1872 in the United Kingdom:

Other years

1870 | 1871 | 1872 | 1873 | 1874

Sport

1872 English cricket season

1871-72 in English football

Events from the year 1872 in the United Kingdom.

Incumbents

• Monarch - Victoria of the United Kingdom
• Prime Minister - William Gladstone, Liberal

Events

• 2 February - British government buys a number of forts on the Gold Coast from the Netherlands.^[1]
• 5 March - Tichborne Case decided against the impostor Arthur Orton.
• 11 March - Work begins erecting Seven Sisters Colliery, South Wales; located on one of the richest coal sources in Britain.
• 16 March - In the first ever final of the FA Cup, the world's oldest football competition, Wanderers F.C. defeated Royal Engineers A.F.C. 1-0 at The Oval in Kennington, London.^[2]
• 18 July - the Ballot Act 1872 introduces secret ballots in United Kingdom elections.^[2]
• 31 July - Licensing Act 1872 establishes licenses for public houses and limits drinking hours.^[1]
• 1 September - Group of Icaiche Maya under Marcos Canul attack Orange Walk Town in British Honduras. British send troops against them.
• 30 November - Scotland v England: the first ever international football match takes place at Hamilton Crescent in Scotland.^[2]
• 12 December - A meteorite struck earth near Banbury.
• 21 December - The HMS Challenger sails from Portsmouth on the four year scientific expedition that would lay the foundation for the science of oceanography.

Undated

• London Metropolitan Police strike.

Publications

• Samuel Butler's novel Erewhon.
• George Eliot's novel Middlemarch.
• Thomas Hardy's anonymous romantic novel Under the Greenwood Tree.

Births

• 18 May - Bertrand Russell, philosopher and mathematician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature (died 1970)
• 31 May - Heath Robinson, cartoonist and illustrator (died 1944)
• 23 July - Edward Adrian Wilson, explorer, physician, naturalist and ornithologist (died 1912)
• 21 August - Aubrey Beardsley, artist (died 1898)
• 8 October - John Cowper Powys, writer and philosopher (died 1963)
• 12 October - Ralph Vaughan Williams, composer (died 1958)
• 26 December - Norman Angell, politician, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (died 1967)

Deaths

• 27 February - John McLeod Campbell, churchman (born 1800)
• 1 April - Frederick Maurice, theologian (born 1805)
• 28 November - Mary Somerville, mathematician (born 1780)
• 15 December - Lady Beaconsfield, wife of Benjamin Disraeli (born 1792)

References

See also