{"id":6626,"date":"2021-11-13T07:05:00","date_gmt":"2021-11-13T06:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.historyextra.com\/?p=191661"},"modified":"2021-11-13T07:33:08","modified_gmt":"2021-11-13T06:33:08","slug":"13-november-on-this-day-in-history","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbchistory\/rss_feed\/13-november-on-this-day-in-history\/","title":{"rendered":"13 November: On this day in history"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Dominic Sandbrook\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Saturday, 13 November 2021 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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13 November 1002: \u00c6thelred massacres the Danes on St Brice\u2019s Day<\/h3>\n

Anglo-Saxon king oversees an \u201cearly form of ethnic cleansing\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

It is one of the most tantalising and controversial passages in the entire Anglo-Saxon Chronicle<\/a>. In the same year, says the entry for 1002, \u201cthe king gave an order to slay all the Danes that were in England. This was accordingly done on the mass-day of St Brice; because it was told the king, that they would beshrew [curse] him of his life, and afterwards all his council, and then have his kingdom without any resistance.\u201d<\/p>\n

More than a millennium later, the St Brice\u2019s Day Massacre remains one of the most blood-curdling events in English history. The king in question was \u00c6thelred II, known to generations of children as the Unready \u2013 which really meant \u2018ill-advised\u2019. For years the king had been struggling to cope with Viking raids on England\u2019s shores. Often \u00c6thelred paid the raiders off and allowed them to settle in the eastern part of his country, known as the Danelaw, where Scandinavian settlers already used Danish language and law. But shortly after the turn of the new century, the king\u2019s patience ran out.<\/p>\n

We will never really know the tensions and motives that provoked \u00c6thelred to order the extermination of the Danes in England. Nor will we know how many were killed, although possible sites for mass graves have been identified in the West Country and Oxford, where a royal charter later described Danish men being burned alive in St Frideswide\u2019s Church. Given the locations, it seems that the Danelaw itself was exempt: historians suggest that this early form of ethnic cleansing was directed against arrogant young Viking mercenaries who had recently settled in the west.<\/p>\n

But the massacre was a political disaster. Just a year later, Sweyn Forkbeard, king of Denmark, invaded England. And within a decade, \u00c6thelred was in exile and Sweyn was master of England.<\/p>\n

Read more: Viking apocalypse: the invasion that spelled doom for the Anglo-Saxons<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Julian Humphrys rounds up smaller anniversaries\u2026<\/h4>\n

13 November 1761<\/h6>\n

British soldier Sir John Moore was born in Glasgow. Moore first saw active service during the American War of Independence<\/a> and served in Corsica, Ireland, Holland, Egypt and the Baltic before losing his life at Corunna in Spain in 1809.<\/p>\n

13 November 1849<\/h6>\n

English painter William Etty died in York, the city of his birth. A statue of him stands outside York Art Gallery. Etty, who never married, is best known for his opulent paintings of the female nude.<\/p>\n

13 November 1850<\/h6>\n

Scottish novelist, poet and travel writer Robert Louis Stevenson was born in Edinburgh. Both his father and grandfather were lighthouse engineers and the family had initially hoped that the young Robert would follow in their footsteps.<\/p>\n

13 November 1887\u00a0<\/h6>\n

Police clash with demonstrators in Trafalgar Square in the first \u2018Bloody Sunday\u2019.<\/p>\n

13 November 1908<\/h6>\n

Andrew Fisher becomes fifth prime minister of Australia. Born in Scotland, he became a miner aged ten. His trade union activities made it difficult for him to find a job and he emigrated in 1885. His three periods in office will see social reform, creation of the Royal Australian Navy and Commonwealth Bank, construction of the trans-Australian railway and Australia\u2019s entry into the First World War<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\u00a0<\/p>\n

13 November 1940: Fantasia makes movie history<\/h3>\n

Walt Disney\u2019s animation receives rapturous praise from critics<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cAt the risk of being utterly obvious,\u201d began the\u00a0New York Times<\/em>\u2019s review on 14 November 1940, \u201clet us begin by noting that motion-picture history was made at the Broadway Theatre last night with the spectacular world premi\u00e8re of Walt Disney\u2019s long-awaited\u00a0Fantasia<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Times<\/em>\u00a0was not exaggerating. Four years after Walt Disney had come up with the idea of interweaving animation and classical music, and at a then-enormous cost of more than $2m,\u00a0Fantasia<\/em>\u00a0was the cultural sensation of the season. Not only had the film devoured the talents of some 1,000 animators, but Disney had spent a colossal $200,000 devising a special new sound system,\u00a0Fantasound<\/em>, to \u201ccreate the illusion that the actual symphony orchestra is playing in the theater\u201d.<\/p>\n