Suvarna Garge (Editor)

1868 in the United Kingdom

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Events from the year 1868 in the United Kingdom.

Contents

Incumbents

  • Monarch — Victoria
  • Prime Minister —
  • until 27 February: The Earl of Derby (Conservative
  • 27 February-1 December: Benjamin Disraeli (Conservative)
  • starting 3 December: William Ewart Gladstone (Liberal)

    • Events

  • 2 January — British Expedition to Abyssinia: Robert Napier leads an expedition to free captive British officials and missionaries.
  • 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.
  • 9–13 April — Expedition to Abyssinia: At the Battle of Magdala, Robert Napier decisively defeats the emperor Tewodros II.
  • 10–11 May — "Murphy riots" against Irish people in Ashton-under-Lyne.
  • 26 May — Last public hanging in Britain — Fenian bomber Michael Barrett outside Newgate Prison in London for his part in the Clerkenwell explosion of 1867.
  • 29 May — Capital Punishment Amendment Act abolishes public hanging in Britain.
  • 2 June — The first Trades Union Congress is held in Manchester.
  • 29 June — The Press Association founded in London.
  • July — The Summer assize for Berkshire is moved from Abingdon to Reading, 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.
  • 13 August — First non-public hanging in Britain — Thomas Wells inside Maidstone Prison.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • 24 November — The Smithfield Meat Market opens in London.
  • 3 December — William Ewart Gladstone becomes Prime Minister.
  • 10 December
  • Whitaker's Almanack first published.
  • The world's first traffic lights are installed in Parliament Square in London.

    • Undated

  • Cardwell Reforms abolish flogging in the peacetime British Army.
  • Church rate ceases to be compulsory.
  • Thomas Henry Huxley discovers what he thinks is a primordial matter and names it bathybius haecklii (he admits his mistake in 1871).

    • Publications

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

    • Births

  • 7 February — Aleen Cust, Irish veterinary surgeon (died 1937)
  • 22 February — David Devant, stage magician (died 1941)
  • 22 March — Alfred Fowler, astronomer (died 1940)
  • 25 March — William Lockwood, cricketer (died 1932)
  • 10 April — George Arliss, actor (died 1946)
  • 28 April — Lucy Booth, Salvationist, fifth daughter of William and Catherine Booth (died 1953)
  • 6 June — Robert Falcon Scott, 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)

    • Deaths

  • 10 February — David Brewster, scientist, inventor and writer (born 1781)
  • 28 March — James Thomas Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan, military leader (born 1797)
  • 2 May — James Wilson Carmichael, marine painter (born 1800)
  • 7 May — Henry Peter Brougham, Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain (born 1778)
  • 29 July — John Elliotson, doctor and author (born 1791)
  • 17 August — Duncan Forbes, linguist (born 1798)
  • 24 September — Henry Hart Milman, historian and ecclesiastic (born 1791)
  • 27 October — Charles Thomas Longley, Archbishop of Canterbury (born 1794)

    • References

    1868 in the United Kingdom Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA


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