On This Day - 6th March
1340
The birth of John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster and the third surviving son of King Edward III.
1806Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Victorian poet and wife of Robert Browning,
was born.
1893 The opening of the Liverpool Overhead Railway (known locally as the Dockers' Umbrella) which operated for 7 miles along the Liverpool Docks. See 
picture inside the Museum of Liverpool. The railway had a number of world firsts - it was the first electric elevated railway, the first to use automatic signalling, electric colour light signals and electric multiple units and was home to one of the first passenger escalators at a railway station.
1917The birth of the comedian Frankie Howerd, famous for his risqué double entendres whose career spanned six decades. He hid his potentially career-destroying homosexuality from both his audience and his mother, as acts between consenting males was illegal in England and Wales until 1967 and illegal in Scotland until 1981. Howerd died on 19th April 1992, one day before fellow comedian Benny Hill.
1926The Shakespeare Memorial Theatre at Stratford upon Avon was destroyed by fire. It was replaced with this theatre (see 
picture) which opened in 1932, on Shakespeare's birthday (April 23rd)
1944658 U.S. bombers began a daylight attack on Berlin from bases in Britain
and dropped 2,000 tons of bombs.
1951 The death of Ivor Novello, (see 
picture), Cardiff born composer and actor. His first big hit was 'Keep the Home Fires Burning, which was very popular during World War I. The Ivor Novello Awards for songwriting were established in 1955 in Novello's memory and are awarded each year by the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors
1957Ghana became independent, the first British colony to do so.
1961The death of Lancashire born entertainer George Formby, 'king of the ukulele'.
1970The British Government announced a ban on the importation of domestic pets following the death from rabies of a dog imported from Pakistan.
1974British coal workers called off a four-week strike following a 35% pay offer from the new Labour government.
1984The National Coal Board announced a plan of massive job cuts & pit
closures. (Additional note - On 18th December 2015 miners at Kellingley Colliery worked their final shifts. It was the end of an era; the closure of the UK's last deep coal mine.)
1985The Conservative MP Ivar Lawrence made the longest speech of the 20th
century in the House of Commons. He spoke for 4 hours and 23 minutes on the
subject of the fluoridation of drinking water.
1987The British-owned cross-channel ferry the 'Herald of Free Enterprise'
left Zeebrugge, Belgium, with its bow doors open. The ferry capsized killing
193 passengers.
1988Three IRA terrorists were shot dead by SAS men in Gibraltar.
1992Thousands of computers around the world were infected with a computer
virus called Michelangelo. 6th March is the anniversary of Michelangelo's birth.
1996Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams warned the public that the IRA was prepared for another 25 years of war.
1997A £650,000 Picasso was stolen from a London art gallery. The thief escaped in a taxi.
1998With a break in tradition, it was decided that the Union Flag would be flown over Buckingham Palace when the monarch was not in residence, but would make way for the Royal Standard when she was there.
2015 Research from the University of Oxford estimated that the migrant population in England had increased by more than half a million in three years.