April
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1 April – April Fool’s Day.
1 April 1918 – the Royal Air Force is founded in England. It’s first planes were the Sopwith Pup, Sopwith Camel, Bristol F2B fighters, and Royal Aircraft Factory’s SE5s, which were used during World War I.
1 April 1999 – Europe adopts the Euro as a common currency.
1 April 2012 – Aung San Suu Kyi wins a Burma by-election. Suu Kyi had been under house arrest for around 20 years following the military take-over of Burma in 1990.
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2 April 1926 – birth of Sir John Arthur ‘Jack’ Brabham AO OBE, Australian racing legend, 3 times Formula One world champion (1959, 1960, 1966). Died 19 May 2014.
2 April 1972 – Charlie Chaplin returns to the U.S. after 20 years of self-imposed exiled for ‘un-American’ activities. He had been accused during the McCarthy era of being a communist sympathiser.
2 April 1982 – Argentina invades the Falkland Islands, a British-controlled territory. The conflict escalates with Britain sending troops to expel Argentina. The conflict ends on 14 June 1982 when Britain regains control of the Islands.
2 April 2007 – Argentina restates its claim that the Falkland Islands belong to Argentina. Britain continues to oppose the claim.
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3 April 1973 – the world’s first mobile phone call is made from a Manhattan street corner, by Motorola’s Martin Cooper to his rival, Joel Engel from Bell.
3 April 1882 – death of Jesse James, U.S. outlaw. (Born 5 September 1847).
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4 April 1928 – birth of Maya Angelou (born Marguerite Ann Johnson), American author, poet and civil rights activist. Maya wrote seven autobiographies, three books of essays, and several books of poems. She had numerous occupations, including fry cook, dancer, actor, director and journalist. Her civil rights activism saw her work with Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. Died 28 May 2014.
4 April 1968 – assassination of Martin Luther King. American civil rights activist and clergyman. Born 15 January 1929.
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5 April 1839 – birth of Robert Smalls, African American who was born into slavery in Beaufort, South Carolina. When he was a teenager, his master sent him to Charleston to work. Smalls ended up working on boats and became adept at all manner of work around wharves and boats, including stevedore, rigger, sail maker and wheelman (essentially a pilot, although slaves were not granted that title). During the Civil War, he was asked to steer a lightly armed Confederate vessel, the CSS Planter. One evening, after the white crew members disembarked, Smalls dressed in the captain’s uniform and commandeered the vessel with the help of seven other slaves, sailing towards Union ships. On the way, he picked up his wife and child, as well as the families of the other slave crewman. As they neared the Union ships, Smalls flew a white bed-sheet from the mast as a symbol of surrender. Smalls was treated as a hero by the Union. He later successfully petitioned President Abraham Lincoln and Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton, to allow black men to fight for the Union. Stanton signed an order allowing 5,000 black men to enlist with Union forces. Smalls was made pilot of the USS Keokuk. After the Civil War, Smalls returned to Beaufort and bought his former master’s house. Smalls became a businessman, operating a store for freed men. He also became politically active, joining the Republican Party. In 1868 Smalls was elected to the State House of Representatives. He worked on passing the Civil Rights Bill and in 1868, the Republican government enacted the Civil Rights Act, which gave citizenship to all Americans, regardless of race. Smalls was elected to the United States House of Representatives in 1874, and served two terms.In 1912, Smalls famously described the Republican Party as, ‘the party of Lincoln … which unshackled the necks of four million human beings‘. In 1913, Smalls stopped a lynch mob from lynching two black men, after he warned their mayor that blacks he’d sent through the city would burn the town down if the mob wasn’t stopped. The mayor and sheriff stopped the mob. Smalls inspirational life went from slave, to hijacker, to defector, to politician and civil rights campaigner. Died 23 February 1915.
5 April 1994 – death of Kurt Cobain. Lead singer, guitarist and lyricist for Nirvana. He was 27. Born 20 February 1967. The exact date of his death is unknown as his body wasn’t discovered until 8 April 1994.
5 April 1997 – death of Allen Ginsberg, leading American beat-generation writer and poet. Born 3 June 1926.
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6 April 1895 – The Australian ballad, ‘Waltzing Matilda‘ is performed at the North Gregory Hotel, Winton (central-west Queensland). This is believed to be the first time the song was performed in public.
6 April 1896 – The Olympic Games recommences in Athens 1,501 years after being banned by Emperor Theodosius I in 393AD.
6 April 1909 – Robert E. Peary and Matthew A. Henson become the first men to reach the North Pole. Their claim is in dispute because of navigation techniques and lack of independent verification.
6 April 2006 – the National Geographic Society reveals the discovery of a papyrus codex in a cave near El Minya, Egypt, which it claims is the Gospel of Judas Iscariot. The codex is yet to be verified as written by Judas.
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7 April 1933 – beer available again in 19 U.S. states since it had been banned on 16 January 1920.
7 April 1947 – death of Henry Ford, American industrialist and car maker. Born 30 July 1863.
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8 April 1947 – birth of Larry Norman, pioneering Christian rock musician. Died 24 February 2008.
8 April 1861 – death of Elisha Graves Otis, American industrialist and founder of the Otis Elevator Company. In 1854, he put the finishing touches to his signature invention: a safety device to prevent elevators falling if the cable fails.
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9 April 1413 – Henry V crowned King of England.
9 April 1682 – Robert Cavelier de la Salle discovers the mouth of the Mississippi River. He names it Louisiana and claims it in the name of France.
9 April 1865 – Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrenders his 28,000 troops to Union General Ulysses S. Grant, effectively ending the Civil War.
9 April 1867 – United States Senate ratifies by one vote, a treaty with Russia for the purchase of Alaska.
9 April 1937 – the first Japanese-made aircraft to fly to Europe lands at Croydon Airport, London. It’s name is the Kamikaze.
9 April 1945 – execution of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, German pastor, theologian and anti-Nazi dissident. He was executed at Flossenburg Concentration Camp two weeks before the camp was liberated by US soldiers. Born 4 February 1904.
9 April 1948 – around 120 fighters from the Zionist paramilitary groups Irgun and Lehi attacked Deir Yassin near Jerusalem, a Palestinian Arab village of roughly 600 people. The assault occurred as Jewish militia sought to retaliate against the blockade of Jerusalem by Palestinian Arab forces during the civil war that preceded the end of British rule in Palestine. The Palestinians tried to resist the attack, but the village fell after fierce house-to-house fighting. 107 Palestinians were murdered during and after the battle for the village, including women and children—some were shot, while others died when hand grenades were thrown into their homes. Several villagers were taken prisoner and may have been killed after being paraded through the streets of West Jerusalem. Four of the attackers were killed, with around 35 injured. The killings were condemned by the leadership of the Haganah—the Jewish community’s main paramilitary force—and by the area’s two chief rabbis. The Jewish Agency for Israel sent Jordan’s King Abdullah a letter of apology, which he rebuffed. Abdullah held the Jewish Agency responsible for the massacre, because they were the head of Jewish affairs in Palestine. He warned about “terrible consequences” if more incidents like that occurred. The deaths became a pivotal event in the Arab–Israeli conflict for their demographic and military consequences. The narrative was embellished and used by various parties to attack each other—by Palestinians against Israeli forces; by the Haganah to hide their complicity in the affair; and by the Israeli left to accuse the Irgun and Lehi of violating the Jewish principle of purity of arms, thus exposing Israel’s behaviour to the world. News of the killings sparked terror among Palestinians, encouraging them to flee from their towns and villages in the face of Jewish troop advances, and it strengthened the resolve of Arab governments to intervene, which they did five weeks later. (Wikipedia.org)
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10 April 1815 – Indonesia’s Mount Tambora volcano begins a three month long eruption that lasted until 15 July 1815. It killed 71,000 people and affected the world’s climate for the next two years.
10 April 1912 – the ill-fated Titanic departs the port in Southampton, England bound for New York. On 14 April 1912, she hit an ice-berg and sank, killing more than 1,500 people.
10 April 1919 – death of Emiliano Zapata Salazar, Mexican revolutionary. Born 8 August 1879.
10 April 1979 – birth of Rachel Corrie, American peace activist. She was killed on 16 May 2003 when run over by an Israeli bulldozer that she was trying to stop from demolishing a Palestinian house in Gaza. Rachel was committed from an early age to human rights and caring for the poor as shown in this speech she gave in the fifth grade: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDq32EgMxb8
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11 April 1979 – Ugandan President Idi Amin (Dada) is ousted when Tanzanian rebels sieze power. Amin flees to Libya and eventually settles in Saudi Arabia. Amin had been responsible for ethnic cleansing, killing an estimated 80,000 to 300,000 people.
11 April 1981 – Riots in Brixton, South London commence following the arrest of a black man. On a day known as ‘Black Saturday’, up to 5,000 youths confront police and run riot through the streets, looting, throwing petrol bombs, burning hundreds of cars and buildings, and injuring hundreds of people. Police arrested 82 people.
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12 April 1961 – Uri Gagarin (Russian) becomes the first man in space.
12 April 1989 – death of Sugar Ray Robinson (Walker Smith Jr), American welterweight and middleweight professional boxing champion, declared to be the greatest boxer of all time. Sugar Ray stood at 5′ 11″ (1.80m). He fought 200 fights, winning 173 (108 by knock-out), lost 19, drew six, with two no contests. By 1946 Sugar Ray had won 40 fights straight, but was denied a shot at the world welterweight championship because he refused to cooperate with the mafia, which controlled much of boxing. In December 1946, he was finally allowed to contest the world championship and won. In 1947 Sugar Ray defended his welterweight title against Jimmy Doyle. In the eighth round, Doyle was knocked out and died later that night. Sugar Ray crossed weight classes and also won the world middleweight championship. In 1950, he broke the record for the shortest fight by knocking out Jose Basora 50 seconds into the first round. The record wasn’t broken for a further 38 years. in 1951, he fought Jake La Motta in what became known as the St Valentine’s Day massacre after the fight was stopped in the 13th round when La Motta was out on his feet, unable to even lift his arms throw a punch. That fight and some of the other matches with La Motta were adapted for the Martin Scorsese movie, Raging Bull. Born 3 May 1921.
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13 April 1570 – birth of Guy Fawkes, English soldier and one of the masterminds behind the failed ‘Gunpowder Plot’ to blow up English Parliament in an effort to assassinate King James 1 and VI of Scotland. Died 31 January 1606.
13 April 1919 – Jallianwala Bagh massacre (also known as the Amritsar massacre), when troops of the British Indian Army opened fire on civilians who had congregated in defiance of an order given by Colonel Reginald Dyer. The crowd had gathered to protest the arrest and deportation of of two national leaders, Satya Pal and Saifuddin Kitchlew. The congregation is considered to be the beginning of Indian nationalism. Official British Indian sources gave a figure of 379 identified dead, with approximately 1,100 wounded. The casualty number estimated by the Indian National Congress was more than 1,500 injured, with approximately 1,000 dead. This “brutality stunned the entire nation”, resulting in a “wrenching loss of faith” of the general public in the intentions of the UK. The ineffective inquiry and the initial accolades for Dyer by the House of Lords fuelled widespread anger, leading to the Non-cooperation Movement of 1920–22.
13 April 1923 – birth of Don Adams, American actor, most famous for his character Maxwell Smart (Agent 86) in the TV show ‘Get Smart’. Died 25 September 2005.
13 April 1947 – birth of Mike Chapman, Australian songwriter and record producer. Hailing from Nambour, Queensland, Chapman became one of the most influential record producers in Britain when he teamed with Nicky Chinn, with hits for Sweet, Smokie, Suzi Quatro, Mud, Racey and others, including Bow Wow Wow, Pat Benatar, Huey Lewis, Toni Basil. He also produced albums for the Knack and Blondie.
13 April 1975 – The 15 year long Lebanese Civil War starts when Christian Phalangists attack a bus, massacring 26 members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
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14 April 1865 – President Abraham Lincoln is shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theater, Washington DC. Lincoln died the following day.
14 April 1912 – the RMS Titanic strikes an ice-berg just before midnight in the north Atlantic ocean as it sailed on its maiden voyage from Southampton UK to New York City USA , resulting in the deaths of 1,502 of the 3,372 people onboard.
14 April 1988 – Soviet Union begins withdrawing troops from Afghanistan after nine years of occupation.
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15 April 1452 – birth of Leonardo Da Vinci, Italian renaissance inventor, painter, sculptor, mathematician, writer. Died 2 May 1519.
15 April 1865 – Death of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln after being shot the day before. Born 12 February 1809.
15 April 1912 – RMS Titanic sinks after hitting an iceberg on her maiden voyage from Southampton UK to New York City, USA, costing the lives of 1,502 people out of the 2,224 crew and passengers who were on board. The White Star Line, who owned the Titanic, had declared her unsinkable.
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16 April – Panda Appreciation Day. It was on this day in 1972, that the People’s Republic of China presented US President Richard Nixon with two pandas, Ling Ling and Hsing Hsing.
16 April 73AD – The Great Jewish Revolt ends when the fortress Masada falls to the Romans.
16 April 1850 – death of Marie Tussaud, French-English sculptor, founder of Madam Tussaud’s wax museum. Born 1 December 1761.
16 April 1917 – Vladimir Lenin returns to Petrograd, Russia following exile in Switzerland.
16 April 1947 – Bernard Baruch coins the term ‘Cold War’ to describe the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union.
16 April 1990 – Dr Jack Kevorkian, (euthanasia activist, otherwise known as the Doctor of Death) participates in his first assisted suicide.
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17 April 1521 – Martin Luther appears before the Diet of Worms to be questioned by representatives of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, over the alleged possession of heretical books. (Worms is a town in Germany and Diet is a formal assembly).
17 April 1961 – the U.S. government sponsor 1,500 Cuban exiles to invade the Bay of Pigs, Cuba in an effort to overthrow the socialist government of Fidel Castro. The attacks fails, resulting in the deaths or capture of all of the exiles.
17 April 1967 – the final episode of the sit-com, Gilligan’s Island, airs in the United States. The first episode aired on 26 September 1964. It told the story of four men and three women on board the S.S. Minnow are ship-wrecked on a deserted island in the Pacific Ocean following a storm. Stranded are the ship’s mate, Gilligan and the ship’s skipper, a millionaire and his wife (the Howells), a sultry movie star (Ginger Grant), a professor and farm girl (Mary-Anne Summers).
17 April 1969 – Sirhan Sirhan convicted of 1968 assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy. He was originally given a death sentence, which was later commuted to life imprisonment. Robert Kennedy was the brother of assassinated President John F. Kennedy.
17 April 2010 – A Manhattan library reveals that first President George Washington failed to return two library books, accruing overdue fees of $300,000. The library said they weren’t pursuing payment of the fees.
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18 April – World Heritage Day, more formerly known as ‘International Monuments and Sites’ Day as declared by UNESCO. A day for raising awareness of monuments and sites throughout the world that are of world heritage significance.
18 April 1839 – birthday of Henry Kendall, Australian poet. Died 1 August 1882.
18 April 1897 – The Greco-Turkish War is declared between Greece and the Ottoman Empire.
18 April 1955 – death of Albert Einstein, German-born theoretical physicist. He developed the theory of relativity and of course his mass-energy equivalence formula, E=mc2 (energy = mass x speed of light squared). Born 14 March 1879.
18 April 1983 – a suicide bomber detonated a car bomb that destroyed the United States Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 63 people, 17 of whom were American. Most of the victims were CIA and embassy staff, a number of soldiers and a Marine. Pro-Iranian group, Islamic Jihad Organization, claimed responsibility. However, it’s believed the attack was undertaken by Lebanese group, Hezbollah, in response to the intervention of a multinational force, comprised of western nations, in the Lebanese Civil War.
18 April 1996 – At least 106 civilians are killed in Lebanon when Israel shells a United Nations refugee compound at Quana where more than 800 Palestinians and Lebanese were sheltered. Israel claimed it was an accident and that they were trying to hit a nearby Hezbollah position that had fired at them. Hezbollah claimed they had fired because Israel breached the security zone in order to lay land-mines. Both the UN and Amnesty International investigated and found that Israel had deliberately attacked the refugee camp; a claim that Israel denies. Human Rights Watch found that Israel’s use of high-explosive shells and anti-personnel shells were designed to maximise casualities and their use so close to a civilian area, breached international humanitarian law.
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19 April 1987 – The Simpsons is first aired on television in the United States.
19 April 1993 – 70 members of the cult Branch Davidian sect, led by David Koresh, perish following a fire at their Waco compound. It is believed they lit the fire deliberately as federal agents stormed the compound following a siege that began in February 1993.
19 April 1995 – Terrorist Timothy McVeigh detonates a bomb in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, including 19 children, and injuring 680 people. McVeigh was executed by lethal injection on 11 June 2001.
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20 April 1889 – birth of Adolf Hitler in Austria. Austrian-German politician. German Chancellor from 2 August 1934 – 30 April 1945. Genocidal megalomaniac. Died 30 April 1945.
20 April 1908 – first day of competition in the New South Wales Rugby League.
20 April 1912 – death of Bram Stoker, Irish novellist, author of ‘Dracula’. Born 8 November 1847.
20 April 1914 – Ludlow Massacre:The Ludlow Massacre was an attack by the Colorado National Guard and Colorado Fuel and Iron Company guards on a tent colony of 1,200 coal miners and their families at Ludlow, Colorado, on April 20, 1914. About two dozen people, including miners’ wives and children, were killed. The chief owner of the mine, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., was widely criticized for the incident. The massacre, the seminal event in the Colorado Coal Wars resulted in the deaths of 25. The deaths occurred after a daylong fight between militia and camp guards against striking workers. Ludlow was the deadliest single incident in the southern Colorado Coal Strike, which lasted from September 1913 through December 1914. The strike was organized by the miners against coal mining companies in Colorado. In retaliation for Ludlow, the miners armed themselves and attacked dozens of antiunion establishments over the next ten days, destroying property and engaging in several skirmishes with the Colorado National Guard along a 40-mile front from Trinidad to Walsenburg. The entire strike would cost between 69 and 199 lives.
20 April 1918 – German flying ace, Manfred Von Richthoffen (the Red Baron), shoots down his 79th and 80th victims. The following day he was fatally wounded while pursuing a Sopwith Camel. Before yielding to his injuries, Richthoffen landed his plane in an area controlled by the Australian Imperial Force. Richthoffen died moments after allied troops reached him. Witnesses claim his last word was ‘kaputt’, which means broken, ruined, done-in or wasted.
20 April 1939 – Billie Holiday records the first civil rights song, ‘Strange Fruit’.
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21 April 753BC – Romulus founds Rome.
21 April 1782 – the city of Rattanaskosin is founded by King Buddha Yodfa Chulaloke. The city is now known as Bangkok.
21 April 1910 – death of Mark Twain, U.S. novellist, author of ‘The Adventures of Tom Sawyer’ and ‘The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’. Born 30 November 1835.
21 April 1947 – birth of Iggy Pop, punk, garage & glam rocker, actor.
21 April 1970 – Prince Leonard (born Leonard Casley), self-appointed sovereign secedes the Hutt River Province from Australia. Now known as the Principality of Hutt River, it is located 517km north of Perth, Western Australia and is the oldest micronation in Australia. Its sovereignty is not recognised by Australia or other nations. On 2 December 1977, Prince Leonard declared war on Australia after the Australian Tax Office pursued him for non-payment of taxes. Hostilities were ceased a few days later and Prince Leonard wrote to the Governor-General declaring his sovereignty based on the Province being undefeated in war. In 2012, the ATO again unsuccessfully attempted to recover claimed taxes. Hutt River has its own stamps and currency.
21 April 1972 – The Province of Hutt River attains legal status when Australia fails to challenge its sovereignty within two years of its formation, as required by Australian law.
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22 April – Earth Day. The United Nations created International Mother Earth Day by resolution A/RES/63/278 to be celebrated on 22 April each year. It recognises that ‘the Earth and its ecosystems are our home‘ and that ‘it is necessary to promote harmony with nature and Earth‘.
22 April 1616 – death of Miguel de Cervantes, Spanish novelist, authored Don Quixote, a classic of Western literature and which is considered to be the first modern European novel. Cervantes is considered to be the greatest writer in the Spanish language and the world’s pre-eminent novelist. Born 29 September 1547.
22 April 1870 – birth of Vladimir Lenin. Russian communist revolutionary and political leader. He served as Russian leader from 1917 to 1924 and concurrently as Premier of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1924. Died 21 January 1924.
22 April 1889 – at high noon, thousands rush to claim land in the ‘Land Run of 1889’ resulting in the creation of Oklahoma City and Guthrie with populations greater than 10,000 within a few hours.
22 April 1917 – birth of Sidney Nolan, one of Australia’s leading artists, best known for his series of Ned Kelly paintings. During the 2000 Olympics, performers wore costumes based on Nolan’s depiction of Ned Kelly. Nolan painted a number of Australian legends and historical events, including the Eureka Stockade, and explorers Burke and Wills. Nolan was influenced by Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse. Died 28 November 1992.
22 April 1979 – birth of Daniel Johns, Australian musician, singer-songwriter. Played in Silverchair and The Dissociatives.
22 April 1995 – death of Maggie Kuhn, activist and founder of the Gray Panthers, who campaigned for nursing home reform and opposed ageism. She also fought for human rights, social and economic justice, global peace, integration, and mental health issues. Born 3 August 1905.
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23 April 1564 – birth of William Shakespeare, the Bard. English poet and playwright.
23 April 1616 – death of William Shakespeare, the Bard. English poet and playwright. Shakespeare invented more than 1700 words which are now in common use. He changed nouns into verbs, verbs into adjectives and joining words that normally wouldn’t be joined.
23 April 1928 – birth of Shirley Temple, American actress, singer, dancer and former U.S. ambassador to Ghana and Czechoslovakia. Died 10 February 2014.
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24 April 1581 – birth of St Vincent de Paul, Catholic priest, born in France, who dedicated himself to serving the poor. Died 27 September 1660.
24 April 1915 – arrest of 250 Armenian intellectuals and leaders in Istanbul, Turkey, leads to the Armenian Genocide. It is estimated that the Ottoman Empire massacred between 1 million and 1.5 million Armenians.
24 April 1916 – Easter Rising (or Easter Rebellion) in which Irish republicans rose up against British rule with an armed insurrection in order to establish an independent Irish Republic. The Rising lasted for six days and resulted in the deaths of 500 people, of whom 54% were civilians, 30% were British military and 16% were Irish rebels. Most of the civilians deaths were caused by the British military using artillery or mistaking them for rebels. Fighting occurred mainly in Dublin, although there were also fights in counties Meath, Galway, Louth and Wexford. The rebels surrendered after six days. Most of their leaders were subsequently tried and executed. 3,430 men and 79 women were arrested. 90 were sentenced to death, however 15 were actually executed. The evidence against many of them was flimsy at best and with many them prohibited from defending their charges, accusations were made that the trials and sentences were illegal. There were also claims of British atrocities involving extrajudicial killings during the Rising. The executions and extrajudicial killings further fed the anger of the Irish against British rule.
24 April 1933 – Hitler begins persecuting Jehovah’s Witnesses by shutting down the Watch Tower Society office in Magdeburg. Around 10,000 Witnesses were incarcerated during Hitler’s reign, with approximately 1,200 dying in custody, including 250 who were executed.
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25 April – Anzac Day. National day of remembrance for Australia and New Zealand to commemorate ANZACs who fought at Gallipoli during World War I, honouring all service-men and women who served their country.
25 April – World Penguin Day.
25 April 1915 – World War I: the battle of Gallipoli begins, when Australian, New Zealand, British and French forces invade Turkey’s Gallipoli Peninsula, landing at Cape Helles, and what is now called Anzac Cove. The attack followed a failed British attempt on 18 March 1915 to seize Constantinople by sailing a fleet into the Dardenelle Straits. The Turks laid naval mines and sank three British ships. The Gallipoli Campaign resulted in the deaths of 56,643 Turks, 56,707 allies, which included 34,072 from Britain, 9,798 from France, 8,709 from Australia, 2,721 from New Zealand, 1,358 from British India, 49 from Newfoundland. More than 107,000 Turks and 123,000 allies were injured. The Gallipoli Campaign is seen as a defining moment in the national histories of both Australia and Turkey.
25 April 1918 – Australian troops victorious over the Germans in the town of Villers-Bretonneux on the Western Front. The town had been occupied by the British, however, on 18 April 1918, Germany used mustard gas outside the town. On 21 April, an aerial dog-fight between British & German planes ensued, with the infamous Red Baron (Manfred von Richthofen) being shot down and killed (rumour has it that his last words were ‘kaputt’). On 24 April, Germany over-ran the British by attacking with tanks. This was the first use of German tanks during the war. The British counter-attacked with their tanks, providing the first tank versus tank battle of the war. However, most of the British troops were untrained boys aged 18 and 19 years old who had not even fired a shot . The Germans quickly won the battle and took 2400 prisoners. At 2200 hours on 25 August 1918, Australian troops counter-attacked in a pincer-movement, with General H.E. Elliot leading an attack from the north and General T.W. Glasgow leading an attack from the south. By dawn on 26 April, British and Australian troops occupied Villers-Bretonneux. The victory was completed on 27 April when Australians established a line outside of the town. Significant losses were sustained in the battle, with Germany losing around 10,400 lives, Britain losing 9,529 lives, France losing 3,470 lives and Australia losing 2,473. It is arguably one of the single most significant victories by Australian troops during World War I, although there were others along the Western Front, including the 4 July victory at Le Hamel under the leadership of General John Monash. In 2018, the Australian Government opened The Sir John Monash memorial centre at Villers-Bretonneux as the central hub of the existing Australian Remembrance Trail along the Western Front.
25 April 1983 – American schoolgirl, Samantha Smith, is invited to the Soviet Union after its leader, Yuri Andropov, reads her letter expressing her fears of nuclear war.
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26 April 121AD – birth of Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor. Died 17 March 180AD.
26 April 1865 – Union troopers corner and shoot dead John Wilkes Booth, the man who fired the fatal bullet on 14 April 1865 that assassinated President Abraham Lincoln.
26 April 1894 – birth of Rudolf Hess. Prominent Nazi politician who served as Deputy Fuhrer under Adolf Hitler. In 1941, Hess flew solo to Scotland in an effort to negotiate peace after being ignored by Hitler in various plans associated with the war. The flight was not sanctioned by Hitler. Hess was taken prisoner and charged with crimes against peace. He served a life sentence and remained in prison until his death. Died 17 August 1987.
26 April 1945 – birth of Dick Johnson, Australian racing car legend. Five-time Australian Touring Car Champion, three-time winner of the Bathurst 1000, inducted into the V8 Supercar Hall of Fame in 2001.
26 April 1986 – the Chernobyl nuclear disaster when an explosion and fire at the No 4 reactor in the Chernobyl nuclear plant, Ukraine, releases radioactive gas across Northern Europe. It is estimated to have killed up to 1 million people from radioactive related cancers.
26 April 1989 – the deadliest tornado in world history strikes Central Bangladesh, killing more than 1300, injuring 12,000 and leaving up to 80,000 homeless.
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27 April 1904 – The Australian Labor Party wins the federal election, making Chris Watson Australia’s third prime minister. The ALP was the first such labour party in the world to win a national election.
27 April 1950 – apartheid formally commences in South Africa with the implementation of the Group Areas Act that segrated races.
27 April 1951 – birth of Paul Daniel ‘Ace’ Frehley, former lead guitarist with Kiss. Frehley’s character with the band was the ‘Spaceman’. He has since launched a solo career and formed a band called Frehley’s Comet.
27 April 1953 – President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs Executive Order 10450 ‘Hiring and Firing Rules for Government Employment’. The order declared homosexuality, communism and moral perversion to be national security threats and grounds for sacking a government employee or not hiring an applicant.
27 April 1994 – South Africa’s first democratic election in which citizens of all races could vote. The interim constitution is enacted. The African National Congress won the election with 62% of the vote, bringing Nelson Mandela to power. 27 April is celebrated as Freedom Day in South Africa.
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28 April 1789 – Mutiny on the ‘Bounty’. Lieutenant Bligh and 18 of his crew from the Royal Navy ship HMS Bounty, are set afloat in an open boat following a mutiny led by Christian Fletcher. After 47 days Bligh landed the boat on Timor, in the Dutch East Indies. The mutineers settled on Pitcairn Island and in Tahiti. In 1856, the British Government granted Norfolk Island to the Pitcairners because population growth had outgrown the small island.
28 April 1926 – birth of Harper Lee, American author. Harper wrote the iconic ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’, which detailed the racism that she witnessed as she grew up in her hometown of Monroeville, Alabama. Died 19 February 2016.
28 April 1945 – Italians execute former dictator Benito Mussolini and his mistress, Clara Petacci.
28 April 1996 – Port Arthur massacre in Tasmania, when Martin Bryant shoots 35 people dead. He is currently serving a life sentence for the murders.
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29 April 711 – Islamic conquest of Hispania as Moorish forces led by Tariq ibn-Ziyad land on Gibraltar in preparation for the invasion of Spain.
29 April 1770 – Captain James Cook names Botany Bay after landing there on this day.
29 April 1910 – British Parliament passes ‘The People’s Budget’, the first budget in British history that is aimed at redistributing wealth to all.
29 April 1945 – the Dacchau concentration camp near Munich is liberated by US forces.
29 April 1967 – Muhammad Ali stripped of his boxing title after refusing, on religious grounds, being drafted into the Army.
29 April 1980 – death of Alfred Hitchcock, English movie producer and director. Born 13 August 1899.
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30 April – International Jazz Day.
30 April – Walpurgis Night (also called Hexennacht – which translates as Witches Night), held on the eve of St Walpurga’s Feast Day. In Germany it’s reputedly the night when witches celebrate the coming of the Spring (which occurs on 1 May) on the Brocken (the highest peak in Northern Germany). Heavy metal band, Black Sabbath, originally named one of their songs Walpurgis, but were told by their record company that it wasn’t acceptable because of the connation with Satanism, so the song was renamed War Pigs, although the lyrics remained the same. Sabbath’s bassist, Geezer Butler said of the song, ‘Walpurgis is sort of like Christmas for Satanists. And to me, war was the big Satan. It wasn’t about politics or government or anything. It was [about] evil. So I was saying ‘generals gathered in the masses / just like witches at black masses’ to make an analogy‘.
30 April 1945 – German Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler and his wife, Eva Braun, commit suicide in a bunker in Germany. Hitler had been Chancellor of Germany since 2 August 1934. He was born in Austria on 20 April 1889.
30 April 1975 – the Fall of Saigon and the end of the Vietnamese civil war, when North Vietnamese tanks rumbled into Saigon, then the capital of South Vietnam, defeating the South Vietnamese army, United States military and her allies. The Fall was preceded by the largest helicopter evacuation in history, known as Operation Frequent Wind, in which 7,000 American military and civilians were evacuated. Weeks earlier, Operation Baby Lift had evacuated 2,000 orphan babies. Operation New Life evacuated 110,000 Vietnamese refugees. Tens of thousands of Vietnamese evacuated by land and sea. Following the communist take-over, hundreds of thousands of South Vietnamese fled the country, resulting in a surge of refugees worldwide. 30 April and 1 May are celebrated in Vietnam as Liberation Day or Reunification Day. Those who fled refer to it as Black April.