1066 William the Conqueror and his army set sail from the mouth of the Somme River in Picardy, northern France, beginning the Norman Conquest of England.
1605 The armies of Sweden are utterly defeated by the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the Battle of Kircholm.
1779 John Adams is appointed to negotiate Revolutionary War peace terms with Great Britain.
1849 The opening, by Queen Victoria, of Newcastle's High Level Bridge . It was designed by Robert Stephenson to form a rail link towards Scotland for the developing English railway network.
1854 French fishing vessel SS Vesta collides with American passenger paddle-wheel ship SS Arctic off Newfoundland in heavy fog, sinking the larger passenger ship and killing 322; most of the survivors are crew members.
1871 The inauguration of Rochdale Town Hall, a Grade I listed building , described by art critic Nikolaus Pevsner as possessing a 'rare picturesque beauty'. It's said that Adolf Hitler admired it so much that he wished to ship the building, brick-by-brick, to Nazi Germany had the United Kingdom been defeated in the Second World War.
For action on this day 1857, during the Indian Mutiny, at the Siege of Lucknow, bombardier Jacob Thomas from Llanwinio, near Carmarthen of the Bengal Artillery was awarded the Victoria Cross. His citation reads: For distinguished gallantry at Lucknow on the 27th September, 1857, in having brought off on his back, under a heavy fire, under circumstances of considerable difficulty, a wounded soldier of the Madras Fusiliers, when the party to which he was attached was returning to the Residency from a sortie, whereby he saved him from falling into the hands of the enemy.
1908 Henry Ford's first Ford Model T automobile leaves the Piquette Avenue Plant in Detroit, Michigan.
27 Sep 1968 Pink Floyd appeared at the Queen's Hall in Dunoon, Scotland. Due to bad weather, all the ferries to Dunoon were cancelled, so Pink Floyd hired their own boat from Gourock and risked the rough seas to make the crossing, eventually appearing in front of 400 fans.
27 Sep 1967 Working on new songs The Beatles recorded various parts for the new John Lennon song ‘I Am The Walrus’ and the new Paul McCartney song ‘Fool On The Hill.’ Lennon received a letter from a pupil at Quarry Bank High School, that mentioned an English teacher was making his class analyse Beatles' lyrics. Lennon, amused that a teacher was putting so much effort into understanding the Beatles' lyrics, decided to write in his next song the most confusing lyrics that he could.
