1900 in the United Kingdom

Incumbents

• Monarch – Victoria
• Prime Minister – Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury
• Parliament – 26th, 27th

  Events

January

• 3 January – royal yacht Victoria and Albert almost capsizes while being floated out of dry dock at Pembroke Dock on completion of her construction.
• 9 January – influenza outbreak in London.
• 24 January – Second Boer War: Boers repel British troops under General Sir Redvers Buller at the Battle of Spion Kop.
• 31 January – the Gramophone Company copyrights the His Master's Voice illustration.

  February

• 5 February – the UK and the United States sign a treaty for the building of a Central American shipping canal through Nicaragua.
• 6 February – the House of Commons vote of censure over the government's handling of the Second Boer War is defeated by a majority of 213.
• 8 February – Second Boer War: British troops are defeated by Boers at Ladysmith, South Africa.
• 12 February – meeting held at Mile End to protest against the Boer War ends in uproar.
• 14 February – Second Boer War: in South Africa, 20,000 British troops invade the Orange Free State.
• 27 February
• * Boer War: in South Africa, British military leaders receive an unconditional notice of surrender from Boer General Piet Cronjé.
• * Creation of the Labour party; Ramsay MacDonald is appointed its first secretary.
• 28 February – Second Boer War: the 118-day Siege of Ladysmith is lifted.

  March to September

• March–September – War of the Golden Stool fought against the Ashanti Empire.
• 1 April – Irish Guards formed by Queen Victoria.
• 4 April
• * An anarchist shoots at the Prince of Wales during his visit to Belgium for the birthday celebrations of the King of Belgium.
• * Queen Victoria arrives in Dublin on a rare visit.
• 23 April – 12 May – the Automobile Club of Great Britain stages a Thousand Mile Trial, a reliability motor rally over a circular route from London to Edinburgh and return.
• 24 April – the Daily Express newspaper published for the first time.
• 14 May – 28 October – Great Britain and Ireland compete at the Olympics in Paris and win 15 gold, 6 silver and 9 bronze medals.
• 17 May – Second Boer War – Siege of Mafeking ends.
• 18 May – the UK proclaims a protectorate over Tonga.
• 5 June – Boer War: British soldiers take Pretoria, South Africa.
• 19–21 July – Bernard Bosanquet first bowls a googly in first-class cricket, playing for Middlesex against Leicestershire at Lord's.
• 27 July – Louise, Princess Royal, a granddaughter of Queen Victoria, marries Alexander Duff, Earl of Fife, in the private chapel of Buckingham Palace, London; 2 days later he is created Duke of Fife, the last Dukedom created in Britain for a person who is not a son, grandson or consort of the Sovereign.
• 30 July
• * The Duke of Albany becomes Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha as Carl Eduard following the death of his uncle, Duke Alfred, a son of Queen Victoria who is the third of the reigning monarch's children to die.
• * Mines Act prohibits children under the age of thirteen from working in mines.
• 8 August – Great Britain loses to the United States in the first Davis Cup tennis competition.
• 14 August – an international contingent of troops, under British command, invades Peking and frees the Europeans taken hostage.
• 27 August – British defeat Boer commandos at Bergendal.
• 3 September – West Bromwich Albion F.C. move into The Hawthorns, a new stadium on the border of West Bromwich and Handsworth.

  October

• 3 October – Edward Elgar's choral work The Dream of Gerontius receives its first performance, in Birmingham Town Hall.
• 25 October – Second Boer War: United Kingdom annexes Transvaal.

  November

• 22–14 November 1903 – strike of Welsh slate workers at Penrhyn Quarry.

  December

• 3 December – the Conservative Party under Lord Salisbury wins the 'Khaki' general election. Winston Churchill is elected Member of Parliament for Oldham; and two Labour candidates are successful: Keir Hardie in Merthyr Tydfil and Richard Bell in Derby.
• 15 December – the three lighthouse keepers on Flannen Isle disappear without a trace
• 28 December – the Liverpool barque Primrose Hill is wrecked on South Stack off Holyhead, with the loss of 33 lives.
• 31 December – a storm causes a stone and a lintel to fall at Stonehenge; they are restored in 1958.

  Undated

• Beer Scare: beer drinkers in North West England suffer poisoning from arsenic in brewing sugars: 6,000 people affected and 70 killed.
• William Harbutt of Bathampton begins commercial production of Plasticine modelling clay.
• Completion of the Arnold Cross estate, Shoreditch, London; Britain's first council estate to be commenced.
• Diamond Jubilee wins the English Triple Crown by finishing first in the Epsom Derby, 2,000 Guineas and St Leger, ridden by Herbert Jones.

  Publications

• Ernest Bramah's oriental fantasy stories The Wallet of Kai Lung.
• Joseph Conrad's novel Lord Jim.
• Maurice Hewlett's historical novel The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay.
• Gertrude Jekyll's book Home and Garden: notes and thoughts, practical and critical, of a worker in both.
• Arthur Quiller-Couch's anthology The Oxford Book of English Verse 1250–1900.
• H. G. Wells' novel Love and Mr Lewisham.

  Births

• 1 January
• * Roger Maxwell, film actor
• * Lillian Rich, silent film actress
• 2 January – Una Ledingham, physician, specialist in diabetes mellitus and pregnancy
• 4 January – William Young, World War I veteran
• 20 January – Dorothy Annan, painter, potter and muralist
• 23 January – William Ifor Jones, composer
• 6 February – Guy Warrack, Scottish-born conductor
• 12 February
• * Robert Boothby, politician
• * Fred Emney, comic performer
• 20 February – Bernard Knowles, cinematographer and screenwriter
• 3 March
• * Edna Best, stage, film and early television actress
• * Basil Bunting, modernist poet
• 29 March – Margaret Sinclair, Scottish-born nun
• 31 March – Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester
• 3 April – Albert Ingham, mathematician
• 9 April – Mary Potter, painter
• 19 April – Richard Hughes, novelist
• 22 April – Nellie Beer, Conservative politician, Lord Mayor of Manchester
• 24 April – Elizabeth Goudge, novelist
• 30 April – Cecily Lefort, World War II heroine, spy for SOE
• 2 May – A. W. Lawrence, Classical archaeologist
• 5 May – Harold Tamblyn-Watts, comic strip artist
• 10 May – Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, astronomer and astrophysicist
• 24 May – Sonia Cubitt, née Keppel, baroness, grandmother of Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall
• 27 May – Ethel Lang, née Lancaster, supercentenarian
• 29 May – David Maxwell Fyfe, 1st Earl of Kilmuir, Scottish-born politician, lawyer and judge, Lord Chancellor
• 30 May – Gerald Gardiner, Lord Chancellor
• 6 June
• * Arthur Askey, comedian
• * Lester Matthews, actor
• 17 June – Evelyn Irons, Scottish-born journalist, war correspondent
• 25 June
• * Philip D'Arcy Hart, medical researcher, pioneer in tuberculosis treatment
• * Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, Admiral of the Fleet and last Viceroy of India
• 26 June – John Benham, 400m runner
• 30 June – James Stagg, Scottish-born meteorologist
• 2 July
• * Tyrone Guthrie, theatre director
• * Sophie Harris, theatre and opera costume and scenic designer
• 10 July – Evelyn Laye, actress
• 4 August – Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, queen consort of George VI and later Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother
• 17 August – Vivienne de Watteville, adventurer
• 19 August – Gilbert Ryle, philosopher
• 27 August – Frank Moody, Welsh boxer
• 25 August – Isobel Hogg Kerr Beattie, Scottish architect
• 4 September – Maxwell Knight, spymaster and naturalist
• 8 September – Tilly Devine, organised crime boss
• 9 September – James Hilton, novelist and screenwriter
• 11 September – Jimmy Brain, footballer
• 12 September – Eric Thiman, composer
• 1 October – Tom Goddard, cricketer
• 2 October – Isabella Forshall, paediatric surgeon
• 6 October – Stan Nichols, cricketer
• 8 October – Geoffrey Jellicoe, landscape architect
• 9 October – Alastair Sim, character actor
• 14 October – Roland Penrose, Surrealist painter and art collector
• 16 October – Edward Ardizzone, painter, printmaker and author
• 5 November – Ethelwynn Trewavas, ichthyologist
• 20 November – Helen Bradley, painter
• 22 November – Tom Macdonald, Welsh journalist and novelist
• 28 November – Edwina Mountbatten, Countess Mountbatten of Burma, née Ashley
• 4 December – John Axon, railwayman hero
• 16 December – V. S. Pritchett, short story writer
• 17 December – Mary Cartwright, mathematician
• 22 December – Alan Bush, pianist, composer and conductor
• 26 December – Evelyn Bark, humanitarian, leading member of the Red Cross, first female recipient of the CMG
• Robina Addis, pioneering professional psychiatric social worker
• Bella Reay, footballer
• Saira Elizabeth Luiza Shah, born Elizabeth Louise MacKenzie, Scottish writer as Morag Murray Abdullah

  Deaths

• 20 January
• * R. D. Blackmore, novelist
• * John Ruskin, writer and social critic
• 22 January – David E. Hughes, musician and professor of music
• 31 January – John Sholto Douglas, 9th Marquess of Queensberry, nobleman and boxer
• 6 February – Sir William Wilson Hunter, colonial administrator, statistician and historian
• 23 February
• * William Butterfield, architect
• * Ernest Dowson, poet
• 10 March – George James Symons, meteorologist
• 16 March – Sir Frederic William Burton, painter and curator
• 24 April – George Douglas Campbell, 8th Duke of Argyll, politician
• 4 May – Augustus Pitt Rivers, ethnologist and archaeologist
• 28 May – Sir George Grove, writer on music and the Bible and civil engineer
• 3 June – Mary Kingsley, explorer, in Cape Colony
• 30 July – Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, second eldest son of Queen Victoria, in Germany
• 28 August – Henry Sidgwick, philosopher
• 31 August – John Bennet Lawes, agricultural scientist
• 9 October – John Crichton-Stuart, 3rd Marquess of Bute, landed aristocrat, industrial magnate, antiquarian, scholar, philanthropist and architectural patron
• 16 October – Sir Henry Acland, physician
• 22 November – Sir Arthur Sullivan, composer
• 29 December – John Henry Leech, entomologist
• 30 November – Oscar Wilde, playwright, writer and poet, in France