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27 November 1655: Samuel Hartlib told John Evelyn of a new...

Writer or writing item

27 November 1655

Samuel Hartlib told John Evelyn of a new copying invention: a special ink which enabled extra copies to be damp-pressed off papers written in it.
Evelyn, John. The Diary of John Evelyn. Editor De Beer, Esmond Samuel, Oxford University Press, 1959.
364

December 1955: Black activist Claudia Jones, threatened...

Building and people item

December 1955

Black activist Claudia Jones , threatened with deportation from the USA to her native Trinidad for violating anti-Communist laws, arrived in London, where she spent her nine remaining years.
Weigand, Kate. “A Radical Activist, Rediscovered”. Women’s Review of Books, Vol.
26
, No. 1, Jan.–Feb. 2009, pp. 13-14.
13-14

15 June 1703: Playwright and architect John Vanbrugh bought...

Building and people item

15 June 1703

Playwright and architect John Vanbrugh bought land for a new theatre in the Haymarket, London. The theatre eventually opened as the Queen's Theatre during the 1704-5 season.
The London Stage 1660-1800. Southern Illinois University Press, 1960–1968, 5 vols.
2: 25

September 1828: Catherine McAuley opened in Baggot Street,...

Building and people item

September 1828

Catherine McAuley opened in Baggot Street, Dublin, her first House of Mercy , a centre for charity and teaching.
Atkinson, Norman. Irish Education: A History of Educational Institutions. Allen Figgis, 1969.
76

15 July 1919: The first commercial flight, run by Aircraft...

National or international item

15 July 1919

The first commercial flight, run by Aircraft Transport and Travel Limited , was made between London and Paris.
Hudson, Kenneth. Air Travel: A Social History. Adams and Dart, 1972.
16

Barbarina Brand, Baroness Dacre

BBBD wrote as an amateur in the Romantic period. She wrote dramatic works, mostly tragedies, often adapted from texts by other authors, and poems, mostly occasional verse and often translated from poems by others. Her...
Barbarina Brand, Baroness Dacre Photograph of a charcoal drawing of Baroness Barbarina Brand Dacre. The image is oval, showing her seated at a three-quarter turn, wearing a dark, high-waisted dress with a low neckline and puffed sleeves. She has short, dark, curly hair, and wears a single-strand necklace.

August 1914: The Union of Democratic Control was established...

National or international item

August 1914

The Union of Democratic Control was established by J. Ramsay MacDonald , Norman Angell , Charles Trevelyan , and E. D. Morel .
Ceadel, Martin. Pacifism in Britain, 1914-1945 : The Defining of a Faith. Clarendon, 1980, http://U of A HSS.
Appendix I
Hinton, James. Protests and Visions: Peace Politics in Twentieth-Century Britain. Hutchinson Radius, 1989, http://U of A HSS.
44
Harvey, Kathryn. "Driven by War into Politics": A Feminist Biography of Kathleen Innes. University of Alberta, 1995.
65-6
The Working Class Movement Library holds most of...

1956: Chambers' Journal ceased publication....

Writer or writing item

1956

Chambers' Journal ceased publication.
Sutherland, John, b. 1938. The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford University Press, 1989.
112

789: The Anglo-Saxon chronicle records the first...

National or international item

789

The Anglo-Saxon chronicle records the first landing of Viking ships in England.
Morgan, Kenneth O., editor. The Oxford Illustrated History of Britain. Oxford University Press, 1984.
79

October 1933: Hitler took Germany out of the League of...

Writer or writing item

October 1933

Hitler took Germany out of the League of Nations , contrary to the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles (signed on 28 June 1919).
Best, Geoffrey. “Hooked Trout”. London Review of Books, 2 June 2005, pp. 32-3.
32

June 1853: William Makepeace Thackeray published The...

Writer or writing item

June 1853

William Makepeace Thackeray published The English Humourists of the Eighteenth Century, compiled from a series of critical lectures given in England, Scotland, and the United States.
British Library Catalogue. http://explore.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?dscnt=0&tab=local_tab&dstmp=1489778087340&vid=BLVU1&mode=Basic&fromLo.
Drabble, Margaret, editor. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 5th ed., Oxford University Press, 1985.
973
Cox, Michael, editor. The Oxford Chronology of English Literature. Oxford University Press, 2002, 2 vols.

7 September 1908: English theatre patron Annie Horniman founded...

Building and people item

7 September 1908

English theatre patron Annie Horniman founded the Manchester Repertory Company , which began its first season at the renovated Gaiety Theatre , Manchester.
Palmer, Alan, and Veronica Palmer. The Chronology of British History. Century, 1992.
341
Hartnoll, Phyllis, editor. The Oxford Companion to the Theatre. 4th ed., Oxford University Press, 1983.
397
Stevenson, John, 1946 -. British Society, 1914-45. Penguin, 1984.
417

April 1698: Jeremy Collier published his Short View of...

Writer or writing item

April 1698

Jeremy Collier published his Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage, a book in heavy-handed pamphlet style with exaggerated typography.
Hume, Robert D. “Jeremy Collier and the Future of the London Theatre in 1698”. British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (BSECS) Conference, Oxford, 3 Jan. 1998.

13 November 1715: The Duke of Argyll fought the rebellious...

National or international item

13 November 1715

The Duke of Argyll fought the rebellious Jacobite forces at Sheriffmuir in Scotland.
Grun, Bernard. The Timetables of History. 3rd revised, Simon and Schuster, 1991.
328

1688: Mary Holden, following in the footsteps of...

Building and people item

1688

Mary Holden , following in the footsteps of Sarah Jinner , published The Womans Almanack; it appeared the following year as well.
Sharp, Jane. “Introduction”. The Midwives Book, edited by Elaine Hobby, Oxford University Press, 1999, p. xi - xxxi.
xx and n27

23 June 1925: British troops fired into striking crowds...

National or international item

23 June 1925

British troops fired into striking crowds in Canton, killing fifty-two people and wounding a hundred and seventeen; this followed an incident in Shanghai on 30 May 1925, which left nine people dead and twenty...

By December 2008: The city of Paris offered a rent-free artist's...

Writer or writing item

By December 2008

The city of Paris offered a rent-free artist's studio to Taslima Nasrin or Nasreen , a Pakistani/Bangladeshi author exiled by the denunciation and threats that greeted her novel Lajja (Shame) in 1993.
Chrisafis, Angelique. “Paris opens door to author fleeing Islamist threats”. Guardian Weekly, 9 Jan. 2009, p. 7.
7

23 July 1920: British East Africa, renamed Kenya, became...

National or international item

23 July 1920

British East Africa, renamed Kenya, became a Crown Colony.
Keller, Helen, editor. The Dictionary of Dates. Macmillan, 1934, 2 vols.
I: 658
Langer, William L., editor. An Encyclopedia of World History: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern, Chronologically Arranged. 4th ed., Houghton Mifflin, 1968.
1083

By late September 1910: Irish writer Lord Dunsany published A Dreamer's...

Writer or writing item

By late September 1910

Irish writer Lord Dunsany published A Dreamer's Tales, a volume (not his first) of fantasy stories: strange visions from [a] dream-world.
“The Times Digital Archive 1785-2007”. Thompson Gale: The Times Digital Archive.
454 (22 September 1910): 342

1919: Poet Victor Neuburg founded Vine Press in...

Writer or writing item

1919

Poet Victor Neuburg founded Vine Press in Steyning, Sussex.
Rose, Jonathan, and Patricia J. Anderson, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 112. Gale Research, 1991.
337
This press is not to be confused with the press of the same name established in 1956 by Peter Foster and John Peters .

1856: The National Portrait Gallery was founded,...

National or international item

1856

The National Portrait Gallery was founded, largely through the advocacy of Lord Stanhope , who was president of the Society of Arts at the time.
Boase, Thomas Sherrer Ross, editor. English Art, 1800-1870. Clarendon, 1959.
270
Nunn, Pamela Gerrish. Victorian Women Artists. Women’s Press, 1987.
36
National Portrait Gallery. http://www.npg.org.uk/live/index.asp.

April 1915: In the first use of gas as a weapon of war,...

National or international item

April 1915

In the first use of gas as a weapon of war, Germans killed 5,000 Franco-Algerian soldiers at Ypres in Belgium by means of 168 tonnes of chlorine.
Pennington, Hugh. “Woolsorters’ Disease”. London Review of Books, 29 Nov. 2001, pp. 26-7.
27
This was the second battle of Ypres...

28 March 1912: The Conciliation Bill (on suffrage) was defeated...

National or international item

28 March 1912

The Conciliation Bill (on suffrage) was defeated in a House of Commons vote, after passing its second reading (the previous year) with a huge majority.
Holton, Sandra Stanley. “Women and the Vote”. Women’s History: Britain, 1850-1945, edited by June Purvis and June Purvis, University College London, 1995, pp. 277-05.
294
Tickner, Lisa. The Spectacle of Women: Imagery of the Suffrage Campaign, 1907-1914. University of Chicago Press, 1988.
133
Hume, Leslie Parker. The National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies, 1897-1914. Garland, 1982.
135
Frye, Kate Parry. Campaigning for the Vote: Kate Parry Frye’s Suffrage Diary. Editor Crawford, Elizabeth, Francis Boutle Publishers, 2013.
98-100

15 February 1775: Lord Barrington, Secretary at War, asked...

National or international item

15 February 1775

Lord Barrington , Secretary at War, asked for British troops in Boston to be increased to about ten thousand men
Thomas, Peter David Garner. Tea Party to Independence: The Third Phase of the American Revolution, 1773-1776. Clarendon, 1991.
198

1879: The Marseillaise became the French national...

National or international item

1879

The Marseillaise became the French national anthem, accompanying constitutional changes to reflect the principles of France's Third Republic.
Merriman, John M. “Contested Freedoms in the French Revolutions, 1830-1871”. Revolution and the Meanings of Freedom in the Nineteenth Century, edited by Isser Woloch, Stanford University Press, 1996, pp. 173-11.
210