1066: Edward the Confessor, England's most pious King, died.

1787: John Burke, genealogist and founder of Burke's Peerage, was born in Tipperary, Ireland.

1797: The world's first top hat was worn. James Hetheringtonn was arrested and fined £50 for wearing a tall, shiny structure calculated to frighten people.

1884: Gilbert and Sullivan's Princess Ida was premiered at the Savoy Theatre.

1896: German physicist Wilhelm Rontgen gave the first demonstration of X-rays.

1919: The Nazi Party was founded by Anton Drexler in Munich.

1941: Amy Johnson, English aviator and first woman to fly solo from England to Australia in 1930, drowned in a mysterious accident over the Thames estuary.

1948: Mrs Dale first opened her radio diary. She was noted for always being "rather worried" about her doctor husband, Jim.

1971: One-day international cricket was born when 46,000 spectators watched England play Australia at Melbourne. The scheduled Test match had been aborted by rain.

1981: The hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper, who killed 13 women over four years, ended when lorry-driver Peter Sutcliffe was charged with murder.

1991: Thirteen people died as 100mph winds battered the British Isles and power cuts crippled the country.

ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR: PM Tony Blair was condemned by Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu for his "mind-boggling" support for the United States over war in Iraq.