On This Day

19th June

1269 – King Louis IX of France ordered all Jews found in public without an identifying yellow badge to be fined ten livres of silver.

1306 – The Earl of Pembroke's army defeated Bruce's Scottish army at the Battle of Methven.

1865 – Over two years after the Emancipation Proclamation, slaves in Galveston, Texas, United States, were finally informed of their freedom. The anniversary is still officially celebrated in Texas and 13 other contiguous states as Juneteenth.

1961 – Kuwait declared independence from the United Kingdom.

1964 – The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was approved after surviving an 83-day filibuster in the United States Senate.

1970 - Edward Heath became prime minister after a surprise victory for the Conservatives in the general election.

1975 - An inquest jury decided Lord Lucan murdered the 29-year-old nanny of his three young children.

1978 – Garfield comic strip was first published. It has grown to over $1 billion in revenue, and is distributed to over 110 countries.

1978 - Cricketer Ian Botham became the first man in the history of the game to score a century and take eight wickets in one innings of a Test match.

1982 – The body of Roberto Calvi was found hanging beneath Blackfriars Bridge in London. More than a week after he went missing from Milan.

1987 – ETA committed one of its most violent attacks, in which a bomb was set off in a supermarket, Hipercor, killing 21 and injuring 45.

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