1212 – The most severe of several early fires of London began in Southwark and burned most of the city to the ground including Southwark Cathedral.

1460 – In England’s Wars of the Roses, the Yorkists (commanded by Richard Neville, the 16th Earl of Warwick) defeated the Lancastrians and captured Henry VI at the Battle of Northampton.

1553 – Lady Jane Grey, the 9 days Queen, took the throne of England until 19th July when she was succeeded by Mary I. She was later charged with high treason and executed in November of the same year.

1940 – World War II: The first in a long series of German bombing raids against Great Britain, as the Battle of Britain, which lasted three and a half months, began.

1947 – The Government announced that Princess Elizabeth (now Queen Elizabeth II) would get extra clothing coupons for her wedding dress.

1954 – Gordon Richards rode his last mount, at Sandown; the 21,834th of his almost 34-year racing career.

1958 – Britain’s first parking meters were installed, in Mayfair, London.

1972 – William Whitelaw, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, broke the news that he had been involved in secret talks with the provisional IRA in London, as he announced that the two week ceasefire in Northern Ireland had come to an end.

1985 – The Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior was blown up in Auckland harbour, New Zealand.

1996 – The battered bodies of Lin Russell, 6 year-old daughter Megan and 9 year old daughter Josie, were found half a mile from their home in Kent. Michael Stone, 38, was later found guilty of two counts of murder (of Lin and Megan) and one count of attempted murder (Josie) and given three life sentences. His original conviction was overturned on appeal but a second trial resulted in another verdict of guilty after another prisoner claimed that Stone had confessed to the killings while on remand in jail.

1996 – Nelson Mandela received eight honorary degrees at Buckingham Palace.

1997 – More than 100,000 people packed Hyde Park in London for a countryside rally to protest against Government proposals to ban fox hunting.

2000 – Figures released by the government showed that one in four British homes were using the Internet.

2011 – The last ever edition of the News Of The World. The newspaper was launched in 1843 and its closure came after a string of new allegations about the paper’s extent of phone hacking and corrupt payments made to police officers.