1868 in the United Kingdom

Other years
1866 | 1867 | 1868 (1868) | 1869 | 1870
Constituent countries of the United Kingdom
England | Ireland | Scotland | Wales
Sport
1868 English cricket season

Events from the year 1868 in the United Kingdom.

## Incumbents

[edit]

* Monarch – Victoria
* Prime Minister – Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby (Conservative) (until 27 February); Benjamin Disraeli (Conservative) (starting 27 February, until 1 December); William Ewart Gladstone (Liberal) (starting 3 December)

## Events

[edit]

* 2 January – British Expedition to Abyssinia: Robert Napier leads an expedition to free captive British officials and missionaries.[1]
* 9 January – penal transportation from Britain to Australia ends with arrival of the convict ship Hougoumont in Western Australia after an 89-day voyage from England.
* 13 February – the War Office sanctions the formation of what will become the Army Post Office Corps.
* 27 February – Benjamin Disraeli succeeds the Earl of Derby as Prime Minister following Derby's resignation due to ill-health.
* 12 March – Britain annexes Basutoland[2] and it becomes a protectorate.
* 14 March – Eliza Lynn Linton's article "The Girl of the Period" is published in the Saturday Review.
* 2 April – last public hanging of a woman in Britain – Frances Kidder outside Maidstone Prison by William Calcraft for drowning her stepdaughter.[3]
* 9–13 April – expedition to Abyssinia: At the Battle of Magdala, Robert Napier decisively defeats the emperor Tewodros II.
* 25 April – HMS Repulse, the last wooden battleship constructed for the Royal Navy, is launched as an ironclad (with auxiliary steam propulsion) at Woolwich Dockyard.
* 10–11 May – "Murphy riots" against Irish people in Ashton-under-Lyne.[4]
* 26 May – last public hanging in Britain – Fenian bomber Michael Barrett outside Newgate Prison in London by William Calcraft for his part in the Clerkenwell explosion of 1867.[5]
* 29 May – Capital Punishment Amendment Act abolishes public hanging in Britain.
* 2 June – the first Trades Union Congress is held in Manchester.[1]
* 29 June – the Press Association founded in London.[1]
* July – the Summer assize for Berkshire is moved from Abingdon to Reading,[6] effectively making the latter the county town.
* 17 July – judicial decision of the House of Lords in Rylands v Fletcher, a leading case in English tort law, establishing a standard of strict liability in negligence actions.
* 31 July
* Pharmacy Act 1868 regulates the profession of pharmacist and restricts sale of poisons and dangerous drugs.
* Church rate ceases to be compulsory.[7]
* 13 August – first non-public hanging in Britain – Thomas Wells inside Maidstone Prison by William Calcraft.[5]
* 20 August – Abergele train disaster kills 32 passengers and a fireman.
* 20 October – astronomer Norman Lockyer observes and names the D3 Fraunhofer line in the solar spectrum and concludes that it is caused by a hitherto unidentified chemical element which he later names helium.[8]
* 12 November – Archibald Tait is offered the post of Archbishop of Canterbury.
* 15–24 November – general election, the first under the extended franchise of the Reform Act 1867: Liberal Party victorious.[2]
* 24 November – the Smithfield Meat Market opens in London.[1]
* 3 December – William Ewart Gladstone becomes Prime Minister.
* 10 December
* Whitaker's Almanack first published.[1]
* The world's first traffic lights are installed in Parliament Square in London.[1]

### Undated

[edit]

* The Foreign & Colonial Investment Trust is founded by Philip Rose as The Foreign & Colonial Government Trust, the world's first collective investment scheme.[9]
* Thomas Henry Huxley discovers what he thinks is a primordial matter and names it bathybius haecklii (he admits his mistake in 1871).

## Publications

[edit]

* Wilkie Collins' novel The Moonstone.
* Queen Victoria's diary Leaves from the Journal of Our Life in the Highlands, from 1848 to 1861.

## Births

[edit]

* 5 January – Edward Garnett, writer, critic and literary editor (died 1937)
* 4 February – Constance Markievicz, née Gore-Booth, Anglo-Irish parliamentarian (died 1927 in Ireland)
* 7 February – Aleen Cust, Irish veterinary surgeon (died 1937)
* 12 February – William Faversham, actor (died 1940)
* 22 February – David Devant, stage magician (died 1941)
* 15 March – Grace Chisholm Young, mathematician (died 1944)
* 22 March – Alfred Fowler, astronomer (died 1940)
* 25 March – William Lockwood, cricketer (died 1932)
* 4 April – Philippa Fawcett, mathematician (died 1948)
* 5 April – Percy Furnivall, racing cyclist and surgeon (died 1938)
* 10 April – George Arliss, film actor (died 1946)
* 12 April – J. L. Garvin, newspaper editor (died 1947)
* 14 April – Annie S. D. Maunder, née Russell, Irish-born astronomer (died 1947)
* 25 April – Willie Maley, Irish-born Scotland footballer and manager (died 1958)
* 28 April – Lucy Booth, Salvationist, fifth daughter of William and Catherine Booth (died 1953)
* 30 April – J. B. Christopherson, physician (died 1955)
* 5 June – James Connolly, Scottish-born Irish nationalist leader (executed 1916 in Ireland)
* 6 June – Robert Falcon Scott, Antarctic explorer (died 1912)
* 7 June – Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Scottish architect (died 1928)
* 6 July – Princess Victoria (died 1935)
* 14 July – Gertrude Bell, archaeologist, writer, spy and administrator (died 1926)
* 7 August – Granville Bantock, classical composer and conductor (died 1946)
* 21 October – Ernest Swinton, general, pioneer of the military tank (died 1951)
* 23 October
* Frederick W. Lanchester, automotive engineer (died 1946)
* William Rylands, businessman and baronet (died 1948)
* 30 November
* Angela Brazil, writer of schoolgirl fiction (died 1947)
* Ernest Newman, music critic (died 1959)

## Deaths

[edit]

* 10 February – Sir David Brewster, Scottish scientist, inventor and writer (born 1781)
* 24 February – John Herapath, physicist and railway journalist (born 1790)
* 25 February – James Parke, 1st Baron Wensleydale, judge (born 1782)
* 28 March – James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan, military leader (born 1797)
* 12 April – James Gascoyne-Cecil, 2nd Marquess of Salisbury, politician (born 1791)
* 2 May – James Wilson Carmichael, marine painter (born 1800)
* 7 May – Henry Peter Brougham, Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain (born 1778)
* 11 May – John Crawfurd, Scottish physician, colonial administrator, diplomat and author; last British Resident of Singapore (born 1783)
* 26 July – Robert Rolfe, 1st Baron Cranworth, Lord Chancellor (born 1791)
* 29 July
* John Elliotson, physician and author (born 1791)
* Sir John Lillie, army officer, entrepreneur and inventor (born 1790)
* 3 August – Edward Welch, Welsh-born architect (born 1806)
* 17 August – Duncan Forbes, linguist (born 1798)
* 24 September – Henry Hart Milman, historian and ecclesiastic (born 1791)
* 27 October – Charles Longley, Archbishop of Canterbury (born 1794)
* 28 October – Sir Richard Pakenham, diplomat, Ambassador to the United States (born 1797)
* 23 December – Sir Herbert Edwardes, general and colonial administrator (born 1819)

## References

[edit]

1. ^ a b c d e f Penguin Pocket On This Day. Penguin Reference Library. 2006. ISBN 0-14-102715-0.
2. ^ a b Palmer, Alan; Palmer, Veronica (1992). The Chronology of British History. London: Century Ltd. pp. 289–290\. ISBN 0-7126-5616-2.289-290&rft.pub=Century+Ltd&rft.date=1992&rft.isbn=0-7126-5616-2&rft.aulast=Palmer&rft.aufirst=Alan&rft.au=Palmer,+Veronica&rfr_id=info:sid/en.wikipedia.org:1868+in+the+United+Kingdom" class="Z3988">
3. ^ Beadle, Jeremy; Harrison, Ian (2007). Firsts, Lasts & Onlys: Crime. London: Robson Books. ISBN 978-1-905798-04-9.
4. ^ Moody, T. W.; et al., eds. (1989). A New History of Ireland. 8: A Chronology of Irish History. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-821744-2.
5. ^ a b "Timeline of capital punishment in Britain". Retrieved 2 February 2011.
6. ^ "Berkshire Quarter Sessions". Jackson's Oxford Journal. 4 July 1868.
7. ^ Ellens, J. P. (1987). "Lord John Russell and the Church Rate Conflict: the Struggle for a Broad Church, 1834–1868". The Journal of British Studies. 26 (2): 232–257\. doi:10.1086/385887.232-257&rft.date=1987&rft_id=info:doi/10.1086/385887&rft.aulast=Ellens&rft.aufirst=J.+P.&rfr_id=info:sid/en.wikipedia.org:1868+in+the+United+Kingdom" class="Z3988">
8. ^ Hampel, Clifford A. (1968). The Encyclopedia of the Chemical Elements. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold. pp. 256–268\. ISBN 0-442-15598-0.256-268&rft.pub=Van+Nostrand+Reinhold&rft.date=1968&rft.isbn=0-442-15598-0&rft.aulast=Hampel&rft.aufirst=Clifford+A.&rfr_id=info:sid/en.wikipedia.org:1868+in+the+United+Kingdom" class="Z3988">
9. ^ Fixsen, Rachel (27 October 2000). "There's life in the old investment trust yet!". The Independent. London. Archived from the original on 1 May 2022. Retrieved 4 November 2007.

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1868 in Europe

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