctica, but turned back north towards Tahiti to resupply his ship, then resumed his southward course in a second fruitless attempt to find the continent.

1784 The birth, in Todmorden - West Yorkshire of John Fielden (see picture) British industrialist and Radical Member of Parliament for Oldham. John Fielden despaired that the concerns of the poor would never be given adequate attention and he and Lord Ashley passed 'The Ten Hours Act' to ensure that women and children only worked up to 10 hours a day in factories.

1820 The birth, at this house (see picture) in Thornton, West Yorkshire of the poet and novelist Anne Brontë. She was the youngest of six children of Patrick and Maria Brontë. The Brontës moved to Haworth, West Yorkshire on 20th April 1820. The Brontë Museum is in the former parsonage at Haworth. Anne wrote two novels. Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. She died from pulmonary tuberculosis when she was just 29 years old. See picture of Haworth Parsonage and find out more about Haworth by visiting this page of the Beautiful Britain website.

1863 The birth, in Chorlton-on-Medlock, near Manchester, of David Lloyd George, Welsh politician. In 1909 he introduced old-age pensions, followed in 1911 by health and unemployment insurance. In 1916 he became Prime Minister of a coalition government. After the First World War he was re-elected with a huge majority, and held office until 1922. The tiny village of Llanystumdwy was his childhood home. This building, (see picture) in Llanystumdwy, is one of the very few museums in Britain which celebrates the life of a former Prime Minister.

1896 The Daimler Motor Company (Coventry) was registered as the first British car manufacturer.

1899 The birth of the author Nevil Shute. Before becoming famous as an author, he was part of the aeronautical engineering team that created the R100 airship. He worked at RNAS Howden, East Yorkshire, under Barnes Wallis and lived at this house (see picture) on 78 Hailgate, Howden. A plaque (see picture) is now fixed to the house to commemorate this.

1907 Alfred Wainwright, whose books for walkers did much to popularise the Lake District, was born, in Blackburn, Lancashire. In 1952, he began the task of walking every fell in Lakeland and recording his walks with pen and ink drawings. It took him 13 years to climb the 214 fells, travelling on foot or by public transport from his Kendal home, as he never learnt to drive. His ashes are scattered on Haystacks, Cumbria. See picture of Haystacks.

1912 Captain Robert Falcon Scott reached the South Pole, only to find that the Norwegian Roald Amundsen had beaten him by one month.

1945 The Nazis began the evacuation of the Auschwitz concentration camp as Soviet forces closed in. Nearly one and a half thousand British prisoners of war were sent to the Auschwitz death camps.

1968 The motor manufacturer British Leyland was formed; from the merger of British Motor Holdings Ltd. and Leyland Motor Corp. Ltd.

1986 The Royal yacht Britannia evacuated Britons and other foreign nationals from Aden during their civil war.

2008 British Airways Flight 38 crash landed just short of London Heathrow Airport with no fatalities. It was the first complete hull loss of a Boeing 777, the world's largest twin jet aircraft.

2014 Cambridge City Council said that apostrophes on new street signs would be abolished, a decision that was condemned by language traditionalists. The naming policy also banned street names which would be "difficult to pronounce or awkward to spell" and any that "could give offence" or would "encourage defacing of nameplates". After an intervention by cabinet minister Eric Pickles, local people in Cambridge started to edit street signs, adding apostrophes if they were necessary.

2015 Jay Chou, one of Taiwan’s biggest pop stars, married model Hannah Quinlivan at Selby Abbey in North Yorkshire. See picture of Selby Abbey. The service was followed by a recption at nearby Castle Howard.

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