^B{^#!16!14 February^N! St Valentine's Day. Feast day of St John the Baptist of the Conception, St Antoninus of Sorrento, St Maro, St Abraham of Carrhae, St Adolf of Osnabrⁿck, St Auxentius, Saints Cyril and Methodius, and St Conran.
^B{1779^B} Captain Cook was stabbed to death by natives in the Sandwich Islands (now Hawaii). ^B{1797^B} The naval Battle of St Vincent took place off SW Portugal, in which Captain Nelson and Admiral Jervis defeated the Spanish fleet. ^B{1852^B} Great Ormond Street children's hospital, in London, UK, accepted its first patient. ^B{1895^B} Oscar Wilde's ^I{The Importance of Being Earnest^I} was first staged in London, UK. ^B{1929^B} The St Valentine's Day Massacre took place in Chicago, when seven members of Bugsy Moran's gang were gunned down in a warehouse. ^B{1945^B} US Air Force and RAF heavy bombers destroyed Dresden, leaving between 60-130,000 dead. ^B{1946^B} The Bank of England was nationalized. ^B{1956^B} At the 20th Soviet Communist Party Conference, Nikita Khrushchev denounced the policies of Stalin. ^B{1974^B} Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn was sent into exile after publication of his book, The Gulag Archipelago. ^B{1989^B} The Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa edict calling on Muslims to kill Salman Rushdie for his blasphemous novel ^I{The Satanic Verses^I}.
^B{^I{^#!14!Born ^N}Francesco Cavalli, Italian composer, ^B{1602^B}; Thomas Malthus, English economist, ^B{1766^B}; Christopher Sholes, US inventor of the typewriter, ^B{1819^B}; Jack Benny, US comedian and actor, ^B{1894^B}; Alan Parker, British film director, ^B{1944^B}; Kevin Keegan, British footballer, ^B{1951^B}.
^B{^I{^#!14!Died ^N}King Richard II of England,^B{ 1400^B}; Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, Italian painter, ^B{1525^B}; William Sherman, US general, ^B{1891^B}; Julian Huxley, English biologist and philosopher, ^B{1975^B}; P G Wodehouse, English novelist, ^B{1975^B}; Frederick Loewe, US composer, ^B{1988^B}.
