13 APRIL

LAST ‘FULL-BLOODED’ ABORIGINAL TASMANIAN MAN’S DEATH AND DISSECTION [ 3 March 1869 ] Today in 1869, William Lanne, who at the time was believed to be the last ‘full-blooded’ Tasmanian man, died of cholera and dysentery, aged just 34 years.  ELEVEN KENYAN POLITICAL DETAINEES MURDERED [ 3 March 1959 ] On 3 March 1959, prison…

BRITISH GENERAL WARNS AGAINST PROSECUTING KENYAN MILITIA FOR MURDER. 9 June 1954 – General Erskine, commanding British troops in Kenya, advised the War Council against prosecuting members of Kenya’s Home Guard for murder. “They do a very good job because they do it from the heart and with faith in the Kenya Government… I must…

REPORT FROM JAMAICA – GIBBETED SLAVES SURVIVE FOUR TO EIGHT DAYS [ 18 June 1760 ] A letter, dated the 18 June 1760, from the British Caribbean territory of Jamaica and subsequently published in newspapers across England, Scotland and Ireland, described, with a grudging respect, the resilience of slaves who ‘are gibbeted alive in terrorem…

THOUSANDS MURDERED AFTER BRITISH LED IMPERIAL ARMY TAKES SUZHOU [ 5 December 1863 ] On this day in 1863, thousands of men and women in the Chinese rebel city of Suzhou were massacred, after the town was seized by imperial Chinese forces. Colonel Charles Gordon (later to become legendary as General Gordon of Khartoum) had…

‘HEADS (OF BLACKS) FIXED ON POLES IN VARIOUS PARTS’ OF DEMERARA [ 18 December 1823 ] Following a mostly non-violent slave insurrection in the British colony of Demerara (now Guyana) in August 1823, in which the plantation owners had been locked into their homes, Governor Major General John Murray imposed a savage crackdown,  shooting dead…

BRITISH AND FRENCH IN SECRET AGREEMENT TO DIVIDE THE MIDDLE EAST [ 3 January 1916 ] Today in 1916, during the First World War, a line was drawn on the map from Acre on the coast of Palestine to Kirkuk in northern Iraq, dividing much of the Middle East into what were planned as post-war…