What happened in the times of the Brontes?

1800, the Combination Laws banned trade unionism, thus unions forced to operate in secret or under the guise of "non-political" Friendly Societies which were recognised as legal in 1793.

1802, children banned from working more than 12hrs a day

1800-15 - see under Europe for the conflicts with Napoleon;

1810-12 & 1816-17, Luddite protesters against introduction of new equipment in textile industry smash factory machinery

1819, children aged < 9yrs banned from working in cotton mills

1824, laws against trade unionism repealed but their legal status was precarious until the 1860s

1830, King George IV dies & is succeeded by Queen Victoria (r. 1837-1901) an 18yr old princess who would become England's longest-reigning monarch with 9 off-spring & their spouses being in most of the royal houses of Europe making her popularly known as the "grandmother of Europe"

1830's government funding for elementary schools leads to rise in state education which became free for anyone by 1870

1830's & 40's, cholera epidemics lead to public health measures.

1832, Reform Act leads to the Whigs & the Conservative Party to organise themselves as national parties

1834, the New Poor Law, workhouse conditions must be inferior to lowest paid labourer outside to discourage laziness & vagrancy

1835-7, 1st railway boom in England, creating many, disconnected lines owned by new railway companies. Railway investments commonly returned 10% on their capital.

1841, Robert Peel becomes 1st PM of a Conservative (as opposed to a purely Tory) Party after defeating former PM Lord Melbourne's Whig Party.

1844, limits on woman's working hours; 2nd railway boom, almost exhausting the available capital of the investing public;

1845, establishment of free public libraries

1847, Emily Bronte "Wuthering Heights"; 

1850-3, Anglo-Kaffir war;

1851, Prince Albert establishes the Great Exhibition to promote industry & peace;

1855, Viscount Palmerston becomes PM & clashed often with Victoria

1857, Irish Republican Brotherhood (Fenians) founded;

1860's, despite ferocious penalties for even petty crime, 100,000 lived in London by thieving or swindling & another 80,000 were prostitutes. This was the city of Sweeney Todd the Barber & Jack the Ripper.

1861, Prince Albert dies causing Victoria to retreat from social life & lose popularity; Charles Dickens "Great Expectations";

1864, 1st International Workingmen's Assoc. founded by Karl Marx;

1865, William Booth, concerned for the adverse effects of urbanism, founds the Salvation Army to help provide social & spiritual welfare of the destitute; Many land owners earned £100,000/yr & paid tax of only 2d in the pound, the average labourer's income was £70

1869, Liberal Party PM Gladstone (r. 68-74; 80-85; 86; 92-94) disestablishes the Irish Church; 

• John Stuart Mill pushes for women's rights:
  • fighting against loveless marriages as marriages were primarily a property exchange with husband taking all of his wife's property as well as being able to cane her and lock her up if refusing sex without her ever being able to free herself of her tormentor.
  • fighting for equal pay for women and woman's right to vote.

1870, secondary education made universal; 

1871, Lewis Carroll "Through the looking glass"; Charles Darwin "The descent of man"; Jehovah's Witnesses founded; F.A. cup;

1872, the great railway companies founded from the amalgamation of many smaller ones. Introduction of cheap 3rd class train travel at a penny a mile;

1876, Conservative Party PM Disraeli makes Victoria Empress of India; Gilbert and Sullivan "HMS Pinafore"; 

1880, education for children < 10 yrs made compulsory which finally cleared the streets of ragged children living on their wits. Dining cars on trains;

1883, the Cheap Trains Act made provision for discounted workmen's tickets which then allowed the better paid factory workers to live further out in the suburbs away from the slums around the factories.

1884, the agricultural labourer is enfranchised

1885, 1 in 4 Londoners still lived in abject poverty

1885, Lord Salisbury, a Tory becomes PM (r. 85-6; 86-92, 95-02) an implacable foe of Irish Home Rule, made the Conservative Party the most powerful one

1886-7, Karl Marx "Das Kapital" published in English; violent riots by the unemployed vented distress that accompanied the music halls, gin palaces & imperial pomp of Victorian London.

1887, Doyle's 1st Sherlock Holmes story;

1889, London dock strike;

1897, Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee

1890, corridor trains, & then lavatory-equipped ones, made long non-stop train trips possible.

1891, minimum age for children to work raised to 11yrs; Thomas Hardy "Tess of the     D'Urbervilles";

1895, H.G.Wells "The Time Machine"; Rutherford comes to England from NZ;

1898, H.G.Wells "The War of the Worlds";

1899, Oscar Wilde "The importance of being earnest"; Elgar "Enigma Variations"; 

Read about: History

• the rise of the British Empire and the fall of the domestic tradesman
• the rise of abusive child labour
• European nationalism & liberalism:
• Britain's monarchy moves out of the political arena to become a neutral guardian of national stability & is ruled by Queen Victoria with the concurrent revival of Puritanism;
• American civil war & the abolishing of slavery.
• the age of the telegraph
• the age of the passenger steamship (1839 - 1960s)
• the age of the railways (1840-1880
• the age of the city slums & the eventual rise of public health & philanthropy
• London after 1860 - the war against dirt
• Science & technology
• Art & music