On This Day - 21st August

1872 - Illustrator and author Aubrey Beardsley born
1904 - Jazz Musician Count Basie born
1924 - Actor Jack Weston born
1932 - American actor, director, screenwriter, playwright, novelist and composer Melvin Van Peebles born
1936 - NBA basketball player Wilt Chamberlain born
1938 - Country singer Kenny Rogers born
1940 - Leon Trotsky murdered
1956 - Actress Kim Cattrall born
1968 - 'Prague Spring', dozens are killed in a massive Soviet military clampdown in Czechoslovakia.
1973 - The coroner presiding over the "Bloody Sunday" inquest accuses the British army of "sheer unadulterated murder".
1983 - Philippines opposition leader Benigno Aquino is assassinated minutes after returning home from exile.
1986 - At least 1,200 people are feared dead after volcanic gases escape from a lake in Cameroon.

On This Day - 20th August

1833 - 23rd President of the U.S. Benjamin Harrison born
1890 - Horror and fantasy author H.P. Lovecraft born
1914 - Pope Pius X dies
1921 - Valley of the Dolls' author Jacqueline Susann born
1942 - Musician and 'South Park's' Chef Isaac Hayes born
1948 - LED ZEP frontman Robert Plant born
1954 - Al Roker born
1962 - Buffy and Angel actor James Marsters born
1970 - The England soccer captain, Bobby Moore, is cleared of charges of stealing in a trial in Colombia.
1971 - Limp Bizkit musician Fred Durst born
1978 - Two people die during an attack on a bus carrying Israeli airline staff in central London.
1989 - 30 people killed in Marchioness Cruise boat disaster
1992 - Intimate photographs of the Duchess of York and a Texan businessman are published in a tabloid newspaper.

On This Day - 19th August

1871 - Aviator Orville Wright born
1902 - Poet Ogden Nash born
1919 - Publisher Malcolm Forbes born
1921 - Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry born
1931 - American jockey Willie Shoemaker born
1940 - Actress Jill St. John born
1942 - A total of 3,623 of the 6,086 men who made it ashore are either killed, wounded, or captured (almost 60%)during the 'Battle of Dieppe'.
1944 - Conductor Sir Henry Wood dies
1946 - Former U.S. president Bill Clinton born
1951 - Queen bass guitarist John Deacon born
1955 - Actor Peter Gallagher born
1956 - Actor Adam Arkin born
1960 - The United States pilot, Francis Gary Powers, is sentenced to 10 years in prison by a Soviet military court.
1966 - American country music singer LeAnn Womack born
1969 - Actor Matthew Perry born
1975 - Campaigners calling for the release of robber George Davis from prison vandalise the pitch at Headingley cricket ground in Leeds.
1987 - Michael Ryan kills 14 people in Hungerford
1991 - Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev is overthrown in a coup as Communist hardliners take over.
2003 - A massive bomb wrecks the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad, killing 17 people including the UN's chief envoy to Iraq.
2012 - Film Director Tony Scott commits suicide aged 68.

On This Day - 18th August

1774 - US explorer of the Missouri and the Rockies Meriwether Lewis born
1922 - Actress Shelley Winters born
1933 - Film director Roman Polanski born
1937 - Actor Robert Redford born
1943 - Actor Martin Mull born
1954 - Actor Patrick Swayze born
1964 - South Africa are barred from taking part in the 18th Olympic Games in Tokyo over its refusal to condemn apartheid.
1969 - Actors Christian and Edward Norton, as well as House of Pain rapper Erik "Everlast" Schrody born
1969 - Four days and nights of sex, drugs and rock and roll come to a peaceful end as the Woodstock music festival winds down a day later than planned.
1970 - Film director, actor and musician Malcolm-Jamal Warner born
1971 - The British Army is accused of shooting dead an unarmed, disabled man during disturbances in Northern Ireland.
1989 - Manchester United Football Club is sold for £20m in the biggest takeover deal in the history of British football.
1992 - Conditions in two Serbian detention camps are condemned as "hell on earth" by the man leading a delegation to inspect them.

On This Day - 17th August

1786 - Davy Crockett born. Famous for his death at the Alamo he spent his formative years murdering indians before holding various politcal positions.
1892 - Actress Mae West born
1920 - Actress Maureen O'Hara born
1926 - Jiang Zemin General Secretary of the Communist Party of China from 1989 to 2002 born
1943 - Actor Robert De Niro born
1960 - Film actor and director Sean Penn born
1969 - Actor and singer Donnie Wahlberg born
1970 - Tennis player Jim Courier born
1978 - Three Americans make the first crossing of the Atlantic Ocean by hot air balloon. Ben Abruzzo, Larry Newman and Max Anderson took six days to complete the flight from Maine in the US to France.
1987 - Former Deputy Furher and Hitler's right-hand man Rudolf Hess, is found dead in Spandau Prison having commited suicide
1998 - President of the United States, Bill Clinton, admits having an inappropriate relationship with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
1999 - The most powerful earthquake to hit Turkey (measuring six-point-seven on the Richter scale) leaves at least 17,000 people dead.

On This Day - 16th August

1819 - The Peterloo Massacre. The Manchester Yeomanry mounted on horseback charge a 60,000 strong crown who had turned up at a pro-reform rally at St Peters Field, Manchester. Officially there were but a handfull of deaths although over 600 injured.
1913 - Former Prime Minister of Israel Menachem Begin born
1920 - American Poet and Novelist Charles Bukowski born
1925 - Actor Fess Parker born
1928 - Actress and singer Ann Blyth born
1930 - Actor Robert Culp and American footballer Frank Gifford born
1946 - Actress Lesley Ann Warren born
1952 - Flash flood rips through Lynmouth in the worst flash flood that Britain had suffered in the 20th century leaving 34 people dead
1954 - Film director James Cameron born
1958 - Madonna and actress Angela Bassett born
1960 - Actor Timothy Hutton born
1972 - 'Dixie Chick' Emily Robison born
1977 - 'The King' Elvis Presley, whose singing and style revolutionized popular music in the 1950s, dies after collapsing at his home aged 42.
1980 - American singer songwriter Vanessa Carlton born
2003 - The notorious former Ugandan dictator Idi Amin dies in exile in a Saudi Arabian hospital.
2005 - Flash floods devastate a north Cornwall coastal village after the area's average August rainfall fell in just two hours.

On This Day - 15th August

1769 - Napoleon Bonaparte born
1879 - Actress Ethel Barrymore born
1912 - American chef and author Julia Child born
1925 - Actress 'Baby' Rose Marie born
1925 - Actor Mike Connors born
1944 - Allied invasion of Southern France
1944 - American journalist Linda Ellerbee born
1945 - Allied nations across the globe rejoice on Victory in Japan day that marks the end of World War II.
1946 - Song writer Jimmy Webb born
1950 - Princess Anne born
1965 - Riots begin in Los Angeles and last six days, leaving 34 dead and about 1,000 people injured. Nearly 4,000 people were arrested and hundreds of buildings were destroyed.
1971 - Controversial horse rider Harvey Smith is stripped of his £2,000 winnings and a major show jumping title for allegedly making a rude gesture.
1972 - Actor Ben Affleck born
1985 - The speedboat Virgin Atlantic Challenger capsizes off the south-west of England scuppering Richard Branson's attempt at the fastest-ever Atlantic crossing.
1998 - 29 people die after a massive car bomb in the town of Omagh in Northern Ireland.
2005 - Israeli troops meet peaceful resistance as they deliver the first eviction notices to settlers in the Gaza Strip.