Today in History - April 28
The Mutiny on the Bounty
Queen Victoria Becomes Empress of India
-- Compiled by James Finlayson-Bald
The Mutineers turning Lt Bligh and part of the Officers and Crew adrift from His Majesty's Ship the Bounty, 29th April 1789.
Bligh was to sail this small launch (just 6 metres long) all the way from Tahiti to Timor - an epic voyage of 3,618 nautical miles (6,701 km) that took 47 days. He achieved this amazing feat of navigation using just a quadrant and a pocket watch (and without charts or compass)!
The above painting was done by Robert Dodd (1748-1815) and may be seen in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, England.
On this date:
1503--Spanish destroy French fleet at Cerignola, Sicily.
1521--Holy Roman Emperor Charles V grants his brother, Archduke Ferdinand, the Hapsburg possessions in Lower Austria, Carinthia, Styria and Carinola.
1655--English fleet destroys pirate fleet of Bey of Tunis and releases prisoners in Algiers; Protestants in Vaudois district of Savoy are massacred.
1789--Mutinous crew of British ship Bounty sets Captain William Bligh and 18 sailors adrift in launch in South Pacific.
1876--Britain's Queen Victoria is declared Empress of India.
1910--Albanian revolt is suppressed by Turkish Army.
1936--King Farouk ascends to throne in Egypt; Arab high command is formed to unite Arabs against Jewish claims.
1945--Italy1s dictator Benito Mussolini and his mistress are executed by partisans in World War II.
1954--Premiers of India, Pakistan, Burma, Indonesia and Ceylon confer at Colombo; India signs commercial and cultural agreement with China.
1968--Tokyo police restore order after 5,000 people demonstrate for return of Okinawa to Japan, and an end to Vietnam War.
1969--Charles de Gaulle resigns as President of France.
1976--India's Supreme Court upholds right of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's government to imprison political apponents without court hearing.
1978--Leaders of military coup in Afghanistan disclose that President Mohammed Daud and several senior members of his government were killed when they resisted the takeover.
-- James Monroe, US President (1758-1831)
-- Antonio de Oliveira Salazar, Portuguese dictator (1889-1970)
-- Kenneth D. Kaunda, President of Zambia (1924- )
"Excellent things are rare."
--Plato, Greek philosopher (about 427 B.C. -347 B.C.)
The above article was written by James Finlayson-Bald.
Edited and illustrations added by David Paul Wagner.