May I pick just one ‘fact’ that is not a fact in Lino DeBono’s article ‘Reviewing Maltese history’ (February 4), in which he complains about the dearth of ‘real facts’ in the island’s written history.

Giving a brief outline since the early 1930s, he writes, at one point, that “a Nationalist canvasser shot and hit [Gerald] Strickland in court”. Strickland was indeed shot at (three times) but he was not hit.

The incident happened on May 23, 1930, at 9.30 am and the man was Gianni Miller, a delinquent known as Il-Ħembet, who, at the time, was a billiard board marker at the Nationalist Party club in Victory Street, Senglea. He had only one arm.

Strickland was momentarily dazed but he looked none the worse for it and walked straight to the hall for the hearing.

When, in one of his arguments, DeBono mentions Strickland’s party, along with those of (Toni) Pellegrini’s (Christian Workers’ Party) and Herbert Ganado’s (Democratic Nationalist Party) of the 1960s, he must obviously be referring to Mabel Strickland’s Progressive Constitutional Party (PCP). The two were not the same.

By the way, the title of Edgar Mizzi’s book is Malta in the making 1962–1987: an eyewitness account, not The making of Malta and the name of the chairman of the Malta Royal Commission was Lord Askwith, not Asquit.