Centenaries - whole and half

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250 years ago - 1762 July 17 - Tsar Peter III of Russia is assassinated in a palace coup apparently instigated by his wife Catherine the Great and her guards. He had only been on the throne for six months.

Note: At the time, Russia was still on the Old Style Calendar so there it was July 6 but in most of the rest of the world and by today's calendar it was July 17.

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50 years ago - 1962 July 24 - In Iowa, Charles Noel Brown is hanged for the murders of two men in a failed carjacking. He had a partner in the crime named Charles Kelly who will follow him to the gallows at a later date. The two murderers had also earlier killed a man in a Minnesota robbery.

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400 years ago - 1612 July 29 - Jennet Preston is hanged in York for the murder of Thomas Lister. She was also accused of using her charms through witchcraft.

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300 years ago - 1712 August 1 - Elizabeth Chivers is executed by hanging for the murder of her illegitimate child also named Elizabeth. She was actually seen drowning the child and citizens brought her in to English authorities.

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I will have to look up Savage Grace.

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50 years ago - 1962 August 8 - Elizabeth Duncan with her hired killers, Augustine Baldonado and Luis Moya Jr., are executed in the San Quinton gas chamber for the brutal murder of her pregnant daughter-in-law Olga. The elder Mrs. Duncan had allegedly once had an incestuous relationship with her son, Olga's husband.

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50 years ago - 1962 August 18 - In their California home, Dr. Geza de Kaplany tortures his wife with cuts and acid. Hajna will eventually die from this and her husband will be sentenced to life in prison after being convicted of her murder. That said, he only served 12 years before he was released. Reports put Dr. de Kaplany as living in Germany as a naturalized citizen. He would now be 86 if still living.

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100 years ago - 1912 August 19 - In his English home, Robert Money shoots and kills his wife and his three children, sets the place ablaze then shoots and kills himself. Money also shot another woman, to whom he was also "married", but she escaped the flames and survived. This killer is a suspect in the unsolved 1905 murder of his sister Mary Money as well.

50 years ago - 1962 August 19 - Ida Irga, 75, is sexually assaulted and killed in her home. She is another victim in the still officially unsolved serial killer case known as the Boston Strangler.

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400 years ago - 1612 August 20 - For causing death by bewitchment, two men and seven women are hanged in Lancashire.

50 years ago - 1962 August 20 - Jane Sullivan, 67, is sexually assaulted and strangled in her residence with her nylon stockings. She is the second fatality in two days caused by the unknown Boston Strangler.

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50 years ago - 1962 August 24 - Outside of Genoa, Italy, unable to handle the stresses of normal life, Donato Tremamunno shoots and kills his landlord and boyhood friend Antonio Ragone. He then goes on to murder his own wife and infant son. To end the rampage, he sexually assaults and kills Ragone's wife Vita by strangulation then commits suicide with his gun.

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150 years ago - 1862 August 25 - In Ireland, Richard Burke is executed by hanging for the murder of his wife Johanna.

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50 years ago - 1962 September 6 - Charles Edwin Kelley is hanged in Iowa for the murders of two men in a failed carjacking. Charles Brown, his partner in the crime, had been executed on an earlier date. The two killers had also previously slain another man in a Minnesota robbery.

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100 years ago - 1912 September 24 - Chester Jordan is executed in a Massachusetts electric chair for the 1908 murder of his wife Honora. Both were vaudeville actors and Mr. Jordan had killed her by first beating Honora and then throwing her down some stairs. He then tried to cover the crime by hacking the body to pieces and then burning it but this was thwarted when Honora's torso was discovered in a trunk.

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100 years ago - 1912 September 28 - Edward Hopwood shots and kills his former fiancée Florence Silles in the back of a taxi. The stage actress angered Hopwood when she found out that he was already married and ended the relationship. Hopwood then turned the gun on himself but failed to kill himself and was hanged later in the year for the London murder.

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50 years ago - 1962 September 30 - Paul Guihard is shot in the back at very close range in Oxford, Mississippi. The 30-year-old French reporter was there to cover racial unrest relating to the recent integration policy. His murder is still unsolved.