Victorian

  • 1838: The Battle of Bossenden Wood takes place in Kent

    On 31 May 1838, soldiers confronted a small group of followers in Bossenden Wood, near Dunkirk in Kent. By the end of the clash, 11 people were dead. The group had gathered around John Nichols Tom, who called himself Sir William Courtenay. He made religious and political claims, and some people in the local area…

  • 1849: Anne Brontë dies at Scarborough

    Anne Brontë died at Scarborough on 28 May 1849, aged 29. She had travelled there from Haworth while seriously ill. The illness was tuberculosis, often called consumption at the time. Scarborough was not a passing detail in the story. It was where she spent her final days, away from the parsonage and the family setting…

  • 1859: Arthur Conan Doyle is born in Edinburgh

    Arthur Conan Doyle was born in Edinburgh on 22 May 1859. He became one of the best-known writers of the late Victorian period, though not always for the work he valued most. His reputation rests above all on Sherlock Holmes, the fictional detective who made crime feel like a problem to be read through evidence,…

  • 1859: The Great Clock at Westminster begins ticking

    On 31 May 1859, the Great Clock at Westminster began ticking. The Great Bell, commonly called Big Ben, was not heard until July. The clock belonged to the new Palace of Westminster, built after the 1834 fire. It was part of the rebuilding of Parliament, but it also had a public use. It gave time…

  • 1868: Michael Barrett is publicly hanged at Newgate

    Michael Barrett was hanged outside Newgate Prison on 26 May 1868. He became the last person publicly hanged in England. Barrett had been convicted after the Clerkenwell explosion of December 1867. The blast was connected to an attempt to free Fenian prisoners from the Clerkenwell House of Detention. It caused civilian deaths and injuries, and…

  • 1895: Oscar Wilde is convicted of gross indecency

    Oscar Wilde was convicted at the Central Criminal Court on 25 May 1895 and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment with hard labour. The conviction followed a failed libel case against the Marquess of Queensberry, the father of Lord Alfred Douglas. Wilde had gone to court as the complainant. When the case collapsed, evidence raised there…

  • 1897: Blackwall Tunnel opens beneath the Thames

    The original Blackwall Tunnel opened on 22 May 1897, linking Blackwall on the north bank of the Thames with Greenwich on the south. Its purpose was practical. The Thames was central to London’s trade, but it also made road journeys awkward. Ferries, bridges and longer routes could only do so much for a city whose…

  • 1897: *Dracula* is published in London

    *Dracula* was published in London by Archibald Constable and Company in May 1897. 26 May is often given as the publication date, though it is safer to treat it as probable rather than exact. Bram Stoker’s novel reached the British market as a gothic story before Dracula became a figure of film, costume and shorthand.…