Timeline
This is a (very much incomplete) timeline of Nottingham’s history. We will add to it over time. Quite a bit of information has been taken from the Nottingham Date Book (1884; referenced as DB Vol. I or II).
14th century
1396
Four persons from Nottingham are arrested and interrogated in London after they were accused of being members of the Lollards.
17th century
1642
Charles I raises his standard in Nottingham, beginning the English Civil War. The town is sacked during an unsuccessful attack by Royalist forces.
1649-50
A Digger settlement is established somewhere in Nottinghamshire. It appears that Gerrard Winstanley came to Nottingham around this time.
18th century
1751
Execution of William Parsons, a gentlemen turned highwaymen. DB Vol.II; pp. 16-8.
1752
Death of the poacher Thomas Booth ‘a never failing subject of conversational interest in public-house circles: no modern deer-stealer was anything like so popular’. DB Vol.II; pp. 24.
Failed attempt by framework-knitters to organise to improve their working conditions by forming ‘themselves into a community; and not to listen to their employers, who pretended to be the workmen’s friends’. DB Vol. II; pp. 25-6.
1766
Cheese riots at Goose Fair. The major is knocked over by a cheese. Troops coming from Derby shot a farmer on the second day of the riots, though he was not trying to expropriate, but to guard cheese. Other people are wounded though nothing is known about the severity of their injuries and whether they survived. See draft version of our pamphlet Damn your charity…
1779
Textile workers responded with riots and frame smashing to the defeat of a Bill in the Commons which should have regulated minimum standards for their wages. The house of master hosier Samuel Need who had led opposition to their appeal was burned to the ground. Every window of Arkwright’s mill is smashed and rioters attempt to set fire to it. Property belonging to every hosier known to have voted against the bill was attacked and more than 300 frames were flung into the streets. Order is not restored for three days.
1788
Residents of Nottingham riot over the price of meat.
1796
Despite having been beaten in 1794, Jacobins are victorious in a Nottingham election.
19th century
1801
A reformist candidate supported by the Foxite Corporation is victorious in elections in the city. There is a triumphant procession accompanied by a band playing Ca Ira and the Marseillaise.
1801-2
Rioting spreads across UK. In Nottingham army officers are stoned out of a theatre after they try to get the audience to sing “God Save the King”.
1811
Luddite movement begins in Nottingham.
When Luddite John Westley is killed on November 10 his funeral leads to the Riot Act being read in several places in Nottingham.
1812
Spencer Perceval, the prime minister, is assassinated in the House of Commons. In Nottingham residents celebrate, parading through the streets.
1816
The funeral of Luddite James Towle takes place in November. Although clerical magistrate Dr Wylde forbade the reading of the burial service, 3,000 people attended.
1817
8,000-10,000 framework knitters walk out in a nine week strike.
Pentrich Revolution. Some 300 lightly armed men try to march to Nottingham.
1819
Hosier workers in the city attempt unsuccessfully to organise a general strike.
Source: Bryson: ‘Portrait of Nottingham’
1821
A hosier strike across Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire lasts two months, but again ends unsuccessfully. 5,000 people parade daily with placards “Pity Our Distress… We Ask For Bread” the government responds by dispatching troops to Bromley House as a checkpoint against revolution.
1831-2
In March 9,000 city residents sign a petition calling for electoral reform.
In October the second Reform Bill is rejected by the House of Lords, triggering the Reform Riots in Nottingham. Colwick Hall is trashed and nearly burned down, the House of Correction attacked, as are a number of houses and shops all over the town. On Monday night, the Castle burned down as is a silk mill in Beeston on Tuesday. An attack on Wollaton Hall failed, a number of people taken prisoner. Two men are shot, one later dies of his injuries. In February, three men are hanged for their alleged involvement in the destruction of the Beeston silk mill. See our pamphlet To the Castle!.
1833
A petition is organised, seeking remission of the sentence of Joseph Turner, transported for life for his role in the Pentrich Revolution sixteen years earlier. The petition is written by Mark Phillips, a member of the reformed 1832 Parliament.
1834
Protests take place in Nottingham against the sentence passed on the Tolpuddle Martyrs. 2,000 trade unionists form up on the Forest and are joined by the Nottingham Female Union. The two groups marched together to Market Square accompanied by a band playing the national anthem and “Praise God from whom all blessings flow”.
Source: Thomis/Grimmett: ‘Women in Protest 1800-1850’
1838
Female Political Association formed in the city.
Source: Crawford: ‘The women’s suffrage movement in Britain and Ireland…’
1839
1.3 million-strong Chartist petition presented to the House of Commons in July, 17,000 of the signatories were said to have come from Nottingham.
1842
The Battle of Mapperley Hills. Around 5,000 Chartists assembled on Mapperley Plains, and troops arrested 400 men, leading to a riot.
1847
Feargus O’Connor elected to Parliament, the only Chartist to become an MP.
1859
Statue of Feargus O’Connor unveiled, 12-15,000 people turn up.
1866
49 Nottingham women are among the signatures of a suffrage petition.
Source: Crawford: ‘The women’s suffrage movement in Britain and Ireland…’
1873
The Great Depression hits Nottingham, the Nottingham Journal comments: “Prices have risen enormously, incomes have remained stationary, and the result has been that the purchasing power of money is in all probability somewhere about thirty-three per cent less than it was ten years ago. [...] there can be no question that the rise of prices is a serious matter to people with fixed or small incomes, and we fear there is small consolation before them in the future.”
Source: The Nottingham Journal 09.06.1873.
That year also sees a strike in the textile industry: “This dispute developed into the greatest the trade had yet seen and a great deal of bitterness was generated.”
Source: Wyncoll, Peter (1985): The Nottingham Labour Movement 1880-1939; Lawrence and Wishart; London, p22.
1874
Foundation of the Lace Makers’ Union.
Source: Mason, Sheila A. (1994): Nottingham Lace 1760s-1950s – The Machine-made Lace Industry in Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire; The Alden Press; Oxford/Northampton, p176.
20th century
1909
In February 1909 Helen Watts, daughter of the vicar of Lenton, was arrested, along with other suffragettes, for marching on Parliament.
1913
Haystack worth £100 destroyed near Nottingham by suffragettes.
1923
Suffragettes set fire to timber sheds at Great Central Railway Station.
Source: New York Times
In response to Britain’s aggressive stance towards Poland, trade unionists in Nottingham, Newcastle and Liverpool attempt to organise.
Source Clinton: ‘The trade union rank and file: trades councils in Britain, 1900-40’
1926
General Strike. The Evening Post is forced to suspend publication, public transport is affected.
1928
D.H. Lawrence writes Lady Chatterley’s Lover, but it is not published until 1960.
1936-7
A number of Notts residents travel to Spain to fight in the Civil War.
More: Evening Post
1937
Striking miners at Harworth Colliery in Nottinghamshire, who were arrested in April 1937 during disturbances orchestrated by the police are defended by the National Council for Civil Liberties (which would later become Liberty)
More on Harworth from the Communist Party’s archives
1944
The NUM is founded at a conference held in Nottingham.
Source: NUM
1958
West Indian immigrants in St Anns riot. In the aftermath, an enterprising bus company apparently offered tours of the riot-torn streets.
Source: BBC
1960
Lady Chatterley’s Lover is finally published, leading to a trial under the Obscene Publications Act 1959.
1964
Anarchy produce a special issue focused on Nottingham.
More: scanned and transcribed versions at the Sparrow’s Nest
1970
A group of West Indians, mainly from the island of St Kitts, held a carnival parade in the Meadows.” Despite difficulties the event went on to become an annual attraction.
More: BBC
1971
Nottingham Campaign for Homosexual Equality holds its first meeting.
More: Notts Rainbow Heritage
1972
Mushroom Bookshop opens its doors.
1977
The Anti-Nazi League is formed in the days following the Battle of Lewisham. Brian Clough is amongst the signatories of the founding statement.
The Committee for Homosexual Equality holds its conference in Nottingham. Taking over the Commodore for its meetings and what was then the Albany Hotel on Maid Marian Way for visiting delegates. The conference made headline news mainly because of the invitation of a Dutch professor who had made a study of paedophiles. Gay men may have been branded as paedophiles, but the newspapers did not appreciate them discussing the truth about that stereotyping.
More: Notts Rainbow Heritage
1978
Evening Post journalists begin strike action.
More: LeftLion
1981
Hyson Green is shaken by rioting between 10th-17th July.
More: NCCL
1984-5
The Miners’ Strike.
1985
The Rainbow Centre obtained premises at 180 Mansfield Road, next door to the new Friends of the Earth shop in Nottingham.
1990
Nottingham and District Trades Union Council celebrates its centenary.
When the Poll Tax in Nottingham is set, campaigners burst into the council chamber on the 5th March and custard pie several councillors.
Source: Evening Post; 5th March 1990.
1993
A memorial at County Hall, to the Nottinghamshire volunteers of the British Battalion was unveiled by the Spanish Ambassador to Britain.
1994
32 fascists from ex-coalfields in Notts/Derby arrested after causing damage and assault in Nottingham’s ‘Mushroom Books’ on 15th January.
Source: Counter Information
1998
When Nottingham Carnival faces the axe, local pressure including demonstrations forces the council to seek outside help.
More: BBC
1999
Mushroom Bookshop goes into voluntary liquidation.
21st century
2001
The National Front try to hold an “anti-paedophile protest” outside Nottingham Prison and are challenged by around 400 protesters.
2002
Sumac Centre opens.
2009
Nottingham Radical History Group formed.
Nottinghamshire County Council, under the Tory council leader Kay Cutts, rearranged the Spanish Civil War Memorial and de facto conceals every political context to those who do not know what the memorial is referring to.
