The world this week: Hitler’s suicide and the Iranian embassy siege

The world this week…

29 April

The day before committing suicide, Adolf Hitler married Eva Braun in 1945. On the same day, US troops freed the Jews from the Dachau concentration camp near Munich.

The Duchess of Windsor, Wallis Simpson is laid to rest next to her husband King Edward VIII at Frogmore in 1986.

Rioting broke out in Los Angeles in 1992 following the acquittal of four white police officers who were accused of beating black motorist, Rodney King.

The Queen decided to open Buckingham Palace’s doors to the public for the first time in 1993. They were opened to raise money for repairs to Windsor Castle.

Deaths: Abraham Gesner, 1864, Canadian geologist; Arthur Mold, 1921, English cricketer; Alfred Hitchcock, 1980, English director; John Kenneth Galbraith, 2006, Canadian economist.

30 April

Hailstones the size of “oranges” was reported in the farming town of Moradabad, India in 1888. 246 people were killed and many more farm animals, devastating the town.

Adolf Hitler killed hinself in 1945 in a bunker under his headquarters in Berlin. He swallowed a cyanide pill before shooting himself in the head.

The Anne Frank diaries are published for the first time in English in 1952. Frank and her family hid from the Nazis in Holland during the war.

Dozens are injured in a Soho nail bomb in 1999. Three people are killed and at least 70 injured in the third nail-bomb attack in London in two weeks.

Deaths: Sigismund III Vasa, 1632, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania; Edouard Manet, 1883, French impressionist painter; Agnes Moorehead, 1974, American actress; George Balanchine, 1983, Russian-American ballet composer and choreographer; Muddy Waters, 1983, US blues singer/guitarist.

1 May

Adventurer and performer Calamity Jane was born in 1852 near Princeton, Missouri. There are many legends surrounding her life but serious historians have never found any evidence suggesting they are legitimate.

Herbert Hoover dedicated the Empire State building in 1931. He pressed a button which turned on all the lights of the building.

Formula 1 legend Ayrton Senna died in a car crash at the San Marino Grand Prix in Italy in 1994. He died at the age of 34.

The Labour party returned to power in Britain in 1997 after 18 years of Conservative rule. Tony Blair won a landslide victory in the election.

Hundreds of demonstrators rioted in London during anti-capitalist protests in 2000. Around 95 people were arrested and nine police officers were injured.

Deaths: Matilda of Scotland, 1118, first wife of Henry I; David Livingstone, 1873, British physician and explorer; Joseph Goebbels, 1945, German Nazi minister of propaganda.

2 May

Madrid revolted against French rule in 1808 which started a battle in the city’s central square, Puerta del Sol.

A British submarine sank an Argentine cruiser in 1982, killing 323. The General Belgrano was destroyed by the royal navy off the Falklands Islands.

Osama bin Laden was killed by US forces in 2011. The man behind 9/11 was killed during a raid on his hideout in Pakistan.

Deaths: Leonardo da Vinci, 1519, artist and scientist; Martin Bormann, 1945, prominent Nazi official; Joseph McCarthy, 1957, American senator; J Edgar Hoover, 1972, first director of the FBI.

3 May

Italian philosopher and writer Niccolo Machiavelli was born in 1469. He became one of the fathers of modern political theory and was a lifelong patriot.

Two commuter trains and a freight train collided near Tokyo, Japan, killing more than 160 passengers and injuring twice as many in 1962.

A bomb exploded on an Air Lanka passenger jet at Colombo’s airport. It left 21 dead and 41 injured in 1986.

Three-year-old Madeleine McCann vanished during a family vacation in Portugal in 2007. Her disappearance prompted the start of a worldwide hunt which is still ongoing.

Deaths: Patrick Pearse, 1916, Irish activist; Dalida, 1987, Egyptian-French singer; George Murphy, 1992, American politician.

4 May

Audrey Hepburn was born in 1929 as Edda Kathleen Hepburn-Ruston. She was the daughter of an English banker and a Dutch baroness.

The Grammys were presented for the first time in 1959. Some of the winners included Ella Fitzgerald, Henry Mancini and Frank Sinatra.

Margaret Thatcher was sworn in as Britain’s first female prime minister in 1979. Thatcher was sworn in the day after the Conservatives won a 44-seat majority in the parliamentary elections.

Ken Livingstone was voted London mayor in 2000. He was an independent candidate who was expelled from the Labour Party.

Deaths: E Nesbit, 1924, English author; Dennis Crosby, 1991, American singer; Adam Yauch, 2012, Beastie Boys vocalist; Elena Baltacha, 2014, Ukranian-British tennis player.

5 May

Napoleon Bonaparte died in exile in 1821. The former French ruler who once ruled an empire across Europe, died a prisoner on the island of Saint Helena.

Six people were killed by a Japanese bomb in 1945 in Oregon. A woman and five neighbourhood children were killed while attempting to drag a Japanese balloon out the woods which turned out to be armed.

Navy commander Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr became the first American to be launched into space aboard the Freedom 7 capsule in 1961. The flight lasted 15 minutes and reached a height of 116 miles into the atmosphere above Earth.

The siege of the Iranian embassy in London ended after the SAS raided the building and rescued 19 hostages in 1980.

Human remains were found in a suitcase near Virginia Beach in 2004. The remains were the first of three suitcases to be found that month.

Deaths: Leo Diegel, 1951, American golfer; Carlos Saavedra Lamas, 1959, Argentine politician; Greg Quil, 2013, Australian-Canadian singer-songwriter and journalist.