George Washington (February 22, 1732 – December 14, 1799) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first president of the United States from 1789 to 1797. Appointed by the Second Continental Congress as commander of the Continental Army in June 1775, Washington led Patriot forces to victory in the American Revolutionary War and then served as president of the Constitutional Convention in 1787, which drafted and ratified the Constitution of the United States and established the American federal government. Washington has thus been called the "Father of his Country".

Washington's first public office, from 1749 to 1750, was as surveyor of Culpeper County in the Colony of Virginia. He subsequently received military training and was assigned command of the Virginia Regiment during the French and Indian War. He was later elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses and was named a delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, which appointed him Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army. Washington led American forces to a decisive victory over the British in the Revolutionary War, leading the British to sign the Treaty of Paris, which acknowledged the sovereignty and independence of the United States. He resigned his commission in 1783 after the conclusion of the Revolutionary War.

Washington played an indispensable role in adopting and ratifying the Constitution, which replaced the Articles of Confederation in 1789. He was then twice elected president by the Electoral College unanimously. As the first U.S. president, Washington implemented a strong, well-financed national government while remaining impartial in a fierce rivalry that emerged between cabinet members Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton. During the French Revolution, he proclaimed a policy of neutrality while sanctioning the Jay Treaty. He set enduring precedents for the office of president, including use of the title "Mr. President" and the two-term tradition. His 1796 farewell address became a preeminent statement on republicanism in which he wrote about the importance of national unity and the dangers regionalism, partisanship, and foreign influence pose to it.

Washington has been memorialized by monuments, a federal holiday, various media depictions, geographical locations including the national capital, the State of Washington, stamps, and currency. He is ranked among the greatest U.S. presidents. In 1976, Washington was posthumously promoted to the rank of General of the Armies, the highest rank in the U.S. Army. His legacy is marred, however, by his ownership of slaves and his complicated relationship with slavery, as well as his policy to assimilate Native Americans into the Anglo-American culture and waging war against Native American nations during the Revolutionary Wars and the Northwest Indian War.

George Washington was born on February 22, 1732, at Popes Creek in Westmoreland County, Virginia. He was the first of six children of Augustine and Mary Ball Washington. His father was a justice of the peace and a prominent public figure who had four additional children from his first marriage to Jane Butler. The family moved to Little Hunting Creek in 1734 before eventually settling in Ferry Farm near Fredericksburg, Virginia. When Augustine died in 1743, Washington inherited Ferry Farm and ten slaves; his older half-brother Lawrence inherited Little Hunting Creek and renamed it Mount Vernon.

Washington did not have the formal education his elder brothers received at Appleby Grammar School in England, but he did attend the Lower Church School in Hartfield. He learned mathematics, trigonometry, and land surveying and became a talented draftsman and mapmaker. By early adulthood, he was writing with "considerable force" and "precision". As a teenager, to practice his penmanship, Washington compiled over a hundred rules for social interaction styled Rules of Civility and Decent Behaviour in Company and Conversation, copied from an English translation of a French book of manners.

Washington often visited Mount Vernon and Belvoir, the plantation of William Fairfax, Lawrence's father-in-law. Fairfax became Washington's patron and surrogate father, and Washington spent a month in 1748 with a team surveying Fairfax's Shenandoah Valley property. The following year, he received a surveyor's license from the College of William & Mary. Even though Washington had not served the customary apprenticeship, Fairfax appointed him surveyor of Culpeper County, Virginia, where he took his oath of office July 20, 1749. He subsequently familiarized himself with the frontier region, and though he resigned from the job in 1750, he continued to do surveys west of the Blue Ridge Mountains. By 1752 he had bought almost 1,500 acres (600 ha) in the Valley and owned 2,315 acres (937 ha).

In 1751, Washington made his only trip abroad when he accompanied Lawrence to Barbados, hoping the climate would cure his brother's tuberculosis. Washington contracted smallpox during that trip, which left his face slightly scarred. Lawrence died in 1752, and Washington leased Mount Vernon from his widow Anne; he inherited it outright after her death in 1761.

Lawrence Washington's service as adjutant general of the Virginia militia inspired George to seek a commission. Virginia's lieutenant governor, Robert Dinwiddie, appointed Washington as a major and commander of one of the four militia districts. The British and French were competing for control of the Ohio Valley: the British were constructing forts along the Ohio River, and the French between the Ohio River and Lake Erie.

In October 1753, Dinwiddie appointed Washington as a special envoy. He had sent Washington to demand French forces to vacate land that was claimed by the British. Washington was also appointed to make peace with the Iroquois Confederacy, and to gather further intelligence about the French forces. Washington met with Half-King Tanacharison, and other Iroquois chiefs, at Logstown, and gathered information about the numbers and locations of the French forts, as well as intelligence concerning individuals taken prisoner by the French. Washington was nicknamed Conotocaurius by Tanacharison. The name, meaning "devourer of villages", had been given to his great-grandfather John Washington in the late 17th century by the Susquehannock.

Washington's party reached the Ohio River in November 1753, and was intercepted by a French patrol. The party was escorted to Fort Le Boeuf, where Washington was received in a friendly manner. He delivered the British demand to vacate to the French commander Saint-Pierre, but the French refused to leave. Saint-Pierre gave Washington his official answer after a few days' delay, as well as food and winter clothing for his party's journey back to Virginia. Washington completed the precarious mission in 77 days, in difficult winter conditions, achieving a measure of distinction when his report was published in Virginia and London.

In February 1754, Dinwiddie promoted Washington to lieutenant colonel and second-in-command of the 300-strong Virginia Regiment, with orders to confront French forces at the Forks of the Ohio. Washington set out with half the regiment in April and soon learned a French force of 1,000 had begun construction of Fort Duquesne there. In May, having set up a defensive position at Great Meadows, he learned that the French had made camp seven miles (11 km) away; he decided to take the offensive.

The French detachment proved to be only about 50 men, so Washington advanced on May 28 with a small force of Virginians and Indian allies to ambush them. During the ambush, French forces were killed outright with muskets and hatchets, including French commander Joseph Coulon de Jumonville, who had been carrying a diplomatic message for the British. The French later found their countrymen dead and scalped and blamed Washington, who had retreated to Fort Necessity.

The full Virginia Regiment joined Washington at Fort Necessity the following month with news that he had been promoted to command of the regiment and colonel upon the regimental commander's death. The regiment was reinforced by an independent company of a hundred South Carolinians led by Captain James Mackay; his royal commission outranked Washington's and a conflict of command ensued. On July 3, a French force attacked with 900 men, and the ensuing battle ended in Washington's surrender. He signed a surrender document in which he unwittingly took responsibility for "assassinating" Jumonville, later blaming the translator for not properly translating it.

In the aftermath, Colonel James Innes took command of intercolonial forces, the Virginia Regiment was divided, and Washington was offered a captaincy in one of the newly formed regiments. He refused, however, as it would have been a demotion and instead resigned his commission. The "Jumonville affair" became the incident which ignited the French and Indian War, later to become part of the Seven Years' War.

In 1755, Washington served voluntarily as an aide to General Edward Braddock, who led a British expedition to expel the French from Fort Duquesne and the Ohio Country. On Washington's recommendation, Braddock split the army into one main column and a lightly equipped "flying column". Suffering from severe dysentery, Washington was left behind, and when he rejoined Braddock at Monongahela the French and their Indian allies ambushed the divided army. Two-thirds of the British force became casualties, including the mortally wounded Braddock. Under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Gage, Washington, still very ill, rallied the survivors and formed a rear guard, allowing the remnants of the force to disengage and retreat.

During the engagement, he had two horses shot from under him, and his hat and coat were bullet-pierced. His conduct under fire redeemed his reputation among critics of his command in the Battle of Fort Necessity, but he was not included by the succeeding commander (Colonel Thomas Dunbar) in planning subsequent operations.

The Virginia Regiment was reconstituted in August 1755, and Dinwiddie appointed Washington its commander, again with the rank of colonel. Washington clashed over seniority almost immediately, this time with John Dagworthy, another captain of superior royal rank, who commanded a detachment of Marylanders at the regiment's headquarters in Fort Cumberland. Washington, impatient for an offensive against Fort Duquesne, was convinced Braddock would have granted him a royal commission and pressed his case in February 1756 with Braddock's successor as Commander-in-Chief, William Shirley, and again in January 1757 with Shirley's successor, Lord Loudoun. Shirley ruled in Washington's favor only in the matter of Dagworthy; Loudoun humiliated Washington, refused him a royal commission and agreed only to relieve him of the responsibility of manning Fort Cumberland.

In 1758, the Virginia Regiment was assigned to the British Forbes Expedition to capture Fort Duquesne. Washington disagreed with General John Forbes' tactics and chosen route. Forbes nevertheless made Washington a brevet brigadier general and gave him command of one of the three brigades that would assault the fort. The French had abandoned the fort and the valley before the assault, however, and Washington only saw a friendly fire incident which left 14 dead and 26 injured. Frustrated, he resigned his commission soon afterwards and returned to Mount Vernon.

Under Washington, the Virginia Regiment had defended 300 miles (480 km) of frontier against twenty Indian attacks in ten months. He increased the professionalism of the regiment as it grew from 300 to 1,000 men, and Virginia's frontier population suffered less than other colonies. Though he failed to realize a royal commission, he gained self-confidence, leadership skills, and knowledge of British military tactics. The destructive competition Washington witnessed among colonial politicians fostered his later support of a strong central government.

On January 6, 1759, Washington, at age 26, married Martha Dandridge Custis, the 27-year-old widow of wealthy plantation owner Daniel Parke Custis. The marriage took place at Martha's estate; she was intelligent, gracious, and experienced in managing a planter's estate, and the couple had a happy marriage. They moved to Mount Vernon, near Alexandria, where he lived as a planter of tobacco and wheat and emerged as a political figure.

Washington's 1751 bout with smallpox is thought to have rendered him sterile, though it is equally likely that "Martha may have sustained injury during the birth of Patsy, her final child, making additional births impossible." The couple lamented not having any children together. Despite this, the two raised Martha's two children John Parke Custis (Jacky) and Martha Parke Custis (Patsy), and later Jacky's two youngest children Eleanor Parke Custis (Nelly) and George Washington Parke Custis (Washy), along with numerous nieces and nephews.

The marriage gave Washington control over Martha's one-third dower interest in the 18,000-acre (7,300 ha) Custis estate, and he managed the remaining two-thirds for Martha's children; the estate also included 84 slaves. As a result, he became one of the wealthiest men in Virginia, which increased his social standing.

At Washington's urging, Governor Lord Botetourt fulfilled Dinwiddie's 1754 promise of land bounties to all-volunteer militia during the French and Indian War. In late 1770, Washington inspected the lands in the Ohio and Great Kanawha regions, and he engaged surveyor William Crawford to subdivide it. Crawford allotted 23,200 acres (9,400 ha) to Washington; Washington told the veterans that their land was hilly and unsuitable for farming, and he agreed to purchase 20,147 acres (8,153 ha), leaving some feeling they had been duped. He also doubled the size of Mount Vernon to 6,500 acres (2,600 ha) and, by 1775, had increased its slave population by more than a hundred.

As a respected military hero and large landowner, Washington held local offices and was elected to the Virginia provincial legislature, representing Frederick County in the House of Burgesses for seven years beginning in 1758. He first ran for the seat in 1755 but was soundly beaten by Hugh West. When he ran in 1758, Washington plied voters with beer, brandy, and other beverages. Despite being away serving on the Forbes Expedition, he won the election with roughly 40 percent of the vote, defeating three opponents with the help of local supporters.

Early in his legislative career, Washington rarely spoke or even attended legislative sessions. He would later become a prominent critic of Britain's taxation policy and mercantilist policies towards the American colonies and became more politically active starting in the 1760s.

Washington imported luxuries and other goods from England, paying for them by exporting tobacco. His profligate spending combined with low tobacco prices left him £1,800 in debt by 1764, prompting him to diversify his holdings. In 1765, because of erosion and other soil problems, he changed Mount Vernon's primary cash crop from tobacco to wheat and expanded operations to include corn flour milling and fishing.

Washington soon was counted among the political and social elite in Virginia. From 1768 to 1775, he invited some 2,000 guests to Mount Vernon, mostly those whom he considered people of rank, and was known to be exceptionally cordial toward guests. Washington also took time for leisure with fox hunting, fishing, dances, theatre, cards, backgammon, and billiards.

Washington's stepdaughter Patsy suffered from epileptic attacks from age 12, and she died in his arms in 1773. The following day, he wrote to Burwell Bassett: "It is easier to conceive, than to describe, the distress of this Family". He cancelled all business activity and remained with Martha every night for three months.

Washington played a central role before and during the American Revolution. His distrust of the British military had begun when he was passed over for promotion into the Regular Army. Opposed to taxes imposed by the British Parliament on the Colonies without proper representation, he and other colonists were also angered by the Royal Proclamation of 1763 which banned American settlement west of the Allegheny Mountains and protected the British fur trade.

Washington believed the Stamp Act 1765 was an "Act of Oppression" and celebrated its repeal the following year. In March 1766, Parliament passed the Declaratory Act asserting that Parliamentary law superseded colonial law. In the late 1760s, the interference of the British Crown in American lucrative western land speculation spurred the American Revolution. Washington was a prosperous land speculator, and in 1767, he encouraged "adventures" to acquire backcountry western lands. Washington helped lead widespread protests against the Townshend Acts passed by Parliament in 1767, and he introduced a proposal in May 1769 which urged Virginians to boycott British goods; the Acts were mostly repealed in 1770.

Parliament sought to punish Massachusetts colonists for their role in the Boston Tea Party in 1774 by passing the Coercive Acts, which Washington saw as "an invasion of our rights and privileges". He said Americans must not submit to acts of tyranny since "custom and use shall make us as tame and abject slaves, as the blacks we rule over with such arbitrary sway". That July, he and George Mason drafted a list of resolutions for the Fairfax County committee, including a call to end the Atlantic slave trade, which were adopted.

On August 1, Washington attended the First Virginia Convention. There, he was selected as a delegate to the First Continental Congress. As tensions rose in 1774, he helped train militias in Virginia and organized enforcement of the Continental Association boycott of British goods instituted by the Congress.

The American Revolutionary War broke out on April 19, 1775, with the Battles of Lexington and Concord and the Siege of Boston. Upon hearing the news, Washington was "sobered and dismayed", and he hastily departed Mount Vernon on May 4, 1775, to join the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia.

On June 14, 1775, Congress created the Continental Army and John Adams nominated Washington as its commander-in-chief, mainly because of his military experience and the belief that a Virginian would better unite the colonies. He was unanimously elected by Congress the next day. Washington appeared before Congress in uniform and gave an acceptance speech on June 16, declining a salary, though he was later reimbursed expenses.

Washington was commissioned on June 19 and officially appointed by Congress as "General & Commander in chief of the army of the United Colonies and of all the forces raised or to be raised by them". He was instructed to take charge of the Siege of Boston on June 22, 1775.

Congress chose his primary staff officers, including Major General Artemas Ward, Adjutant General Horatio Gates, Major General Charles Lee, Major General Philip Schuyler, and Major General Nathanael Greene.  Henry Knox, a young bookkeeper, impressed Adams and Washington with ordnance knowledge and was subsequently promoted to colonel and chief of artillery. Similarly, Washington was impressed Alexander Hamilton's intelligence and bravery. He would later promote him to colonel and appoint him his aide-de-camp.

Washington initially banned the enlistment of blacks, both free and enslaved, into the Continental Army. The British saw an opportunity to divide the colonies, and the colonial governor of Virginia issued a proclamation, which promised freedom to slaves if they joined the British. Desperate for manpower by late 1777, Washington relented and overturned his ban. By the end of the war, around one-tenth of Washington's army were blacks. Following the British surrender, Washington sought to enforce terms of the preliminary Treaty of Paris (1783) by reclaiming slaves freed by the British and returning them to servitude. He arranged to make this request to Sir Guy Carleton on May 6, 1783. Instead, Carleton issued 3,000 freedom certificates and all former slaves in New York City were able to leave before the city was evacuated by the British in late November 1783.

Early in 1775, in response to the growing rebellious movement, London sent British troops to occupy Boston, led by General Thomas Gage, commander of British forces in America. They set up fortifications, making the city impervious to attack. Local militias surrounded the city and effectively trapped the British troops, resulting in a standoff.

As Washington headed for Boston, word of his march preceded him, and he was greeted everywhere; gradually, he became a symbol of the Patriot cause. Upon arrival on July 2, 1775, two weeks after the Battle of Bunker Hill, he set up headquarters in Cambridge. When he went to inspect the army, he found undisciplined militia. After consultation, he initiated Benjamin Franklin's suggested reforms: drilling the soldiers and imposing strict discipline. Washington ordered his officers to identify the skills of recruits to ensure military effectiveness, while removing incompetent officers. He petitioned Gage, his former superior, to release captured Patriot officers from prison and treat them humanely. In October 1775, King George III declared that the colonies were in open rebellion and relieved Gage of command for incompetence, replacing him with General William Howe.

The Continental Army, reduced to only 9,600 men by January 1776 due to expiring short-term enlistments, had to be supplemented with militia. Soon, they were joined by Knox with heavy artillery captured from Fort Ticonderoga. When the Charles River froze over, Washington was eager to cross and storm Boston, but General Gates and others were opposed to untrained militia striking well-garrisoned fortifications. Instead, he agreed to secure the Dorchester Heights, 100 feet above Boston, with Knox's artillery to try to force the British out.

On March 9, under cover of darkness, Washington's troops bombarded British ships in Boston harbour. On March 17, 9,000 British troops and Loyalists began a chaotic ten-day evacuation aboard 120 ships. Soon after, Washington entered the city with 500 men, with explicit orders not to plunder the city. He refrained from exerting military authority in Boston, leaving civilian matters in the hands of local authorities.

After the victory at Boston, Washington correctly guessed that the British would return to New York City, a Loyalist stronghold, and retaliate. He arrived there on April 13, 1776, and ordered the construction of fortifications to thwart the expected British attack. He also ordered his occupying forces to treat civilians and their property with respect, to avoid the abuses Bostonians suffered at the hands of British troops.

Howe transported his resupplied army, with the British fleet, from Halifax to New York City. George Germain, who ran the British war effort in England, believed it could be won with one "decisive blow". The British forces, including more than a hundred ships and thousands of troops, began arriving on Staten Island on July 2 to lay siege to the city. After the Declaration of Independence was unanimously adopted on July 4, Washington informed his troops on July 9 that Congress had declared the united colonies to be "free and independent states".

Howe's troop strength totalled 32,000 regulars and Hessian auxiliaries, and Washington's consisted of 23,000, mostly raw recruits and militia. In August, Howe landed 20,000 troops at Gravesend, Brooklyn, and approached Washington's fortifications Opposing his generals, Washington chose to fight, based on inaccurate information that Howe's army had only 8,000-plus troops. In the Battle of Long Island, Howe assaulted Washington's flank and inflicted 1,500 Patriot casualties, the British suffering 400. Washington retreated, instructing General William Heath to acquire river craft. On August 30, General William Stirling held off the British and gave cover while the army crossed the East River under darkness to Manhattan without loss of life or materiel, although Alexander was captured. Howe was emboldened by his Long Island victory and dispatched Washington as "George Washington, Esq." in futility to negotiate peace. Washington declined, demanding to be addressed with diplomatic protocol, as general and fellow belligerent, not as a "rebel", lest his men be hanged as such if captured. The Royal Navy bombarded the unstable earthworks on lower Manhattan Island. Despite misgivings, Washington heeded the advice of Generals Greene and Putnam to defend Fort Washington. They were unable to hold it; Washington abandoned the fort and ordered his army north to the White Plains.

Howe's pursuit forced Washington to retreat across the Hudson River to Fort Lee to avoid encirclement. Howe landed his troops on Manhattan in November and captured Fort Washington, inflicting high casualties on the Americans. Washington was responsible for delaying the retreat, though he blamed Congress and General Greene. Loyalists in New York City considered Howe a liberator and spread a rumour that Washington had set fire to the city. Patriot morale reached its lowest when Lee was captured. Now reduced to 5,400 troops, Washington's army retreated through New Jersey, and Howe broke off pursuit to set up winter quarters in New York.

Washington crossed the Delaware River into Pennsylvania, where Lee's replacement General John Sullivan joined him with 2,000 more troops. The future of the Continental Army was in doubt due to lack of supplies, a harsh winter, expiring enlistments, and desertions. Washington was disappointed that many New Jersey residents were Loyalists or sceptical about independence.

Howe split up his army and posted a Hessian garrison at Trenton to hold western New Jersey and the east shore of the Delaware. Desperate for a victory, Washington and his generals devised a surprise attack on Trenton. The army was to cross the Delaware in three divisions: one led by Washington (2,400 troops), another by General James Ewing (700), and the third by Colonel John Cadwalader (1,500). The force was to then split, with Washington taking the Pennington Road and General Sullivan traveling south on the river's edge.

Washington ordered a 60-mile search for Durham boats to transport his army, and the destruction of vessels that could be used by the British. He personally risked capture while staking out the Jersey shoreline alone leading up to the crossing. Washington crossed the Delaware on Christmas night, 1776. His men followed across the ice-obstructed river from McConkey's Ferry, with 40 men per vessel. The wind churned up the waters, and they were pelted with hail, but by 3:00 a.m. on December 26, they made it across with no losses. Knox was delayed, managing frightened horses and about 18 field guns on flat-bottomed ferries. Cadwalader and Ewing failed to cross due to the ice and heavy currents. Once Knox arrived, Washington proceeded to Trenton, rather than risk being spotted returning his army to Pennsylvania.

The troops spotted Hessian positions a mile from Trenton, so Washington split his force into two columns, rallying his men: "Soldiers keep by your officers. For God's sake, keep by your officers." The two columns were separated at the Birmingham crossroads. General Greene's column took the upper Ferry Road, led by Washington, and General Sullivan's column advanced on River Road. The Americans marched in sleet and snowfall. Many were shoeless with bloodied feet, and two died of exposure. At sunrise, Washington, aided by Colonel Knox and artillery, led his men in a surprise attack on the unsuspecting Hessians and their commander, Colonel Johann Rall. The Hessians had 22 killed, including Colonel Rall, 83 wounded, and 850 captured with supplies.

Washington retreated across the Delaware to Pennsylvania and returned to New Jersey on January 3, 1777, launching an attack on British regulars at Princeton, with 40 Americans killed or wounded and 273 British killed or captured. American Generals Hugh Mercer and John Cadwalader were being driven back by the British when Mercer was mortally wounded. Washington arrived and led the men in a counterattack which advanced to within 30 yards (27 m) of the British line.

Some British troops retreated after a brief stand, while others took refuge in Nassau Hall, which became the target of Colonel Alexander Hamilton's cannons. Washington's troops charged, the British surrendered in less than an hour, and 194 soldiers laid down their arms. Howe retreated to New York City where his army remained inactive until early the next year. Washington took up winter headquarters in Jacob Arnold's Tavern in Morristown, New Jersey, while he received munition from the Hibernia mines. While in Morristown, Washington's troops disrupted British supply lines and expelled them from parts of New Jersey.

During his stay in Morristown, Washington ordered the inoculation of Continental troops against smallpox. This went against the wishes of the Continental Congress who had issued a proclamation prohibiting it, but Washington feared the spread of smallpox in the army. The mass inoculation proved successful, with only isolated infections occurring and no regiments incapacitated by the disease.

The British still controlled New York, and many Patriot soldiers did not re-enlist or deserted after the harsh winter campaign. Congress instituted greater rewards for re-enlisting and punishments for desertion to effect greater troop numbers. Strategically, Washington's victories at Trenton and Princeton were pivotal; they revived Patriot morale and quashed the British strategy of showing overwhelming force followed by offering generous terms, changing the course of the war. In February 1777, word of the American victories reached London, and the British realized the Patriots were in a position to demand unconditional independence.

In July 1777, British General John Burgoyne led the Saratoga campaign south from Quebec through Lake Champlain and recaptured Fort Ticonderoga intending to divide New England, including control of the Hudson River. However, General Howe in British-occupied New York City blundered, taking his army south to Philadelphia rather than up the Hudson River to join Burgoyne near Albany.

Washington and Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette rushed to Philadelphia to engage Howe. In the Battle of Brandywine, on September 11, 1777, Howe outmanoeuvred Washington and marched unopposed into the nation's capital at Philadelphia. A Patriot attack failed against the British at Germantown in October.

In Upstate New York, the Patriots were led by General Horatio Gates. Concerned about Burgoyne's movements southward, Washington sent reinforcements north with Generals Benedict Arnold, his most aggressive field commander, and Benjamin Lincoln. On October 7, 1777, Burgoyne tried to take Bemis Heights but was isolated from support by Howe. He was forced to retreat to Saratoga and ultimately surrendered after the Battles of Saratoga. As Washington suspected, Gates' victory emboldened his critics.

Biographer John Alden maintains, "It was inevitable that the defeats of Washington's forces and the concurrent victory of the forces in upper New York should be compared." Admiration for Washington was waning, including little credit from John Adams.

Washington and his Continental Army of 11,000 men went into winter quarters at Valley Forge north of Philadelphia in December 1777. There they lost between 2,000 and 3,000 men as a result of disease and lack of food, clothing, and shelter. The British were comfortably quartered in Philadelphia, paying for supplies in pounds sterling, while Washington struggled with a devalued American paper currency. The woodlands were soon exhausted of game. By February, Washington was facing lowered morale and increased desertions among his troops.

An internal revolt by his officers, led by Major General Thomas Conway, prompted some members of Congress to consider removing Washington from command. Washington's supporters resisted, and the matter was dropped after much deliberation. Once the plot was exposed, Conway wrote an apology to Washington, resigned, and returned to France.

Washington made repeated petitions to Congress for provisions. He received a congressional delegation to check the Army's conditions and expressed the urgency of the situation, proclaiming: "Something must be done. Important alterations must be made." He recommended that Congress expedite supplies, and Congress agreed to strengthen and fund the army's supply lines by reorganizing the commissary department. By late February, supplies began arriving. Meanwhile, Baron Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben's incessant drilling transformed Washington's recruits into a disciplined fighting force by the end of winter camp. For his services, Washington promoted Von Steuben to Major General and made him chief of staff.

In early 1778, the French responded to Burgoyne's defeat and entered into a Treaty of Alliance with the Americans. Congress ratified the treaty in May, which amounted to a French declaration of war against Britain. In May 1778, Howe resigned and was replaced by Sir Henry Clinton.

The British evacuated Philadelphia for New York that June and Washington summoned a war council of American and French generals. He chose a partial attack on the retreating British at the Battle of Monmouth. Generals Charles Lee and Lafayette moved with 4,000 men, without Washington's knowledge, and bungled their first attack on June 28. Washington relieved Lee and achieved a draw after an expansive battle. At nightfall, the British continued their retreat to New York, and Washington moved his army outside the city. Monmouth was Washington's last battle in the North.

Washington became America's first spymaster by designing an espionage system against the British. In 1778, Major Benjamin Tallmadge formed the Culper Ring at Washington's direction to covertly collect information about the British in New York. Washington had disregarded incidents of disloyalty by Benedict Arnold, who had distinguished himself in many battles.

In 1780, Arnold began supplying British spymaster John André with sensitive information intended to compromise Washington and capture West Point, a key American defensive position on the Hudson River. Historians Nathaniel Philbrick and Ron Chernow noted possible reasons for Arnold's defection to be his anger at losing promotions to junior officers, or repeated slights from Congress. He was also deeply in debt, profiteering from the war, and disappointed by Washington's lack of support during his eventual court-martial.

After repeated requests, Washington agreed to give Arnold command of West Point in August. On September 21, Arnold met André and gave him plans to take over the garrison. While returning to British lines, André was captured by militia who discovered the plans; upon hearing the news of André's capture on September 24, while waiting to greet and have breakfast with Washington, Arnold immediately fled to the HMS Vulture, the ship that had brought André to West Point, and escaped to New York.

Upon being told about Arnold's treason, Washington recalled the commanders positioned under Arnold at key points around the fort to prevent any complicity. He assumed personal command at West Point and reorganized its defences. André's trial for espionage ended in a death sentence, and Washington offered to return him to the British in exchange for Arnold, but Clinton refused. André was hanged on October 2, 1780, despite his request for a firing squad, to deter other spies.

In late 1778, General Clinton shipped 3,000 troops from New York to Georgia and launched a Southern invasion against Savannah, reinforced by 2,000 British and Loyalist troops. They repelled an attack by American patriots and French naval forces, which bolstered the British war effort.

In June 1778, Iroquois warriors joined with Loyalist rangers led by Walter Butler and killed more than 200 frontiersmen, laying waste to the Wyoming Valley in Northeastern Pennsylvania. In mid-1779, in response to this and other attacks on New England towns, Washington ordered General John Sullivan to lead an expedition to force the Iroquois out of New York by effecting "the total destruction and devastation" of their villages and taking their women and children hostage. The expedition systematically destroyed Iroquois villages and food stocks, and forced at least 5,036 Iroquois to flee to British Canada. The campaign directly killed a few hundred Iroquois, but according to historian Rhiannon Koehler, the net effect was to reduce the Iroquois by half. They became unable to survive the harsh winter of 1779–1780; some historians now described the campaign as a genocide.

Washington's troops went into quarters at Morristown, New Jersey for their worst winter of the war, with temperatures well below freezing. New York Harbor was frozen, snow covered the ground for weeks, and the troops again lacked provisions.

In January 1780, Clinton assembled 12,500 troops and attacked Charles Town, South Carolina, defeating General Benjamin Lincoln. By June, they occupied the South Carolina Piedmont. Clinton returned to New York and left 8,000 troops under the command of General Charles Cornwallis. Congress replaced Lincoln with Horatio Gates; after his defeat in the Battle of Camden, Gates was replaced by Nathanael Greene, Washington's initial choice, but the British had firm control of the South. Washington was reinvigorated, however, when Lafayette returned from France with more ships, men, and supplies, and 5,000 veteran French troops led by Marshal Rochambeau arrived at Newport, Rhode Island in July 1780. French naval forces then landed, led by Admiral de Grasse.

Washington's army went into winter quarters at New Windsor, New York in December 1780; he urged Congress and state officials to expedite provisions so the army would not "continue to struggle under the same difficulties they have hitherto endured". On March 1, 1781, Congress ratified the Articles of Confederation, but the government that took effect on March 2 did not have the power to levy taxes, and it loosely held the states together.

General Clinton sent Benedict Arnold, now a British Brigadier General with 1,700 troops, to Virginia to capture Portsmouth and conduct raids on Patriot forces; Washington responded by sending Lafayette south to counter Arnold's efforts. Washington initially hoped to bring the fight to New York, drawing off British forces from Virginia and ending the war there, but Rochambeau advised him that Cornwallis in Virginia was the better target. De Grasse's fleet arrived off the Virginia coast, cutting off British retreat. Seeing the advantage, Washington made a feint towards Clinton in New York, then headed south to Virginia.

The siege of Yorktown was a decisive victory by the combined forces of the Continental Army commanded by Washington, the French Army commanded by General Comte de Rochambeau, and the French Navy commanded by Admiral de Grasse. On August 19, the march to Yorktown led by Washington and Rochambeau began, which is known now as the "celebrated march". Washington was in command of an army of 7,800 Frenchmen, 3,100 militia, and 8,000 Continentals. Inexperienced in siege warfare, he often deferred to the judgment of General Rochambeau and relied on his advice. Despite this, Rochambeau never challenged Washington's authority as the battle's commanding officer.

By late September, Patriot-French forces surrounded Yorktown, trapped the British Army, and prevented British reinforcements from Clinton in the North, while the French navy emerged victorious at the Battle of the Chesapeake. The final American offensive began with a shot fired by Washington. The siege ended with a British surrender on October 19, 1781; over 7,000 British soldiers became prisoners of war. Washington negotiated the terms of surrender for two days, and the official signing ceremony took place on October 19; Cornwallis claimed illness and was absent, sending General Charles O'Hara as his proxy.  As a gesture of goodwill, Washington held a dinner for the American, French, and British generals, all of whom fraternized on friendly terms and identified with one another as members of the same professional military caste.

Afterwards, Washington moved the army to New Windsor, New York where they remained stationed until the Treaty of Paris was signed on September 3, 1783, formally ending the war. Although the peace treaty did not happen for two years following the end of the battle, Yorktown proved to be the last significant battle or campaign of the Revolutionary War, with the British Parliament agreeing to cease hostilities in March 1782.

When peace negotiations began in April 1782, both the British and French began gradually evacuating their forces. With the American treasury empty, unpaid and mutinous soldiers forced the adjournment of Congress. In March 1783, Washington successfully calmed the Newburgh Conspiracy, a planned munity by American officers; Congress promised each a five-year bonus. Washington submitted an account of $450,000 in expenses which he had advanced to the army, equivalent to $9.15 million in 2022. The account was settled, though it was allegedly vague about large sums and included expenses his wife had incurred through visits to his headquarters.

The following month, a Congressional committee led by Alexander Hamilton began adapting the army for peacetime. In August 1783, Washington gave the Army's perspective to the committee in his Sentiments on a Peace Establishment, which advised Congress to keep a standing army, create a "national militia" of separate state units, and establish a navy and a national military academy.

The Treaty of Paris was signed on September 3, 1783, and Britain officially recognized American independence. Washington disbanded his army, giving a farewell address to his soldiers on November 2. During this time, Washington oversaw the evacuation of British forces in New York and was greeted by parades and celebrations. Along with Governor George Clinton, he took formal possession of the city on November 25.

In early December 1783, Washington bade farewell to his officers at Fraunces Tavern and resigned as commander-in-chief soon thereafter. In a final appearance in uniform, he gave a statement to the Congress: "I consider it an indispensable duty to close this last solemn act of my official life, by commending the interests of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty God, and those who have the superintendence of them, to his holy keeping." Washington's resignation was acclaimed at home and abroad and showed a sceptical world that the new republic would not degenerate into chaos.

The same month, Washington was appointed president-general of the Society of the Cincinnati, a newly established hereditary fraternity of Revolutionary War officers. He served in this capacity for the remainder of his life.

    Works by Queen Victoria at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)

Newspaper clippings about Queen Victoria in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW

Queen Victoria

House of Hanover

Cadet branch of the House of Welf

Born: 24 May 1819 Died: 22 January 1901

Regnal titles

Preceded by

William IV

    Queen of the United Kingdom

20 June 1837 – 22 January 1901     Succeeded by

Edward VII

Vacant

Title last held by

Bahadur Shah II

as Mughal emperor     Empress of India

1 May 1876 – 22 January 1901

Queen Victoria

Events  

Coronation

        Honours Hackpen White Horse Wedding

        Wedding dress Golden Jubilee

        Honours Medal Police Medal Clock Tower, Weymouth Clock Tower, Brighton Bust Adelaide Jubilee International Exhibition Diamond Jubilee

        Honours Medal Jubilee Diamond Jubilee Tower Cherries jubilee Recessional (poem) Cunningham Clock Tower Devonshire House Ball

Reign  

    Bedchamber crisis Prime Ministers Edward Oxford Empress of India John William Bean Victorian era Victorian morality Visits to Manchester Foreign visits State funeral Mausoleum

Family  

    Albert, Prince Consort (husband) Victoria, Princess Royal (daughter) Edward VII (son) Princess Alice of the United Kingdom (daughter) Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (son) Princess Helena of the United Kingdom (daughter) Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll (daughter) Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught and Strathearn (son) Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany (son) Princess Beatrice of the United Kingdom (daughter) Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn (father) Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld (mother) Descendants Royal descendants Princess Feodora of Leiningen (half-sister) Carl, 3rd Prince of Leiningen (half-brother)

Early life  

    Kensington System John Conroy Victoire Conroy Louise Lehzen Lady Flora Hastings Charlotte Percy George Davys Legitimacy

Honours  

    Places Empire Day Royal Family Order Victoria Day Victoria Day (Scotland) Victoria Cross Victoria (plant)

Depictions  

Film  

    Sixty Years a Queen (1913) Victoria in Dover (1936) Victoria the Great (1937) Sixty Glorious Years (1938) Victoria in Dover (1954) Mrs Brown (1997) The Young Victoria (2009) Victoria & Abdul (2017) The Black Prince (2017) Dolittle (2020)

Television  

    Happy and Glorious (1952) Victoria Regina (1961) The Young Victoria (1963) Victoria & Albert (2001) Looking for Victoria (2003) Royal Upstairs Downstairs (2011) Victoria (2016–2019)

 

Stage  

    Victoria and Merrie England (1897) Victoria Regina (1934) I and Albert (1972)

Statues and

Memorials  

    List of statues London

        Memorial Statue Square Leeds St Helens Lancaster Bristol Weymouth Chester Reading Liverpool Birmingham Birkenhead Dundee Balmoral cairns Guernsey Isle of Man Valletta

        Statue Gate Winnipeg Montreal

        Square Victoria, British Columbia Toronto Regina Bangalore Hong Kong Kolkata Visakhapatnam Penang Sydney

        Building Square Adelaide Brisbane Melbourne Christchurch

Poetry  

    "The Widow at Windsor" (1892) "Recessional" (1897)

 

Songs  

    Victoria Choral Songs

Stamps  

British  

    Penny Black

        VR official Penny Blue Two penny blue Penny Red Embossed stamps Halfpenny Rose Red Three Halfpence Red Penny Venetian Red Penny Lilac Lilac and Green Issue Jubilee Issue

Colonial  

    Chalon head Canada 12d black Canada 2c Large Queen Ceylon Dull Rose India Inverted Head 4 annas Malta Halfpenny Yellow Mauritius "Post Office" stamps

Related  

    Osborne House Queen Victoria's journals John Brown Abdul Karim Pets

        Dash Diamond Crown

English, Scottish and British monarchs

Monarchs of England until 1603    Monarchs of Scotland until 1603

Alfred the Great Edward the Elder Ælfweard Æthelstan Edmund I Eadred Eadwig Edgar the Peaceful Edward the Martyr Æthelred the Unready Sweyn Edmund Ironside Cnut Harold I Harthacnut Edward the Confessor Harold Godwinson Edgar Ætheling William I William II Henry I Stephen Matilda Henry II Henry the Young King Richard I John Henry III Edward I Edward II Edward III Richard II Henry IV Henry V Henry VI Edward IV Edward V Richard III Henry VII Henry VIII Edward VI Jane Mary I and Philip Elizabeth I

    Kenneth I MacAlpin Donald I Constantine I Áed Giric Eochaid Donald II Constantine II Malcolm I Indulf Dub Cuilén Amlaíb Kenneth II Constantine III Kenneth III Malcolm II Duncan I Macbeth Lulach Malcolm III Donald III Duncan II Edgar Alexander I David I Malcolm IV William I Alexander II Alexander III Margaret John Robert I David II Edward Balliol Robert II Robert III James I James II James III James IV James V Mary I James VI

    Monarchs of England and Scotland after the Union of the Crowns from 1603

    James I and VI Charles I Charles II James II and VII William III and II and Mary II Anne

    British monarchs after the Acts of Union 1707

    Anne George I George II George III George IV William IV Victoria Edward VII George V Edward VIII George VI Elizabeth II

    Debatable or disputed rulers are in italics

British princesses

The generations indicate descent from George I, who formalised the use of the titles prince and princess for members of the British royal family. Where a princess may have been or is descended from George I more than once, her most senior descent, by which she bore or bears her title, is used.

1st generation  

    Sophia Dorothea, Queen in Prussia

 

2nd generation  

    Anne, Princess Royal and Princess of Orange Princess Amelia Princess Caroline Mary, Landgravine of Hesse-Kassel Louise, Queen of Denmark and Norway

 

3rd generation  

    Augusta, Duchess of Brunswick Princess Elizabeth Princess Louisa Caroline Matilda, Queen of Denmark and Norway

 

4th generation  

    Charlotte, Princess Royal and Queen of Württemberg Princess Augusta Sophia Elizabeth, Landgravine of Hesse-Homburg Princess Mary, Duchess of Gloucester and Edinburgh Princess Sophia Princess Amelia Princess Sophia of Gloucester Princess Caroline of Gloucester

 

5th generation  

    Princess Charlotte, Princess Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld Princess Elizabeth of Clarence Queen Victoria Augusta, Grand Duchess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz Princess Mary Adelaide, Duchess of Teck

 

6th generation  

    Victoria, Princess Royal and German Empress Alice, Grand Duchess of Hesse and by Rhine Princess Helena, Princess Christian of Schleswig-Holstein Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll Princess Beatrice, Princess Henry of Battenberg Princess Frederica, Baroness von Pawel-Rammingen Princess Marie of Hanover

 

7th generation  

    Louise, Princess Royal and Duchess of Fife Princess Victoria Maud, Queen of Norway Marie, Queen of Romania Grand Duchess Victoria Feodorovna of Russia Princess Alexandra, Princess of Hohenlohe-Langenburg Princess Beatrice, Duchess of Galliera Margaret, Crown Princess of Sweden Princess Patricia, Lady Patricia Ramsay Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone Princess Marie Louise, Princess Maximilian of Baden Alexandra, Grand Duchess of Mecklenburg-Schwerin Princess Olga of Hanover

 

8th generation  

    Mary, Princess Royal and Countess of Harewood Princess Alexandra, 2nd Duchess of Fife Princess Maud, Countess of Southesk Princess Sibylla, Duchess of Västerbotten Princess Caroline Mathilde of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha Frederica, Queen of Greece

 

9th generation  

    Queen Elizabeth II Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon Princess Alexandra, The Honourable Lady Ogilvy

 

10th generation  

    Anne, Princess Royal

 

11th generation  

    Princess Beatrice, Mrs Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi Princess Eugenie, Mrs Jack Brooksbank Lady Louise Mountbatten-Windsor1

 

12th generation  

    Princess Charlotte of Cambridge

1 Status debatable; see her article

Hanoverian princesses by birth

Generations are numbered by descent from the first King of Hanover, George III.

1st generation  

   Charlotte, Queen of Württemberg Princess Augusta Sophia Elizabeth, Landgravine of Hesse-Homburg Princess Mary, Duchess of Gloucester and Edinburgh Princess Sophia Princess Amelia

 

2nd generation  

    Charlotte, Princess Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld Princess Charlotte of Clarence Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom Princess Elizabeth of Clarence Augusta, Grand Duchess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz Princess Mary Adelaide, Duchess of Teck

 

3rd generation  

   Princess Frederica, Baroness von Pawel-Rammingen Princess Marie

4th generation  

    Marie Louise, Princess Maximilian of Baden Alexandra, Grand Duchess of Mecklenburg-Schwerin Princess Olga

5th generation  

    Frederica, Queen of the Hellenes

6th generation  

    Princess Marie, Countess von Hochberg Princess Olga Princess Alexandra, Princess of Leiningen Princess Friederike

7th generation  

    Princess Alexandra Princess Eugenia

8th generation  

    Princess Elisabeth Princess Eleonora Princess Sofia

Authority control Edit this at Wikidata

General  

    ISNI

        1 VIAF

        1 WorldCat

 

National libraries  

    Norway Spain France (data) Catalonia Germany Italy Israel United States Latvia Japan Czech Republic Australia Greece Korea Croatia Netherlands Poland Sweden Vatican

Art galleries and museums  

    Victoria Te Papa (New Zealand)

Art research institutes  

    RKD Artists (Netherlands) Artist Names (Getty)

Biographical dictionaries  

    Germany

Scientific databases  

    CiNii (Japan)

Other  

    Faceted Application of Subject Terminology Music Brainz artist

        2 National Archives (US) RISM (France)

        1 Social Networks and Archival Context

        2 SUDOC (France)

        1 Trove (Australia)

        1

Categories:

    Queen Victoria 1819 birth s1901 deaths Monarchs of the United Kingdom Monarchs of the Isle of Man Heads of state of Canada Monarchs of Australia Heads of state of New Zealand Queens regnant in the British Isles19th-century British monarchs20th-century British monarchs House of Hanover Hanoverian princesses House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (United Kingdom)Empresses regnant Indian empresses British princesses19th-century diarists British diarists Founders of English schools and colleges People associated with the Royal National College for the Blind People from Kensington British people of German descent Female critics of feminism Knights Grand Cross of the Order of the Immaculate Conception of Vila Viçosa Dames of the Order of Saint Isabel Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur Grand Crosses of the Order of St. Sava Recipients of the Order of the Cross of Takovo

The standard circulating coinage of the United Kingdom, British Crown Dependencies and British Overseas Territories is denominated in pennies and pounds sterling (symbol "£"), and ranges in value from one penny sterling to two pounds. Since decimalisation, on 15 February 1971, the pound has been divided into 100 (new) pence. Before decimalisation, twelve pence made a shilling, and twenty shillings made a pound.

British coins are minted by the Royal Mint in Llantrisant, Wales. The Royal Mint also commissions the coins' designs.

In addition to the circulating coinage, the UK also mints commemorative decimal coins (crowns) in the denomination of five pounds. Ceremonial Maundy money and bullion coinage of gold sovereigns, half sovereigns, and gold and silver Britannia coins are also produced. Some territories outside the United Kingdom, which use the pound sterling, produce their own coinage, with the same denominations and specifications as the UK coinage but with local designs.

 

Currently circulating coinage

The current decimal coins consist of one penny and two pence in copper-plated steel, five pence and ten pence in nickel-plated steel, equilateral curve heptagonal twenty pence and fifty pence in cupronickel, and bimetallic one pound and two pound. All circulating coins have an effigy of Queen Elizabeth II on the obverse, and various national and regional designs, and the denomination, on the reverse. All current coins carry an abbreviated Latin inscription whose full form, ELIZABETH II DEI GRATIA REGINA FIDEI DEFENSATRIX, translates to "Elizabeth II, by the grace of God, Queen and Defender of the Faith".

Denomination     Obverse     Reverse     Diameter     Thickness     Mass     Composition     Edge     Introduced

One penny     Queen Elizabeth II     Crowned portcullis with chains (1971–2008)

Segment of the Royal Arms (2008–present)     20.3 mm     1.52 mm     3.56 g     Bronze (97% copper, 2.5% zinc, 0.5% tin)     Smooth     1971

1.65 mm     Copper-plated steel     1992

Two pence     Plume of ostrich feathers within a coronet (1971–2008)

Segment of the Royal Arms (2008–present)     25.9 mm     1.85 mm     7.12 g     Bronze     1971

2.03 mm     Copper-plated steel     1992

Five pence[a]     Queen Elizabeth II     Crowned thistle (1968–2008)

Segment of the Royal Arms (2008–present)     18 mm     1.7 mm     3.25 g     Cupronickel (3:1)     Milled     1990

1.89 mm     Nickel-plated steel     2012

Ten pence[a]     Crowned lion (1968–2008)

Segment of the Royal Arms (2008–present)     24.5 mm     1.85 mm     6.5 g     Cupronickel (3:1)     1992

2.05 mm     Nickel-plated steel     2012

Twenty pence     Crowned Tudor Rose     21.4 mm     1.7 mm     5 g     Cupronickel (5:1)     Smooth, Reuleaux heptagon     1982

Segment of the Royal Arms     2008

Fifty pence[a]     Britannia and lion     27.3 mm     1.78 mm     8 g     Cupronickel (3:1)     Smooth, Reuleaux heptagon     1997

Various commemorative designs     1998

Segment of the Royal Arms     2008

One pound     Queen Elizabeth II     Rose, leek, thistle, and shamrock encircled by a coronet     23.03–23.43 mm     2.8 mm     8.75 g     Inner: Nickel-plated alloy

Outer: Nickel-brass     Alternately milled and plain (12-sided)     28 March 2017[1]

Two pounds[b]     Abstract concentric design representing technological development     28.4 mm     2.5 mm     12 g     Inner: Cupronickel

Outer: Nickel-brass     Milled with variable inscription and/or decoration     1997 (issued 1998)

Various commemorative designs     1999

Britannia     2015

 

The specifications and dates of introduction of the 5p, 10p, and 50p coins refer to the current versions. These coins were originally issued in larger sizes in 1968 and 1969 respectively.

 

    This coin was originally issued in a smaller size in a single metal in 1986 for special issues only. It was redesigned as a bi-metallic issue for general circulation in 1997.

Production and distribution

All genuine UK coins are produced by the Royal Mint. The same coinage is used across the United Kingdom: unlike banknotes, local issues of coins are not produced for different parts of the UK. The pound coin until 2016 was produced in regional designs, but these circulate equally in all parts of the UK (see UK designs, below).

Every year, newly minted coins are checked for size, weight, and composition at a Trial of the Pyx. Essentially the same procedure has been used since the 13th century. Assaying is now done by the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths on behalf of HM Treasury.

The 1p and 2p coins from 1971 are the oldest standard-issue coins still in circulation. Pre-decimal crowns are the oldest coins in general that are still legal tender, although they are in practice never encountered in general circulation.[2]

Coins from the British dependencies and territories that use sterling as their currency are sometimes found in change in other jurisdictions. Strictly, they are not legal tender in the United Kingdom; however, since they have the same specifications as UK coins, they are sometimes tolerated in commerce, and can readily be used in vending machines.

UK-issued coins are, on the other hand, generally fully accepted and freely mixed in other British dependencies and territories that use the pound.

An extensive coinage redesign was commissioned by the Royal Mint in 2005, and new designs were gradually introduced into the circulating British coinage from summer 2008. Except for the £1 coin, the pre-2008 coins remain legal tender and are expected to stay in circulation for the foreseeable future.

The estimated volume in circulation as at March 2016 is:[3]

Denomination     Number of

pieces

(millions)     Face value

(£m)

Two pounds     479     957.036

One pound     1,671     1,671.328

Fifty pence     1,053     526.153

Twenty-five pence     81     20

Twenty pence     3,004     600.828

Ten pence     1,713     171.312

Five pence     4,075     203.764

Two pence     6,714     134.273

One penny     11,430     114.299

Total     30,139     4,643.658

History of pre-decimal coinage

The penny before 1500

See also: Penny (English coin) and Scottish coinage

The English silver penny first appeared in the 8th century CE in adoption of Western Europe's Carolingian monetary system wherein 12 pence made a shilling and 20 shillings made a pound. The weight of the English penny was fixed at 22+1⁄2 troy grains (about 1.46 grams) by Offa of Mercia, an 8th-century contemporary of Charlemagne; 240 pennies weighed 5,400 grains or a tower pound (different from the troy pound of 5,760 grains). The silver penny was the only coin minted for 500 years, from c. 780 to 1280.

From the time of Charlemagne until the 12th century, the silver currency of England was made from the highest purity silver available. But there were disadvantages to minting currency of fine silver, notably the level of wear it suffered, and the ease with which coins could be "clipped", or trimmed. In 1158 a new standard for English coinage was established by Henry II with the "Tealby Penny" — the sterling silver standard of 92.5% silver and 7.5% copper. This was a harder-wearing alloy, yet it was still a rather high grade of silver. It went some way towards discouraging the practice of "clipping", though this practice was further discouraged and largely eliminated with the introduction of the milled edge seen on coins today.

The weight of a silver penny stayed constant at above 22 grains until 1344; afterwards its weight was reduced to 18 grains in 1351, to 15 grains in 1412, to 12 grains in 1464, and to 101⁄2 grains in 1527.

The history of the Royal Mint stretches back to AD 886.[4] For many centuries production was in London, initially at the Tower of London, and then at premises nearby in Tower Hill in what is today known as Royal Mint Court. In the 1970s production was transferred to Llantrisant in South Wales.[5] Historically Scotland and England had separate coinage; the last Scottish coins were struck in 1709 shortly after union with England.[6]

The penny after 1500

During the reign of Henry VIII, the silver content was gradually debased, reaching a low of one-third silver. However, in Edward VI's reign in 1551, this debased coinage was discontinued in favor of a return to sterling silver with the penny weighing 8 grains. The first crowns and half-crowns were produced that year. From this point onwards till 1920, sterling was the rule.

Coins were originally hand-hammered — an ancient technique in which two dies are struck together with a blank coin between them. This was the traditional method of manufacturing coins in the Western world from the classical Greek era onwards, in contrast with Asia, where coins were traditionally cast. Milled (that is, machine-made) coins were produced first during the reign of Elizabeth I (1558–1603) and periodically during the subsequent reigns of James I and Charles I, but there was initially opposition to mechanisation from the moneyers, who ensured that most coins continued to be produced by hammering. All British coins produced since 1662 have been milled.

By 1601 it was decreed that one troy ounce or 480 grains of sterling silver be minted into 62 pennies (i.e. each penny weighed 7.742 grains). By 1696, the currency had been seriously weakened by an increase in clipping during the Nine Years' War[7] to the extent that it was decided to recall and replace all hammered silver coinage in circulation.[8] The exercise came close to disaster due to fraud and mismanagement,[9] but was saved by the personal intervention of Isaac Newton after his appointment as Warden of the Mint, a post which was intended to be a sinecure, but which he took seriously.[8] Newton was subsequently given the post of Master of the Mint in 1699. Following the 1707 union between the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland, Newton used his previous experience to direct the 1707–1710 Scottish recoinage, resulting in a common currency for the new Kingdom of Great Britain. After 15 September 1709 no further silver coins were ever struck in Scotland.[10]

As a result of a report written by Newton on 21 September 1717 to the Lords Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury[11] the bimetallic relationship between gold coins and silver coins was changed by Royal proclamation on 22 December 1717, forbidding the exchange of gold guineas for more than 21 silver shillings.[12] Due to differing valuations in other European countries this unintentionally resulted in a silver shortage, as silver coins were used to pay for imports, while exports were paid for in gold, effectively moving Britain from the silver standard to its first gold standard, rather than the bimetallic standard implied by the proclamation.

The coinage reform of 1816 set up a weight/value ratio and physical sizes for silver coins. Each troy ounce of sterling silver was henceforth minted into 66 pence or 51⁄2 shillings.

In 1920, the silver content of all British coins was reduced from 92.5% to 50%, with some of the remainder consisting of manganese, which caused the coins to tarnish to a very dark colour after they had been in circulation for long. Silver was eliminated altogether in 1947, except for Maundy coinage, which returned to the pre-1920 92.5% silver composition.

The 1816 weight/value ratio and size system survived the debasement of silver in 1920, and the adoption of token coins of cupronickel in 1947. It even persisted after decimalisation for those coins which had equivalents and continued to be minted with their values in new pence. The UK finally abandoned it in 1992 when smaller, more convenient, "silver" coins were introduced.

History of decimal coinage

Decimalisation

Since decimalisation on 15 February 1971 the pound (symbol "£") has been divided into 100 pence. (Prior to decimalisation the pound was divided into 20 shillings, each of 12 [old] pence; thus, there were 240 [old] pence to the pound). The pound remained as Britain's currency unit after decimalisation (unlike in many other British commonwealth countries, which dropped the pound upon decimalisation by introducing dollars or new units worth 10 shillings or 1⁄2 pound). The following coins were introduced with these reverse designs:

    Half penny, 1971–1984: A crown, symbolising the monarch.

    One penny, 1971–2007: A crowned portcullis with chains (the badge of the Houses of Parliament).

    Two pence, 1971–2007: The Prince of Wales's feathers: a plume of ostrich feathers within a coronet.

    Five pence, 1968–2007: The Badge of Scotland, a thistle royally crowned.

    Ten pence, 1968–2007: The lion of England royally crowned.

    Fifty pence, 1969–2007: Britannia and lion.

The first decimal coins – the five pence (5p) and ten pence (10p) — were introduced in 1968 in the run-up to decimalisation in order to familiarise the public with the new system. These initially circulated alongside the pre-decimal coinage and had the same size and value as the existing one shilling and two shilling coins respectively. The fifty pence (50p) coin followed in 1969, replacing the old ten shilling note. The remaining decimal coins – at the time, the half penny (1⁄2p), penny (1p) and two pence (2p) — were issued in 1971 at decimalisation. A quarter-penny coin, to be struck in aluminium, was proposed at the time decimalisation was being planned, but was never minted.

The new coins were initially marked with the wording NEW PENNY (singular) or NEW PENCE (plural). The word "new" was dropped in 1982. The symbol "p" was adopted to distinguish the new pennies from the old, which used the symbol "d" (from the Latin denarius, a coin used in the Roman Empire).

Updates 1982–1998

In the years since decimalisation, a number of changes have been made to the coinage; these new denominations were introduced with the following designs:

    Twenty pence, 1982–2007: A crowned Tudor Rose, a traditional heraldic emblem of England (NB With incuse design and lettering).

    One pound, 1983–2016: various designs; see One pound (British coin).

    Two pounds, 1997–2014: An abstract design of concentric circles, representing technological development from the Iron Age to the modern day electronic age.

Additionally:

    The halfpenny was discontinued in 1984.

    The composition of the 1p and 2p was changed in 1992 from bronze to copper-plated steel without changing the design.

    The sizes of the 5p, 10p and 50p coins were reduced in 1990, 1992 and 1997, respectively, also without changing the design.

The twenty pence (20p) coin was introduced in 1982 to fill the gap between the 10p and 50p coins. The pound coin (£1) was introduced in 1983 to replace the Bank of England £1 banknote which was discontinued in 1984 (although the Scottish banks continued producing them for some time afterwards; the last of them, the Royal Bank of Scotland £1 note, is still issued in a small volume as of 2021). The designs on the £1 coin changed annually in a largely five-year cycle, until the introduction of the new 12-sided £1 coin in 2017.

The decimal halfpenny coin was demonetised in 1984 as its value was by then too small to be useful. The pre-decimal sixpence, shilling and two shilling coins, which had continued to circulate alongside the decimal coinage with values of 2+1⁄2p, 5p and 10p respectively, were finally withdrawn in 1980, 1990 and 1993 respectively. The double florin and crown, with values of 20p and 25p respectively, have technically not been withdrawn, but in practice are never seen in general circulation.

In the 1990s, the Royal Mint reduced the sizes of the 5p, 10p, and 50p coins. As a consequence, the oldest 5p coins in circulation date from 1990, the oldest 10p coins from 1992 and the oldest 50p coins come from 1997. Since 1997, many special commemorative designs of 50p have been issued. Some of these are found fairly frequently in circulation and some are rare. They are all legal tender.

In 1992 the composition of the 1p and 2p coins was changed from bronze to copper-plated steel. Due to their high copper content (97%), the intrinsic value of pre-1992 1p and 2p coins increased with the surge in metal prices of the mid-2000s, until by 2006 the coins would, if melted down, have been worth about 50% more than their face value.[13] (To do this, however, would be illegal, and they would have had to be melted in huge quantities, using quite a bit of energy, to achieve significant gain.) In later years, the price of copper fell considerably.[citation needed]

A circulating bimetallic two pound (£2) coin was introduced in 1998 (first minted in, and dated, 1997). There had previously been unimetallic commemorative £2 coins which did not normally circulate. This tendency to use the two pound coin for commemorative issues has continued since the introduction of the bimetallic coin, and a few of the older unimetallic coins have since entered circulation.

There are also commemorative issues of crowns. Until 1981, these had a face value of twenty-five pence (25p), equivalent to the five shilling crown used in pre-decimal Britain. However, in 1990 crowns were redenominated with a face value of five pounds (£5)[14] as the previous value was considered not sufficient for such a high-status coin. The size and weight of the coin remained exactly the same. Decimal crowns are generally not found in circulation as their market value is likely to be higher than their face value, but they remain legal tender.

Obverse designs

All modern British coins feature a profile of the current monarch's head on the obverse. There has been only one monarch since decimalisation, Queen Elizabeth II, so her head appears on all decimal coins, facing to the right (see also Monarch's head, above). However, five different effigies have been used, reflecting the Queen's changing appearance as she has aged. These are the effigies by Mary Gillick (until 1968), Arnold Machin (1968–1984), Raphael Maklouf (1985–1997), Ian Rank-Broadley (1998–2015), and Jody Clark (from 2015).[15]

All current coins carry a Latin inscription whose full form is ELIZABETH II DEI GRATIA REGINA FIDEI DEFENSATRIX, meaning "Elizabeth II, by the grace of God, Queen and Defender of the Faith". The inscription appears on the coins in any of several abbreviated forms, typically ELIZABETH II D G REG F D.

2008 redesign

In 2008, UK coins underwent an extensive redesign which eventually changed the reverse designs of all coins, the first wholesale change to British coinage since the first decimal coins were introduced in April 1968.[16] The major design feature was the introduction of a reverse design shared across six coins (1p, 2p, 5p, 10p, 20p, 50p), that can be pieced together to form an image of the Royal Shield. This was the first time a coin design had been featured across multiple coins in this way.[16]To summarize the reverse design changes made in 2008 and afterwards:

    The 1p coin depicts the lower part of the first quarter and the upper part of the third quarter of the shield, showing the lions passant of England and the harp of Ireland respectively

    The 2p coin depicts most of the second quarter of the shield, showing the lion rampant of Scotland

    The 5p coin depicts the centre of the shield, showing the meeting and parts of the constituent parts of the shield

    The 10p coin depicts most of the first quarter of the shield, containing the three lions passant of England

    The 20p coin depicts the lower part of the second quarter and upper part of the fourth quarter, showing the lion rampant of Scotland and the lions passant of England respectively

    The 50p coin depicts the point of the shield and the bottom portions of the second and third quarters showing the harp of Ireland and lions passant of England respectively

    The round, nickel-brass £1 coin from 2008–2016 depicted the whole of the Royal Shield. From 2017 it was changed to a bimetallic 12-sided coin depicting a rose, leek, thistle and shamrock bound by a crown.

    The £2 coin from 2015 depicts Britannia.

The original intention was to exclude both the £1 and £2 coins from the redesign because they were "relatively new additions" to the coinage, but it was later decided to include a £1 coin with a complete Royal Shield design from 2008 to 2016,[17] and the 2015 redesign of the £2 coin occurred due to complaints over the disappearance of Britannia's image from the 50p coin in 2008.[18]

On all coins, the beading (ring of small dots) around the edge of the obverses has been removed. The obverse of the 20p coin has also been amended to incorporate the year, which had been on the reverse of the coin since its introduction in 1982 (giving rise to an unusual issue of a mule version without any date at all). The orientation of both sides of the 50p coin has been rotated through 180 degrees, meaning the bottom of the coin is now a corner rather than a flat edge. The numerals showing the decimal value of each coin, previously present on all coins except the £1 and £2, have been removed, leaving the values spelled out in words only.

The redesign was the result of a competition launched by the Royal Mint in August 2005, which closed on 14 November 2005. The competition was open to the public and received over 4,000 entries.[16] The winning entry was unveiled on 2 April 2008, designed by Matthew Dent.[16] The Royal Mint stated the new designs were "reflecting a twenty-first century Britain". An advisor to the Royal Mint described the new coins as "post-modern" and said that this was something that could not have been done 50 years previously.[19]

The redesign was criticised by some for having no specifically Welsh symbol (such as the Welsh Dragon), because the Royal Shield does not include a specifically Welsh symbol. Wrexham Member of Parliament (MP) Ian Lucas, who was also campaigning to have the Welsh Dragon included on the Union Flag, called the omission "disappointing", and stated that he would be writing to the Queen to request that the Royal Standard be changed to include Wales.[20] The Royal Mint stated that "the Shield of the Royal Arms is symbolic of the whole of the United Kingdom and as such, represents Wales, Scotland, England and Northern Ireland."[20] Designer Dent stated "I am a Welshman and proud of it, but I never thought about the fact we did not have a dragon or another representation of Wales on the design because as far as I am concerned Wales is represented on the Royal Arms. This was never an issue for me."[20]

The Royal Mint's choice of an inexperienced coin designer to produce the new coinage was criticised by Virginia Ironside, daughter of Christopher Ironside who designed the previous UK coins. She stated that the new designs were "totally unworkable as actual coins", due to the loss of a numerical currency identifier, and the smaller typeface used.[21]

The German news magazine Der Spiegel claimed that the redesign signalled the UK's intention "not to join the euro any time soon".[22]

Changes after 2008

As of 2012, 5p and 10p coins have been issued in nickel-plated steel, and much of the remaining cupronickel types withdrawn, in order to retrieve more expensive metals. The new coins are 11% thicker to maintain the same weight.[23][24] There are heightened nickel allergy concerns over the new coins. Studies commissioned by the Royal Mint found no increased discharge of nickel from the coins when immersed in artificial sweat. However, an independent study found that the friction from handling results in four times as much nickel exposure as from the older-style coins. Sweden already plans to desist from using nickel in coins from 2015.[25]

In 2016, the £1 coin's composition was changed from a single-metal round shape to a 12-sided bi-metal design, with a slightly larger diameter, and with multiple past designs discontinued in favor of a single, unchanging design. Production of the new coins started in 2016,[26] with the first, dated 2016, entering circulation 28 March 2017.[27]

In February 2015, the Royal Mint announced a new design for the £2 coin featuring Britannia by Antony Dufort, with no change to its bimetallic composition.[28]

Edge inscriptions on British coins used to be commonly encountered on round £1 coins of 1983–2016, but are nowadays found only on £2 coins. The standard-issue £2 coin from 1997 to 2015 carried the edge inscription STANDING ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS. The redesigned coin since 2015 has a new edge inscription QUATUOR MARIA VINDICO, Latin for "I will claim the four seas", an inscription previously found on coins bearing the image of Britannia. Other commemorative £2 coins have their own unique edge inscriptions or designs.

Obsolete denominations

The following decimal coins have been withdrawn from circulation and have ceased to be legal tender.

Denomination     Obverse     Reverse     Diameter     Thickness     Mass     Composition     Edge     Introduced     Withdrawn

Half Penny     Queen Elizabeth II     St Edward's Crown     17.4 mm     1 mm     1.78 g     Bronze     Smooth     1971     1984

Five pence*     Queen Elizabeth II     Crowned Thistle     23.59 mm     1.7 mm     5.65 g     Cupronickel     Milled     1968     1990

Ten pence*     Crowned Lion     28.5 mm     1.85 mm     11.31 g     1992

Fifty pence*     Seated Britannia alongside a Lion     30.0 mm     2.5 mm     13.5 g     Smooth, Reuleaux heptagon     1969     1997

Various commemorative designs     1973

One Pound†     Queen Elizabeth II     Numerous different designs     22.5 mm     3.15 mm     9.5 g     Nickel-brass     Milled with variable inscription and/or decoration     1983     15 October 2017

Royal Shield     2008

Two pounds     No standard reverse design     28.4 mm     ~3 mm     15.98 g     Nickel-brass     1986     1998

* The specifications and dates of 5p, 10p, and 50p coins refer to the larger sizes issued since 1968.

† The specification refers to the round coin issued from 1983–2016. Although obsolete, this coin is still redeemable at banks and the British railway systems, and is still legal tender on the Isle of Man.

Commemorative issues

Circulating commemorative designs

Circulating fifty pence and two pound coins have been issued with various commemorative reverse designs, typically to mark the anniversaries of historical events or the births of notable people.

Three commemorative designs were issued of the large version of the 50p: in 1973 (the EEC), 1992–3 (EC presidency) and 1994 (D-Day anniversary). Commemorative designs of the smaller 50p coin have been issued (alongside the Britannia standard issue) in 1998 (two designs), 2000, and from 2003 to 2007 yearly (two designs in 2006). For a complete list, see Fifty pence (British decimal coin).

Prior to 1997, the two pound coin was minted in commemorative issues only – in 1986, 1989, 1994, 1995 and 1996. Commemorative £2 coins have been regularly issued since 1999, alongside the standard-issue bi-metallic coins which were introduced in 1997. One or two designs have been minted each year, with the exception of none in 2000, and four regional 2002 issues marking the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester. As well as a distinct reverse design, these coins have an edge inscription relevant to the subject. The anniversary themes are continued until at least 2009, with two designs announced. For a complete list, see Two pounds (British decimal coin).

From 2018–2019 a series of 10p coins with 26 different designs was put in circulation "celebrating Great Britain with The Royal Mint’s Quintessentially British A to Z series of coins".[29]

Non-circulating denominations

1981 commemorative twenty-five pence coin, celebrating the marriage of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer.

The following are special-issue commemorative coins, seldom encountered in normal circulation due to their precious metal content or collectible value, but are still considered legal tender.

    Twenty-five pence or crown (25p; £0.25), 1972–1981

    Five pounds or crown (£5), 1990–present [1]

    Twenty pounds (£20), 2013–present

    Fifty pounds (£50), 2015–2016

    One hundred pounds (£100), 2015–2016

Denomination     Obverse     Reverse     Diameter     Thickness     Mass     Composition     Edge     Introduced

25 pence     Queen Elizabeth II     No standard reverse design     38.61 mm     2.89 mm     28.28 g     Cupronickel or silver     Milled, with variable inscription     1972

5 pounds     1990

20 pounds     27.0 mm     Unknown     15.71 g     Silver     Milled     2013

50 pounds     Britannia     34.0 mm     31 g     2015

100 pounds     Elizabeth Tower 'Big Ben'     40.0 mm     62.86 g

Legal tender status of commemorative coins

The prolific issuance since 2013 of silver commemorative £20, £50 and £100 coins at face value has led to attempts to spend or deposit these coins, prompting the Royal Mint to clarify the legal tender status of these silver coins as well as the cupronickel £5 coin.[30][31][32] Royal Mint guidelines advise that, although these coins were approved as legal tender, they are considered limited edition collectables not intended for general circulation, and hence shops and banks are not obliged to accept them.

Maundy money

Maundy money is a ceremonial coinage traditionally given to the poor, and nowadays awarded annually to deserving senior citizens. There are Maundy coins in denominations of one, two, three and four pence. They bear dates from 1822 to the present and are minted in very small quantities. Though they are legal tender in the UK, they are rarely or never encountered in circulation. The pre-decimal Maundy pieces have the same legal tender status and value as post-decimal ones, and effectively increased in face value by 140% upon decimalisation. Their numismatic value is much greater.

Maundy coins still bear the original portrait of the Queen as used in the circulating coins of the first years of her reign.

Bullion coinage

The traditional bullion coin issued by Britain is the gold sovereign, formerly a circulating coin worth 20 shillings (or one pound) and with 0.23542 troy ounces (7.322 g) of fine gold, but now with a nominal value of one pound. The Royal Mint continues to produce sovereigns, as well as quarter sovereigns (introduced in 2009), half sovereigns, double sovereigns and quintuple sovereigns.

Between 1987 and 2012 a series of bullion coins, the Britannia, was issued, containing 1 troy ounce (31.1 g), 1⁄2 ounce, 1⁄4 ounce and 1⁄10 ounce of fine gold at a millesimal fineness of 916 (22 carat) and with face values of £100, £50, £25, and £10.

Since 2013 Britannia bullion contains 1 troy ounce of fine gold at a millesimal fineness of 999 (24 carat).

Between 1997 and 2012 silver bullion coins have also been produced under the name "Britannias". The alloy used was Britannia silver (millesimal fineness 958). The silver coins were available in 1 troy ounce (31.1 g), 1⁄2 ounce, 1⁄4 ounce and 1⁄10 ounce sizes. Since 2013 the alloy used is silver at a (millesimal fineness 999).

In 2016 the Royal Mint launched a series of 10 Queen's Beasts bullion coins,[33] one for each beast available in both gold and silver.

The Royal Mint also issues silver, gold and platinum proof sets of the circulating coins, as well as gift products such as gold coins set into jewellery.

Non-UK coinage

The British Islands (red) and overseas territories (blue) using the Pound or their local issue.

Outside the United Kingdom, the British Crown Dependencies of Jersey and Guernsey use the pound sterling as their currencies. However, they produce local issues of coinage in the same denominations and specifications, but with different designs. These circulate freely alongside UK coinage and English, Northern Irish, and Scottish banknotes within these territories, but must be converted in order to be used in the UK. The island of Alderney also produces occasional commemorative coins. (See coins of the Jersey pound, coins of the Guernsey pound, and Alderney pound for details.). The Isle of Man is a unique case among the Crown Dependencies, issuing its own currency, the Manx pound.[citation needed] While the Isle of Man recognises the Pound Sterling as a secondary currency, coins of the Manx pound are not legal tender in the UK.

The pound sterling is also the official currency of the British overseas territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands,[34] British Antarctic Territory[35] and Tristan da Cunha.[36] South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands produces occasional special collectors' sets of coins.[37] In 2008, British Antarctic Territory issued a £2 coin commemorating the centenary of Britain's claim to the region.[38]

The currencies of the British overseas territories of Gibraltar, the Falkland Islands and Saint Helena/Ascension — namely the Gibraltar pound, Falkland Islands pound and Saint Helena pound — are pegged one-to-one to the pound sterling but are technically separate currencies. These territories issue their own coinage, again with the same denominations and specifications as the UK coinage but with local designs, as coins of the Gibraltar pound, coins of the Falkland Islands pound and coins of the Saint Helena pound.

The other British overseas territories do not use sterling as their official currency.

Pre-decimal coinage

Half crown, 1953

Two shilling coin, or florin, 1949

Shilling, 1956, showing English and Scottish reverses

For further information about the history of pre-decimal coinage, see Pound sterling and Decimal Day.

System

Before decimalisation in 1971, the pound was divided into 240 pence rather than 100, though it was rarely expressed in this way. Rather it was expressed in terms of pounds, shillings and pence, where:

    £1 = 20 shillings (20s).

    1 shilling = 12 pence (12d).

Thus: £1 = 240d. The penny was further subdivided at various times, though these divisions vanished as inflation made them irrelevant:

 

    1 penny = 2 halfpennies and (earlier) 4 farthings (half farthing, a third of a farthing, and quarter farthing coins were minted in the late 19th century, and into the early 20th century in the case of the third farthing, but circulated only in certain British colonies and not in the UK).

Using the example of five shillings and sixpence, the standard ways of writing shillings and pence were:

    5s 6d

    5/6

    5/- for 5 shillings only, with the dash to stand for zero pennies.

The sum of 5/6 would be spoken as "five shillings and sixpence" or "five and six".

The abbreviation for the old penny, d, was derived from the Roman denarius, and the abbreviation for the shilling, s, from the Roman solidus. The shilling was also denoted by the slash symbol, also called a solidus for this reason, which was originally an adaptation of the long s.[39] The symbol "£", for the pound, is derived from the first letter of the Latin word for pound, libra.[40]

A similar pre-decimal system operated in France, also based on the Roman currency, consisting of the livre (L), sol or sou (s) and denier (d). Until 1816 another similar system was used in the Netherlands, consisting of the gulden (G), stuiver (s; 1⁄20 G) and duit, (d; 1⁄8 s or 1⁄160 G).

Denominations

For an extensive list of historical pre-decimal coin denominations, see List of British banknotes and coins.

In the years just prior to decimalisation, the circulating British coins were:

Denomination     Obverse     Reverse     Diameter     Thickness     Mass     Composition     Edge     Introduced     Withdrawn

Farthing (1⁄4d)     Various Monarchs     Wren (Britannia on early mintages)     20.19 mm         2.83 g     Bronze     Smooth     1860     1961

Half penny (1⁄2d)     Golden Hind (Britannia on early mintages)     25.48 mm         5.67 g     1969

Penny (1d)     Britannia     31 mm         9.45 g     1971

Threepence (3d)     King George VI 1937–1952

Queen Elizabeth II 1953–1971     Thrift until 1952 Crowned portcullis with chains     21.0–21.8 mm     2.5 mm     6.8 g     Nickel-brass     Plain (12-sided)     1937     1971

Sixpence (6d)     King George VI 1946–1952

Queen Elizabeth II 1953–1971     Crowned royal cypher until 1952 Floral design – Four Home Nations     19.41 mm         2.83 g     Cupronickel     Milled     1947     1980

Shilling (1/-)     Crowned lion on Tudor crown or Crowned lion standing on Scottish crown until 1952 Coat of Arms of England or Scotland     23.60 mm     1.7 mm     5.66 g     1990

Florin (2/-)     Crowned rose flanked by a thistle and shamrock until 1952 Rose encircled by thistle, leek and shamrock     28.5 mm     1.85 mm     11.31 g     1992

Half crown (2/6)     Royal Shield flanked by crowned royal cypher until 1952 Crowned Royal Shield     32.31 mm         14.14 g     1969

Crown (5/-)     Various commemorative designs     38 mm     2.89 mm     28.28 g     1951     Present

The farthing (1⁄4d) had been demonetised on 1 January 1961, whilst the crown (5/-) was issued periodically as a commemorative coin but rarely found in circulation.

The crown, half crown, florin, shilling, and sixpence were cupronickel coins (in historical times silver or silver alloy); the penny, halfpenny, and farthing were bronze; and the threepence was a twelve-sided nickel-brass coin (historically it was a small silver coin).

Some of the pre-decimalisation coins with exact decimal equivalent values continued in use after 1971 alongside the new coins, albeit with new names (the shilling became equivalent to the 5p coin, with the florin equating to 10p), and the others were withdrawn almost immediately. The use of florins and shillings as legal tender in this way ended in 1991 and 1993 when the 5p and 10p coins were replaced with smaller versions. Indeed, while pre-decimalisation shillings were used as 5p coins, for a while after decimalisation many people continued to call the new 5p coin a shilling, since it remained 1⁄20 of a pound, but was now counted as 5p (five new pence) instead of 12d (twelve old pennies). The pre-decimalisation sixpence, also known as a sixpenny bit or sixpenny piece, was equivalent to 2+1⁄2p, but was demonetised in 1980.

Pre-decimal coins of the pound sterling     Five pounds

    Double sovereign

    Sovereign

    Crown

    Half crown

    Florin

    Shilling

    Sixpence

    Groat

    Threepence

    Penny

    Halfpenny

    Farthing

    Half farthing

    Third farthing

    Quarter farthing

Five pounds     1     2+1⁄2     5     20     40     50     100     200     300     400     1200     2400     4800     9600     14400     19200

Double sovereign     2⁄5     1     2     8     16     20     40     80     120     160     480     960     1920     3840     5760     7680

Sovereign     1⁄5     1⁄2     1     4     8     10     20     40     60     80     240     480     960     1920     2880     3840

Crown     1⁄20     1⁄8     1⁄4     1     2     2+1⁄2     5     10     15     20     60     120     240     480     720     960

Half crown     1⁄40     1⁄16     1⁄8     1⁄2     1     1+1⁄4     2+1⁄2     5     7+1⁄2     10     30     60     120     240     360     480

Florin     1⁄50     1⁄20     1⁄10     2⁄5     4⁄5     1     2     4     6     8     24     48     96     192     288     384

Shilling     1⁄100     1⁄40     1⁄20     1⁄5     2⁄5     1⁄2     1     2     3     4     12     24     48     96     144     192

Sixpence     1⁄200     1⁄80     1⁄40     1⁄10     1⁄5     1⁄4     1⁄2     1     1+1⁄2     2     6     12     24     48     72     96

Groat     1⁄300     1⁄120     1⁄60     1⁄15     2⁄15     1⁄6     1⁄3     2⁄3     1     1+1⁄3     4     8     16     32     48     64

Threepence     1⁄400     1⁄160     1⁄80     1⁄20     1⁄10     1⁄8     1⁄4     1⁄2     3⁄4     1     3     6     12     24     36     48

Penny     1⁄1200     1⁄480     1⁄240     1⁄60     1⁄30     1⁄24     1⁄12     1⁄6     1⁄4     1⁄3     1     2     4     8     12     16

Halfpenny     1⁄2400     1⁄960     1⁄480     1⁄120     1⁄60     1⁄48     1⁄24     1⁄12     1⁄8     1⁄6     1⁄2     1     2     4     6     8

Farthing     1⁄4800     1⁄1920     1⁄960     1⁄240     1⁄120     1⁄96     1⁄48     1⁄24     1⁄16     1⁄12     1⁄4     1⁄2     1     2     3     4

Half farthing     1⁄9600     1⁄3840     1⁄1920     1⁄480     1⁄240     1⁄192     1⁄96     1⁄48     1⁄36     1⁄24     1⁄8     1⁄4     1⁄2     1     1+1⁄2     2

Third farthing     1⁄14400     1⁄5760     1⁄2880     1⁄720     1⁄360     1⁄288     1⁄144     1⁄72     1⁄48     1⁄36     1⁄12     1⁄6     1⁄3     2⁄3     1     1+1⁄3

Quarter farthing     1⁄19200     1⁄7680     1⁄3840     1⁄960     1⁄480     1⁄384     1⁄192     1⁄96     1⁄72     1⁄48     1⁄16     1⁄8     1⁄4     1⁄2     3⁄4     1

Visualisation of some British currency terms before decimalisation

Slang and everyday usage

Some pre-decimalisation coins or denominations became commonly known by colloquial and slang terms, perhaps the most well known being bob for a shilling, and quid for a pound. A farthing was a mag, a silver threepence was a joey and the later nickel-brass threepence was called a threepenny bit (/ˈθrʌpni/ or /ˈθrɛpni/ bit, i.e. thrup'ny or threp'ny bit – the apostrophe was pronounced on a scale from full "e" down to complete omission); a sixpence was a tanner, the two-shilling coin or florin was a two-bob bit. Bob is still used in phrases such as "earn/worth a bob or two",[41][better source needed] and "bob‐a‐job week". The two shillings and sixpence coin or half-crown was a half-dollar, also sometimes referred to as two and a kick. A value of two pence was universally pronounced /ˈtʌpəns/ tuppence, a usage which is still heard today, especially among older people. The unaccented suffix "-pence", pronounced /pəns/, was similarly appended to the other numbers up to twelve; thus "fourpence", "sixpence-three-farthings", "twelvepence-ha'penny", but "eighteen pence" would usually be said "one-and-six".

Quid remains as popular slang for one or more pounds to this day in Britain in the form "a quid" and then "two quid", and so on. Similarly, in some parts of the country, bob continued to represent one-twentieth of a pound, that is five new pence, and two bob is 10p.[42]

The introduction of decimal currency caused a new casual usage to emerge, where any value in pence is spoken using the suffix pee: e.g. "twenty-three pee" or, in the early years, "two-and-a-half pee" rather than the previous "tuppence-ha'penny". Amounts over a pound are normally spoken thus: "five pounds forty". A value with less than ten pence over the pound is sometimes spoken like this: "one pound and a penny", "three pounds and fourpence". The slang term "bit" has almost disappeared from use completely, although in Scotland a fifty pence is sometimes referred to as a "ten bob bit". Decimal denomination coins are generally described using the terms piece or coin, for example, "a fifty-pee piece", a "ten-pence coin".

Monarch's profile

All coins since the 17th century have featured a profile of the current monarch's head. The direction in which they face changes with each successive monarch, a pattern that began with the Stuarts, as shown in the table below:

Facing left             Facing right   

Cromwell 1653–1658[43]     Broad 1656 Oliver Cromwell coin.jpg         Charles II 1660–1685     Guinea 641642.jpg

James II 1685–1688              William and Mary 1689–1694

William III 1694–1702     William and Mary Guinea

Anne 1702–1714     Half-crown of Anne        George I 1714–1727     George I Quarter Guinea

George II 1727–1760     George II Guinea 722655        George III 1760–1820     Sovereign George III 1817

George IV 1820–1830     Sovereign George IV 1828 651295         William IV 1830–1837     William4coin.jpg

Victoria 1837–1901     Sovereign Victoria 1842 662015        Edward VII 1901–1910     Matte proof 5 pound Edwards VII

George V 1910–1936     1 penny 1927 george 5.  

Edward VIII 1936     EdwardVIII coin.jpg     (uncirculated issues)

George VI 1936–1952     1937 George VI penny         Elizabeth II 1952–present     1953 half crown obverse

For the Tudors and pre-Restoration Stuarts, both left- and right-facing portrait images were minted within the reign of a single monarch (left-facing images were more common). In the Middle Ages, portrait images tended to be full face.

There was a small quirk in this alternating pattern when Edward VIII became king in January 1936 and was portrayed facing left, the same as his predecessor George V. This was because Edward thought his left side to be better than his right.[44] However, Edward VIII abdicated in December 1936 and his coins were never put into general circulation. When George VI came to the throne, he had his coins struck with him facing the left, as if Edward VIII's coins had faced right (as they should have done according to tradition). Thus, in a timeline of circulating British coins, George V and VI's coins both feature left-facing portraits, although they follow directly chronologically.

Regal titles

A 1937 George VI penny

From a very early date, British coins have been inscribed with the name of the ruler of the kingdom in which they were produced, and a longer or shorter title, always in Latin; among the earliest distinctive English coins are the silver pennies of Offa of Mercia, which were inscribed with the legend OFFA REX "King Offa". As the legends became longer, words in the inscriptions were often abbreviated so that they could fit on the coin; identical legends have often been abbreviated in different ways depending upon the size and decoration of the coin. Inscriptions which go around the edge of the coin generally have started at the center of the top edge and proceeded in a clockwise direction. A very lengthy legend would be continued on the reverse side of the coin. All but Edward III and both Elizabeths use Latinised names (which would have been EDWARDUS and ELIZABETHA respectively).

Examples of coinage legends Latin text     English text     Notes

EDWARD DEI GRA REX ANGL Z FRANC D HYB(E)     Edward III, by the grace of God King of England and France, Lord of Ireland   

EDWARD DEI GRA REX ANGL DNS HYB Z ACQ     Edward, by the grace of God King of England, Lord of Ireland and Aquitaine     Used after the Treaty of Brétigny (1360) when Edward III temporarily gave up his claim to the French throne.

EDWARD DEI G REX ANG Z FRA DNS HYB Z ACT     Edward, by the grace of God King of England and France, Lord of Ireland and Aquitaine.     Used after Anglo-French relations broke down and Edward III resumed his claim.

HENRICUS VII DEI GRATIA REX ANGLIÆ & FRANCIÆ     Henry VII by the Grace of God, King of England and France     France had been claimed by the English continuously since 1369.

HENRICUS VIII DEI GRATIA REX ANGLIÆ & FRANCIÆ     Henry VIII by the Grace of God, King of England and France     The Arabic numeral 8 was also used instead of the Roman VIII.

HENRICUS VIII DEI GRATIA ANGLIÆ FRANCIÆ & HIBERNIÆ REX     Henry VIII by the Grace of God, Of England, France and Ireland, King     Used after Henry VIII made Ireland a kingdom in 1541. The Arabic numeral 8 was also used instead of the Roman VIII.

PHILIPPUS ET MARIA DEI GRATIA REX & REGINA     Philip and Mary by the Grace of God, King and Queen     The names of the realms were omitted from the coin for reasons of space.

ELIZABETH DEI GRATIA ANGLIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REGINA     Elizabeth, by the Grace of God, of England, France, and Ireland, Queen   

IACOBUS DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REX     James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King     James, King of Scotland, by succeeding to the English throne united the two kingdoms in his person; he dubbed the combination of the two kingdoms "Great Britain" (the name of the whole island) though they remained legislatively distinct for more than a century afterwards.

CAROLUS DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REX     Charles, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King   

OLIVARIUS DEI GRATIA REIPUBLICÆ ANGLIÆ SCOTIÆ HIBERNIÆ & CETERORUM PROTECTOR     Oliver, by the Grace of God, of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, Ireland etc., Protector     Cromwell ruled as a monarch but did not claim the title of king.

CAROLUS II DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REX     Charles II, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King   

IACOBUS II DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REX     James II, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King   

GULIELMUS ET MARIA DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REX ET REGINA     William and Mary by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King and Queen     The spouses William and Mary ruled jointly.

GULIELMUS III DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REX     William III by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King     William continued to rule alone after his wife's death.

ANNA DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REGINA     Anne by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, Queen   

GEORGIUS DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REX FIDEI DEFENSOR BRUNSVICENSIS ET LUNEBURGENSIS DUX SACRI ROMANI IMPERII ARCHITHESAURARIUS ET ELECTOR     George by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland King, Defender of the Faith, of Brunswick and Lüneburg Duke, of the Holy Roman Empire Archtreasurer and Elector     George I added the titles he already possessed as Elector of Hanover. He also added the title "Defender of the Faith", which had been borne by the English kings since Henry VIII, but which had previously only rarely appeared on coins.

GEORGIUS II DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REX FIDEI DEFENSOR BRUNSVICENSIS ET LUNEBURGENSIS DUX SACRI ROMANI IMPERII ARCHITHESAURARIUS ET ELECTOR     George II by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland King, Defender of the Faith, of Brunswick and Lüneburg Duke, of the Holy Roman Empire Archtreasurer and Elector   

GEORGIUS III DEI GRATIA MAGNÆ BRITANNIÆ FRANCIÆ ET HIBERNIÆ REX FIDEI DEFENSOR BRUNSVICENSIS ET LUNEBURGENSIS DUX SACRI ROMANI IMPERII ARCHITHESAURARIUS ET ELECTOR     George III by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland King, Defender of the Faith, of Brunswick and Lüneburg Duke, of the Holy Roman Empire Archtreasurer and Elector   

GEORGIUS III DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM REX FIDEI DEFENSOR     George III, by the Grace of God, of the Britains King, Defender of the Faith     The Acts of Union united Great Britain and Ireland into a single kingdom, represented on the coinage by the Latin genitive plural Britanniarum ("of the Britains", often abbreviated BRITT). At the same time, the claim to the throne of France was dropped and other titles were omitted from the coinage.

GEORGIUS IIII (IV) DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM REX FIDEI DEFENSOR     George IV, by the Grace of God, of the Britains King, Defender of the Faith     The Roman numeral "4" is represented by both IIII and IV in different issues.

GULIELMUS IIII DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM REX FIDEI DEFENSOR     William IV, by the Grace of God, of the Britains King, Defender of the Faith   

VICTORIA DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM REGINA FIDEI DEFENSATRIX     Victoria, by the Grace of God, of the Britains Queen, Defender of the Faith   

VICTORIA DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM REGINA FIDEI DEFENSATRIX INDIÆ IMPERATRIX     Victoria, by the Grace of God, of the Britains Queen, Defender of the Faith, Empress of India     Queen Victoria was granted the title "Empress of India" in 1876.

EDWARDUS VII DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM OMNIUM REX FIDEI DEFENSOR INDIÆ IMPERATOR     Edward VII, by the Grace of God, of all the Britains King, Defender of the Faith, Emperor of India     Edward VII's coins added OMNIUM ("all") after "Britains" to imply a rule over the British overseas colonies as well as the United Kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.

GEORGIUS V DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM OMNIUM REX FIDEI DEFENSOR INDIÆ IMPERATOR     George V, by the Grace of God, of all the Britains King, Defender of the Faith, Emperor of India   

GEORGIUS VI DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM OMNIUM REX FIDEI DEFENSOR INDIÆ IMPERATOR     George VI, by the Grace of God, of all the Britains King, Defender of the Faith, Emperor of India   

GEORGIUS VI DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM OMNIUM REX FIDEI DEFENSOR     George VI, by the Grace of God, of all the Britains King, Defender of the Faith     The title "Emperor of India" was relinquished in 1948, after the independence of India and Pakistan.

ELIZABETH II DEI GRATIA BRITANNIARUM OMNIUM REGINA FIDEI DEFENSATRIX     Elizabeth II, by the Grace of God, of all the Britains Queen, Defender of the Faith   

ELIZABETH II DEI GRATIA REGINA FIDEI DEFENSATRIX     Elizabeth II, by the Grace of God, Queen, Defender of the Faith     The "of all the Britains" was dropped from the coinage in 1954, and current coins do not name any realm.

Coins in the colonies

Some coins made for circulation in the British colonies are considered part of British coinage because they have no indication of what country it was minted for and they were made in the same style as contemporary coins circulating in the United Kingdom.

A three halfpence (1+1⁄2 pence, 1/160 of a pound) coin was circulated mainly in the West Indies and Ceylon in the starting in 1834. Jamaicans referred to the coin as a "quatty".[45]

The half farthing (1/8 of a penny, 1/1920 of a pound) coin was initially minted in 1828 for use in Ceylon, but was declared legal tender in the United Kingdom in 1842.[46]

The third farthing (1/12 of a penny, 1/2880 of a pound) coin was minted for use in Malta, starting in 1827..[46]

The quarter farthing (1/16 of a penny, 1/3840 of a pound) coin was minted for use in Ceylon starting in 1839.[46]

Mottos

In addition to the title, a Latin or French motto might be included, generally on the reverse side of the coin. These varied between denominations and issues; some were personal to the monarch, others were more general. Some of the mottos were:

    POSUI DEUM ADIUTOREM MEUM "I have made God my helper". Coins of Henry VII, Henry VIII, Elizabeth I. Possibly refers to Psalm 52:7, Ecce homo qui non-posuit Deum adjutorem suum "Behold the man who did not make God his helper".

    RUTILANS ROSA SINE SPINA "A dazzling rose without a thorn". Coins of Henry VIII and Edward VI. Initially on the unsuccessful and very rare Crown of the Rose of Henry VIII and continued on subsequent small gold coinage into the reign of Edward VI.

    POSUIMUS DEUM ADIUTOREM NOSTRUM "We have made God our helper". Coins of Philip and Mary. The same as above, but with a plural subject.

    FACIAM EOS IN GENTEM UNAM "I shall make them into one nation". Coins of James I, signifying his desire to unite the English and Scottish nations. Refers to Ezekiel 37:22 in the Vulgate Bible.

    CHRISTO AUSPICE REGNO "I reign with Christ as my protector". Coins of Charles I.

    EXURGAT DEUS DISSIPENTUR INIMICI "May God rise up, may [his] enemies be scattered". Coins of Charles I, during the Civil War. Refers to Psalm 67:1 in the Vulgate Bible (Psalm 68 in English Bible numbering).

    PAX QUÆRITUR BELLO "Peace is sought by war". Coins of the Protectorate; personal motto of Oliver Cromwell.

    BRITANNIA "Britain". Reign of Charles II to George III. Found on pennies and smaller denominations.

    HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE. "Shamed be he who thinks ill of it." Sovereigns of George III. Motto of the Order of the Garter.

    DECUS ET TUTAMEN. "A decoration and protection." Some pound coins of Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom and some crown coins including some of Victoria and George V. Refers to the inscribed edge as a protection against the clipping of precious metal, as well as being a complimentary reference to the monarch and the monarchy.

 

Minting errors reaching circulation

Coins with errors in the minting process that reach circulation are often seen as valuable items by coin collectors.

In 1983, the Royal Mint mistakenly produced some two pence pieces with the old wording "New Pence" on the reverse (tails) side, when the design had been changed from 1982 to "Two Pence".

In 2016, a batch of double-dated £1 coins was released into circulation. These coins had the main date on the obverse stating '2017', but the micro-engraving having '2016' on it. it is not known how many exist and are in circulation, but the amount is fewer than half a million.

 

In June 2009, the Royal Mint estimated that between 50,000 and 200,000 dateless 20 pence coins had entered circulation, the first undated British coin to enter circulation in more than 300 years. It resulted from the accidental combination of old and new face tooling in a production batch, creating what is known as a mule, following the 2008 redesign which moved the date from the reverse (tails) to the obverse (heads) side.[47]

See also

        Banknotes of the pound sterling

    List of British bank notes and coins

    Mark (money)

    Non-decimal currency

    One hundred pounds (British coin)

    Roman currency

    Twenty pounds (British coin)

References

"New 12-sided pound coin to enter circulation in March". BBC News. 1 January 2017. Archived from the original on 31 March 2017. Retrieved 29 March 2017.

"How can I dispose of commemorative crowns? And why do some have a higher face value than others?". The Royal Mint Museum. Archived from the original on 13 April 2020. Retrieved 22 November 2019.

"Mintage Figures". The Royal Mint. Archived from the original on 17 May 2013.

"Coins – Collector Gold & Silver Coins & Limited Edition Gifts". The Royal Mint. Archived from the original on 10 February 2005.

"Llantrisant". Royal Mint. 2012. Archived from the original on 16 November 2011. Retrieved 28 January 2012. "In April 1967 it was announced that the new Royal Mint would be built at Llantrisant in South Wales."

"National Museums of Scotland – Balance and scales (detail)". Archived from the original on 9 April 2009.

The 1696 Recoinage (1696–1699) Archived 14 January 2010 at the Wayback Machine, Richard Kleer, University of Regina, The Literary Encyclopedia

Newton and the Counterfeiter, Thomas Levenson, Faber & Faber, ISBN 978-0-571-22992-5

The Scottish Mint after the recoinage, 1709–1836 Archived 22 August 2009 at Wikiwix, Athol L Murray, Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, 1999

Sir Isaac Newton and the Scottish recoinage, 1707–10 Archived 21 August 2009 at Wikiwix, Athol L Murray, Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, 1997

On the Value of Gold and Silver in European Currencies and the Consequences on the World-wide Gold- and Silver-Trade Archived 28 January 2017 at the Wayback Machine, Sir Isaac Newton, 21 September 1717.

By The King, A Proclamation Declaring the Rates at which Gold shall be current in Payments reproduced in the numismatic chronicle and journal of the Royal Numismatic Society, Vol V., April 1842 – January 1843

McVeigh, Karen (12 May 2006). "Why coppers are rising in value". The Times. Retrieved 19 June 2022.

Corporate FAQs Archived 11 November 2007 at the Wayback Machine

The Fifth Definitive Coinage Portrait First Edition Archived 3 March 2015 at the Wayback Machine Royal Mint (www.royalmint.com). Retrieved on 2015-03-03.

"Royal Mint unveils coin designs". BBC News. 2 April 2008. Archived from the original on 25 June 2009. Retrieved 15 September 2009.

New Coin Designs FAQ Archived 6 April 2008 at the Wayback Machine, Royal Mint

"Birmingham MP's crusade to bring back Britannia on coins" Archived 8 April 2009 at the Wayback Machine, Birmingham Post, 9 February 2009

"Your Change is Changing". Bulletin. Royal Mint (107): 6. 2008. "[Stephen Raw said] "We couldn't have had post-modern designs like this 50 years ago – the public simply wouldn't have accepted them"

"Wales short-changed by new coin designs" Archived 13 May 2008 at the Wayback Machine, Daily Post (North Wales), 3 April 2008

Ironside, Virginia (6 April 2008). "I hate the new coins. My father must be turning in his grave". The Independent. Retrieved 6 May 2020.

"Make Way for Britain's New Coin Designs". Archived from the original on 14 July 2011. Retrieved 17 May 2008.

"Cupro Nickel Replacement Programme". Archived from the original on 10 July 2014. Retrieved 1 September 2014.

"Treasury 'should foot coin change bill'". BBC News. 5 November 2011. Archived from the original on 5 November 2011. Retrieved 5 November 2011.

Lacey, Anna (22 June 2013). "A bad penny? New coins and nickel allergy". BBC Health Check. Archived from the original on 7 August 2013. Retrieved 25 July 2013.

"Royal Mint starts new £1 coin production". TheGuardian.com. 31 March 2016.

"£1 Coin | the Royal Mint".

"£2 Coin Designs and Specifications | the Royal Mint".

"The Great British Coin Hunt 2018 – Quintessentially British a to Z Sterling Silver Coins".

"Legal Tender Guidelines | the Royal Mint".

"How the Royal Mint is Attempting to Redefine "Legal Tender" for Collector Coins". 27 March 2016.

Barker, Simon (14 January 2020). "Are £5 Coins Legal Tender?". CostlyCoins.

"The Queen's Beasts are brought to life in a new bullion coin range", Royal Mint Blog, 31 March 2016, archived from the original on 2 April 2016, retrieved 1 April 2016

"Foreign and Commonwealth Office country profiles: South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands". fco.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 22 April 2009. Retrieved 9 May 2018.

"Foreign and Commonwealth Office country profiles: British Antarctic Territory". fco.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 21 November 2008. Retrieved 9 May 2018.

"Foreign and Commonwealth Office country profiles: Tristan da Cunha". fco.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 30 June 2010. Retrieved 9 May 2018.

"Government of South Georgia & the South Sandwich Islands". Archived from the original on 12 November 2002.

The British Antarctic Territory Currency Archived 19 April 2010 at the Wayback Machine, Antarctic Heritage Trust

Quine, W. V. (1987). Quiddities: An Intermittently Philosophical Dictionary. Harvard University Press. p. 126. ISBN 9780674042438.

"Ask Oxford". Archived from the original on 29 March 2007.

""bob or two" – Google Search".

David Jones (7 April 2008). "Two Bob Trouble". Blogspot.

Coins with Cromwell's image were first minted in 1656 by Pierre Blondeau.

"Rare Edward VIII coin showing profile of monarch's 'better side' goes on display". BT.com. Retrieved 13 October 2019.

Chalmers, Robert (1893). A History of Currency in the British Colonies. London, UK: Her Majesty's Stationery Office. p. 110. Retrieved 15 November 2014.

"Fractional Farthings".

    Bingham, John (29 June 2009). "Mix-up at Royal Mint creates dateless 20p pieces worth £50". The Telegraph. Archived from the original on 2 July 2009. Retrieved 29 June 2009.

External links

    Clayton, Tony: Coins of England and Great Britain

    Chard, Juliana: Common Names of British Coin Denominations

    UK Coin Designs and Specifications from the Royal Mint's website

    Coin Designs — Royal Mint competition designs

    United Kingdom: Coins Issued and Used – list of all UK coins, with photos and descriptions

    Old Money Converter – converts £sd to decimal currency

    Old Money Converter 2 – converts decimal currency to £sd

Sterling coinage

Decimal  

    1/2p 1p 2p 5p 10p 20p 50p £1 £2

Pre-decimal  

    Quarter farthing (1/16d) Third farthing (1/12d) Half farthing (1/8d) Farthing (1/4d) Halfpenny (1/2d) Penny (1d) Three halfpence (1+1/2d) Twopence (2d) Threepence (3d) Fourpence (4d) Sixpence (6d) Shilling (1/–) Fifteen pence (1/3d) Florin (2/–) Half crown (2/6d) Double florin (4/–) Crown (5/–) Quarter guinea (5/3d) Third guinea (7/–) Half sovereign (10/–) Half guinea (10/6d) Sovereign (£1) Guinea (£1/1/–) Double sovereign (£2) Two guineas (£2/2/–) Five pounds (£5) Five guineas (£5/5/–)

Non-circulating  

Commemorative  

    25p £5 £10 £20 £25 £50 £100 £200 £500 £1000 Maundy money

Bullion  

    Britannia Quarter sovereign Half sovereign Sovereign Double sovereign Quintuple sovereign Lunar The Queen's Beasts Landmarks of Britain

See also  

    Sterling Sterling banknotes List of British banknotes and coins List of British currencies Jubilee coinage Old Head coinage Scottish coinage Coins of Ireland List of people on coins of the United Kingdom

Types of British coinage

    Falkland Islands Gibraltar Guernsey Isle of Man Jersey St Helena and Ascension United Kingdom

Economy of the United Kingdom

Companies  

Co-operatives Employee-owned companies FTSE 100 Index FTSE 250 Index FTSE Fledgling Index FTSE SmallCap Index Government-owned companies

currency,

governance,

regulation  

    Bank of England

        Governor of the Bank of England Budget Company law Competition and Markets Authority Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy Financial Conduct Authority Gilts HM Revenue & Customs HM Treasury

        Chancellor of the Exchequer Debt Management Office Monetary Policy Committee Office for Budget Responsibility Pound sterling

Banknotes Coinage Taxation UK Statistics Authority UK Trade & Investment

History  

Chronological  

    1659–1849 Navigation Acts Agricultural Revolution Industrial Revolution Financial Revolution Panic of 1796–97 1815–46 Corn Laws New Imperialism 1830s–1945 Second Industrial Revolution 1860s–1914 1873–79 Long Depression 1926 general strike 1929–39 Great Depression 1948–52 Marshall Plan 1974 Three-Day Week 1979 Winter of Discontent 1986 Big Bang 1992 Black Wednesday Late-2000s recession 2008 bank rescue package 2009 bank rescue package 2020

Events

January–March

January 11 – Louis Pasteur's anti-rabies treatment is defended in the Académie Nationale de Médecine, by Dr. Joseph Grancher.

January 20

 

    The United States Senate allows the Navy to lease Pearl Harbor as a naval base.

    British emigrant ship Kapunda sinks after a collision off the coast of Brazil, killing 303 with only 16 survivors.

January 21

    The Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) is formed in the United States.

    Brisbane receives a one-day rainfall of 465 millimetres (18.3 in) (a record for any Australian capital city).

January 24 – Battle of Dogali: Abyssinian troops defeat the Italians.

January 28

    In a snowstorm at Fort Keogh, Montana, the largest snowflakes on record are reported. They are 15 inches (38 cm) wide and 8 inches (20 cm) thick.

    Construction work begins on the foundations of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France.

February 2 – The first Groundhog Day is observed in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania.

February 4 – The Interstate Commerce Act of 1887, passed by the 49th United States Congress, is signed into law by President Grover Cleveland.

February 5 – The Giuseppe Verdi opera Otello premieres at La Scala, Milan.

February 8 – The Dawes Act, or the General Allotment Act, is enacted in the United States.

February 23 – The French Riviera is hit by a large earthquake, killing around 2,000 along the coast of the Mediterranean.

February 26 – At the Sydney Cricket Ground, George Lohmann becomes the first bowler to take eight wickets, in a Test innings.

March 3 – Anne Sullivan begins teaching Helen Keller.

    March 3: Helen Keller and Sullivan.

    March 7 – North Carolina State University is established, as North Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts.

    March 13 – Chester Greenwood patents earmuffs in the United States.

April–June

    April 1 – The final of the first All-Ireland Hurling Championship is held.

    April 4 – Argonia, Kansas, elects Susanna M. Salter as the first female mayor in the United States.

    April 10 (Easter Sunday) – The Catholic University of America is founded in Washington, D.C.

    April 20 – Occidental College is founded in Los Angeles, California.

    April 21 – Schnaebele incident: A French/German border incident nearly leads to war between the two countries.

    May 3 – An earthquake hits Sonora, Mexico.

    May 9 – Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show opens in London.

    May 14 – The cornerstone of the new Stanford University, in northern California, is laid (the college opens in 1891).

    May 25 – The Hells Canyon massacre begins: 34 Chinese gold miners are ambushed and murdered in Hells Canyon, Oregon, United States.

    June 8 – Herman Hollerith receives a U.S. patent for his punched card calculator.

    June 18 – The Reinsurance Treaty is closed between Germany and Russia.

    June 21

        The British Empire celebrates Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee, marking the 50th year of her reign.

        Zululand becomes a British colony.

    June 23 – The Rocky Mountains Park Act becomes law in Canada, creating that nation's first national park, Banff National Park.

June 23: Banff National Park

    June 28 – Minot, North Dakota is incorporated as a city.

    June 29 – The United Retail Federation is established in Brisbane, Australia.

July–September

    July – James Blyth operates the first working wind turbine at Marykirk, Scotland.

    July 1 – Construction of the iron structure of the Eiffel Tower starts in Paris, France.

    July 6 – King Kalākaua of Hawai'i is forced by anti-monarchists to sign the 'Bayonet Constitution', stripping the Hawaiian monarchy of much of its authority, as well as disenfranchising most native Hawaiians, all Asians and the poor.

    July 12 – Odense Boldklub, the Danish football team, is founded as the Odense Cricket Club.

    July 19 – Dorr Eugene Felt receives the first U.S. patent for his comptometer.

    July 26

        L. L. Zamenhof publishes "Unua Libro" (Dr. Esperanto's International Language), the first description of Esperanto, the constructed international auxiliary language.

        Blackpool F.C. is created in England, U.K.

    August – The earliest constituent of the U.S. National Institutes of Health is established at the Marine Hospital, Staten Island, as the Laboratory of Hygiene.

    August 8 – Antonio Guzmán Blanco ends his term as President of Venezuela.

    August 13 – Hibernian F.C. of Scotland defeats Preston North End F.C. of England to win the 'Championship of the World', after the two teams win the Association football Cup competitions in their respective countries.

    September 5 – The Theatre Royal, Exeter, England, burns down, killing 186 people.

    September 28 – The 1887 Yellow River flood begins in China, killing 900,000 to 2,000,000 people.

July 26: Esperanto

October–December

    October 1 – The British Empire takes over Balochistan.

    October 3 – Florida A&M University opens its doors in Tallahassee, Florida.

    October 12 – Yamaha Corporation, the global musical instrument and audiovisual brand, is founded as Yamaha Organ Manufacturing in Hamamatsu, Japan.

    November

        Results of the Michelson–Morley experiment are published, indicating that the speed of light is independent of motion.

        Arthur Conan Doyle's detective character Sherlock Holmes makes his first appearance, in the novel A Study in Scarlet, published in Beeton's Christmas Annual.

    November 3 – The Coimbra Academic Association, the students' union of the University of Coimbra in Portugal, is founded.

    November 6 – The Association football club Celtic F.C. is formed in Glasgow, Scotland, by Irish Marist Brother Walfrid, to help alleviate poverty in the city's East End by raising money for his charity, the 'Poor Children's Dinner Table'.

    November 8 – Emile Berliner is granted a U.S. patent for the Berliner Gramophone.

    November 10 – Louis Lingg, sentenced to be hanged for his alleged role in the Haymarket affair (a bombing in Chicago on May 4, 1886), kills himself by dynamite.

    November 11 – August Spies, Albert Parsons, Adolph Fischer and George Engel are hanged for inciting riot and murder in the Haymarket affair.

    November 13 – Bloody Sunday: Police in London clash with radical and Irish nationalist protesters.

    December 5 – The International Bureau of Intellectual Property is established.

    December 25 – Glenfiddich single malt Scotch whisky is first produced.

Date unknown

    Laos and Cambodia are added to French Indochina.

    Heinrich Hertz discovers the photoelectric effect on the production and reception of electromagnetic (EM) waves (radio); this is an important step towards the understanding of the quantum nature of light.

   Franz König publishes "Über freie Körper in den Gelenken" in the medical journal Deutsche Zeitschrift für Chirurgie, describing (and naming) the disease Osteochondritis dissecans for the first time.

    Teachers College, later part of Columbia University, is founded.

    The first English-language edition of Friedrich Engels' 1844 study of The Condition of the Working Class in England, translated by Florence Kelley, is published in New York City.

    Publication in Barcelona of Enrique Gaspar's El anacronópete, the first work of fiction to feature a time machine.

    Publication begins of Futabatei Shimei's The Drifting Cloud (Ukigumo), the first modern novel in Japan.

    The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn is founded.

    Nagase Shoten (長瀬商店), predecessor of Japanese cosmetics and toiletry brand Kao Corporation, is founded in Nihonbashi, Tokyo, Japan.[citation needed]

    Tokyo Fire Insurance, predecessor of Sompo Japan Nipponkoa Insurance, is founded.

    Global construction and real estate development company Skanska is founded in Malmö, Sweden.

    American financial services company A. G. Edwards is founded by General Albert Gallatin Edwards in St. Louis, Missouri.

    Heyl & Patterson Inc., a pioneer in coal unloading equipment, is founded by Edmund W. Heyl and William J. Patterson in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

    The first battery rail car is used on the Royal Bavarian State Railways.

Births

January–February

Miklós Kállay

Arthur Rubinstein

Edelmiro Julián Farrell

Joseph Bech

Chico Marx

 

    January 1

        Wilhelm Canaris, head of German military intelligence in World War II (d. 1945)

        Max Ritter von Müller, German World War I fighter ace (d. 1918)

    January 3 – August Macke, German painter (d. 1914)[23]

    January 10 – Robinson Jeffers, American poet (d. 1962)

    January 13 – Jorge Chávez, pioneer Peruvian aviator (d. 1910)

    January 17 – Ola Raknes, Norwegian psychoanalyst, philologist (d. 1975)

    January 19 – Alexander Woollcott, American intellectual (d. 1943)

    January 21 – Maude Davis, oldest person in the world (d. 2002)

    January 22 – Elmer Fowler Stone, American aviator, first United States Coast Guard aviator (d. 1936)

    January 23

        Miklós Kállay, 34th Prime Minister of Hungary (d. 1967)[24]

        Dorothy Payne Whitney, American-born philanthropist, social activist (d. 1968)

    January 28 – Arthur Rubinstein, Polish-born pianist and conductor (d. 1982)[25]

    February 3 – Georg Trakl, Austrian poet (d. 1914)[26]

    February 5 – Corneliu Dragalina, Romanian general (d. 1949)

    February 6 – Josef Frings, Archbishop of Cologne (d. 1978)

    February 10 – John Franklin Enders, American scientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1985)[27]

    February 11 – Ernst Hanfstaengl, German-born pianist, U.S. politician (d. 1975)

    February 12 – Edelmiro Julián Farrell, Argentine general, 28th President of Argentina (d. 1980)

    February 17

        Joseph Bech, Luxembourgish politician, 2-time Prime Minister of Luxembourg (d. 1975)[28]

        Leevi Madetoja, Finnish composer (d. 1947)[29]

    February 20 – Vincent Massey, Governor General of Canada (d. 1967)[30]

    February 21 – Korechika Anami, Japanese general (d. 1945)

 

March–April

Julian Huxley

Marc Chagall

Gustav Ludwig Hertz

Erwin Schrödinger

Giovanni Gronchi

 

    March 4 – Violet MacMillan, American Broadway theatre actress (d. 1953)

    March 5

        Harry Turner, American professional football player (d. 1914)

        Heitor Villa-Lobos, Brazilian composer (d. 1959)[31]

    March 11 – Raoul Walsh, American film director (d. 1980)

    March 13 – Alexander Vandegrift, American general (d. 1973)

    March 14

        Sylvia Beach, American publisher in Paris (d. 1952)[32]

        Charles Reisner, American silent actor, film director (d. 1962)

    March 18 – Aurel Aldea, Romanian general and politician (d. 1949)

    March 21 – Luís Filipe, Prince Royal of Portugal (d. 1908)

    March 22 – Chico Marx, American comedian and actor (d. 1961)

    March 23

        Juan Gris, Spanish-born painter, graphic artist (d. 1927)[33]

        Prince Felix Yusupov, Russian assassin of Rasputin (d. 1967)

    March 24 – Roscoe Arbuckle, American actor, comedian, film director, and screenwriter (d. 1933)

    March 25 – Chūichi Nagumo, Japanese admiral (d. 1944)

    March 25 – Padre Pio, Italian Franciscan Capuchin, mystic and Catholic saint (d. 1968)

    April 2 – Louise Schroeder, German politician (d. 1957)

    April 3 – Nishizō Tsukahara, Japanese admiral (d. 1966)

    April 10 – Bernardo Houssay, Argentine physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1971)

    April 12 – Harold Lockwood, American film actor (d.1918)

    April 15

        Mike Brady, American golfer (d. 1972)

        Felix Pipes, Austrian tennis player (d. 1983)[34]

    April 22 – Harald Bohr, Danish mathematician and footballer (d. 1951)[35]

    April 26 – Kojo Tovalou Houénou, prominent African critic of the French colonial empire in Africa (d. 1936)

 

May– June

Saint-John Perse

 

    May 2

        Vernon Castle, British dancer (d. 1918)

        Eddie Collins, American baseball player (d. 1951)

    May 5 – Geoffrey Fisher, Archbishop of Canterbury (d. 1972)

    May 11 – Paul Wittgenstein, Austrian-born pianist (d. 1951)

    May 15 – John H. Hoover, American admiral (d. 1970)

    May 22 – Jim Thorpe, American athlete (d. 1953)

    May 23 – C. R. M. F. Cruttwell, English historian (d. 1941)[36]

    May 25 – Pio of Pietrelcina, Italian saint (d. 1968)

    May 26 – Paul Lukas, Hungarian-born actor (d. 1971)

    May 31 – Saint-John Perse, French diplomat, writer and Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1975)[37]

    June 3 – Carlo Michelstaedter, Italian philosopher (d. 1910)

    June 4 – Tom Longboat, Canadian distance runner (d. 1949)

    June 5 – Ruth Benedict, American anthropologist (d. 1948)

    June 9 – Emilio Mola, Spanish Nationalist commander (d. 1937)

    June 13 – André François-Poncet, French politician, diplomat (d. 1978)

    June 22

        Julian Huxley, British biologist (d. 1975)

        Santiago Amat, Spanish sailor (d. 1982)

    June 26 – Ganna Walska, Polish opera singer (d. 1984)

 

July– August

 

    July 1

        Maria Isidia da Conceição, Brazilian supercentenarian

        Morton Deyo, American admiral (d. 1973)

    July 3 – Elith Pio, Danish actor (d. 1983)

    July 6 – Annette Kellermann, Australian professional swimmer, vaudeville star, film actress, writer and business owner (d. 1975)

    July 7 – Marc Chagall, Russian-born painter (d. 1985)[38]

    July 9 – Samuel Eliot Morison, American historian (d. 1976)

    July 11 – Nicolae Păiș, Romanian admiral (d. 1952)

    July 14 – Curtis Shake, American jurist (d. 1978)

    July 16 – Shoeless Joe Jackson, American baseball player (d. 1951)

    July 18 – Vidkun Quisling, Norwegian politician, traitor (d. 1945)

    July 21 – Luis A. Eguiguren, Peruvian historian and politician (d. 1967)

    July 22 – Gustav Ludwig Hertz, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1975)

    July 28 – Marcel Duchamp, French-born artist (d. 1968)[39]

    July 29

        Sigmund Romberg, Hungarian-born composer (d. 1951)

        Mamoru Shigemitsu, Japanese diplomat and politician (d. 1957)

    July 31 – Mitsuru Ushijima, Japanese general (d. 1945)

    August 3

        Rupert Brooke, British war poet (d. 1915)[40]

        August Wesley, Finnish journalist, trade unionist, and revolutionary (d. ?)[41]

    August 4 – Peter Bocage, American jazz musician (d. 1967)

    August 6 – Oliver Wallace, English-born film composer (d. 1963)

    August 12 – Erwin Schrödinger, Austrian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1961)

    August 13 – Julius Freed, American inventor, banker (d. 1952)

    August 17

        Emperor Charles I of Austria (d. 1922)

        Marcus Garvey, African American publisher, entrepreneur and Pan Africanist (d. 1940)[42]

    August 22 – Walter Citrine, 1st Baron Citrine, British trade unionist (d. 1983)

    August 24 – Harry Hooper, American baseball player (d. 1974)

    August 27 – Julia Sanderson, American actress (d. 1975)

 

September–October

Avery Brundage

Le Corbusier

Chiang Kai-shek

 

    September 1 – Blaise Cendrars, Swiss writer (d. 1961)[43]

    September 3 – Frank Christian, American jazz musician (d. 1973)

    September 5 – Irene Fenwick, American actress (d. 1936)

    September 8 – Jacob L. Devers, American general (d. 1979)

    September 9 – Alf Landon, American Republican politician, presidential candidate (d. 1987)

    September 10 – Giovanni Gronchi, 3rd President of Italy (d. 1978)

    September 12 – Yusif Vazir Chamanzaminli, Azerbaijani statesman, writer and claimed "core author" of novel Ali and Nino (d. in Gulag 1943)

    September 13

        Lancelot Holland, British admiral (d. 1941)

        Leopold Ružička, Croatian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1976)

        Frank Gray (researcher), Physicist and researcher, known for the Gray code (d. 1969)

    September 16 – Nadia Boulanger, French composer and composition teacher (d. 1979)[44]

    September 26 – William Barnard Rhodes-Moorhouse, British aviator, first airman to receive the Victoria Cross (d. 1915)

    September 28 – Avery Brundage, American sports official (d. 1975)[45]

    October 2 – Violet Jessop, Argentine-born British RMS Titanic survivor (d. 1971)

    October 4 – Charles Alan Pownall, American admiral, 3rd Military Governor of Guam (d. 1975)

    October 5 – René Cassin, French judge, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1976)

    October 6 – Le Corbusier, Swiss architect (d. 1965)[46]

    October 8 – Huntley Gordon, Canadian-born actor (d. 1956)

    October 13 – Jozef Tiso, Prime Minister of Slovakia (d. 1947)

    October 14 – Ernest Pingoud, Finnish composer (d. 1942)

    October 18 – Takashi Sakai, Japanese general (d. 1946)

    October 20 – Prince Yasuhiko Asaka, Japanese prince (d. 1981)

    October 22 – John Reed, American journalist (d. 1920)[47]

    October 23 – Lothar Rendulic, Austrian-born German general (d. 1971)

    October 24 – Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg, Queen Consort of Spain (d. 1969)

    October 28 – Herb Byrne, Australian rules footballer (d. 1959)

    October 31 – Chiang Kai-shek, 1st President of the Republic of China (d. 1975)

 

November - December

Bernard Montgomery

Boris Karloff

Erich von Manstein

 

    November 1 – L. S. Lowry, English painter (d. 1976)[48]

    November 6 – Walter Johnson, American baseball player (d. 1946)

    November 10 – Arnold Zweig, German writer (d. 1968)[49]

    November 11

        Walther Wever, German general, pre-World War II Luftwaffe commander (d. 1936)

        Roland Young, English actor (d. 1953)

    November 14 – Amadeo de Souza Cardoso, Portuguese painter (d. 1918)

    November 15 – Georgia O'Keeffe, American painter (d. 1986)[50]

    November 17 – Bernard Montgomery, British World War II commander (d. 1976)

    November 19 – James B. Sumner, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1955)

    November 23

        Boris Karloff, British horror film actor (d. 1969)

        Henry Moseley, English physicist (d. 1915)

    November 24 – Erich von Manstein, German field marshal (d. 1973)

    November 25 – Nikolai Vavilov, Russian and Soviet agronomist, botanist and geneticist (d. 1943)[51]

    November 27 – Masaharu Homma, Japanese general (d. 1946)

    November 28

        Jacobo Palm, Curaçao-born composer (d. 1982)

        Ernst Röhm, German Nazi SA leader (d. 1934)

    November 30 – Beatrice Kerr, Australian swimmer, diver, and aquatic performer (d. 1971)

    December 3 – Prince Naruhiko Higashikuni, former Prime Minister of Japan (d. 1990)

    December 6 – Lynn Fontanne, British-born actress (d. 1983)

    December 12 – Kurt Atterberg, Swedish composer (d. 1974)

    December 13 – Alvin Cullum York, American World War I hero (d. 1964)

    December 16 – Adone Zoli, Italian politician, 35th Prime Minister of Italy (d. 1960)

    December 22 – Srinivasa Aaiyangar Ramanujan, Indian mathematician (d. 1920)

    December 25 – Conrad Hilton, American hotelier (d. 1979)

    December 26 – Arthur Percival, British general (d. 1966)

 

Deaths

January–June

 

    January 12 – Stafford Northcote, 1st Earl of Iddesleigh, British politician (b. 1818)

    February 19 – Eduard Douwes Dekker, Dutch writer (b. 1820)[52]

    February 26 – Anandi Gopal Joshi, first Indian woman doctor (b. 1865)

    February 27 – Alexander Borodin, Russian composer (b. 1833)[53]

    March 4 – Catherine Huggins, British actor, singer, director and manager (b. 1821)

    March 8 – Henry Ward Beecher, American clergyman, reformer (b. 1813)

    March 24

        Jean-Joseph Farre, French general and statesman (b. 1816)

        Justin Holland, American musician, civil rights activist (b. 1819)

        Ivan Kramskoi, Russian painter (b. 1837)

    March 28 – Ditlev Gothard Monrad, Danish politician (b. 1811)[54]

    April 10 – John T. Raymond, American actor (b. 1836)

    April 19 – Henry Hotze, Swiss-American Confederate propagandist (b. 1833)

    April 23 – John Ceiriog Hughes, Welsh poet (b. 1832)[55]

    May 7 – C. F. W. Walther, German-American theologian (b. 1811)

    May 8 – Aleksandr Ulyanov, Russian revolutionary, brother of V. I. Lenin (b. 1866)

    May 14 – Lysander Spooner, American philosopher and abolitionist (b. 1808)

    June 4 – William A. Wheeler, 19th Vice President of the United States (b. 1819)

    June 10 – Richard Lindon, British inventor of the rugby ball, the India-rubber inflatable bladder and the brass hand pump for the same (b. 1816)

 

July–December

Gustav Kirchhoff

 

    July 8 – John Wright Oakes, English landscape painter (b. 1820)

    July 17 – Dorothea Dix, American social activist (b. 1802)

    July 25 – John Taylor, American religious leader (b. 1808)

    August 8 – Alexander William Doniphan, American lawyer, soldier (b. 1808)

    August 16

        Webster Paulson, English civil engineer (b. 1837)

        Sir Julius von Haast, German-born New Zealand geologist (b. 1822)

    August 19

        Alvan Clark, American telescope manufacturer (b. 1804)

        Spencer Fullerton Baird, American naturalist and museum curator (b. 1823)

    August 20 – Jules Laforgue, French poet (b. 1860)[56]

    September 12 – August von Werder, Prussian general (b. 1808)

    October 12 – Dinah Craik, English novelist and poet (b. 1826)[57]

    October 17 – Gustav Kirchhoff, German physicist (b. 1824)

    October 21 – Bernard Jauréguiberry, French admiral, statesman (b. 1815)

    October 26 – Hugo von Kirchbach, Prussian general (d. 1809)

    October 31 – Sir George Macfarren, British composer and musicologist (b. 1813)

    November 2

        Jenny Lind, Swedish soprano (b. 1820)[58]

        Alfred Domett, 4th Premier of New Zealand (b. 1811)[59]

    November 8 – Doc Holliday, American gambler, gunfighter (b. 1851)[60]

    November 19 – Emma Lazarus, American poet (b. 1859)[61]

    November 28 – Gustav Fechner, German experimental psychologist (b. 1801)

    December 5 – Richard Lyons, 1st Viscount Lyons, British diplomat (b. 1817)

    December 14 – William Garrow Lettsom, British diplomat, mineralogist and spectroscopist (b. 1805)

    December 23 – Adolphus Frederick Alexander Woodford, British parson (b. 1821)

 

Date unknown

 

    Antoinette Nording, Swedish perfume entrepreneur (b. 1814)

 

References

 

United States Naval Institute (1930). Proceedings of the United States Naval Institute. The Institute. p. 406.

"The Loss of the Kapunda: Details of the Disaster". Belfast Morning News. February 23, 1887. p. 5. Retrieved March 18, 2016.

Gaston Tissandier (1889). The Eiffel Tower: A Description of the Monument, Its Construction, Its Machinery, Its Object, and Its Utility. With an Autographic Letter of M. Gustave Eiffel. Illustrated. Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Rivington. p. 27.

Dana Facaros; Michael Pauls (1982). New York & the Mid-Atlantic States. Regnery Gateway. p. 171. ISBN 978-0-89526-856-3.

Serial set (no.0-3099). 1891. p. 47.

Sister Mary Antonio Johnston (1948). Federal Relations with the Great Sioux Indians of South Dakota,1887-1933, with Particular Reference to Land Policy Under the Dawes Act. Catholic University of America Press. p. 41.

Mike Cronin; William Murphy; Paul Rouse (2009). The Gaelic Athletic Association, 1884-2009. Irish Academic Press. p. 266. ISBN 978-0-7165-3028-2.

Lewis Ford (1892). The Variety Book Containing Life Sketches and Reminiscences. Washington Press. p. 106.

Charles Hitchcock Sherrill (1931). Bismarck & Mussolini. Houghton Mifflin. p. 97-101.

Oregon Historical Society (2006). Oregon Historical Quarterly. Oregon Historical Society. p. 326.

Royal.gov.uk Archived November 1, 2005, at the Wayback Machine

"Parks Canada - This Week in History". March 18, 2004. Archived from the original on March 18, 2004.

Price, Trevor J. (2004). "Blyth, James (1839–1906)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/100957. Retrieved April 16, 2014. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)

Hardy, Chris (July 6, 2010). "Renewable energy and role of Marykirk's James Blyth". The Courier (Dundee). D. C. Thomson & Co.

U.S. Patent No. 366,945, filed July 6, 1886; second patent granted October 11, 1887: U.S. Patent No. 371,496, filed March 12, 1887.

"Brand and History - About Us - Yamaha Corporation". www.yamaha.com. Retrieved May 19, 2021.

Coogan, Tim Pat (2002). Wherever Green Is Worn: The Story of the Irish Diaspora. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 250. ISBN 978-1-4039-6014-6.

Wagg, Stephen (2002). British Football and Social Exclusion. Routledge. p. 196. ISBN 978-0-7146-5217-7.

Westcott, Kathryn (April 9, 2011). "HG Wells or Enrique Gaspar: Whose time machine was first?". BBC News. Retrieved April 9, 2011.

"The Yasuda Fire and Marine Insurance Company, Limited History". Funding Universe. Retrieved May 19, 2021.

"Our history". Skanska - Global corporate website. Retrieved October 19, 2020.

Johnston, Ben (2010). "Battery Rail Vehicles". Retrieved May 19, 2021.

Meseure, Anna; Macke, August (1993). August Macke, 1887-1914. Benedikt Taschen. p. 7. ISBN 978-3-8228-0551-0.

Szy, Tibor (1966). Hungarians in America: A Biographical Directory of Professionals of Hungarian Origin in the Americas. Kossuth Foundation. p. 218.

Opus. Warwick Publishing Group. 1999. p. 30.

Trakl, Georg; Skelton, Robin (1994). Dark Seasons: A Selection of Poems. Broken Jaw Press. p. 9. ISBN 978-0-921411-22-2.

"John F. Enders". Nobel Prize. Retrieved April 12, 2021.

Official Journal of the European Communities: Debates of the European Parliament. Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. March 1975. p. 2.

Morris, Mark (1996). A Guide to 20th-century Composers. Methuen. p. 112. ISBN 978-0-413-45601-4.

Bissell, Claude (December 15, 1981). The Young Vincent Massey. University of Toronto Press, Scholarly Publishing Division. p. 10. ISBN 978-1-4426-3371-1.

Béhague, Gerard (1994). Heitor Villa-Lobos: The Search for Brazil's Musical Soul. Institute of Latin American Studies, University of Texas at Austin. p. 2. ISBN 978-0-292-70823-5.

Kellner, Bruce (1988). A Gertrude Stein Companion: Content with the Example. Greenwood Press. p. 153. ISBN 978-0-313-25078-1.

Brion, Marcel (1958). Modern Painting; from Impressionism to Abstract Art. Thames and Hudson. p. 95.

"Fritz Felix PIPES - Olympic Tennis | Austria". International Olympic Committee. June 14, 2016.

Bochner, Salomon (1992). Collected Papers of Salomon Bochner. American Mathematical Society. p. 73. ISBN 978-0-8218-7054-9.

Ellis, Geoffrey (2007). "Cruttwell, Charles Robert Mowbray Fraser". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/32655. Retrieved November 1, 2010. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.) (subscription required)

Bernard S. Schlessinger; June H. Schlessinger (1991). The Who's Who of Nobel Prize Winners, 1901-1990. Oryx Press. p. 74. ISBN 978-0-89774-599-4.

Anthony Mason (July 5, 2004). Marc Chagall. Gareth Stevens Publishing LLLP. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-8368-5649-1.

Marcel Brion (1958). Modern Painting; from Impressionism to Abstract Art. Thames and Hudson. p. 94.

John Lehmann (1980). Rupert Brooke: His Life and His Legend. Weidenfeld & Nicolson. p. 20. ISBN 978-0-297-77757-1.

August Wesley - Born Glorious

Marcus Garvey; Robert A. Hill (August 17, 1987). Marcus Garvey Life and Lessons: A Centennial Companion to the Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association Papers. University of California Press. p. 35. ISBN 978-0-520-06265-8.

John Flower (January 17, 2013). Historical Dictionary of French Literature. Scarecrow Press. p. 118. ISBN 978-0-8108-7945-4.

Alan Kendall (1976). The Tender Tyrant, Nadia Boulanger: A Life Devoted to Music : a Biography. Macdonald and Jane's. p. 8. ISBN 978-0-356-08403-9.

John Apostal Lucas (1980). The Modern Olympic Games. A. S. Barnes. p. 161. ISBN 978-0-498-02447-4.

Juan Antonio Ramírez (2000). The Beehive Metaphor: From Gaudí to Le Corbusier. Reaktion Books. p. 116. ISBN 978-1-86189-056-6.

New Times. Trud. September 1987. p. 28.

Allen Andrews (1977). The Life of L. S. Lowry, 1887-1976. Jupiter Books. p. 30. ISBN 978-0-904041-60-6.

Irene Harand (1937). His Struggle (an Answer to Hitler). Artcraft Press. p. 240.

Britta Benke (2000). Georgia O'Keeffe, 1887-1986: Flowers in the Desert. Taschen. p. 5. ISBN 978-3-8228-5861-5.

Sputnik. Novosti Printing House. 1997. p. 5.

Frank Northen Magill (1958). Masterplots: Cyclopedia of world authors; seven hundred fifty three novelists, poets, playwrights from the world's fine literature. Salem Press. p. 777.

Overture: The Magazine of the Baltimore Symphony. Baltimore Symphony Orchestra Association. 1979. p. 20.

Jon Bartley Stewart (2009). Kierkegaard and His Danish Contemporaries: Philosophy, politics and social theory. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. p. 169. ISBN 978-0-7546-6872-5.

David Gwenallt Jones. "Hughes, John (Ceiriog; 1832-1887), poet". Dictionary of Welsh Biography. National Library of Wales. Retrieved November 2, 2020.

St James Press; Anthony Levi (1992). Guide to French Literature: 1789 to the Present. St. James Press. p. 345. ISBN 978-1-55862-086-5.

August Nemo; Dinah Craik (July 1, 2019). Essential Novelists - Dinah Craik: The Ideals of English Middle-class Life. Tacet Books. p. 3. ISBN 978-85-7777-325-1.

Cecilia Jorgensen; Jens Jorgensen (2003). Chopin and the Swedish Nightingale: The Life and Times of Chopin and a Romance Unveiled 154 Years Later. Icons of Europe. p. 89. ISBN 978-2-9600385-0-7.

Claudia Orange (December 21, 2015). The Story of a Treaty. Bridget Williams Books. p. 269. ISBN

Jon Tuska; Vicki Piekarski; Paul J. Blanding (1984). The Frontier Experience: A Reader's Guide to the Life and Literature of the American West. McFarland. p. 124. ISBN 978-0-89950-118-5.

    Emma Lazarus (1888). The Poems of Emma Lazarus. Houghton, Mifflin. p. 1.

I post worldwide to: Afghanistan * Albania * Algeria * American Samoa (US) * Andorra * Angola * Anguilla (GB) * Antigua and Barbuda * Argentina * Armenia * Aruba (NL) * Australia * Austria * Azerbaijan * Bahamas * Bahrain * Bangladesh * Barbados * Belarus * Belgium * Belize * Benin * Bermuda (GB) * Bhutan * Bolivia * Bonaire (NL)  * Bosnia and Herzegovina * Botswana * Bouvet Island (NO) * Brazil * British Indian Ocean Territory (GB) * British Virgin Islands (GB) * Brunei * Bulgaria * Burkina Faso * Burundi * Cambodia * Cameroon * Canada * Cape Verde * Cayman Islands (GB) * Central African Republic * Chad * Chile * China * Christmas Island (AU) * Cocos Islands (AU) * Colombia * Comoros * Congo * Democratic Republic of the Congo * Cook Islands (NZ) * Coral Sea Islands Territory (AU) * Costa Rica * Croatia * Cuba * Curaçao (NL)  * Cyprus * Czech Republic * Denmark * Djibouti * Dominica * Dominican Republic * East Timor * Ecuador * Egypt * El Salvador * Equatorial Guinea * Eritrea * Estonia * Ethiopia * Falkland Islands (GB) * Faroe Islands (DK) * Fiji Islands * Finland * France * French Guiana (FR) * French Polynesia (FR) * French Southern Lands (FR) * Gabon * Gambia * Georgia * Germany * Ghana * Gibraltar (GB) * Greece * Greenland (DK) * Grenada * Guadeloupe (FR) * Guam (US) * Guatemala * Guernsey (GB) * Guinea * Guinea-Bissau * Guyana * Haiti * Heard and McDonald Islands (AU) * Honduras * Hong Kong (CN) * Hungary * Iceland * India * Indonesia * Iran * Iraq * Ireland * Isle of Man (GB) * Israel * Italy *  Jamaica * Jan Mayen (NO) * Japan * Jersey (GB) * Jordan * Kazakhstan * Kenya * Kiribati * Kosovo * Kuwait * Kyrgyzstan * Laos * Latvia * Lebanon * Lesotho * Liberia * Libya * Liechtenstein * Lithuania * Luxembourg * Macau (CN) * Macedonia * Madagascar * Malawi * Malaysia * Maldives * Mali * Malta * Marshall Islands * Martinique (FR) * Mauritania * Mauritius * Mayotte (FR) * Mexico * Micronesia * Moldova * Monaco * Mongolia * Montenegro * Montserrat (GB) * Morocco * Mozambique * Myanmar * Namibia * Nauru * Navassa (US) * Nepal * Netherlands * New Caledonia (FR) * New Zealand * Nicaragua * Niger * Nigeria * Niue (NZ) * Norfolk Island (AU) * North Korea * Northern Cyprus * Northern Mariana Islands (US) * Norway * Oman * Pakistan * Palau * Palestinian Authority * Panama * Papua New Guinea * Paraguay * Peru * Philippines * Pitcairn Island (GB) * Poland * Portugal * Puerto Rico (US) * Qatar * Reunion (FR) * Romania * Russia * Rwanda * Saba (NL)  * Saint Barthelemy (FR) * Saint Helena (GB) * Saint Kitts and Nevis * Saint Lucia * Saint Martin (FR) * Saint Pierre and Miquelon (FR) * Saint Vincent and the Grenadines * Samoa * San Marino * Sao Tome and Principe * Saudi Arabia * Senegal * Serbia * Seychelles * Sierra Leone * Singapore * Sint Eustatius (NL)  * Sint Maarten (NL)  * Slovakia * Slovenia * Solomon Islands * Somalia * South Africa * South Georgia (GB) * South Korea * South Sudan * Spain * Sri Lanka * Sudan * Suriname * Svalbard (NO) * Swaziland * Sweden * Switzerland * Syria * Taiwan * Tajikistan * Tanzania * Thailand * Togo * Tokelau (NZ) * Tonga * Trinidad and Tobago * Tunisia * Turkey * Turkmenistan * Turks and Caicos Islands (GB) * Tuvalu * U.S. Minor Pacific Islands (US) * U.S. Virgin Islands (US) * Uganda * Ukraine * United Arab Emirates * United Kingdom * United States * Uruguay * Uzbekistan * Vanuatu * Vatican City * Venezuela * Vietnam * Wallis and Futuna (FR) * Yemen * Zambia * Zimbabwe

Please note exclusions on individual listings