The Famine Year
Foundation of the Orange Order
Speenhamland Act proclaims that the Parish is responsible for bringing up the labourer's wage to subsistence level - towards the end of the eighteenth century, the number of poor and unemployed increased dramatically - price increases during the Napoleonic Wars (1793-1815) far outstripped wage rises - many small farmers were bankrupted by the move towards enclosures and became landless labourers - their wages were often pitifully low
Pitt and Grenville introduce The Gagging Acts' or 'Two Bills' (the Seditious Meetings and Treasonable Practices Bills) - outlawed the mass meeting and the political lecture.
Consumption of lime juice made compulsory in Royal Navy
The prosecutor for Britain, Lord Justice Eyre, charges reformers with High Treason - he argued that, since reform of parliament would lead to revolution and revolution to executing the King, the desire for reform endangered the King's life and was therefore treasonous
Abolition of Parish Register duties
?5 notes first issued by the Bank of England
Britain declares war on France (1793-1802)
King's Proclamation drawing out the British militia
Introduction of Money Orders in Britain
Repression in Britain (restrictions on freedom of the press) - Fox gets Libel Act through Parliament, requiring a jury and not a judge to determine libel
Boyle's Street Directory published
Coal-gas lighting invented by William Murdock, an Ayrshire Scot
First publication of The Observer - world's oldest Sunday newspaper
John Bell, printer, abandons the long s' (the 's' that looks like an 'f')
Establishment of the Ordnance Survey of Great Britain
Forth and Clyde Canal opened in Scotland
Mutiny on HMS Bounty - Captain William Bligh and 18 sailors are set adrift and the rebel crew ends up on Pitcairn Island
First convicts (and free settlers) arrive in New South Wales (left Portsmouth 13 May 1787) ? the 'First Fleet'; eleven ships commanded by Captain Arthur Phillip
First steamboat demonstrated in Scotland
Law passed requiring that chimney sweepers be a minimum of 8 years old (not enforced)
First slave carrying act, the Dolben Act of 1788, regulates the slave trade - stipulates more humane conditions on slave ships
King George III's mental illness occasions the Regency Crisis - Edmund Burke and Charles James Fox attack ministry of William Pitt - trying to obtain full regal powers for the Prince of Wales
Gibbon completes Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
MCC (Marylebone Cricket Club) established at Thomas Lord's ground in London
Sunday School Society founded to educate poor children (by 1851, enrols more than 2 million)
John Walter publishes first edition of The Times (called The Daily Universal Register for 3 years)
First mail coaches in England (4pm Bristol / 8am London)
Pitt's India Act - the Crown (as opposed to officers of the East India Company) has power to guide Indian politics
Wesley breaks with the Church of England
First golf club founded at St Andrews
Invention of threshing machine by Andrew Meikle
Last public execution at Tyburn in London (John Austin, a highwayman)
Treaty of Versailles (Britain/US)
Duty payable on Parish Register entries (3d per entry - repealed 1794) - led to a fall in entries!
Gilbert's Act establishes outdoor poor relief - the way of life of the poor beginning to alter due to industrialisation - New factories in rapidly expanding towns required a workforce that would adjust to new work patterns
James Watt patents his steam engine
Jun 2- 8: The Gordon Riots - Parliament passes a Roman Catholic relief measure - for days, London is at the mercy of a mob and destruction is widespread
First Derby run at Epsom (some say 2nd June)
Male Servants Tax
The English Reform Movement - until now, only landowners and tenants (freeholders with 40 shillings per year or more) allowed to vote, and in open poll books
Fountain pen invented
About this time the word 'Quiz' entered the language, said to have been invented as a wager by Mr Daly, a Dublin theatre manager
Naval engagement between Britain and USA off Flamborough Head
Capt James Cook killed on Hawaii
Marc Isambard Brunel opens the first steamdriven sawmill at Chatham Dockyard in Kent
First iron bridge built, over the Severn by John Wilkinson
First Spinning Mills operational in Scotland
Samuel Miller of Southampton patents the circular saw.
First attack on a warship by a submarine - David Bushnell's ?Turtle' attacked HMS Eagle in New York harbour. The attack was perhaps spectacular (a charge did detonate beneath the ship) but was nevertheless unsuccessful. 'Turtle' was a one man Affair man-powered [Les Moore]
American Declaration of Independence
Somerset House in London becomes the repository of records of population
Watt and Boulton produce their first commercial steam engine
Battle of Lexington: first action in American War of Independence (1775- 1783)
Cook arrives on Easter Island
Judge Mansfield rules that there is no legal basis for slavery in England
First Travellers' Cheques issued by the London Credit Exchange Company
Morning Post' first published (until 1937)
Right to report Parliamentary debates established in England
Capt James Cook lands in Australia (Botany Bay) ? Aug 21: formally claims Australia for Britain
Clyde Trust created to convert the River Clyde, then an insignificant river, into a major thoroughfare for maritime communications
David Garrick organises first Shakespeare festival at Stratford-upon-Avon
Arkwright invents water frame (textile production)
Capt James Cook maps the coast of New Zealand
The first edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica' published in Edinburgh by William Smellie
Philip Astley starts his circus in London
Newcomen's steam pumping engine perfected by James Watt