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Events on Wednesday 21 August 1940 1
1879 – 1940Leon Trotsky (1879-1940)Died 21 August 1940, aged 60Russian revolutionary, founder of the Red Army and Stalin's chief rival, exiled from the Soviet Union in 1929. A Soviet agent, Ramón Mercader, struck him with an ice axe at his home in Coyoacán, Mexico City, on 20 August. He died the following day.