Born on this day
Tuesday, April 28, 1908. : Oskar Schindler, the man responsible for saving over a thousand Jews during the Holocaust, is born.
Oskar Schindler was born into a wealthy business family on 28 April 1908 in Zwittau, now Svitavy, Bohemia, which was then part of Austria-Hungary, but is now the Czech Republic. As a businessman himself, he sought to profit from the German invasion of Poland in 1939, buying a factory in Krakow at a low price and employing Jews as cheap labour. Schindler initially hid wealthy Jewish investors, possibly for profit, but later he began shielding his workers without regard to cost.
After witnessing a 1942 raid on the Kraków Ghetto, where soldiers shipped the ghetto inhabitants to the concentration camp at Plaszow, Schindler was appalled by the murder of many Jews who had tried to hide. He worked to transfer the Jews to a safer place, using his own skills of persuasive speech and bribing government officials to avoid being investigated.
Shindler spent millions to protect and save the Jews. After the war, he emigrated to Argentina, but returned to Germany in 1958, bankrupt. Schindler died in Germany on 9 October 1974, at the age of 66.
Australian History
Thursday, April 28, 1949. : Melbourne is announced as the host city for the Games of the XVI Olympiad.
Melbourne was announced as the host city for the Games of the XVI Olympiad on 28 April 1949, beating bids from Buenos Aires, Mexico City and six other American cities by a single vote. The Olympic Games commenced with an opening ceremony in November 1956. Because Melbourne is located in the southern hemisphere, the Olympics were held later in the year than those held in the northern hemisphere. Strict quarantine laws prevented Melbourne from hosting the equestrian events, and they were instead held in Stockholm on June 10, five months before the rest of the Olympic games began.
Despite boycotts by several countries over international events unrelated to Australia, the games proceeded well, and earned the nickname of “The Friendly Games”. It was at the first Australian-held Olympics that the tradition began of the athletes mingling with one another, rather than marching in teams, for their final appearance around the stadium.
Australian History
Sunday, April 28, 1996. : Port Arthur, Australia, becomes the scene of an horrific massacre of innocent men, women and children.
Port Arthur, on the Tasman Peninsula in Tasmania, Australia, was once the site of one of Australia’s most brutal penal settlements, but is now a top tourist attraction. However, the peace of the small town was shattered by a gunman on 28 April 1996. On that day 28-year-old social misfit, Martin Bryant, started shooting indiscriminately, ultimately murdering 35 men, women and children, and wounding dozens more.
Around 11am, Bryant stopped at Seascape cottage just outside Port Arthur, where he shot and killed David and Sally Martin who had bought the guesthouse Bryant wanted to buy. Shortly after lunchtime, he entered the Broad Arrow Cafe, ordered and ate a meal, then began shooting the tourists in the cafe. Within a few minutes, twenty people were dead, and Bryant continued on his murdering rampage first through a nearby carpark then further up the road, killing drivers, passengers and pedestrians, including chasing down 6-year-old Alannah Mikac who tried to hide behind a tree. After his killing spree, Bryant returned to the guesthouse where, after holding the police at bay for 18 hours, he then set fire to the house, hoping to escape in the confusion. He was captured by the police and taken to the Royal Hobart Hospital, where he was treated for burns and kept under guard.
Bryant pleaded guilty to the massacre. Having been deemed intellectually impaired and mentally unstable, he is currently serving a life sentence in Hobart’s Risdon Prison, in protective custody for his own safety. He has attempted to commit suicide on several occasions, and he remains under threat from other prisoners who cannot forgive him for stalking a child.
Among those killed were the family of Walter Mikac – his wife, Nanette and their two daughters, Madeline, age 3, and six-year-old Alannah. Subsequently, Mikac became recognised as the face of the worst mass murder in Australian history. Mikac is a co-founder of the Alannah and Madeline Foundation, which was set up in their memory to provide support for children who are the victims of violent crime. Crown Princess Mary of Denmark is the patron of the Alannah and Madeline Foundation.
The Port Arthur Historic Site now includes a memorial garden to the victims of the massacre. It is located at the site of the Broad Arrow Café, which is now just a shell, as its interior was completely emptied after the terrible events of that day. The name of the perpetrator is not mentioned anywhere on the site.
World History
Tuesday, April 28, 1789. : Fletcher Christian leads the mutiny against Captain Bligh on the ‘HMS Bounty’.
Fletcher Christian was born in Cumberland, England, on 25 September 1764. He went to sea at the age of sixteen, and two years later he sailed aboard HMS Cambridge where he met William Bligh for the first time. Bligh, born on 9 September 1754, had also started his seagoing career at the age of 16, quickly rising through the officer ranks. Bligh and Christian were very close during their early years together.
The ‘HMS Bounty’ sailed with a crew of 45 men from Spithead, England in December 1787 under Lieutenant William Bligh, bound for Tahiti. Their mission was to collect breadfruit plants to be transplanted in the West Indies as cheap food for the slaves. For many months, breadfruit was cultivated and readied for the long sea voyage back to England and, during this time, the crew enjoyed living in Tahiti where they became accustomed to the relaxed island life and especially the company of the Tahitian women. However, Bligh was a stern disciplinarian who worked his men hard, and morale was very low when the crew prepared for their return journey. Soon after departing Tahiti, on the morning of 28 April 1789, Fletcher Christian and part of the crew mutinied, taking over the ship, throwing the breadfruit plants overboard, and setting Bligh and 18 crew members adrift in the ship’s 23-foot launch. Lieutenant Bligh sailed nearly 6000km back to England, arriving there on 14 March 1790, where he was initially court-martialled. He was acquitted in the trial. The mutineers took HMS Bounty back to Tahiti, and collected 6 Polynesian men and 12 women. They then continued on to Pitcairn Island, arriving there on 15 January 1790. After burning the ship, they established a settlement and colony on Pitcairn Island that still exists.
In 1808, Captain Mayhew Folger of the American sealing ship ‘Topaz’ landed at Pitcairn Islands. By that stage, many of the mutineers had succumbed to disease, suicide or been victims of murder. Of all the men, both whites and Polynesians, only John Adams survived. Adams, by then a changed man after his conversion to Christianity, went on to become the respected leader on Pitcairn. He died on 5 March 1829, forty years after the mutiny. In 1856, having outgrown Pitcairn Island, many of the descendants of the original mutineers were relocated to Norfolk Island in the South Pacific, where they have kept alive their strong Pitcairn culture to this day.