S01E01 The Assassination of Ernst Roehm
Munich 1934: The Night of The Long Knives Flying into Munich in the early hours of 20th June 1934, Adolf Hitler, then Chancellor of Germany, drove to a fashionable lakeside hotel, where one of his...
Infamous Assassinations
S01E12: The Assassination of Verwoerd
Cape Town, 1966 On 6 September 1966, seven minutes after taking his seat in the House of Assembly, South African Prime Minister Dr Henrick Verwoerd was assassinated by Demetrio Tsafendas, a Bible-quoting parliamentary messenger. Verwoerd had played a key role in constructing South Africa''s Apartheid laws, but ironically the assassin claimed he was not doing enough for whites. It was the second attempt on Verwoerd''s life.
Overview
This brand-new and exclusive series takes a closer look at some of the world's most talked-about assassinations and near misses. Always a fascinating and macabre subject, assassinations can damage a nation's confidence, create wars and shock the world. Throughout this series some of the 20th century's most outrageous attempts can, thanks to rare archive footage and reconstructions, be seen first hand and viewers are brought closer to the events than ever before. From the assassinations of John F Kennedy and Mahatma Ghandi, to attacks on royalty, politicians and media celebrities, this series uncovers the real reasons behind these events and how they unfolded.
Episodes
S01E02 The attempt on Princess Anne
London, 1974 As the Queen"s daughter travelled from Buckingham Palace along the Mall, she was attacked by a gunman who fired six shots at her vehicle. Several passers-by, her chaffeur and a policemen were all...
S01E03 The Assassination of John Lennon
New York, 1980 On 8th December 1980, outside the Dakota Building, the 40 year-old Beatle was shot dead by Mark David Chapman, a young stalker who alleged that he was Lennon''s ''double''. What were the...
S01E04 The Assassination of Lord Louis Mountbatten
Ireland, 1979 The former Viceroy of India and cousin of the Queen, Lord Mountbatten was a World War II naval hero, Allied Commander in South East Asia and one of the architects of D-Day. On...
S01E05 The Assassination of Trotsky
Russia, 1940 On 20 August 1940, the exiled Bolshevik leader was assassinated with an ice-pick by Ramon Mercader, who was undoubtedly working on behalf of Stalin and his secret police. Why was it still necessary...
S01E06 The Assassination of Pope John Paul II
Rome, 1981 On 13 May 1981, in front of a crowd of 20,000 people in St Peter''s Square, a young Turkish gunman shot the Polish Pope, possibly at the behest of the Russians who were...
S01E07 The Assassination of Sikorski
Gibraltar, 1943 On 4th July, 1943, General Wladyslaw Eugeniusz Sikorski, Commander-in-Chief of the Polish Army, was flying to the Middle East on a Liberator bomber when it crashed into the sea off Gibraltar. He was...
S01E08 The Assassination of President McKinley
Buffalo, New York, 1901 On 6th September 1901, whilst opening an expedition, President McKinley was shot by Polish anarchist, Leon Czolgosz. McKinley''s successor, 42 year-old Teddy Roosevelt, was sworn in within 12 hours. McKinley was...
S01E09 The Assassination of Heydrich
On the morning of 10th June 1942, whilst driving his open-top Mercedes to his office, Hitler"s effective deputy and architect of the Final Solution was blown to pieces by a bomb thrown by two Czechoslovakian...
S01E10 The Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin
On 4th November 1995, as he was about to address a mass rally of his supporters celebrating the Israeli-Palestinian Peace Accord, one of Israel''s greatest Prime Ministers was gunned down by a young Israeli opposed...
S01E11 The Assassination of Zia Al Huq
On August 17 1988, en route for a military base in Northern Pakistan, Pakistan's pro-military strongman was brought down by a bomb in his Hercules transport plane, possibly in retaliation for helping the rebels fight...
S01E12 The Assassination of Verwoerd
Cape Town, 1966 On 6 September 1966, seven minutes after taking his seat in the House of Assembly, South African Prime Minister Dr Henrick Verwoerd was assassinated by Demetrio Tsafendas, a Bible-quoting parliamentary messenger. Verwoerd...
S01E13 The Assassinations of Indira & Rajiv Gandhi
India, 1984 & 1989 Indira Gandhi, Prime Minister of India, was assassinated on 31st October 1984 by her Sikh bodyguards as she walked in the garden of her New Delhi home. It appeared that her...
S01E14 The Assassination of Che Guevara
Bolivia, 1967 Born to a middle-class Argentine family, Ernesto ''Che'' Guevara became an icon for revolution and rebellious youth all over the world. One of Fidel Castro''s most trusted lieutenants in the Cuban revolution, he...
S01E15 The Assassination of Anwar Sadat
Cairo, 1981 On 6 October 1981, wearing a black ceremonial uniform at a military parade, the Egyptian President was shot down by four uniformed men who machine-gunned him as he was watching an Egyptian Air...
S01E16 The Attempt on Ronald Reagan
Washington, 1981 On 30th March 1981, as US President Ronald Reagan was leaving the Washington Hilton Hotel, 25-year-old John Hinckley III fired six shots from a .22 revolver. One of the bullets missed Reagan''s heart...
S01E17 The Assassination of Michael Collins
Eire, 1922 One of the most charismatic leaders in the struggle for Irish independence from British rule, Michael Collins came to realise that only compromise could secure southern Ireland''s independence and peace. Many of his...
S01E18 The Attempts on De Gaulle
France, 1961: The Day of the Jackal There were three attempts to kill General de Gaulle, all of which were unsuccessful. The first was by German snipers in Paris 1945. The second was on 8...
S01E19 The Attempt on Hitler
Rastenburg, 1944 Although there had been two previous attempts to kill Hitler, including poisoning a bottle of Cointreau on his aircraft, the assassination attempt which nearly worked at his Prussian forest hideaway in Rastenburg resulted...
S01E20 The Assassination of Robert Kennedy
Los Angeles, 1968 On 6th June 1968, hours after winning the Californian Democratic Primary election, Senator Robert Kennedy was shot and fatally wounded. The assassin was 24-year-old Palestinian immigrant, Sirhan Sirhan, who fired five shots...
S01E21 The Assassination of Mahatma Gandhi
New Delhi, 1948 India''s greatest founding father was a champion of peaceful protest, yet ironically he was gunned down for no clear reason by Nathuram Godse, a fanatical Hindu, in the gardens of Birla House...
S01E22 The Assassination of Martin Luther King
Memphis, 1968 After leading mass protests in Birmingham Alabama and his "I have a dream" speech, Martin Luther King took on the causes of American withdrawal from South Vietnam and the plight of the poor...
S01E23 The Assassination of Tsar Nicholas II
Yekaterinburg, 1918 After a disastrous war with Germany, the Bolsheviks imprisoned the Romanov family as their supporters approached. Factory worker guards were replaced by Cheka executioners and on 17th July 1918, the family were murdered...
S01E24 The Assassination of King Alexander
Marseille, 1934 On 9th October 1934, just after King Alexander of Yugoslavia had arrived in the cruiser Dubrovnik for a State visit to France, a man later identified as Croatian nationalist Petros Kellerman jumped onto...
S01E25 The Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
Sarajevo, 1914 A group of Serbian nationalists were determined to kill the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne. Two of the assassins had bombs and one, a student named Gavril Princep, had a pistol. When the...
S01E26 The Assassination of John F Kennedy
Dallas, 1963 By 22 November 1963, the date of his assassination, President Kennedy had made many enemies. He had declared war on the Mafia, racial prejudice and the industrial/military interest in Vietnam. He had humiliated...
