1939: Bismarck launched
On this day, the German navy launches the 823-foot battleship Bismarck at Hamburg. Adolf Hitler hoped that the state of the art Bismarck would herald the rebirth of the German surface battle fleet. However, after the outbreak of war Britain closely guarded ocean routes from Germany to the Atlantic Ocean, and only U-boats moved freely through the war zone. In May 1941, the order was given for the Bismarck to break out into the Atlantic. Once in the safety of the open ocean, the battleship would be almost impossible to track down; all the while wreaking havoc on Allied convoys to Britain.
Learning of its movement, Britain sent almost the entire British home fleet in pursuit. On May 24, the British battle cruiser Hood and battleship Prince of Wales intercepted it near Iceland. In a ferocious battle, the Hood exploded and sank, and all but three of the 1,421 crewmen were killed. The Bismarck escaped, but because it was leaking fuel, it fled for occupied France. On May 26, it was sighted and crippled by British aircraft, and on May 27, three British warships descended on the Bismarck and finished it off. The German death toll was over 2,000.
2005
Former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri is killed by a car bomb in Beirut.
2005
The Philippines is hit but three separate bomb attacks, believed to have been carried out by al-Qaida linked militants.
1997
In England, jurors at the inquest into the death of Stephen Lawrence rule that the black teenager was killed in an unprovoked racist attack.
1993
In Britain, the two year old child James Bulger is found dead near a railway station in Merseyside.
1989
Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini issues a fatwa against British author Salman Rushdie for his book Satanic Verses.
1984
British ice skaters Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean win the ice dance gold medal at the Winter Olympics in Sarejavo.
1979
Adolph Dubs, the US Ambassador to Afghanistan, is kidnapped by Islamic extremists in Kabul. Dubs is subsequently killed in an attempt to free him.
1974
Soviet authorities charge Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn with treason one day after expelling him from the country.
1956
The twentieth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union takes place. During the Congress new leader Nikita Krushchev makes the first official criticism of former leader Josef Stalin.
1949
The Israeli parliament, the Knesset convenes for the first time.
1945
Chile, Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru join the United Nations.
1943
The Second World War: Battle of the Kasserine Pass - German General Erwin Rommel and the Afrika Korps launch an offensive against the Allies in Tunisia.
1929
St. Valentine's Day Massacre: Seven gangster rivals of Al Capone are murdered in Chicago, Illinois.
1852
Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children opens in London.
1556
In England, as part of the counter-reformation former Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer is removed from office, imprisoned and charged with treason