What happened this week in history

1660 - The Long Parliament of England was dissolved to prepare for the new Convention Parliament.

1872 - The Wanderers beat the Royal Engineers 1-0 in the first FA Cup final at Kennington Oval in London.

1876 - The first women’s boxing match was held in New York.

1888 - The purchase of a car was recorded for the first time. Emile Rogers, of Paris, bought a petrol-driven vehicle from the new factory of Karl Benz.

1904 - The GPO issued its first book of stamps, which cost two shillings and one half pence – the equivalent of 10p.

1914 - The French foreign minister’s wife shot and killed the editor of Le Figaro when he threatened to publish compromising letters written by her husband.

1926 - The first rocket, fuelled by petrol and liquid oxygen, was successfully launched by American physicist Robert Goddard.

1958 - The Ford Motor Company produced its 50 millionth automobile, the Thunderbird, averaging almost a million cars a year since the company was founded.

1973 - The new London Bridge was opened.

1975 - London’s historic Rainbow Theatre closed its doors after a final performance by, among others, Procol Harum and Richard and Linda Thompson.

1976 - Harold Wilson resigned as Prime Minister. He was succeeded by James Callaghan.

1978 - The supertanker Amoco Cadiz split in two after running aground on the Portsall Rocks, three miles off the coast of Brittany, resulting in the largest oil spill in history at that time.

1989 - In Egypt, a 4,400-year-old mummy was found near the Pyramid of Cheops.

1995 - The US state of Mississippi formally ratified the 13th Amendment, becoming the last state to approve the abolition of slavery. The 13th Amendment was officially ratified in 1865.

2002 - Singer Liza Minnelli married her fourth husband at a star-studded New York ceremony with 15 bridesmaids.