1831 in the United Kingdom explained

Events from the year 1831 in the United Kingdom.

Incumbents

• Monarch – William IV
• Prime Minister – Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey (Whig)
• Foreign Secretary – Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston

Events

• 3 March – Tithe War breaks out in Ireland.
• 7 March – Royal Astronomical Society receives its Royal Charter.^[1]
• 12 April – Broughton Suspension Bridge over the River Irwell collapses under marching troops.^[2]
• 27 April – ending of the First Anglo-Ashanti War (1823–1831).
• 28 April–1 June – general election results in a Whig victory, and a mandate for electoral reform.^[3]
• May–June – Merthyr Rising in Merthyr Tydfil.
• 30 May – census in the United Kingdom.
• 1 June – Royal Navy officer and explorer James Clark Ross leads the first expedition to reach the Magnetic North Pole.
• 8 June – Freeminers in the Forest of Dean, led by Warren James, break down enclosures in the Forest.^[4]
• 1 August – the new London Bridge is officially opened.^[5]
• 18 August – the paddle steamer Rothsay Castle is wrecked at the eastern end of the Menai Strait with the loss of 93 lives.
• 29 August – Michael Faraday demonstrates electromagnetic induction.^[6]
• 8 September – coronation of King William IV.^[5]
• 22 September – the House of Commons passes the Great Reform Bill to expand the franchise, but this is later defeated in the Lords.
• 27 September – British Association for the Advancement of Science first meets, in York.^[3]
• October – King's College London opens.
• 9–11 October – reform riots in Nottingham: Nottingham Castle and a silk mill at Beeston are gutted by fire.^[7]
• 15 October
  • Special Constables Act regularises operation of the Special Constabulary.
  • Truck Act prohibits payment of wages other than in cash.^[8]
• 26 October – cholera epidemic begins in Sunderland.
• 28 October – Michael Faraday constructs the first dynamo.^[5]
• 29–31 October – 1831 Bristol riots ("Queen Square riots") in Bristol (England), in connection with the Great Reform Act controversy: 100 city centre properties are destroyed (including the Bishop's palace), at least 120 are estimated to have been killed, 31 of the rioters will be sentenced to death and a colonel facing court-martial for failure to control the riot commits suicide.^[9]
• December – first meeting in England of the Plymouth Brethren, organised primarily by George Wigram, Benjamin Wills Newton and John Nelson Darby.^{[10] [11]}
• 27 December – Charles Darwin embarks on his historic voyage aboard ^[5] from Plymouth.
• Undated – The house which will eventually contain Abbey Road Studios is built in the St John's Wood district of London.

Publications

• January – Joseph Livesey begins publishing The Moral Reformer in Preston, Lancashire, the first publication of the temperance movement in England.
• Mrs Gore's novels Pin Money, Mothers and Daughters,^[12] and The Tuileries and her play The School for Coquettes.
• Thomas Hood's poem The Dream of Eugene Aram, the Murderer.
• Thomas Love Peacock's anonymous novel Crotchet Castle.
• Mary Prince's slave narrative The History of Mary Prince.

Births

• 21 March – Dorothea Beale, proponent of women's education (died 1906)
• 7 May – Richard Norman Shaw, architect (died 1912)
• 16 May – David Edward Hughes, musician and professor of music (died 1900)
• 13 June – James Clerk Maxwell, physicist (died 1879)
• 14 October – Samuel Waite Johnson, railway locomotive engineer (died 1912)
• 15 October – Isabella Bird, explorer, writer, photographer and naturalist (died 1904)

Deaths

• 14 February – Henry Maudslay, mechanical engineer (born 1771)
• 21 February – Robert Hall, Baptist minister (born 1764)
• 20 April – John Abernethy, surgeon (born 1764)
• 8 June – Sarah Siddons, actress (born 1755 in Wales)
• 17 August – Patrick Nasmyth, Scottish landscape painter (born 1787)

Notes and References

1. Web site: A brief history of the RAS. Royal Astronomical Society. 2011-02-06. https://web.archive.org/web/20110130164034/http://www.ras.org.uk/about-the-ras/a-brief-history. 30 January 2011. live.
2. Book: Bishop, R. E. D.. Vibration. 2nd. Cambridge University Press. 1979. 0-521-22779-8.
3. Book: Palmer, Alan. Palmer . Veronica. 1992. The Chronology of British History. Century Ltd. London. 257–258. 0-7126-5616-2.
4. Book: Anstis, Ralph. Warren James and the Dean Forest Riots. 978-0-9511371-0-9. Albion House. Coalway. 1986.
5. Book: Penguin Pocket On This Day. Penguin Reference Library. 0-14-102715-0. 2006.
6. Web site: Icons, a portrait of England 1820–1840. 2007-09-12. https://web.archive.org/web/20070922055840/http://www.icons.org.uk/theicons/icons-timeline/1820-1840. 22 September 2007. dead.
7. Web site: John. Beckett. Riot and rebellion. The Nottinghamshire Heritage Gateway. 2008-07-20. 2016-12-26.
8. Book: The History Today Companion to British History. registration. London. Collins & Brown. 1-85585-178-4. 1995. 762.
9. Web site: Revolting riots in Queen Square. BBC. Made in Bristol. 2004. 2011-02-16.
10. Book: Burnham, Jonathan D.. 2004. A Story of Conflict: the Controversial Relationship Between Benjamin Wills Newton and John Nelson Darby. The Emergence of the Plymouth Brethren. Paternoster Press. Carlisle. 978-1-84227-191-9. 56336926.
11. Book: Livingstone, Elizabeth A.. 2000. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Oxford University Press. 978-0-19-280057-2. 46858944.
12. Book: Leavis, Q. D.. Q. D. Leavis. Fiction and the Reading Public. 2nd. London. Chatto & Windus. 1965.