100 years ago

The "Handelsblad" stated that some Belgian civilian prisoners of war, who had arrived at Antwerp from various parts of Germany, were in a very miserable state.

They were bare-footed or in wooden shoes, and just as they had been fetched away from the fields some months before. Many of them were covered only in rags.

They all complained of the treatment they had had to endure. Their food had been horrible and quite insufficient.

In one prison camp alone 150 prisoners had died out of a total of 1800 interned there.

When passing through German towns, the unfortunate prisoners had been led through the street under military escort, and grown-up people had encouraged the street boys to strike them with sticks.

Everywhere they were forced to work as slaves, and as a punishment their hands, feet and neck were tied to a pole.

The treatment of the British was still worse, and sometimes medical attention was refused in most urgent cases. While on the return journey to Belgium many of the prisoners had been without food for four days.
 

50 years ago

A new outer ring road encircling York, with two new bridges over the River Ouse and one over the Foss, had been agreed in principle by the Ministry of Transport.

Exploratory survey work would probably start during the year for the trunk road part of the scheme, linking Tadcaster Road (A64) and Malton Road (A64) with an eventual dual carriageway, skirting Bishopthorpe and Heslington.

The whole scheme was to be considered in two parts: the first part, between Tadcaster Road and Malton Road; the second half of the scheme, for further consideration at a later date, from the Malton Gates Bridge westwards to a point between Huntington and Wigginton, then to the A19 near Rawcliffe village.
 

25 years ago

The United States and Soviet Union said they intended to sign an agreement at a June summit to destroy most of their chemical weapons.

"The sides will work out a bilateral agreement on reciprocal obligations... including inter-alia the destruction of the bulk of their chemical weapons stocks to equal low levels," the two countries said in a joint statement.

"They will proceed with the objective of computing and signing such an agreement at the June 1990s summit meeting."

The deal was hammered out in three days of talks between US Secretary of state James Baker and Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze.