28 JULY

BRITAIN STRIKES SECRET DEAL WITH AMERICA TO EXPEL THE INHABITANTS OF DIEGO GARCIA. On this day in 1966 a secret plan was agreed between Britain and the United States, by which Washington would cancel $14 million in military debts and in return London undertook to take “administrative measures” required for “resettling the inhabitants” of the…

11 MALAYAN COMMUNISTS SHOT DEAD “WHILE TRYING TO ESCAPE” 7 November 1948 –  During a counter insurgency “sweep” of the “communist infested” Muar Lenga district of Johor in southern Malaya, British troops shot dead eleven insurgents. They claimed they had been trying to escape.  Another nine men were shot dead, allegedly for the same reason,…

Page to be updated with content soon. The next page with content is 16 November

CHURCHILL URGES POISON GAS ATTACKS ON GERMAN CITIES Writing a memo to General Sir Hastings Ismay on 6 July 1944, Winston Churchill urged the Chiefs of Staff to urgently consider the use of poison gas against German towns and cities. The memo came one month after British and American soldiers had landed in France and…

LORD MANSFIELD – THROWING SLAVES OVERBOARD CANNOT BE MURDER. [ 22 May 1783 ] On this day in 1783, Lord Mansfied, the presiding judge at an appeal hearing, issued his verdict on the case of  132 men, women and children thrown overboard from a British owned slave ship, the Zong, on 29 November 1871.  It…

BRITISH INTRODUCE STATE OF EMERGENCY IN CYPRUS At 17.00 GMT on Saturday 26 November 1955 the newly appointed British governor of Cyprus, Field Marshal Sir John Harding, announced, during a short statement on radio, draconian emergency laws in order to crush a growing insurgency against British rule.  The death penalty could now be applied for…