Our Family History

The Genealogy of Robert and Christina Barritt

1842 - 1893 (51 years)

	Date	Event(s)
1	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.
2	1843	1843: UK - Alexander Bain (1818-1903) invented an early fax machine 1843: UK - About 2000 miles of railway lines now laid
3	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
4	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)
5	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.
6	1847	1847: UK - Flourens discovered the anesthetic properties of chloroform 1847: USA - Levi Strauss invents denim jeans 1847: UK - Hungarian Ignaz Semmelweis invents antisceptics.
7	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
8	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.
9	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.
10	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
11	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
12	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.
13	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
14	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
15	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
16	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.
17	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.
18	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
19	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
20	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)
21	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.
22	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
23	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
24	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.
25	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.
26	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.
27	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.
28	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.
29	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.
30	1871	1871: UK - Trade Unions are legalized
31	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
32	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
33	1874	1874: UK - Benjamin Disraeli becomes Conservative Prime Minister for the second time 1874: USA - American, C. Goodyear, Jr. invents the shoe welt stitcher.
34	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
35	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.
36	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.
37	1878	1878: Berlin, Germany - The Congress of Berlin is held. Benjamin Disraeli announces peace with honour
38	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
39	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.
40	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.
41	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
42	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.
43	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.
44	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
45	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.
46	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.
47	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.
48	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
49	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
50	1892	1892: France - Leon Bouly invents cinematographic film camera 1892: UK - William Gladstone forms his fourth Liberal government 1892: UK - Sir James Dewar invents the Dewar flask or vacuum flask. 1892: Germany - Rudolf Diesel invents the diesel-fueled internal combustion engine.
51	1893	1893: USA - Whitcomb L. Judson invented the zip to help a friend with a stiff back who could not bend over to do up his shoes 1893: UK - Second Irish Home Rule Bill fails to pass the House of Lords 1893: New Zealand - First nation to grant women the right to vote 1893: France - Car number plates introduced 1893: USA - Grover Cleveland president of the USA 1893-1897.

Our Family History

The Genealogy of Robert and Christina Barritt

Maria Catharina WEHRLIN