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1781 -

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Timeline

Sarah BURLESON (1781 - )

	Date	Event(s)
1	1781	1781: Great Britain - Frederick William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus by its movement, although at the time he supposed it to be a comet 1781: Great Britain - Matthew Boulton and James Watt produce an improved steam engine with rotary motion achieving significant impact - it means that manufacturers are no longer restricted to site with natural power (i.e., water, wood for charcoal) 17 Oct 1781: USA - The Americans obtain a great victory of British troops at the Siege of Yorktown
2	1782	1782: Ireland - Ireland obtains short-lived parliament 22 Mar 1782: Great Britain - Lord North's government collapses
3	1783	1783: Great Britain - Joseph Michel and Jacques 1783: Great Britain - Fox-North coalition established 1783: Great Britain - Britain recognises American independence at the Treaty of Paris. 1783: Ireland - Act of Renunciation gives Ireland rights in legislation and judication 1783: Great Britain - William Pitt the Younger becomes Prime Minister, simplifies taxes and customs duties, tries to pacify Ireland, abolish slave-trading and laws preventing Catholics holding office; returns Florida and Minorca to Spain and Senegal to France 1783: Great Britain - Englishman Henry Cort invents the Rolling Mill for steel production. 1783: Great Britain - S 1783: Great Britain - Benjamin Hanks patents the self-winding clock. 2 Apr 1783: Great Britain - William Bentinck, Duke of Portland Prime minister (Whig)
4	1784	1784: Great Britain - First edition of The Times newspaper 1784: Great Britain - Introduction of mail coach 1784: Great Britain - Andrew Meikle invents the threshing machine. 1784: Great Britain - Joseph Bramah invents the safety lock. 1784: USA - Benjamin Franklin develops bifocal eyeglasses.
5	1785	1785: Great Britain - William Pitt's motion for Parliamentary Reform is defeated 1785: Great Britain - Charles-Augustin de Coulomb invents the torsion balance. 1785: Great Britain - Blanchard invents a working parachute. 1785: Great Britain - Edmund Cartwright invents the power loom. 1785: France - Claude Berthollet invents chemical bleaching. 1785: Scotland - Glasgow triples in size, has 54 cotton mills in full work during period to 1818 1785: USA - Oliver Evans of Newport, Delaware invented the automatic flour-milling machinery that revolutionized the industry.
6	1786	1786: Great Britain - The Eden commercial treaty with France is drawn up 1786: Pennsylvania, USA - John Fitch invents a steamboat.
7	1787	1787: Windsor, Great Britain - In Windsor Great Park, King George III alights from carriage and addresses oak tree as King of Prussia, but eventually recovers from this attack of dementia; first colonies in Australia, first iron boat launched
8	1788	1788: Great Britain - Time to travel from London to Manchester reduced from 4.5 days to 28 hours 22 Jan 1788: Great Britain - Birth of Lord Byron (died 1824)
9	1789	1789: France - French Revolution, Louis XVI, many aristocrats and others executed, France declares war on European monarchies 1789: France - The guillotine is invented. 1789: Great Britain - The French Revolution sounded the death knoll toward elaborate and affected dress and hairdos. The powdered wig and towering women's hair styles passed from fashion. Simpler, more practical clothes emerged. Boys wore the skeleton suit, often with a comfortable open collar, and by the end of the century with plebian long trousers. 1789: USA - Thomas Jefferson brought a pasta making machine back with him when he returned to America after serving as ambassador to France. 1789: Switzerland - Dr. Pierre Ordinaire creates an absinthe elixir 30 Apr 1789: USA - George Washington first president of the United States 1789-1797.
10	1790	1790: Great Britain - Edmund Burke publishes his Reflections on the Revolution in France 1790: Great Britain - Lower-class radicalism increases, Habeas Corpus Act temporarily suspended 1790: USA - The United States issued its first patent to William Pollard of Philadelphia for a machine that roves and spins cotton. 1790: USA - Samuel Slater opens the first U.S. cotton mill in Rhode Island. Thomas Saint in England invents the first cloth-stitching machine. 1790: Great Britain - Marie, Vicomte de Botherel, born. He installed kitchens on buses in Paris suburbs in 1839, the first restaurant cars. 1790: Great Britain - Marie Harel is said to have developed Camembert cheese in Normandy.
11	1791	1791: Great Britain - The Celerifere, an early version of the bicycle, was built by Comte Mede de Sivrac. It was basically a scooter with a high seat 1791: Great Britain - James Boswell publishes his Life of Johnson and Thomas Paine, his Rights of Man 1791: Great Britain - John Barber invents the gas turbine.
12	1792	1792: Italy - Volta discovered he could arrange metals in a series in such a way that chemical energy is converted into electrical energy; that is, two dissimilar metals are submerged in an electrolyte and connected by an circuit and thereby exchange electrons. By 1800, he had invented the so-called voltaic cell, a pile of such metals 'consisting of pairs of silver and zinc disks separated by pieces of moist cardboard' 1792: Great Britain - Coal gas is used for lighting for the first time. Mary Wollstonecraft publishes her Vindication of the Rights of Women 1792: Great Britain - Cartwright invents steam-powered weaving loom 1792: Great Britain - The first ambulance.
13	1793	1793: Great Britain - Economic depression 1793: Great Britain - Speculative 'Canal Bubble' bursts 1793: Great Britain - Board of Agriculture formed to popularise new methods and machinery 1793: Great Britain - Britain becomes foremost world trader during period to 1815 1793: Great Britain - Eli Whitney invents the cotton gin which efficiently separates cotton fibers from the seeds, allowing one person to do a job once done by 50 people. This profoundly changes the economics of raising cotton, revitalizing slavery in the American South. 1 Feb 1793: Great Britain - France declares war on Britain
14	1794	1794: Great Britain - Erasmus Darwin, Charles' grandfather, proposed that 'warm-blooded animals have arisen from one living filament...possessing the faculty of continuing to improve by its own inherent activity, and of delivering those improvements by generation to its posterity.' 1794: Great Britain - Metric system introduced in France 1794: Great Britain - More lower-class radicalism, Habeas Corpus suspended again, instigators charged with treason, in Scotland found guilty and transported 1794: Great Britain - Welshman Philip Vaughan invents ball bearings. 1794: Great Britain - Total of 40,000 British troops die in West Indies in war with France over two year period 1 Jun 1794: Great Britain - Howe defeats French fleet at Ushant
15	1795	1795: Great Britain - The 'Speenhamland' system of outdoor relief is adopted, making wages up to equal the cost of subsistence 1795: Ireland - Near-civil war between Protestants and Catholics in Ireland, erupts in 1798, takes nearly a year to suppress 1795: Great Britain - New Treason and Sedition Act passed 1795: Great Britain - Francois Appert invents the preserving jar for food.
16	1796	1796: Great Britain - Edward Jenner investigated the folk tale that milk maids were immune to small pox, the virus variola major, and in a brief series of experiments confirmed that exposure to cow pox, the virus vaccinia, rendered immunity 1796: Italy - General Napoleon Bonaparte appears on scene, attacks Austrian armies 1796: Ceylon - British conquer Ceylon
17	1797	1797: Europe - All Europe makes peace with France save Britain, sea battle off Cape St. Vincent (off Spanish coast), Jervis and Nelson (then Captain) utterly defeat big French and Spanish fleet 1797: Great Britain - Royal Navy sailors at Spithead and the Nore mutiny over deplorable conditions 1797: USA - John Adams president of the USA 1797-1801. 1797: Great Britain - A British inventor, Henry Maudslay invents the first metal or precision lathe. 1797: Great Britain - Wittemore patents a carding machine. 1797: Great Britain - John Hetherington in London develops the top hat. 1797: Great Britain - Major Dubied purchased the formula for an 'absinthe elixir' and together with his son, Henri-Louis Pernod sets up an absinthe factory in Switzerland.
18	1798	1798: Great Britain - Thomas Robert Malthus, in his Essay on the Principle of Population, contended that population increses by a geometric ratio whereas the means of subsistence increase by an arithmetic ratio. 1798: Great Britain - Introduction of An income tax of ten percent on incomes over 1798: Egypt - Battle of the Nile, Napoleon's Mediterranean fleet smashed 1798: Ireland - Catholic uprising 1798: Great Britain - Wordsworth and Coleridge publish Lyrical Ballads 1798: Great Britain - Franco-American Naval War: United States vs France 1798-1800. 1798: Great Britain - Aloys Senefelder invents lithography. 1798: Great Britain - The first soft drink id invented.
19	1799	1799: Great Britain - Trade Unions are suppressed. Napoleon is appointed First Consul in France 1799: France - Napoleon is appointed First Consul in France 1799: Great Britain - Three-year commercial boom in Britain begins 1799: France - Napoleon becomes President of France; amendments to Treason and Sedition Act 1799: Great Britain - Alessandro Volta invents the battery. 1799: Great Britain - Louis Robert invents the Fourdrinier Machine for sheet paper making. 1799: Great Britain - Deaths among women 1 in 913, children 1 in 115. For the first time London birth rate passes death rate, continues until introduction of water closet deposits effluence in Thames (source of potable water) and typhoid returns 1799: Great Britain - Eliza Acton Born. She wrote the first cookbook for the housewife, rather than for the professional chef. 1799: France - Joseph-Louis Proust, a French chemist, extracted sugar from grapes, and proved it identical to sugar extracted from honey.
20	1800	1800: UK - Act of Union with Ireland unites Parliaments of England and Ireland 1800: UK - Battle of Copenhagen, Napoleon's Danish fleet decimated 1800: Ireland - After Catholic rebellion in Ireland Pitt proposes one Parliament for both countries, but King George refuses, Pitt resigns; Sir Joseph Banks introduces voltaic battery 1800: UK - Sir Joseph Banks introduces voltaic battery 1800: UK - Robert Owen buys mills at New Lanark, turns into successful humane model 1800: France - Frenchman J.M. Jacquard invents the Jacquard Loom. 1800: UK - Over 20 miles of railway tracks laid 1800: UK - Over a ten year period, 30 acres of new docks are built in London, which becomes the greatest port in the world 1800: UK - Over the coming century, approx. 1 million people emigrate from Britain. 50,000 are prisoners transported to Maryland or Botany Bay 1800: USA - William Young in Philadelphia offers shoes made for the left and the right foot.
21	1801	1801: UK - The first British Census is undertaken 1801: UK - Population of England and Wales now 10 million, Great Britain estimated at 11 million, biggest increases in North and West Midlands, London now 1 million plus, Manchester 137,201, Glasgow and Edinburgh 100,000 plus, England has 8 towns larger than 50,000, 6 of them in the North; Lord Dundas travels on Scottish canal in small steamboat - beginning of steamboat travel 1801: UK - Tripolitan War 1801-1805. Barbary Wars: also fought in 1815. United States vs Morocco, Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli 1801-1805. 1801: USA - Thomas Jefferson president of the USA 1801-1809.
22	1802	1802: UK - Peace with France is established. Peel introduces the first factory legislation 1802: UK - Ineffective Treaty of Amiens signed with French
23	1803	1803: UK - Beginning of the Napoleonic Wars. Britain declares war on France. Parliament passes the General Enclosure Act, simplifying the process of enclosing common land 1803: UK - Parliament passes the General Enclosure Act, simplifying the process of enclosing common land 1803: UK - Threat of French invasion causes flood of volunteers, army of half a million fielded during period to 1805
24	1804	1804: France - Napoleon crowned Emperor of France 1804: UK - John Dalton establishes atomic theory 1804: UK - Richard Trevithick, an English mining engineer, developed the first steam-powered locomotive. 1804: UK - Freidrich Winzer (Winsor) was the first person to patent gas lighting.
25	1805	1805: UK - Ludolf Christian Treviranus said that spermatozoa were analogous to pollen 21 Oct 1805: UK - Battle of Trafalgar, Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson trounces French and Spanish fleets for Britain, is mortally wounded; John Wilkinson expires, buried in iron coffin
26	1806	1806: Africa - Cape Colony passes under British control 1806: UK - Louis Nicolas Vauquelin and Pierre Jean Robiquet isolated the first amino acid, asparagine' from asparagus. 1806: UK - Sir Humphry Davy discovers sodium, magnesium, potassium, many other metals, and chlorine 23 Jan 1806: UK - Death of Pitt the Younger
27	1807	1807: UK - Trading in slaves made illegal in England by work of Wilberforce 1807: UK - William Bentinck, Duke of Portland Prime Minister to 1809 (Whig) 1807: USA - Robert Fulton ushered in the era of self-propelled ships with his construction of a commercially viable paddle-wheel steamboat
28	1808	1808: Peninsular War to drive the French out of Spain (until 1814) 1808: Portugal - Battle of Vimeiro is a British victory; British casualties less than 40,000 dead
29	1809	1809: UK - Two-year commercial boom in Britain 1809: USA - James Madison president of the USA 1809-1817. 1809: UK - Sir Humphry Davy invents the first electric light - the first arc lamp. 1809: UK - Grain famine each of the years to 1812
30	1810	1810: UK - Final illness of George III begins 1810: Germany - Frederick Koenig invents an improved printing press. 1810: UK - Over the next decade the death rate in England and Wales reaches 21.1 in 1000
31	1811	1811: UK - Depression caused by Orders of Council. 1811: UK - George III's illness leads to his son, the Prince of Wales, becoming Regent 1811: UK - Ned Ludd leads rioters who smash machinery, burn factories, followers known as Luddites 1811: UK - Birth rate falls all over England during the next 20 years
32	1812	1812: France - Georges Cuvier, in Discours sur les r 1812: UK - Prime Minister Spencer Perceval is assassinated in the House of Commons by a disgruntled bankrupt 1812: Russia - Napoleon attacks Russia, defeated 1812: London, UK - Cylinder Printing press invented and adopted by The Times 1812: USA - War of 1812: United States vs Great Britain 1812-1815.
33	1813	1813: UK - Canned food was invented for the British Navy by Peter Durand. The cans were made of solid iron and usually weighed more than the food inside them 1813: UK - Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is published. 1813: India - The monopolies of the East India Company are abolished 1813: Portugal - British victory at Battle of Vittorio 1813: UK - 2300 power looms in use, by 1833 - 100,000 1813: USA - Creek War: United States vs Creek Indians 1813-1814.
34	1814	1814: France - Napoleon abdicates, exiled to Isle of Elba 1814: UK - George Stephenson designs a steam locomotive. 1814: UK - Joseph von Fraunhofer invents the spectrocope for the chemical analysis of glowing objects. 1814: UK - The first plastic surgery is performed
35	1815	1815: Europe - Peace is established in Europe at the Congress of Vienna. 1815: UK - The Corn Laws are passed by Parliament to protect British agriculture from cheap imports 1815: UK - Start of two-year commercial boom in Britain 1815: UK - England has now 2600 miles of canals, 500 in Scotland and Ireland; China clippers take 109 days to sail 15000 miles from Canton to English Channel; Britain's population estimated at 13 million; Britain imports 82 million pounds of raw cotton, by 1860 1000 million pounds; coal output 16 million tons (30 miillion by 1835, 50 million by 1848) 1815: UK - Sir Humphry Davy invents the miner's lamp. 1815: UK - Over the next fifteen years, five new states are founded along Mississippi Valley, mostly due to people fleeing Depression; more go to Canada, as many as 20,000 some years, frequently Scots Mar 1815: Elba, France - Napoleon escapes, leads French in war once more 18 Jun 1815: Belgium - Duke of Wellington trounces the French at Waterloo with timely help of Blucher (Prussia)
36	1816	1816: UK - Violation of game laws can result in seven years transportation
37	1817	1817: UK - Economic slump in Britain leads to the 'Blanketeers' March' and other disturbances 1817: USA - James Monroe president of the USA 1817-1825.
38	1818	1818: UK - Mary Shelley publishes her Frankenstein 1818: India - Britain defeats Maratha, now effective ruler of India
39	1819	1819: UK - Troops intervene at a mass political reform meeting in Manchester, killing and wounding four hundred people at the 'Peterloo Massacre' 1819: UK - Singapore founded as free trade port 1819: UK - Samuel Fahnestock patents a 'soda fountain'
40	1820	1820: UK - A radical plot to murder the Cabinet, known as the Cato Street Conspiracy, fails 1820: UK - Trial of Queen Caroline, in which George IV attempts to divorce her for adultery 1820: UK - Death of George III, blind and insane 1820: UK - London's population estimated at 1,274,000 1820: UK - Government finances scheme to send out 6,000 settlers to Cape in South Africa 1820: UK - George IV, ruler of England to 1830. House of Hanover: Eldest son of George III, Prince Regent, from Feb 1811.
41	1821	1821: UK - Queen Caroline is excluded from the coronation 1821: UK - Start of two years of famine in Ireland 1821: UK - Michael Faraday invents electric motor and generator
42	1822	1822: France - First prototype Espresso machine 1822: Ireland - Famine in Ireland prompts migration to US and Canada
43	1823	1823: UK - The Royal Academy of Music is established in London. 1823: UK - The British Museum is extended and extensively rebuilt to house an expanding collection 1823: UK - Mackintosh (raincoat) invented by Charles Mackintosh of Scotland.
44	1824	1824: UK - The National Gallery is established 1824: UK - Commercial boom in Britain 1824: UK - Professor Michael Faraday invents the first toy balloon. 1824: UK - Englishman Joseph Aspdin patents Portland cement, the modern building material.
45	1825	1825: UK - Nash reconstructs Buckingham Palace. 1825: UK - Trade Unions are legalized. 1825: UK - Commercial depression in Britain 1825: UK - The world's first railway service, the Stockton and Darlington Railway opens 1825: USA - John Quincy Adams president of the USA 1825-1829. 1825: UK - William Sturgeon invented the electromagnet. 1825: Settlement of Canada, Australia and New Zealand begins in earnest over the next 25 years
46	1826	1826: France - One of the first print references to fondue written by Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin in his Physiologie du Gout 1826: France - Physicist Joseph Niepce makes the first known photograph, View from a Window at Gras, via a heliograph process on a metal plate.
47	1827	1827: UK - Printing press can now print 4-5000 copies/hour, 11.5 million copies of newspapers pour over Britain 1827: UK - Charles Wheatstone invents the microphone. 1827: UK - John Walker invents modern matches.
48	1828	1828: UK - The Duke of Wellington becomes British Prime Minister
49	1829	1829: UK - Parliament passes the Catholic Relief Act, ending most restrictions on Catholic Civil Rights. They are allowed to own property and run for public office, including parliament 1829: UK - Sir Robert Peel founds the Metropolitan Police Force, constables become known as bobbies 1829: USA - Andrew Jackson president of the USA to 1837. 1829: USA - William Austin Burt patents a typographer, a predecessor to the typewriter. 1829: France - Louis Braille invents braille printing.
50	1830	1830: UK - Opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. 1830: UK - First major cholera epidemic in Britain starts and lasts two years. 1830: Australia - Free migrants to Australia = 1500, by 1841 = 32,000 1830: UK - Starving field labourers in southern counties riot for higher wages, 19 hanged, 481 deported to Australia 1830: France - B. Thimonnier invents a sewing machine. 1830: UK - William IV, ruler of England to 1837. House of Hanover: 3rd son of George III, married Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen. 1830: UK - Royal Commission finds that mail coach average speed is 9 miles per hour 26 Jun 1830: UK - Death of George IV
51	1831	1831: UK - Michael Faraday, in the first in a series of Experimental Researches in Electricity, discovered the means of producing electricity from magnetism, i.e., electromagnetic induction, the generation of an electric field by a changing magnetic field. This is the principle of the dynamo 1831: UK - Swing Riots' in rural areas against the mechanization of agricultural activities. 1831: UK - The new London Bridge is opened over the River Thames 1831: UK - Population of England and Wales now 14 million 1831: UK - American, Cyrus H. McCormick invents the first commercially successful reaper.
52	1832	1832: UK - The first or Great Reform Act is passed. This climax of a period of political reform extends the vote to a further 500,000 people and redistributes Parliamentary seats on a more equitable basis 1832: UK - Cholera Act 1832: UK - House-breaking, sheep-stealing and forgery removed from list of capital crimes in England 1832: UK - Commission created to look into inhumanity of transporting prisoners to Australia, another in 1837, transportation to New South Wales finally stops in 1840 1832: USA - Texas Revolutionary War: Texas vs Mexico 1832-1836. 1832: UK - Age of Coal and Iron or The Railway Age, dooms canals and stage coaches during period to 1867. Leaders are mostly Quakers of Midlands and North: Peases, Croppers, Sturges
53	1833	1833: UK - Abolition of Slavery throughout the British Empire. 1833: UK - Parliament passes the Factory Act, prohibiting children aged less than nine from working in factories, and reducing the working hours of women and older children 1833: UK - Start of the Oxford Movement in the Anglican Church
54	1834	1834: UK - Charles Babbage designed a programmable mechanical calculating machine, or 'analytical engine,' that could carry out arithmetic operations specified on punch cards and choose the sequence of operations. Although the design was never built, Augusta Ada Byron wrote programs to demonstrate its potential power. 1834: UK - Robert Owen founds the Grand National Consolidated Trade Union. The government acts against 'illegal oaths' in such unionism, resulting in the Tolpuddle Martyrs being transported to Australia 1834: London, UK - Fire destroys the Palace of Westminster 1834: UK - New Poor Law Act, object to make life in the workhouse far worse than in fields and factories 1834: USA - Jacob Perkins invents an early refrigerator (really an ether ice machine). 1834: USA - Henry Blair patents a corn planter, he is the second black person to receive a U.S. patent.
55	1835	1835: UK - Parliament passes the Municipal Reform Act, requiring members of town councils to be elected by ratepayers and councils to publish their financial accounts 1835: UK - Commercial boom. 'Little' railway mania across Britain starts and continues into 1836 1835: UK - Englishman Francis Pettit Smith invents the propeller. 1835: UK - Solymon Merrick patents the wrench. 1835: UK - Charles Babbage invents a mechanical calculator.
56	1836	1836: UK - William Lovett founds London Working Men's Association, beginning of Chartism 1836: USA - Samuel Colt invented the first revolver. 1836: South Africa - Boers leave British South Africa in search of independence on Great Trek (to 1840)
57	1837	1837: UK - Charles Dickens publishes Oliver Twist, drawing attention to Britain's poor. 1837: UK - Death of William IV 1837: USA - Martin van Buren president of the USA 1837-1841. 1837: UK - English schoolmaster Rowland Hill invents the postage stamp. 1837: UK - Victoria I, ruler of England to 1901. House of Hanover: Daughter of Edward, 4th son of George III Jul 1837: UK - Births, deaths and marriages must be registered by law
58	1838	1838: UK - The Anti-Corn Law League is established. Publication of the People's Charter. The start of Chartism
59	1839	1839: USA - First use of OK in print (in Boston Morning Post) 1839: UK - William Henry Fox-Talbot produces photographs from negatives 1839: France - Louis Daguerre and J.N. Niepce co-invent Daguerreotype photography. 1839: UK - Kirkpatrick Macmillan invents a bicycle. 1839: USA - Charles Goodyear invents rubber vulcanization. 1839: UK - Welshman Sir William Robert Grove conceives of the first hydrogen fuel cell. 1839: USA - Thaddeus Fairbanks invents platform scales. 1839: UK - First railway timetable published by Quaker Bradshaw 1839: China - The Opium Wars until 1842, Britain forces China to take European goods
60	1840	1840: UK - Victoria I marries Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. 1840: UK - There are reckoned to be 107 accountants in London 1840: New Zealand - New Zealand annexed 1840: UK - Englishman John Herschel invents the blueprint. 1840: Australia - During period to 1853 convicts are still sent to Tasmania at the rate of about 4,000 per year 1840: UK - Queen Victoria begins dressing the princes in kilts and sailor suits.
61	1841	1841: UK - The first British Census recording the names of the populace is undertaken. 1841: UK - The Tories come to power. Sir Robert Peel becomes Prime Minister 1841: USA - William Henry Harrison president of the USA. He succumbed to pneumonia in 1841. 1841: USA - John Tyler president of the USA to 1845. He is the first vice president to succeed to the presidency due to death of a president. 1841: UK - Samuel Slocum patents the stapler.
62	1842	1842: UK - First Christmas card 1842: UK - First UK public telegraph lines, from Paddington to Slough and Gosport to London 1842: UK - Lord Shaftesbury's Mines Act forbids underground work for women and children under 10 1842: China - Hong Kong annexed 1842: UK - Joseph Dart builds the first grain elevator.
63	1843	1843: UK - Alexander Bain (1818-1903) invented an early fax machine 1843: UK - About 2000 miles of railway lines now laid
64	1844	1844: UK - Charles Darwin wrote, but didn't publish, an essay presaging the theory of the origin of species. 1844: USA - Samuel Finley Breese Morse demonstrates a telegraph, using a code of his own invention 1844: UK - Parliament passes the Bank Charter Act 1844: Yorkshire, UK - Foundation of the Rochdale Co-Operative Society - Chartist and Owenite workers of Rochdale open Rochdale Pioneers Store (cooperative) in Toad (T'owd) Lane 1844: UK - Royal Commission on the Health of Towns 1844: UK - Two years of railway mania begins across Britain. Massive investment and speculation leads to the laying of 5,000 miles of track 1844: UK - Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children founded 1844: UK - Englishman John Mercer invents mercerized cotton. 1844: UK - Ten Hours Bill limited working hours for women and youths in textile business to 10 hours/day, passes thanks to Lord Shaftesbury's efforts during period to 1847
65	1845	1845: Ireland - Irish Potato Famine kills more than a million people in two years 1845: UK - Frederick Engels publishes The Condition of the Working Class in England 1845: UK - There are reckoned to be 210 accountants in London 1845: UK - General Enclosure Act, further enclosure prohibited 1845: USA - James Polk president of the USA to 1849. 1845: USA - American Elias Howe invents a sewing machine. 1845: UK - Robert William Thomson patents the first vulcanised rubber pneumatic tyre. 1845: India - Conquest of Punjab and Kashmir (to 1849)
66	1846	1846: UK - Repeal of the Corn Laws, Britain moves towards complete free trade 1846: UK - Electric Telegraph Company formed, 17 offices by 1854 1846: USA - Mexican-American War 1846-1848. 1846: USA - Dr. William Morton, a Massachusetts dentist, is the first to use anesthesia for tooth extraction.
67	1847	1847: UK - Flourens discovered the anesthetic properties of chloroform 1847: USA - Levi Strauss invents denim jeans 1847: UK - Hungarian Ignaz Semmelweis invents antisceptics.
68	1848	1848: UK - Major Chartist demonstration in London. 1848: UK - Parliament passes the Public Health Act 1848: UK - Karl Marx publishes The Communist Manifesto and Das Kapital 1848: UK - 5000 miles of railway tracks now laid, 2000 of which were equipped with telegraph wires; Britain now produces about half of world's pig iron, trebles output within 30 years 1848: UK - Queen's College for Women founded
69	1849	1849: USA - Zachary Taylor president of the USA 1849-1850. Zachary Taylor died while in office. 1849: UK - Walter Hunt invents the safety pin.
70	1850	1850: USA - American Joel Houghton invented the first dishwasher. He made it out of wood, and gave it a hand-turned wheel that splashed water on the dishes inside. It didn't really work, but it did get the first 'dishwasher' patent 1850: UK - First machine-made paper bag 1850: UK - Mines Inspectorate created, helps protect adult male mine workers 1850: USA - Millard Fillmore president of the USA 1850-1853. Vice president under Zachary Taylor, he was sworn in as president after Taylor's death.
71	1851	1851: UK - The Great Exhibition is staged in Hyde Park. Thanks to Prince Albert, it is a great success 1851: UK - Window tax abolished 1851: USA - Patent for sewing machine issued to Isaac Singer 1851: UK - British Census shows 10,736,000 females, 8,155,000 of whom were aged 10 and older, largest occupational group domestic service workers, 905,000, 145,000 washerwomen, 55,000 charwomen (cleaners), 272,000 in cotton industry, 113,000 in woolen industry, 140,000 in lace, hosiery and linen 1851: Europe - First submarine cable, Dover to Calais 1851: London, UK - Reuters opens news agency 1851: Africa - Livingstone's explorations begin 1851: Australia - Population of Australia rises from 405,000 in 1851 to 1,168,000 in 1861 Sep 1851: Melbourne, Australia - Gold fever - 19,000 immigrants land in one month, for the whole year 94,664, seven times as many as 1851
72	1852	1852: UK - Death of the Duke of Wellington 1852: UK - Derby's first minority Conservative government 1852: UK - Aberdeen's coalition government is established
73	1853	1853: UK - Potato crisps invented by a cook named George Crum. 1853: Crimea - Florence Nightingale first recommended the regimen of cleanliness which dramatically reduced the death rate in hospitals 1853: UK - Vaccination against smallpox is made compulsory 1853: UK - Queen Victoria uses chloroform during birth of Prince Leopold 1853: UK - William Gladstone presents his first budget 1853: UK - Franklin Pierce president of the USA 1853-1857.
74	1854	1854: UK - The Northcote-Trevelyan civil service report is published 1854: UK - John Tyndall demonstrates the principles of fiber optics. 1854: UK - Crimean War begins, as Britain and France attempt to defend European interests in the Middle East against Russia
75	1855	1855: UK - John Snow, investigating London's piped water supply, showed graphically that cholera could be transmitted by water from a particular pump. 1855: UK - Palmerston's first government comes to power
76	1856	1856: Crimea - Crimean War comes to an end. 1856: UK - The Victoria Cross is instituted for military bravery 1856: UK - Every county and borough required to employ police force 1856: UK - Marriage and Divorce Act permits any man to divorce his wife on grounds of adultery, permits woman same but has to also show cruelty or desertion; beforehand, a special Act of Parliament was required for divorce 1856: UK - Britons panicked by false rumours of Napoleon III's designs on Britain 1856: UK - John Stuart Mill publishes Liberty 1856: Great novels: Dickens, Dumas, Flaubert, Turgenev, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy 1856: France - Louis Pasteur invents pasteurisation. 1856: New Zealand - Population of New Zealand rises from less than 60,000 to 350,000 in the period to 1878
77	1857	1857: Atlantic - Cyrus Field made his first attempt at laying a trans-Atlantic telegraph cable. In 1866, his fourth attempt was successful. 1857: China - The Second Opium War opens China to European trade. 1857: India - The Indian Mutiny erupts against British Rule on the sub-continent 1857: USA - James Buchanan president of the USA 1857-1861. 1857: USA - George Pullman invents the Pullman Sleeping Car for train travel.
78	1858	1858: UK - Derby establishes his second minority government 1858: UK - Parliament passes the India Act 1858: UK - Eraser fitted to end of pencil 1858: UK - Jean Lenoir invents an internal combustion engine. 1858: UK - Hamilton Smith patents the rotary washing machine.
79	1859	1859: UK - Charles Darwin's book On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life asserts that all life had a common ancestor and that the origin of species was natural selection 1859: UK - Palmerston brings his second Liberal government to power. 1859: UK - Samuel Smiles' Self-Help published
80	1860	1860: UK - Joseph Wilson Swan invented the light bulb, an incandescent lamp using a carbon filament. 1860: UK - Gladstone's budget and the Anglo-French Cobden Treaty codifies and extends the principles of free trade
81	1861	1861: UK - Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis published his deduction that childbirth fever was transmitted on the hands of doctors during their examinations 1861: UK - Death of Prince Albert, Prince Consort 1861: Australia - Women first given vote 1861: USA - Abraham Lincoln president of the USA 1861-1865. 1861: USA - Elisha Otis patents elevator safety brakes, creating a safer elevator. 1861: USA - Linus Yale invents the Yale lock or cylinder lock. 1861: USA - American Civil War (to 1865)
82	1862	1862: France - Louis Pasteur published the germ theory: infection is caused by self-replicating microorganisms, and that attenuated viral cultures granted immunity. These beneficent antigens he named vaccines in honor of Edward Jenner and his vaccinia virus 1862: UK - Parliament passes the Limited Liability Act in order to provide vital stimulus to accumulation of capital in shares 1862: UK - Alexander Parkes invents the first man-made plastic, Parkesine. 1862: UK - Dr. Richard Gatling patents the machine gun.
83	1863	1863: UK - Edward, Prince of Wales, marries Princess Alexandra of Denmark. 1863: UK - The Salvation Army is founded 1863: UK - First underground railway opens in London
84	1864	1864: UK - Chimney-sweeper's Act, due in part to Charles Kinglsey's Water Babies 1864: UK - Great Battle of Berkhamstead Common saves common land, Epping Forest also saved 1864: UK - Reform Bill, working men given franchise 1864: Canada - First independent dominion in the British Empire under the Dominion of Canada Act 1864: UK - Judge declares trades unions illegal
85	1865	1865: Finland - Nokia corporation established as a forest industry enterprise by mining engineer Fredrik Idestam 1865: UK - Lister, using carbolic acid as antiseptic and sterilizing his instrument, proved the efficacy of antiseptic surgery 1865: UK - Death of Palmerston. Russell establishes his second Liberal government 1865: UK - Lewis Carroll publishes Alice's Adventure in Wonderland 1865: UK - Andrew Johnson president of the USA 1865-1869. Vice president under Abraham Lincoln, he was sworn in as president upon Lincoln's death. 14 Apr 1865: USA - Abraham Lincoln shot by John Wilkes Booth and dies the next day.
86	1866	1866: UK - Gregor Mendel, in Versuche 1866: UK - Alfred Nobel patented dynamite 1866: UK - Russell and Gladstone fail to have their moderate Reform Bill passed in parliament. Derby takes power in his third minority Conservative government 1866: UK - Englishman Robert Whitehead invents a torpedo. 1866: UK - J. Osterhoudt patents the tin can with a key opener.
87	1867	1867: UK - Derby and Benjamin Disraeli's Second Reform Bill doubles the franchise to two million. 1867: UK - Christopher Scholes invents the first practical and modern typewriter.
88	1868	1868: UK - Benjamin Disraeli succeeds Derby as Prime Minister. William Gladstone becomes Prime Minister for the first time 1868: UK - J P Knight invents traffic lights. 1868: USA - George Westinghouse invents air brakes. 1868: UK - Robert Mushet invents tungsten steel.
89	1869	1869: UK - George M. Beard distinguished neurasthenia, a nervous disease of men, from hysteria, a women's disease, as, in an earlier time, men's hypochondriasis had been distinguished from women's vapeurs. Subforms of neurasthenia came to be called phobias. 1869: Ireland - The Irish Church is disestablished. 1869: Egypt - The Suez Canal is opened 1869: UK - Women obtain municipal franchise 1869: USA - Ulysses Grant president of the USA 1869-1877.
90	1870	1870: UK - Primary education becomes compulsory in Britain through the Forster-Ripon English Elementary Education Act (but poor children still roam streets after school). The Act means labourers, spouses and children of succeeding generations can read and write; women permitted to sit on school boards 1870: UK - Parliament passes the Women's Property Act, extending the rights of married women, and the Irish Land Act 1870: UK - First British postcard devised by Anthony Trollope 1870: USA - Wheeler introduces toilet paper roll 1870: Inauguration of London to Calcutta telegraph line, first electronic link between Europe and India 1870: UK - Volume of Britain's external trade equals France, Germany and Italy combined, 3-4 times greater than US; agricultural wages reach height not surpassed for many years 1870: UK - Religious tests abolished for academic posts, patronage abolished for all public offices, competitive exams introduced for Civil Service 1870: Europe - Prussia defeats France in the Franco Prussian War.
91	1871	1871: UK - Trade Unions are legalized
92	1872	1872: UK - Secret voting is introduced for elections 1872: UK - Parliament passes the Scottish Education Act 1872: USA - A.M. Ward issues the first mail-order catalog. 1872: UK - J.S. Risdon patents the metal windmill. 1872: UK - Period to 1896 sees three economic slumps and two recoveries, said to be due to imported foodstuffs from US depressing Britain's agricultural business 1872: USA - Levi Strauss discovered rugged trousers for miners made out of sturdy brown canvas. Once this resource was exhausted, he turned to denim, which he dyed blue to become what is known now as blue jeans
93	1873	1873: UK - William Gladstone's government resigns after the defeat of their Irish Universities Bill. Benjamin Disraeli declines to take up office instead 1873: UK - Parmalee invents automatic fire sprinklers 1873: UK - Joseph Glidden invents barbed wire. 1873: UK - The Great Depression lasts until 1896
94	1874	1874: UK - Benjamin Disraeli becomes Conservative Prime Minister for the second time 1874: USA - American, C. Goodyear, Jr. invents the shoe welt stitcher.
95	1875	1875: UK - Benjamin Disraeli purchases a controlling interest for Britain in the Suez Canal. 1875: UK - Parliament passes R.A. Cross's Conservative social reforms 1875: UK - Collapse of British agriculture due to cheap grain from US, wheat acreage falls by nearly a million acres
96	1876	1876: USA - Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone. 1876: Germany - Nikolas August Otto designed the first four-stroke piston engine 1876: UK - Queen Victoria becomes Empress of India. 1876: Bulgaria - The massacre of Christians in Turkish Bulgaria leads to anti-Turkish campaigns in Britain, led by William Gladstone 1876: UK - Melville Bissell patents the carpet sweeper.
97	1877	1877: South Africa - Confederation of British and Boer states established 1877: USA - Rutherford Hayes president of the USA 1877-1881. 1877: USA - Thomas Edison invents the cylinder phonograph or tin foil phonograph. 1877: UK - Eadweard Muybridge invents the first moving pictures.
98	1878	1878: Berlin, Germany - The Congress of Berlin is held. Benjamin Disraeli announces peace with honour
99	1879	1879: South Africa - The Zulu War is fought. The British are defeated at Isandhlwana, but are victorious at Ulundi 1879: Midlothian, Scotland - Gladstone's Midlothian campaign denounces imperialism in South Africa and Afghanistan 1879: Afghanistan - Second Afghan War gives Britain control
100	1880	1880: UK - William Gladstone establishes his second Liberal government 1880: South Africa - The first Anglo-Boer War begins 1880: UK - British forests now decimated except for bits of the New Forest and the Forest of Dean. 1880: UK - Number of agricultural labourers reduced by about 100,000 in last 10 years 1880: UK - Englishman John Milne invents the modern seismograph. 1880: UK - The British Perforated Paper Company invents a form of toilet paper.
101	1881	1881: London, UK - Savoy Theatre introduces electric lighting 1881: London, UK - Parliament passes the Irish Land Act and the Coercion Act 1881: USA - Death of Billy the Kid 1881: USA - James Garfield president of the USA 1881. Garfield was wounded by an assassin's bullet on 3 Jul 1881 and dies 19 Sep 1881. 1881: UK - David Houston patents the roll film for cameras. 1881: USA - Alexander Graham Bell invents the first crude metal detector. 1881: UK - Edward Leveaux patents the automatic player piano. 19 Sep 1881: USA - Chester A. Arthur president of the USA 1881-1885. Vice president under James Garfield, he is sworn in as president upon the death of Garfield.
102	1882	1882: Europe - A triple alliance is established between Germany, Austria and Italy 1882: USA - Standard Oil controls 95% of oil refining capacity 1882: UK - Stillwell invents brown paper bag 1882: Egypt - Revolt leading to British occupation
103	1884	1884: Vienna, Austria - Sigmund Freud published a paper in which he found cocaine, an alkaloid in coca, effective against fatigue and neurasthenia. 1884: UK - Hilaire de Chardonnet invented the first artificial textile, which was made from cellulose. It was later named rayon 1884: UK - Parliament passes the third Reform Act which further extends the franchise 1884: UK - Fabian Society forms, rejects Marxian theory, embraces Ricardian theory (socialist) 1884: One-third of world's shipping is British, including 4/5 of world's steamships 1884: Burma - Britain annexes Upper Burma 1884: Africa - Britain and Germany partition East Africa 1884: UK - Excess of births over deaths in England is 13.3, in Germany 10.8, and France 1.4. 1884: USA - James Ritty invents the first working, mechanical cash register. 1884: UK - Charles Parson patents the steam turbine. 1884: USA - Lewis Edson Waterman invents the first practical fountain pen. 1884: USA - George Eastman patents paper-strip photographic film.
104	1885	1885: Mesopotamia - Death of General Gordon at Khartoum. 1885: USA - Grover Cleveland president of the USA 1885-1889. 1885: Germany - Karl Benz invents the first practical automobile to be powered by an internal combustion engine. 1885: USA - Harim Maxim invents a machine gun. 1885: Germany - Gottlieb Daimler invents the first gas-engined motorcycle.
105	1886	1886: UK - Gladstone's third Liberal government fails to pass its first Irish Home Rule Bill through the House of Commons. Gladstone resigns as Prime Minister. Split in the Liberal Party. Salisbury establishes his second Conservative-Liberal-Unionist government. 1886: UK - The Royal Niger Company is chartered 1886: South Africa - Gold is discovered in the Transvaal 1886: New York, NY, USA - Statue of Liberty erected in New York Harbour 1886: UK - Local Government Act establishes County Councils as administrative organs of country life, replace Justices of Peace who are preserved as magistrates, creates London County Council (does not cover City); women are included with men in electorate of newly- established County Councils 1886: UK - British South Africa Company, formed by Yorkshireman Cecil Rhodes, colonization of Rhodesia begins 1886: UK - Great Dock Strike of London dockers, led by John Burns and Tom Mann 1886: USA - John Pemberton invents Coca Cola. 1886: USA - Josephine Cochrane invents the dishwasher. 1886: UK - 3,992,880 migrants leave UK for US, 2,235,671 leave UK for British North America during period to 1927
106	1887	1887: Germany - Emile Berliner patents the gramophone 1887: UK - Queen Victoria celebrates her Golden Jubilee 1887: UK - The Independent Labour Party is founded 1887: UK - The British East Africa Company is chartered 1887: UK - Telegraph companies control 107,000 miles of submarine cable 1887: USA - There are estimated to be 5,400 cash registers in US (increases to 16,900 in 1890) 1887: Germany - Heinrich Hertz discovers radio waves. 1887: UK - F.E. Muller and Adolph Fick invent the first wearable contact lenses.
107	1888	1888: UK - Celluloid photographic film introduced 1888: UK - The County Councils' Act establishes representative county based authorities 1888: USA - Kodak box camera 1888: UK - Coin-operated public telephone invented 1888: UK - John Boyd Dunlop patents a commercially successful pneumatic tyre. 1888: USA - Nikola Tesla invents the AC motor and transformer. 1888: USA - Marvin Stone patents the spiral winding process to manufacture the first paper drinking straws.
108	1889	1889: UK - The British South Africa Company is chartered 1889: Paris, France - The Eiffel Tower, designed by French engineer Alexandre Gustave Eiffel, is completed for the Paris Exposition. 1889: UK - First Official Secrets Act in UK 1889: USA - Benjamin Harrison president of the USA 1889-1893. 1889: UK - Sir James Dewar and Sir Frederick Abel co-invent Cordite - a type of smokeless gunpowder. 1889: UK - Joshua Pusey invents the matchbook.
109	1890	1890: UK - Starting this decade, women's clothing becomes less voluminous, lawn tennis takes place of croquet as means of meeting opposite sex, bicycle becomes fashionable
110	1891	1891: UK - University of Wales founded; Act permits women to enter medical or other faculty on same terms as men 1891: USA - Jesse W. Reno invents the escalator. 1891: UK - Agricultural depression to 1899 as cheaper frozen meat from Australia, New Zealand and South America floods into Britain, cheaper grain comes in from North America