1751 in Great Britain:

Other years

1749 | 1750 | 1751 | 1752 | 1753

Events from the year 1751 in Great Britain.

Incumbents

• Monarch - King George II
• Prime Minister - Henry Pelham, Whig

Events

• 31 March - Frederick, Prince of Wales dies and is succeeded by his son the future George III of the United Kingdom as Prince of Wales.^[1]
• April - The Gin Act requires government inspection of distilleries and restricts sale to licenced premises.^[2]
• 31 August - Robert Clive takes the Indian town of Arcot from the French.^[1]
• 20 October - Charles, Duke of Bolton, marries celebrated actress Lavinia Fenton, already the mother of his three children.

Undated

• A British settlement is founded in Georgetown in North America.^[1]
• Parliament passes the Calendar Act introducing the Gregorian Calendar, correcting the eleven day difference and making 1 January New Year's Day from 1752.^[1]
• William Hogarth engraves the prints Gin Lane, Beer Street and The Four Stages of Cruelty.^[2]

Publications

• 15 February - Thomas Gray's Elegy Written in a Country Church-Yard (anonymously).^[3]
• Henry Fielding's novel Amelia.^[1]
• Eliza Haywood's novel The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless.^[4]
• David Hume's book An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals.^[1]
• Tobias Smollett's novel The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle.^[1]

Births

• 2 May - John Andr , soldier (died 1780)
• 11 July - Caroline Matilda of Wales, posthumously-born daughter of Frederick, Prince of Wales and later queen consort of Denmark (died 1775)
• date unknown - Thomas Sheraton, furniture designer (died 1806)

Deaths

• 20 January - John Hervey, 1st Earl of Bristol, politician (born 1665)
• 29 March - Thomas Coram, sea captain and philanthropist (born c.1668)
• 31 March
  • Frederick, Prince of Wales (born 1707)
  • Robert Walpole, 2nd Earl of Orford (born 1701)
• 2 October - Thomas Mathews, Welsh admiral (born 1676)
• 26 October - Philip Doddridge, religious leader (born 1702)
• 12 December - Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke, statesman and philosopher (born 1678)
• 17 December - Sir William Gooch, 1st Baronet, Governor of Virginia (born 1681)

References

See also