British politician Stephen Timms survived a murder attempt by an Islamic extremist during a constituency surgery.
14 May 1057
A Thursday in history
Weekday
Thursday
Season
Spring (N. Hemisphere)
Century
11th century
Records
349
2010
2008On the day of the UEFA Cup Final, violence erupted between football hooligan supporters of both teams and the Greater Manchester Police, resulting in 39 arrests and 39 injured officers.
1980Salvadoran Civil War: Refugees trying to flee El Salvador across the Sumpul River to Honduras were attacked by both Salvadoran and Honduran forces, resulting in at least 300 deaths.
1955Cold War: Eight Eastern Bloc countries signed a mutual defense treaty to establish the Warsaw Pact.
1951Trains ran on the Talyllyn Railway in Wales for the first time since its preservation, making it the first railway in the world to be operated by volunteers.
1943Second World War: Australian Hospital Ship Centaur was attacked and sunk by a Japanese submarine off the coast of Queensland, killing 268 people aboard.
1940World War II: The bulk of Dutch forces surrendered to the German Wehrmacht, ending the Battle of the Netherlands.
1939In Lima, Peru, Lina Medina became the youngest confirmed mother in history, giving birth at the age of five years, seven months and twenty-one days.
- 1931
Five people were killed in Ådalen, Sweden, as soldiers opened fire on an unarmed trade union demonstration.
- 1919
Sir Harry Hands, the mayor of Cape Town, performed the first public observance of a two-minute silence in remembrance of those killed in World War I.
1878The last witchcraft trial in the United States opened in Salem, Massachusetts.
1868Boshin War: Troops of the Tokugawa shogunate withdrew from the Battle of Utsunomiya Castle and retreated north towards Nikkō and Aizu.
1863American Civil War: Union troops captured Jackson, the capital of Mississippi.
- 1857
Mindon Min was crowned as King of Burma.
1856Major Henry C. Wayne arrived in Indianola, Texas, with 34 camels to form the short-lived United States Camel Corps.
1804Led by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, the Corps of Discovery left Camp Dubois near present-day Hartford, Illinois, to begin the first overland expedition to the West Coast of the United States and back.
1509War of the League of Cambrai: French forces defeated the Venetians at the Battle of Agnadello in present-day Northern Italy.
1264Second Barons' War: King Henry III was defeated at the Battle of Lewes and forced to sign the Mise of Lewes, making Simon de Montfort the de facto ruler of England.
Photo archive
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What was life like?
Prices, jobs, food, music and everyday routine — the world as it felt to live in.
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