1787 in Great Britain

1787 in Great Britain:

Other years

1785 | 1786 | 1787 | 1788 | 1789

Sport

1787 English cricket season

Events from the year 1787 in the Kingdom of Great Britain.

Incumbents

• Monarch - George III
• Prime Minister - William Pitt the Younger (Tory)

Events

Am I Not a Man and a Brother? Design of the medallion created for the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade by Wedgwood, 1787

• 1 January - George III writes his first letter to Arthur Young's Annals of Agriculture, under the name of Ralph Robinson of Windsor.
• 11 January - William Herschel discovers the Uranian moons Titania and Oberon.
• 19 February - William Herschel first uses the 40-foot telescope under construction for him at Slough.
• 13 May - Captain Arthur Phillip leaves Portsmouth with the eleven ships of the First Fleet carrying around 700 convicts and at least 300 crew and guards to establish a penal colony in Australia.
• 22 May - Thomas Clarkson and Granville Sharp found the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade with support from John Wesley, Josiah Wedgwood and others.
• 31 May - The original Lord's Cricket Ground holds its first cricket match; Marylebone Cricket Club founded.
• 23 December - Captain William Bligh sets sail for Tahiti on the Bounty.
• undated - Principal Triangulation of Great Britain completed under the direction of General William Roy.

Publications

• Freed slave Ottobah Cugoano publishes Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil and Wicked Traffic of the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species.
• The Scots Musical Museum begins publication.

Births

• 7 January - Patrick Nasmyth, Scottish landscape painter (died 1831)
• 10 February - William Bradley, Britain's tallest ever man (died 1820)
• 17 February - George Mogridge (Old Humphrey), miscellaneous writer and poet (died 1854)
• 10 March - William Etty, painter, especially of nudes (died 1849)
• 28 March - Claudius James Rich, archaeologist and anthropologist (died 1821)
• 7 June - William Conybeare, geologist (died 1857)
• 28 June - Harry Smith, military commander (died 1860)
• 13 September - John Adamson, antiquary and expert on Portuguese (died 1855)
• 13 October - William Brockedon, painter (died 1854)
• 4 November - Edmund Kean, actor (died 1833)
• 21 November - Bryan Procter (Barry Cornwall), poet (died 1874)
• 22 November - Copley Fielding, watercolour landscape painter (died 1855)
• 16 December - Mary Russell Mitford, novelist and dramatist (died 1855)
• Ignatius Bonomi, architect (died 1870)
• John Dobson, architect (died 1865)
• Harriet Gouldsmith, landscape painter and etcher (died 1863)
• Approximate date - Ikey Solomon, receiver of stolen goods (died 1850 in Australia)

Deaths

• 1 April - Floyer Sydenham, classical scholar (born 1710)
• 2 April - Thomas Gage, General (born 1719)
• 10 May - William Watson, physician and scientist (born 1715)
• 3 November - Robert Lowth, bishop and grammarian (born 1710)
• 18 December - Francis William Drake, British admiral and Governor of Newfoundland (born 1724)
• 18 December - Soame Jenyns, English writer (born 1704)