On This Day in History - 11th December

11th December

On This Day in History - 11th December 

1282 The death of the last native Prince of Wales - Llewelyn ap Gruffydd, prince of Gwynedd

1620 - 103 Mayflower pilgrims land at Plymouth Rock

1688 James II fled to France, never to return and was forced to abdicate after William of Orange had landed in England on 5th November 

1792 - France's King Louis XVI went on trial, accused of treason

1877 English photographer Eadweard Mubridge won a long standing bet for a millionaire by proving that a horse's four feet are all off the ground simultaneously once every stride. He used multiple cameras around the track, each taking a single frame via a series of trip wires

1914 The Royal Flying Corps, which later became the RAF, adopted the red, white and blue roundel to identify its aircraft more easily during World War I

1914 In the Battle of the Falklands, all British ships survived whilst four German cruisers were sunk

1936 After ruling for less than one year, Edward VIII becomes the first English monarch to voluntarily abdicate the throne. Edward planned to marry divorcee Mrs. Wallis Simpson and, before he left for France, he made a final radio broadcast to the nation. He was succeeded by his brother, George, who became George VI

1952 Derek Bentley, aged 19, and 16 year old Christopher Craig, were found guilty of the murder of a policeman in south London. Because of his age, Craig was sentenced to be detained at Her Majesty’s pleasure, while Bentley, who did not fire the gun, was sentenced to hang. Despite a public outcry, the sentence was carried out on 27th January 1953

1961 - JFK provides US miltary helicopters & crews to South Vietnam

1961 - Marco Pierre White, English chef and restaurateur born

1967 Concorde, the world's first supersonic airliner, was rolled out of its hangar for public viewing for the first time

1971 - Maurice "Mac" McDonald, American fast-food pioneer died

2005 A huge fire continued to burn at Buncefield oil depot near Hemel Hempstead in Hertfordshire. It was the largest of its kind in peacetime Europe and the noise of the explosions could be heard as far away as the Netherlands

2012 - British physicist, Stephen Hawking, wins the $3 million Fundamental Physics Prize, the most lucrative academic prize in the world