June

Less than a week after he was appointed prime minister, Renfrewshire-born Gordon Brown found himself dealing with a terrorist attack on Glasgow Airport, which had been rammed by a Jeep carrying burning gas cannisters. Five passers-by were injured, but none of the 4000 passengers and staff inside the terminal lost their lives.

June was also the month in which crime writer Val McDermid, Formula 1 racing driver Jackie Stewart, author MC Beaton and lighthouse designer Robert Stevenson were all born. Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy, Taggart actor Mark McManus, and James Douglas, who was beheaded by the guillotine he had brought to Scotland, were each laid to rest.

The German Navy scuttled its ships in Scarpa Flow in June 1919 as discussions that would lead to the signing of the Treaty of Versailles were ongoing. Although the Treaty formalised the end of the First World War, the Navy was worried that the talks would break down and fighting would resume. If that happened while its ships were still in British waters, Britain and its allies could have used them against Germany, which would have been unable to defend itself. Scuttling, therefore, seemed to only logical course of action.

Several years later, June saw the establishment of the peace camp at HMS Neptune, the Faslane naval base on the Clyde, where Britain berths its nuclear submarines. Although it started small, the camp has been a constant presence, has grown steadily, and has gained international attention. The site has been a submarine base since the first trials were conducted there at the end of the First World War.