Dates in History

The table below sets out dates in the past, which I hope you will find interesting. It is not enough to see when and where our ancestors lived, but to see what else was going on around them at the time. Our ancestors survived many deadly diseases including the Black Death, Cholera and the Influenza pandemic of 1918-19 when 100 million people died worldwide! How do I know they survived? Well, because without them and/or their children we would not be here today.

Some of our relatives lived (somewhere, we know not where) when William the Conqueror invaded England. Some were alive during Shakespeare’s (1564-1616) lifetime, when he wrote and performed his plays in London. Some may have been Royalists, while others supported the Parliamentarians during the English Civil War (1642-1647); probably they mostly just got on with surviving and putting food on the table. Our relatives saw great change during the Industrial Revolution and witnessed amazing progress during Victorian times. Some travelled great distances to the USA and Canada, Brazil, Paraguay, Australia and New Zealand in the nineteenth century seeking a better life.

We know all these things happened. As you look for your ancestors on this website, note the dates and then look at the table below. It will tell you some of the things that were going on when our ancestors lived and worked, married and had children. Without them, we would not be here…

YEAR	EVENT
2500 BC	Stonehenge was built in what is now Wiltshire, England
43 AD	Roman invasion of Britain by Aulus Plautius.
61 AD	Boudicca, Queen of the Iceni, leads an uprising against the Romans; she sacks Colchester, London and St Albans slaughtering possibly up to 80,000 people. Legend states she committed suicide by poison following her Army's defeat at the hands of the Romans.
121 AD	Hadstrian orders the Roman Army to build a wall to defend against the Picts.
250 AD	Ulster and Scotland are invaded by the Scots, possibly from the Iberian peninsula. Meanwhile Britain is invaded from the North Sea by the German Angles, Jutes and Saxons. Thee Romans will battle the invaders for the next 200 years!
450 AD	Saxons invade Britain from northern Germany.
570 AD	The Prophet of the Islamic religion, is born in Mecca.
597 AD	Augustine lands in England, under the direction of Pope Gregory I, to re-convert the people to Christianity
784 AD	The king of Mercia, King Offa, begins work on his defensive dyke to defend England from the Welsh. This borders the west side of the Forest of Dean to this day.
785 AD	The Vikings begin their raids on the coastlines of Britain
871 AD	Alfred “the Great”, born in 849, becomes king of Wessex. He fought the invading Vikings and, fifteen years later, captured London becoming King of England. The Vikings under Guthrum were tolerated under Alfred. He reformed the law and promoted education and schooling.
890 AD	Work begins on the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, as monks record the known history of England.
911 AD	The Viking leader, Rollo, settles in Normandy, in France. Just over a 150 years later, this will lead to the invasion of England by the Norman (Viking) invaders.
943 AD	Malcom I becomes King of the Scots.
949 AD	The Viking leader, Rollo, settles in Normandy, in France. Just over a 150 years later, this will lead to the invasion of England by the Norman (Viking) invaders.
986 AD	Eric the Red creates a Viking colony in Greenland. His son, Leif Ericson, went on to explore North America five centuries before Christopher Columbus. A Viking settlement has been found in Newfoundland, confirming the exploration.
1016	King Canute, a Viking, is King of England, Denmark, Sweden and Norway. His reign lasts 19 years.
1066	William, Duke of Normandy defeats King Harold at the Battle of Hastings. England has never been successfully invaded since.
1086	Population of England estimated to be between 1.5 million and 2.25 million people. A survey of England is recorded in the Doomsday Book.
1097	Tower of London completed for William the Conqueror.
1209	London Bridge built across the Thames
1215	Population of England estimated to be about 5.7 million people. King John seals the Magna Carta.
1249	University College, Oxford, founded
1300	Population of England between 4 and 5 million people
1306	Population of London 40,000
1314	Robert the Bruce defeated the English at Bannockburn, assuring Scotland’s independence for 300 years. My Scottish wife remains in charge to this day!
1315-22	Great Famine.
1337	Hundred Years’ War between France and England begins
1340	Approximate year of birth of Geoffrey Chaucer, the 14th century poet
1348-50	First outbreak of Black Death kills about half the 7 million population of England
1368-69	Black Death
1375	Black Death
1381	The Peasants Revolt, following the Black Death, resulted in greater hardship and less wages. Ultimately King Richard I reneged on his promises.
1387	Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales is published
1415	Battle of Agincourt, Henry V victorious. 5 years later he marries Katherine, daughter of Charles VI of France, to make him heir to the French throne.
1431	English burn Joan of Arc at the stake, who had defeated them at battles at Orleans and Pataye.
1485	Henry VII defeats Richard III at Bosworth, as the house of Tudor overthrows the last Plantagenet king.
1492	Christopher Columbus sails across the Atlantic, reaching the Caribbean Islands.
1498	Vasco de Gama sails to India via the Cape of Good Hope, in South Africa.
1500	Lead pencils were used in England for the first time.
1519	Leonardo da Vinci, the great Italian Rewnaissance artist and scientist died.
1534	King Henry VIII breaks from the Catholic Church of Rome.
1538	All parish churches in England are required to register every birth, marriage and death. Not all parishes complied immediately; some took decades!
1553	Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, burned at the stake in Oxford.
1558	Elizabeth I comes to the Thone of England.
1564	Population of England estimated to be about 3.5 million people; London 100,000.
1564	William Shakespeare born.
1572	St Bartholomews’ Day Massacre in Paris, when 8,000 Protestant Huguenots were killed.
1582	Gregorian Calendar created.
1587	Mary, Queen of Scots, executed
1588	English Navy attack the Spanish Armada, largely destroying it.
1600	Elizabeth I awards charter to British East India Company
1603	Plague again hits London
1605	Guy Fawkes is discovered, thus foiling the Gunpowder Plot.
1607	The first permanent English settlement in North America is established at Jamestown, Virginia.
1611	King James Bible published
1616	William Shakespeare dies
1620	The Mayflower sails for America carrying the Pilgrim Fathers.
1636	Plague hits Newcastle
1642	Theatres in London closed by Puritans, described as the “Coup of Joylessness”
1642-47	Civil War between the Royalists and the Parliamentarians in England, Ireland and Scotland.
1664	The English capture New Amsterdam fron the Dutch and re-name it New York.
1665-66	The Great Plague hits London and elsewhere killing tens of thousands.
1666	The Great Fire of London
1679	England inroduces the Habeas Corpus Act confirming the right to a trial before imprisonment.
1690	Yellow Fever affects New York City
1700-1810	Between these dates more than 7 million Africans were sold into slavery and shipped to America. Over a million of them died on the journey.
1703	Sir Isaac Newton, mathematician and astromoner, is made president of the British Royal Society.
1707	England and Scotland are joined in the Act of Union./td>
1713-15	Measles affects Boston, Massachusetts, spreading to New England and the Great Lakes in the Thirteen Colonies.
1727-50	Scarlatina outbreaks in such places as York, Plymouth, Cornwall, Devon, London, Sheffield, Kidderminster and St Albans.
1747	Parish registers are all recorded in one book prior to this date in England. It takes until 1813 before all parishes in England use three different books for each event, ; births, marriages and burials.
1751	Gregorian Calendar introduced in England
1757	Smallpox in Manchester kills 20,000
1760	Canada comes under the sole contril of Britain.
1763	Rio de Janeiro becomes the capital of Brazil/
1765	In the mid-1760's James Hargreaves invented the 'Spinning Jenny".
1773	Typhus epidemic in Chester; smallpox in Manchester kills 27,000
1776	US Declaration of Indepenence from the Britsh
1781-84	‘Plague ague’ (type of malaria) hits River Severn Valley
1788	First British convicts shipped to Australia (Botany Bay).
1789	George Washington becomes the first president of the United States of America.
1789	The storming of the Bastille Prison, in Paris, France, sparks off the French Revolution.
1792	A republic is established in France following the abolition of the monarchy.
1800	John Adams becomes the first President to occupy the White House.
1800	Vilta invents the first battery
1800	Library of Congress founded by Congress
1801	Thomas Jefferson defeats John Adams to become President of the USA.
1801	England, Scotland and Ireland are united by the Act of the Union
1803	The USA doubles in size following the Louisiana Purchase.
1804	Lewis and Clark begin their journey westward towards the Missouri River in search of the Northwest Passage
1804	Napoleon Bonaparte coroneted as Emperor of France
1804-06	Lewis and Clark explore the west beyond the Mississippi River.
1805	Battle of Trafalgar. The Royal Navy defeat the French and Spanish Navies with the loss of Admiral Nelson and approximately 1600 men.
1806	The Holy Roman Empire is brought to an end by Napoleon.
1807	The slave trade is abolished by the British Government.
1812	Tin cans made in Briain for the preserving of food.
1812	The Luddites destroy factory machines in Nottingham, which they believe were taking away their jobs.
1813	All parish churches in England finally use separate registers for births, marriages and burials by this date.
1815	Following his defeat at Moscow in 1812, Napoleon is finally defeated at the Battle of Waterloo.
1816	‘Year with no Summer’ Famine following poor harvest, food riots. Welsh move into England to beg for food; smallpox spreads, 100,000 Irish die.
1816-26	First cholera pandemic across Europe kills thousands.
1829	George Stevenson builds the “Rocket’ steam locomotive.
1829-51	Second cholera pandemic across Europe, Asia and North America.
1831	Cholera spreads through Britain and 30,000 die.
1831	Charles Darwin begins his five year journey of scientific research to the Pacific Ocean aboard the 'Beagle'.
1837	Civil registration of births, marriages and deaths began in England and Wales in 1837.
1840	The first stamp, the Penny Black, is introduced in Britain.
1846	Very hot summer and drought. Between 500,000 and 1,000,000 die over the next two years. Lancashire, Cheshire, Birmingham, Dudley, Wolverhampton, Leeds, York and Sunderland badly affected. Floating hospital ships more on rivers such as the Mersey
1849	California Goldrush!
1854	The Broad Street cholera outbreak kills 616 people in one small area.
1866	The age of death is included in the index of death records from this date.
1868	The transporation of convicts to Australia ceased. It is estimated 137,000 men and about 25,000 women had been shipped to Australia, some for minor offences.
1883	Krakatoa erupts.
1894	The Genealogical Society of Utah is founded by the Church of LDS.
1911	Roald Amundson of Norway reaches the South Pole.
1911	2nd April 1911 was Census Day in the UK.
1911	1st July Mother’s maiden name included in the birth indexes for England and Wales.
1912	Influenza pandemic 50 million die world wide (23,000 in London).
1914	The Panama Canal is opened.
1915	German Airships bomb England. A German U-Boat sinks the Lusitania, killing 1,200 people.
1917	The Russian Revolution.
1918	The Great War (WWI) ends in November of this year, but at a terrible price. In a period of about 4 years and 4 months, 10 million people died and 20 million were injured..
1920-33	Prohibition bans sale of alcohol in the USA.
1922	Six northern counties of Ireland join Britain, creating the United Kingdom with England, Scotland and Wales. The rest of Ireland is given dominion status as The Irish Free State and finally beomes the Republic of Ireland in 1949.
1922	Portable and car radios are produced in the USA.
1928	Britain gives the vote to women over 21.
1929	The Wall Street Crash occurs in New York.
1933	The Nazi Party comes to power in Germany.
1936-39	Civil War in Spain.
1939	Germany invades Poland, leading to World War II. They have already invaded Rhineland, forced a union with Austria and partioned Czechoslovakia.
1940	British scientists invent Radar.
1945	American scientists develop the atom bomb.
1947	India gains independence.
1950-53	Korean War.
1961	Belin Wall is built to prevent the flow of East Germans to the West.
1961	Yuri Gagarin, a Russian, becomes the first man in space..
1965-73	Vietnam War.
1966	1st January 1966 – the first 2 forenames added to Birth indexes in England and Wales.
1969	Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walk on the moon.
1969	The full date of birth added to the death indexes together with the first two forenames.
1989	The Belin Wall is demolished, leading to the unification of Germany.