Timeline

Below is a timeline of a few of the events that happened during the time of our ancestors.

1685 – 88	Reign of King James II.
1689 – 92	Jacobean Rising in Scotland.
1689 – 1702	Reign of King William III & Queen Mary II.
1702 - 14	Reign of Queen Anne.
1714 – 27	Reign of King George I.
1727 – 60	Reign of King George II.
1760 – 1820	Reign of King George III.
1773	Boston Tea Party.
1775 – 83	American War of Independence.
1789 – 99	French Revolution.
1798	Introduction of Income Tax.
1803 – 15	Napoleonic Wars.
1813	Monopoly of the East India Company abolished.
1815	Corn Laws passed to protect British agriculture from cheap imports.
1820 – 30	Reign of King George IV.
1823	Rugby Football invented by William Web Ellis.
1825	John Nash reconstructs Buckingham Palace.
1825	Locomotion No. 1 built by George Stephenson.
1829	Metropolitan Police Force set up by Robert Peel.
1830 – 37	Reign of King William IV.
1831	New London Bridge opened over the River Thames.
1832	Cholera spreads from Sunderland, killing over 20,000 people.
1833	Abolition of slavery throughout the British Empire.
1833	Factory Act passed prohibiting children aged less than nine from working in factories.
1834	Poor Law Act passed creating workhouses for the poor.
1834	Tolpuddle Martyrs transported to Australia.
1834	Fire destroys the Palace of Westminster.
1835	Henry Fox Talbot creates the first photographic negative.
1836	Births, marriages and deaths must be registered by law.
1836	Charles Darwin returns after five year voyage on HMS Beagle.
1837 – 1901	Reign of Queen Victoria.
1839 – 42	First Opium War and Britain gains Hong Kong.
1840	Penny post service begins.
1843	Launch of SS Great Britain, the world's first all metal ship.
1844	Railway building mania starts. 5,000 miles of track are built by 1846.
1845 – 49	Irish potato famine.
1846	Repeal of the Corn Laws.
1851	Great Exhibition in Hyde Park.
1853	Vaccination against smallpox made compulsory.
1853 – 56	Crimean War.
1854	Charge of the Light Brigade.
1854	10,000 die of cholera in London from contaminated water in the Broad Street area.
1858	London came to a standstill in the hot summer because of The Great Stink caused by inadequate sewers.
1858	First trans-Atlantic telegraph service.
1861 – 65	American Civil War.
1871	Great Fire of Chicago.
1871	Trade Unions legalised.
1875	Sir Joseph Bazalgette completes new sewers in London following The Great Stink of 1858.
1876	Graham Bell demonstrates the telephone.
1879	Zulu War
1884	Third Reform Act gives all adult men the vote.
1888	The Jack the Ripper killings.
1891	Free schooling introduced.
1899 – 1901	Boxer Rebellion in China.
1899 – 1902	Boer War in South Africa.
1901 – 10	Reign of King Edward VII.
1905	Motor buses first used in London.
1907	Taxi-cabs are legally recognized in Britain for the first time.
1907	Parliament rejects Channel Tunnel scheme. Finally opens 6th May 1994.
1908	Pensions introduced for over 70’s with a weekly income less than 10 shillings (50 pence).
1908	The Children’s Act establishes separate juvenile courts to try children.
1909	Introduction of Labour Exchanges.
1910 – 36	Reign of King George V
1911	National Insurance Act provides sickness & unemployment benefits.
1912	RMS Titanic sinks with the loss of more than 1,500 passengers and crew.
1914 – 18	World War 1.
1917 – 23	Russian Civil War.
1918	The Reform Act gives votes to women over 30.
1919 – 21	Irish War of Independence.
1920	World wide flu epidemic kills 20 million people.
1922	The British Broadcasting Company starts radio transmissions.
1927 – 49	Chinese Civil War.
1928	Alexander Fleming discovers penicillin.td>
1928	All women over the age of 21 get the vote.
1929	Start of the Great Depression which lasted almost 10 years.
1932	George V makes the first annual Christmas broadcast on radio.
1935	Robert Watson-Watt demonstrates Radar.
1936 – 39	Spanish Civil War.
1936	Jarrow crusade of unemployed marches on London.
1936	Reign of King Edward VIII – abdicates in December.
1936	The BBC inaugurates the world’s first television service.
1936 – 52	Reign of King George VI.
1937	Frank Whittle invents the jet engine.
1939 – 45	World War 2.
1948	National Health Service establishes free medical treatment.
1950 – 53	Korean War.
1952 - 2022	Reign of Queen Elizabeth II. The coronation was on the 2nd June 1953 at Westminster Abbey, London.
1955 – 75	Vietnam War.
1967	Capital punishment abolished in the UK for murder.
1971	Decimal currency is introduced on February 15th.
1973	Britain joins the European Community.
1989	Fall of the Berlin Wall and end of the Cold War.
1993	European Parliament comes into force.
1994	Opening of the Channel Tunnel on 6th May between England and France.
1997	Hong Kong reverts to China after 155 years of British rule.
2007	Queen Elizabeth II becomes the oldest ever reigning British monarch.
2008	World-wide banking crisis. Government has to bail out two major British banks.
2015	Queen Elizabeth II becomes the longest reigning UK monarch.
2016	Britain voted to leave the European Union. This became known as Brexit.
2019	A novel coronavirus, officially known as COVID-19, was first identified in Wuhan, China.
2020	Britain formally leaves the European Union.
2020	The coronavirus, COVID-19, rapidly spreads and is declared a pandemic, resulting in countries imposing travel restrictions and self-isolation to reduce the spread of the virus.
2022	Queen Elizabeth II died on the 8th September.
2022	Reign of King Charles III.
2023	The minimum age for marriage in England and Wales raised from 16 to 18. The minimum age in Scotland and Northern Ireland remains at 16.
2023	Coronation of King Charles III on the 6th May at Westminster Abbey, London.