On this day: Linford Christie won gold in Barcelona

1560: Scotland’s parliament abolished papal jurisdiction and approved a Calvinistic Confession of Faith, founding Presbyterian Church of Scotland under the leadership of John Knox. 1714: George Louis of Brunswick-Lüneburg became King George I, the first Hanoverian king of Great Britian, following the death of Queen Anne. 1747: The Proscription Act was passed, banning the wearing of tartan and carrying weapons. Penalty for a first offence was six months’ jail and, for a second, seven years’ transportation. 1793: The kilogram was introduced in France as the first metric weight. 1798: Horatio Nelson destroyed French fleet off Aboukir (Battle of the Nile). 1831: New London Bridge, designed by John Rennie, was opened. It lasted 140 years, was then sold and rebuilt in Arizona. 1834: Slavery was abolished in the British Empire. 1870: The Irish Land Act gave rights to tenants of landlords in Ireland. 1907: The first Boy Scout camp opened on Brownsea Island, Dorset. 1914: German Emperor Willem II declared war on Russia and his nephew, Tsar Nicholas II. 1918: British troops entered Vladivostok. 1936: Adolf Hitler opened the 11th modern Olympic Games in Berlin, when the Olympic flame was carried from Greece for the first time. 1944: Anne Frank made her last diary entry. Three days later, she was arrested and transported to a Nazi concentration camp. 1945: The Japanese city of Toyama was destroyed by B-29s. 1953: Cuban rebel Fidel Castro, who had led an attack on the Moncada Army Barracks, was arrested. He was sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment but released after two years. 1963: Separate representation of the Scottish peerage in terms of Article XXII of the Treaty of Union by 16 of their members was abolished. 1967: University of Dundee, formerly University College, Dundee, incorporated in the University of St Andrews in 1890, became a separate university. 1968: Canada replaced silver with nickel in its coinage. 1972: Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward’s first article exposing the Watergate Scandal was published in the Washington Post. 1986: The Grateful Dead’s guitarist Jerry Garcia awoke from a coma after three weeks. 1987: Mike Tyson defeated Tony Tucker with a unanimous points decision to become the first Undisputed world Heavyweight Champion since 1978. 1987: The Maori Language Act came into force, making te reo Maori an official language of the country. 1989: Australia took a 3-0 lead over England to retain the Ashes. 1991: Croatia issued general mobilisation call as civil war with Serbia, which had claimed 100 lives in two days, turned into Europe’s most violent conflict since Second World War. 1992: Linford Christie won the 100 metres and oarsmen Steve Redgrave and Matthew Pinsent the coxless pairs at the Olympic Games in Barcelona. 2002: A ban on hunting with dogs came into force in Scotland. 2008: Eleven climbers and guides were swept to their deaths in a storm on 28,251ft Himalayan peak K2. 2013: Robert Mugabe won 142 of 210 seats to maintain power in Zimbabwe. BIRTHDAYS Fiona Hyslop, Cabinet secretary for culture, Europe and external affairs, 51; Coolio (born Artis Ivey), rapper, 52; Robert Cray, blues musician, 62; Chuck D, rapper, 55; Sam Mendes CBE, film director, 50; Professor Laurie Taylor, sociologist and broadcaster, 79; Graham Thorpe MBE, cricketer, 46; Honeysuckle Weeks, actress, 36; Joe Elliott, musician (Def Leppard), 56; David James MBE, TV football pundit and former goalkeeper, 45; Pat Heywood, Scottish actress, 84. ANNIVERSARIES Births: 10BC Claudius, Roman Emperor, and uncle of Caligula; 1545 Andrew Melville, reformer (nicknamed “The Blast”), principal of Glasgow University, and St Mary’s College, St Andrews; 1819 Herman Melville, author (Moby Dick); 1822 James Grant, Edinburgh-born novelist; 1930 Lionel Bart, composer and lyricist; 1933 Dom DeLuise, actor; 1936 Yves St Laurent, fashion designer; 1942 Jerry Garcia, musician. Deaths: 30BC Mark Antony, Roman politician and general; 1714 Queen Anne, the last Stuart sovereign; 1834 Robert Morrison, missionary who translated Bible into Chinese; 1903 Martha Jane Canary (“Calamity Jane”), American frontierswoman and scout; 1919 Oscar Hammerstein I, theatre impresario; 2005 King Fahd, ruler of Saudi Arabia 1982 to 2005; 2007 Tommy Makem, Irish folk singer and storyteller; 2009 Corazon Aquino, former president of the Philippines; 2014 Mike Smith, broadcaster.