This Day in History - 30th October

1470 Henry VI returned to the English throne after the Earl of Warwick (known as Warwick the Kingmaker) defeated the Yorkists in battle.

1485 The coronation of Henry VII of England. He founded the Yeoman of the Guard - 'Beefeaters' - to guard Royal Palaces in London.

1580 English explorer Sir Francis Drake completed his circumnavigation of the world when his ship, the 'Golden Hind', arrived back at Plymouth on the south coast of England.

1935 The birth of Michael Winner, former film director, producer, and food critic for the Sunday Times until his death in 2013. An active proponent of law enforcement issues he established the Police Memorial Trust after WPC Yvonne Fletcher was murdered in 1984.

1957 The Government revealed details of plans to reform the House of Lords, which included creating the first women life peerages.

1960 English surgeon Michael Woodruff performed Britain's first successful kidney transplant, at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary.

1965 English model Jean Shrimpton wore a miniskirt to the first day of the Melbourne Cup Carnival in Australia. The event became a milestone in the advancement of the mini as the defining fashion of the 1960s.

1979 Barnes Wallis, British aeronautical engineer and inventor of the wartime dam busting 'bouncing bomb' died. The pilots of 617 squadron used Derwent Reservoir in Derbyshire to practice their low level flying. There is a memorial to them at Derwent Dam.

1984 The 3 surviving members of the 'Beatles' Pop group were given the freedom of the City of Liverpool. Harrison refused to attend.

1990 English and French tunnellers met for the first time underneath the English Channel during the construction of the Channel Tunnel.

1995 At Winchester Crown Court, Rosemary West, the wife of serial killer Frederick West, broke her 20 month silence to plead her innocence over her husband's murders.

2001 Farmer Tony Martin, the loner who shot dead a teenage burglar, was cleared of murder but told he must spend at least another year in jail.