1917 in The United Kingdom - Events

Events

  • 19 January - Silvertown explosion: a blast at a munitions factory in London kills 73 and injures over 400. The resulting fire causes over £2M-worth of damage.
  • 26 January - The sea defences at the village of Hallsands, Devon are breached, leading to all but one of the houses becoming uninhabitable.
  • 2 February - Bread rationing introduced.
  • 21 February - Elder Dempster Line troopship SS Mendi is rammed by SS Darro off the Isle of Wight, killing 646.
  • February - Formation of the Women's Land Army, superseding the Women's National Land Service Corps.
  • March - Establishment of the Imperial War Cabinet, a body composed of the chief British ministers and the prime ministers of the Dominions (Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa) to set policy.
  • 11 March - World War I: British forces led by Sir Stanley Maude capture Baghdad, the southern capital of the Ottoman Empire.
  • 26 March - World War I: First Battle of Gaza - British cavalry troops retreat after 17,000 Turks block their advance.
  • 28 March - The Women's Army Auxiliary Corps founded.
  • 6/7 May - First bomb dropped on London by a fixed-wing aircraft (one death).
  • 25 May - First daylight bombing raid on the UK by fixed-wing aircraft: 95 killed in Folkestone area.
  • 4 June - The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is established as an order of chivalry by George V under letters patent.
  • 13 June - First daylight bombing raid on London by fixed-wing aircraft: 162 killed.
  • 9 July - HMS Vanguard is blown apart by an internal explosion at her moorings in Scapa Flow, Orkney, killing an estimated 843 crew with no survivors.
  • 17 July - King George V issues a Proclamation stating that the male line descendants of the British Royal Family will bear the surname Windsor.
  • 2 August - Squadron Commander E.H. Dunning becomes the first pilot to land his aircraft on a ship when he lands his Sopwith Pup on HMS Furious in Scapa Flow but is killed five days later during another landing on the ship.
  • 17 August - One of English literature's most important and famous meetings takes place when Wilfred Owen introduces himself to Siegfried Sassoon at Craiglockhart War Hospital in Edinburgh.
  • 21 August - Most provisions of Corn Production Act come into force. This guarantees minimum prices for wheat and oats and specifies a minimum wage for agricultural workers.
  • 5 October - Sir Arthur Lee donates the country house Chequers to the nation.
  • November - Women's Royal Naval Service established.
  • 2 November - The Balfour Declaration proclaims British support for Jewish settlement in Palestine.
  • 7 November - World War I: Third Battle of Gaza ends — British forces capture Gaza from the Ottoman Empire.
  • 16 November - British troops occupy Tel Aviv and Jaffa in Palestine.
  • 17 November - People's Dispensary for Sick Animals established by Maria Dickin.
  • 20 November - World War I: Battle of Cambrai begins — British forces make early progress in an attack on German positions but are soon beaten back.
  • 11 December - British troops take Jerusalem from the troops of the Ottoman Empire.

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Famous quotes containing the word events:

    “All the events which make the annals of the nations are but the shadows of our private experiences.”
    —Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    “The great events of life often leave one unmoved; they pass out of consciousness, and, when one thinks of them, become unreal. Even the scarlet flowers of passion seem to grow in the same meadow as the poppies of oblivion.”
    —Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)

    “If there is a case for mental events and mental states, it must be that the positing of them, like the positing of molecules, has some indirect systematic efficacy in the development of theory.”
    —Willard Van Orman Quine (b. 1908)