Events: In 1819 the Peterloo massacre took place at St Peter’s Field, Manchester; in 1896 the discovery of gold in Rabbit Creek, Yukon, sparked the Gold Rush; in 1921 The Times exposed as a forgery the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion", which had purported to be a manifesto outlining a Jewish conspiracy for world domination; in 1960 Cyprus became an independent republic .

Births: Ralph Thoresby, antiquary, born in Leeds, 1658; Catherine Cockburn, dramatist, born in London, 1679; Carolina Oliphant (Lady Nairne), songwriter, born in Gask, Perthshire, 1766; Arthur Cayley, mathematician, born in Richmond, Surrey, 1821; Jules Laforgue, French poet, born in Montevideo, Uruguay, 1860; T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia), British adventurer, writer, archaeologist and soldier, born in Tremadoc, Caernarvonshire, 1888; Dame Mary Gilmore, Australian poet, born near Goulburn, New South Wales, 1865; Georgette Heyer, historical novelist, born in Wimbledon, Surrey, 1902 .

Deaths: Thomas Fuller, scholar, died in London, 1661; Jakob Bernoulli, mathematician, died in Basel, Switzerland, 1705; Ramakrishna, Hindu religious leader, teacher and writer, died in Calcutta, India, 1886; Jean-Martin Charcot, neurologist, died in Morvan, France, 1893; Robert Bunsen, German chemist, died in Heidelberg, 1899; Umberto Boccioni, Italian painter and sculptor, died in Verona, 1916; Sir Joseph Norman Lockyer, astronomer, died in Salcombe Regis, Devon, 1920; "Babe" Ruth, baseball player, died in New York, 1948; Margaret Mitchell, author of Gone With The Wind, died in Atlanta, Georgia, 1949; Douglas Hogg (1st Viscount Hailsham), Lord Chancellor 1928-29 and 1935-38, died in Sussex, 1950; Louis Jouvet, actor, died in Paris, 1951; Irving Langmuir, chemist and Nobel laureate 1932, died in Falmouth, Massachusetts, 1957; Wanda Landowska, Polish-born French harpsichordist and pianist, died in Lakeville, Connecticut, 1959; Selman Waksman, Ukrainian-born biochemist, discoverer of streptomycin and Nobel laureate 1952, died in Hyannis, Massachusetts, 1973; Elvis Presley, "king of rock’n’roll", died in Memphis, Tennessee, 1977; John George Diefenbaker, Prime Minister of Canada 1957-63, died in Ottawa, Ontario, 1979.