First British Empire

1497 John Cabot, sent by King Henry VII on an expedition to discover a route to Asia via the Atlantic, reaches the coast of Newfoundland. He claims the land for the British crown

1562 English naval commander John Hawkins begins his involvement in the slave trade between West Africa and the New World. He and Francis Drake are given permission to carry out privateering raids against Spanish ports in the Americas

1577–80 Francis Drake circumnavigates the world

1600 The English East India Company receives a Royal Charter from Queen Elizabeth I

1607 Captain John Smith and the Virginia Company establish the first permanent English settlement in the Americas at Jamestown

1612 Battle of Swally: East India Company achieves a major victory over the Portuguese in Surat, India

1617 Smallpox epidemic, spread by European traders, sweeps through New England, decimating the Native American population

1619 East India Company establishes a trading post at Surat

1620 The Mayflower arrives in Massachusetts with around 100 passengers, called the Pilgrims, a small Protestant sect who wanted to establish a separate church free from persecution

1621 King James VI of Scotland (James I of England) grants a charter to Sir William Alexander to found a Scottish colony in part of eastern Canada. He calls it New Scotland or Nova Scotia

1624–28 Settlements successfully established on St Kitts, Barbados and Nevis in the Cartibbean

1620s–1680s Colonies founded on Atlantic coast of North America by British and European settlers seeking religious freedom. These will become the Thirteeen Colonies

1639 East India Company establishes a trading post at Madras (present-day Chennai)

1649–52 Irish Catholic rebellion brutally crushed by English troops

1649 The Bahamas are colonized

1655 The island of Jamaica is captured from the Spanish

1661 Marriage treaty of Charles II of England and Catherine of Braganza, daughter of King John IV of Portugal, places the islands of Bombay (present-day Mumbai) in possession of the English Empire

1664 English capture the Dutch colony of New Netherland in North America, renaming the settlement of New Amsterdam New York

1668 English crown leases Bombay islands to the East India Company

1670 Hudson's Bay Company, chartered by King Charles II of England, lays claim to Hudson Bay in what is today known as Canada, and the surrounding area, called Rupert's Land

1672 Royal African Company set up to organize the capture and transportation of African slaves to Caribbean islands to work on the sugar plantations established there

1690 Job Charnock founds Calcutta on behalf of the East India Company

1695 Parliament of Scotland grants a charter to the Company of Scotland, which establishes a settlement the Isthmus of Panama in 1698, but which is abandoned in 1700

1713 Under the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht, which concludes the War of the Spanish Succession, Britain gains possession of Newfoundland, Acadia, St Kitts and Hudson’s Bay in the Americas, as well as Gibraltar and Minorca in Europe

1746–63 East India Company victories in three Carnatic Wars give it control over southern India

1757 East India Company troops under Robert Clive defeat Nawab of Bengal and his French allies at the Battle of Plassey, giving the Company control over Bengal, India

1763 Under the terms of the Treaty of Paris, which concludes the Seven Years' War between Britain and France, Lower Canada, the lands east of the Mississippi, Florida and Senegal are all ceded to Britain. France recognizes British rule over the East India Company's possessions in India. Britain cedes Cuba and Manila to the Spanish

1766–1818 East India Company victories in the Anglo-Mysore Wars and Anglo-Maratha Wars give it control of vast regions of India

1770 Captain James Cook claims New South Wales for Britain

1770 Great Bengal Famine: up to an estimated 10 million people die

1783 Under the terms of the Treaty of Paris at the conclusion of the American War of Independence, Britain recognizes the independence of the United States of America. United States gains all the territory east of the Mississippi River, north of Florida and south of Canada. Britain returns Florida to the Spanish in exchange for the Bahamas, Grenada and Montserrat. Senegal and the island of Tobago are ceded to France

Second British Empire

1787 British politician William Wilberforce begins his campaign to end slavery in British colonies

1788 The first ships carrying convicts from England arrive at Botany Bay, Australia

1792 Freetown, Sierra Leone, is founded as a haven for the Nova Scotian Settlers, free-born and freed African Americans. They sought refuge with the British during the American War of Independence. Their descendants are known as the Creole people

1801 Irish Act of Union unites Britain and Ireland as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, with a single parliament at Westminster

1806 Cape of Good Hope is occupied by the British

1807 Slave Trade Act abolishes the slave trade (but not yet slavery itself) in the British Empire

1808 British Crown Colony of Sierra Leone is established as a haven for freed slaves, with Freetown serving as the capital of British West Africa

1811 British East India Company captures Java from the Dutch

1815 At the Congress of Vienna, after the conclusion of the Napoleonic Wars, Britain gains Malta, Mauritius and Tobago from France, Trinidad from Spain and Guyana and the Cape Colony from the Netherlands. It returns Dutch and French colonies, and gains control of Ceylon (modern-day Sri Lanka)

1819 Singapore is founded by Sir Stamford Raffles

1823 Demerara rebellion in Georgetown, Guyana. More than 10,000 enslaved people protest peacefully against their poor treatment and demand their freedom. The rebellion is brutally crushed by governor John Murray. Up to 250 slaves are killed and 27 are executed.

1826 Straits Settlements, made up of Malay peninsula settlements of Penang, Singapore, Malacca and Dinding, come under control of East India Company

1826 Several provinces of Burma are annexed by British India after a decisive victory in the First Anglo-Burmese War

1829–59 Separate colonies are created from portions of New South Wales in Australia

1833 Slavery is abolished throughout the British Empire. The law comes into force in 1834

1839–42 The First Opium War between China and Britain, fought over Chinese attempts to end the East India Company's importing the drug opium from India, results in a victory for the British. Under the treaty of Nanjing that ends the war, Britain acquires the colony of Hong Kong

1843 Maori revolt against British rule in New Zealand

1843 Britain annexes the Colony of Natal

1845–49 Severe famine in Ireland, leading to an estimated 1 million deaths, while another 1.5 million Irish people emigrate to the United States, Canada and Great Britain

1857 Rebellion breaks out among the British East India Company's Indian troops, known as sepoys, in northern and central India, which quickly widens. The rebellion is suppressed by East India Company troops by the following year

1858 The British East India Company is dissolved. After the Government of India Act is passed, India is administered directly by the British government: the British Raj

1861 Lagos, West Africa, is annexed by the British

1867 Provinces of Canada, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia are formed into the Dominion of Canada, a self-governing Dominion of the British Empire

1871 British Columbia becomes a province of the Dominion of Canada

1874 The British government forms the Gold Coast colony (part of present-day Ghana)

1876 Queen Victoria takes the title Empress of India

1876–78 Great Famine in India: between 5 and 10 million people die and up to 60 million are affected

1878–80 British victory in Second Anglo-Afghan War leaves Afghanistan as a buffer zone between British Raj and Russian Empire

1879 The British defeat Zulu resistance in the Anglo-Zulu War and annexe the Zulu Kingdom to in southern Africa

1880–81 First Boer War: the Boers resist British attempts to take over the Transvaal Republic through successful guerrilla war tactics

1882 British invade Egypt, taking control of the Suez Canal Zone and making Egypt, along with its territories in Sudan, a British protectorate

1884–85 Berlin Conference decides how Africa is to be carved up by European colonial powers, including Britain. It triggers the "Scramble for Africa"

1885 Bechuanaland Protectorate (part of present-day Botswana) is established in southern Africa

1889 Under the leadership of Cecil Rhodes, the British South Africa Company obtains a charter from the British government allowing it to settle lands north of the Limpopo River, which later become known as Northern and Southern Rhodesia

1895 East Africa Protectorate proclaimed in what is today Kenya. The region is extended westwards to include present-day Uganda in 1902

1897 Britain conquers the Kingdom of Benin in present-day Nigeria

1898 New Territories, an area of mainland China, are acquired on a 99-year lease and added to the colony of Hong Kong

1898 Following a decisive British victory at the Battle of Omdurman, Sudan effectively becomes a colony of the British Empire

1899–1900 Indian famine: between 1.25 to 10 million people die

1899–1902 Second Boer War: British troops are victorious over the Boers. The two independent Boer republics are absorbed into the British Empire as the Transvaal Colony and the Orange River Colony

1901 Commonwealth of Australia comes into being as a self-governing Dominion of the British Empire

1902 Following British victories in wars against the Ashanti people, the Gold Coast protectorate (present-day Ghana) is established

1907 Anglo-Russian Convention: Persia (Iran's former name) is divided into spheres of influence between Russia (in the north of the country) and Britain (in the southwest)

1907 New Zealand and Newfoundland both become self-governing Dominions of the British Empire

1910 With the unification of the Cape Colony, Natal Colony, Transvaal Colony and the Orange River Colony, the Union of South Africa comes into being as a Dominion of the British Empire

Twilight of Empire

1916 Easter Rising: a group of Irish Nationalists stage an uprising in Dublin to make Ireland an independent republic outside the United Kingdom

1917 In the Balfour Declaration, Britain announces support for a “National Home" for the Jewish people in Palestine, then part of the Ottoman Empire under attack by British forces during World War I

1919–21 Anglo-Irish War: British forces fight the Irish Republican Army (IRA), set up to defend the new republican parliament, or Dáil, in Dublin

1919 Amritsar Massacre: hundreds of Indian pilgrims gathered peacefully in the Jallianwala Bagh public garden of Amritsar are shot and killed by British troops

1919 Treaty of Versailles, following the defeat of Germany and the Ottoman Empire in World War I (1914–18): Germany's colonies and large parts of the former Ottoman Empire become League of Nations Mandates for France and Britain (and some of Britain's Dominions) to administer. Britain gains control of Palestine, Transjordan, Iraq, Tanganyika and parts of Cameroon and Togoland, while Union of South Africa gains South West Africa, Australia gains New Guinea and New Zealand gains Western Samoa

1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty: Irish Republicans agree to an independent Irish Free State for the 26 largely Catholic Republican counties in the south of Ireland, while the six mostly Protestant Unionist counties in the north remain part of the UK

1922 Egypt, declared a British Protectorate at the outbreak of the World War I, is granted formal independence

1924 The British Empire Exhibition is held at Wembley Stadium

1931 The Statute of Westminster grants the Dominions of the British Empire—Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Irish Free State and South Africa—full independence (Newfoundland reverts to colonial status)

Empire to Commonwealth

1942 Singapore falls to Japanese forces during World War II

1943 Bengal famine: between 2 and 3 million people out of a population of 60 million die of starvation, malaria and other diseases caused by malnutrition and lack of health care 

1947 India is partitioned between Muslim-majority Pakistan and Hindu-majority India, which both become independent nations. The partition displaces between 10 and 20 million people along religious lines, creating a massive refugee crisis and triggering large-scale violence, with estimates of the loss of life varying between 200,000 and 1 million

1948 Ceylon (present-day Sri Lanka) and Burma (present-day Myanmar) become independent

1948 British forces withdraw from the British Mandate for Palestine and the State of Israel declares its independence

1948–60 Malayan Emergency: uprising by guerrilla fighters of the Malayan National Liberation Army. Britain grants independence to the Federation of Malaya in 1957

1949 Newfoundland becomes part of Canada

1952–60 Mau Mau Uprising breaks out in opposition to white British colonial rule in Kenya

1956 Egypt's president, Gamal Abdul Nasser, nationalizes Suez Canal, prompting an invasion by Britain and France to retake it. Facing opposition from US President Eisenhower, Britain withdraws its forces

1957 Ghana becomes the first Sub-Saharan African country to achieve independence from Britain

1960 Nigeria gains independence

1960 Cyprus gains its independence, after a long anti-British campaign by EOKA (National Organisation of Cypriot Fighters), a guerrilla group desiring political union with Greece (enosis)

1961–63 Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania (originally Tanganyika before merging with Zanzibar in 1964) all become independent

1962 Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago gain their independence

1964 Malta and Gozo are granted independence and become the country of Malta

1964 Northern Rhodesia gains its independence under the new name of Zambia

1965 Southern Rhodesia, re-named Rhodesia, issues a Unilateral Declaration of Independence, leading to civil war between forces of the white-led government and liberation armies led by African leaders, which lasts until 1979

1966 British Guiana, Britain's only colony on the continent of South America, becomes independent

1971 Britain grants independence to Bahrain, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates

1980 Rhodesia, under its new name of Zimbabwe, gains its independence

1981 Belize, known as British Honduras until 1973, Britain's only colony in Central America, becomes independent

1997 Following an agreement reached between Britain and China in 1984, Hong Kong is handed back to China

Consultant: Philip Parker