This Day in History - 13th October

1399 Henry IV (the first King of the House of Lancaster) was crowned king of England.

1853 The birth of Lillie Langtry, actress and mistress of King Edward VII, also the Earl of Shrewsbury and Prince Louis of Battenberg.

1884 Greenwich was chosen as the universal time meridian of longitude from which standard times throughout the world are calculated.

1894 The first Merseyside 'derby' football match was played at Goodison Park between Liverpool and Everton, with Everton winning 3 - 0.

1899 The start of the siege of the British garrison at Mafeking by Boer forces. The commander of the garrison, Colonel Robert Baden-Powell and his forces held firm for 217 days.

1904 The birth, in Halifax, of Wilfred Pickles OBE, actor and radio presenter. Pickles was a proud Yorkshireman and was the first newsreader to speak in a regional accent. His BBC Radio show 'Have A Go', ran from 1946 to 1967 and launched such catchphrases as 'What's on the table, Mabel?' and 'Are yer courting?', all delivered in Pickles's inimitable style.

1924 Labour Party leader Ramsay MacDonald became the first Prime Minister to make an election broadcast on BBC radio.

1925 The birth of Margaret Thatcher British Prime Minister from 1979 to 1990. Known as 'The Iron Lady' she was the longest serving Prime Minister for more than 150 years.

1940 Princess Elizabeth, aged 14, (now Queen Elizabeth II), made her first radio broadcast to child evacuees.

1946 The birth of Edwina Currie, former Member of Parliament. She resigned as a Junior Health Minister in 1988 over the controversy of salmonella in eggs. Among her comments over the next two years were that good Christian people don't get AIDS, that old people who couldn't afford their heating bills should wrap up warm in winter, and that northerners die of ignorance and chips.

1954 Chris Chataway broke the 5,000-metres world record by five seconds in the London v Moscow match at White City, West London.

1963 The term Beatlemania was coined after The Beatles appeared at the Palladium. They made their debut as the top of the bill on ITV's 'Sunday Night at The London Palladium.'

1988 The British Government failed to stop publication of the controversial book Spycatcher, written by a former secret service agent.

1988 The Queen sued The Sun newspaper after it printed a private photograph.

1992 The government announced plans to close one third of Britain's deep coal mines, putting 31,000 miners out of work.

1996 British racing driver Damon Hill, driving a Williams, won the Japanese Grand Prix to clinch his first (and only) World Championship.

2008 The government said that they would pump billions of pounds of taxpayers money into three UK banks in one of the UK's biggest nationalisations. Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), Lloyds TSB and HBOS would have a total of £37bn injected into them. In return for the investment, the government would get a say in how the banks were run, including controls over the bonuses paid to management.

2014 The Royal College of Midwives took part in strike action for the first time in the organisation's 133 year history, in protest at the government's decision not to grant a 1% 'across the board' pay rise. The 4 hour strike, (from 7:00 a.m. at hospitals in England) also included nurses, paramedics, hospital porters and ambulance crews.

2014 176 people took part in the 48th World Conker Championships at Southwick, in Northamptonshire. Competitors came from overseas, including the United States, Mexico, and Italy.

2014 UKiP leader Nigel Farage hailed it an 'emotional moment' as he watched Douglas Carswell introduced to Parliament as the party's first elected MP.

2016 Queen Elizabeth II became the world's longest-reigning monarch following the death of Thai King Bhumibol Adulyadej