1607: John Harvard, founder of Harvard University, was born in London.

1703: The first Eddystone Lighthouse was swept away in the Great Storm. More than 8,000 died across the country.

1864: Charles Dodgson presented a little girl called Alice Liddle with a story she had inspired him to write. It was called Alice In Wonderland and the Oxford professor adopted the pen-name of Lewis Carroll.

1867: Mrs Lily Maxwell of Manchester cast her vote in a parliamentary election. She had been placed on the electoral register in error and had to be escorted by a bodyguard to protect her from opponents to women's suffrage.

1922: Howard Carter and the Earl of Carnarvon became the first men to see inside the tomb of the Pharaoh Tutankhamun near Luxor since it was sealed 3,000 years before.

1942: The Soviet forces counter-attacked at Stalingrad, ending the German siege and forcing General von Paulus's Sixth Army to retreat.

1966: The world's first tidal power station was opened by General de Gaulle on the Rance estuary near St Malo in Brittany.

1968: Rock group Cream - Eric Clapton, (pictured) Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker - played their farewell concert at the Royal Albert Hall.

1970: The first year of Edward Heath's government was marked by the most working days lost by strikes since 1926, the year of the General Strike - 8.8 million.

1983: Gold bars worth £25 million were stolen from the Brink's-Mat security warehouse at Heathrow Airport.

ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR: The director general of the Prison Service begged judges to think hard before sending women to prison as figures showed a huge rise in the number of female inmates.

BIRTHDAYS: Tina Turner, rock singer, 64; John McVie, rock musician, 57; Des Walker, footballer, 37; Garcelle Beauvais, actress, 36; Tammy Lynn Michaels, actress, 28.